“He gets out, and you know the way he acts like the whole world belongs under his shoes? He stomps into my mom’s flowers. The asshat is just trudging on the flowers she loves. I said, ‘What the hell are you doing?’ He goes, ‘Reminding you whose house this is.’ I said, ‘It belongs to your parents, not you.’ Then he’s all, ‘You know someone fucked up the red beast last Sunday night?’ But I can see over his shoulder that the car’s already been repainted. And then he goes, ‘If I find out it was you, Rags, I’m gonna do more than fuck up your mom’s garden.’ Then he kicks the flowers a couple times—if I hadn’t been so pissed, I would have laughed at how dumb he looked. He got back in the car and drove away. My mom’s wildflowers were all broken and bent.” He rubs at the creases on his forehead.
“I made Simon promise not to tell it was Conner. Last time he egged the house and Dad called Mr. Welsh, they got into a shouting match. I listened from the kitchen phone. Mr. Welsh said that maybe he didn’t need renters anymore, if they were going to give him headaches.”
His drags his hands over his face.
“My mom loves this house.”
Video stop.
Retrieved from the cellular phone of Vivian Marlo
Transcript and notes prepared by Badge #821891
Shared Media Folder Titled: IV, Sun., Sept. 29, 1:45 p.m.
Video start.
V. Marlo tucks her hair neatly behind her ears. Her face takes up the picture. “This morning Izzie and Har said they wanted us to help the dead girl.” A long pause. “I couldn’t sleep after we found her. I imagined stuff about her. I named her.” She begins to whisper. “Abigail—Abby for short. And I’d play games, like what’s Abby’s favorite fro-yo flavor? What nail polish does Abby like? What does Abby want to be when she’s older?”
Her eyes water. “I’m glad we’re going to try to help Abby. But it’ll be impossible to convince the police to figure out who hurt her. My parents think I was too young to understand why no one acted like Abby dying was a big deal.”
She moodily shakes her head. “On the drive to the Lessing Summer Theater Academy, we go to a big rest stop for truckers with all these fast food counters and a weird gift shop that sells shot glasses and cleaning supplies. Depressing. It’s mostly fat old men and a few families. Except there’s usually a group of girls hanging around the bathrooms. Their clothes are faded and small. They look grimy, like they don’t have parents at home to take care of them. My dad pretends he doesn’t see them, but Mom looks sad. Once I saw her give them cash. Abby was like them.” She brushes a fallen tear from her cheek. “No parents. Alone. Dropout. Runaway. Not from here. They figured that meant she was into drugs or she did stuff for money. That’s why the police didn’t have to find out what happened to her. That’s why none of the grown-ups cared much. She was alone and that cop Denton thought she was garbage.” She grimaces. “It’s going to be a bitch to convince a man like that he was wrong.”
Video stop.
13
Are you high?” Viv asked. The car air was complicated with gym sneakers, a swimsuit stale with saltwater, and Viv’s perfume. The sounds of the packed school parking lot jumped in through the open moonroof of Viv’s car. It was Monday, two days after the blood moon. Her expression was curious. “You have the same look that Jack Robertson has in first period from eating edibles for breakfast.”
I made a face. “He eats them every morning?”
“Probably thinks it makes him so badass. What’s up with you?”
I picked at the silver polish on my nails. “I slept crappy.”
I’d been an idiot. Harry and me in the pool. Under the lowering moon. Alcohol in our bloodstreams. Everything asleep around us. I’d been swept away. In the morning, worry snagged me like a splinter on a sweater. Our secret society had three rules: Never lie, never tell, and always love each other. It was the final rule that Viv amended when she recited it the first night the Order gathered in the barn. She said, always love each other, as friends forever. Was it my imagination that she emphasized friends as though to say love each other as only friends; that her eyes skittered from me to Harry; that it was on her mind when she accused me of wanting to see Harry naked? Was Viv worried that Harry and I would ruin what the four of us had? Would Graham? I wasn’t worried. The four of us were unbreakable. Mysteries, a meteorite, bullies, a murder, and an attack had only made us stronger.
Viv unzipped her makeup bag. “Look up,” she said, smoothing concealer under my eyes. “Close them.” She brushed shadow on my lids. A blunt pencil ran steadily from the inner corner to its outer. “Now this.” She handed me mascara. “Presto. You look like you got ten hours.”
We zigzagged between parked cars. Viv’s cinnamon hair was in a braid, slung over her shoulder, threaded with a long white feather. Crystals dotted the ends of her wing-tipped eyeliner. She was a work of art. I linked my arm with hers.
I resolved to tell her by lunchtime about Harry and me. She did not deserve to be lied to. Neither did Graham, but I was counting on Harry to tell him.
We approached the campus’s front courtyard and flagpole. Viv shielded her mouth, saying, “Amanda’s dressed like a stuffed animal again.” Amanda’s crew—Jess Clarkson, Rachel Fogarty, Conner’s boy band—was sprawled in a bohemian circle on the cement around the flagpole. Their legs, backpacks, water bottles, and lunches all in identical red-and-black shopping bags from a fancy yoga apparel shop were landmines in the middle of the busy courtyard. Conner and Trent stripped the backpack from a passing freshman, launched it back and forth, knocking kids out of the way to clear their path. Campbell was watching them with a sort of surprised confusion, which made me think he was dismayed in his choice of friends.
Usually when the four of us drove to school separately, we met up in our lunch spot before the bell. That morning Graham had texted from the line at Cup of Jo. My chai latte would be waiting for me. We approached our turn. Viv changed her mind. Most people would avoid their sworn enemy. Viv refused to hide from Amanda.
“I look too good today not to rub it in her face,” Viv said. I tightened my arm around hers. Viv held her head high, a steely concentration hardening her eyes as she guided me in the direction of the flagpole.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Amanda and Jess sitting back to back. When we were five or so feet from Amanda, Viv stopped. She stretched her arms above her head, arched her back, and gave a loud yawn. She smiled impishly at me and flipped the braid off her shoulder. She was a bull’s-eye tempting an arrow. Amanda’s eyes were glued to Viv’s profile.
I braced myself for the insult she’d toss at Viv. Sometimes I was collateral damage.
Unexpectedly it was Rachel who spoke. “Rags and Bitches,” Rachel called with a condescending wave.
“Rags isn’t there, dumbass,” Amanda snipped.
“I know, just the bit— ”
There was a threat in Amanda’s eyes. Rachel became absorbed in the rings stacked on her fingers. Amanda shook her head and continued talking to Jess. “Like I was saying, he was definitely at least nineteen and . . .”
Viv had started off again, her hand tugging me with her. It didn’t make sense, Amanda shutting her own friend up, sacrificing the opportunity to cut Viv down. Amanda’s eyes were locked onto us as she continued her story about the at least nineteen-year-old. Jess hazarded a heavy-lidded glance our way.