What We Knew

by Barbara Stewart

  I lied, afraid she’d change my curfew back to nine. When we got to our corner there was no reason to go home. I begged my mom for some money and went to Lisa’s instead. I figured she’d need some support. Open mic was a big deal—for me and for her. For years I’d been telling her to stop hiding her voice. If this thing backfired, she’d never speak to me again.

  “How’s my makeup?” Lisa asked the bathroom mirror. “Too much? Too little? Maybe a little more eyeliner.” She raised the liquid pencil and extended the wings trailing from her lids.

  “You look good,” I said. “Really good. I like your top.”

  “Katie picked it. She said it makes me look like…” Lisa leaned out the door and shouted down the hall. “Who’d you say I look like, Katie?”

  “The woman on that cooking show! The one with the boobs and the teeth!”

  Lisa plumped herself in the mirror. “Yeah. Her.”

  I freshened up quickly, borrowing Lisa’s deodorant and running a brush through my hair.

  “C’mon. Let’s go,” she said. “I want to get there early so we get a good seat.”

  I caught her arm and examined her eyes. “Did you take one of Larry’s pain pills?”

  Lisa stared right back. “No. Why?”

  “You just seem really calm…” I trailed off.

  “I’m just ready to do this,” she said. “I’m done being afraid. What’s the worst that can happen?”

  The worst that could happen? Open mic night was canceled. The guy who usually runs it was away on vacation. Apparently, we weren’t the only ones who hadn’t gotten the memo—a couple of head bangers wandered in after us, looking for the sign-up sheet.

  “I guess it wasn’t meant to be.” Lisa shrugged, scanning the coffee menu. She ordered some crazy frozen thing—more dessert than drink—with whipped cream and chocolate shavings. I had only enough for a small coffee. “I’ll be glad when you find a job,” she said, getting one for me, too. Waiting for our order, we snagged one of the high tables in back and watched a few more musician-types trickle in.

  “You’re still going to the audition, right? Actually, don’t answer that. You’re going.” Lisa didn’t argue. She went for straws instead. Watching more and more people come in, I tried to ignore the gnawing in my chest. I’d wanted so badly to hear her sing, for this to be her night. There was always next week, but next week seemed so far away.

  Lisa poked a straw through my whipped cream, and I sipped. My cheeks imploding, I mumbled, “Does this thing have caffeine in it?”

  “That would be the -uccino part—”

  Her eyes had caught on something.

  I turned and then stiffened.

  “Why’s he here?” I hissed.

  Lisa waved Foley to our table. “He wanted to watch,” she whispered. “I couldn’t say no. I didn’t say anything because I knew you’d be pissed.”

  Pissed didn’t even begin to describe how I felt when Foley came up from behind and put his hands on my shoulders. “Don’t touch me,” I snapped. Lisa made a pouty face and flicked Foley’s earring. “Open mic’s canceled,” she said. “There’s nobody to run it. I would’ve called, but I forgot my phone.”

  “You could’ve used mine,” I said.

  Foley scanned the cafe. It wasn’t exactly packed, but there was a decent crowd, big enough for him to convince the guy behind the counter to let him emcee for the night. I sat there silently fuming while he set up the microphone and amp and then went around with a sign-up sheet. I should’ve known he’d find some way to save the day. “Nothing’s changed,” I growled when he returned. “I still hate you.”

  Foley ignored me. Lisa wrote her name on the list, taking the fourth slot, which was perfect: enough time for everyone to get settled, but not enough for her to change her mind.

  “I owe you,” she said, hugging Foley. “Thanks.”

  Foley shrugged. He glanced at the couches and tables filled with intense-looking hipsters and punks, preening and tuning. “It’s funny how no one was willing to step up,” he said.

  “Doesn’t your arm ever get tired?” I asked Foley. I slurped the chocolate sludge at the bottom of my cup and gave him a shove. “Stop patting yourself on the back and get this thing started.”

  I’m sure there were some ridiculously talented people that played before Lisa, but my world had shrunk. It’s happened before, during auditions, my mind drifting to some faraway place where it’s only me and the lines in my head while I wait for the director to call my name. That night was all about Lisa, but it still had a tunnel effect as I watched her, blanched of color, restless knees bouncing. Her eyes widened unnaturally when Foley introduced her.

  “You’ve got this,” I said. “Don’t think. Just sing.”

  Everyone clapped as she made her way to the stool in the corner. Wiping her palms on her thighs, she smiled painfully and looked to me. Say something, I whispered. Lisa nodded but when she opened her mouth to speak, the espresso machine drowned her out. My heart stalled. Foley ran up and adjusted the microphone. The guy polishing the steamer wand shouted “Sorry!” and then my phone rang. It was Lisa’s ring tone, which meant it was probably Katie calling to tell her she’d left it. I shut it off. Foley slapped his arms together like a movie set clapper. Take two.

  I wasn’t surprised that Lisa’s voice was a little shaky at first, but I was surprised when after a few bars she cut short the bubbly pop song she’d been rehearsing and asked to start over. What are you doing? I thought. But Lisa was already somewhere else, swaying gently, tapping her foot to an imagined melody. Smiling shyly, she locked eyes with me as the first line to a different song escaped from her lips. My brain sparked with recognition. It was one of her favorites. Mine, too. Part love song, part lullaby, she’d sung it hundreds of times after we discovered it back in eighth grade, acting like it was new even though it had been around since our parents were in high school.

  Foley slipped into the chair beside me and scooted closer to see over all the heads, but I didn’t care. I was busy burning the moment into my brain, a permanent recording of my best friend at her best. Something about that song always fills me with this heavyhearted longing. It isn’t just the lyrics—a dream of childhood, of warmth and safety and blue skies—but the way Lisa sings it. Softly, sweetly, her voice building and building, gathering strength for the final verse when the song shifts from sweet memories to unanswerable questions about the future. I’d wanted to hear that song so badly the day I’d returned from Troy feeling stupid and small and scared. I’d wanted Lisa to sing it to me. She probably would have, too. If I’d asked. If I’d gone to her. If only I’d gone to her.

  Nobody ever gets booed at open mic, but you can tell when someone knocks it out of the park. Classic rock is always a hit but it wasn’t just the song. Lisa had nailed it, making it her own. Her voice stronger than ever.

  Or since.

  I leaned over and whispered in Foley’s ear. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but thank you.”

  Stumbling through the maze of tables, drunk on applause, Lisa high-fived Foley as he went up to introduce the next person on the sign-up sheet. The rest of open mic was one big yawn. I felt sort of sorry for the people who went after, especially the singers. Nobody paid much attention. Everybody was up getting coffee or out smoking cigarettes. Even the ones who stayed in their seats kept glancing back at our table.

  “I was so scared,” Lisa said later, after the last musician gave a shout-out to Foley and packed up her guitar, after the guy running the coffee shop shouted last call, after everyone spilled out into the humid night air. “The way nobody clapped at first, I thought maybe it sucked.”

  “Are you kidding?” Foley said. “They were in shock. I was in shock.”

  Lisa batted a moth circling her head. “Seriously?”

  “When have you ever seen the guy behind the counter stop pumping coffee to watch?” I asked.

  Lisa smiled at her feet and then up at the stars. “Yeah, I was pretty awesome.”<
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  The neon sign in the window extinguished, and Lisa thanked Foley again.

  “You’re welcome, my dear,” he said with a smile, but then he glanced at me and his eyes dropped sadly. I think the truth of us was just sinking in. Foley’s power to fix anything extended only so far. The one thing he needed to fix was beyond fixing. “C’mon, Wonder Boy,” I said, the bitter knot in my chest loosening a little. “Walk us home.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “I’ve gotta run.” In typical Foley fashion, he didn’t offer a reason, just bowed to Lisa and then bowed to me and took off. I watched until his shape fused with the shadows before checking my phone. Katie had called twice more, but she hadn’t left any messages.

  “We should go, too,” I said.

  “I’m never gonna be able to sleep tonight,” Lisa said. “I’m practically vibrating.”

  Singing and squealing, we floated up State Street hill, past the drugstore and the golden arches and the church where my parents were married. When we got to my corner, Lisa put her hands on my shoulders. “Remember that day at the roller rink when you said we should take a bus to the city?” she asked. “I’ve been thinking we should do it. Just you and me.”

  It was a perfect ending to what started out as a less than perfect day. The old Lisa was back, but there was a new Lisa, too. I went to sleep with the ghost of her voice ringing softly in my ears. That’s why I thought I was dreaming when I opened my eyes and heard Lisa’s pitch in my room. But she wasn’t singing. She was crying. Not in my room, but outside my window. Heart knocking, I slipped through the kitchen and met Lisa out back. There was a book in her hand—Katie’s diary. Before she even opened it, I knew it wasn’t good, whatever she wanted to show me. I led her into the garage and turned on the light and then leaned against the tool bench and read the last entry, written a few hours before, while Lisa and I were hanging out in front of the cafe with Foley. We should’ve protected her. Little Katie. My knees felt weak, the weight of her words pulling me down. When I looked up, Lisa was glaring, waiting for me to speak, but I couldn’t. What do you say? What can you say? I said what was in my head, the looping line of the last verse, the one that sang me to sleep: Where do we go now?

  twenty-one

  To: splendidhavoc@horizon.net

  From: blackolcun@horizon.net

  Subject: SOS

  What’s my excuse?

  I know what you’d say: violence is never an answer. But what did you expect us to do? Go to the cops? With what? A sixth-grader’s diary and several glass eyes? Maybe he’s not the monster from my nightmares, but he’s still dangerous. Sometimes you have to act. Someone had to take charge. Does that make me the perpetrator? I guess Lisa will get charged as an accomplice. I don’t know how this stuff works. I don’t want to go to prison. Like that kid from your class, the one who shot that girl while robbing a sub shop. His life is over. I’m not him. I’m a good person. We were protecting Katie. There was no one else who could. Sometimes I hate being a girl. I hate it. I hate it. I hate it. Remember how Mom used to send me to those Girl Power classes? What a load of crap—girl power. It’s a myth, just like Banana Man. I have no control over anything, my own body, even. It was strange the way I felt outside myself tonight. Like I was watching myself on stage. Like I was playing a part.

  But I had no choice.

  twenty-two

  I felt gutted reading Katie’s diary that night—like someone had taken a vacuum to my insides. Flattening the spine on the tool bench, I’d wanted so badly to find the stuff of an eleven-year-old girl’s dream summer—afternoons at the pool and roller-skating parties and ice cream and first kisses. Instead I found a nightmare.

  I was in the shower when the bathroom door creaked open. I saw a shadow on the ceiling and thought it was Lisa—home from her thing at the coffee shop—but when I called her name, the shadow didn’t answer. I froze, water running down my face, shampoo stinging my eyes, afraid to look around the curtain because I knew it was him—the monster. I knew he was watching. I don’t know what he was waiting for, but it felt like forever. The hot water ran out and I started shivering and then there was this creepy groaning noise and the bathroom door closed. I know he’ll be back. Maybe not tonight, but someday. I need Lisa so bad right now. She’s the only one who’ll believe me. I tried calling, but she forgot her phone. I called stupid Tracy but she didn’t pick up. I hope Lisa gets home soon. She’s supposed to protect me. I’m too old to be scared of the dark, but I am.

  “Why didn’t you answer your phone?” Lisa shouted angrily. She punched the air in frustration, sending the lightbulb above her head swinging crazily. The shadows followed, lurching and shrinking.

  “I didn’t know,” I whispered. “I didn’t think it was anything. Where is she now?”

  Lisa dropped her voice and covered her eyes. “Home,” she said. “Sleeping.”

  “Did you check her window?” I asked. “Is it locked?”

  “Read,” Lisa demanded. Clutching her head, she paced the garage while my fingers struggled with the dog-eared pages—the important entries, the ones Lisa wanted me to see. I stared dumbly at the words, my brain dulled by shock and fear. Like a child’s drawing of a gruesome scene, something about Katie’s chunky, kiddish handwriting only made me feel sicker.

  Last night there were two glass eyes on the crate next to my bed, just like the ones Lisa thinks I don’t know about. She was supposed to be home by ten—that’s her curfew. But I don’t know what time she got home. I fell asleep. This morning the eyes were gone.

  I read the entry again and again, trying to make the words stick. He left them for Katie. Not me. This wasn’t about me. I wanted to wake Katie and wrap her in my arms and apologize for everything. For doubting, for lying, for making excuses, for always believing there’s a rational explanation. I’d tried so hard to ignore what the pit of my stomach knew: he’s real. I focused on the blackness beyond the garage window and then lowered my head. I had to tell Lisa. “Katie’s not making this up,” I said. “I found the eyes. I have them.” Lisa’s inky shadow spilled across the diary. Hand shaking, she ripped a page while turning to the next entry.

  Lisa’s all freaked out. I heard her talking to Tracy. She thinks Banana Man’s been in our house. She thinks he left a glass eye for her, just like the one she stole from his house. She’s been sleeping in my room. She says I have the better fan, but that’s not why. She wants to protect me. I think it’s working.

  But why was he stalking Katie, too? She was innocent; she had nothing to do with what we did. I turned to the final creased corner and read:

  Lisa would kill me if she knew I went into the woods with Ryan. I think I saw him. Banana Man. He was watching from behind a tree.

  When I looked back, there were tears running down Lisa’s face. My blood turned cold as I remembered my mother’s words: If you see the creature, even just a glimpse— I closed the diary.

  “You said it was Trent,” Lisa hissed. “You said it was Gabe. You lied. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I—it had to be them. Nothing else fit.” My eyes skittered around the garage, taking in the relics of a former life. “This can’t be real,” I said. “This isn’t us. Things like this don’t happen to girls like you and me. How was I supposed to believe we were being stalked by … by what? I don’t even know what to call him.”

  “You know what to call him,” she said. “You know what he is.”

  I did. I stared at the moths flinging themselves at the bare bulb and then grabbed a flashlight from the shelf. That night, as Lisa and I ran blindly through the woods, Katie was my sister, too. There was no right or wrong or consequences. Those words had lost their meaning. The last time we’d entered the woods together, armed with rocks, screaming like banshees, our fearlessness took us only so far—within throwing distance—but now we were possessed by something unbending, stony, a cold, calm nerve that carried us to the threshold of his house and somewhere darker, deeper. A place no one should ever go. Lisa lifted t
he flap of screen. I shone the light inside. The smell was awful.

  “Do you think he’s here?” I whispered into the crook of my arm.

  “He’s here,” Lisa hissed. “I feel it. Don’t you feel it?”

  I did. Something electric, a pulsing current, like when you know there’s a TV on in another room, even if the sound’s muted. A thunderous rumble shook the ground, shook the trees. The black tarp walls rippled. I bounced the light around the living room, searching, my heart hitching with the hope and dread of finding him sitting calmly in the flowered armchair, sharpening his fingernails, or hunched over the piano, licking his gray teeth.

  I’ve been waiting for you, Tracy.

  The walls stilled. An eerie expectant silence thrummed in my ears. I let the flashlight linger on the initials Adam had carved into the blackened piano case until Lisa tapped me on the shoulder and pointed toward the back. She followed the carpet scraps, and I followed her, past the ancient washing machine and the step stool, every muscle in my body taut and quaking, braced for the inevitable. That he didn’t rise from the shadows only made me more anxious. I dropped the light, but Lisa kept going, into the kitchen. Everything was exactly the same as last time. Not the way we’d left it. The way we’d found it. Clean and orderly. I shone the light on the plates Lisa had smashed, webbed with cracks now, but whole again, stacked neatly on the table with the crackers and oatmeal and coffee. A gust of wind made the tarp walls shudder, and then another sound—not wind, not walls—made Lisa and I lock eyes. The sound of metal on metal. The sound of rusty springs creaking. Lisa motioned toward the bedroom, and I trained the light on the ground. Slowly, cautiously, we crept across the kitchen and peered around the gap. My heart skipped. There, on the iron bed frame, was the long gray cocoon. There he was. Breathing peacefully, sleeping peacefully, in his cocoon of musty bedding. Lisa and I locked eyes again. Suddenly, we were back in middle school: I’m not going! You go! No, you go! The demon stirred, shifting its weight. Now! I mouthed, but Lisa hesitated. I didn’t. Rushing the bed, I struck the first blow, hard and fast.