That Weekend

by Kara Thomas

  He said his friend had dropped his car off, gone home, had dinner with his girlfriend, only to wake up in the morning not remembering a single thing.

  What if my assumption is wrong—that whether by falling, or being attacked, I’d been knocked unconscious in the place where Sunshine found me, almost two miles from Devil’s Peak? What if I’d gotten hurt at our campsite and tried to hike back to get help, only to wind up lost and disoriented? Maybe I’d given up when it got dark and went to sleep, only to wake up with the memory of the past thirty-six hours gone.

  But why would Kat and Jesse let me hike back hurt, alone?

  They wouldn’t have. Whatever happened to incapacitate them, to stop them from making it down the mountain, had to have happened before I fled.

  I sit at the edge of my bed, cover my face with my hands. The Ativan has started to slow the panic zipping through my veins; I relax my shoulders, reach for my phone.

  No new texts; my conversation with Amos is at the top of my inbox. Unease settles over me.

  Amos and Ben are the only people who’ve reached out to me this week. I’d dismissed the silence as the hazards of senior year—I’d let my social circle shrink to my two best friends and my boyfriend, and I’d lost all three of them in a manner of days.

  But what if there’s another reason no one has contacted me to see how I’m coping with the news about Kat and Jesse?

  You should check Facebook.

  The thought comes out of nowhere. I know it’s a terrible idea, and clearly the Ativan talking, but I stumble over to my desk, open my laptop. With quaking fingers, I scroll past prom dresses in every shade of pastel, hat-toss photos from graduation. Glimpses of the life I’d be living if I hadn’t gone to Sunfish Creek with Kat and Jesse.

  Graduation was last night. While Dad and I were driving home from Sunfish Creek, my classmates congregated on the soccer field to collect their diplomas. Three hundred brains, at once thrumming with their own theories regarding the three people missing.

  Even if Ben didn’t tell anyone that I was with Kat and Jesse, there’s no way around my empty chair. People are probably talking.

  I want to know what they’re saying.

  I halt at a post Anna Markey made last night. Two pictures: One of Anna and Shannon, robed arms wrapped around each other, cheek to cheek and beaming. The other, an empty folding chair covered in flowers.

  It takes me a moment to process what I’m looking at. Marcotte, Markey. Kat was supposed to sit next to Anna at graduation. The chair is hers.

  This evening two bright souls were missing from the graduation stage, but they were in our hearts and on our minds. Hoping Kat and Jesse will be home soon to celebrate with all of us

  I picture Anna grinding her teeth while typing those words. Anna Markey, who talked shit about Kat behind her back because she’s a better volleyball and lacrosse player than Anna is.

  There are over two dozen comments on Anna’s post.

  Praying! Written by Samantha Kellog at 10:35 p.m.

  Priya Viswanathan at 10:39 p.m.

  I scroll through the well-wishes, feeling a stab of fear when I see Shannon DiClemente’s name.

  Anyone else wondering where CK was last night?

  CK. Claire Keough.

  Noah McKenna: looney bin maybe

  Noah McKenna: she was with them but she can’t remember anything

  Oh, please. She’s setting herself up for an insanity defense

  Written by Shannon DiClemente, three hours ago. Five people have liked her comment.

  My fingers move to my lips, searching for feeling as the blood drains from them. I keep scrolling through the direct replies to Shannon.

  Um, this is a really shitty thing to accuse Claire of?? What she ever do to any of you?

  Katy O’Connor, a junior from the newspaper staff, a girl I barely spoke to outside of meetings.

  Five minutes later, Anna Markey replied to Katy:

  Um, maybe you want to ask Ben Filipoff? She bitch slapped him bc I brought him to my room to get him a clean T-shirt. Girl is psychotic.

  Four likes.

  Noah McKenna, replying to Shannon, Katy, and Anna all at once:

  Keough would never kill Salpietro…she’s in love w him.

  Three likes.

  My body is numb with the shock of seeing the words. Something I thought was a secret, blasted on Facebook for the past six hours without anyone bringing it to my attention.

  Because they all think you did it.

  I’ve never even been in a fight. Do they really think I have it in me to push my best friends off a cliff? Or are they being cruel just because they can?

  Shannon and Anna…Ben’s friends. People I ate lunch with every day for the past four months. I knew they didn’t like me; they humored me, waited for Ben to get me out of his system.

  But still. To accuse me of something like this, where they knew I might see it? I thought I was liked at school. I wasn’t popular by any stretch, but I thought people liked me enough that if they suspected I was involved in something as serious as a potential double murder, they’d whisper about it in private.

  I swallow against the tsunami of panic rising in me. When my vision returns, I realize I have been tracing the scabbed-over cut on my right palm.

  I picture the blood streaking my arm; the blood I washed away in the emergency room bathroom; the blood that deep down, I know, did not come from me.

  NOW

  Dr. Peter Wen is supposed to be the best neurologist in Suffolk County, but he looks like he graduated from high school yesterday. I can tell Dad thinks so too by the way his eyebrows shot to the rim of his glasses when Dr. Wen walked into the room.

  “So,” he’s saying. “Your scans show significant reduction in the size of the hematoma.”

  “That’s great news,” he adds when I don’t react.

  My mind is not in this room; I left it at home, with my laptop, with Kat’s car keys. The second Ativan I snuck before Dad picked me up was the only reason I could stay still throughout the MRI administered upon my arrival here.

  I’ve heard and processed maybe about twenty percent of what Dr. Wen has said since we sat down in his office, a leather-and-mahogany prison.

  How could they be saying that shit about me? How much worse would it be if they heard Dr. Wen say I’m fine?

  “So it’s just going away on its own?” I ask.

  “That’s usually the case with young and healthy patients.” Dr. Wen twirls a pen between his fingers. “We’ll do another scan in six weeks, but you aced the cognitive and short-term-memory tests. Do you have any questions?”

  I grip the armrest. “Dad, I want to talk to Dr. Wen alone for a second.”

  Dad gapes at me. “I—all right. I’ll go make your follow-up appointment.”

  When Dad is gone, Dr. Wen cocks his head. “Everything all right, Claire?”

  “Anything I say to you stays between us, right? Doctor-patient confidentiality or whatever?”

  The pen Dr. Wen is twirling between his fingers slips and clatters to the desk. “Well, yes, unless you tell me you’re thinking of hurting yourself or someone else.”

  I inhale, exhale. “Is there a way to tell from my scan if someone hit me in the head?”

  Dr. Wen’s lips purse. I can make out the ghost of a mustache he’s probably been trying to grow since medical school.

  “Physical force or an assault could result in a hematoma, yes.” Dr. Wen looks uncomfortable. “Do you feel unsafe at home, Claire?”

  I swallow down the knob forming in my throat. “No, it’s nothing like that—I just need to know if someone hit me. Or if I was running and tripped and fell.”

  “Unless your memory returns, there’s no definitive way—”

  “Could it come back?” I ask. “Could I remember everything?�
��

  “There’s no way to know—every head injury is different,” Dr. Wen says carefully. “You have to keep in mind the brain is incredibly complicated.”

  I inhale around the quaking in my chest. “How complicated? If I hit my head—is it possible the head injury could have made me do something I wouldn’t normally have done?”

  Dr. Wen blinks. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

  “I don’t know,” I whisper.

  I need to know. Did I hurt them? Why would I hurt them?

  Dr. Wen is still blinking rapid-fire at me as I stand, so forcefully the chair legs snag on the carpet, nearly sending the chair toppling.

  * * *

  —

  Dad is standing by the exit door in the waiting room, but he doesn’t say anything to me until we get to the car.

  “Want to tell me what that was about?”

  My heart is still speed-bagging in my chest. I’m afraid if I open my mouth all the fears I’ve been holding in will fly out like projectile vomit.

  What if I hurt them?

  There’s no turning back from telling my father about the car keys in my pocket, the amount of blood on my hand in the emergency room. He will tell Mom and they’ll argue about whether we should tell the FBI and it’ll just be out there that I destroyed possible evidence, even if there was a totally innocent reason for my hand to be covered in blood.

  Maybe Kat or Jesse got hurt. One would have stayed with the other one while I ran to get help. The blood got on me because I was trying to help.

  There’s no other option.

  I love them both.

  Hurting people—that’s not me.

  But I wasn’t myself, was I? Whatever memories I have of Saturday don’t belong to me. They belong to some other girl, wandering a trail, bloodied and confused.

  That girl wasn’t me. And I don’t know what she was capable of.

  “Claire,” Dad says, an edge to his voice that cuts me off at the knees. “I think you need to talk to someone about all of this. Maybe someone at Mom’s office.”

  I tilt my head against the window, the glass cool on my temple. “That’s probably a good idea,” I admit.

  Dad says nothing; obviously he’d been preparing for a fight, but I don’t have it in me. I just need to survive this car ride, the walk from the driveway to the house, from my front door to my bedroom. I’m counting the steps until I can disappear under my covers.

  When Dad turns onto our street, it becomes clear I’m not sneaking anywhere.

  There’s a car parked in front of our house. The back door on the driver’s side is dented.

  Dad pulls into our driveway and cuts the engine. “Go right inside, Claire.”

  His voice says he’s thinking the same thing I am—whoever is in that car is probably someone I want to see even less than another cop or FBI agent.

  Dad slams his door and strides over to the man getting out of the car. I trail behind; I have no intention of heading inside the house as Dad directed.

  The guy extends a hand to my father. “Oliver Fucillo. I’m a reporter with the Long Island Register.”

  Oliver Fucillo is in too-tight jeans and a dress shirt rolled up to his elbows. His hair is gelled to the side, and his glasses make him look like a serial killer.

  Dad accepts his handshake and promptly folds his arms across his chest. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m covering the Marcotte-Salpietro case for the Register,” Oliver says. “Does Claire have a moment to chat?”

  “Surely you could have called first?” Dad says.

  “I did—no one answered.” Oliver Fucillo’s jaw is dotted with acne. He’s probably a fresh-out-of-college hire desperate for a big story that will bring him one step closer to his dream of being an NPR host.

  “Claire, why don’t you go inside?” Dad says over his shoulder, eyes not leaving Oliver.

  My feet are rooted to the driveway.

  Oliver waves at me. “I was hoping for a comment on the potential person of interest in the case?”

  My heartbeat goes still; Dad’s mouth hangs open. “We weren’t aware there was a person of interest. Off the record, of course.”

  “Paul Santangelo,” Oliver says. “The man Claire accused of being involved in Kat and Jesse’s disappearance.”

  The redheaded man. He has a name. I stare at Oliver. “I didn’t accuse anyone of anything.”

  “Claire. Don’t say anything else.” Dad takes a step toward Oliver. “Please leave before I call the police.”

  Oliver pales. His eyes flick to me. “Maybe I could give Claire my card—”

  The look Dad gives him nearly gives me organ failure. I’ve never seen him this angry—I turn and hurry into the house without looking back.

  Dad isn’t far behind me. He pulls the front door shut behind him, his face suddenly scarily serene.

  “What did you say to him?” I ask.

  “I told him I’m calling the Register and letting his boss know about his inappropriate conduct.” Dad massages his temple with his thumb and his forefinger. He freezes as we both hear it—the phone ringing in the kitchen.

  I dart ahead to get it, but Dad is faster. He snatches the phone out of the cradle, lips forming a line at the voice on the other end.

  “No,” Dad says tartly. “She’s not home. Please don’t call again.”

  “What is happening?” I whisper.

  “I don’t know.” Dad replaces the phone in the cradle as it begins to ring again.

  With Dad occupied by the phone blitzkrieg, I slip into my room and sit at my desk.

  I pull up Google, commanding myself to breathe. That reporter, Oliver or whatever, had said I’d accused the hiker of killing Kat and Jesse. He has a name: Paul Santangelo.

  And apparently, he’s trending, thanks to a story in the Daily News.

  FRIEND OF MISSING TEENAGERS IDENTIFIES POSSIBLE SUSPECT

  “Oh, shit.” I cover my mouth and check the time stamp on the story. It went up about two hours ago, when I was in Dr. Wen’s office.

  The Daily News has learned that Paul A. Santangelo, 37, of Sunfish Creek, has been interviewed in the investigation into the disappearance of two teenagers from Bobcat Mountain. The Sunfish Creek sheriff’s department declined to confirm whether Mr. Santangelo was interviewed.

  However, sources familiar with the investigation tell us that the friend who accompanied Katherine Marcotte and Jesse Salpietro on the ill-fated camping trip made statements to the sheriff suggesting that Mr. Santangelo may be responsible for the missing couple’s disappearance. The sheriff’s office would not comment on the nature of these statements.

  The identity of the young woman has not been independently confirmed, but an individual familiar with the parties involved tells the Daily News she is a friend of Marcotte and Salpietro. According to sources close to the Marcotte family, the young woman was found on Bobcat Mountain with an unspecified head injury. While she is cooperating with the investigation, she claims she has no memory of the hours preceding Marcotte and Salpietro’s disappearance.

  The FBI has taken control of the investigation and declined to comment for this story.

  They didn’t name me.

  But the reporter from the Register and whoever the hell else is calling our house know I was on the mountain.

  Everyone knows. How?

  Do not Google yourself.

  I have to Google myself.

  WHO IS CLAIRE KEOUGH? 5 FACTS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT MISSING TEEN KAT MARCOTTE’S BEST FRIEND

  I press a fist into the sharp pain in my abdomen as I click through to the article. I am not sure I could even come up with five facts about myself, but whoever operates Heavy.com did.

  Claire Keough is attending SUNY Geneseo in the fall.

 
Claire Keough was released from Sunfish Creek Hospital Thursday morning.

  Claire Keough was editor-in-chief at the Rookery, Brookport High School’s newspaper.

  I don’t get to the last two facts about me because I’m too distracted by the pictures, obviously ripped from my Facebook page.

  My page is private and my name is listed as Claire Margaret, but they found it anyway. They found someone with loose privacy settings who posted these pictures—why, oh God, would someone post these—

  “Oh God,” I whisper.

  Jamie Liu and I knocking back shots. My eyes are glazed, my head tilted back. Jamie is laughing at me and the photo is positioned in a way that suggests the actual subject of the picture was cropped out. Lucky shot.

  I barely recognize the girl in the picture. She looks like the sloppy chick at the party you never talk to, who hangs on your neck like a spider monkey, crooning into your ear that she’s soooo wasted.

  That girl looks like she’s totally lost control.

  People are going to see this. The thought lands like a thumb mashed into the panic center of my brain.

  My parents. My future professors at Geneseo. Anyone who Googles me in the next fifty years. All of them are going to see the worst version of me.

  My panic quickly morphs into anger and my anger turns into a heat-seeking missile. I need someone to blame for my conversation with the sheriff about the hiker being leaked to the press.

  Someone in the sheriff’s department? No, the building was a ghost town when we arrived, and McAuliffe’s office door was closed when we spoke. Sheriff Sanctimonious would never leak sensitive information to the press himself.

  So who else knew? My dad, obviously, but he looked like he wanted to drop-kick Oliver Fucillo into oncoming traffic. He’d never do anything to bring reporters to our doorstep, which leaves one person—