The Perfect Stranger

by Megan Miranda

  I shrugged with one shoulder. “It’s fine.”

  “Is it?” She raised an eyebrow. “Word on the school grapevine is the police believed he was pursuing you. Or . . . seeing you. Honestly, depends on the source.”

  I let out a mean laugh. “Not seeing. Definitely not seeing.” I pressed my lips together. “Truthfully, I don’t have a fucking clue what’s going on. He used to call me, drunk, is all. I ignored him. He called me the night of the attack on that other woman, but I didn’t pick up. That’s why the police keep coming back to me.” I thought of the earlier voicemails, where he might’ve been walking home from in the night. “Did you ever see him around here? Davis Cobb?”

  She shook her head. “No, not that I can recall.” She took a long drink from the beer in her cup. “This is so fucked up. Do you think it was him? With the woman at the lake?”

  “Can’t say. But that’s what the police seem to think.”

  I also knew how the police worked. It was like those intro science courses I had to take for graduation: You form a hypothesis and work with that theory in mind, to either prove it or watch as it falls apart in your hands. As crime reporters, we worked beside the cops more often than not. Pushing their leads forward, digging up the information they couldn’t. Or the other way around—using a leak from a source in the department to get things moving. In the end, though, we all got what we came for. The truth wanted out, and we were its facilitators.

  Kyle had returned to the stool, and Kate grinned in his direction. “Well,” she said, “either way, the cute guy on the stool keeps looking over here, and I don’t think he’s looking for Davis Cobb.”

  The waiter came with a plate of fries, and Kate was smiling, waiting for my response.

  “Part two of the long story: My roommate is missing,” I said.

  “What?” The fry in her hand froze a few inches over the plate.

  “My roommate. That’s why the cute guy on the stool keeps looking over here. I reported her missing.”

  “Oh my God,” she said, leaning closer, placing a hand over mine. “Are you okay? What happened?” Then her eyes moved too quickly, as if she were sliding pieces together, creating something bigger: two potential victims instead of one. Her mouth thinned into a flat line.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. She’s kind of flaky, so I didn’t worry for a couple days. Not until the whole thing with Davis Cobb.”

  “So it could still just be nothing?”

  I thought of the necklace I’d found, the things she’d left behind, the feeling I couldn’t shake, what I now knew about James Finley. But I also knew this was what I was trained in: seeing the danger everywhere. “It could,” I said. “It doesn’t seem to be related. So.”

  Kate’s shoulders visibly relaxed. She raised her hand, ordering us another round, and pushed the fries toward me. “Here, you need these more than I do.”

  I was grateful for the chance not to talk. I needed to box this away, enjoy the night out. I felt the buzz of the beer working its way through my body, easing my thoughts and my smile.

  I listened to Kate tell me about her ex, all the shitty things he did, and I knew the words to say, the looks to give. I was glad to turn the speaking over to her. We paid the bill after ordering one more round, and I drank the last beer too fast, felt it go straight to my head when I stood, and considered asking Kate to drive me home.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Kyle stand at the same time, saw him pause. Wondered if he was thinking the same thing I was: If we’d met under different circumstances, as different people, would this have turned into something else by now?

  “I’m gonna hit the bathroom on the way out,” I said.

  Kate pulled me into a one-armed hug, smelling like hair spray and alcohol. “Drive safe,” she said. “And let’s do this again.”

  I waited until she was out the door before I moved slowly toward the bathroom. I was three steps down the hall when I heard him.

  “Hey,” he called, walking toward me. I waited for him halfway down the wood-paneled hall, both of us different people. His hand was on my elbow, spinning me around.

  And when I turned, I was already leaning toward him, pulling his head down to mine. His mouth was cold from the beer, and he walked us into the corner, leaned his whole body into mine, breaking the perception of what I’d imagined Kyle would be. There was nothing contained and even-keeled about him right now. His hands were everywhere—on my bare skin even here, in a poorly lit hallway—and he didn’t pull back until the bathroom door squeaked open behind us.

  The light from the open door cut across us, and he ducked his head against mine. “I gotta pay my tab,” he said, still leaning against me, my back to the wall. “Wait for me out front.”

  * * *

  I WAITED AT THE side of the front steps, near the main streetlight in the dark lot. By the time Kyle arrived, we’d both sobered considerably. The crisp night air did that to a person, or hindsight, or foresight. I could see the excuses already written across his face as he waited on the second step. I brushed my hand in the air between us.

  “It’s okay,” I said.

  He walked down the remaining steps, hands tucked into his pockets. “Let me drive you home, at least.”

  This was cop Kyle talking. He could taste the alcohol on me, would know my limit from the flush to my cheeks. I didn’t want to argue the point.

  “How will you get back?” I asked.

  “It’s not far. I can walk. The air will do me some good.”

  I handed him my keys when we reached my car. Then watched as he adjusted the driver’s seat, propped a knee up, fumbled for the headlights. I smiled when he jumped at the sound of the music from the speakers, louder than he was expecting, and I reached over to turn it down. I could feel him holding his breath as I leaned in, was close enough to consider turning toward him, ignoring his words. But then I leaned back, and Kyle put the car in gear, and the moment was gone.

  “So,” he said, halfway to my house. “Who was the girl?”

  “Kate Turner,” I said. “We work together. She thought I could use the night out.” I stretched, felt light-headed, liked the way the stars looked when I squinted. “She was right. You? Those your friends?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, some.”

  “Cops?”

  He smiled again. “Some.”

  * * *

  THE HEADLIGHTS REFLECTED OFF the sliding glass doors of my house in the dark. Kyle turned off the car, so the only noise was from the night: the crickets and the wind through the valley.

  He stood in my driveway, turned in a small circle. “I guess I pictured more streetlights,” he said, grinning. He looked at the stars, pointed at a slightly brighter speck. “So, that’s north . . .”

  I started to laugh, wanted to reach for him. “Actually, I think that’s Venus.”

  “Good thing I was in the Boy Scouts.” But he was looking at me, not the road, not the stars, and the air crackled around us.

  “You don’t have to go,” I said.

  He pressed his lips together. Didn’t raise his hands to me, didn’t come any closer.

  “Unless you want to,” I said.

  He shook his head, the corner of his lips tipping up. “I don’t.” But he still wouldn’t close the distance.

  I thought of Emmy, and I went to him instead. “It’s not a crime,” I said to him.

  I pulled him by the hand, led him up the porch steps, used the two separate keys to let us in while he leaned against the glass. There were a thousand chances to turn around, to stop this, and I paused, waiting for one of us to change our mind. I opened the door for him, waited for him to follow me inside, locked up behind us. Opted against the light, which might tip things too far into reality. Walked slowly down the hall and felt him behind me, dragging his fingers along the wall as he followed.

  CHAPTER 16

  I woke before Kyle, who slept with the sheets kicked off, an arm thrown over his head. The light was streaming thr
ough the gap in my bedroom curtains, cutting a path across his chest, and I smiled, my fingers just an inch from his stomach, wondering whether I should wake him. The scar on his forehead looked rougher close up, and he had another on his ribs that I hadn’t seen the night before. I touched my fingers gently to it now, his chest rising and falling, thinking that Kyle himself was a story; something to uncover.

  In the end, I decided to leave him be. His clothes were in my doorway. I tiptoed over them, left them where they were, hoping to grab a quick shower before he woke.

  The light on the side table in the living room was on, and I froze. I hadn’t turned it on when we got home, I was sure.

  But I’d just had the deadbolt installed, and it was currently locked. Surely it was Kyle. Kyle, up for a drink in the middle of the night or looking for the bathroom. I slept like the dead with someone beside me—the opposite of what logic would suggest.

  I flicked off the living room light before heading to the shower.

  * * *

  BY THE TIME I got out of the bathroom, the bed was empty, the sheets pulled up and smoothed over. I pulled on some yoga pants and a long top and padded out to the living room, towel-drying my hair. Kyle looked up from the kitchen table, a box of cereal open on the table, a half-empty bowl without milk in front of him.

  He grinned, raised his spoon filled with dry cornflakes to me. “Hope you don’t mind,” he said. And then he looked down, as if embarrassed.

  “Not at all,” I said. “Can I get you anything else?”

  “No, thanks. I’m on duty later today, so I’ve got to head back. I didn’t want to leave before saying goodbye, though.”

  I smiled. “Let me grab my shoes and I’ll drive you back.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  “Really,” I said. “It’s fine.”

  Kyle was rinsing out the bowl when I came back with my sneakers. There was an easy comfort between us as long as we kept moving. He slid the front door open while I found my purse, and I saw him bending over, reaching for something just out of sight.

  He turned back around, his arm extended. “Your paper,” he said with a grin. He handed it to me, bound in a clear plastic bag.

  “I don’t—” And then I stopped. Caught a glimpse of the headline as I turned it over.

  The top of a B, cut in half. My spine stiffened, and I cleared my throat. “Thanks.” I dropped the paper on the countertop like it was nothing. Grabbed my keys, tried to keep them from shaking in my hand. “Ready?” I asked.

  “Ready,” he said.

  I locked up after us, and he walked slowly by my side, his arm occasionally brushing against mine. But all I could think of was the paper and what it was doing there. If maybe it was nothing but the local paper, a trial service or a misplaced delivery. If I was letting my imagination run away with me and there was absolutely nothing to be worried about.

  “So,” he said, standing beside my car, letting the thought trail.

  “So . . .” I said, distracted. This sounded like the start of any number of interchangeable excuses. I was drinking. It was the night. The bar. You. It’s not you. It’s just not me. I didn’t need to hear it. “How about we skip the awkward part, huh?”

  He smiled then, laughed to himself. “Sure thing, Leah.”

  We drove in silence to the parking lot, where there was a single car remaining. A black midsize SUV in the middle of the second row, mud streaking the wheels. “Guess that’s you?”

  “That would be me.” He sat for a moment, decided better of it, left the car. As I shifted into gear, ready to drive away, there was a tap on the driver’s-side window. I lowered it, and Kyle leaned his forearms on the base of the open window, his head almost on my level. He leaned in through the gap to kiss me, one hand on my chin, his thumb on the side of my jaw—I had just barely caught on, and then he was gone.

  * * *

  IT WAS WAITING ON the kitchen counter, exactly as I’d left it. A paper inside a plastic sleeve, rolled up and bound by a dirty rubber band. Print circulation had fallen off in Boston, but I imagined here it was still going strong.

  I preferred the hard copy, like this. There was a logic to the layout. There was a predetermined hierarchy, and you always knew where you were in relation to everything else, in a designated order of importance. Not a list of clicks you’d forgotten you’d made. There were no automatic-playing videos (a personal hatred), or pop-up ads, or a computer history of your reading habits curated to provide you only like-minded news in the future—your worldview shrinking and morphing without your knowledge.

  The paper smelled of morning dew, the edges curved and brittle.

  It was probably a mistake. A wrong address, a fill-in delivery guy. Or a free copy, a marketing campaign to entice more subscribers. The B could be for Bulletin or Beacon or any number of words. There could be any number of reasons for this paper to be on my front porch.

  I slid the rubber band off, unrolled it so I could see the rest of the header. Felt my heart hammering inside my chest as the words slowly revealed themselves. Boston. The Post.

  My paper.

  I felt a tightening in my shoulders, a twist in my stomach, had to place a hand on my chest to remind myself: Slow down.

  Okay, okay, this wouldn’t be so hard to figure out. I’d said I’d worked as a journalist. I’d told my students. I’d done this to myself. There was no reason for them not to know. I’d needed my job history to get this new job. Treat it like it doesn’t matter, and it won’t. Nothing would appear incriminating, looking from the outside in.

  Except.

  My eyes flicked to the date, and my heart ended up in my stomach. April 23. Someone would’ve had to call the paper or the local library to find an old copy like this. The last story I would ever print. The story the paper and I both wanted so desperately to forget, holding our collective breath, hoping nothing came of it.

  I counted the pages by heart, flipped directly to the story, the paper trembling in my hand:

  A Season of Suicides: 4 Girls Take Their Lives at Local College—Is Anyone Listening?

  There they were. Their pictures in a square grid, images provided by the college registrar’s office. I knew the facts by heart, clockwise from top left:

  Kristy Owens, shower floor, razor blade.

  Alecia Gomez, Dermot Tower, jumped.

  Camilla Jones, Charles River, pockets weighed down with rocks, Virginia Woolf–style.

  Bridget LaCosta, bathtub, overdose.

  I’d seen Bridget’s cause of death, her blood chemistry report, was perusing her class schedule when I saw his name listed—Professor Aaron Hampton—and everything had clicked. My blood was thrumming, seeing all the pieces lined up.

  A bottle of pills, his smiling face, the sound of running water.

  There was nothing explicit in print that put forward what I believed: that Bridget LaCosta had been killed. There was nothing in this paper that would give away all that came before or after. There was no rebuttal or follow-up—the story was left to die.

  I folded the pages back together, hid the paper in the back of the utensil drawer, wondered who could’ve gotten it and brought it to my doorstep in the middle of the night.

  Had it been here earlier in the evening? Before I’d returned home with Kyle? I didn’t think so. So someone had been by my house between nine P.M. and eight A.M. Someone could’ve seen straight inside with the light turned on. Could’ve noticed Kyle’s clothes strewn in the hallway or his shoes kicked off in the living room. Could’ve wandered the perimeter, listening at my window. Could’ve stood on their toes and peered inside my room, between the gap of curtains.

  I went outside, circled the house, looked for footprints, for evidence that anyone had been here. I searched for cigarette butts, kicked-up dirt, flattened soil, anything—but there was nothing unusual.

  I imagined Davis Cobb crouched in the bushes, the paper stashed under his arm, thinking, I got you now. The faces blurred, and suddenly, it was Paige who
had tracked me down and brought this to remind me—

  A deep breath in to stop the cycle. Calm down, Leah. Calm down.

  I could not let myself get like this. Couldn’t make something where there had been nothing, as had been the claim about my story.

  But it was not nothing—I knew him, the vile hidden center.

  I was not surprised that he had continued to slide under the radar, as sociopaths often do. Charming, remorseless, not held back by conscience or guilt.

  So I had taken a page from his book, and I’d struck. I remembered the moment I’d decided to do it, after Noah had left that night. I’d probably decided even sooner, which was why I’d been pacing the apartment. I had already known what I would do.

  The words in print, looking no different than any other: A source speaking on condition of anonymity adds more complexity to the case of Bridget’s overdose. “One of her professors gave her those pills,” she said. “I know because he gave them to me, too.”

  That they believed I had manufactured this source, a wisp of my imagination, to get the truth: This wasn’t even the nail in the coffin.

  If I got to the truth, all would be forgiven, all would be fair—I was sure of it. And so I turned in the article, and I waited for the investigation. For the school to look into who would have access to that medication—she had only four professors, it wouldn’t be hard—for other girls to come forward, as I was so sure they would; for the police to look a little closer at the case, to wonder why and how the pills had been given to her. To wonder if there was more to Professor Aaron Hampton than met the eye.

  A calculated risk. A big move. A bigger crash.

  A fallout that I hadn’t expected and couldn’t control. Everything moved so fast, too fast to get a solid grip on—my life spinning out of control alongside it.

  I hadn’t spoken to Aaron Hampton in nearly eight years. But like a recurrent nightmare, he had returned. I didn’t even print his name. Logan said my reasons didn’t matter. He said I’d meant to ruin Aaron, that anyone could figure out whom I was talking about if they looked closely. He said this as if it were a bad thing. As if there weren’t a girl with her face immortalized in black-and-white print, asking me to do it. And the echo in my own head, demanding it.