“We were too young. You don’t remember me, but you’re so nice to me.”
“We might not remember you, Erica, but we know you. This whole town knows you.” Merril stabs a tomato. “The police searches, the sort-of sightings. The memorials. Just when we would start to forget, a fake you would show up and stir up everything. You were always here.”
“That must’ve been annoying.”
Cass shrugs. “You can’t say a missing girl is annoying. People get mad and call you insensitive.”
“It was like nobody could move on.” Merril sighs. “But hey. It’s over now. You’re alive, you’re the real deal, and you’re here. We can all keep going.”
I’m not here.
I move my lettuce leaves around. I’m not here. I’m going to go away, and the Erica-shaped gap in their lives will come back. Stronger than ever. The last nail in the coffin that never existed.
Merril looks behind me, her smile growing. “Hi, Kerwin!”
My throat contracts. Sure enough—Kerwin in a polo shirt and a smirk walks over. She gets up and kisses him on the cheek. He sits across from me.
“Just thought I’d come by and say hi. Hope I’m not ruining a girls’ day out.”
“Not especially.” Cass keeps the fork on her lips thoughtfully. Coolly. She, unlike most girls, tends to play it cool around Kerwin. Unnaturally so. Could she, like me, suspect him of something? Or maybe that’s just how she treats guys who’re prettier than she is.
“So, Erica”—Kerwin smirks—“how’d you like Club Riddler?”
I freeze.
Cass quirks a brow. “Riddler? Isn’t that the super-grungy one on the south side?”
“I spotted Erica there. With that girl you guys don’t like—Taylor is her name?” His brown eyes are guarded.
Merril frowns. “Why were you hanging out with her, Rica?”
“I— I just met her.” I shrug. “She said she knew a good place to party, so I went with her. I didn’t stick around.”
“You got in a cab and went home with her,” Kerwin interjects.
Merril’s mouth falls open. “Where? Back to her house?”
“She was drunk,” I defend. “She needed help getting home. And besides”—I shoot a nasty glare at Kerwin—“why were you there anyway?”
“I was trying to find a good place for Merril and me to go out, of course.”
Fat chance. He was following me. Coincidence is null and void with this guy. But why the stalker routine? What’d I do? What does he want from me? Merril sighs lovingly and kisses Kerwin again. Lip on lip, a bit of tongue.
Cass makes a grossed-out face at me. “Who you want to hang out with is your business, Rica,” she assures me. “But Taylor’s bad news. She’s been into some weird stuff over the years. And she’s not exactly the easiest person to get along with.”
“She’s just lonely,” I murmur. Cass shrugs.
Kerwin excuses himself early. He stopped by just to tell me he’d seen me, hiding under the guise of coming to see his girlfriend. One of my friends. It’s too much of a coincidence. It’s too confusing. I can’t even put a finger on his motive. He doesn’t like me romantically enough to stalk me and use Merril to keep an eye on me. There’s no longing in his gaze. I need to find out his deal, and fast. I feel like he is circling me, like a rope is going around my feet, and the only time I’ll see it is when it cinches and drags me to the ground.
After lunch we walk to the parking lot. I’m getting a ride home in Merril’s Volvo, but halfway across the pavement I spot a man standing at his car. His bald head shines in the weak sunlight—Mr. White.
Merril glances where my eyes are riveted. “Who’s that guy? Is he staring at us? What a creeper.”
“He’s a police officer,” I lie. “He came to the house and asked questions. He thinks I’m not Erica. I’m going to go talk to him.”
“I’ll wait for you.” Merril nods.
Mr. White balks when he sees me walking toward him. He ducks into his car and starts the engine. I dash up and wrench the passenger door open, slamming it and facing him. Up close, his square jaw and the scars over his right eye are obvious. His arm muscles are the kind that have been accumulated over decades. He clutches the wheel—missing three fingers on his left hand. Like I thought—injured ex-military.
“Hello, Mr. White. I’m Erica.”
“Get out of my car.” His voice is gravelly.
“I told Mom about you.” I look at my nails and flick my hair like I’d seen Cass do when acting flippant. “She told me your name. Said she was going to talk to you.”
“Your mother hasn’t said anything.”
“She didn’t hire you to shadow me. That means you’ve been doing it on your own. Why? What did I ever do to you?”
His brown eyes narrow. I can read him so easy, even if he is ex-military. He was trained to be stoic under fire, but that stoniness gives him away. None of the other Ericas ever approached him. They probably noticed him at some point, but they were afraid of him and of what he could uncover. I’m pretending like I have nothing to hide—it’s either the worst bluff ever, or the best. Depends on how deeply he thinks on it.
“You think I’m not the real Erica.”
“I never said that.” He grunts.
“You’re obviously good at what you do.” I pat the inside of the car, a Saab. “Pretty fancy wheels.”
He doesn’t say anything.
“And you’re obviously in love with Mom.” It’s a risky thing to say, but the rapid succession of questions lets me gauge his reactions—the previous two statements had been false. His lack of emotion proved that. But the final statement made his mouth twist and his leg jump. My gut was right—he has a deeply personal motive. He’s known Mrs. Silverman for years, seen her at her worst. He protected her from betrayal that would’ve grown if left to fester in falsity. He’s in love with her.
“You need to get out of my car.” His voice strains to stay level. He’s a man of few words, but not few emotions.
“I understand that you want to protect her again.” I soften my voice, making it soft. “But I want to protect her too. She’s in love with Dad. You know that, right? He’s coming back slowly but surely.”
Mr. White adjusts the collar of his trench coat.
“You don’t have to believe I’m the real Erica. You can keep following me if you want. But give up on Mom. Please. I’m going to put my family together again. I can’t do that if you get in the middle.”
“What were you doing at Club Riddler?”
“Not you, too.” I exhale. “What the hell are you doing stalking an underage girl?”
“It’s my job,” he deadpans. “I’m sure you didn’t tell your mother you were going to the club. Shall I break the news to her, or will you?”
“She doesn’t care,” I spit. “It’s what teens do—rebel.”
“I have pictures. Of you and that Taylor girl.”
“I was helping a friend.”
“You were getting drunk with a friend in a club well known for the paramount quality of its drugs.”
“I wasn’t drinking, and I didn’t take drugs! And you’re stalking without someone paying you to. Isn’t that technically a crime?”
“Not as much as fraud. As pretending to be someone you’re not.”
I don’t dignify him with a confirmation or denial. That club was a mistake, a huge oversight. Erica would’ve never gone. I never should’ve gone. I have to clean up my mess—now. I make my voice low, hoarse, wounded.
“You’re right. I’m not the Erica I should be. I should be more proper. More refined. I should be less selfish, more open. People don’t say it, but it feels like they want to. They want to say I’m not what I should be. But you can’t forget the life you’ve lived. I can’t just forget everything that made me who I am today. So you’r
e right. I’m not Erica. Not yet. But I’m learning.”
Even though he’s a hardened ex-military man, suspicious of me and clearly having been through a lot in his life, the insecurity in my words seems to reach him. His eyes soften.
“Give her those pictures if you want. I don’t care. I wanted to get out, get away from her, from everything crushing me. Smothering me. I can’t tell her that. She’d hate me for saying it.”
I swallow hard. There’s nothing left to say. I get out and close the door, and he pulls out of the lot.
Merril drives me home, and I hug her before I get out.
“Thank you. I mean it. For being my friend.” For being the first friend Violet’s ever made.
“Hey, you’re welcome.” She pats my back and pulls away. “Is something wrong? You’re not usually super-touchy.”
“I’m fine. See you on Monday.”
“Don’t hang out with Taylor anymore, okay? You’re all bummed-looking. She gets to people like that.”
I wait until her car leaves the curb. I don’t press the button on the gate’s admittance panel. I don’t wait for it to swing open. I don’t walk up the path lined with freshly budding apple trees and the barest of spring grasses. I leave the huge white house and the manicured lawn behind.
I pull the black hoodie I bought at the mall over my head. The sleeves hang over my fingertips, warming them. The zipper clinks, and the ties around the neck flicker across my face in the wind. Old friends. Violet welcomes them. The hoodie is too clean-smelling, too new, but it has a soothing effect on her heart, like a child’s blanket.
I run.
Down the street, the sidewalk, past houses just as big and prestigious as Erica’s. Past expensive cars and hired help unloading groceries and trimming hedges. Always hired help. The really important people stay inside their castles and sit on their thrones. Violet laughs. Laughs and runs until her legs burn. Until she reaches the highway and the overpass that connects the gated community to the rest of the world. She laces her fingers through the chain-link fence that keeps people from jumping into traffic, and she looks at her nails—pink with faint glitter. She makes a face. Erica wants to come out, bleeds out from between her eyes, but Violet craves air before she goes dormant for another month.
Violet shakes the fence. The freeway pulses with cars and speed and wind. The Strip can be seen from here—a faint line of neon signs that grows brighter as the daylight dies. Sucking light. Hotels and casinos, too, but mostly signs. The Strip is a world of signs: low-price, half-price, sale, two-for-one, Violet and Erica for one. Violet shakes the fence and lets out a scream, but the rush of traffic drowns it out. Erica winces and covers her ears. Violet breathes in exhaust and exhales carbon monoxide, and she lives for another second, another day. She lives to pretend to be someone else for another day.
10: Light It
Today Millicent is even wider. Today her pen has a teddy bear on the end.
Today she asks me what I dream about.
“Lights,” I murmur. The leather divan is cool against the bits of my skin that stick out of my uniform. “Red and blue lights. Police, I guess.”
“And what do you think those lights represent?”
Fear. Worst-case scenarios. What will happen if I mess this con up. Mess my life up. One wrong slip of the hand, one wrong pair of eyes, one wrong thing said to Mrs. Silverman by Taylor, Mr. White, Kerwin, and I’m gone, taken by the flickering ruby-and-sapphire lights.
“The tightrope is too small and my feet are too big,” I mutter, “but the show must go on. Be happy, smile, wave. Pretend to get better. Pretend you know how to be the person who’ll make them happy.”
Millicent scribbles, sips her tea. It smells like charcoal and weeds.
“The lights in my dream,” I lie, “represent the day I found out they weren’t my parents. The day I became Erica.”
It’s not the first time the police chase them.
Sal holds his hands out obediently, a soft smile in place. Makes small talk with the officers—knows them all by name. Asks after their families. Introduces himself to the young cop who’s new.
Violet goes back to foster care.
Sal’s lawyer—mob lawyer—pulls strings. There is no cloth of justice green bills cannot dye. Violet waits like a good girl in a strange house with strange food, strange people.
Sal hires a woman. She comes to the door one day, pretending to sell makeup. Pushes her way in. Sal slips into the kitchen’s back door and takes the stairs like a panther. Rushes into Violet’s room (she was coloring a picture of a ballerina), and she wordlessly grabs the Mickey Mouse backpack they gave her (stuffed with electronics the couple wouldn’t miss). The woman yells at the husband for spilling concealer, covering their exit with noise.
The two of them don’t get caught by the police often. But when they do, it usually hurts Violet.
Red-and-blue rotating lights in the rearview mirror mean being alone.
11: Shake It
Mr. Silverman doesn’t ask anything of me.
He doesn’t need a false face. He doesn’t ask me to pretend so hard. I still pretend (force of habit), but it’s at a minimum with him. Erica only barely needs to be here. With just her smile and tone of voice, I can coast through a blissful hour or two, or however long the checkers match lasts. He just wants me to play. I play very well and with all my heart, because games are second nature to me. Games are my blood. I am a player for a living.
Mrs. Silverman dropped me off and left, saying she had to get something from the cleaners. I can relax even more. He moves a checker forward and throws his hands up.
“Two!”
“Two.” I smile, and his fingers snatch my board pieces. He’s on the verge of winning.
“My real dad, Sal . . .” I start. “He used to let me win at poker. Sometimes. But I never managed to beat him in an actual game. He liked challenging me, but he always somehow won. Still does. I’ll play him until he dies, and I bet you, he’ll win every game. Until I figure out his strategy. Then he’s toast.”
He moves his next piece, victory forefront on his mind. He practically dances in his seat. Crusted soup stains the front of his shirt. When he wins, he explodes, running to my seat and clutching me around the neck in his version of a hug. The nurse looks nervous, but I motion to her that it’s fine. I hug him back. He smells like anesthetic and the muted musk of sleep. As abruptly as the hug starts, he ends it and sits back down. He sweeps the board clean and rearranges the pieces for another game. I settle in and sip my bottled coffee as he works. He pours all his concentration into it.
“You were having problems controlling it before Erica vanished, weren’t you?”
He doesn’t acknowledge my question, but his hands twitch a little as he moves his first red piece.
“You must’ve been incredibly smart for it to corrupt you. You must’ve loved her a lot for her disappearance to change you so drastically. You went crazy imagining what was happening to her, and being unable to do anything about it. You thought of a hundred smarter ways the police could be doing things. But you were just a civilian. What could you do? What would they let you do?”
I play the game with him for a few minutes. He’s not so happy anymore. I’m winning. He finally glances up and spins a piece of mine in his fingers.
“Zoo. In Robinson Crusoe, there was a zoo. Pandas and a zoo.”
More than three words. He spoke more than three.
I keep my breathing even. “Zoo?” I lead.
He spins the piece faster and fumbles with it. He puts it back down, as if fearing it’ll slip from his grasp.
“What are you talking about, Dad?”
“I’ll get better when you come back.” He shakes his head, like a fly is buzzing around it. “When you really come home, I’ll get better.”
He means Erica. He’s been listening—he knows
I’m not her.
“Dad—”
He cuts me off. “It’s your move.”
I move. I try to get him to talk more, but he presses his lips shut and only smiles when he wins for the second time. He carefully puts the game away. “I am the rat in the maze; you are the chameleon in the trees.”
I’m afraid. For that one second, I see the twinkle of consciousness in his eyes. I underestimated him—dismissed him as near comatose like everyone else. Mr. Silverman’s heard everything anyone’s ever said to him. He pats my shoulder like a regular person would and follows the nurse back to his room.
Finally, after sixteen years, I’ve met someone better than I am at pretending.
“Dad, wait!” I start after him. The nurse closes his door, but I see a slice of the room for a second. Unlike the white walls outside, Mr. Silverman’s room is covered in ink, pencil, Magic Marker. Numbers crowd his walls like swarming ants. The nurse shoots me a look.
“Can I help you?”
“Let me in Dad’s room. What’s all that writing on the walls?”
“He likes to scribble random numbers, I’m afraid. But if you want to go in, that’s up to him.”
“Dad!” I pound on the door. “Can I come in for a minute?”
“I’m busy.” He grunts.
My brain races. How can I play this and get in there? Those numbers looked too interesting to pass up.
“Dad, you didn’t even hug me good-bye,” I whimper.
There’s a silence. The door creaks open, and I push in. Mr. Silverman throws his arms around my neck and squeezes. I stand on my tiptoes to see over his shoulder. The room looks like a mathy Picasso gone wrong. Numbers stretch over the walls and nearly onto the ceiling. Every white space is used up. I take the numbers in as fast as I can—these aren’t random numbers. There’s structure in this mess. Eight or nine equations are repeated, interrupting each other, clashing, their answers melding. It’s advanced stuff far beyond my capability, but I can deduce, from his scribbled margin work, that he’s trying to find a common integer. No, more than one common integer. Exactly eight integers. But the long division is wrong.
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