by D. J. Palmer
You began to cut. Snip. Snip. You cut and tore at that fabric until one of Wally’s fins dangled from his fuzzy body as if a motorboat had struck him. Next, you jabbed the scissors through Wally’s eye socket, twisting them around until a glass bead of an eye popped out of his stuffed head and bounced on the carpeted floor.
I was so shocked at what I’d seen that I lost my voice, but eventually I whispered, “What are you doing, Penny?”
You whispered back to me, in a voice that sounded different from the one I knew, harsher, colder, “Don’t call me Penny. I’m Eve.”
You looked different, too. There was a strange tilt to your mouth that was almost like a sneer, and a new way you carried your shoulders—thrown back, with more confidence. You had swagger, no other way to describe it. You collected Wally’s eye and took him with you when you left the room.
The next morning you were Penny, the old Penny—head down in your Apple Jacks; your sad, sweet smile—back to the sister I knew.
As for Wally, he vanished, simple as that. I’m not sure Ryan even noticed he was gone. I never said anything because, well, I was your protector and didn’t know what to make of that night. Eve stayed away, so I sort of let it go.
Then you turned twelve, and Eve returned. One day, you and I heard a horrific sound coming from a patch of tall grass as we were walking home from Eisman’s Beach. Mom let me take you there because Eisman’s had a lifeguard on duty, so it was safe—not that we did much swimming in those frigid waters. Even so, on a hot summer day, ocean water up to your ankles could cool you down just like an ice bath. We were heading home on Puritan Road, carrying two chairs and a beach bag, when we heard the noise.
We didn’t know what to make of it. It was a hissing, anguished, high-pitched whine. When we finally located the source, we found a gray-and-black tabby cat lying in the tall grass, its back broken. That much was obvious from the unnatural bend of its body, a U-shaped curve that had almost folded the poor animal in half. Two of its legs were shattered, their bones sticking out from the fur, and it had a long gash in its abdomen that showed what was happening on the inside. The cat saw us standing over it, and I swear those green eyes were pleading with us to end its misery.
We were both in total shock.
“A car must have hit it,” I said softly. “What else could have done that?”
“She’s hurting,” you said, your voice quivering with fright. You had tears in your eyes, as did I. “She can’t be saved. Look at her.”
I looked away instead.
“I should call Mom … or the vet. I have a phone,” I said breathlessly. “We’ll call the animal hospital.”
“It’s going to take too long,” you said with evident despair. “A minute of this is too long. Look at her. She’s suffering.”
You pointed. This time you made me look. And you were right—never in my life had I seen such torment. The cat was writhing on the ground, moving as much as it could with a broken back and broken legs, making a gravelly, groaning sound like a door creaking open. Sometimes the noises were higher pitched, sharper, as if the animal were calling out to say, Help … please help me.
“What should we do?” I shouted my question out of sheer panic.
You searched the ground until your gaze settled on a big rock lying in a tangle of weeds. When I realized what it was you were looking at, what had to be on your mind, I started shaking my head vigorously.
“No. No. We can’t,” I said.
And you said, “It’s hurting. It’s going to take too long to put her out of her misery. She can’t be saved. You know it’s true.”
And it was true. We didn’t need to be veterinarians to figure that one out. So I guess that’s why I didn’t stop you, didn’t say no, didn’t ask you to drop it, didn’t do anything at all when you bent down and stuck your fingers beneath the rock, tugging and tugging until you pried it free from the soft earth into which it had sunk. I didn’t call Mom or the vet. There were no passing cars to flag down. It was just the two of us when you lifted up the rock and cradled it against your belly.
I heard you grunt before you hoisted it over your head. It was heavy, lopsided, and must have been difficult, but you had a strength that day that I’d never seen before. I watched you for a second as you swayed on your feet, the muscles of your arms straining against the heavy weight, fighting for balance. There was this look on your face, a kind of excitement—a strange satisfaction brimming there. I couldn’t look at you, so I settled my gaze back on that poor cat.
You started the countdown.
“One…”
My stomach tightened. The cat meowed like a siren’s wail, as if it knew what was coming.
“Two…”
My hands balled into fists. I dug my heels into the ground, bracing myself for the inevitable. When I glanced over at you, there wasn’t a bit of fear in your eyes, not a single indication of uncertainty or doubt on your face. Instead of seeming nervous, to me you appeared eager, and I had to look away again. But, looking at the cat continue to struggle, hissing now, knowing that the end was near, I couldn’t do that, either, so instead I just stood there with my eyes closed tight.
I heard you grunt, one final heave-ho effort, before you let out a scream like a war cry.
“Three!”
As sunspots danced on the lids of my shuttered eyes, I screamed too. But it wasn’t loud enough to drown out the thud of the rock and the crack of bone. The hissing stopped, and the air was soon filled with the smell of blood.
When I finally found the courage to open my eyes, I went completely cold inside. First I saw the cat, its body as still as the rock lying on top of it. I turned my head slowly to look at you. There you stood, your arms limply at your sides, surveying what you’d done with a look of astonishment on your face. You’d shed no tears, and you showed no fear, no sorrow, no hint of remorse. Worse, your eyes held a strange sparkle. There was dark satisfaction glimmering there, and I couldn’t help but think that you’d gotten a twisted thrill out of what you’d done.
That look on your face, in your eyes—I’d seen it before, when you had Wally in one hand and a pair of scissors in the other. I asked in a voice soft as the warm summer breeze that ruffled your long hair, “Eve, is that you?”
You turned your head slowly to look at me, as if you’d just realized I was standing right beside you. You kept your unblinking gaze fixed on me for a time as a slight grin came to your face. And without saying a word, your smile brightened as you sent me a single nod.
CHAPTER 19
THE DINING ROOM AT Big Frank’s was a quarter full, better than usual, but not good enough. Customers contentedly grazed on pizzas, calzones, and salads, but Grace had no appetite at all. She was busy in the kitchen, helping Annie prepare pies and such, thinking mostly about Mitch and their meeting with Navarro.
As she was layering sauce on a pizza, Grace layered more guilt onto herself.
“Maybe if we’d met Dr. Cross sooner, knew about DID sooner, got Penny better treatment, none of this would have happened,” Grace lamented to Annie, who was slicing veggies next to her with the skill of a Hibachi chef.
She left out how frustrating it was that after all the effort to get a proper diagnosis it wasn’t sticking, not with Palumbo and apparently not with Mitch either. Of course she was grateful that Mitch had a plan that might help keep Penny out of prison, but with the trial so close, and Eve so difficult, it was a long shot—or a moon shot, as Navarro had implied.
“I think you’re being too hard on yourself,” Annie said, her knife a blur against the cutting board. “Everyone thought Ruby was a routine. You couldn’t have known it was DID. And then, well, when Chloe came, you didn’t even know it was an alter. If it weren’t for therapy, you wouldn’t have even known any of these alters had names. One day Penny just announces that she wants to get straight As in school and you’re supposed to think … what? It’s not really Penny? I would have been happy as could be if my kids ever committed to their scho
oling like that.”
Grace had to laugh, because that was just how she’d felt back then. Happy. Her concern had been only that Penny would be too hard on herself if she fell short of that goal.
“There were signs much earlier, is all I’m saying,” Grace said definitively. “The rock incident, remember that?”
“Refresh, please,” Annie replied with a slight grimace of embarrassment. “A lot has happened to you, and this old noggin has downshifted.” She rapped her knuckles against her skull.
“I’m sure you remember that Penny and Ryan were always squabbling—he said this, she did that—that kind of thing.”
“Oh yeah, that I do remember.”
“And Arthur thought it was jealousy on Ryan’s part. You know, Penny took a lot of the attention away from him.”
“I remember that, too.”
“Then one day, after a fight about some nonsense, Penny threw a rock that hit Ryan in the head. She was … what, twelve? Thirteen? Way too old for that behavior, but she said she was just messing around and didn’t mean to hit him. Next morning, Penny found her confiscated phone and was using it like nothing had happened.
“I reminded her about her punishment, but instead of defending herself, she was utterly horrified. She had no memory of throwing that rock and burst into tears, poor thing, saying how she’d never hurt Ryan. Memory loss is a sign of trouble, plain and simple. It was one of her alters who threw that rock, and I bet you anything it was Eve. I should have known, should have done something sooner, and that’s all there is to it.”
Grace noticed Ryan hovering nearby. He was carrying a box of potatoes retrieved from the back storeroom, and sported a brand-new, plum-colored Big Frank’s polo shirt, which he had custom made for the staff to wear.
Grace liked the shirts well enough, thought they looked sharp. She was especially fond of the embroidered depiction of Ryan’s grandfather, the restaurant’s namesake, spinning a pizza on his outstretched (and stitched) finger. It was the spitting image of Francesco, aka Frank, right down to the same bald spot that Arthur had inherited. Ryan hoped that a new look would attract new customers, but the dwindling receipts couldn’t be the only explanation for the brooding look haunting his face. It all fell apart soon after Penny’s arrest. What had happened between then and now? The question continued to bedevil her.
“Talking about my darling sister?” Ryan asked as he set the box down atop a stainless steel prep table. Standing upright, he wrapped his arms across his broad chest in a way that made his biceps pop in the sleeves of the polo.
“I had a meeting with her lawyer and new doctor today,” Grace explained. “Dr. McHugh is going to try to reach Penny’s alters. He believes if he connects with them, he might be able to demonstrate she wasn’t in control that night … that she suffered some kind of psychotic break when she met Rachel for the first time in person.”
“I thought Eve was all dug in. So he’s going to free the hostages, is that it?” Ryan said incredulously.
“It’s possible,” Grace said. “If not, he doesn’t think the jury will buy the insanity defense.”
“That’s fair. I don’t buy any of this nonsense about alternate personalities.” Ryan’s eyelids lowered, and Grace saw something in him that reminded her of Eve. “It’s so absurd,” he went on. “She’s crazy as a loon. Always has been. That Palumbo guy was spot on when he called her a psychopath. Psychotic break? Give me a break. She wanted to kill, wrote about killing, even wrote that she was going to kill Rachel Boyd, and then she went and did it. What more do you need to know?”
“Ryan, please,” Grace said, invoking the mother tone that had worked well only when her children were young.
He was heading back to the cash register when Grace heard the tinkling sound of the little brass bell above the front door. From the kitchen, she peered around Ryan to observe three men entering the restaurant. They were definitely not regulars.
Two of the men Grace did not know at all: dark-haired, dark-eyed, greasy-looking fellows, both in grease-stained work clothes. They moved from the front door to the counter with a cocky indifference that would have sent her across the street had she encountered them on a sidewalk.
The man in the middle, however, Grace recognized without a second glance because his picture had been all over the scandal-loving news around the time of the murder—Vincent Rapino, Rachel Boyd’s paramour, who had never before found cause to set foot inside Big Frank’s. Rapino was tall and thin, standing a head above his two companions. He came forward in something of a prowl, catlike on his feet, head darting around, surveying the restaurant with probing eyes.
Ryan, who was manning the cash register, politely waited to take food orders from these men, not realizing who it was approaching him. Or if he did, he played it extremely cool. Grace undid her apron as she came out from the kitchen to join Ryan at the front counter.
“I’ve got this, Mom,” Ryan said.
“No,” Grace muttered to him, talking in a low voice. “I don’t think you do.”
“Well, well, well,” said Rapino, locking eyes on Grace as he smacked a calloused hand against the red laminate countertop. “Gracie Francone. What are the chances?”
He had a voice hard and cutting as a saw blade, which sent a shiver through Grace’s body. Although he wore baggy jeans and an untucked plaid shirt, Grace could tell Rapino was ripped with muscle. He had his shirt rolled up, revealing sleeves of tattoos that wrapped around his arms like growing vines. His lean, sharp-featured face was pockmarked and covered in a heavy five-o’clock shadow. Beneath his thick black eyebrows, his eyes gave off the same ominous feel as storm clouds.
“How are you, Grace?” Rapino asked. Grace could smell cigarette smoke on his breath, and booze too, enough that you’d want to keep a match away from that mouth.
“Hello, Vince,” Grace said, trying to sound calmer than she felt. “What brings you here?”
Rapino sent his two companions an overly exaggerated look of surprise.
“I thought this was a place where you could get something to eat,” he said with a derisive laugh.
Grace swallowed hard before doing a reset. It shouldn’t be a total shock to see him here, she told herself. The trial was coming up, so Penny was back in the news. She knew his auto repair place was in Lynn, and he was from there—but while Lynn had plenty of pizzerias, there were no laws on the books preventing his patronage here.
Rapino rubbed a hand across his head and through hair the color of oil.
“What can I get you?” Grace asked, fixing the three men with something of a gunfighter’s stare. She knew they had come to harass her, but she didn’t know how it would play out.
Rapino scanned the menus behind Grace—a set of blackboards in varnished wood frames, arranged so that they blocked the view of some industrial ventilation equipment. Most of the lettering on the menus was done using decals, but Annie always wrote out the daily specials in chalk. Today’s was any slice and a soda for $4.99.
Rapino let out an exasperated sigh that sounded forced. “I was hoping to get a birthday cake,” he said, running his tongue across his lips like he was licking off imaginary frosting. “Don’t see it on the menu.”
A confused look bloomed on Ryan’s face.
“This is a pizza place,” he said curtly. “I think Whole Foods is open; you can get a cake there.”
“Whole Paycheck?” Rapino sounded aghast. “I’ll pass.” And he barked a soulless laugh.
“You know why he wants a birthday cake?” the shorter of Rapino’s two minions asked in an accent straight out of Southie.
“Tell him,” said Rapino, keeping his ominous stare fixed firmly on Grace.
“It’s Rachel Boyd’s birthday today,” said the other man, who hadn’t spoken yet.
Ryan leaned his body over the counter, closing the short gap between him and Rapino, no fear in his eyes. Grace could see the muscles in Ryan’s broad shoulders go taut beneath that plum-colored polo.
“What the hell is this about?” he asked. Rapino took a single step back out of striking distance—he was no dummy. Grace suspected that Ryan could give these men a go, but hopefully he’d stand his ground. Three-to-one odds weren’t in his favor.
“Want to tell him, Gracie, or should I?” said Rapino, casting a chiding smile.
“This is Vince Rapino,” Grace said to Ryan, somehow keeping a cool demeanor while her heart pounded wildly. “He was Rachel’s—”
Grace suspected Ryan remembered the name, but she wasn’t sure how to label Vince and Rachel’s relationship. She didn’t have to think long, because in her brief pause Rapino answered for her.
“She was my girlfriend—something like that, right? Girlfriend,” he repeated. “But that really pissed off my wife.” Rapino scratched at a spot under his chin with a neutral expression. She couldn’t tell what this man really felt, or if he felt anything at all.
“Now, though … now I got divorce papers, child support, and all the crap that goes with it. And you know what I’m thinking? I’m thinking that my wife—we’d been married eleven years, two kids—thinking that she might not have known about Rachel and me if your daughter, Gracie—your crazy, bitch-ass daughter—didn’t carve her up like a goddamn pumpkin.” The bit of lightness that had momentarily come to Rapino’s face emptied on the spot.
“What do you want, Vince?”
Heat flushed Grace’s cheeks as a prickle of unease danced across the nape of her neck.
“No harm here,” Rapino said, holding up his hands as a truce. “We were driving around, saw your big, bright sign, and thought, ‘Hey, let’s get some birthday cake to celebrate Rachel on her special day,’ and we come in … and I’m like, ‘Wow, Grace Francone, here you are, what a shock.’ It’s like Rachel herself guided us here.”
He made a flourishing gesture to the heavens, but Grace wasn’t deluding herself that Vince’s trip to Big Frank’s had anything to do with some mystical influence from the beyond.
“Like you didn’t know my mom worked here,” Ryan said. Grace could sense him getting hotter.