Mary (Bloody Mary)

by Hillary Monahan

  “No, thanks,” I said. I didn’t want to see all those people. I didn’t want to answer the questions I knew were coming. I had the answers, but no one would believe me. I didn’t trust myself not to scream them in someone’s face. It was much safer to stay at home and grieve, and if not grieve, then to sleep forever so I didn’t have to feel anything.

  Mom looked surprised. “Really? I thought…She’s your friend. Why not?” It should have occurred to me she’d ask that, and I should have had an answer prepared, but I didn’t. I glanced at the wall and shrugged. She reached out to lift my chin with her finger so I was forced to look at her. “Shauna?”

  “I’m afraid of what we might find,” I blurted. “If she’s dead and mangled and…you know.” It was weak, I knew it was weak, but it was the best I could come up with on the spot.

  I was afraid she’d see right through it. She frowned, but after a moment, she pulled away from me and sighed. “Okay. I suppose I can understand that. That’d be hard. Well, harder. It’s just…I don’t know if I should go. One of us should, I think, but I don’t want to leave you alone.”

  “No, it’s okay. I’m okay, and if you do find something, you should call me. I just can’t, not right now. I want to sleep.”

  She watched me for a long while before shaking her head. “No, I don’t think I will. Go to sleep. I’ll be right outside if you need me.”

  I was just about to drift off when a knock struck our front door. I rolled out of bed to poke my head into the hall. Standing in the apartment doorway in his service blues was a police officer. My pulse pounded in my ears. I forced myself to approach, my arms wrapping around my chest so he couldn’t see that I wasn’t wearing a bra.

  He was nice, all things considered. He asked me when I’d seen Anna last, and I told him in the bathroom after lunch. Had I heard from her on the phone after that? No. Did I have any reasons to suspect she’d run away? No. Had she been spending time with anyone unusual? No. It took five minutes for him to question me. He left me a name and a contact number before wishing Mom and me a good night.

  When the door closed behind him, Mom peered at me from her seat on the couch.

  “Are you okay?” she asked.

  “No.”

  Mom woke me Wednesday with news that school had been canceled while the investigation continued. I rolled over and went back to sleep. When I came out of my bedroom at nine, Mom was on the phone, standing next to the refrigerator. She had called in to work. Her too-loud phone conversation also informed me that search parties had scoured for Anna throughout the night, and scent dogs had been brought in to find her, but so far there’d been no trace.

  Nor would there be, but I was one of only two people who knew that. Maybe three, if Jess had told Kitty. Who I hadn’t even called yet. I ran my fingers over my face and groaned.

  “Are you okay?” Mom asked, her hand moving to cover the receiver on the phone.

  I shrugged. She offered me a box of cereal for breakfast, but I waved her off. I wasn’t hungry. I wasn’t anything except numb.

  “Right. I’ll call you back in a bit, Luanne,” she said, flipping her phone closed and sliding it into her pocket. She motioned me to a chair, and I sat in it because I had no idea what to do with myself. I drifted through the apartment like a ghost. “She asked if we wanted to join this morning’s search. They’re moving out from the school to the Hockomock Swamp.”

  “You go. I’ll be fine,” I said.

  “You don’t look fine, but I guess that’s to be expected.” She shook her head. “But I’d like to help with the search. All I can think is what if it had been you? The Sasakis must be beside themselves. But I don’t want to leave you alone if you’re not all right.”

  “I can handle being alone.”

  “If you’re sure.” She sounded hesitant, like she needed my reassurance that I wasn’t going to disappear on her if she left for a few hours.

  “I’m sure,” I said. Logically, I knew I should want her to stay. I should want hugs and love and every ounce of maternal care that I could get. But I was too emotionally stunted to give a damn what she did. I was a hollow robot going through the motions of being human.

  Mom got back on the phone, and I craned my head to eyeball the bathroom, weighing the risks of a quick shower. I really couldn’t put it off much longer. I retrieved the box of salt from my bureau and prepped the bathroom as efficiently as possible, even shaking a few granules on top of the shower lever and showerhead to keep the water from turning muddy. I used facecloths as anchors, too, so the crystals couldn’t slide off.

  I’d adjusted the shower temperature when I spotted Mary watching me from the frosted panels. It was that same hazy, mirage-like image it’d been the first time, like she was on the other side waiting for me. Instead of freaking out, I skipped the conditioner and got my ass out of there as quickly as possible. I didn’t care that she watched me. There was no fear.

  This should have been victory. For the first time, I’d mastered my terror over the ghost on my tail, but there was no joy there, only resignation. Mary watched me because she’d always watch me. It was what my life had become.

  As I left the bathroom, a towel on my head and one around my body, Mom was heading for the door dressed in jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt, and work boots. She looked like she was going to a construction site. I understood why—the Hockomock Swamp was overgrown and dense. I’d been in there for a biology field trip once, and it’d been a punishing, wet experience.

  “Hey, Luanne’s waiting for me downstairs. The car’s in the driveway if you need it, but if you go out, text me? I don’t want to come home to an empty house. I think I’d have a meltdown.” I nodded. She blew me a kiss and turned to leave, but stopped before stepping over the threshold. She looked at me over her shoulder, her fingers drumming on the back of the couch. “You’re sure about my going? If you want me to stay—”

  “Go, Mom. I’m fine. I’m here.”

  She cast me another long look before rushing over to hug me, her lips grazing the towel on top of my head. “All right, all right. Humor your old lady. She’s worried about you.” I hugged her back, and she took that to mean she really could go, that I wasn’t going to erupt or die because she abandoned me for a few hours. She stroked a hand over my bare shoulder and ran for the door to meet her friend.

  With Mom gone, I knew I had to call Kitty. I didn’t want to, but I had to. I grabbed my phone from the nightstand. Waiting for me were a dozen missed calls and a series of texts from Jess, each one angrier and angrier. I scrolled through, deleting most of them until I got to the second-to-last one. It leant me pause, and I found my upper lip curling like a rabid dog about to bite.

  Working to get u unhaunted and ur ignoring me. Don’t b a bitch.

  The insinuation that I didn’t care about my well-being was a nasty grenade for her to lob. I texted her back with a simple, Go away. Before she could blitz me with more messages, I dialed Kitty’s number. A half a ring in, Kitty picked up with a pathetic whimper.

  “Sh-Shauna, I ca—I can’t. I can’t. Bronx and n-n-now Anna.” Before she could complete the thought, she was crying, and I was close to joining her. I breathed hard, full draws in through the nose and out through the mouth to keep my calm. It helped a little; only a few tears leaked from the corners of my eyes to dribble down my cheeks.

  “I know. I’m sorry I didn’t call. I was so messed up. My mom just left to join a search party, and I want to say something to her but I can’t,” I said.

  “What can you say? No one would believe.…God. I can’t believe she’s gone. She’s been my b-best friend since we were six. Six!”

  The next half hour was spent doing what I could to comfort her, but words weren’t sufficient. Nothing I could say would help. Kitty was entitled to her grief. So was I, for that matter. I wrapped up the call when my voice started cracking every other word.

  “I love you, Kitty. I’m so sorry. I tried to save her. I did everything I could. I’m sorr
y,” I said.

  “I know. I know you did. Th-thank you. I love you, too.” She sniffled and croaked out a good-bye before hanging up. I cradled my cell to my chest, feeling worse than I had when I’d called, but that was no surprise—Kitty sounded awful. We both carried the burden of Anna’s death, but hers was heavier. Anna and Kitty were more sisters than not. Now one sister was gone.

  I rolled onto my hip to face the wall. It took a few minutes of slow, deep breathing to get my wits about me. I’d cry again today, it was inevitable, but I had one more thing I needed to do before I let myself wallow. I had to talk to Cody.

  She barked a hello a moment later.

  “Hi. It’s me,” I said.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I saw the news.”

  I whimpered and dug my teeth into the sides of my tongue. That simple statement rocked me to the core. She could have chided me because I hadn’t forced Anna out of my life like she’d told me to do twice already, but she didn’t. There was nothing except sympathy in her tone. In a weird, twisted way, I almost wished she’d yelled at me instead. The anger would have given me something to cleave to.

  “Thank you. I just wanted to let you know, and I told Jess off and I…Maybe next week we’ll hit the church? I need a few days,” I said.

  Cody sucked in a deep breath. “Yes. We’ll go when you’re ready. In the meanwhile, I think that’s for the best. To keep Jess away. She called me this morning and I…There’s something not right there. Take care of yourself and keep her at arm’s length.”

  “What’d she do now?” I asked. I could hear the hesitation in Cody’s voice, debating whether or not she should tell me. It was strange; she was such a straight shooter that I never figured she’d hedge on anything, but something Jess had said bothered her. Jess had somehow managed to flap the unflappable. “Cody?”

  “Right, I’m sorry.” Cody grumbled beneath her breath. “She was asking about the tag—how I got haunted, the circumstances of it. But it wasn’t so much what she was asking as how she was asking it that bothered me. Which is why I didn’t want to say anything because it’s hard to convey appropriately.…You know what it was? Your friend sounded excited and intense, and for a minute, just a minute…” Cody paused to suck in a deep breath before blowing it out into the receiver. It nearly deafened me, but not so much that I couldn’t hear her when she said, “…for a minute I really didn’t know whose side she was on. Ours or Mary’s.”

  I was done crying. I was still miserable, but thinking about Jess, I was also angry. And anger was fuel. I could channel it and concentrate on the matter at hand—getting unhaunted. What did I know? Jess had been too invested in Mary since the beginning. I’d chalked it up to enthusiasm for something new and cool, and though it seemed like forever ago now, I felt excited about Mary in the beginning, too.

  The problem was that Jess knew things we didn’t and had all along. She dropped information when we absolutely needed it, but she had never been forthright with it. I sensed she had a piece of the Mary puzzle that I was missing, but how was I supposed to get it from her? Even if we were talking, I couldn’t assume she’d be straight with me. She’d been lying by omission all along. It was frustrating, doubly so because I had so very little to go on. There was the church, yes, and I would revisit that hellhole soon enough, but what else could I do from home?

  I abandoned my bed and turned on my laptop, keeping the salt on hand in case Mary tried anything cute with the screen. The search engine popped up and I stared at it awhile, wondering where I should begin. The only new development was the Dietrich lady who’d been in all those pictures at the church. I followed Bronx’s advice and signed up for an ancestry Web site.

  At first, it didn’t look like much. Adeline Dietrich was born in Solomon’s Folly in 1940. Her mother’s maiden name was Abigail Brown, and she had married Richard Dietrich. Adeline had one sister named Ruth. Following the Brown line, Abigail was the child of Michael Brown, who was the only child of Mary Simpson Brown, who was the child of…

  I stopped reading and stared. Mary Simpson Brown was the child of Constance and Edward Simpson, and Constance’s maiden name was Worth. I clicked on Constance’s sister, and there it was, Mary’s name, with the dates of 1847–1864. Adeline Dietrich was related to Mary Worth. Frantically, I jotted it all down on a piece of paper so I could show it to Cody when I saw her. I wasn’t sure how Mary’s family tree would help us, but maybe the clue to putting the ghost away for good existed somewhere in the names on this page.

  I pored over the tree once more to ensure I hadn’t misread anything. This time, instead of only paying attention to the mothers and fathers, I branched off to look at siblings, too. There were a few who had died young in the late 1800s and early 1900s, and a few others who’d died childless. The tree didn’t extend all that far, most of it contained to Massachusetts and Solomon’s Folly in particular. By the time I got back to Ruth Dietrich, Adeline’s sister, I was ready to be finished, but I clicked on Ruth’s name all the same. When the screen popped up, I had to rub my eyes once, twice, three times, because I couldn’t believe what was in front of me.

  Ruth Dietrich maintained her maiden name as her legal name, but she had married in 1962. Why she’d kept her name wasn’t interesting to me. What was interesting was who she’d married. Augustus McAllister. He and Ruth had one child together. Stuart McAllister. Jess’s dad.

  “Holy shit,” I whispered. I clicked on Stuart, and sure enough, listed beneath him and his wife, Allison Jamison McAllister, were their two children—Jessica and Todd. Augustus McAllister was the colander-wearing Grandpa Gus, and Jess’s Aunt Dell must have been a nickname for Aunt Adeline. In the church, I’d said there was something familiar about those pictures of Adeline. What was familiar was that she looked like Jess.

  I didn’t have the complete puzzle, but I did have one more answer. This wasn’t about some stupid ghost hunt for Jess. This wasn’t a game. This was about her legacy, and her legacy was that she, Jess McAllister, was a blood relative of Mary Worth.

  I didn’t know what to do with the information. On one hand, I wanted to confront Jess. On the other, that’d require talking to her. I tried calling Kitty back, but she wasn’t picking up her phone. She’d mentioned going to the hospital to see Bronx when we’d talked earlier, and they didn’t allow her to have her phone on in there. I left her a text to call me later.

  After Kitty, my thumb went to Anna’s speed dial digit. She was always the next one on the rotation, the third in the series of friends, but now she was gone. She’d never be here again. I climbed back into bed and hugged my pillow, squeezed my eyes closed, and huddled underneath my blankets. The vague excitement I’d felt over the Jess discovery was swallowed by helplessness and despair.

  I’d said I wouldn’t wallow all day, but that’s exactly what I did, right up until my mother came home two hours later. I drifted in and out of sleep, my waking minutes plagued by thoughts of Jess, Mary, and Anna. I didn’t wake up when Mom walked into my room at suppertime, but I almost hit the roof when she leaned over my bed to run her fingers across my forehead. She startled me so much, I almost jumped out of my skin.

  “What?” I shouted, shooting up in bed so fast, I smashed my skull against the wall behind me. It hurt, and I wrapped my arms around my head. Mom reached out to pull me to her, forcing my face into her midsection. She smelled like sweat and outdoors stuff—pine needles and sap and mud. She smelled like the Hockomock Swamp.

  “They called off the search for now,” she said quietly. “Are you okay? Your head?”

  “Yeah. Yeah, I’m okay,” I lied for what felt like the millionth time. Mom’s fingers stroked the back of my neck before traveling up to my newest wound. She probed it a little, and I shrank away from the touch, but the pain was already abating.

  “Good. It sounds like they’re going out looking again tomorrow. I have to go back to work, but if you want to stay home from school, you can.”

  I shook my head. “No, I don’t
want to be here alone.” And I didn’t. For all that I’d fallen into a casual ambivalence about Mary during my shower, I wasn’t stupid enough to court an early demise by staying in a house full of shiny stuff alone any longer than necessary. I’d been lucky so far, but luck wouldn’t last. I was overdue for another ghostly visit.

  I was silent all the way to Mom’s work the next morning. Before relinquishing the car to me for the day, she made me restate my promise to call her the moment I walked into the apartment. I swore I would, and she held both of my cheeks while she kissed me, telling me twice how much she loved me.

  I pulled the car out of her work parking lot and drove exactly one street down before pulling over. Packing tape and a lot of salt later, I had the car warded enough that I didn’t have to fear for my life.

  I didn’t expect school to be so full. I figured more parents would keep their kids at home considering the potential kidnapper in our midst. Police were stationed outside of the main entrances, and there was a news van parked along the street. I walked in through the parking lot doors and made a beeline for my locker, but before I could reach it, there was a hard tug on my wrist from behind.

  “I have to talk to you,” Jess said.

  I yanked my hand away and kept walking.

  “Stop. Seriously, we need to talk. I’ve got something going on af—”

  “Shut up. SHUT UP!” I hollered, whipping my head around to glare at her. People stopped to stare at us, some whispering behind their hands. I leaned toward Jess, my lips inches away from her ear. “I know, Jess. I know why you dragged us into this. I know why you’re so hung up on Mary. I hope it was worth Bronx’s legs. I hope seeing your great-aunt was worth Anna, you bitch.”

  She looked like I’d struck her. There should have been some satisfaction in her stunned silence, but there was only hurt and anger. Everyone had lost so much while Jess stood there without a single blond hair out of place.