Between

by Jessica Warman

  He rolls the plastic into a tight ball and hands it to Mera, who holds out an open palm. I know for a fact that he’s got a tiny bottle of mouthwash and a roll of dental tape in his bookbag, and that he’s dying to rinse and floss before he has to—God forbid—interact with anyone besides Mera. But it’s clear that nobody’s willing to wait.

  Lowering his head, awkwardly covering his mouth with a hand as he speaks, Topher says, “Richie came by my house early this morning. He wanted to know if I could lend him some money.”

  “I was there,” Mera adds. “He was pretty upset.”

  “There she goes again,” I tell Alex. “Always has to be the center of attention.”

  Joe leans forward with interest. “Did he say what it was for? Did he tell you he was leaving?”

  Topher shrugs. “Not really. He just said he needed it.”

  Immediately, I think of Caroline and the money she stole from my bathroom.

  “How much did you give him?” Joe asks.

  “Um, not very much.”

  “How much is ‘not very much’?”

  Topher clears his throat. He refuses to look at anyone. “I went to the ATM. I took out as much as I could. Seven hundred dollars.” He pauses. “Richie wanted more.”

  Nicole presses a hand to her forehead. She clutches my father’s arm. “My God,” she murmurs. “We saw him all the time. We know his family. He’s like a son.” She stares at Joe. “It is not possible that he hurt Liz. I’ve known that boy since he was a toddler. He’s been in our house almost every day.”

  Nicole is right. I close my eyes, trying to remember. I don’t touch Alex. I want to be in this kitchen alone with my family, with Richie—who was like family—to witness a time when we were all happy. I’m starting to feel like that’s impossible.

  When I open my eyes, I see snow falling heavily outside the kitchen window. From the doorway into the living room, I notice a big tree adorned with twinkling white lights and dozens of ornaments. My family might not be Christian, but Christmas was always a big deal in our household. Josie and I used to get piles of presents; we’d make a list of the things we wanted, and it was rare that we didn’t get all of it. Like I said, my father refused us nothing, and Nicole never seemed to have a problem with his desire to spoil me and Josie—but especially me.

  I am seventeen, a junior in high school. I can tell because there’s a book of CliffsNotes for Othello resting in front of me at the kitchen table; we studied Shakespeare my junior year.

  Even though it’s so early in the morning—the clock on the stove reads 7:48—my cheeks are naturally flushed beneath my makeup, eyes wide and alert. I probably got up at five a.m. to go running. I always enjoyed running in the snow, feeling my breath leave my body in puffs of moisture, finding the balance between body heat and cold air that cloaked me in a sweaty blanket of warmth.

  Josie stands at the stove, her back to me. She’s busy cooking; there are cast-iron pans on two of the burners, both of them sizzling as she stirs. She’s always liked to cook.

  The kitchen door opens without so much as a knock, and Richie steps into the room. Even though he lives only a few doors down, he’s bundled up in a heavy winter coat. A black-and-gray argyle scarf is wound around his neck, gloves on his hands. The only thing missing is a hat; his curls are full of still-frozen snowflakes. He is adorable.

  “Good morning,” he says, grinning at me as I sit at the table. He kicks his winter boots off on the small oriental rug just inside the doorway. He walks over to me, leans down, and kisses the top of my head.

  I beam up at him. “Morning.”

  Nicole stands at the fridge, its door open, staring at the contents. She’s still in her pajamas, which aren’t much: a short white nightgown peeks out from beneath a cream-colored satin robe that falls to her midthigh. Her legs are toned and deeply tanned, even though it’s winter; when she can’t lie out in the sun, she uses an expensive bronzer that gives her entire body a natural-looking glow.

  Richie takes a seat beside me at the table. I watch us with longing and deep regret as my living self leans toward him and kisses him full on the lips.

  “You’re so cold,” I giggle, pulling away. “How much snow is out there now?”

  Before he can answer, my father walks into the room. He’s wearing a suit, complete with black-and-red-striped suspenders that stretch against his big belly, his jacket slung over his shoulder. “It’s cold enough that school is canceled,” my dad says. He walks to Nicole, puts an arm around her waist, and kisses her cheek.

  Things might not have been perfect, but we seemed so happy. I would give anything, I think, to go back to this moment, to be living it for real instead of watching as an outsider.

  “School’s closed? Really?” Josie turns away from the stove, grinning. “They never cancel school.”

  She’s right; everybody is used to snow in Connecticut. It practically takes a blizzard for the administration to cancel classes.

  “I just saw it on the news upstairs,” my dad says. “A frozen pipe burst. You kids got lucky.”

  As I’m watching all of us, I notice that Richie and I aren’t paying any attention to my dad. Beneath the table, I can see his hand resting on my knee; I’m wearing a black pencil skirt and dark stockings. My shoes are shiny red high-heeled boots. How the hell was I expecting to walk through the snow in that outfit?

  Sitting close to each other, Richie and I have locked gazes. With his free hand—the one that isn’t on my knee—he reaches toward my face, tucks a stray blond hair behind my ear.

  We are in our own world, oblivious to my family around us. It occurs to me that this was after my fall down the stairs, after I started losing weight and acting distant. Still, he and I were in love. That much is obvious. We can barely take our eyes off each other.

  “What will we do with our day?” Richie murmurs to me.

  A tiny smile plays on my lips, which are carefully lined, filled in with crimson lip stain, finished off with a coat of gloss. “We’ll think of something,” I almost whisper.

  “All right, you two.” Josie stands above us, holding a plate of scrambled eggs. “That’s enough already. You’re going to make me vomit.”

  I glance up at her. I’m still smiling. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t say ‘sorry.’ Just cut it out.” She sets the plate in front of Richie. “Here you go. Eggs with bacon, onion, tomato, and smoked mozzarella.” She pauses. “You like it. Right?”

  “Oh, yeah. Thanks, Josie.” Richie grins at her. “You’re the best.”

  For a moment, she seems at a loss.

  She liked him already, I realize, watching her. She was cooking him breakfast. She was trying to take care of him.

  “It’s no problem,” she finally says. “I like to cook.” She turns around, picks up another plate from the counter, and places it in front of me. “For you, Liz. Egg whites. Plain.”

  “Thank you.” I wink at her.

  Josie smiles, but it’s almost a smirk. “We wouldn’t want you to balloon to a size zero, would we?”

  “Marshall,” Nicole says, frowning at my dad. “You’re not seriously going into work today, are you? There’s almost a foot of snow on the ground. The roads won’t be cleared yet.”

  My dad takes a long sip from the mug of coffee that he’s holding. “Don’t worry about me. I’m only driving to the train station.”

  Nicole shakes her head. “They can manage without you for a day. It’s not worth risking your safety.”

  He takes another sip of coffee, puts the mug on the countertop, and shrugs himself into his jacket. “I’ll be fine.” Looking from me and Richie to Josie, he asks, “What are you kids going to do with yourselves?”

  “We can watch a movie at my place,” Richie says to me.

  I give him another tiny smile, like we’re sharing a secret. “Okay. Sure.”

  “Josie?” my dad asks. “What about you?”

  There’s a silence as Richie and I look first at each other, then
at my stepsister. It’s awkward; that much is obvious.

  She liked him already, I think again. She wanted him.

  Finally, from the table, I say, “Josie? You can come, too, if you want.”

  Josie glances at her mother. Nicole, I can tell, understands what’s going on. She half frowns at her daughter. Then she shakes her head, almost imperceptibly—I don’t think Richie or I notice, but as a ghost, I do.

  “No,” Josie says. “I have homework.” She looks at Richie. “I’m actually going to read Othello.” And she smiles at him. “Not just the CliffsNotes.”

  “Good for you.” Richie takes a big bite of his eggs. “Mmm, these are great. Liz, you could learn a thing or two from your sister.”

  Another silence. Josie looks at me, I look at her; Richie stares at his eggs.

  As I stand in the corner, watching the three of us, I take my index finger and draw a triangle, its invisible lines connecting our bodies. There it is.

  “Liz?”

  The voice is coming from somewhere far away. I feel disoriented, a little dizzy.

  “Liz? Hey. Are you there?”

  It’s Alex. He’s shaking me, tugging me away from the memory.

  I blink and blink. Then I’m back, standing with him in the kitchen, still surrounded by my dad, Nicole, Josie, Mera, and Topher—and Joe Wright.

  Josie is staring at her cell phone, as though she’s willing a message to appear.

  “Tell Mr. Wright,” Nicole implores Josie. “Tell him Richie would never hurt anybody. You know him almost as well as Liz did. Right, honey?”

  Josie wipes her eyes. Her fingernails are a freshly painted hot pink, perfectly matched to the ribbon in her hair. “There’s something you should know.” She looks from my dad to Nicole to Joe. “Richie and I started seeing each other,” she says, “a couple of months before Liz died.” She pauses. “She didn’t know about it. Liz. We were going to tell her eventually.”

  Mera stiffens but doesn’t say anything. She catches Topher’s gaze, and as they’re looking at each other, I see them communicating in such a familiar, easy way. Richie and I used to do it, too: it’s the kind of look that only two people who’ve been together for a long time can share, a look that says volumes without either person having to speak at all. Richie, I know, could not look at Josie that way. Never had. Never would.

  Topher tugs himself away from Mera. “I’m sorry,” he says, “I can’t stand it. I’ve gotta use the restroom.” He picks up his bookbag.

  “He’s flossing,” I say to Alex. “Let’s follow him.”

  “Really?” Alex is surprised. “You don’t want to stay in here and listen?”

  I shake my head. “No. It’s too much.” What I really mean is that it’s too painful to watch my stepsister explaining her new relationship with Richie to our parents. But I don’t have to tell Alex all of that; he understands.

  In the bathroom, the first thing Topher does is dig his dental tape and mouthwash out of his bookbag. Carefully, he flosses in between every single tooth. Twice. He rinses with the mouthwash. Then he unzips the main compartment of his backpack and roots around until he emerges with a small bag of weed. He flushes it down the toilet. He takes a deep breath, leaning his fists against the bathroom sink and staring at his reflection in the mirror.

  Topher pulls his lips back with his fingers to expose the tops of his teeth, studying them. When he’s finished—apparently dissatisfied with what he sees—he shakes his head, muttering, “Fucking cigarettes.” He takes a long, shaky breath. He’s sweating, clearly nervous, his usual nonchalance nowhere to be found. “Fucking Richie,” he whispers. “Couldn’t let it go.”

  Topher comes out of the bathroom just as Joe is walking to my front door. He stares at Joe for a second, his stride frozen, and glances over Joe’s shoulder at the kitchen. My family can’t see him—my parents are out of sight and Josie, still seated at the kitchen table, has her back to him. But Mera is standing in the corner, watching Topher. She widens her eyes, shifts her gaze past Topher, toward Joe.

  Topher holds a finger to his lips. Almost silently, he and Joe leave my house.

  “Hey. I need to talk to you,” he says to Joe, fidgeting a little bit, staring at the bright blue sky.

  “Okay.” Joe folds his arms across his chest, looking around. My neighbors are still on their porches or looking out their front windows. There are three police cars, lights silently flashing, parked on my street. Richie’s mother is sitting down on the sidewalk, legs crossed. She looks small and defeated. She looks like a child.

  “God, she’s falling apart,” Alex says.

  I think of the empty kitchen. The stash in Richie’s room that Mrs. Wilson saw and did nothing about. “She had it coming,” I murmur.

  “How was the flossing?” Joe asks Topher.

  “It was great. You shouldn’t neglect your gums.” Topher puts a cigarette between his lips. “Don’t lecture me. I’m eighteen.”

  “All right, no lecture. So what do you want? It’s been a busy morning.”

  “How come you just happened to come across Richie as he was packing up to leave? That seems awfully lucky.”

  “I’m the law, kiddo. It’s my job to keep an eye on things.” Joe begins to crack his knuckles, one by one. With each distinct pop, Topher winces.

  “Aren’t you kids shook up?” Joe asks. “Two of your classmates have died in the past year. One of them was your close friend. How many kids are in your grade? A hundred? Ninety?”

  “Something like that.” Topher shoots a nervous glance at my house, blowing a ribbon of smoke into the air. “You’re right, it sucks.” He pauses. “If you find Richie, are you going to arrest him?”

  “Yes.”

  “For what? I guarantee you he didn’t kill Liz.”

  “Possession of a firearm, for starters. And he’s got other problems, too, believe me.”

  “I know that. He’s my friend. I know all about Richie’s problems, okay? Listen, Josie’s lying to you. She wasn’t hooking up with Richie before Liz died. There’s no way.”

  Joe shakes his head, clearly annoyed by Topher’s supposed insight. “That’s not what I understand.”

  “Well, then you’re misunderstanding. He wouldn’t have done that.” Topher rubs a hand nervously across his mouth and lowers his voice, even though there’s nobody else around. “If you want to find Richie, you need to go into Groton. There’s an apartment complex by the river called Covington Arms. Apartment nine. You need to find a guy named Vince Aiello.”

  At the mention of the name, Joe’s attention snaps into focus.

  My vision tunnels. My stomach turns. When I look at Alex, he’s staring at me with obvious doubt. For weeks, I’ve been maintaining that I’ve never heard of Vince Aiello. It’s clear Alex thinks I’m lying, that I must remember something about a man who obviously played a prominent role in my past.

  “I must be forgetting,” I say weakly. “I swear, Alex, I don’t know who he is.”

  “Richie’s been weird lately,” Topher continues. “He’s been parking outside the guy’s building, following him, things like that.” He tosses his cigarette butt onto the street. Joe stares at it but doesn’t say anything. “He was a mess when he came to my place this morning. Mera was there, she saw how he was acting. He’s going crazy about Liz. That’s why I know he didn’t kill her. He’s losing his mind without her. He thinks she was cheating on him, but the thing is, the guy—Vince—he’s a total loser. He works in an auto shop. He’s a greaseball, you know?”

  “Maybe Liz liked greaseballs. Lots of girls like bad boys.” Joe glances over his shoulder at Richie’s house. “Richie sells drugs. I know it. You know it. Maybe Liz wanted to step it up a notch.”

  “No.” Topher shakes his head. “No way. You didn’t know Elizabeth Valchar, sir. I did. I’ve known her since kindergarten. Let me tell you something about that girl. She was my friend and everything, but sir, with all due respect, you’re wrong. I’ll give you an example, okay? One
time Mera and I picked her up for school in the morning, and the night before we’d been at the drive-in movies. We were eating popcorn in the back of my car, and there were all these little kernels stuck in the seams of the leather, you know? And there were greasy napkins on the floor. Not a big deal, right? You push it aside, you sit down. But not Liz. No, sir. That girl refused to get into my car. There were too many crumbs to just brush them onto the floor, and even then, they still would have gotten her dress dirty. That’s what she told me. She said she’d get in my car again after I went to the car wash and vacuumed it out.”

  “I remember that day,” I say. When I look at Alex, he’s staring down at his shirt. It was his uniform from the Mystic Market. It’s smeared with food stains and grease.

  “I’m sorry if my appearance is disgusting to you,” he says, his stance self-conscious.

  When Topher tells the story, it seems absurd. Was I really that prissy? I must have been. I frown. “I was wearing white linen. It was dry-clean only.” Even as I speak them, the words sound weak. Why didn’t I just get in the car? It was only a dress.

  “Your entire life,” Alex says, “was dry-clean only.”

  “I was with Richie once or twice when he drove by Vince’s apartment,” Topher continues. “I saw Vince myself.” He wrinkles his nose, remembering. “Even from across the street I could see that he had these long, dirty fingernails. His hands were all beaten up. They were weathered, you know? I mean, he was filthy—you could tell from a mile away. He was wearing a T-shirt with holes in the armpits. He’s not a bad boy, or a gangster, or anything cool like that. He’s a freaking slob. A real loser.”

  Topher hesitates for a moment. He fishes a piece of gum from his pocket and begins to chew. Shading his eyes with a hand, he peers at the sky again—it’s a clear, pretty day, the sun just starting to really blaze overhead. “Elizabeth Valchar would have jumped into the Sound herself before she let a guy like that lay a finger on her. If Richie says he saw her coming out of Vince’s apartment, you’ve gotta find out why, because believe me, there is something funny going on.”