The Girls I've Been

by Tess Sharpe

  I know it makes me the biggest hypocrite in the world, but it hurts in that chest-aching way that only she can squeeze my heart into feeling. The back of my throat burns with tears I’d never dare shed.

  “My dad is in Oregon,” Iris says, like it’s a real answer, when we all know it’s not. She’s playing me, and if I can’t take my own game, what does that make me? She’s twisted this into the ultimate dare with the same skill she applies to mending her clothes and raising money for shelter kittens and calculating probable wind patterns in a wildfire.

  “I have no idea who or where my dad is,” I say.

  “And my dad is an asshole who Nora had to blackmail so he’d stop beating me,” Wes says, and Iris’s eyebrows disappear into her bangs at this information. “Everyone in this room has a fucking asshole for a dad. There’s the truth.”

  “So do you just hop around town, doing crimes and conning people?” Iris asks me.

  “I’ve never hopped anywhere in my life, thank you very much. And blackmailing the mayor was a . . . coming-out-of-retirement thing.”

  “How can you be retired from something you’re actively involved in?”

  “I’m not involved in anything,” I say, acutely aware of Wes at my right. He’s looking down at his knees, at where they’re touching Iris’s, at where they’re touching mine. I know without having to ask that he’s trying to weigh his loyalties, because I’m bending the rules.

  “You’re not who you say you are. Your mother isn’t dead. You have hitmen scouring the country—maybe the globe—for you. You talked that bank robber out there into handing Lee the little girl like some kind of magician. But you’re not involved in anything? You’re not Nora O’Malley!” Her voice rises too high on my name and I don’t expect it and neither does she, I think; the full-bodied flinch that goes through me when those words come out of her mouth.

  “What’s your real name? I know it’s not Ashley Keane.”

  My mouth goes dry. I can feel the phantom sting of rubber against my wrist. You’re Rebecca. Snap. You’re Samantha. Snap. You’re Haley. Snap. You’re Katie.

  You’re never, ever her. She was to stay locked up inside, somewhere safe, untouched. The only girl who goes untouched. The only girl who remains unknown.

  I’ve said the name out loud only once since I left that hotel room in Florida with Lee. I whispered it in Wes’s ear and I’d been scared he’d make it into a weapon, a final blow to the pieces I broke us into. But instead he’d extended the first warped and tattered piece to build the Franken-friends on. He’s always had the grace I find so hard to fake.

  Iris has grace, too. I think I shattered some of it today, and maybe too much.

  “Right now, I have to be Ashley.”

  Her eyes narrow, and for a moment, I mistake it for anger. But when her gaze meets mine, there’s a blazing in it that makes my stomach melt. “You listen to me, whoever you are,” she says. “I will set those assholes out there on fire before I let them take you like some sort of bank robbery consolation prize/human shield.”

  “Iris . . .”

  “No! You do not get to sigh my name and ruffle your hair and give me sad, sacrificial lamb eyes. You do not waltz into my life and run circles around me until I’m dizzy from you and then leave in the most horrific way possible. And you certainly do not get to serve yourself up to the bank robbers on a shiny platter with an apple in your mouth, roast-pig style.”

  My mouth twists with each order she issues, until I’m wound tighter than a corkscrew, and when she calls me out on my plan so easily, I can’t stop myself from snapping, “Why the hell can’t I?”

  “Because I love you,” she says, so crisp and sharp that the words will mark me for good and bad and doomed.

  The tightness in my chest springs free in a second. “You . . .” And then I can’t say any more. I can’t even breathe. I’m dimly aware that Wes is chuckling next to me, like he knew it all along. Iris stares at me like it’s Truth and Dare entwined. And I guess it is, because that’s what loving her has been for me. I couldn’t deny the truth of it, so I took on the risk.

  “Yes,” she says. “I love you, whoever the hell that happens to be. So no more lying. No more secrets. And no more running cons without including both of us.” She waves at Wes, who’s beaming like we don’t have about ten metaphorical anvils hanging over our heads. “Deal?”

  It’s a fair deal, if you’re trusting. I’m not, of course. You don’t have to just be taught to trust, you have to grow up in a life with people who are worthy of it. And the tilting ground Mom put me on was not.

  But I had to trust Lee. I chose to trust Wes.

  And I risked everything to love Iris.

  So I open my mouth to tell her we have a deal, because she deserves that from me, but before my lips can even form the word, a scream that starts and then cuts off in a horrible, gutted sort of way echoes across the hall. The sound sends Iris cringing back against the cupboards and Wes banging up against them just as fast, trying to shield her and grab me close at the same time. My heart doesn’t thump fast this time. This time, it slows down, dread filling the agonizing space between.

  I had laid a trap.

  Did the wrong person get caught in it?

  — 35 —

  Katie (Age 10): Sweet, Spirited, Smart (In Three Acts, Reversed)

  Act 3: Sweet

  Four Hours After

  It’s still raining when I get back from the laundromat. The windows are dark, all the lights are shut off, and his car’s not in the driveway.

  I push inside the house through the back door, moving through it in the dark, my shirt dripping pink raindrops as I go. If I can just get to the money that I’ve got hidden in the downstairs bathroom, maybe I can run . . .

  I have to pass the living room to get there. I tell myself to be ready, that I can bear it.

  Blanket’s big enough for two.

  The blanket’s gone now. So are the couch cushions. There’d been blood all over them, and now they’re gone.

  Just like him.

  It’s like nothing happened, like that moment got plucked out of time, and I stare, trying to make sense.

  Come a little closer, sweetie.

  Did he clean it up? He must’ve. But I thought . . .

  There had been a lot of blood. And yelling as I ran.

  I don’t bite.

  But he must be okay. If he could drive away.

  Right?

  “There you are.”

  I jump, so close to screaming I have to clap my hands over my mouth.

  My mother looks at me from the hallway, a bottle of bleach spray in her dish-gloved hands.

  I shiver, suddenly aware of the cold under her gaze.

  My first instinct is to apologize. There are bruises on the insides of my knees and I’ve become someone different in the space of those minutes that were maybe hours, but the words on my lips are still I’m sorry.

  It’s hard and strange and churning sickly inside me to want to be wrapped in the protection of a person who I think I might need protection from.

  “I’m almost done here,” she says. “Then we’re leaving.”

  I just stare, barely making sense of the words.

  Where is he?

  “You’re going to be okay,” and it’s not a question or some sort of vow. It’s not a blessing or a wish.

  It’s an order. She says it just like she says Katie. Your name is Katie, and it is so familiar that it almost snaps me out of the grasp of doubt.

  What did she do to him? Was it worse than what I did?

  “Come on,” she says, holding out her hand. The red almost blots out the yellow rubber.

  Where is he?

  I can see it in her eyes. There’s too much red on her gloves.

  Gone. For good.

  I’m rooted by it;
the crash of it. The realization that she got back and saw what I did, all the blood and him and just . . .

  God, we’re exactly alike, aren’t we?

  She says my name. Not Katie. My real name. It jerks me out of the spiral that’s tightening around me.

  “Come on. You need to help me get rid of him.”

  She’s still holding out her bloody hand.

  I take it.

  I have no other choice.

  — 36 —

  11:32 a.m. (140 minutes captive)

  1 lighter, 3 bottles of vodka, 1 pair of scissors, 2 safe-deposit keys

  Plan #1: Scrapped

  Plan #2: Fucked

  In the wake of the scream, we’re dead silent. This time, Iris is the one in the middle, Wes on one side, me on the other. No one is shaking, and all of us are tensed up. What to do, what to do, there’s nowhere to go.

  “Who . . .” she starts to say, a breathless word that’s cut off by the scraping sound we all know now.

  He’s coming in.

  It’s not like before. He’s not like before. His face is all storm, no substance. No more curiosity. And there’s a lot more blood on a lot more than his hands now.

  Shit. Shit. He’s got a knife somewhere. I thought I’d covered all the weapons, but clearly I hadn’t. That’s too much blood.

  I jump up, because he’s reaching for me before he can even cross the room, and if I can get away from Iris and Wes, maybe I can . . .

  He backhands me so fast, I don’t have time to plant my feet; I just go down. My teeth clatter together as my cheek smacks the floor. Wes bellows like I haven’t heard in years, and the only thing in my head is his scream and white-hot pain and ringing ears, and the only thing in my mouth is blood. I spit it out on the floor, along with a chunk of my back molar. Fuck.

  “Don’t move,” Gray Cap says, and it takes me a confused, blinking moment to realize he’s not talking to me. He’s not pointing the gun at me.

  He’s pointing the gun at Wes. Because Wes is standing there, big and threatening and three seconds from going for him, gun or not.

  Everything around me wobbles as I cough out more blood and groan, “Don’t.” I dig my elbows into the uncomfortable, ugly, bloodstained carpet. I have to get up. “Wes, don’t. Isso okay.” I slur the last words, still too much blood in my mouth.

  “You . . .” Gray Cap spits, and the gun’s back on me, away from both of them, thank God. When I meet his eyes, I see the burn of humiliation on his cheeks.

  What happened? What did he find out? Who did he hurt across the hall?

  “What do you think you’re doing?” he asks me.

  The one in red isn’t behind him. Is he downstairs in the basement now that they have the welding machine? Does that mean we’re dealing only with Gray Cap?

  “Answer me!”

  I have a choice. I can cringe and cry and hope he thinks that one blow is enough to put me in my place. Or I can go with my gut, because it’s telling me that he’s never going to believe anything I say or do again, so I might as well lean into it.

  I let the blood dribble out of my mouth and down my chin. “Bleeding,” I answer.

  He snatches me up off the floor so hard my shoulder joints scrape in protest. “You’re going to bleed a lot more when I’m done with you.”

  It’s a bad line, and I would tell him so, but I know what it looks like when a man wants to kill you and just needs one little push toward it.

  “Don’t touch her!” Wes shouts as Gray Cap tosses me into the hall. I bounce against the other wall, the picture above me rattling at the impact. I scramble down the hall on my butt as he drags the table in front of the office door to block Wes and Iris in, but he catches up with me in seconds. He scoops me up again, fingers digging painfully into my armpit, and drags me down the hall.

  Back in the lobby we go. Red Cap’s nowhere to be seen. He’s gotta be downstairs; is it even going to matter in a few seconds? Is this it? Am I dead? He doesn’t throw me on the ground this time. He keeps me close.

  It scarier this time, because of that. He has a knife somewhere. That much blood on his shirt means he has a knife and he probably used it on one of the hostages across the hall. The knife scares me more than the gun right now.

  What’s he planning? How do I get out of it?

  “You little bitch,” he says in my face with such force I can feel the flecks of spit against my cheeks.

  “Did you hurt the kid?” I ask, because I’m not supposed to know for sure that he’s taken her out of the bank. Lee honked. That means Casey is safe. I have that, at least.

  It’s not enough. It’s not even close. It’s one speck of good in a whole world of bad. Wes and Iris are back there, and that means this can’t be it.

  I have to keep spinning.

  Did he put the guard out of his misery? Is the scared teller dead? The older lady?

  “No, I traded the kid,” he says. “Just like you said.” He lets out a huff of breath. It’s not a laugh. It’s not a growl. But it spreads anger and a bitterness in the air.

  “Why would you hurt one of them when you got what you wanted?” I hate how bewildered I sound. He got what he wanted. Lee wouldn’t have honked the horn otherwise.

  “You think I wanted to give Frayn’s kid up?” he asks, and oh, shit.

  One of the adults. They must’ve blabbed without realizing they were blabbing. Had the teller asked about Casey? I couldn’t blame her, but she couldn’t have kept her mouth shut about the kid being related to the bank manager?

  Still, I try not to feel too hostile, because if it was the teller who spilled, she’s probably the hurt one.

  I can’t think the dead one. Not yet. Not without proof. Wishful thinking? Absolutely. I’m hanging on to it.

  “Yeah, I figured it out,” he says.

  Denying it will make him angrier. I don’t want that. I need to bring him down and then build him up. His ego’s not just bruised; I battered it. He wants to take that out on me.

  “If I say too little, too late, are you gonna hit me again?” I put just enough shake into my voice to make his mouth twitch.

  “You conned me.”

  “I was very clear who I am.”

  His hand rises, and I jerk; it’s not fake or practiced. It’s one hundred percent real, and my mouth throbs at the idea of more damage. My cheek is swelling up, but luckily he got me in my lower jaw, so my vision isn’t messed up. Yet.

  “Who did you hurt?” I ask again.

  “Why does it matter?”

  I bite the inside of my swollen cheek to keep from screaming, the pain more than a little mind clearing. If he’s just attacking people to blow off steam, we are so fucked. If he starts shooting, the deputies will find a way in. Or Lee will tear the bricks apart with her bare hands to get to me.

  “Why do you care so much?” he persists.

  “I’d like to get out of here before anyone important shows up.”

  “You care,” he says, with the kind of stubborn awe that tells me I am fucked. “You’re smooth. You didn’t even try to get me to hand you over to the cops. You could have. But you protected the kid.”

  “She’s a kid.”

  “Stone-cold bitch like you shouldn’t mind that. You left a mess in Florida, but you got free. Why aren’t you trying to get free now?”

  He’s skirting too close to the truth. I want to wrench away from him—he’s still gripping my arm, holding me too close, and now I know why: He wants to look into my eyes. He thinks they’ll tell him something.

  “I don’t want to get caught in the crossfire, is that so weird? It’s not like the deputies out there get a ton of storm the bank training around here between traffic stops and busting pot grows. And your friend is trigger-happy.”

  “I didn’t shoot anyone.” The yet hangs there, unspoken, but s
o clear. I have no idea how to flip this. I gave away what he wanted. But why does he need leverage over the bank manager when he’s got the welding machine?

  The safe-deposit box keys. The ones I found in the manager’s office. They’re still tucked in my bra.

  Gray Cap thinks the manager has them on him. He doesn’t think they’re in the bank. That’s why he’s so mad about Casey.

  I lick my lips and take a step back. He doesn’t let me go, but he doesn’t step forward, his elbow straightening, allowing me the space. Good. Good. That’s good.

  “Who did you hurt?” I soften my voice. “The teller?”

  “She should’ve told me who the kid belonged to.” He almost smirks at his bad pun. “And you . . .” His grip tightens up again, and my teeth clench even as I try to keep my mouth soft. He wants to see pain. I’m not giving him that.

  “I did you a favor,” I say stubbornly. “The news that a kid was inside would’ve brought in the big guys from Sacramento faster. It’s in your best interest to get out of here before SWAT comes.”

  “And you’re all about my best interest?”

  “Normally, no: I care about me. Unfortunately, that means I have to give a shit about you, because how did you put it? The guy with the gun never has to say sorry. The only reason you haven’t shot me is because I’m betting you’ve done the math and whatever score is waiting down in the basement is not even close to the seven million my stepfather will pay if you bring me back to Florida, all alive and grown up.”

  “Sounds like a sweet deal,” he says. “But I know you’re trying to stall. It’s not gonna work. We’ll be out of here soon.”

  I know he’s not talking about him and Red Cap. He knows I know he’s not talking about the two of them. He’s talking about him and me.

  I made myself bait because that’s what I was born to be, and now I’ve got to pay the price. At least Iris and Wes will be safe.

  “You gonna fight me?” he asks.

  “You gonna hit me again?”

  “Depends.”

  “Then ditto.”

  He’s quiet for a moment. His grip shifts on me. Changes. When his hand clenches tighter around my arm, it’s nothing like before. Before was punishment.