Damage Done

by Amanda Panitch

  I had to threaten Spence with the gun. It made me feel like I had a belly full of grave dirt, worms squirming and all, but I had no choice. I couldn’t walk meekly back into the night and let him keep coming after me. If anything, his reticence made him more menacing. He only wanted to talk to me when he had the upper hand.

  And he had done something with my brother.

  In the end, I got the words I needed: 5464 Harmony Lane. I sliced through the zip ties, stuck them in my bag, and left him alone in the silence.

  —

  When I emerged from the back door and made my way around front, Michael was standing in front of the house with his arms crossed, his jaw working with worry. He nearly threw himself at me as I came into view. “Thank God, Lucy—Julia,” he panted. “I was about to bust in there. You were in there so long I was starting to panic.”

  My heart was finally starting to slow down. “I’m done. He told me what I needed. Thanks for standing guard. Everything’s okay.” I sighed. “We’re going to have to part ways now, though.”

  He looked like an explosion had gone off inside him; he clutched his stomach, holding himself together, and his shoulders hunched forward. “What do you mean?”

  “I need to go back to Elkton,” I said. “My brother’s been talking about the shooting. The police called in Spence to talk to him. Spence was his old psychologist. Something my brother did or said or whatever persuaded Spence to help break him free, and he’s now being held in one of Spence’s buddies’ houses in Elkton awaiting further instruction.”

  Michael laughed. It wasn’t a funny laugh, or a happy laugh. “That’s insane,” he said. “That’s just…insane.”

  “Well, it’s what’s happening, so if it’s insane, then so be it,” I said.

  “And what are you planning to do in Elkton?” He grabbed me by the wrist. Not hard—if I’d pulled, my arm would have slipped free. I didn’t pull, though. “Let’s call my dad and let the police take care of it.”

  Words stuck in my throat. “No police. Not yet. I just need to talk to him,” I said. “Because he’s awake, and he’s alive, and he’s…” I didn’t even know what to say. Once I would’ve said my other half. Now I wasn’t sure. “You and your”—I made swirls in the air—“sister-aunt in New York City who you never see wouldn’t understand.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t think I can do this. Your brother is…” Notorious. Infamous. Dangerous. “…a murderer. And he’s probably being held under armed guard. What makes you think you can just waltz in there and talk to him? I’m telling you, let me call my dad. He’s good at what he does. He’ll keep it under the radar.”

  “No cops,” I said firmly. “A cop helped kidnap him in the first place. If you call the cops, I swear to God”—I’ll kill you—“I’ll never speak to you again.” Saying those words almost made me gasp with the hurt, but I held firm. Showed no weakness.

  He shook his head. “Then you’re going to have to do it alone. This is too much for me. I’m going home. I’m sorry, Lucy…Julia.” He released my wrist, and my arm swung free. “I’ll drive you home, if you want.” He leaned in and hugged me.

  Standing there, my cheek nestled against his chest, felt right. Suddenly the thought of going at this alone froze me so quickly I thought my ankles might shatter. I pulled back, stood up on my tiptoes, and before he could back away, pressed my lips to his.

  Judging from the way he lowered his hands to my waist and pulled me in close, he wasn’t that intent on leaving me behind. He smelled salty and still a little garlicky (let’s be real: garlic is a beautiful smell), and the stubble coating his jaw scraped my chin. I pressed myself more firmly against him, parting my lips and letting his tongue slip inside my mouth, making me warm and golden and tingly from my throat to my belly.

  I pulled away first, meeting his eyes with mine. He blinked a few times, looking dazed; he still gripped me by the waist, as if I were the only thing keeping him standing.

  “I need you with me. Please come,” I said. I blinked hard, trying to keep my eyes from glistening. I was pretty sure it didn’t work. “Please don’t leave me. Everybody always leaves me.”

  He sighed, cleared his throat, and ran a hand through his hair, leaving it sticking up in all sorts of weird directions. Then he sighed again and pulled me back to him. “I’m here with you, Julia,” he said. “I’m here.”

  We walked hand in hand to the car. I smiled a small, secret smile.

  —

  The ninth to be shot was the band director, Mr. Watson. At this point, only Mr. Watson, two other kids—Penelope Wong and Sophie Grant—me, and my brother were left standing. We called Mr. Watson “Mr. Walrus”—he had a belly big enough to swallow the room, perpetually red cheeks, and a mustache that drooped past the corners of his mouth. We only called him Mr. Walrus behind his back, of course. Walruses (walri?) had tusks.

  Those tusks had been on full display the day of the incident. With no exits available and my brother bearing down, Mr. Walrus had decided to take those last two students’ safety into his own hands; they had hunkered down on the floor, halfway under one of the risers, as if that would save them. Mr. Walrus flattened himself on top, covering both of them with his bulk. He might have begged and pleaded, or he might have gone to his death stoic and resolute. All I know is that my brother stood over him, fired down, and shot him in the back of the head. He died quickly, which was more than I could say for the two kids under him.

  My brother had never been one to let something suffer unnecessarily, at least not on purpose. He was practical. Spiders he took outside. Mice he trapped in release cages and let them run free in the woods or, one very memorable time, in Liv’s bedroom. Even when our school had cockroaches and they were running around in the hallway bumping into walls, poison eating away at their rudimentary nervous systems, he went around crunching them all beneath his boots, giving them the small gift of quick deaths, if not painless ones. Even with the animals he killed, Fluffy and the others, he always killed them quickly before he cut them open to look at their insides.

  That merciful trait was in full evidence in the band room that day. Sure, a lot of kids died. For some reason, known only to him, they had to die. But with the exception of poor Nina Smith (and that was unintentional), they all died within a few minutes. They might have had to die, but nobody had to suffer. Nobody except for me.

  —

  I took the gun with me, having stuck it in my bag with my zip ties and pepper spray and the photo of my brother.

  I didn’t know which item was the most dangerous.

  As we got in the car, I crammed my bag back under my legs and snuck a glance at Michael. He still looked hesitant. I shifted in my seat so that our sides touched. Heat radiated through me. I touched his upper arm. “Thank you again.”

  “For the ride?”

  I gave a little laugh. Ha-ha. “Not just the ride,” I said. “For everything.” I ran my hand down his arm and stroked the side of his thumb, curving my fingers so that my nails trailed over his skin. I felt the muscles in his wrist shiver. “For coming to Elkton with me. I don’t know if I’d have the strength…to do it alone.”

  He smiled at me. Sunshine washed over my face. “Of course,” he said. “I’m happy to be here. I want to be here. For you.”

  I smiled back. My cheeks felt cold.

  “What’s the address?” he asked, his finger poised over the GPS. I told him, and we set off. I kept sneaking glances at him, afraid he’d come to his senses at some point and turn this car back around, but he kept staring straight ahead, his fingers clenched around the steering wheel. The only sign he was still nervous was the twitching in his jaw.

  I meant to think over strategies for getting inside the next house, for getting to my brother without alerting the guys who were sure to be in there with him. Instead, I fell asleep.

  “Julia. Julia, wake up. We’re in Elkton. I think.”

  I startled awake. The familiarity of the scene outside my window sucked
all the breath from my lungs. The south of the state was beautiful, but it had been so white, so clean, so new.

  Elkton was different. Elkton was home.

  Here, there was actual weather, winters where I had to wear a coat and summers where we went to the beach. Here, the fog descended so low and so thick, walking through it was like walking through clouds, or a dream. Here, there were endless vineyards stretching off into the rugged mountains where I’d gone hiking with my brother as a kid.

  “We’re almost there, I think,” Michael said. He was tapping his fingers on the steering wheel again. He was nervous, probably because of what he thought I’d do next. I wished he’d just quit thinking. “Twenty minutes away.”

  I rustled in my seat, my nerves suddenly exploding. I was glad I had that gun. I hoped I wouldn’t need it, but it made me feel safe.

  “Are you okay?” Michael said. He reached over and squeezed my knee. I grabbed his hand before he could pull it away, and squeezed back.

  “No,” I said. It felt good to be honest, for once. “But I will be.”

  The house where my brother waited was past my old house. I debated whether I should look, or whether I should spend the time studying my increasingly fascinating shoes. Something rusty and brown crusted one of the toes; I sighed and rubbed it off, grinding it into the carpet of the car.

  By the time we approached, I felt like I had no choice but to look. I was too curious; I wondered if reporters still thronged the street out front, if there were still eggs drying on the siding, if the new owners had repaired the front window through which some well-wisher had thrown a brick. Or if there were new owners at all. Maybe the city had just leveled the place altogether, pushing my entire childhood underground, as if my brother and I had never stood against the kitchen door and let our mother mark our heights on the wood. As if we’d never existed.

  But it was still there, still squat and white, still impeccably manicured. The red slashes down the front of the garage (more well-wishes) had been painted over, and the shutters had been repainted a dark green. An unfamiliar car sat in the driveway. It was a good thing I wasn’t driving, because I probably would have smashed that intruder right through the garage door.

  A million years ago, I had driven through that garage door. Like I said, I could drive; I just didn’t. Maybe the third time I’d ever driven, my mom had come to pick me up from band practice, and I’d driven us home. I’d coasted down the road, through a number of lights and intersections, and had so proudly pulled us right into the center of the driveway. Then I’d hit the brake, only instead of hitting the brake I’d hit the gas. Oops. There went all my bat mitzvah money.

  “Everything okay?” Michael asked, snapping me back to the present.

  I startled in my seat. “That was my old house,” I said. I blinked furiously. “It’s hard to see it.”

  “It must be hard,” Michael said. He licked his lips. “Do you mind if I ask…why…”

  “Why he did it?”

  “Do you know?” He chewed on the inside of his cheek. “Of course, if you don’t want to talk about it, I completely—”

  “No. It’s okay.” I sighed and rolled my shoulders. “He didn’t leave a note or anything. We never knew why. But I know. It was my fault.”

  Electricity charged the air. “What? You didn’t—”

  “I didn’t do it, obviously,” I said, and leaned forward, hunching into myself as if I were a snail and could curl inside my shell. “But it was my fault. I failed him. I was supposed to help him, and I clearly didn’t do it very well.”

  “Julia. You can’t blame yourself.” Michael’s hand, warm and heavy, fell onto my shoulder. “This is in no way your—”

  “He was in therapy for a while. Because of the things he did. We should have known.” My hands, resting on my knees, curled into fists. “I should have known.”

  “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.” He rubbed my shoulder up and down, up and down, his fingers sliding over the bunched muscle beneath. “You’re going to talk to him. That’s why we’re here, right? So we can find him.”

  I let the muscle ease just a bit, just so he could feel me relax. “Right.”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  “Say it again.”

  “It’s not your fault.”

  I let myself relax fully, and he took his hand off my shoulder, apparently confident he’d saved the day, yet again. “Ten minutes away,” he said. “Do we have a plan?”

  “I have a plan. You just need to follow me and try not to make any sudden movements or talk too loudly.” I’d tucked the gun I’d taken from Spence’s place in my pants, where it pressed right up against my spine. I knew later I’d have bruises like an abstract painting. You’d be able to hang me in a museum right next to the Picassos.

  “I still don’t like this.”

  “I know.” I just didn’t care. I couldn’t afford to care right now.

  My dead best friend had once lived on Harmony Lane. Fortunately she’d lived near the end, so we didn’t have to pass her old house. Seeing my old house had been enough for one day; I didn’t know if I could take Liv’s, too. Just thinking of her sent a stab of pain through my chest.

  Liv’s distinguishing characteristic had been her niceness. If she’d been in Harry Potter, she most definitely would have been a Hufflepuff. I told her this once, and she got mad at me. Like, legitimately mad, not fake mad. She didn’t speak to me for three hours before I finally rolled my eyes and told her I’d totally made a mistake. She should have been in Slytherin with me.

  Maybe she wasn’t that nice, come to think of it. But still, I’d never once seen a food drive to which she didn’t donate or a volunteer shift at the elementary school for which she didn’t sign her name, and she was known for feeding and petting the stray cats that lived in her backyard, even though she was allergic. That was what I’d planned to say at her funeral, except, of course, I hadn’t been allowed to go.

  “Here we are.” Michael slowed in front of the house, but I waved him on, craning my neck as we passed. It was almost disturbingly ordinary: neat black shutters, two floors, patchy green grass. A tricycle lay on its side on the front lawn, and I stifled a flash of fear that Spence had given me the wrong address.

  Too late to worry about that now.

  Michael pulled to a stop a few doors down, and I hopped out. “Thanks,” I said. “You can keep watch again.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not keeping watch again,” he said. “Anything could happen to you in there. I’m coming in with you.”

  I didn’t have time to argue. My brother was in there; people could be hurting him as we spoke.

  Or worse, my brother could be hurting other people.

  I clutched my lock picks tightly in one hand. “Fine,” I said, and took off. I slipped my flats off so I wouldn’t stumble as I ran, and prayed I wouldn’t hit a nail. Grass flew beneath my soles, moist and scratchy. I hoped Michael would have enough sense not to yell after me—not my real name, at least—and wasn’t disappointed. I heard him grunt and scramble for the lock on his door, but by then I was already in the backyard. He didn’t stand a chance.

  Still, my hand was shaking as I picked the lock on the back door. This situation was a lot more volatile than the one at Spence’s house—I hoped it would just be the two guys Spence specified plus Ryan inside, but for all I knew the entire Elkton police force could be hosting their annual pizza party in the living room.

  The door cracked open easily, and I slipped inside. There was a dead bolt, only it had been left unlocked, which was odd. The air had the feel of a museum: the house smelled kind of musty, and there was a stillness to it, like no one had moved through it in a long time. I held my breath and listened hard.

  I didn’t hear anyone talking or moving. Maybe Spence had given me the wrong address after all.

  Wait. I couldn’t hear anything, but I could smell something. Something distinct. I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply. I knew this smell, and
just its presence sent me hurtling back to the band room. I had to clench my fists and bite hard on the inside of my lip not to scream.

  It was blood. The house hung heavy with the smell of blood.

  The door pushed me from behind; I grabbed for the gun without thinking. Before I had the chance to aim it, I saw the intruder was Michael; relief swept through me like a cool breeze.

  His eyes were practically popping with annoyance, and then he caught a whiff and shrank back. “Is that blood?” he whispered. His eyes flickered to the gun in my hand, but then right back up to my face. He trusted me. He trusted me with a gun.

  I gave a curt nod. My heart was hammering sickly in my throat. I could hardly breathe. “Wait here,” I whispered back. I almost dropped the gun, my hand was so sweaty.

  He shook his head and grabbed my other hand. I didn’t bother arguing. I knew this time I wouldn’t win.

  Together, we crept through the hallway and into what appeared to be the living room. The house had an open layout, the rooms flowing into and out of each other without doors or walls in the way, and everything was modern and chrome and white.

  Except the couch. The couch had been white. Now it was a canvas of red and brown and a shade of purple I’d never seen before. It could hang on the museum wall right next to my back.

  I took a few steps forward, holding my breath again. Someone—or something that had once been a someone—was sprawled over the cushions, his head propped on the armrest as if he were taking a nap. I squinted.

  Someone had shot the figure straight in the mouth; small, jagged bits of his teeth were scattered on the cushions around the remains of his face and all over the floor. Even Joseph Goodman, dentist to the stars, couldn’t help him now.

  “His teeth,” Michael whispered. Then he leaned over and threw up on the dead guy’s feet.

  Pride was hot in my chest. I wouldn’t throw up. I hadn’t even thrown up in the band room. “There should be one more. Where is he?” I whispered back, ignoring the smell of sick.