All Unquiet Things

by Anna Jarzab

  It made sense that one person couldn’t, maybe shouldn’t, be everything to another person, but I longed to be that for Cass. He and I had both been neglected by the people who were supposed to love us the most. As I looked at Cass, practically naked now in the light of the streetlamps, I imagined a small child cowering in front of his angry father and I wanted to sob. Instead I wrapped my arms around his warm, bare chest and pressed my lips against his sternum, promising that I would never leave him.

  I didn’t even realize until much, much later that he never made the same promise to me.

  Senior Year

  After school, as I was throwing my bag in the backseat of my car, Cass sidled up to me, hands in his pockets, looking unsure of himself. I turned around quickly, as if I didn’t see him, and subtly checked my hair in the side mirror. Not as good as it had looked after I blew it dry in the morning, but decent enough.

  “Hey,” he said, shrugging slightly and giving me a small smile.

  “Hey,” I said, clutching the top of the driver’s side door. “What’s up?” My stomach churned like a washing machine. I suddenly wished I was wearing something new, or that I had on more makeup than a swipe of mascara and a layer of Chap Stick.

  “Can we, I don’t know, take a walk?”

  “Uh, sure.”

  “How about we take the creek path?” he suggested. “Just to the overlook.”

  The creek path went from the student parking lot all the way down to Empire Creek at the bottom of the foothill, but first it wound through the back parts of the affluent neighborhoods, and halfway down—near Cass’s house—there was a large overlook where students would park their cars. You could see the whole valley, and Cass and I had gone there many times when we were dating.

  “So,” I said.

  “So.” He took a deep breath. He was nervous, which was adorable. “How are you?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Is that really true?”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “Because you don’t seem fine.”

  “Uh, thanks?”

  “I mean, you seem upset.”

  His words broke the spell. Upset? Of course I was upset. In mere seconds, he had gone from the boy I had loved to the boy who had dumped me when I needed him most. “Well, it’s been a long year,” I snapped.

  “I know.” He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. “I guess I’m mostly to blame for that.”

  I said nothing, because I couldn’t assure him that he wasn’t. His abandonment had done all sorts of toxic things to me: It had worsened my growing depression over Carly’s death, it had increased my anxiety, and it had basically left me completely alone. But I was starting to build my life back up again. I had found a purpose for my existence, and though I didn’t yet know who killed Carly, I felt closer to the truth than ever before. What’s more, I couldn’t blame it all on Cass. I knew deep down in my gut that he hadn’t wanted to leave me. He was just too weak and had caved in to all the pressure his family and friends had put on him. And it was my fault, too. I had taken it all lying down; I had let people talk and whisper, and retreated into a self-imposed exile that left me friendless. I had counted too much on the loyalty of those who weren’t capable of giving it.

  “I hope,” he continued, “that we can maybe find some way to get past this.”

  “You want me to forgive you?”

  “I know you don’t want to,” he said. “But maybe you could? Because I really miss you, Aud. I made a huge mistake, and I’m really sorry. I should’ve said that a long time ago.”

  “Yeah, you should have.” I kept trying to think how Neily would respond, to channel him, because as much as I didn’t want to admit it to myself, I was starting to forgive Cass. He hadn’t wanted to hurt me, I knew that. He was just a coward. And as much as I wanted to hate him for that, I found that I couldn’t. I didn’t have Neily’s fortitude, or his single-mindedness. I wanted to be happy again. I wanted to move on, to live my life without having to constantly look backward into the past. That was why I was doing all this, and I couldn’t help but respect Cass for trying to make it right.

  But I also couldn’t let him off the hook that easily. “What did you think would happen, Cass?” I asked. “What do you want from me?”

  He paused, as if unsure about saying what he wanted to say. “I want us to be together again,” Cass admitted. I was a bit taken aback. I hadn’t seen Cass’s shy side in a really long time. The look on his face was sweet and boyish, and though it had never escaped my notice, I was struck by how good he looked—how handsome and tall he was, how perfectly our bodies still complemented each other’s. We had been the golden couple, and even after the past year the physical chemistry still crackled between us, easily betraying what both of us were feeling.

  “No. I’m sorry, but that’s not going to happen.” It took all of my inner Neily to say it.

  “Why not?” he asked, with the expression of someone who knew exactly why not.

  “You turned your back on me when I needed you most,” I reminded him. “Maybe I can forgive you, but how am I ever supposed to trust you? And how am I supposed to be with a person that I can’t trust?”

  He pressed his lips together so hard they practically disappeared. “Is this about Monroe? Are you dating him now?”

  “No,” I said slowly. “We’re just friends.”

  “I thought you said that you were English partners.”

  “Well, now we’re friends. Things change pretty quickly around here.”

  “But you’re not dating?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “So you are dating?”

  “No!” I shouted. “Why are you doing this to me? Why can’t you leave me alone?”

  “I just can’t,” he said.

  “You were doing such a good job of it before,” I said. “And to tell you the truth, I think I liked it better that way.”

  He stepped back. “You did?” he asked, wounded.

  “Did you honestly think I still had feelings for you?” I asked, anger momentarily eclipsing every other emotion. “After everything that you did to me? After the teasing, and the rumors, and the prank phone calls, did you think that I was still interested in having a relationship with any of you? You and your friends made my life hell. I can’t believe I ever cared about a single one of you, because it’s obvious that none of you ever gave a damn about me.”

  “That’s not true,” he protested. “I cared. I know I didn’t do a good job of being there for you after what happened, but if Adam or Lucy or any of those other assholes ever did anything to hurt you, I didn’t know about it. I never would have let them do it if I knew.”

  “I don’t believe you,” I said, with less conviction than before.

  “That’s your choice, Audrey. But it’s the truth. And isn’t that what you’re all about these days? The truth?” He sat down on a nearby rock.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Lucy told me you came to her house and started asking questions about Carly,” he said. “She didn’t know what it meant, but I did. As soon as I found out you were back at Brighton I knew what you were doing. You’re poking around Carly’s murder, aren’t you?”

  I suddenly felt exposed, as if I were standing in the middle of the quad completely naked. “No,” I said, as forcefully as I could. “Why would I want to open up all those old wounds?”

  “Because you’re too smart to believe what everybody’s saying about your dad,” Cass said. “You know he didn’t kill her.”

  Everything inside of me softened like butter. “You don’t think my dad killed Carly?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “I used to, but the more I thought about it, the more it didn’t make any sense. I know your dad. I don’t think he had the heart to do something like that.”

  “Then why did you break up with me?” I asked, eyes tearing. “If you thought he was innocent, why did you leave me?”

  “At the
time, I believed the police. I believed the papers. I believed everybody in town who was saying your dad was a killer. How could I not?”

  He closed the gap between us and put his arms around me. I buried my face in his chest, breathed him in. He smelled like laundry and skin hot from the sun. “You should know,” he said, “that I think you’re putting yourself in serious danger playing a game like this.”

  “It’s not a game,” I insisted. “I know what I’m doing.” Yes, I was afraid, but I was not a coward. I didn’t need his warnings—I was perfectly aware.

  “I know. But I want to help,” he murmured into my hair. “You can’t do this alone.”

  “I’m not alone,” I said, pulling away. It was something I had to keep telling myself.

  Cass nodded. “Right. Neily.”

  “He’s been helping me figure things out,” I told him.

  “You really trust that guy?”

  “Of course I do. Why wouldn’t I?”

  “He had a huge grudge against Carly. He found her body,” Cass reminded me. “For all you know, he could have killed her.”

  “No,” I said.

  “Why not?”

  “Because he wanted Carly back, not dead. Of all the people in this goddamn town, he’s the only person suffering as much as I am. I trust him because we’re the same. He understands.”

  “I understand.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “I do! I may not have been as close to Carly as you were, but she was my friend and I miss her,” Cass said. “Besides, what happened to her separated us, and if you think I’m not suffering because of that you’re crazy.”

  “What do you want me to do? We can’t get back together—that would be a disaster. We can’t be friends, because you still have feelings for me. What do you want?” I couldn’t bring myself to admit that I still had feelings for him. He would never walk away if he knew that for sure.

  “Let me help. Give me a chance to prove that I’m on your side.”

  “I don’t think Neily would like that very much.”

  “Do you care about what he thinks?”

  “Yeah, I do.”

  Cass shrugged. “Then I guess there’s nothing more I can say.”

  “There isn’t,” I confirmed. He turned to leave, but I caught his arm. “But I appreciate the apology.”

  Cass smiled the smile of a person who has played all of his cards and has nothing left to lose. Then he leaned over and kissed me.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Fifteen minutes later, I was sitting in the front seat of my car, alone. I wasn’t moving; in fact, I hadn’t even put the key into the ignition. I was just sitting. Sitting and thinking.

  The kiss had brought back a flood of memories, good and bad. I remembered the first kiss I had ever shared with Cass. He had been too much of a gentleman to kiss me during our first date at the Loon, but the next night Adam had his whole group of friends over while his parents were at their second house, in Tahoe. I had been tipsy, but I knew what I was doing. We were sitting on the couch and I was cuddled up against him, my face resting against his chest. I had made the first move, sloughing off my nerves and leaning forward, catching him off guard. When it was over, he looked happy and relieved. We were fourteen.

  But I also remembered the last kiss I had shared with Cass, the morning of the day Carly had died. Sick with what was about to become a series of painful stomachaches brought on by stress, I had left Lucy’s party early with the promise that I would see Cass in the morning. At noon, he called to invite me to brunch, and though my stomach still hurt I agreed to let him pick me up and take me out. I wasn’t hungry, so we ended up not going to brunch, contenting ourselves instead with driving around town and gossiping about what had happened at Lucy’s party after I left. Carly and Adam’s blow-out fight, I remember, was the biggest topic, but he also told me that Lucy had gotten really drunk and sung a Britney Spears song on top of the dining-room table. He told me funny stories to cheer me up, and I tried to laugh and smile, but by the time we got back to my house all I wanted to do was lie down and sleep for a hundred years. He took me inside and covered me up with a blanket, and before he left he kissed me.

  Carly died that night. I wouldn’t see Cass again for three more days, and by then he wouldn’t even look me in the eye. We had both turned seventeen in August.

  “No. No, I’m sorry. I can’t,” I said a few seconds after our kiss at the overlook.

  Now, as I sat in my car, trying to catch my breath and stop my brain from spinning like a Tilt-a-Whirl, part of me regretted having pushed Cass away at the overlook. To his credit, he hadn’t followed me or tried to stop me from leaving. He knew what I needed. In all this time, he hadn’t forgotten how to read me.

  I picked up my phone to call Neily, but he wasn’t going to be much help, so I resisted the urge. Instead, I put the car in drive and headed to Carly’s house. Paul would be at work, and there were still plenty of things left to sort through and pack up in Carly’s room. I could bury myself in that mindless, robotic work and soon, hopefully, I’d forget all about Cass.

  Junior Year—Fall Semester

  I had always known that Cass’s reputation was important to him; my mistake was in believing that I was more important. I honestly don’t know how his parents felt about me before Carly’s death, because after that first encounter I only spoke to them a handful of times and I never cared much about impressing them because I knew what terrible people they were, at least as far as Cass was concerned. We didn’t talk about his parents and I assume he didn’t talk about me at home. It took some maneuvering to ignore the issue, but no more than it takes to avoid a pothole in the road. To me, Cass’s parents were practically nonentities, to the point where I sometimes forgot he had them. The shock I felt when I realized they had pressured him into breaking up with me was indescribable.

  “What do you mean you can’t be with me anymore?” I asked, utterly bewildered. After avoiding me for days, Cass had called and asked me to meet him at the overlook. He didn’t seem to have gotten much sleep the night before and I could just hear Mr. Irving’s voice in my ear: You had better break up with that girl, Cass. I won’t have my son dating the daughter of a murderer! I don’t want you to have anything to do with that family, do you hear me?

  Cass took a deep breath and hung his head slightly. “I’m sorry, Aud. It’s not me. It’s my family. They think—well, I’m sure you know what they think.”

  “But … I need you, Cass,” I pleaded, reaching for his hand. “I need you now more than I ever have. I love you so much. You still love me, right?”

  He nodded at the ground, unwilling to look at me. His fingers were limp in mine.

  “Then we should be together, no matter what anybody says,” I insisted. “We can keep it a secret, we don’t have to tell anybody.”

  “We both have enough secrets,” Cass told me, swallowing hard. “You have to concentrate on yourself right now. I can’t help you through this. I just can’t.”

  “Didn’t you hear what I said? I need you,” I repeated. “All you have to do is be there.”

  “I’m sorry, Audrey,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry.” He took his hand out of mine and walked away, back toward the life he’d built to cover the bruises. I couldn’t watch him leave, so I turned and looked at the valley sprawled out beneath my feet.

  I waited until he was gone to cry.

  Senior Year

  I let myself into the house using my key and headed upstairs to clean out the rest of Carly’s drawers. When I was finished, I ran my hand over the back of each drawer to make sure I hadn’t missed anything. Checking the last one, my fingers sent something rolling. It was a tiny hand-painted wooden doll, one that I recognized as belonging to a set of matryoshka dolls Miranda and Paul had brought back for Carly from a trip they took to Saint Petersburg when she was nine years old. The set still sat atop Carly’s bureau, next to the packet of pictures I had insisted Neily keep but that he had left be
hind.

  The nesting dolls were fashioned in the rough outline of a woman’s figure and painted robin’s-egg blue. A girl’s face, with big, expressive blue eyes and long black eyelashes, had been painted on, and the dolls were adorned with white polka dots and black and yellow pansies. I shook them, expecting to hear the clatter of something inside, but there was no sound. I opened them up, extracting doll after doll until I got to the very last. Inside, wrapped in tissue paper to muffle the sound, was a dull brass key engraved with the number forty-two.

  As I stood holding the key, I finally figured out a way to get to the safe-deposit box. It would be tricky, but if I was a good enough liar I could probably pull it off. I left Paul’s house immediately and drove home, where I pulled the box of Carly’s things I had decided to keep out from under my bed. Inside, buried under photo albums and stuffed animals and a shoebox full of gently worn notes we’d passed to each other in class, was a plastic folder containing an assortment of official documents I couldn’t throw away. One was the authorization letter for the safe-deposit box that I’d found earlier in Carly’s desk; maybe I should’ve given it back to Paul, but I hadn’t wanted to give away anything that might come in handy. Another was Carly’s driver’s license.

  As I drove into the valley, I remembered the promise I’d made to Neily: No lies, no tricks, no secrets. I kept thinking I should call him, that he should be there when I opened the box, but every time I considered this possibility I rejected it. I would share the contents of the box with Neily if I found anything relevant, but until then it was mine alone.

  It was almost closing time when I arrived at the bank. I strode up to the counter as confidently as possible and handed over the key and the letter.

  “I’d like to open a safe-deposit box,” I told the clerk. “It belongs to my parents, but my dad authorized me to access it.”

  The clerk read the letter carefully. “Do you have identification, Miss Ribelli?” she asked.