“Nobody can know I told you. I’m scared I’ll get in trouble for not saying anything before.”
“Fine.”
“I didn’t think she was serious. If I thought she was serious, I would have tried to help her, I swear. You know how she was. It just seemed like typical Betty, trying to get attention. And even if she did mean it, I never thought anyone would actually do it.”
“Do what?”
“Kill her,” Rebecca said flatly. “I think that she asked Calder to kill her.”
CHAPTER TWELVE.
I LISTENED TO Rebecca’s story, such as it was—disjointed, incoherent, completely unbelievable. She couldn’t say where she had first heard it, or who had told her, or when; perhaps most importantly, she didn’t know why.
“Let me see if I understand this right,” I said. “Someone was going around saying that Betty had asked Calder to kill her, but not why she wanted him to do it?”
“I told you, I didn’t think she was serious.”
“Did you ever ask her about it?”
“No.”
“So you never talked to her about it at all.”
She hung her head. “No. When she went missing, I thought, there’s no way, she must have been pulling some kind of prank. And then Calder confessed, and I thought it must have been some kind of mistake. Even if she had asked him, he would never have done it. For a long time I didn’t believe that he had done it. But now—” She started crying again.
“Did it ever occur to you that maybe Calder was the one who started that rumor? Maybe he was planning to kill her so he wanted to make her sound suicidal. How many people know about this? Did anyone ever mention it to the police?”
“I don’t know, I don’t think so. Please don’t be mad at me, Finley.”
“I’m not mad,” I tried to assure her. “I don’t know what I am.”
What I was, primarily, was skeptical. The idea that Calder had killed Betty at her request was patently ludicrous, and I knew better than anyone how easy it was to spread a rumor around Williston. Was this better or worse than people thinking she had OD’d? I wasn’t sure. Either scenario made Betty the architect of her own death—the very idea I’d been trying to disprove since I’d arrived back in town—although there was something particularly galling about Calder murdering her under circumstances that might still make Betty seem like she had brought it on herself.
Serena and I had prayed for a valid motive to present itself; this was not the one I’d had in mind.
The lights around the softball field were off tonight, and only streetlamps lit the park. Rebecca’s tears glistened on her cheeks.
“Shelly believes it, doesn’t she?” I asked. “That’s why she went to the police and told them Betty was planning to run away. She knew Calder was guilty and she was trying to protect him.”
“She wasn’t a hundred percent sure. I think she wanted to believe he said no, and that Betty went around asking people until somebody said yes.”
I went cold inside.
She asked me to do something and I wouldn’t do it, Danny had said. If you want to know the rest, talk to Owen.
She asked him first.
• • •
I’m not particularly proud of this, but I was high at the funeral. I woke up that morning to Talking Heads’ “Take Me to the River” playing on the radio and I didn’t think I could do it, any of it. Get up, put on a black dress, face Betty’s parents, watch them put her body in the ground. So I took a handful of the Vicodin I’d stolen from Shelly’s parents. As I swallowed a few, I looked at myself in the mirror above my dresser. The bruise on my face was fading to yellow around the edges; I would have tried to cover it with makeup, but I didn’t own any. I pressed my fingers against my cheekbone and winced. It still hurt. But not for long.
• • •
The funeral service wasn’t about Betty. It was about Jesus. I sat next to my father and stared at the casket, and honestly that’s pretty much all I remember until everyone filed outside and saw that the sun had come out for the first time in ten days. I was relieved to have a reason to put on my sunglasses, hide my black eye and missing pupils. People squinted up at the sky like they didn’t recognize it.
Everyone was there with their families: Owen helping his parents into the car, situating his dad in the backseat with his oxygen tank; Serena standing miserable and silent as her mother spoke to the priest; Rebecca crying into her older sister’s armpit.
We’re all just kids, I thought. How did we end up here?
Dad put a hand on my arm to steady me, and I realized I was wobbling in my heels.
“Are you okay?” he asked, looking down at me with concern.
I tried to articulate what I was feeling, the all-consuming sense of dread spreading through me like a fast-moving infection, the sudden, helpless understanding that I—we, all of us in that parking lot, the town of Williston itself—had been irrevocably damaged by what had happened to Betty, that her death had set in motion a series of events that had not yet fully played out, and that things would get markedly worse before it was over, if in fact it ever would be. It didn’t matter that the sun was finally shining; from here on out it would be all unlights, all the time.
What I managed to say was, “This is a mistake,” and I knew Dad didn’t understand what I meant, and that it was probably better that way.
• • •
Over time I have managed, with a moderate degree of success, to eradicate my memory of the burial. The pills helped for sure, so that whatever recollections I might have had were certainly murky to begin with, but a large part of it was willful. For years afterward I would be doing something completely innocuous—writing a paper in my dorm room, waiting for the subway, putting on my shoes and jacket in preparation to leave my apartment—and that morning would come back to me, unbidden, that image of us all standing around her grave as they lowered the coffin, and I would be leveled. Sometimes I gasped out loud, clutching my stomach like I had been punched; sometimes I would cry. But every time I would push the memory away until all that was left were a few hazy impressions: my heels sinking into the grass and my arms prickling in the sudden summer heat, Betty’s mother crying and crying. It’s funny to me now, in light of everything that came after, that the moment we put her in the ground, when she was finally laid to rest, so to speak, is the one that I can’t bear to think of.
• • •
Afterward, we all went back to the Flynns’ for the reception. Claustrophobia immediately set in; it smelled like too-sweet lavender air freshener, although when I looked around I realized that was just all the flowers. The photographs of Betty were still all over the place, even the one of her and Calder on the mantel. The dining room table was flush with casseroles and bowls of potato salad. The fog around me was lifting, unfortunately, but at last the tight family units were loosening, and I was able to corner Serena and lead her outside to the patio. I wanted to tell her about Rebecca, what she’d said, but then I saw Serena’s face, and I knew it wasn’t the right time.
“You’re scratching your nose,” she said.
“Am I?”
“Yeah. Are you high?”
“Maybe. A little, I guess.”
The corner of her mouth lifted slightly, stopping just short of a smile. Her cheeks weren’t as round as they’d been a month ago; her collarbone stood out farther from her neck. Her eyes had a haunted look I recognized all too well. I pulled her in for a hug, squeezing her tight, inhaling her baby-powder deodorant and coconut shampoo. Her hands rested on my waist, and suddenly all I wanted was to leave with her, take her someplace deep into the woods where nobody could find us, or get her into my car and just start driving. We’d never even gone on a normal date; no picnics on the beach, no hand-holding at the movies. And now here we were, awkwardly milling around the Flynns’ living room after watching Betty’s cask
et lowered into the ground.
“What are you doing later?” I asked her.
“Nothing. Why?”
“Let’s go into Pullman. Go out to dinner or something.”
“Like a date?” she asked, raising an eyebrow at me.
“Like a date.”
“Okay.” She nodded at something over my shoulder. “Check this out.”
I turned around. Jack Emerson was there with two other boys I could only imagine were his brothers; one was a little taller, the other a little thinner, but all three had the same black Irish looks—dark hair, fair skin, blue eyes. All three were wearing suits with white shirts and striped ties. Add aviator sunglasses, and they could have passed for young FBI agents.
“What do you think he’s doing here?” I asked.
“I have no idea. Maybe one of his brothers knew Betty?”
“Maybe. Seems like a weird coincidence, though.”
“There are no coincidences,” Serena said. “I want to talk to him.”
“What are you going to say?”
She began walking toward the Emerson brothers. “I have no idea.”
I went back inside to find Owen. I waded through a river of unfamiliar adults, members of the Flynns’ church, I figured, or relatives from other parts of Maine. The Shepards were out in force. I only sort of recognized Owen’s distant relatives, but I didn’t see him anywhere. Finally I spotted Emily, unwrapping a cobbler at the table.
“Do you know where Owen is?” I asked her.
“Hello, Finley. Nice to see you, too. Wish it were under different circumstances. The service was lovely, wasn’t it? Et cetera.”
“Please, Emily, I need to talk to him. It’s important.”
When she was done making room for the cobbler, she balled up the cling wrap in her hand and looked down at me. Her nostrils flared when she saw my face. “I told you to be careful, didn’t I?”
“Congratulations, that makes you the winner of a brand-new ‘I told you so.’”
She shook her head. “Fucking idiot.”
“I won’t argue with you there.”
“I wish I could say I never understood what he saw in you, but unfortunately, it makes perfect sense.”
“What about Betty? Do you get what he saw in her?”
“Misery loves company. You should know that better than anybody.” She grabbed a bottle of wine and a glass from the center of the table. “He dropped his parents off at home after the burial. He’ll be here soon, don’t worry.” Instead of pouring herself a generous helping of chardonnay, she tucked the whole bottle under her arm and headed for the patio door. I vacillated between absolutely despising her and holding her up as some kind of role model. For the moment, I decided to follow her example and filled a coffee mug with red wine from a box.
“Finley.”
I set the mug back on the table and wheeled around. “Mrs. Flynn.”
She had clearly composed herself for her guests. There was a glassy sheen to her eyes that could have been tears or Valium, I wasn’t sure. I wondered if I could slip upstairs long enough to search the medicine cabinets without anybody noticing. Betty’s mom was wearing a tea-length black dress with simple jewelry, a single strand of pearls and a stud in each ear, and her silver-blonde hair was swept up in an elegant, mystifying knot. She was gracious enough not to mention my black eye.
“Thank you for coming,” she said. “I’m sorry I couldn’t find a moment to visit with you sooner.”
“It’s okay, really,” I said. “I’m so sorry. About Betty.”
“I’m just relieved we were finally able to have a proper service for her.”
“If there’s anything I can do—”
“It’s good to see you. Here in the house. It brings back a lot of happy memories of Betty as a little girl. All those sleepovers you two had. She would get so excited when you were coming over. She loved you so much.”
“I loved her, too.”
“I know. She knows it, too.” Mrs. Flynn glanced around the room at the other mourners. “I didn’t want to do any of this. I wanted a small private service, not all this fuss. These casseroles. But Mr. Flynn reminded me that you do things like this for the living, the people left behind. Death really is easiest on the departed. It’s everyone else who does the suffering, gets angry, looks for someone to blame.”
“But someone is to—”
“Do you know the parable of the unmerciful servant?”
“Sorry?”
“It’s from the Bible; Matthew. Bear with me, I know you’re not much of a believer.”
I swallowed hard. “I’m listening.”
“A king was collecting debts from his servants. There was one servant who owed the king a large sum of money, but the servant couldn’t pay, and his master ordered him to be sold. The servant fell to his knees, begging his lord for patience, and the king was moved by compassion, released the servant, and forgave his debt. Later, that same servant found a fellow servant who owed him a much smaller sum of money, and instead of showing him the same forgiveness, even when the man was on his knees asking for mercy, the first servant insisted on being paid, and had him thrown in jail. When the king found out, he was furious that the servant hadn’t been able to show another person the same kindness that had been shown him, so the king gave the servant to the tormentors until he could pay the king his debt, which was no longer forgiven. And Jesus said to Peter, ‘So my heavenly Father will do to you, if you don’t each forgive your brother truly from all his misdeeds.’ Do you understand?”
I looked into her glassy eyes, watched as she tucked a gray-blonde lock of hair behind her ear. “Have you really forgiven—whoever did this?” I asked her.
She nodded. “I have. And you will, too.”
“When?”
“When you’re ready for your suffering to be over.” She hugged me, a surprisingly strong embrace. She smelled like lilacs and coffee. “It’s good to see you again. Stop by anytime and see us.”
Then she was gone, whisking off into the kitchen in a graceful black blur. I reclaimed my mug of wine and took a few generous swallows. Suddenly Owen appeared, beelining toward me with great purpose. There was a sheen of sweat on his forehead; he put a damp, sticky hand on my elbow.
“Are you all right?” I asked him.
“I need you to do me a favor. Go outside to the patio, right now. Please.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
“Goddammit, Finley, why can’t you ever do what I ask you? Can’t you just trust me?”
“Apparently, I can’t,” I said.
“What, you’re still upset about that?”
“Still? I just found out a few days ago.”
“Fine, be mad, whatever. Go be mad in the backyard.”
He tried to ease me toward the patio with a firm nudge, but I planted my feet in the carpet. I actually enjoyed playing games like this with Owen; I’d been doing it since I could talk, and battling with him over something inconsequential was as pleasant a diversion as I was likely to get at a funeral. But when I stopped to look at his face, I saw sheer panic and realized he was serious. Something terrible was about to happen, and he was trying to protect me from it. I understood a second too late, right when the air in the room changed.
The house didn’t go silent, not exactly, but there was a pause in all the chatter, and when it started up again it was a little too loud—that uncomfortable, feigned nonchalance, people talking without moving their eyes, trying to avoid whatever was in their peripheral vision. It didn’t take me long to see it, the tall blond figure in the black suit, moving through the crowd without stopping to talk to anyone.
“Oh my God,” I said. “What is Calder doing here?”
“Please go outside.”
“Not until I know what he wants.”
Calder was ca
rrying some kind of bundle in his arms.
“The fuck?” Owen said. “Did he bring his laundry?”
“Oh, no,” I said. “Oh, no.”
Mrs. Flynn emerged from the kitchen, and this time the conversation did die.
“Where did you get those?” she asked.
“I found them in my sister’s closet. She says she bought them at the Goodwill. I don’t want them in our house anymore. I think they brought us bad luck. I was going to burn them, but I thought you might want them back.”
He held out the armful of Betty’s clothes. Mrs. Flynn froze. I looked around for Mr. Flynn, but didn’t see him. Even Owen was rooted to the spot. Serena and Emily were still outside. There was no one else.
I stepped forward. “I’ll take them.” I glanced at Mrs. Flynn. “Is that okay? I can bring them home, and you can decide if you want them or not.”
“That’s fine,” she said, her voice thin and quiet.
I held my arms out toward Calder, took a deep breath, and raised my eyes. His were bloodshot, and he smelled like seriously cheap whiskey, but his suit was neatly pressed and his shoes were perfectly shined. He was listing to one side, slanted like a Dutch angle from an Orson Welles movie. Drunk as fuck. I wondered how well all his medications went with alcohol.
“Why don’t you just give them to me?” I told him calmly. “And then you should probably go.”
He carefully handed me the pile of clothes, making sure none slipped and fell to the floor. His hand grazed mine as we made the transfer. It was trembling. It was so hard to imagine this slip of a boy hurting anybody, but at the same time I was more certain that he had done it than I’d ever been. I closed my arms around the heap of fabric, hugging it to my chest.
“I’ve got it,” I said. “I’m good.” I took a step backward.
“Caroline’s awake,” he said conversationally. “She’s been asking about you.”
“Asking what?”
“When you’re coming to visit her.”
“How’s she doing?”
“Sixty-forty. That’s what the doctors say.”
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