The Truth Beneath the Lies

by Amanda Searcy

  My heart thuds in my ears, so I’m not sure I hear him right.

  He points. “I grew up here.” I follow his finger. Bluebird Estates looms over us. “Apartment 32. The water never got hot on Tuesdays.” He laughs.

  My face must be glowing electric red. I can’t believe I thought for a second that Albert could be the attacker. He’s so Albert, with his vest laid out on the backseat so it doesn’t get wrinkled.

  His phone rings. A frown passes over his face. “I have to get this,” he says.

  “Thanks for the ride.”

  “Hey, Kayla? We might have some openings for stockers this summer….” He trails off. Albert is willing to break the rules for me. My heart rises in my chest. Shonda will get better and go back to McDonald’s. I’ll go back to No Limit. The world will be almost right again.

  “Thanks.” This time I mean it.

  —

  “Kayla,” Finn whispers through a crack in apartment 21. “Kayla.”

  “Not now, Finn.” I keep walking.

  Mom doesn’t open the door when I approach. Voices come from inside. I turn the knob and push the door open enough to stick my head through. Detective Cavallo is perched on the same too-small chair. Mom sits across from him. They look like two people on a blind date who have run out of things to say.

  Mom jumps to her feet when she sees me. “There you are,” she almost shouts. The smile on her face is manic. She pushes me into a chair and disappears to her room.

  Cavallo glances at his watch and then raises an eyebrow in what I assume is a fatherly gesture.

  “You let him go?” I ask to take his attention off me.

  The color leaves his face. He picks at a torn piece of skin on the side of his thumb. It isn’t an act. This is real.

  “It’s not him.”

  “Are you sure? You said he gave you a fake ID. Did you do the fingerprints and DNA and stuff?”

  He glares. “I’m sure. The dispatcher typed his driver’s license number wrong when the officer called it in. It was a simple mistake. Everything checked out in the end.”

  “Then why are you here?” I see Mom peek her head out from her room in my peripheral vision.

  Cavallo sees her, takes a deep breath, and lowers his voice to a whisper. “I shouldn’t be telling you this, but you need to stay away from Drake and his, uh, associate.”

  “Associate? You mean Jordan?”

  He nods. “You’re young, Kayla. You have your whole life ahead of you. Study, go to football games, kiss high school boys.”

  Another fatherly gesture. Cavallo talked to Jordan once under circumstances that were my fault. Now he thinks Jordan’s too old for me? Wrong for me? He may be a cop and all, but he’s not my father. He’s known me for, like, ten minutes. He doesn’t get to tell me how to live my life. I stand up. “Is there anything else?”

  He shakes his head. I show him to the door.

  Mom creeps out like a scared cat. She glances around and straightens up. “What was that about?”

  I shrug. She doesn’t need to know.

  A knock on the door echoes through the apartment and sends Mom scampering away again.

  I open the door. Finn shoves a piece of paper at me. “I’m not your secretary,” he growls, and storms away.

  Shannon is awake

  “Do you mean Shonda? Shonda is awake?” I yell at his closed door. He opens it and gives me the finger.

  —

  I can’t sleep. With Albert and Cavallo and my excitement over Shonda waking up, I hadn’t stopped to think about what I did. I got an innocent man arrested—dramatically—in front of a whole restaurant of people. I feel like shit. Worse than I have felt about anything—other than finding Shonda.

  Plus, the man in black is still out there.

  I slip on my shoes and pull my coat over my pajamas. Mom is a sound sleeper, so she doesn’t hear me sneak out the front door. In the hallway, thumping music echoes from upstairs and hides the sound of my footsteps, not that anyone is sober enough to wonder why I’m leaving in the middle of the night.

  I push open the lobby door and see the Camaro parked along Bluebird Lane, right where I thought it would be. I knew Drake would go back to dealing. He has to pay rent somehow. After what I did, who am I to judge him.

  He’s on the phone. I knock on the window. He jumps and drops the phone, like I’ve disturbed a call he doesn’t want anyone to know about. When he registers that it’s me, he rolls the window down. I step back and cringe.

  “What?” he barks.

  I take a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I know you probably hate me, but I wanted you to know that I’m sorry about what I did.” There. I said it.

  He glances around me, but we’re alone. “You did what you thought was right.” I jump at the sound of his voice. It’s soft and low, not filled with anger like I expected. “You did what you thought would help that girl. I respect that.” He reaches his fist out the window. “We’re cool.” I hesitantly bump his fist with mine. I feel tears forming in my eyes. I don’t know what this niceness is about, but it makes me feel even worse about what I did. It would be better if he yelled at me.

  “Tell Jordan”—my voice cracks—“tell him I’m sorry.” Drake nods. I start to walk away.

  “Kayla?” he calls after me. I turn around. Now he’s animated, exasperated. “Stop wandering around by yourself in the middle of the night.”

  I hold a letter in my hand. A folded, forbidden missive. An explanation. An apology. If I have to write my final words, I would want them to be these. I hold it in front of the teasing gap-mouth of the blue mailbox. My fingers need to let go, and it will be off. Flying to a place that seems a million miles away now.

  My fingers won’t release it. They hold firm. My feet bounce back and forth, unclear about the directions they’re receiving. Stay or go.

  The mailboxes are a patchwork of darker shades of blue, wherever graffiti has been covered up. They stand in a line on the main street that runs through town.

  This block is empty. The storefronts boarded up. The stucco cracked.

  The letter in my hand flutters in the breeze. I have to let go.

  A red truck pulls up to the curb next to me. The window rolls down. I slam the letter behind my back and automatically flop the hair over my face to hide the bruise on my cheek.

  The driver leans out. His eyes are obscured by mirrored sunglasses. His smooth, deep brown arm reaches for me. From his fingers dangles my lime-green strappy sandal.

  My heart pounds. My lips roll under. The letter crumples in my fist. Tomás motions the shoe at me. “From that asshole’s description, you’re the only person this could belong to.”

  I step forward. My hand shakes as I reach for it.

  “Thanks,” I whisper. I think. Or maybe it’s in my head, because Tomás doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t move. I stare at myself reflected back where his eyes should be.

  “I, uh…” I don’t know what to say. I’m afraid the memory of what happened with Red will make me collapse to the sidewalk.

  “I’m not a narc,” I blurt out.

  Tomás’s composure of steel breaks. He laughs. “Yeah, I kinda figured that.” His face turns serious again. He points to my shoe. “If he gives you any more trouble, let me know. I’ll take care of it.”

  “Please, don’t tell—”

  He raises his palm to stop me. “Not my business.”

  “Why are you being nice to me?” The words burst out of my mouth like an accusation. I can’t hold back the waterworks anymore.

  He shrugs. “Happy likes you. You’re real with her. Not like those bitches who act nice and then say she’s a slut behind her back.”

  I don’t even know what the word real means now, much less how to be it. I use the hand that’s clutching the letter to wipe my face. The ink smears.

  “I’ve never had a friend like Happy before.” It’s true. I know if I were to tell her—tell her my story—she would listen. She would laugh at the funny part
s and cry at the sad ones. She wouldn’t judge me or roll her eyes or tell me how stupid I was.

  Tomás smiles. Not smiles—beams. He loves her. I can tell. It’s real love, too. Not some knockoff version of love, the kind of love you use when you want something.

  Tomás rolls the window up and pulls away.

  I shove the soggy, wrinkled letter into my pocket. The shoe hasn’t done anything to me. It covered my foot and then got left behind. I dump it in a trash can anyway. I won’t be able to look at it again. It’s a reminder, a symbol of what I almost did to myself.

  Shit has happened to me. Lots of it. I haven’t felt in control of a single moment of my own life. I’m tired. My feet hurt. My eyes may never be dry again. But I want to do better. I have a friend. Mom is happy. We are part of a community. People look out for one another here. I’ve never had that before.

  I’m not letting anyone take it away from me.

  —

  I stick my head into C&J’s. Mrs. Morales is jotting down notes at the front podium. “Hi, Mrs. Morales. Do you think I can talk to Adrian outside for a second?” I flash her a million-watt smile. She smiles back with motherly pride and yells for Adrian to come up front.

  I step outside and press my back against a pillar that blocks me from being viewed from inside the restaurant. While I wait, I try to channel the nastiest, most evil, manipulative bastard I can think of.

  Adrian steps in front of me. “Bet—”

  I hold a finger in front of his face. “No. It’s my turn to talk now.”

  He crosses his arms and grins. We’ll see how long that lasts.

  “Yes,” I say. “I have two phones. You got me. Maybe that makes me an escaped convict, or a Russian spy, or maybe that makes me exactly who you think I am. But I”—I place my finger on his chest and let it slide down seductively—“have never been caught red-handed in the desert.”

  His face falls a little. “Those Border Patrol agents got a good look at you. I bet they’d love to know what good little Adrian was doing with a woman and child in an isolated shack. And you know what would happen after that? Everyone would find out. Your parents, your teachers, the whole town.”

  I sigh dramatically. “Sure, some of them would pat you on the back for it. But what about the ones who don’t? What about the ones who stop eating at your parents’ restaurant?” I pause and go in for the kill. “What about the fathers who tell their daughters to stay away from you?” He flinches. That was it. That was the nerve.

  I smile. “So here’s the deal, Adrian. I’m going to do whatever I want, talk to whomever I want, and you won’t be able to do a thing about it. Because if you take me down, I’m taking you with me.” His face goes white. “Nod if you understand.” He moves his head almost imperceptibly.

  “Now smile pretty. Everyone’s watching.”

  His lips turn up. He shows some teeth.

  “Good boy.” I place my hand on his shoulder and slide it down to his wrist as I turn away. I wave to Mrs. Morales in the window and walk down the sidewalk.

  When I’m at the end of the shopping center out of view of C&J’s, I throw up into a trash can.

  —

  Mom sits in a pile of white ribbons and red roses. Her calloused fingers loop the ribbon around the flowers in a fast, practiced motion. She holds up the bouquet. A white trail runs down her arm. “What do you think?”

  “Looks great. You’re getting good at that.” I smile. Mom is caught off guard. She examines me for hints of substance abuse or delirium. Finding none, she smiles back. It lights up her whole face.

  I have a grocery sack hanging from my wrist. Inside is a box of store-brand chocolate cake mix and a can of frosting. It isn’t as fancy as I wanted, but it was all my piddly allowance could buy.

  I place the groceries on the counter and search the cabinets for a cupcake tin. I catch a glimpse of the disturbed duffel bag. I push a stockpot in front of it and glance up at Mom. She’s humming to herself in the garden of roses that was once our dining room table. I find the cupcake tin and set it next to the sack on the counter, like I do this every day. Like this is a normal thing. Making cupcakes on a sunny afternoon.

  I feel a buzz in my pocket. I turn on my heels. Mom glances over her shoulder as I run to my bedroom. I shut the door and pull the back monster out. It’s silent. The phone didn’t vibrate. It was my jumpy imagination. I expect him to call, expect him to read my mind from afar. Expect him to know about the money, the letter, Adrian.

  I put the crumpled letter into the bag with the sweatshirt under my bed. They can keep each other company. I lie down and listen to my heart beating.

  A few minutes later, Mom knocks on the door. “Betsy, are you going to bake something? Do you want me to preheat the oven?”

  “Yes.” It comes out as a strangled whisper.

  —

  I texted Happy to meet me at the park. When I pull up and wrestle the Tupperware of cupcakes out of the car, she’s sitting on a bench with her back to me. Her short legs that don’t touch the ground swing back and forth. If you didn’t know who she was, she would seem like a joyful, carefree child.

  When I walk around the bench, her belly comes into view, then the dark circles under her eyes, then her mouth, hard, pinched, and unsmiling.

  “Hi,” I say, and sit down next to her. She tilts her head with curiosity.

  I take a deep breath. “I know that you have a lot of friends, and they’ve probably thrown you a baby shower.” My lungs have trouble exhaling all the way, forcing me to suck in another shallow breath to keep talking. “But here.” I shove the cupcakes at her. “These are for you.”

  I’m no good at this. Her eyes meet mine. I feel my face get hot. “You’re my good thing,” I say. “You’re my good thing that happened because I’m here in San Justo.” I feel stupid and clumsy. This is not how I imagined this going. I wanted to thank her for being my friend, even though I have been a terrible one back. Thank her for talking to me that first day of school, for introducing me to the Morales family and Tomás and treating me like the human being that I’m not sure I am.

  She peels the top off the box. “Wow,” she says.

  There’s another thing. I can’t chicken out now. I place a card in her hand. I couldn’t find anything else to write on, so it’s one of Mom’s business cards. I blacked out her information and wrote on the back.

  “ ‘Good for babysitting whenever you want,’ ” Happy reads aloud. “Really?” She’s right to be skeptical. I nod.

  She turns away. This was a stupid thing to do. I have made a colossal fool of myself. I should go before I make things worse. I move to stand up, but Happy looks back at me. Her eyes are glassy.

  “This is the nicest thing anyone has ever done for me.”

  “Really?” I ask.

  She nods as she wipes her face. “Hormones,” she says, and dives into the cupcakes, smearing chocolate icing on the sides of her mouth.

  If it’s true that food takes on the emotions of the preparer, these cupcakes probably taste like blood and dirt and tears, but Happy doesn’t seem to notice. She eats three, blissfully smiling to herself.

  A guard is posted outside of Shonda’s room. His long limbs and pale, skinny body are folded like a praying mantis into a small, white chair. He holds a comic book up with one hand.

  When he sees us walking toward him, he stands and blocks the door. “She’s not allowed visitors.”

  Even though both he and I tower over Shonda’s grandmother, she maneuvers me around him and into the room.

  She pulls a chair next to Shonda’s bed and motions for me to sit.

  The guard follows us in. “Ma’am, you can’t…”

  She raises an eyebrow. His mouth shuts.

  “I’ll give you your privacy,” she says, and pulls the curtain across the room. Her heels clack along the sterile white tile into the hallway.

  Shonda’s eyes are closed. I sit and reach for her hand. The same one I held in the woods that night.
r />   She stirs. One of her legs is suspended above the bed in an elaborate contraption. The opposite arm is enclosed in a pink cast. Oxygen tubes limit how far she can turn her head, but her eyes slide to the side to see me.

  “Please,” she whispers, “don’t be mad at me.”

  “What?” I ask.

  “Don’t be mad at me for kissing your boyfriend.”

  At least one of the many machines and tubes she’s hooked up to must contain some pretty heavy pain meds.

  “I’m Kayla,” I say. “I used to see you at McDonald’s.”

  Her eyes droop closed again. “I know. You’re Jordan’s girlfriend. Don’t be mad at me.”

  I squeeze her hand. “Shonda, what are you talking about?”

  “At his house. I tried to kiss him.”

  “When were you at his house? Was the guy with the snake tattoo there? Did he do this to you?” All the horror of the woods rushes back to me.

  “Drake?” she asks. “He gave me a ride home once, so that I would be safe.”

  She tries to moves her head to look at me, dislodging one of the oxygen tubes. She lifts the pink cast, but it drops back to the bed. Her eyes close.

  I fix the tubes and say her name forcefully. I can see the effort she puts forth to keep her eyes open.

  “Who did this to you?”

  “I don’t know. He hit me from behind. I don’t remember anything except being cold and hearing your voice tell me I was going to be okay.”

  I look away. I don’t want her to see my face crumple.

  “I told Jordan I had never seen the ocean before. He said he had his own ocean, but I didn’t believe him. He took me to his house and down to the water. It was beautiful.”

  “I think I found your nose stud in his bedroom.”

  Her eyes slide away from me again. Her broken arm reaches her face this time. She touches her nose and winces. She turns back to me. “I tried to kiss him. He was nice about it. He didn’t make me feel stupid. He told me he had feelings for someone else. I asked him if it was the pretty girl from McDonald’s, and he said yes.” Her hand squeezes back against mine. “Please don’t be mad at me.”