movement on the lake surface creatures wading their ripples run through my veins and then the liquid splashing over me in me so cold hurts running running through me and i am
lost
sinking into obsidian
darkness
again
THOMAS
THE CONFERENCE ROOM DOOR BURSTS open and my father surges in, all crisp suit and legal briefcase. “You haven’t answered any questions, have you?” he barks at me.
I shake my head no. For the first time in years, my father’s presence brings relief. That is, until Principal Renall has made the introductions and my father’s settled next to me. In a voice low enough that only I hear he hisses, “Jesus, son. What the hell have you gotten yourself into?” Then, all pretend casual, he asks the officers, “So what’s this about?” But I know my father. Can practically see the snake coiled inside him, ready to strike.
Twirling her pencil, Officer Rodriguez answers, “That’s what we’re here to find out. With your permission, Mr. VanBrackel, we’re going to ask Thomas a few questions.”
My father throws out a hand, dismissive. “Be my guest.” He’ll play nice. For now.
Officer Rodriguez addresses me directly. “Thomas, do you know a young woman by the name of Erica Walker?”
This is about Erica. You knew it was.
My father looks at me, eyes betraying nothing, then nods his head once. Answer.
For the millionth time, I wish I could take it all back—my petty, drunk anger from Saturday, cram it into a jar, and hurl it off a cliff. I hadn’t really been mad at her that night. Not really. But it’s too late to take any of it back. And if I think about her, talk about her…
I’m sunk—we’re all sunk—for what we did to her.
The clock on the wall ticks loudly, so loudly it echoes through the small room, through my brain. I can’t think.
Get it together.
“Thomas?” Officer Rodriguez prompts. Officer Shiva’s pen hovers over his notepad.
Focus, Thomas. Because I don’t have a choice. Because I have to answer their questions or I’ll look guilty, and guilt is what drags you under.
I clear my throat and lean forward, hoping to appear calm, not cocky. “Uh, sure. Erica. Yeah, I don’t really know her that well…”
Lie.
“…We hardly ever talked…”
Lie.
“Let’s start small, then,” Officer Rodriguez suggests. “How do you know Erica?”
A nod from my father.
“She, uh… We have Spanish class together.”
“And have you ever spoken with Erica? Had any conversations in or outside of class?”
Another nod from my father.
“Yes.”
“How often would you say you’ve had contact with Erica?”
Contact? “Uh, do you mean how often I talk to her?”
“Correct.”
“Um, a handful of times. But not…” I trail off.
“But not what, Thomas?”
But not since yesterday, when I yelled at her outside. “Uh, nothing. I didn’t mean to say that.”
My father leans forward, ready to pounce on my next slipup.
“And how would you describe your relationship with Erica?”
“Um, friendly enough. Like I said, I don’t really know her that well. She only moved here a few months back—”
My father cuts in. “Answer the questions directly. Nothing more.”
Officer Rodriguez fixes him with a sharp look before turning back to me. “When was the last time you saw Erica?”
“Uh, yesterday?”
“And did you speak with her?”
“No. No, I didn’t.”
Lie.
“Did you see Erica the night of Saturday, March 11?”
Letters and numbers collide in my head.
My father’s eyes tear into me.
“Um, when?”
“This past Saturday. What were you doing Saturday night?”
The party. They know about the party.
What did Erica tell them?
“I was, uh, at a party. At Boyd’s… Zac Boyd’s.” Erica, standing in the driveway. Short jean skirt. Lucky boots. “Him and I are captains for the lacrosse team. We had a game, then went to his place afterward.”
Keep it short, Thomas.
Officer Rodriguez looks me over. I wipe my sweaty forehead, unclench both fists. “And was Erica at this party?” she asks.
The bonfire. My hat on her head. Body pressed into my back as I carried her. “Maybe. Pretty sure. Yeah.”
“Where is this leading?” my father snaps.
Outside, a raised voice carries into the conference room. “Is anyone going to tell me what the hell’s going on?” It’s Boyd. Which means someone must’ve dragged all the guys—Stallion and Forest, too—into the office to wait with Ricky.
“You were saying?” Officer Rodriguez presses.
I swallow. “It was a normal enough party. Broke up around one. Everyone went home.”
Lies. All of it.
Officer Rodriguez’s frown screams disbelief. She knows. “Thomas, are you aware Erica had a website?”
My oxygen shuts off.
“No more questions,” my father barks.
“Are you aware your name showed up on that website a total of”—eyes scan notes—“sixty-seven times?”
My father throws back his chair, rising. “Son, don’t answer that. He’s not answering any more questions.”
What did Erica say about me?
“Her mother found her last night, Thomas. She wasn’t responsive.”
Her words slam into my chest with the force of a linebacker, crushing all breath from my lungs. The room blurs.
Not responsive.
I’m going to be sick.
“Do the right thing, Thomas. Tell us what really happened Saturday night.”
“Thomas, don’t you dare open your mouth!” My father’s words barely register over the earsplitting shriek in my head.
Not responsive.
Chairs squeak against the floor. Someone grabs my elbow, yanking me to my feet. “I’ll have your badge for this.”
Erica.
Found last night.
Not responsive.
Because of me.
“Is she dead?” I ask, but too quietly.
My father drags me from the room as the officer calls out, “Your deposition is scheduled for Thursday morning, Thomas. Two days from now. Be ready to tell the truth then.”
“Is she dead?” Louder this time, but the door is already closing.
My father leads me to his BMW, his grip like iron on my arm. Only once we’re seated inside does he speak, rage lacing every word. “We’re going straight home. Straight home, you hear me? And when we get there, you are going directly to your room while I make phone calls to figure out how bad this is. When I can stand to look at you, you are going to tell me every last detail. Every last detail. You hear me?”
I nod, wiping tears from my chin.
My father shakes his head, backing his car from the lot. “You fucked up big-time, Thomas. You really did.”
ERICA
A SHARP PINCH PULLS ME from the fog.
A bug, biting, scuttling across my eyelids. I blink.
Too bright. I don’t want to. Too hard.
But the bugs—they’re everywhere—crawling all over me, millions of microscopic legs tickling, deafening high-pitched cry.
I twitch, jerk, scratching at the beetles stuck to my chest. Stuck.
Hundreds. Scampering, scuttling over me.
Everywhere. They’re everywhere.
I scream, but they’ve crawled down my throat with the snake. I choke.
I scratch at them, but their clicking pinchers grow louder, more frantic. Hungry mouths sink in and drink my blood. A green hornet is at my elbow, stinger pumping poisonous venom into my veins.
I thrash my legs but can’t break free. I thrash again. A li
ghtning bolt of pain explodes between my legs, freezing me.
My eyes fly open in time to see large creatures zoom nearby, but the white-hot sun blinds me. Then I see.
Not outside: A dingy room.
Around me, not creatures: people in white, green, maroon rushing toward me.
Up, not the sun: too-bright bulbs blocked by heads crowding in.
In my mouth, not a snake: a wide tube out my throat, around the bed, joining a small machine on wheels.
Down, not bugs: smaller tubes, in and out of blankets, entering my elbow where a dark bruise has formed like an ink blot.
Like the words they wrote on me.
I know where I am.
Hospital. Because of the pills. Because of the words.
Mom’s voice registers seconds before her face bursts into focus. Exhaustion pools under her eyes, hair a collapsing wasp’s nest.
“Erica!”
It’s her voice, but far away, past the lake of marbles, the shrill shriek of the bugs.
“No more, please!… Slept so much already!” says the muffled voice—Mom’s voice—mountains and valleys and rivers away.
But it’s too late. I’m falling backward, into the water. The cool spheres roll through me, and I’m sinking again, floating…
THOMAS
I HAVEN’T LEFT MY ROOM since my father drove me home.
At first, I kept my door open to see if I could catch any news of Erica. Then Mom fell into hysterics when my father sat her down in the living room, so I shut it.
But now the urge to pee takes over, and I force myself out of bed.
I’m halfway down the hall when a throat clears: my father, hand gripping the banister at the base of the stairs. “Thomas, come down. We have things we need to discuss.”
I follow him to his office.
“Close the door,” he says.
I don’t know what’s worse—the way he’s looking at me, or having to step inside this prison cell of a room with him and shut myself in.
I’ve never liked his office, full of dark wood and shelves loaded with heavy books and a giant desk taking up most of the space. His office at work looks exactly the same. I close the door behind me, all the fresh air going with it.
When I was a little kid, I’d sit outside his door, playing on the floor with my action figures or LEGOs, and wait for him to come out. Even several years ago, I would’ve given anything for him to have invited me into his office for a little father-son chat, but not now. Especially not now.
My father strides around his office, pulling legal texts from shelves and manila files from drawers. “The girl’s alive.”
I stagger, drop to the edge of a stiff chair, not realizing until now exactly how much I needed to hear those words. But is she okay? I can’t find the oxygen to ask.
“You lucked out big-time,” my father continues, “or we’d be looking at a possible wrongful death suit on top of everything else. So, now the real work begins. I’ve called together a meeting with all the parents for tomorrow morning. We’ve got to put together a plan of action for Thursday’s deposition. Nip this thing in the bud right now. I also called in a favor to get a copy of the online diary, or whatever this girl wrote, by the day’s end, since they took it down. Then we’re going to go through it all, dissect every word, and I’ll need you to tell me your side. Everything, and I mean everything. I need to know how you met this girl, who her friends are, what her family’s like, what kind of car she drives. Absolutely everything, you understand?” He waits for my nod. “Look at me,” he barks.
We lock eyes. The hatred in his expression makes the hair on my arms stand on end. “What the hell were you thinking.” It’s not a question. He holds my gaze for an eternity until I look away. Then, with a sharp shake of his head he’s back in controlled-lawyer mode. “You need to focus, Thomas. Think hard on anything we can use against her…”
Use against her?
“…and call her character into question. Because two days from now, we’re going to need it. If that lying little bitch wants to go after you,” he continues, “then she doesn’t know what’s coming.”
He’s rifling through his desk, not looking at me, which is the only way I find the courage to say, “She’s not a bitch.” It comes out a whisper. I regret it immediately.
“What’s that?”
“She’s not a bitch.” I say it just loud enough to be heard over the sound of slamming desk drawers. “I’m not using anything against her.”
Only then does he glance in my direction. “Don’t be an idiot, boy. This girl is accusing you of sexual assault. Do you know how much trouble you’re in right now? What this bitch could do to your future, to my reputation?” He throws another file onto his towering pile. “So, you’re going to cooperate and you’re going to cooperate fully. I tell you to jump, you jump. I tell you to crawl, you crawl. I tell you to tell the police on Thursday that this girl is a conniving little liar, and you say exactly that.”
I hadn’t realized I’d been clenching my fists until I think about using one on his face. I know without having read whatever she wrote about me that it’s true. All of it. Because what could be worse than the truth?
“And what if I don’t?” I’m ashamed at how quiet my voice is, though my father’s expression tells me he’s heard me loud and clear.
He cocks his head to the side and sets the files down. In one quick movement, he’s around his desk and advancing on me, all taut muscle under his suit jacket.
I rise quickly to my feet, closed fist raising with each of his steps until a pathetic, Band-Aid-covered hand is all that stands between us. With his face six inches from mine, he seems possessed.
Part of me thinks about my raised fist, mostly ineffective this close up. Another part realizes that this is the first time my father’s seen me in a long time, really seen me, and that we’re the same height. But I know him well enough to realize that everything from how close he’s standing to his broad shoulders and icy gaze are all constructed weapons of intimidation. Still, the last part of me recognizes that these weapons are working. I can smell his aftershave, his brute strength. His mouth is set in a hard line, but there’s satisfaction creeping into his eyes. Victory.
Before he even says a word, I know I’ve already lost.
He takes his time, each word breaking with sarcasm. “How noble of you to stand up for her… now. So, tell me, son,” he growls in a voice already confident of the answer, “if you respected this girl so very much, then why the hell would you and your buddies strip her naked and mark your territory? Or so I hear from your principal.”
A seam tears open in me and all my hot anger gushes out. I’m deflated, knees weak with the truth.
But my father’s not done yet. He has me at his mercy, and he’s going to savor this moment. “If you want to hate someone,” he says, “hate yourself, boy. You’re the one who got yourself into this mess.”
ERICA
I THOUGHT I KNEW WHAT pain was, and then the snake is wrenched from my throat, and I gag, gag, gag.
Numbers drip from the clock as I drag myself from the lake, my skin writhing in acid. It’s a hurt beyond words.
Words. How can you describe pain when all you have are words? Brittle, charred bones. Veins alight. Fingers and toes popping like embers. Guts, throat, skull submerged in lava. And inside, maggots eating away at brain tissue, the crunch of their greedy mouths like tiny crackles of an old-fashioned radio—the only sound I hear aside from the ringing, ringing, ringing.
But none of it truly describes the pain—fiery sparks of singeing coals. Every part of me HURTS.
This is no hangover. This is every pain I’ve ever felt—every jolt, slash, tear, break—all combined into one terrible agony.
My eyes fly open.
What have I done?
THOMAS
MY FATHER SCHEDULED THE MEETING with everyone’s parents for tomorrow morning, so I don’t have much time.
After I hear my father’s car pul
l away, I slip downstairs to use his office phone, looking up Forest’s number on the lacrosse roster. The police confiscated mine, even though it was demolished.
“Hello?” It’s Forest’s mom, exactly what I was afraid of.
“Hey, Mrs. Stevens. Is Forest there?”
There’s a long pause. All I can hear is a dog barking in the background. “Thomas?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be calling.”
“Oh, well, I was hoping that—”
“Forest can’t talk right now.” The line goes dead.
I hold the phone in my hand—I have to talk to Forest before tomorrow, before everyone’s watching us. I need to see if he’s heard anything else and ask what he told the police, what he plans to do.
Hanging up the phone, I make a decision. I slip into the garage and wheel my old bike out the side door, then pedal hard. It’s risky enough that I’m sneaking out, and if Mom heard my truck start up, I’d be in deep shit.
By the time I get to Forest’s house, I’m puffing hard but am fueled by the exertion. For a second, I’d forgotten why I’ve made the familiar trek to Forest’s. Tossing my bike next to the neighbor’s trash cans, I make my way around the side of the house, avoiding the front door. Lady greets me at the back gate, pressing her wet nose into my crotch. “Hey, girl.” I pet her golden fur. “Where’s Forest?”
She follows me, tail wagging as I move around back, circle the hot tub, and step into the planters. I peer through Forest’s window, but his room’s dark.
Lady yips.
I shush her then peek into the living room. The TV blares. Forest sits watching from the couch, leaning on his fist, a plate of sandwich crusts beside him. I’m about to tap on the glass when Mrs. Stevens enters the room. I duck, making Lady yip again. “Shh!”
I only hear pieces of what they’re saying over the TV, but it’s enough to tell me Forest’s dad is on his way home from some sort of retreat and not happy about it.
The minutes tick by as I crouch in the flower bed, muddy sprinkler water soaking into my Chucks. Mom’ll notice I’m gone soon if my father doesn’t get home first, so I’ve gotta get back. When I risk another glance, Mrs. Stevens has disappeared. Through the doorway leading into the kitchen, I spot Forest’s little sister, Elle, bent over a textbook at the table, headphones on and legs swinging.
After the Ink Dries Page 19