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Lulu Dark Can See Through Walls

Page 9

by Bennett Madison


  “It’s not funny!” I finally yelped, when it became clear that they had totally missed the point of the story.

  “I’m sorry, Lu,” Dad said. “It will seem funny in a few months’ time, trust me.”

  “It will not! It will always be humiliating. When I’m old and withered like you guys, it will still be humiliating.”

  “Who are you calling old and withered?” Theo said. “I’m only thirty-one.”

  “Exactly,” I snapped.

  “Whatever,” Theo said. “You’re too boy crazy, Lulu. It’s clouding your judgment.”

  “You should have seen her at that concert,” Charlie said. “Every time he glanced anywhere near her direction, it looked like she was about to pass out. Like a starstruck eight-year-old at an *NSync show.”

  “That’s my girl,” Dad said. “Lulu has always been very passionate. Just like her mother.”

  I shot them both my patented Lulu Dark death stare. One eye for each of them. Sometimes being the only girl in a room full of guys can be a trying experience. They have, like, no respect.

  “You people are such hypocrites. Especially you, Theo,” I said. “You have some nerve calling me boy crazy. I’ve watched those ER reruns on cable with you. I see how you swoon over George Clooney. Anyone who thinks George Clooney is sexy has got to be old. He’s at least sixty himself!”

  The only good thing to come out of the argument was that it seemed to be taking everyone’s mind off the poker game. Everyone except me, that is. I laid my cards triumphantly on the table to reveal that I had a truly golden hand.

  The guys sighed as I pulled another pile of change to my corner, cackling.

  “I told you she cheats,” Theo complained. “She has some trick involving mirrors and rubber bands.”

  “Lulu’s sneaky,” Charlie said. He smirked. “You don’t even know the half of it.”

  “Well, no worries. This is all part of my strategy,” Theo said. “I’m going to make a comeback in the second half.”

  He didn’t, though. In fact, he was the most hopeless player out of everyone: the type who would play a pair of twos as if it was a full house, raising and raising, expecting me to fold under his bluff. Unfortunately for him, Charlie was right when he said that thing to Berlin the night that my purse was stolen. Not only can I see through walls, I can also see through crappy bluffs. So we kept on playing and I kept on winning. No one was really that grumpy about it. They had gotten used to it, and for all their bluster, they accepted my superior skills.

  In the end, I bankrupted everyone. I let out a whoop and immediately began counting the spoils of my victory, loudly proclaiming each dollar.

  “Give it a rest, Lulu,” Theo finally said. “You can count your riches later. Not that I know what you’re going to do with a big pile of nickels: you need a quarter to even buy a gumball in this day and age.”

  “It’s legal tender,” I gloated. “I’m going to roll them up and take them to the bank. I’ve got at least ten bucks here.”

  He didn’t pay me any mind, though. “Hey,” he said brightly, bare feet on the coffee table. “I forgot to tell you guys about the brilliant inspiration I got this morning.”

  I can’t quite tell you what Theo does, but I know that he’s pretty successful—borderline famous, in fact, like my dad. He sort of writes plays, except that he doesn’t call them that. Every time you ask what he’s working on, he gives you some crazy new answer that makes no sense, like that he’s working on a one-man avant-garde electro-musical. He always talks in hyphens like that, which is totally silly but endearing.

  “Oh yeah,” my dad said. “Tell them about your new play.”

  “It’s not a play,” Theo corrected him predictably. “It’s more like an experimental neo-drag cabaret performance piece. It’s going to be called / Was a Teenage Shark Witch.”

  Charlie wrinkled his forehead. You could see he had no clue what Theo was talking about.

  “So in other words, it’s a play,” I clarified.

  Theo gave me an exasperated look. “I suppose you could call it that—if you insist. Anyway, it’s about a girl who’s half shark and half teenager. Kind of like an evil mermaid who likes to go to the mall. Oh yeah, and she’s dead.”

  “Tell them where you got the idea,” Dad said eagerly. Clearly he thought Theo’s idea was totally brilliant—which I didn’t understand. Then again, Theo’s ideas always sound dopey when he talks about them. Then he goes ahead and wins a Pulitzer or something, so you never can tell.

  “From the newspaper this morning,” Theo said. “There was this article about a body that they just found in Dagger Bay. A teenage girl. She was dressed to the nines in designer clothes. And here’s the cool part—she had a tattoo of a silver shark on her hip bone. And it’s like, why a silver shark? Why was she in the bay? Who was the girl? Why did someone want to murder her? And . . .”

  Theo was going on and on, but I wasn’t listening. The room was spinning and I was afraid I was going to throw up. Unless I was hallucinating, things were a whole, whole lot worse than one stolen purse.

  Why? Because Berlin Silver had that exact same tattoo—right on her hip bone. No one had seen her in a week. And her apartment had been ransacked!

  My brain was throbbing, as if it had just expanded to twice its normal size. A murder had taken place. There was no way around it. Berlin Silver had been murdered!

  I didn’t want to worry Dad by telling him—he probably would never let me leave the house again if he knew that one of my class-mates had been offed. But Charlie had to be thinking the same thing as me, and I needed to figure out what to do. This was just too much for me to handle alone.

  “I need to get something from my room,” I said, abruptly standing up. I signaled to Charlie to follow me, but he already knew what I was thinking. He followed with a haunted look on his face while Dad and Theo just looked on, bewildered.

  “Are you okay, honey?” my father asked.

  “I’m fine,” I croaked.

  “I guess the lovebirds are retreating to their nest,” Dad teased.

  Theo rolled his eyes. “Leave them alone,” he said with a snort. “I’ve heard that teenage girls need some privacy now and then.”

  We reached my room and I slammed the door, barricading us inside.

  “Okay, I’m completely freaking,” I wheezed.

  “Don’t freak,” Charlie said at precisely the same moment.

  “How can you say that!? Berlin Silver has been brutally murdered, and you tell me not to freak out? What is wrong with you?”

  “Whoa, whoa, slow down,” Charlie said. “I know it’s a weird coincidence, but there’s no reason to think Berlin has been murdered.”

  “Charlie, how can you be in such denial? They found Berlin in the bay this morning.”

  “No,” he said calmly. “They found a woman with a shark tattoo. There’s a difference.”

  “But—it has to be her. How many people have that exact tattoo in that exact same place?”

  “Probably a lot,” Charlie replied. He’s very good at coming up with explanations that have no other purpose than to make him feel secure about the world. “Think about how many people have Tweety Bird tattoos. Or Betty Boop. Or ‘I Heart Mom.’ I think you’re jumping to conclusions. Trust me.”

  He put his hands on my shoulders, trying to keep me calm, but it wasn’t working at all. His explanation was straight up not plausible.

  “Charlie,” I said, “that’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. It’s got to be her. She’s been missing for a week, her room was trashed, as if by a criminal, and the dead girl has the exact same tattoo.”

  Suddenly another thought occurred to me. “And my purse!” I gasped. “Charlie, someone murdered Berlin and now they have my purse, with my ID in it and everything!”

  “Lulu, get a grip. I bet you anything that Berlin is at school on Monday. With your purse, which she’ll return. And then you can kiss and make up—not that you would ever do that. Anyw
ay, you’ll see. Everything is going to be fine.”

  My head was throbbing. I could tell that I really was about to get a migraine. “It’s not fine!” I wailed. “We have to do something right now!”

  “Lulu, come on, what can you possibly do? Let’s just rent a movie and chill, okay?”

  “A movie?” I gasped. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  Charlie gave me his hurt puppy dog eyes. “Maybe you’d feel better if we just went out for a little bit,” he said hopefully. “Big Blonde is still open.”

  “Charlie, I’d rather French-kiss Regis Philbin than go to Big Blonde at this moment.” I was completely pissed off that he was being so cavalier. “If you wanted to go out tonight, why didn’t you go on a date with someone you were actually interested in?”

  Charlie looked wounded. He didn’t say anything—just turned around, opened the door, and slunk out of the room. I felt bad, but really, it was something that needed to be said.

  I was a mess. Worse, Charlie was right. There was nothing that I could do right now. I stripped off my dress and collapsed into bed.

  It took me forever to fall asleep. I tried doing the meditation exercise that Dad taught me to conquer insomnia, but it was no use. I was tossing and turning, thinking about Berlin. True, I never really liked her, but she didn’t deserve to be murdered. And then there was the thing with my purse. Whoever killed Berlin could be coming for me next. It would be so easy, with my name and address and even my picture inside. I knew, without a doubt, that my life was in danger.

  Then it occurred to me that perhaps I was being self-centered. A person had been murdered, and all I could think about was my precious Korean purse and what was going to happen to me. Suddenly I felt sheepish. My self-absorption had gone too far. Maybe / should take up the Kabbalah, I thought. It seemed to work for Madonna—although not so much for Britney Spears.

  When I finally settled into sleep, it was no escape. In the dream I had, I was at Oscar’s, the fanciest department store in all of Halo City. Now, going to Oscar’s is always a stressful experience because of the persnickety shopgirls and horrible, pushy customers trying to steal your size and butt in line, and in my nightmare all that was blown out of proportion. I could feel everything in the store, the walls and racks of expensive clothes, closing in on me, and I was positive that someone was chasing after me. So I ran into the dressing rooms.

  For some reason, I wasn’t wearing shoes, but I had my purse again. It didn’t make me feel any better.

  I fled from my pursuer through mirror after mirror, each one swallowing me like water and spitting me out into another identical dressing room. I could feel someone following right behind me, but every time I looked over my shoulder, I saw only my own reflection, smiling monstrously. And then the fire alarm went off, a beeping that started soft and became louder and louder until it was screaming in my ears.

  I woke with a start, sweaty and breathless. The department store had evaporated, and I was in the blackness of my bedroom again. But the beeping had gotten louder than ever. It was coming from my bedside table.

  My cell phone was ringing, I realized. Groggily I reached over and grabbed it. UNKNOWN CALLER, the display read.

  “Hello?” I mumbled, picking up.

  “Hi!” The voice on the other end was cheery. It actually sounded quite a bit like my own voice.

  Was my mom calling? It would be just like her to forget the time difference and ring me up at three in the morning.

  “Who is this?” I asked, still half asleep.

  “This is Lulu Dark,” the voice went on. “Listen, I’ve lost my phone, and I guess you found it. Have there been any messages for me?”

  I groaned. Someone was playing a joke, and this was definitely not the time for it.

  “Who is this?” I demanded. “Who is this really?”

  “Um, hello? I told you already, this is Lulu Dark. Personally, what I want to know is who you are, besides a thieving little fink.”

  I gasped. Was this person serious? She certainly sounded it.

  The stranger gave a long, peeved sigh before she continued. “Here’s the thing: if you don’t return my cell phone, you’ll be sorry. So make it snappy.”

  Then, before I could ask any more questions, she’d hung up.

  SIX

  I WOKE UP THE NEXT MORNING WITH the vague feeling that something was wrong—something that I couldn’t put a finger on. / must have had a bad dream, I thought, the kind that ruins your day even though you can never quite remember it. But when I rolled over and saw my cell phone lying on my pillow, it all came flooding back—the shark girl, the creepy phone call.

  None of it had been a dream, as much as I would have loved to think otherwise. Berlin Silver was dead, and no one knew about it but me.

  The more I thought about it, the more I was convinced of what I had to do: I had to head straight to the police station, tell them about Berlin, and hopefully come home with a full retinue of uniformed protection—in case the murderer was coming after me next.

  I dressed quickly and hit the door. On the walk to the station Halo City felt more sinister than ever before. Every corner seemed sharp with potential danger. I jumped at each little noise, knowing that Berlin’s murderer was somewhere on these streets and knew everything about me—including my cell phone number.

  Too bad I’d always laughed at Daisy for her karate lessons. If I were a brown belt like her, I wouldn’t feel like such a wimp.

  My feet carried me toward the station as fast as they could.

  Keep moving, I told myself. Just a few more blocks to go.

  I made a quick turn onto Laight Street—and stopped short.

  Sally Hansen was standing on the other side of the road—at the traffic light—waiting to cross the street. Despite the heavy flow of traffic between us, she locked eyes with me. She stared at me with a menacing glare.

  My heart skipped a beat. This was the third time I’d run into her. Was she following me?

  The look on her face told me I’d better wait till I had Daisy’s backup to find out what was the deal.

  I spun around and hightailed it out of there before the light changed. I ducked around the nearest corner and, once I was certain that I was a safe distance away, slowed down enough to whip out my pocket notebook.

  I scribbled the words SALLY HANSEN!! and the date on the first blank page, then hastily shoved the notebook into the back pocket of my jeans.

  So what if I’d started keeping a notebook? Plenty of people do it; it has nothing to do with being a detective.

  I picked up my pace again and decided on an alternate route to the police station. I practically sprinted there, looking over my shoulder the whole way. Luckily I didn’t see Sally again.

  I didn’t expect the police to take me seriously. I expected them to roll their eyes and run me off, saying something like, “Listen here, chip-pie. Why don’t you leave the detective work to the professionals?” And as such, I prepared myself for a fight.

  But unlike everything you see in cop shows and read in mystery novels, the police didn’t turn me away immediately. In fact, they seemed very interested in what I had to say.

  The detective I spoke with was a tall, heavily made-up woman named Detective Wanda Knight. She and I got along right off the bat. She respected me the instant I complimented her on her lipstick—which I recognized as MAC Berry Lip Blush, applied, of course, with a brush.

  “Oh, you’re good,” she told me, smiling. “You have excellent powers of observation. You might make a good detective yourself.”

  I cringed, but she didn’t take any notice.

  “Now tell me what you know about the tattooed girl,” she said. “All we’ve got so far are a couple of dead leads. Maybe you’re the break in the case we need.”

  I told her everything I’d said to Charlie the night before and was gratified when she took my information seriously, unlike some friends I might mention.

  “It’s certainly an unusual ta
ttoo,” she said thoughtfully. “And in silver. I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a silver tattoo until this case. But you say she disappeared just last week?”

  “That’s right.” I nodded. “The last time I saw her was on Friday.”

  “Well, it can’t be the same girl, then. The body we found has been in the bay for at least four months.”

  I was exasperated. Why do the police always get so caught up in the tiny little details? Hello, big picture! If this is the way that law enforcement operates, it’s no wonder they still haven’t found Tupac’s killer.

  “Listen, Detective Knight,” I said firmly. “Maybe some of the pieces don’t go together, but I’m positive that the girl in the bay is Berlin Silver herself.”

  The policewoman squinted at me. “What makes you so sure?” she asked.

  I was caught off guard. I’m not used to being doubted. I was sure the body was Berlin because I had a hunch—and my hunches are always right. But I obviously couldn’t say that unless I wanted to sound like a total bimbo.

  “Well . . . I—I don’t know!” I sputtered. “It’s just obvious! Isn’t it?”

  Detective Knight seemed to suppress a smirk. “Listen, Lulu.” She patted me on the back. “I can tell you one hundred percent for sure that the dead girl is not your friend. There’s just no chance. That body we pulled from the river has been in the water for so long she’s got no—well, let’s just say it’s not pretty. As for the tattoo—it’s not much, but I guess it’s something. I’ll look into it—and I’ll see if I can dig up something on this Berlin Silver character, too.”

  “If you figure out where she is, can you call me?” I asked.

  The woman raised one eyebrow. “Are you the new district attorney?” she asked dryly.

  I scowled.

  “Sorry,” the detective said. “I couldn’t resist. I saw them say that on Law and Order once.”

  Seeing the disappointed look on my face, she gave an understanding smile. “Thanks for your help, though. I promise that everything will be fine. I’ll do my job if you do yours: stay in school and just say no to drugs, street gangs, and underage drinking.”

 

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