Blood on My Hands

CHAPTER 16

Sunday 4:54 P.M.

WHEN I HEAR the punk cashier in the hardware store yell, “Hey, stop!” my first inclination is to bolt through the door and down the sidewalk as fast as I can. It would be the natural, logical thing to do in my situation, right? So I don’t know where the guile and wherewithal that keeps me from running comes from. Maybe I just know that once I start to run, I’m bound to be caught. So somehow, even though my heart is racing and I feel like I want to jump out of my skin, I force myself to stop and turn to look at her.
She’s holding out a small brown paper bag. “You forgot this.”
I force a smile and take the bag. “Thanks.”
And then I’m out of there.
At the bus stop, despite my hunger, I’m too wound up to eat the sandwich I bought. So I sit and stare down at my black fingernails. Thank God the bus comes soon and it’s almost empty. Sitting near the back, I wolf down the sandwich and wish I’d bought a second one. Then I get to work on the key rings, snipping them with the wire cutters to leave just enough of a gap to squeeze some flesh into. One goes on my lip, two on a nostril, one on an eyebrow, and the rest on my ears. Jeanie once told me something funny about piercings: When you have them, people don’t focus on you. They focus on the hardware.
I got on the bus with no piercings. Thirty-five minutes later, at the stop by Fairchester Community College, I get off in full metallic regalia.
I’ve come to FCC to find Tallon Marx, who is studying for a degree in math with a minor in physical education. Last year she was a teaching assistant at Soundview High, helped coach the girls’ cross-country team, and worked in PACE. Because she was cool and smart and only a few years older than us, she became a confidant and a go-to person when someone had a problem or needed the kind of advice she didn’t feel comfortable going to a friend or an adult for.
At a house that has been divided into units, I ring Tallon’s bell and wait, praying she’s there. A lock clacks and the door opens a few inches, but it’s not Tallon; it’s her roommate, Jasmine, who has freckles and spidery red dreadlocks. “Yes?”
A cold shiver runs through me. She’s staring right at me, at my fake piercings and spiked dyed hair. If she’s watched TV or been on the computer, will she recognize me? But there’s more confusion than recognition in her eyes.
“Hi,” I say. “You’re Jasmine, right? Is Tallon around?”
Jasmine frowns, as if she can’t quite figure out how I know her name and why someone who looks like me would be asking for Tallon. But the good news is that she’s treating me like a stranger, not like a suspect in a murder. “She went to the library, but she should be back soon. Is … there something I can help you with?”
“I—” I almost say that I’m a friend of Tallon’s from Soundview High, but I catch myself. What if Tallon’s told her about the girl she knew from last year who the police are looking for in connection with a murder? “I’m here for tutoring? In math? Tallon said if she wasn’t here, you could let me in.”
Jasmine scowls but opens the door a little bit wider. “She didn’t say anything about tutoring.”
“Oh, yeah, she put a sign up in my school.”
Jasmine bites a corner of her lip, obviously still uncertain about what to do.
“I can wait out here in the hall if you’d like,” I offer with less-than-complete sincerity. I’d much rather wait inside, where there’s less chance of being spotted.
The ploy works. “Oh, no, you can come in,” she says.
I go in, glad to get out of the hall. Jasmine gestures to a couch covered by an Indian-print spread. The couch creaks and feels lumpy. To my right is a tiny standing-room-only kitchen.
“Can I get you something to drink?” Jasmine asks.
“I’m fine, thanks.”
She twirls a dreadlock around with her finger and gestures to a door with an art poster on it. “Well, uh, I have to study. I’m sure Tallon will be here any time now.”
“Thanks.” I give her a wave.
Even in the apartment I feel nervous. What if Jasmine did recognize me and just pretended not to? What if the next person through the door isn’t Tallon but a police officer? Being tense and alert all the time is draining, and that is coupled with the little sleep I got last night. My senses are dulled and sketchy, as if I could easily miss something important because my brain can’t process as quickly or as thoroughly as normal. I try to practice what I’ll say to Tallon but I’m so woozy and sleep-deprived that it’s difficult to put words together.
The door opens and Tallon comes in, carrying a green backpack with a peace symbol on it. Her dark hair is longer than it was last year and she’s wearing lots of silver bangles and rings. She sees me on the couch and gives me an uncertain smile. “Hi.”
“Hi, Tallon.”
She cocks her head and furrows her brow, as if she’s trying to figure out what her connection to this small punk girl could be. I stand up and the perplexed look on her face gradually morphs into one of astonishment.
“Callie?” she gasps.
I press a finger to my lips. “I have to talk to you.”
Tallon’s eyes dart left and right, as if she’s wondering what to do now that she’s discovered a killer in her apartment.
The door with the art poster opens and Jasmine sticks her head out. “Tallon, can I speak to you for a second?”
Tallon’s head swings back and forth between her roommate and me. My insides clench. They know something’s wrong. I have to get out of here.
“You know she hates her,” Jodie once said. We were sitting in Dakota’s backyard, watching her play Katherine in badminton.
“But they’re best friends,” I said.
“You know what the Chinese general said? ‘Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.’ ”
I thought about it, but didn’t see how it related to Dakota and Katherine. “What makes you say that?”
“Watch.”
I watched. To me they looked like two red-faced girls careening and swinging and trying to win a silly game that involved hitting a strange little bally thing over a high net. Katherine, with her compact, boyish body, was a model of deft movement and quick reflexes. Dakota, with her heavy, bouncing chest, often appeared off balance and seemed to lurch from one shot to the next. Neither girl smiled, whereas I imagined that I would have had a hard time not laughing at the absurdity of it. But if there was one thing Dakota and Katherine had in common, it was how serious and determined they were about almost everything.
“They just look like they always do to me,” I said.
Jodie turned and studied me for a moment, as if searching for some clue to why I couldn’t see what she saw. Then she lowered her voice and said, “You can’t see that Dakota is one inch from smashing her racket into Katherine’s face?”
“Ahhh!” Just then Dakota yelped in frustration as the shuttlecock fell to the ground on her side. On the other side of the net, Katherine grinned triumphantly, red-faced and panting, with her hands on her hips.
“I hate you!” Dakota cried, picking up the shuttlecock.
“No, you don’t,” Katherine said.
“Oh, I so hate you!” Dakota insisted, and served. Once again they started batting the little ball back and forth. And almost immediately Katherine hit it just out of Dakota’s reach.
“Grrrrr.” Her face glistening, Dakota gritted her teeth and kept playing.
“Did Dakota say something?” I whispered to Jodie.
“No. She never talks about Katherine. Ever. Even that’s a sign. It’s like she knows she can’t trust herself to say the right thing. I mean, think about the family she comes from. They’re all politicians. It’s all about saying and doing the right thing.”
That might have been true, but it also meant that Jodie had no real evidence of animosity between the two girls. Meanwhile, Dakota and Katherine were once again absorbed in thrashing at the shuttlecock. Still whispering, I asked, “I know what you said about the Chinese general, but seriously, if Dakota hates Katherine so much, why does she want to be her friend?”
“Because they both want the same thing.”
Before I could ask what that thing was, Katherine balled her hand into a fist and cried, “Yes!”
On the other side of the net, Dakota took several determined steps toward a large potted plant nearby and swung the racket down as hard as she could. Crack! I jumped at the sound of the frame shattering against the edge of the clay pot. Dakota tossed the broken racket away and purposefully stood with her back toward us, as if she didn’t want us to see how furious she was.
Katherine smiled, as if she enjoyed causing so much anguish. “I’m getting something to drink,” she announced, dropping her racket in the grass, wiping her forehead with the back of her hand, and heading toward the house.
Dakota stood by the badminton net—her face red and glistening, her eyes narrowed, her jaw clenched—glowering as if she were ready to kill. I felt an elbow touch my arm and turned to find Jodie with one eyebrow raised as if to say, See?