Deadly Little Lessons

by Laurie Faria Stolarz

“Are you kidding? He even gave me my allowance back.”

  I hug him. “You’re the best, you know that?” I say, not quite sure if any of what he’s saying about his dad is even remotely close to the truth. But right now, in this moment, I don’t care if it is.

  INSTEAD OF PARTAKING in the BBQ-flavored orientation festivities, Wes and I sneak off to the booger sculpture to talk. We sit on the grass under a tree.

  “So, what’s the deal?” I ask him, already suspecting the real story, but wanting to hear him say it.

  “The deal?”

  “The main reason you came here, I mean.”

  “I already told you.” He avoids my gaze, plucking at grass. “I thought you could use some company. I can sense a runaway situation when I smell one.”

  “Funny, but all I smell is old-man cologne,” I joke.

  “Are you kidding me?” He stops plucking to glare at me. “This stuff costs me a hundred and fifty bucks a bottle.”

  “Are you running away, too?”

  “Could you blame me if I was?”

  “No blaming here,” I say.

  “I just can’t take it at home.” Wes shrugs, more sullen than I’ve ever seen him before. “My dad told me that if I don’t start becoming more of a man, he’s going to disown me.”

  “And what does your mom say?”

  “Mom’s still his puppet, almost as afraid of him as I am.”

  “He doesn’t hurt her in any way, does he?”

  “Not physically,” he says, now raking the grass with his fingers, “but he punches near her, on the wall.… He also pounds on doors.…”

  “Does he ever hurt you physically?”

  Wes shakes his head. “But sometimes I wish he would. I almost think that would be easier to take than his threats and put-downs—than him making me feel like pond scum all the time. Anyway, my mother’s the one who insisted I come here—to follow you. She even paid the tuition out of her own allowance.”

  I bite my tongue to keep from asking why a full-grown woman has an allowance. “So, she wanted you to run away, too?”

  “If she had it her way, she’d probably run with me.”

  “Does she know?” I ask, reluctant to say the words aloud, since he hasn’t exactly stated them to me. “About your poetry journal, I mean?”

  Wes looks up from the grass to study my face. His cheeks have gone slightly pink. “Well, she hasn’t exactly read the journal, but I think she might suspect what’s inside.”

  When I first read Wes’s poetry journal, I wasn’t exactly surprised that he was gay. More like relieved that he was finally letting someone (me) in. And so, upon returning it, I offered to talk, but Wes didn’t want any part of a discussion.

  “Anyway, here I am,” he segues. “And it should be noted that I could just as easily have followed Kimmie to NYC.”

  “But instead I’m the chosen one?”

  “Because I sensed that there was something else going on with you.”

  “Well, there is,” I say, eager to open up about Sasha since he’s being so open with me.

  “Care to share over barbecued wieners?” He looks back toward the smoking grills. “They’re smelling a little too yummy and overprocessed to resist.”

  “Sounds perfect,” I say.

  I wake up with a start, picturing his eyes. Light brown and almond-shaped, with long, curly lashes and deeply set lids. Eyes far too pretty for a boy’s.

  I remember that he looked at me almost as soon as I stepped through the door that night. He was sitting at the makeshift bar—what I imagined was once an old assembly-line table, because it spanned the length of the room. I figured he must’ve seen the scowl on my face and heard me snap at Jaden and Misery.

  I remember glancing in his direction several more times, because I’d noticed that he’d noticed me. There was a certain power in doing something that Misery had warned me not to.

  I hear him: the sound of locks opening, hinges creaking, and then his footsteps, moving across the dirt floor. I brace myself, hating his sounds.

  I turn on my flashlight and aim it toward the hole, assuming he must’ve listened to the tape. The tape recorder is there again. He pushes it inside, following it with the microphone.

  “Do it again,” he says; his voice is tired and gruff. “But this time, tell me something honest.”

  “Why?” I ask, but as soon as I ask it, I want to take the question back, because I’ve spoken out of turn, and because the more he tells me, the more I’ll know, and the less willing he may be to set me free.

  “No questions,” he snaps.

  I hear him get up. I hear his breath as he lets out a tired sigh.

  “Wait,” I plead. My cut continues to throb. “Could I please just have a fresh bandage? And some more crackers and water?” I haven’t eaten in what feels like days.

  It’s quiet for several seconds, as if he’s considering the idea.

  “Hello?” I call, when he doesn’t answer. “My cut… It’s burning. Could I at least have some fresh water to clean it?” I look down at the cross shape, still confused about what it means, but afraid to actually find out.

  “Give me your flashlight,” he says, finally.

  I hesitate, fearing that I’ve pushed him too far, asked him too much.

  “Give me your flashlight.” His tone is cold and even.

  My fingers trembling, I push my flashlight through the hole, hoping he’s just going to replace the batteries.

  He snatches it. His dirty fingers wrap themselves around the handle. This time, I’m able to see his hand. Like mine, it looks as if it’s been burned, as if he’s been branded too. A muted red scar with a zigzag shape.

  And then it’s gone. And everything turns black. And I hear him start to walk away.

  “Wait!” I shout. “Please, don’t leave me alone. Don’t leave me in the dark.

  “Can you please just talk to me?” I continue. “Ask me questions. We don’t need the tape recorder. I can tell you whatever it is you want to know.”

  But he doesn’t answer. I hear the locks turn: click, clang, snap.

  “Please!” I scream. The word tears at my throat. “Don’t leave me like this,” I whimper, knowing he no longer hears me, fearing that no one will ever be able to hear me again.

  I WAKE UP TO THE CRYING VOICE inside my head, but this time there’s actual speech. I’m sure of it. She’s pleading to be heard.

  “I do hear you,” I whisper, without a thought, into my empty room.

  Luckily, I got the single that I requested. The admissions person who read my application heeded my warning that having night tremors that involved waking up in the middle of the night and shouting at the top of my lungs would make me a lousy roommate. (Okay, so I might’ve lied on my paperwork.) They put me at the end of the hallway as a result, five doors down from any of the other students.

  I place my hands over my ears, focusing harder on the voice. The crying sounds much more desperate than usual: a high-pitched wail that cuts through my core, urging me out of bed. I switch on the light and look at the clock. It’s barely three a.m.

  “Please,” I whisper, plugging my ears with my fingers, but it almost sounds like the voice is outside my head now, coming from out in the hallway. I cross the room and open the door. The hallway is vacant and dim.

  “I do hear you,” I say again. The resident director’s door is at the other end of the hallway. I move in that direction, pinching myself to make sure that I’m not asleep. The crying seems to get louder with each step. Is it possible that a student’s crying—that the voice is indeed outside my head?

  I’m about to knock on the resident director’s door, but the crying sound is coming from above now, on the second floor. I follow it up the stairs, noticing an echoing sensation—it bounces off the bones of my skull, making my stomach lurch.

  On Wes’s floor now, I proceed toward his room, vaguely remembering having read somewhere that girls weren’t allowed to be on the boys’ floor—and vice v
ersa—after eleven o’clock. But I knock on his door anyway.

  He doesn’t answer, and so I knock harder. Finally, he comes to the door. His eyes are bloodshot, and his normally coifed hair is matted and pillow-warped.

  “Is there a fire?” he asks. Toothpaste residue lingers at one corner of his mouth.

  “Do you hear that?” I ask him. “Did someone just hiccup?”

  He furrows his brow. “Am I to assume that you’re sleepwalking? Or perhaps you decided to party without me…” He tsk-tsks.

  “Not sleepwalking. Definitely not partying.” I shake my head.

  “Okay, so then, your alarm clock must be on the fritz, because it’s barely three a.m. And unless it’s the day after Thanksgiving and you’re getting in line early for some crazy holiday madness sale, for which I’m the lucky recipient, go back to bed.”

  “Is someone crying?” I ask.

  He pokes his head out into the hallway and then looks at me like I’m full-on crazy.

  “I need your help,” I tell him, wishing I’d gotten around to filling him in about Sasha yesterday. I would have, but as soon as we got our food from the grill, a bunch of other students joined us at the table, and we all ended up chatting about art.

  I peer over my shoulder, noticing how the crying seems to be moving further away now. I remember having read in Psychometrically Suzy’s blog about the experience in which she touched her father’s hat and heard his voice even though he’d already passed away. She followed the voice until it brought her to a photograph that he had evidently wanted her to see.

  Maybe there’s something that Sasha wants me to see. Maybe I need to go outside…or drive off campus.

  “Can I borrow your car keys?” I ask.

  “Not until you reveal a wide-open gash gushing with blood for which you need emergency medical attention. In which case, I’ll drive you.”

  “Except you can’t actually see my gash. It’s inside my head, slowly driving me insane.”

  “Brain aneurysm?” He cocks his head, mock-sincere.

  “Can I just come inside for a second?”

  He opens the door to let me in. The setup of his room is basically like mine: an eight-by-eight-foot space furnished with a desk, a dresser, and bunk beds.

  “Did you get a single room, too?” I ask. The upper bunk is vacant.

  “No, but my roommate made a friend over boccie ball, and I guess the game went into overtime.”

  I take a seat on his rumpled bed and do my best to relax, but the crying seems more distant now, and I can’t help worrying that I’m wasting critical time.

  “I wish I had something flavorful to offer you,” Wes says. “But how about a jug of water for now?” He gestures to the gallon jug on his dresser. “Don’t mind the residual Nutella stains on the spout.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “So, what’s up?” He plops down beside me on the bed. “Why the sudden urgency about my car?”

  “I might need to go somewhere,” I tell him, eyeing his car keys on the desk.

  “Well, I could’ve guessed that. But I need way more information if I’m going to deem you Audi-worthy. Care to enlighten me as to what’s going on inside that twisted mind of yours?”

  And so I tell him. Everything. About Sasha, about how she’s the reason I ended up at Sumner, and how I believe that it’s her crying that’s been stuck inside my brain. At the end of it all, I almost expect him to bop me on the head to try to knock some sense into me, but instead he’s surprisingly silent.

  “Say something,” I tell him, suddenly feeling self-conscious.

  “I’m not sure where to begin. I mean, Sasha freaking Beckerman?”

  “I assume you’re familiar with the case.”

  “What makes you think you’ll be able to find Sasha when the police haven’t been able to?”

  “I don’t know that I’ll find her, but maybe I can help in some other way. I mean, there’s a reason I hear her voice, right?”

  “And how are you so sure that it’s her voice?”

  “Because that’s what my gut tells me.”

  “And what does your common sense say?”

  “You really think this sounds crazy, don’t you?”

  “Okay,” he says, “let’s just say for argument’s sake that it’s indeed Sasha’s voice inside your head. Why you? Why your head, I mean? It’s not like you know the girl.”

  “No, but we have something very significant in common. We were both adopted.”

  “And you think that you two are the only ones that that’s ever happened to? I mean, seriously, do you watch Maury Povich?”

  “No, but when I was researching summer programs, I came across her case,” I say, proceeding to fill him in on how I’d also seen it mentioned on the unsolved-mysteries show at the diner. “Anyway, I started to delve deeper, and then, when I was sculpting, the crying voice came to me.”

  “And so you just assumed that it was her?”

  I shake my head and tell him about the t-shaped piece I sculpted. “It could’ve been the letter t or a plus sign.”

  “As in two plus two equals crazy?”

  “As in I had no idea whose voice it was at first. But then one day, when I really focused on Sasha—on everything I’d been researching, including a video of her that I watched a kazillion times—the voice came to me again.”

  “When you were sculpting?”

  I nod. “It was like I conjured it up, like I was definitely on to something big, because the voice got really loud, and I may’ve even heard her call out for her mother. I can’t really say for sure.” I sigh, realizing that I’m babbling. “Anyway, the voice has been in my head ever since. The crying, I mean. And it doesn’t go away.”

  “Wow,” he says, leaning back on his bed. He reaches for the Magic 8-Ball on his dresser, shakes it up, and flashes me the result: OUTLOOK NOT SO GOOD.

  “Does that mean you won’t help me?”

  “Well, of course I’m going to help you, but do you think it can wait until dawn?”

  “Not really. I mean, I hear her crying voice now. I want to see where it will lead me.”

  “You do realize how nutty that sounds, don’t you? Okay, yes, I know it’s you, that you’re superpsychometrically talented and all, but where do you honestly intend to go at this hour? Denny’s for a Moons Over My Hammy?”

  “So, you won’t let me take your car?”

  Wes shakes the Magic 8-Ball again and flashes me the answer: “Ask again later,” he reads. “I need more sleep, and so do you. Trust me when I say that I’m doing this for your own good.”

  “Fine,” I say, faking a smile, glad when he turns again to set the Magic 8-Ball back down—my cue to snatch his keys.

  WES’S CAR KEYS gripped in my hand, I hurry downstairs, grab my cell phone from my room, and continue down to the lobby. No one’s working the front desk, so I decide not to bother signing out. Instead, I plow through the doors, my adrenaline high, expecting the crying to be louder outside. But it’s the same as it was in Wes’s room: still there, yet somewhat distant and nowhere near as intense as it was just moments before, or when I could hear her actual words.

  I proceed to his car anyway, hoping that I’m not too late—that the voice will intensify as soon as I get behind the wheel. Two campus security cars are parked on the other side of the soccer field. The fronts of the cars are pointed in opposite directions, but the driver’s-side windows are lined up so they can chat. They don’t seem to notice me—or if they do, they don’t appear to care—as I disarm Wes’s car alarm, slip inside, and start the ignition.

  I pull out of the parking lot and circle the area, concentrating on the sound of Sasha’s tears, but they’re barely above a whimper now. I pull over and type the address of the Beckerman residence into Wes’s GPS, hoping that seeing her house may help evoke her voice more.

  The roads are mostly empty. Strips of light from the streetlamps reflect off the rain-soaked pavement. I take several turns, passing through the ce
nter of town, finally arriving at my destination, only five minutes from the campus.

  The Beckerman house is like something straight out of a storybook: a grand Victorian-style home with multiple peaks. A pretty brick walkway leads to a stained-glass front door, illuminated by a porch light.

  Other than the Beckerman house, none of the houses on the street have their outside lights on. The Beckermans must be keeping theirs on for a reason: maybe so that Sasha can find her way home.

  I park out front and wait several seconds for something magical to happen. But the crying voice remains the same, making me feel both stupid and guilty. I never should’ve driven out here or taken Wes’s keys. I reach for my phone, wanting to call him to apologize, but I’m reluctant to wake him again.

  Just as I roll down the window to get some air, my cell phone rings. I pick it up, hoping it’s Ben, that somehow he’s sensing how lost I feel right now. But when I check the screen, I see that it’s Wes.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, in lieu of a hello.

  “You do know that grand-theft auto is a felony, don’t you? Punishable by up to five years in prison?”

  “So, do me a favor and have me arrested. I’ll probably be better off.”

  “Hmm…tempting.”

  “I’m sorry,” I repeat, shaking my head, hating myself for betraying his trust.

  “Just tell me you’re not sitting in front of the Beckerman residence right now, because that would, like, make you a crazy person for sure.”

  I look in the rearview mirror. “You’re not spying on me, are you?”

  “And how would I finagle that one? It’s not like I have a car.”

  “Okay, so then you know me way too well.”

  “You’re certifiable, Camelia.”

  “I know,” I mutter, feeling a crumbling sensation inside my chest.

  “Of course, you’re also sleep-deprived and hearing voices,” he continues. “So, I may have to give you a free pass—this time. Just get your thieving ass back here.”

  “Will do.” I hang up and take one last look at the house, about to pull away. But someone inside has turned on a light. It’s on the second floor, in what I’m guessing may be a bedroom.