“You’ve got a James Dean thing going on,” she says.
I cross my arms and lean with my back against the shelf by the counter. “Yeah? Am I a rebel without a cause?”
She smiles again. My chest constricts painfully, like a horse just back-kicked me. Damn it, why does she have to be so pretty, so…so Ren?
I grab my coffee before she can say anything else. “See y’around,” I call over my shoulder. Then I get the hell out of there.
Eight
Kadence
Found Video Footage
Kadence Mulligan’s Laptop
Date Unknown
Image opens.
Kadence Mulligan strikes a pose as she sits on the very edge of her bed and arches her back. She’s wearing skin-tight jeans with rhinestones running down the seams and a cropped Jimi Hendrix T-shirt.
“Hello, my lovely Kady-Dids! And it’s another beautiful, frosty afternoon that I’m greeting you from up here in the frozen north. But”—she gestures down at all her bared skin—“it’s gonna take a little more than subzero temperatures to get Kady Mulligan down.” She laughs easily and sits up on the bed, bouncing on the springs several times in excitement and clapping her hands.
“As you can see, I re-dyed my hair”—she shakes her long magenta hair around—“so it’s nice and vibrant again. Nothing to chase away the winter blues like a bright, happy hair color. Though lemme tell you,” she says, laughing, “the Major—that’s my dad—was less than impressed the first time I came home from the salon like this.” She makes a mock stern face and deepens her voice. “‘Young ladies should only have hair the color God gave them.’ So I tried explaining that in the twenty-first century, God gave the world hair dye and salons.”
She laughs again. “He only stopped grumbling about it when our music started doing well and I explained it was part of my signature look. Like Marilyn. Or Madonna. Or Gaga. That helped. At least I’m not wearing a meat dress, right?” She shakes her head, rolling her eyes but still smiling.
“Okay. So, on to the questions! I got a great one this week, sent in by a Twitter follower. @Kadydid_4_life asks, ‘When did you and Lauren first know that you had something special? Was there a moment?’”
Kadence looks upward at the ceiling as if she is thinking. “Well, now that I think about it, there really was. Lauren and I were best friends and had been for a year, but it wasn’t until eighth grade when we entered this school talent show.” She puts a hand over her eyes as if embarrassed. “I know that might sound dumb now, a little, dinky school talent show. But it was this huge deal back then. I mean, Lauren and I even got to go into the principal’s office and announce the talent show over the loudspeaker. Which felt so big at the time.” Kady rolls her eyes at herself.
“I know, I know. We were soooooo cool.” She laughs. “Lauren and I spent every waking minute together—singing, writing songs together, and practicing some more. Lauren was great with lyrics, but she didn’t know much about how to exactly”—Kadence waves a hand, her brow furrowing as if trying to figure out how to explain—“own a stage or really, you know, give the music a soul in that moment with the crowd there. She was killer at the technical stuff, but sometimes she treated music a little like math.
“So then we get to the night of the talent show. Lauren was so nervous.” Kadence laughs fondly at the memory. “We were second-to-last to perform. A few acts before us, there was this girl who was really, really good. She brought down the house, and people backstage were saying she was the best of the night and no one was gonna be able to beat her. So that didn’t exactly help Lauren’s terror!
“Which is why I had to literally drag her out on stage. Like, I had to grab both of her wrists and tug her out there! If I hadn’t, she would have run the other direction. But you know, I had this totally Zen thing going on. I had this inner calm”—Kadence closes her eyes—“like I knew somewhere deep inside that this was the beginning of something huge. That this was our moment.
“I set up Lauren’s kick drum and plugged in both of our guitars. She was shaking like a leaf so I got her settled on the stool and put the guitar strap over her head. I made her look in my eyes. I said, ‘Lauren, look at me. Don’t see anyone else. It’s just you, me, and the music. That’s all that matters. You, me, and the music. That’s all that ever matters.’ And she nodded. I’d really gotten through to her.”
Kadence looks back up at the camera. “Then we played. And it was magical. The entire auditorium was spellbound. I don’t even remember what the song was about. It was one of our earliest attempts obviously, something Lauren had written about a childhood friendship she had lost, I think.
“It was just her voice and mine and the strum of our guitars echoing in the totally silent auditorium, and it was, God…” Kady shakes her head in wonder, as if reliving the moment. “I’m getting goose bumps just remembering it.” She rubs her arms and gives a small shudder of delight. “Anyway, Lauren and I weren’t the only ones who felt the magic. It’s funny, we didn’t even get first place in the talent show. They gave it to that other girl who’d sung several people before us, Mary something or other. But Lauren and I were who everyone was talking about at school the next week.
“And that was it. That was the moment I knew we were going to be something. I knew it was the start of something important. I didn’t know what. I didn’t know how big we’d become or how incredibly blessed we would be to have all of you amazing fans. But I felt the magic that night, guys, and that is what music is all about.
“All right, time to sign off for the episode.” She kisses her palm and holds it out to the camera. “Life is short, my darlings. Reach for the stars before they burn out!”
Nine
Lauren
Sheriff’s Office
Monday, April 2
10:15 a.m.
You know how the police in TV shows always say, “Sorry, ma’am, we don’t deem them to be a missing person until they’ve been gone at least twenty-four hours?” That is not a joke. They really don’t—at least when that person is an adult (even if just barely).
Which is why the county sheriff didn’t send someone to talk to Kadence’s parents until late yesterday afternoon. Too late by Mr. Mulligan’s estimation, since apparently he’d already plastered the town in missing person fliers. I guess they asked Mrs. Mulligan for a list of Kadence’s closest friends. Which is why I’m sitting at a table in the middle of a cinder-block room, biting my nails down to the nubs.
I know they’re going to be talking to Mason too, but I don’t know if it’s already happened or not.
I sit back in my chair and let my arms hang down, though my foot is bouncing against the floor. It takes me a second to realize I’m beating out the rhythm to Nicki Minaj’s “Anaconda.” I have to put my hand on my knee to quiet my mind.
The room they put me in is painted blue like the chandelier Kadence made for my birthday. I suspect the color was chosen on purpose because someone read that it had a calming effect. It’s not working. My palms are sweating.
I hum-sing a line from a new song I’m working on. I know I’m not supposed to do that, but it calms my nerves even though the sound comes out rough and scratchy. Metamorphosis, you make me change my dress. My shoes, my face, I am such a mess.
I wonder what Kadence would do in this situation, and I try to channel her. A kind of What Would Kadence Do? moment that tells me that Kadence would smile.
I smile.
It feels all wrong. This is all wrong.
The chair across the table from me is empty. Behind the empty chair, there’s a mirror. I’d bet a hundred dollars there’s someone watching me on the other side of it. I watch CSI reruns. All three cities.
My parents are outside in the hallway, waiting for me to be done. They wanted to be in here with me, but one of the unexpected perks of turning eighteen is you get to fly solo when inte
rrogated about your best friend’s disappearance. I’m glad my little brother, JJ, is at school and doesn’t know what’s going on. Better he be wrapped up in all the usual junior-high drama than any of my own.
Man, Kady, I wish you were here. The thought hits me unexpectedly. It shouldn’t. It’s what I’ve been waiting to feel all this time. It’s just that sometimes, like at a funeral, the reactions everyone expects you to have are delayed. And you feel guilty, wrong even, for not feeling the way you know you should.
I’ve always been that way though. My emotional reactions to things can get a little disjointed. Like in first grade, when Billy Thompson killed a frog during recess, poking its guts all over a rock, I didn’t start screaming until the middle of class a few hours later. I didn’t calm down for another forty-five minutes, and then only when my parents came to pick me up. And yet…when my dad took me deer hunting a few years later, I was fine.
A blond man walks in holding a Styrofoam cup and a tiny tape recorder. His broad shoulders strain his shirt. He sets the tape recorder on the table and gestures at me with his cup. “Can I get you something?”
The vending machines I passed in the hallway didn’t have anything remotely organic. I was bummed at the time because I didn’t get breakfast, but maybe it’s a good thing I took a pass. Is this guy hoping to trick me into giving up a DNA sample? Or am I being crazy paranoid? I feel more sweat break out on my forehead. At least now he won’t go mining for my saliva in a half-eaten Hot Pocket.
“No, thank you,” I say and sit up a little taller. What would Kadence do? A small part of me recognizes the irony in trying to emulate Kady when only days ago I was swearing that I was done with her forever. The other part of my brain is telling me to shut up because all I want right now is to get out of here.
My fingers feel twitchy. I wish I was holding a guitar. People don’t realize it, but guitars are like shields. They provide a layer of separation between you and the crowd. From anyone who wants to ask you questions.
“I’m fine.” I add, “All things considered.”
He shrugs, sits down, and pulls a yellow pad out of the desk drawer and a pen from behind his ear. He hits the Record button.
“My name is Detective Kopitzke. Let me start by saying that you are not a suspect.”
I nod.
He tips his head. “Is something funny?”
“No,” I whisper. Was I smiling?
“We asked you to come in here today because we understand you are one of Kadence Mulligan’s closest friends.”
I arrange my mouth at the last minute into some kind of expression, I’m not sure what.
“As you know, we’re trying to find your friend, and we’re hoping you can tell us if there’s somewhere special she likes to go. Is there anywhere you like to go with her?”
The question gives me pause. Kadence always made me feel like I could follow her anywhere. That if I didn’t, I would miss out on something awesome. Most of the time she was right. When someone asked, “What’s going on Friday night?” ninety-nine people would answer “I don’t know,” but Kadence would say, “So, so much! I can’t decide!”
But then there were other times too. Times when she took off by herself for her little “camping trips.” The first time she did that, we were only thirteen. Mrs. Mulligan called our house, asking if Kadence was there. Apparently Kadence had told her we were having a sleepover, but that wasn’t true. She had other plans, and she never thought twice about lying to make those plans happen. That night, her plans had included camping out in the woods along the creek. She said she needed a break from her parents sometimes. I understood that, but camping? Alone?
Detective Kopitzke leans back in his chair, and I realize I’ve forgotten to answer his question out loud.
“She used to go on these little camping trips,” I say. “She’d take off overnight. Sleep in the woods or a tree house or someplace.”
His eyebrows go up. “She doesn’t strike me as what you’d call the camping type.”
I feel a prickly sensation at the back of my neck. “I know. She was pretty high maintenance. Is,” I say when I realize I’m thinking of Kadence in the past tense. I have to stop that. I can’t do that out loud. Not with big, blond Kopitzke taking notes. “Is high maintenance. Not that high-maintenance girls can’t camp. Just that it’s hard to understand Kadence going anywhere she can’t plug in a flat iron. But then, maybe that’s why she always camps alone. God forbid someone should see her without full makeup.”
I’m rambling. I laugh a little, embarrassed. “That’s not my line, by the way. It’s Kady’s. ‘God forbid someone should see me without makeup!’ She says that a lot. I don’t know anyone who has seen her natural face since eighth grade, including me.” I sit on my hands as if this can make me shut up.
“When’s the last time she went on one of her camping trips?”
“I don’t know. When we were sixteen? At least that I know of.”
Kopitzke scribbles my answers on his yellow pad. “And how long would she be gone?”
“Usually just overnight.”
“Does the fact that she’s been gone three days worry you?”
“Yes,” I whisper, staring down at my lap. Does looking down make me look shifty? Guilty of something? I quickly look up and meet Detective Kopitzke’s gaze. I smile again, but my cheeks feel tight. I imagine tiny hairline cracks running across my face.
“Do you miss her?” Kopitzke asks.
I don’t answer right away. There was that little twinge I felt a few minutes ago when I wished she was here. But aside from that, the most honest answer is no—I don’t miss her. The moment she announced she was going solo, I understood more about our friendship than I’d cared to admit to myself. I was Kady’s friend only as long as I was useful to her. It was a good six-year run, but it’s over now.
Detective Kopitzke leans forward across the desk at me. “You’re hesitating.”
“I don’t know,” I whisper, voice cracking. “We haven’t been spending a lot of time together. It’s hard to miss what you don’t have.”
“I understand you used to perform with Kadence, that the two of you were like a band or something.”
“Or something.” My eyes drop slightly to his jacket lapel where there’s a coffee stain. I wonder if Mrs. Detective Kopitzke didn’t have time to take in the dry cleaning or if it’s from this morning.
“But you can’t sing anymore.”
I try to keep my teeth from grinding. “Not now. No.”
“How does that make you feel?”
Oh, so now he’s a shrink? He wants to know how it makes me feel? A tremor runs through the muscles in my arms. I cannot allow myself to feel anything. Not here. I cannot show this man how humiliated I am for letting Kadence run my life. How I’m the lowest of the low for kissing Mason, but even lower for how I treated Jude. That’s something I try not to think about too much, but lately—ever since I saw him at Cuppa Cuppa—he’s back front and center in my thoughts.
Kadence used me, turned me into someone I’m not, and even though losing my voice and not being able to sing totally sucks, at least it gave me the chance to step back and reevaluate my life and what’s good for me.
Do I miss Kadence? No. No, I don’t.
But I don’t tell him any of that and just shrug. It makes me look like a brat, but I’m pretty sure smiling looks worse. I’m totally stuck. I don’t know how to act, how to look, how to sound. I tell myself to act naturally, but I’ve lost my grip on what that feels like. I shift in my chair and roll back my shoulders, hoping to reconnect with my body.
Detective Kopitzke studies my face for several long seconds. Then he says, “We understand you were the last person to see Kadence Mulligan on Friday night.”
Something about the way he says “last person to see her” sets off alert buttons in my head. Suddenly I can pictur
e them hooking me up to something that measures how much sweat I can produce in an hour. I mean, sweat equals guilt, right? I think I read that somewhere.
Kadence would never let the pressure get to her.
“I don’t know if that’s true,” I say. “She stuck around the coffee shop for a little bit after the show. It was just me and her for a few minutes, then she left. Went out the back door, headed for the parking lot. I don’t know who she might have seen back there. Obviously she managed to get herself home though. Her car was there.”
I’m rambling again, but I’m proud of myself too, because that’s a fine piece of logic if I ever heard one. Kopitzke makes some kind of note. I try to read it, but it’s at a bad angle and he’s too far away.
“We understand that you and Kadence got in a pretty big fight recently at school.”
My body goes rigid and I swallow loudly. Did Mason tell him that? Why would he? He had to know how that would make me look. For a second my temper flares, but I get it back in check. I mean, even if Mason had said nothing, the story would have come out. There were plenty of witnesses. Like a whole cafeteria full. Better walk carefully on this one.
“It wasn’t that big.”
“Then tell me how you would describe it.”
I roll my eyes. “It was a couple days before spring break. People were getting antsy. They were happy for any kind of excitement. Trust me. As cafeteria drama goes, it wasn’t that big of a deal.”
“I understand the fight was over a boy?”
I sit back in my chair and cross my arms. I’m afraid the posture makes me look sullen and oppositional, but I can’t help myself. That’s exactly how I feel. “Kadence was paranoid. She accused me of hooking up with her boyfriend.”
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