Nowhere Girl

by Susan Strecker

  “It’s okay.” I spoke softly, soothingly. “None of us could say no to her. She had this magnetic force that pulled the rest of the world into her orbit. Of course you did what she wanted. We all did.” I thought of all the times I’d done her laundry so she could go out or signed her into study hall so she could sneak out back to smoke. I took a shaking breath. I had to know how it happened. But I wasn’t sure I could stand to hear the words spoken aloud. “Keep going,” I urged. “Tell me the rest.”

  “She was so fucking beautiful, and I never meant to hurt her. I tried to do it very gently, but she put her hands on the outside of my hands and told me to squeeze harder. She said it felt like she was high on cocaine, like the orgasm might never end.”

  “I understand,” I said, and I did. “You squeezed a little too hard. You didn’t know what you were doing.”

  “No!” The panic on his face was raw. “After that one time, she said that was the only way she wanted to do it. She said it was like flying without wings. But it scared the shit out of me. I kept thinking that if I did it wrong she could get really hurt. So I refused to do it again.”

  “I don’t understand. If you wouldn’t choke her, how’d she die?”

  “She was so pissed that she threatened to break up with me if I didn’t do it again, but I refused. I told her having her alive and mad was better than the alternative. She didn’t speak to me for three days, but then she pulled me outside in between classes and told me she had a new plan. She said she’d talked to you and you were going to cover for her with your parents. I was working that day, delivering pizzas, but the afternoons were always so slow that no one would miss me if I was gone for a while. So we’d planned to meet at the Wolfe Mansion.” He wiped tears out of his eyes and I felt like I was watching the saddest movie ever made. “I was so happy because I thought she’d forgotten about the whole choking thing. But when I got to the third floor, she explained that she’d researched it and she could make it so she could choke herself and I wouldn’t have to do anything.”

  “What?” This sounded too crazy. Even for Savannah. “So she had made like a torture device or a dog collar or something?”

  Brady covered his face with his hands for a moment and didn’t speak. Finally, he picked up his head and continued. “I didn’t know what it was or even if she had it with her. I don’t know, Cady. It was like I just snapped. All of a sudden, I realized that there was something wrong with your sister. She’d told me about the other boys she’d been with and the older girls she smoked pot with and the drugs she’d tried. She talked about it in a way that made me think she was trying to be sophisticated. But that day, I knew it was so much more than that. And I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t fucking handle it, so I left.”

  “What do you mean so much more? I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

  “God, even now, I can’t explain it. It wasn’t about experimenting and pushing the limits. It was like she was daring the universe to make something go wrong. Like each time she did something stupid and walked away from it, she felt like she’d won.”

  That was so Savannah. Every time she climbed out her window and met Chapman Sharp or Dylan Freeman and didn’t get caught, she thought it made her powerful, invincible. “I understand,” I said quietly. I reached for Brady’s hand and held it. We sat quietly for a moment, feeling each other’s warmth before I spoke again. “Tell me the rest.”

  “I yelled at her that she’d gone too far and I didn’t want to be around her anymore.” He’d kept his eyes down while he was talking, but now he was staring at me. “The last thing I ever said to Savannah was that she was crazy and we were done.”

  At that moment, I had a pang so severe in my chest I thought I was having a heart attack, but then I realized I was feeling what Savannah had when Brady yelled at her.

  “I stormed out of the house and headed down that rocky slope to my car. I went back to work, but it was slow, so my boss told me I could leave. I clocked out and started to go home. But I was worried about Savannah and felt terrible about yelling at her, so I went back. But by the time I got there—”

  “She was already dead.”

  “Yes,” he said. “She had brought the contraption with her. I swear to God I didn’t know she was planning on using it that day. I thought she just wanted to talk. It was like a dog collar attached to a leash tied to the bar where you put hangers in the closet.” He stopped speaking and shuddered, as if reliving the memory. “I tried to save her. She must have struggled with the collar and made it tighter instead of looser. I got her out of it as fast as I could, but she wasn’t breathing. I’d left my cell phone in my car, and I couldn’t find hers.”

  “I had it. She asked me to take her backpack home, and it had her phone in it.”

  But he kept talking as if he hadn’t heard me. “I tried CPR, but she was already gone. And I don’t know, I had this crazy thought that it’d be better if it looked like she hadn’t done it to herself. So I took the collar and everything with me and ran to my car to call 911.”

  “You left her there?” I could feel my throat closing. I gripped the necklace harder, digging my nails into the palm of my hand.

  “I didn’t. I wasn’t going to. By the time I got to my car, I could see cops in the woods coming toward the mansion. I thought they could save her.” He was trying to wipe his face of all the tears, the snot, but he couldn’t. “And then it was too late. I didn’t think anyone would believe what really happened.”

  “But you had an alibi. You were at work. All these years, you let us think that someone had murdered Savannah. The cops never considered anything but homicide, because there was nothing left at the scene. And you knew. You knew all along that it was an accident and she did it to herself.”

  “I know. I’m so sorry. So, so sorry.” He sounded pitiful. “I felt responsible. If I had stayed there, she’d still be alive, so I thought it was my fault. It was my fault. I guess I panicked and never told the police or anyone, because I thought that they’d think I was responsible because I could have stopped her.”

  “Did the police interview you?” I remembered Patrick coming to the house months after it had happened and telling us the cops had interviewed almost everyone at Kingswood.

  “Yes, but I told them I was working, and they checked out my alibi with my boss. I guess the time line proved I was at work while—”

  “My sister was accidentally strangling herself.”

  He dropped his head. “Yes.”

  “What about your fingerprints? They must have found them in the Wolfe Mansion.”

  “They found everyone’s prints in that house. Remember how many kids used to go there to party? The whole thing was a cluster.”

  I held Savannah’s necklace in my hand. “You took a necklace off a dead girl. Why?”

  “I didn’t. That was the strangest part. When I got there, before we fought, she took it off and gave it to me.”

  My skin went cold. “I don’t believe you. The only time we ever took those necklaces off was to change out the chains.”

  He put his hands to his heart. “I know. I’d asked her about the pendant once. And she told me it meant you two would always be connected, like you had superpowers. I should have known then”—his voice was broken—“that she was going to do something terrible. But I didn’t understand. So I put it in my pocket and thought I’d give it back to her later. But then we had that awful fight and I left and…” But he didn’t finish.

  He collapsed into my arms, and there was nothing left to do but hold him. We cried together until the sun went down and it became almost too dark to see.

  “I’m ready,” he finally said.

  I sat up, wiping my eyes. “For what?”

  “For my punishment. To take responsibility for what I did.”

  All my life, I’d waited for this moment. I told Gabby and Greg and most of all myself that I wouldn’t be okay until the man who murdered my sister went to prison for the rest of his life. B
ut here I was sitting a foot away from Brady Irons, and all I wanted to do was protect him. “No,” I said. “You didn’t hurt her. Savannah did that to herself. Besides, what about Colette? She needs you.”

  “Colette’s parents flew over from France and took her home. She wasn’t getting better here, and they thought she needed to be with her family. I tried.” He got up, turned on a standing lamp, and then sat next to me again. “I tried to take care of her for five years, but her parents were right to take her home. She’s where she needs to be now.”

  “So you’re going to throw away the rest of your life because of something that wasn’t your fault?”

  He held both my hands in his. “My going to jail won’t bring Savannah back, but it’s my fault she’s gone. If I hadn’t walked out on her, I could have stopped her. I deserve to go to prison for that.”

  “That’s bullshit,” I said, my voice too loud. “You’ve already given up your life.”

  “What do you mean?” He brought my hand to his mouth and kissed my fingers.

  “Look at what you’ve done the last sixteen years. You left town after high school and drifted around the country. You told me once that your dad never forgave you for not joining the army, but you didn’t tell me why you didn’t go.” In all the times that Brady and I had told each other about our lives, I’d never realized that everything he’d done since Savannah’s death was with the intent of punishing himself. “And when you came back, you chose to work in a maximum-security prison, spending your days with murderers, rapists, people who have no hope, nothing to live for.”

  “It was the right thing to do,” he said quietly. “It was the only thing. I belonged in prison, and if I was too much of a coward to turn myself in, then at least I could live that life through my inmates.”

  “That’s the thing”—my voice was thick with pleading—“you don’t belong there. You didn’t do anything wrong. Savannah made the mistake, not you.”

  “It doesn’t matter. I should have gone to the police when it first happened.”

  “True,” I said sadly. “But what matters is that you gave Savannah something that none of the rest of us could.”

  “What’s that?” I could hear my sister’s voice so clearly at that moment. How she used to tell me she was bigger than our small town, that she never belonged here. I used to beg her to be happy, I was so afraid she’d leave me, leave our family. I couldn’t make her see that everyone loved her. That she was the light that illuminated our paths.

  “You made her want to stay. We were twins. Identical. And from the moment I was old enough to understand, I knew that I’d never be enough for her. She was so much more than the rest of us. But you quieted whatever made her so restless. I could see the difference in her those last months. I never knew why she seemed so…” I couldn’t think of the word. “Settled.”

  He got up and went into another room that I couldn’t see and then came back with a box of tissues. “Thank you for saying that, but it’s time.”

  Suddenly, I couldn’t breathe. “For what?”

  “I have to turn myself in.”

  I jumped up. “No! You can’t.”

  “I have to be held accountable.”

  “You’ve been accountable every day that you’ve volunteered at the shelter and tutored inmates and did the best you could for Colette. What’s the world going to gain by locking you up?” A few hours before, I’d been in Charlotte Reid’s living room, and now I was trying to talk the man who held the secret of my sister’s death out of turning himself in. “Go,” I said to Brady. He cocked his head at me. “Colette is with her family. Savannah finally made me hear what she’s been trying to tell me all these years. And I’m okay. Really. I am.”

  “You don’t look okay.” He nodded to my hands. I hadn’t realized I was shaking.

  “Pack up your house, and get out of here.” But even as I was saying it, I realized there was almost nothing downstairs. The few decorations I remembered from when we came to help with Colette—an antique mirror at the base of the stairs and an old painting of a ramshackle house—were gone. “I understand if you can’t stay here, but you’re not helping anyone by going to jail for a crime you didn’t commit.”

  “What about Patrick?”

  “What about him?” I’d forgotten that he thought I was home sick.

  “He’s a good man and a great cop. If I leave town, he’s going to put two and two together.”

  I hadn’t thought about that. “Maybe I can convince him that reopening Savannah’s case is too hard on my family and we want him to let it go.”

  He eyed me as if trying to decide if my plan was brilliant or ludicrous. “Is that really how you want to start off with him?”

  “Start what with him?”

  He grinned, a small glimpse of the man I’d come to know the last four months. “Your relationship.” My eyes widened. “You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed the way he looks at you. And I haven’t even seen you together that much.”

  Maybe Patrick was the reason why I didn’t feel anything for Brady when we’d kissed. “Shit. I don’t know. But I do know that I can’t let you go down for Savannah’s death. You didn’t have anything to do with it.”

  “But I did it.” His voice was desperate.

  “No, you didn’t. You loved a girl who probably didn’t know how to love herself until you came along. You loved her so much you vowed to do anything she wanted. And when she took it too far, you said no. You had no way of knowing what was going to happen once you walked out that door.”

  But Brady was shaking his head. “I don’t want to run. I’m tired of pretending.”

  “Go,” I said again. “Savannah wouldn’t want you in prison.” I swallowed. “She loved you.”

  “Will you hate me if I leave?”

  “I’ll hate you if you don’t.”

  Without saying a word, he came to me, held my face in his hands, and kissed me on the lips. “Thank you, Cady.” And then he was gone.

  * * *

  I stood in Brady’s empty house until a strip of moonlight filtered in through the blinds. I didn’t know what to do. I had no one to tell. Gabby would have kept my secret, but I couldn’t burden her with that knowledge.

  With nothing else to do, I finally pulled open the front door, walked past the garden of daisies, and got in my car. I tried to start it, but my hands were still shaking, and I couldn’t get the key in the ignition. My phone rang in my purse, but I didn’t answer it. When it rang again, I pulled it out and saw Patrick’s name flash on the screen. I knew if I ignored it, he’d keep calling. Or come find me. I pressed the green ANSWER button, but couldn’t get any words out.

  “We got him,” Patrick said.

  A million scenarios flashed through my head. Brady had gotten pulled over for speeding and confessed. He’d had a confrontation with the cop who patrolled the Whole Foods shopping center.

  “Brady Irons walked right into the station and handed me a manifesto of his confession.”

  Brady’d been planning to confess all along. He must have written his statement before I’d gotten to his house.

  “He didn’t do it,” I said. “I don’t know what he told you, but he didn’t do it. She choked herself. She was trying to do some fucked-up sex act, and she fucking strangled herself. You can’t arrest him.” I was so hysterical I could barely get the words out. “Don’t you see, Patrick? He didn’t do it.”

  CHAPTER

  49

  “Cady?” Greg asked after he’d called my name three times from the foyer and I hadn’t answered. The refrigerator door was open, and I’d left the oven on. I still hadn’t changed out of my clothes from the day before. He sat on the couch with me. “Are you all right?” But I couldn’t answer him. “Did something happen?” Eventually, he gave up trying to get me to talk and wrapped his arms around my shoulders, hugging me in a way he hadn’t in years. He put a blanket over me and called Gabby. I hadn’t seen her since I’d walked in on her and David, s
o she had no idea what was going on, but she told David that Greg had found me almost catatonic, and David had called Patrick, who came right over. When Patrick got to our house, he and Greg disappeared into my office for a long time. When they finally came out, Greg came to me on the couch and squatted in front of me. “I’m going to leave you and Patrick to talk this through,” he said. “He’s much better suited for this job.”

  “You’re a shrink,” I’d wanted to say, but I couldn’t get the words out. “This is what you do.” And then he was gone, leaving me when I needed him most, when I needed him to wade through this quicksand with me trying to understand how something I’d been waiting for half my life now felt so wrong.

  Once Greg was gone, Patrick coaxed me into taking a shower while he made me something to eat. When I came downstairs, my hair wet, in a pink T-shirt and gray sweats, he had scrambled eggs, half a cantaloupe, and a glass of orange juice on the counter waiting for me. I brought the plate to the couch and set it down on the coffee table but didn’t eat. Instead, I lay down and pulled the crocheted blanket that had been Savannah’s over my legs.

  “This is what you’ve always wanted,” Patrick said in a soothing tone I imagined he used when he showed up on people’s doorsteps in the middle of the night. “For this to be over.”

  I sat up, dizzy with hunger and exhaustion. “That’s just it.” I half laughed. “The only person responsible for Savannah’s death was Savannah. I wasted so much time, so much of my life trying to avenge my sister. No wonder she never gave me more clues in those dreams I used to have.” It occurred to me then that I hadn’t dreamed about her in weeks. “She wanted me to keep up this vigil for her, forever be the sun that I revolved around.” Patrick put his hand on my back but didn’t speak. “Promise,” I said plainly, “you’ll keep Brady out of jail. You can’t arrest him, Patrick. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

  “The DA wants to talk to the ME again. She said if the time line matches up and the coroner can confirm that the injuries could have been self-inflicted, then they will officially rule Savannah’s death an accident.”