She hit the ignore button on the phone and slid it into her purse.
Sawyer got on the highway, guiding her car down the first exit. The trees that had looked so black and ominous the night of Maggie’s death looked cheery and welcoming now, and Sawyer’s little Accord zipped past, her heart seeming to speed up with every mile crossed. She pulled her car to a stop across the street from Maggie’s house and killed the engine, breathing in the silence.
Sawyer slid the file folders from her bag and found Maggie’s, running her fingertip over the handwritten marker—Gaines, Maggie E. She flipped the manila folder open quickly, her stomach clenching at the two side-by-side photographs clipped to the front cover of the folder. They were both of Maggie, her long hair brushed back from her forehead, her lips pursed. In the photograph on the left, her lips were a glossy, impish pink, the edges slightly turned up. Her eyes stared straight out, daring you to look away; they seemed to hold a world of mystery, of mischief. In the photograph to the left, the glossy pink on Maggie’s lip was replaced by a matte, unnatural blue. The edges that had so often turned up in a grin or a snarl were slack now, giving way to sallow-colored cheeks. Her eyes were open but the spark was gone, the mischief, the mystery faded. Her eyes stared at Sawyer, unseeing, milky white, dead.
Sawyer was surprised when a fat tear plopped on the file folder. She sniffed, willed her shaking fingers to turn the page. The autopsy report was clipped in next and read like the newspaper article—nothing Sawyer didn’t know—nothing she wanted to know.
Finally, she pushed open the car door and approached Maggie’s house. It stood quiet, the entire street desolate. Sawyer pushed her hands in her pocket, unsure of what she wanted to do. When she went to reach for the doorbell, she saw the upstairs curtain twitch, a snatch of blond hair. Her heartbeat sped up. She knocked.
Olivia opened the door a few inches, her red-rimmed eyes zeroing in on Sawyer. “What are you doing here?”
“I’m sorry, Olivia, I know I’m probably the last person you want to see right now.”
Olivia swallowed hard and looked over her shoulder into the darkened house. She opened the door a small bit more and slid out. Sawyer was surprised at how small and frail the girl looked, even though only a few days had passed.
“I don’t want my mother to see you,” she said.
Sawyer nodded. “I understand.”
“I know you weren’t bullying her.” Olivia sunk down on the porch step, slipping her sweatshirt over her knees.
“Do you know if anyone else was?”
Olivia shook her head soundlessly, and Sawyer bit her bottom lip. “I need to get into Maggie’s room.”
Olivia’s eyes flashed, brows high. “Why? What do you want from her?”
Sawyer held up her hands placatingly. “Nothing. I don’t want anything from Maggie. We may not have been friends at the end but we were, once. We were best friends, remember? I want to help her.”
“No one can help my sister anymore. She’s dead.”
Sawyer closed her eyes, struck by the bitterness in Olivia’s voice. “I know. I want to find out who did this to her.”
Olivia looked over her shoulder again as if considering. “My mom took a pill. You have five minutes.”
Sawyer nodded and followed the girl into the house.
Maggie’s bedroom hadn’t changed much since she and Sawyer had been friends in elementary school. The walls were painted the same billowy pink, the bed was still spread with the lacy linens that Sawyer remembered walking her Barbies on and telling ghost stories under. The only difference was the posters and pictures tacked everywhere—Libby, Maggie and Kevin, cheerleaders, bands that Sawyer had never much cared for.
That, and the silence.
An overwhelming silence permeated the whole room, as if everything in there knew that Maggie wasn’t coming back.
Sawyer wasn’t sure what she was looking for and touched things gingerly—Maggie’s schoolbooks, her cheer uniform, the pompons discarded on the floor. When she turned and faced the closet, beads of sweat pricked out at her hairline.
She tried hard not to think of Maggie’s final moments and instead dropped to her knees, feeling around the closet floor. Her fingers closed around a woven bracelet, her heart speeding up as she brought it closer to examine it.
“Best friends,” Sawyer breathed. The words were embroidered into the thing, a bracelet that she and Maggie shared the summer they spent at camp. Like Maggie’s, her own was probably discarded somewhere in her closet.
“Time to leave,” Olivia said from the doorway.
Sawyer slid the bracelet into her jeans pocket and stood, passing Olivia as she left.
“Did you get what you came for?” Olivia wanted to know.
Sawyer just nodded, her emotions knotted in her throat.