CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

I have to talk to Lauren—hear it from her that what Ben said about the party is true—but I can’t get her alone until after dinner, when Ashley goes upstairs to call her sister. Lauren is already changed for her evening ballet class—black leotard, pink tights, and a gauzy skirt. She’s tucked into the corner of the living room couch, bent miserably over her phone. I wonder if this will all be worth it in ten years—why Ashley doesn’t just let her quit dance if it makes her so unhappy.

Lauren’s fingers stop moving across the screen of her phone when I plop down next to her. I nod to her skirt. “Ballet tonight?”

“Pointe. Miss Longo says if I can’t get up by the spring I should take lyrical instead next year.”

I glance down at Lauren’s legs. Her thighs and calves are muscular, strong. She’s been struggling with pointe all year, though: coming home from class in tears because Miss Longo picks on her. I wonder if her wobbliness has anything to do with how Emma and Keelie March are in her class, probably always watching. Rooting for her to fall.

How long has Lauren been depressed for? Could it have started after the fucking frat party my friends dragged her to?

I squeeze Lauren’s knee. “Are you okay? You’re scaring me. You’re not yourself.”

Lauren’s mouth forms a stubborn line. I keep pressing. “Laur, did something bad happen? Something you don’t want to talk about?”

“No. What are you even talking about?” Her nose bunches up. “You sound like Mom.”

“I know that Bailey and Jade took you to a party in Milwaukee.”

Lauren freezes. The contents of my stomach churn; I think of my sister around a bunch of lecherous frat boys, accepting a drink from Bailey and Jade all while they cackled about how fucking funny and clever they were, bringing a kid to a college party.

A niggling voice in my head reminds me I was only a year older than Lauren the first time I let a boy put his hand up my shirt. But Lauren isn’t me; she’s too trusting. She still lives in her Rapunzel tower with her stuffed sea creatures.

“Lauren. Did anyone at the party do anything to you—something you didn’t want—”

“What?” she almost yells. “Gross! No.”

She finally looks me in the eye. She’s telling the truth. “Are you going to tell?”

I gnaw the inside of my lip. “No. But that was really, stupid, Laur.”

“Bailey didn’t say where we were going. She just told me to sneak out and hang out with them.”

I feel like a pile of garbage. I wasn’t there for her. I wasn’t there to protect her that night, or the night in the barn. “They—they’re not your friends. You’re too young to be hanging out with them.”

Lauren casts her eyes down.

“I know you feel alone, but you’re not. Screw Emma and Keelie. You’ll make new friends. And in the meantime, you have me. You have Andrew.”

“Is it true?” Lauren whispers. “That you and Andrew had sex?”

My stomach falls and vomit threatens in my throat. “Who the hell said that?”

“Austin Schultz,” Lauren says. “He asked me if it was true.”

“Paula’s kid?” My heartbeat picks up. Paula Schulz who works at Milk & Sugar—she has a boy who’s Lauren’s age.

I think of the way Paula wouldn’t look at me the other day, and my insides shrivel up. How long have the rumors been circulating?

“Is it true?” Lauren’s voice is so small.

“No. Lauren, of course it’s not true. Did Austin say who told him that?”

Lauren shakes her head. “But it’s not…he’s not the first person who said something to me.”

I’ll bet I know who it was. “Bailey?”

“Kind of?” Lauren gnaws at a hangnail. “At that party—she kept asking about you and Andrew doing stuff alone. It’s like she thought I was dumb and didn’t understand why she was asking.”

But Bailey is gone—dead, everyone says—so there’s only one person left who could have told the student body that I fucked my stepbrother.

I finally gather the nerve to call Jade. After one ring it clicks and I hear her voice: Hey, I’m either sleeping or I don’t feel like dealing with you. Leave a message….

There’s that suction-cup feeling in my stomach again. Jade ignored my call, and she doesn’t care that I know she ignored my call.

It’s a huge fuck-you.

So I think of a response that is both equal and pathetic: I block Jade on every social media account I have and flop into bed, not caring that I’ve just declared war.

I’m washing my face before school in the morning when I smell smoke.

Something is burning in the kitchen. I run down the hall and round the corner in time to see Lauren poking inside the toaster with a wooden spoon. I shoo her out of the way and fish out the charred remains of an English muffin.

“I was upstairs,” Lauren explains.

“Where’s your mom?” I ask.

“She had to take Andrew to the sheriff’s station for another interview.”

I use two fingers to dump the burned muffin into the trash, tamping down the urge to puke all over it. They want to question Andrew more. Of course they want to question Andrew more—he’s the last person who called Bailey.

I think of what Lauren told me last night—what people are saying about Andrew and me—and my knees go numb.

“Why didn’t your mom get me up to tell me?” I ask Lauren.

“She wanted to let you sleep.” Lauren is still in her pajamas. “I have to wake Dad up to drive us to school.”

You are thirteen, I want to shout in her face. You should be able to make yourself breakfast and put yourself on the bus.

I steel myself. I’m horrible. Ashley just wants her daughter to get to school safely. It’s not that unreasonable, now that girls are disappearing around here. It’s unreasonable for me to think that every kid is supposed to grow up the way I did, like a roaming dog.

“Is Andrew in trouble?”

I don’t have the heart to lie to her and say everything is fine. “I don’t know, Monkey. I’ll make you another muffin. Go wake Dad up.”

Lauren flees the kitchen without looking back at me. She’s tossed the bread knife into the sink, into a soapy bowl caked with last night’s spaghetti sauce. I don’t have time to wash it.

Ashley has another set of knives—one that only she had been allowed to use, until I proved I could dice onions without chopping my fingers off. It’s a stainless steel professional set and probably cost a thousand bucks. And I’m using one of them to cut an English muffin.

I slide the knife case box out from the overhead cabinet and open it, running my finger across the handles in search of the bread knife. I linger for a beat over the space where the chef’s knife should be.

Should be.

I push aside the mess of dishes in the sink, racking my brain for the last time I saw Ashley use the chef’s knife. She hasn’t cooked all week, except to make that casserole for the Hammonds—and I washed the dishes that morning.

Heart in my throat, I pull out the dishwasher rack, even though everyone knows better than to leave Ashley’s beloved stainless knives in there with the other grime-covered utensils. The chef’s knife would have been washed and put away whenever it was used.

I sink to the floor, the knob of the lower cabinet digging into my back. It doesn’t mean anything.

Six-inch chef’s knives don’t just disappear. Just like people don’t just disappear.

I cover my mouth with my hands. I replay my conversations with Andrew. Pick them apart for any indication he was bullshitting me the entire time.

His night drive. The phone calls. He’d explained them away so easily.

How the hell is he going to explain the knife missing from our house?

I wiggle my phone out of my jeans pocket and call Andrew, even though I know he can’t answer. I let it ring all the way through, just so I can hear his voice-mail message. Say this is all wrong. Say you didn’t take that knife.

Say you didn’t know the rumors about us. Say you would never hurt Bailey even if you knew she started them.

The pounding of footsteps on the stairs. I scramble to my feet, realizing I’ve forgotten to make Lauren another English muffin.

I realize why Ashley wanted my dad to drive me to school when I arrive.

Everyone already knows why Andrew isn’t with me.

The sea of bodies in the hall seems to part for me. There are no whispers or pointed stares, but their thoughts are displayed clear on their faces.

Andrew Kang is not a killer. Andrew Kang is the nicest guy in school.

Did she really have sex with her stepbrother?

Did they really kill Bailey together?

Do you think he’s covering for her?

My rage returns tenfold when I show up at Jade’s locker and she’s not there like she is every morning. She must have realized by now that I blocked her, and she doesn’t even have the guts to face me and ask why.

Jade isn’t in first-period art, but it’s not unusual for her to stroll in a few periods late. By Spanish third period, my anxiety is spiking. On the way into Mrs. Callahan’s room, I stop by Val’s desk.

“Hey.” She looks up at me. A weak smile before shifting her gaze to see who’s watching.

She doesn’t want to be seen talking to me.

“Um, have you seen Jade today?”

“Yeah, I think she was in second period.” Val scratches the back of her neck, one eye on Bridget, who is at the desk next to her.

“Did you see her in homeroom?” I ask.

“Nah, she wasn’t there. I think she came in late.”

Just in time for second period, so she wouldn’t have to see me. By the time I get back to my desk, I’m seething. As the bell rings, I slide my phone from my pocket and send Jade a text. One I know will get her attention.

Where is your mom REALLY jade??

Everything is falling apart, and I am desperate to take someone down with me.

I get a response at the end of the period.

your locker

When the bell rings, I spring out of my seat. I’ll be late for algebra if I cross to the senior wing first, but fuck it.

Jade’s waiting at my locker when I get there. Before I can open my mouth, her fist comes flying at me. I duck her punch; the sound of her fist slamming into my locker makes people turn around.

“Fuck you, Kacey,” she says, loud enough for everyone to hear. She turns on her heels; I grab her arm.

“I’m right, aren’t I? You lied about your mom just like you lied about Andrew and me.”

Jade looks down at my hand on her wrist. “Get off me.”

“Just tell me why. Do you know where she is?”

Jade yanks herself out of my grasp, so violently I lurch forward. I ignore the stinging in my wrist and swing it, backhanding Jade across the face.

Someone starts to shout about a fight. I’m shaking—I slapped Jade—as I turn to head down the hall, in the other direction of the art room. That’s when she grabs me. Slams me into the row of lockers. Pain sears across my forehead and my brain rattles against my skull.

My forehead is raw, prickling from where it connected with the locker door. Blood. I drag my fingers down her face.

I’ll kill her.

Shouting—so much shouting—someone grabs my shoulders, pins me to the lockers. Mr. White: “What is wrong with you?”

He drags me toward Gonzo’s office, past the SAS guard holding Jade back. Her nose is bleeding around her rhinestone stud. Gonzo trots out of her office, barking at everyone in the hall to get to class.

They all stare at me as they scatter. Mr. White won’t even look at me. I’m so incredibly fucked, but my pulse is steady. A calm settles over me, as if I’ve gotten something important out of the way.

My only regret is not drawing more blood.

“What on earth were you thinking?”

I stare back at Gonzo. Everyone keeps asking me that, but they don’t want the real answer. “I don’t know.”

Gonzo stands up and paces the room. Her eyes are red. “The only reason I’m not expelling you on the spot is that the sheriff’s office just called me.”

“What?” I look up, the bone above my eye throbbing where it connected with someone’s locker.

Gonzo looks at me, her upper lip trembling. “They’re holding a press conference this afternoon. I’m canceling all after-school activities.”

My stomach sinks to my feet. “Why? Did they find Bailey?”

“I don’t know.” Gonzo grabs a tissue from the box on her desk. “Go to the nurse and get a pack of ice for your face.”

The nurse lets me lie on the cot in her office instead of going back to Gonzo’s office where Jade is waiting for her father to pick her up. Thankfully, someone sees the indignity of having to face the person who just kicked your ass. I have a sweaty Ziploc bag of ice pressed to my temple.

The bell rings. At the beginning of the next period, Gonzo comes on the loudspeaker and announces that all after-school activities are canceled.

“Mrs. Gonzalo got in touch with your mom,” the nurse says when she comes to refresh my ice. “She and your dad are a bit tied up right now, but one of them will pick you up as soon as they can. Can you say your ABCs for me?”

This is her way of checking that I don’t have a concussion. The words a bit tied up pinball in my head.

With Andrew. At the police station.

When the nurse isn’t looking, I slide out my phone. Fire off a bunch of texts to Andrew.

What is going on

What are they asking you

I even text Ashley: Is everything okay??

But over an hour ticks by, and they never answer. At lunchtime, a pimply freshman comes in, puking into a plastic bag. The nurse skitters out of her chair to attend to him. I hear the SAS lady who escorted the puking kid say that the office called his parents, and no one can pick him up.

While the nurse is distracted, I fish my headphones out of my bag. Plug them into my phone and pull up the local news’s website. They’re live streaming the press conference about Bailey in ten minutes. I roll onto my side on the cot, brush my hair over the headphones. It doesn’t matter; the freshman has vomited all over the floor, and now the nurse is cleaning it up.

The press conference starts; my screen goes black as the video buffers. When it loads again, Detective Burke is standing outside the Broken Falls Sheriff’s Department. Cathy, Ed, and Ben Hammond stand off to the side of the lectern. Ben is sobbing so hard that Cathy has to hold him up.

Burke clears his throat. “At dawn this morning, we were informed of reports that human remains were found on a property on the Minnesota border.”

My blood turns to ice.

“It’s with difficulty that I can confirm the body belongs to Bailey Hammond.”