Heather said people were nervous about the sit-in, and there was pressure from the first round of exams in classes, and stupid fights were breaking out on campus. Faye joined in, saying someone had emptied someone else’s backpack at the library, scattering notes and books between shelves. A girl nearby said she’d seen an Asian guy run out of the stacks with a can of spray paint.
I left them to head to the library a few minutes later. I meant to get a quick sandwich at the lunch truck, but found myself famished and ordered two, plus a large chocolate milkshake. On my way back to my dorm, I took a shortcut through the back lot of a dorm for upperclassmen and heard the sound of something heavy being dropped over and over again. I saw someone who looked like Lloyd pulling garbage bags out of a large green dumpster. I tried to get closer to see if it actually was him, but when he turned in my direction, I stepped behind a van. When I heard the sound of bags being moved resume, I looked around the van and saw Lloyd open them one by one, fish around inside, and take out articles of clothing. He pulled on pants over his pants and then took a long gray wool coat and shrugged it on, folding the wide flaps over his chest.
I backed away and retraced my steps to walk the long way to my room. The image of Lloyd pawing through the dumpster remained even as I tried to block it out. I made myself focus and called the hospital, and they let me talk to Willa, who was in my mother’s room. She said our mother was sleeping, and Albert was keeping Willa company. “They think maybe tomorrow they might send her home,” Willa said. This was good news at least.
The next morning, I went to the clinic to talk to the nurse again, and I saw Lloyd running past the shantytown. Something clattered out of his hand, but he still ran, and when I came upon it, I saw that it was a can of red spray paint.
Later that day, Daiyu told me that a section of the shantytown, including their house, had been vandalized, along with the statue of Weston’s founder in the quad. Someone had scrawled a line of red across the houses that read “Hypocrites.” Around Theodore Weston’s neck, someone had sprayed red paint in a gory depiction of a beheading.
“Who could have done this?” Daiyu said.
“I don’t know, but Serhan says red paint was stolen from the art studio last night,” Faye offered.
“I’ve never heard of Serhan,” I said.
“Her new boyfriend,” Daiyu said. “He’s Turkish and tells her all these Turkish sayings. He’s so cute.”
“You think everyone is cute,” Heather said.
“He’s a writer—he’s all about fate and romantic sayings,” Faye said.
85
My watch says it’s been only three hours, but it seems like an entire twenty-four have passed. Lloyd stands looking out the window, but to the side. I’d read somewhere that they put snipers on hills to shoot people like him, people who take hostages like this. Lloyd seems to know this too, because he never puts himself in front of the window. All we can do is wait for what happens next. Maybe once we try to leave the building, Sax will have a plan to help us. The drive to the airport is an hour. I wonder if my parents are on their way to Weston by now.
The phone rings again. Lloyd slides over to the phone and nods before holding out the receiver to me. HE WANTS YOU.
Detective Sax speaks in a tone that makes me feel sorry for him. “A shotgun and a handgun are missing from those registered to your father. Are those the weapons in the room with you?”
Everyone in the room can hear, but Lloyd has returned to the window and doesn’t look in my direction. The shotgun is in his hands, and I realize now why it and the handgun looked familiar. “Tell my parents I’m okay,” I reply.
“I’m sorry to tell you, your parents were the victims of gunshot wounds last night,” Sax says.
“What do you mean?” I’m trying to understand the words “victims” and “wounds.” “Are they in the hospital?”
Lloyd snatches the phone out of my hand. THAT’S ENOUGH. And then it hits me, because he won’t look at me, that it was him. He had all night to drive there and back.
YOU SAID YOU WERE GOING HOME. I WAS LOOKING FOR YOU. He spits out those words to the floor, and it’s confirmed.
“Will they make it?” I say in the direction of the phone so Sax can hear me.
Lloyd hangs up the phone. YOUR DAD HAD THE BALLS TO POINT HIS SHOTGUN AT ME. I TOLD HIM THAT WHEN I SHOT HIM BETWEEN THE EYES. JUST TOOK THE GUN RIGHT OUT OF HIS SKINNY ARMS AND SAID, ‘YOU DESERVE TO DIE, FUCKER.’
“My mother? Lloyd, my mother? And my sister? Lloyd?” I’m asking, but he’s returned to the window and he holds back the curtain to look out.
I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING TO YOUR SISTER. SHE WASN’T HOME.
“But my mother?”
YOU’LL NEVER FORGIVE ME.
86
I can’t tell you if I loved my father enough to mourn him or if it just makes me angry that it was his stupid guns that armed this maniac in my room. But my father didn’t deserve to die this way.
87
“Shh . . . shh, Yoona, shh . . .” Faye’s voice is far away, and I’ve fallen into a hole.
From somewhere above me, Lloyd is stomping his feet. Someone is shrieking, and if I could jump out of the window to get away from that sound, I would.
IT’S YOUR FAULT. YOU SAID YOU’D BE THERE. I WENT TO LAKEBURG TO TELL YOU WHAT SERENA TOLD ME. I HAD EVIDENCE THAT JAESUNG IS ALIVE. AND I WANTED TO TELL YOU. I WANTED YOU TO KNOW.
88
The fatigue fell like a heavy blanket over me at six each night without fail. I’d just gotten into bed with the folder the nurse had given me at the clinic. I’d been avoiding it, but now was the time. I had to see how I had to prepare. It took all my energy to force myself to open that folder. And then, just as I took out one of the forms inside, there was a knock on my door. I thought for a second it was Heather inviting me to the dining hall. I covered the folder with a blanket and opened the door.
Lloyd stood before me. He looked as if he hadn’t showered in days. His shoulders were slumped, his face unshaven. He was wearing the same clothes he’d had on the last time I’d seen him, the same striped shirt and jeans. He probably didn’t have many shirts or jeans in that backpack of his. I had never seen him use the laundry machines while he’d stayed with me.
“I have to talk to you,” he said.
“Can’t it be by phone?” I replied.
“I tried calling you, but it rang busy, and I got worried.”
“I was talking to Willa.”
“How’s your mom?”
“Fine.” I was surprised at how little I wanted to share with him and how little I cared about anything to do with him.
“Willa and your mom, they don’t like me,” he said.
“I’ve got a ton to do for my classes.”
“Your dad say something to you about me? What about Willa? She was glaring at me in the waiting room as if she thinks I made your mom sick. She does, doesn’t she? She thinks I did something to her?”
“No one’s even thinking about you,” I said and started closing the door.