Before
“SO, WHAT DO YOU GIRLS HAVE PLANNED for the weekend?” Devin’s mother smiled at us as she chopped tomatoes. She looked like one of those chefs on the cooking channel with the checkered apron, shining silver pots, and a bottle of cooking sherry beside her. She was stealing sips from the bottle, but everything Mrs. Rhodes did was somehow elegant, even when it was happy hour at two in the afternoon.
“We’ll probably go to the mall,” said Devin. “Right, Cass?” She looked at me and smiled, but there was a warning behind her smile. Something hidden between her crooked grin and the flash in her eyes told me there was more. Lately there was always more with Devin. Besides I knew she was still mad about the Greg-and-Dan incident, so I was on my best behavior. I wasn’t in the mood for the drama.
I nodded. “What else is there to do on the weekend when you don’t have a license?”
Mrs. Rhodes laughed, which warmed me in a way I couldn’t explain. She had Devin’s smile but without the slight slant. Straight-up niceness.
Devin nodded at me—I had done well. I’d given the right answer, covered up whatever she had cooking, something I’m sure would have no resemblance to her mother’s tilapia.
“Cass, honey,” said Mrs. Rhodes, “be a love and pass me the olive oil.” She licked her fingers. “It’s over by the sink.”
Devin was a lot closer to the sink, and I wondered why she wasn’t asked. But Devin didn’t seem bothered. She leafed through a fashion magazine on the kitchen table.
“Sure.” I grabbed the fancy Italian-looking olive oil.
“Thanks,” said Mrs. Rhodes. She grinned at me again with the perfect teeth Devin inherited. “Devin’s not really much for helping in the kitchen anymore.” She tilted her head in Devin’s direction. “Are you, Devy?” She smiled, but there was no mistaking the edge in her voice.
Devin didn’t even look up from the magazine. “Nope,” she said.
Mrs. Rhodes’s smile wilted. She went back to chopping tomatoes, the knife coming down on the cutting board this time with more gusto. “Do you like to cook, Cass?”
“I don’t know,” I said, being careful. I didn’t want to be accused later of being a suck-up. “My mom doesn’t cook much.” Since Dad left we were all about takeout.
Mrs. Rhodes nodded. “Yes, I think I knew that.” She shrugged. I silently thanked her for letting that one go. My mother would never have missed the opportunity to smear Susan Rhodes. But Susan Rhodes had class. “Come, I’ll show you how to brown the fish,” she says.
“Oh my God, Mom,” said Devin. “Do you really think she cares?”
“I don’t mind,” I said. I offered up a little smile.
Devin shot me a look.
“Relax,” I mouthed to her. Devin found her mother as annoying as I found mine, and part of me liked watching her get so worked up.
Mrs. Rhodes ignored the slight and slipped a filet into the frying pan. “Here we go,” she said. “Now, Cass, you do the other one.” She put her hand on my shoulder and offered me the spatula. I carefully lifted the filet off the plate.
“Good,” said Mrs. Rhodes. “Careful, now, those things are slippery.”
“She’s just being polite,” said Devin, “aren’t you, Cass?” She put down the magazine and walked toward the kitchen island. “You don’t really want to help, do you?”
I gripped the spatula carefully, the filet weighing it down. Mrs. Rhodes still had her hand on my shoulder, but now I felt Devin behind me, too. I felt her close, felt her breath on the back of my neck. I slid the filet off the spatula. It fell a little too quickly, and we were splattered with droplets of hot oil. I jumped back from the impact.
“Sorry!” I said.
“Nice going, spaz,” said Devin.
“No worries,” said Mrs. Rhodes, wiping down the counter. “It happens.” She was still smiling. “The next one will be easier.” She poured herself a glass of sherry.
“The next one?” said Devin. “Cass, who are you here to hang out with anyway?”
A part of me wanted to stay in the kitchen with Mrs. Rhodes and learn how to brown tilapia. It was that same part that didn’t want to know what Devin really had planned for the weekend.
“Sorry,” said Mrs. Rhodes. She patted me on the hand. “You girls need alone time.”
I didn’t want Mrs. Rhodes to feel bad. “It smells good,” I said, trying to ease the tension.
Mrs. Rhodes brightened. “You’re welcome to stay for dinner, Cass.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Maybe another night.” My mother was expecting me—she hated ordering in for one.
Mrs. Rhodes leaned toward me. “What’s that?” she said. She reached for the charm. “Oh,” she said, tilting her head. “You got new charms?”
I nodded and sort of smiled. Didn’t she know this? We’d charged them to her account.
Devin brushed right over it. “We had to. We got rid of the last ones.”
“You got rid of them?” she asked.
“I don’t want to talk about it, Mom.”
Mrs. Rhodes nodded. “Okay.” She looked at me hopefully, as if maybe I’d talk about it. But I couldn’t. Of course. She brightened again, but it was clearly fake. “Well, they’re lovely. Jim Cordeau’s work?”
“Yes,” I said, since Devin had already stuck her nose back into the magazine.
Mrs. Rhodes nodded. “I can tell. He’s a wonderful designer.”
Without taking her eyes off the magazine, Devin said, “He sends his love.”
“He does?” said Mrs. Rhodes, lifting her head. Devin looked up to see Mrs. Rhodes flush pink. She turned back to her magazine, a satisfied smile on her face.
“I think what he said was he sends his best,” I said.
Devin shrugged. “Whatever.” She was now halfway out of the kitchen. “Come on, Cass,” she said. “Let’s go up to my room.”
Mrs. Rhodes made like she was straightening up and cleared her throat a few times.
“Okay.” I was about to walk out of the kitchen, when Mrs. Rhodes moved in behind me. She put her hand on my shoulder, and I turned around. “Devin’s lucky to have such a good friend.” Her smile seemed forced.
I nodded. “Thanks.” I moved again toward the stairs, but her hand remained firmly on my shoulder.
“Your head’s always been in the right place.” The way she looked at me made me feel like I was supposed to open up and tell her everything she didn’t know about her daughter.
Of course I couldn’t do that. So I lied. It was less complicated that way. “You don’t have to worry about Devin.”
Mrs. Rhodes nodded and smiled, but not her usual smile. This one took work. “Mothers always worry,” she said. “Choices aren’t always easy.” She was far away right then, so I waited for her to come back. It was the least I could do after we had fried tilapia together. She smiled again, this time a little more relaxed. “Now, off with you.” She gave me a gentle nudge out of the kitchen and into the hall.
Devin was waiting on the staircase. “What was that all about?”
“Nothing,” I said. “The tilapia, you know.” I didn’t want to start anything.
“You can stop drooling, by the way,” she said. “My mother’s not so perfect.”
“I didn’t say she was.” But of course I thought it. I thought it all the time.
“At least your mom’s real,” she said, sighing. “What you see is what you get, like it or not.”
“So is yours,” I said. “They’re just different.” Devin leaned on the wooden stair rail and looked at me. She shook her head, then smiled. “Right, okay, Cass. Let’s just go up to my room.”
She headed up the staircase, then turned around. “Did you see her face when I mentioned Cordeau?” she said. “They’re totally doing it.”
“Devin!” My stomach twisted around itself. “There’s no way. Your mother wouldn’t do that. She was just embarrassed by what you said.”
Devin shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t care, anyway.
Like I said, jewelry discounts.” She skipped up a few steps.
“Still gross,” I said. Besides, I didn’t believe it. The Rhodeses were a great couple. Jim Cordeau was just another Susan Rhodes groupie.
Devin turned back around. “By the way, how annoying is she?” She shook her head. “What does she care if we got new charms?”
“She did pay for them, didn’t she?” I looked at her, really looked at her, searching for the part of Devin that actually asked her mother before charging the charms to her account. Or at least her father.
Instead she scowled at me. “You wouldn’t pay, remember? Your guitar—the one you need to buy?”
“I wouldn’t have gotten the charms if your mom wasn’t okay with paying for them.”
“I told her about it. She forgot.”
“If you say so.” There was no point in arguing. No matter what I said, Devin somehow always won.
“And really,” said Devin, “is it 1950? Seriously, her apron!”
I couldn’t help but smile. “The sherry bottle’s a nice touch, too,” I added, feeling a little guilty.
Devin laughed. “Why doesn’t she just use a funnel?”
I unclenched, relieved to have my friend back in my corner. And yet I thought that Devin didn’t deserve to have a mother like Mrs. Rhodes. I hated that I felt this way when Devin was supposed to be my best friend. But sometimes I couldn’t stop my brain from spinning out threads of bad thoughts.
AFTER
“SOMEONE NAMED MARCUS CALLED while you were sleeping,” says my mother.
I look up from my pillow, still woozy from a restless night’s sleep. I can’t stop thinking about what happened yesterday in Devin’s room. My guitar is on the floor beside me. It’s a comfort, somehow, having it there, even though I haven’t played in days. “Oh,” I say to her. Not ready yet to switch gears. Clearly not the response my mother hoped for.
“Well, who is he?” she asks. “A new friend? I’ve never heard of him before.”
“Just some guy.” I close my eyes. I can picture him so vividly, his face, the way his front teeth crisscross. His smile. I can picture what we almost might have had.
My mother walks into the room and runs her hands through her thick, blond supermodel hair. A remnant of her cheerleading days. “He sounded pretty bent on talking to you. Maybe you should call him back.”
I realize then that Marcus probably tried calling my phone first, but it’s uncharged and neglected somewhere in the house. I don’t really care. I don’t want to talk to anyone anyway.
My mother has other ideas. She hands me a sticky note with Marcus’s name and number on it.
I don’t reach for it but instead roll over onto my bed. In the once-upon-a-time before Devin died, I would have wanted nothing more than to call him back. That is, once I’d gotten over the initial shock that he’d actually called. But there are no more happy endings for me.
My mother plunks the note onto my mirror. “In case you change your mind,” she says. “A little distraction would be good for you.”
Distraction? Like I’ll ever be able to think of anything else again?
She looks at the guitar on the floor. “Were you playing? I didn’t hear.”
“No.”
“Why not?” she says. “Weren’t you working on some songs?”
“I don’t feel like playing.”
“Suit yourself,” she says. “But you should do something. Something besides wallowing. Write some angsty music. Get your feelings out.”
I sigh—loudly, for effect. “Leave me alone.”
“Well, don’t leave the guitar there,” she says. “Someone will trip on it.”
“Not if someone stays out of my room.”
My mother tries, I think, unsuccessfully, to hide her frustration. She sounds bored, as though my grief (well, it’s more than grief, but she doesn’t know that) should get over itself so we could go back to discussing things like her divorce, my “idiot father,” my weight. Maybe I’m being unfair. It’s just that I know how she felt about Devin.
“I’m just saying that you have to move on,” she says. “Get out of bed. Live again.” She pats my head like I’m a puppy.
When my father left, Mom had her own day in bed—but that was it. One day and then she was on spin cycle, running around as though if she stopped moving the world would stop, too.
I tune her out—a skill I’ve perfected—and she leaves. Now that I’m alone and fully awake, my mind takes off. I’m thinking again about being in Devin’s room yesterday. About the feeling of hands, the feeling of breath on me. It was so… real that I wonder if Mrs. Rhodes has felt it, too. Is that what she was trying to tell me? Am I totally losing my mind? It’s a dangerous thought given what I have to hide. My body grows warm. I just know what I felt and I think—no, I almost know—that it was Devin. Do people come back? Do they really?
And then there’s the detective. A detective! How can I possibly talk to a detective? What will I say? I don’t even tell my mother about that. I don’t have the energy for her barrage of questions. I bury my head in my pillow.
My mother lingers in the doorway. “I wasn’t trying to upset you.” Again, though, I sense a prickle. We don’t have too many of these mother-daughter talks. They don’t usually go well.
She probably thinks I’m crying, and I let her think that. “It’s okay,” I say, though my voice is muffled from the pillow. I can’t tell her what happened in Devin’s room. The only person I can really talk to, the only one who would understand, is Mrs. Rhodes. But what if she asks too many questions?
The phone rings in the hallway. “Ooh, maybe that’s him—Marcus?” my mother says, smiling. “If it is, I want you to take the call—no discussion!” The idea of a boy calling me makes her giddy. She answers the phone, and then there’s silence for a while.
“Yes,” she says, eventually responding. “No, it’s no bother at all. I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine what you’re going through.” Her voice is strained. “Of course, Susan, I’ll let her know.” Pause. “Yes, we understand,” she says. “Oh, I see, of course. No, I didn’t know, but—yes, yes, of course.” More silence. “Oh, that’s very nice of you, but I’m not sure—yes, certainly.” Pause. “You take care of yourself, okay? If there’s anything we can do. Right, okay. Bye.” My mother’s footsteps press against the Persian runner in the hallway. I’m in for it now.
I lie on my bed, my face buried in the soft down of my pillow. It’s a little hard to breathe, but I don’t have it in me to lift my head. Besides, there are worse things than drowning in goose feathers.
My mother’s back in the doorway to my room. “A detective’s coming by tomorrow?”
I nod.
She moves toward me. “Susan Rhodes told me she mentioned it to you?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she says. “It seems like something I might want to know.”
I shrug. “A lot on my mind, I guess.” I don’t tell my mother much anyway; there’s no real point. The less I say about Devin, about what happened, the better.
“Well, it was inevitable they’d start an investigation, given what happened. Young girls don’t just mysteriously appear dead at the bottom of ravines. They’ll be talking to everyone, as they should. Can’t have a lunatic running around.” My mother considers me and then shrugs again. “Unless she jumped.” She sits down on the bed with a newfound sense of urgency. As if we’re girlfriends dishing about an exciting date. “Do you think?”
“I—I don’t know,” I say, my stomach knotting up. Don’t say anything. Just don’t.
“I suppose anything’s possible,” she says. “Why would Devin have been out there to begin with? Doesn’t make sense.” She shakes her head and sighs. “Then again, Devin was wild. Who knows why she did things?” She runs her hand through her hair. “Was she drinking?”
“No!” I’ve startled her, and she frowns. “She wouldn’t,” I say. Devin didn’t drink. She glar
ed every time Mrs. Rhodes drank.
“Never say wouldn’t,” says my mother. “Kids your age experiment. And with that one—I wouldn’t be surprised if—”
“Never say wouldn’t,” I say, cutting her off.
My mother pauses, then says, “Susan Rhodes invited you over for lunch.” She examines her long, polished fingernails. “Whenever you’re up to it.” She starts to leave the room and then adds, “Although I would think you’d talk to me before you’d talk to her.”
I nod again. Somehow my mother, as always, makes it about her. “Right,” I say. This isn’t the first time Mrs. Rhodes has called since yesterday. I haven’t called her back, and I feel bad about it. It’s not that I don’t want to talk; it’s simply that I can’t. I can’t because of what I have to hide. And I can’t because of what happened in Devin’s room. The feeling of hands—is that what they were? The way they felt, the way they curled around my neck. The way I felt… something. How did Devin’s slippers move? I go over it again and again. The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that it was—something. Something. Something not normal.
I do not want to go back to that house.
Before
“COME ON, IT’LL BE FUN!” Devin jumped up into a sitting position on her bed. The pink patchwork quilt was still bright after all these years—a credit to Mrs. Rhodes’s laundry skills.
“Why do we always have to do this?” I said. I wished we could stay in her room all day and play board games like we used to. When that was enough. Why did everything have to change? I picked a little at my guitar. The strings sounded better, but I still wanted to buy a new one.
Devin crossed her legs, the toes of her fuzzy pink slippers poking out from under her. I had the same pair in purple—we’d bought them together at the flea market—but my feet grew too fast, just like my boobs, so my own slippers were long gone.
“Live a little, Cass,” said Devin. “We’re just going to meet them at the mall for a few hours.” “Them” was a pair of soon-to-be junior boys from another high school. Chad was a new love interest of Devin’s, the other, Marcus, his wingman and my “date.”
Devin Rhodes is Dead Page 4