“You will. We’ll get through this together.” Then she asked, “Why were you and David together in your car?” Kamala sat on the edge of the bed.
Jane twisted the sheet in her hands. “Who is David? They keep mentioning his name and no one tells me who he is.”
“Are you sure you’re not lying, just a little? You can tell me. C’mon, amnesia? It’s so, I don’t know, nighttime soap opera.” She said this very gently, almost kindly.
“I really don’t remember.”
“David’s not the kind of guy you can forget.” Kamala had settled her stare back into a smile. “But your face isn’t hurt. That’s nice. You’re pretty enough.” Kamala ran a hand through her glorious black hair. “I heard David’s face was badly damaged. The service was closed-casket.”
Jane had scrunched down farther in the bed, watching her. Service?
“I don’t know how amnesia works. Do you remember basic knowledge from the culture you live in? You know what a funeral is? What ‘closed-casket’ is? When someone dies, we put them in the ground. The casket is what holds the body. ‘Closed’ is when the body is so ruined, so destroyed, that no one can bear to look at it.”
Jane couldn’t speak. Ever since awakening she had felt like she was in a haze, but she knew that if she pushed the button on the bedside control, the nice nurse would come, and the nice nurse was a big-shouldered guy, about six-three, who could pick Kamala Grayson up and carry her far, far away. Her hand inched toward the control. Kamala’s hand closed on hers, almost gently.
Kamala leaned close and brushed her lips against Jane’s forehead. “I’m just a little raw right now. But we’ve been friends forever and I love you. When you remember what happened with you and David…talk to me. And no one else. I promise it will be all right.”
Mom reentered, holding two Cokes. “I thought you might want one, Kamala.”
“Did I…kill this David?” Jane asked her mother in a hoarse whisper.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Norton,” Kamala said. Her voice was soft and consoling. “Jane got agitated…I tried to calm her down. I should have just rung for the nurse. I mentioned David without thinking, I’m so sorry.”
“Who’s David?” Jane’s voice rose. “Did I kill someone?” Laurel rushed to her side.
“Jane, I’m sorry, it’ll all be OK…” Kamala backed away from the bed. “I should go. Please, call me, if there’s anything that I can do for you, Mrs. Norton. I’ll be happy to help Jane fit back in if she returns to school.” And with that Kamala was gone, scooping up the Coke Laurel had set down as she tried to hug Jane, and took a long sip from it as she left the room.
Jane had to be sedated.
*
And Kamala had been good as her word. Oh, what a help she had been.
Now she stood before Jane, close to the edge of the cliff, and Jane’s first thought: We’re alone here. No one else is around. Just her and me, and a long drop down.
Kamala smiled. Then Jane saw, up the rise, on the side of High Oaks Road, a car parked, a girl watching from the window.
“How are you?” Kamala asked. “I’ve been so worried about you. I heard you flunked out of Saint Mike’s.”
“You heard wrong,” Jane lied. “Thanks for your concern. How’s life at UT?”
“Let’s not compare our lives right now, Jane. I’ve heard you’re not doing well. How can I help you?”
She took a step toward Jane. Slowly Jane moved away from Kamala, up the hill, away from the ledge.
Kamala shook her head sadly. “I wish you would let me be your friend again.”
“Just stay away from me.”
“Jane. How will you ever get better if you don’t take responsibility for your life?”
“I know what you are behind the smile, and behind the gentle words, and behind the fake caring,” Jane said.
Kamala just kept smiling and shaking her head. “I forgave you. I guess you can’t forgive yourself.”
“You sound like a therapist talk show.”
Jane turned to head up the steep hill.
“Jane, I so want to help you,” Kamala said to her back. “Why won’t you let me?”
“I finally figured you out,” Jane said, turning back to face her. “All this hating me behind your sugary smile and your fake concern is just a drama, with you as the star. Messing with me, ruining me, it’s just about you. Did you bring your friend along to watch, so she could tell the really good sorority how kind and noble you are?” Her words sounded so harsh in the quiet of the breeze. While Kamala just kept those gentle, pitying eyes on her.
“I didn’t just lose David,” Kamala said. “I lost you, too. I just don’t understand why you hate me so.”
Kamala. She had to be this Liv Danger, who’d left the creepy Faceplace message. It was entirely the kind of bullying stunt she would pull. All Will Pay. Especially for killing Kamala’s boyfriend. Jane turned and started to walk back up the hill.
“We’re not done,” Kamala said. “You’re not well, Jane. Don’t you realize that I care, your mother cares, we just want you to get better.”
Jane stopped and turned back to the young woman who had been her best friend for years. “You don’t get to call me crazy. Not you!”
Jane stumbled up the steep incline of the hill, back to High Oaks Road. A BMW was parked along the side of the road, and by it stood a young woman, who stared at Jane.
“What are you looking at?” Jane snapped at the girl, who said nothing, but got back into the car.
Oh, great. Jane realized she was going to have to stand here and wait for a rideshare car to respond to her request on the app. She could not bear it if she was still loitering by the side of the road when Kamala left.
Kamala, who had been popular, and was so beautiful, and salutatorian at one of the most competitive high schools in Texas, and perfect. If she tried to hug Jane, Jane thought she would punch her.
Nowhere to go. Then, farther down the road and to her left, she saw a gate to a driveway. That house, she knew, belonged to the man who had heard the crash and had called the police. She knew from the newspaper accounts of the crash that his name was James Marcolin.
She started walking before she could think. The driver could pick her up at the Marcolin residence. It would be an address on the GPS, and even a hundred yards between her and Kamala was better than nothing.
She was halfway there when she heard the BMW’s engine start.
She studied her phone, a camouflage she knew to be lame but she couldn’t help herself.
The BMW pulled even with her. Kamala was in the passenger seat.
“You don’t drive, of course, do you? Let us give you a ride. Is there a homeless shelter you’re staying at?” Kamala asked.
Every word a jab of the knife. Jane kept walking.
“Jane, are you homeless? I want to know the truth.”