by Hannah Jayne
Fifteen
Without her phone, Bex felt insulated from the world, enclosed in her tiny circle of Kill Devil Hills—Laney, Chelsea, Trevor, Michael, and Denise. She liked it. But still her thoughts drifted to the man in the car and the man on the phone. At home, Bex looked up another number and dialed, gnawing on her lower lip as the phone rang and rang. Finally, a pickup.
“Dr. Gold’s office.”
Bex opened her mouth to ask for the doctor again, but nothing came out.
• • •
The Kill Devil Hills cemetery was a rolling green carpet in the center of the mostly sandy landscape. The grass was too green, almost cartoonish, and it made Bex feel uneasy.
“I can’t believe we’re going to a funeral of someone we know,” Trevor said, shifting in the driver’s seat of his Mustang. It was three days later, and Darla was still the center of every newscast, the front-page story of every paper.
Bex pulled her black skirt over her knees, smoothing it again like she had every five minutes on the car ride to the cemetery. It had taken her a while to decide what to wear that morning. She didn’t have a ton of clothes, and although death seemed to follow her like a dark shadow, she had never been to a funeral. There hadn’t been one for her mother, even after the Raleigh police declared her officially dead. There was no body, no note, nothing but seven years of absence, and according to the state, that was as good as dead.
There had been no money for a funeral for her grandmother, and truthfully, Bex wasn’t sure anyone would have come. If they had, it would have only been to stare at the casket of the woman who raised the child of an allegedly murderous animal, who cradled the daughter of the man who may have even killed her own.
Someone had held a memorial service for all the girls after what should have been her father’s trial but Bex didn’t know until later, not that her grandmother would have let her go. She had wanted to, out of morbid curiosity or to make amends or pay respects in some small way, but at the same time, being there would have been a betrayal of her father and would have turned the event into a media circus.
“Have you ever been to a funeral?” Trevor asked when he pushed the car into Park.
Bex shook her head, unwilling to trust her voice.
“Hey, there are Laney and Chelsea.” Trevor and Bex got out of the car and joined the girls on the sidewalk, then joined the slow procession of Kill Devil Hills’ inhabitants and high school students walking into the chapel. A red-nosed woman who couldn’t have weighed ninety pounds was propped next to a man in a nice suit who clasped his hands and bobbed his head each time someone walked in. Bex guessed they were Darla’s parents, and a lump scraped the back of her throat.
The chapel was full. Bex recognized some of the younger attendees as students from school. She tried to look around surreptitiously, certain that everyone could read her mind and was already blaming her for bringing him—her father, Darla’s murderer—to Kill Devil Hills.
A handful of football players in dark suits filtered into the church, and then behind them a girl—a woman, maybe—stepped in carefully, her cocoa-brown eyes skittering from face to face. Her hands were clasped in front of her, the sleeves of her black suit jacket short enough to show thin, pale wrists. Her eyes met Bex’s, and Bex immediately looked away, feeling her cheeks flush. When she chanced a glance back, the girl had taken an aisle seat toward the back of the chapel. And she was focused right on Bex.
“Do you know who that lady is back there?” Bex whispered to Laney.
Laney made a show of looking over her shoulder, and Bex wanted to crawl into a hole. “Who? The blond in the suit jacket? She looks about our age, maybe a little older.”
Bex grabbed Laney’s sleeve and gave it a tiny shake. “Stop staring. Do you know her or not?”
“Negatory. Never seen her before in my life. If she’s related to Darla, I never met her.”
Bex should have been used to people singling her out and staring, but she was uneasy—and made more so when the heavy chapel doors were pushed shut. Bex couldn’t help but feel like it was the sealing of a mausoleum, doors slamming closed, locking them all inside. Trevor reached over and squeezed her hand, and she wanted to revel in the feeling. Her heart should have swooned, but she felt nothing but the heavy stone in her gut and that made her angry. Her father had stolen everything from her, had stolen her whole identity, and now she sat at a funeral, feeling nothing but pain.
My father is gone, she told herself, her teeth aching as she clenched them together. He didn’t do this.
She thought of the phone call, of the voice she could barely remember. Had it been deep or high? Was there really an accent, or had she just made that up?
Bex looked up when the music started to play but had to avert her eyes when the somber-looking men made their way up the aisle, all with red eyes and tearstained cheeks as they carried a slick, white coffin. The spray of flowers on top quivered and Bex lost her breath, tears pouring over her cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” she said, leaning over and whispering to Trevor. “I can’t… I just can’t do this.”
Bex knew people were watching her as she walked out of the chapel, but she didn’t care. Her chest was tight and it hurt to breathe; her head thundered like a bass drum, and she thought she was going to pass out.
The fresh air just beyond the doors loosened the tension and she breathed deeply, greedily gulping air and coughing. She speed walked away, hearing the swell of the music from inside. She missed the click of the door opening and shutting behind her.
Bex wound her way through the garden but stopped at the edge of a little pathway. It opened to the part of the cemetery where the graves were, some with small stone rectangles set in the grass, others with monolithic headstones with carved angels or pictures set in corroded brass.
Death was with her at every turn.
What did you think? she scolded herself. You’re in a freaking cemetery!
“Excuse me.”
Bex turned, tried not to gape at the girl in the black suit. “I saw you in the… In there.” She gestured toward the chapel.
Bex took the girl in: the black skirt that ended just above knobby knees crosshatched with white scars, the way she rubbed her hands, then her skirt, then her hands again. This girl was nervous. “Did you… Did you know…her?”
Bex opened her mouth, to say what she wasn’t sure, but her eyes went over the girl’s head toward the chapel doors where Trevor’s head was poking out.
“I’ve got to go. I’ll see you.”
The girl looked like she wanted to stop her but thought better of it. “Uh, okay.”
“Hey,” Trevor said, sliding his arms around Bex’s waist when she reached him. “You okay? I was worried.”
Bex glanced over her shoulder to where the girl was still standing. She looked at her feet when she noticed Bex watching.
“Yeah, sorry. Just needed a little bit of fresh air.”
After the service, the mourners were invited to the graveside for a second ceremony. Bex’s dread mounted as they walked toward a black rectangle in the manicured lawn. It was still several yards off, but the smell of fresh earth caught on the wind.
“I can’t do this,” Chelsea said, her eyes starting to swell with tears again. “I can’t watch them put my friend in the ground.”
Laney squeezed her hand, and when she looked at Bex, her eyes were swimming with tears too. “I don’t want to watch it either. It’s just so…final.”
Trevor shuddered. “And real.”
The three started to back away. “Bex, you coming with?”
“In a second.”
The grave that terrified Bex also transfixed her, and she found herself wondering what dying would be like. Not the actual death, but the aftermath. Would it be blissful darkness where there would be no feeling, nothing to worry about, no one staring or judging? S
he remembered a horrible old song that a kid had sung a million years ago when she went to real school and her dad was just a dad. The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out. Into your stomach and out your mouth…
Her stomach churned and she wondered if she’d ever feel right again.
In front of her, Darla’s parents were throwing handfuls of dirt into the grave, clumps thudding, sounding hollow against the casket. When Bex turned, she nearly bumped chest to chest into the man behind her.
Sixteen
He was wearing a suit without a tie, and though his thick, peppery graying hair and square jaw seemed slightly familiar, something about him gave Bex the chills. She immediately stepped away.
“Excuse me,” she murmured to her shoes.
“That’s okay.”
The sound of his voice burned through her ears, searing its way to her brain. It was gruff but smooth and deep—and shot ice water through her veins. She didn’t know why, but adrenaline ricocheted through her and she started to run.
“Hey,” the man said, following behind her. “Wait!”
Bex ran toward the parking lot, toward Trevor’s red Mustang with its motor running. She slammed her hands over her ears as the man kept calling out to her and pressed her palms tighter so that when he said her name, she wasn’t sure if he said “Bex” or “Beth.” She vaulted into the front seat of Trevor’s car, slamming the door hard.
“Let’s get out of here,” she said breathlessly. “Please.”
• • •
The following morning, a small box sat beside Bex’s cereal bowl when she came downstairs.
“What’s this?”
Denise smiled. “Your new cell phone came.”
Michael swiped his tablet and, without looking up, said, “I thought you’d be glued to that thing already.”
Bex just looked at the box, phone nestled inside. It had the same number as her old, toilet-logged one, which meant that whomever that Raleigh area code number belonged to—and anyone else who had her number—could still find her. She poked at her cereal, the flakes turning into warm lumps of mush in the milk.
“I’m kind of a technophobe, I guess.”
“Maybe you could teach Michael,” Denise said, snatching the tablet from his hand and laying it on the table. “Make sure you turn it on today. We both have meetings, so we’re not sure who’ll be able to pick you up or when we’ll be home, okay?”
Bex nodded, her throat bone dry.
A message was waiting on her phone the second she turned it on. She stared at the text message icon, a little green smiley face. The more she stared at it, the more the face seemed to turn sinister, daring her to look. She slid the little face over, and the machine-gun fire of her heart died down. The message was from Chelsea: Get together at my place tonight. Low key. 7pm.
“Everything okay, Bex?” Denise asked.
“Yeah, just Chelsea inviting me to her place tonight at seven. Is that okay?”
“Okay by me as long as you’re home by eleven. Are you going to go with Trevor?”
“I can ask—” But Bex was cut off by the pinging of her phone. She glanced down at the face, another wave of relief flooding over her. “Trevor just asked if he could take me.”
“Good deal,” Michael said, inching his tablet back in front of him.
• • •
The school day passed uneventfully even though Bex’s nerves were on a constant hum. She got hit with a basketball in PE and shattered her beaker in biology and was sure that she was being watched at every turn. When Trevor pressed his fingertips to her shoulders in the lunchroom, she jumped, dropping her tray on the floor.
When the final bell rang, Bex was still looking over her shoulder. She went to the front horseshoe to wait for Michael or Denise and stopped dead in her tracks.
The girl from the funeral was standing in front of the school. She started when she saw Bex and raised a hand to wave.
Bex didn’t wave back. Instead, she ducked back into the crowd of kids, winding her way toward the student parking lot where she ran into Trevor. He grinned when he saw her and enveloped her in a hug.
“I was just going to text you. Need a ride?”
Bex looked back over her shoulder, sure she would see the girl standing statue still while the world pulsed along right beside her.
“Actually, yeah. That would be great.” Bex set Denise a quick “got a ride” text and slid into the passenger seat of Trevor’s car. She slouched down, just in case.
• • •
“Are you sure you’re all right? Because I could come in and hang out with you,” Trevor said, his car idling in Bex’s driveway.
She wanted to say, “Yes, please stay.” She wanted to curl into his arms and be a regular girl with a regular boyfriend who held her hand and made out with her on the couch. She wanted to only worry about them getting caught, her lipstick smudging, or whether or not she was kissing him right. She didn’t want to think about the boogeyman, out there lurking in swaths of gray fog.
“I’m fine,” she said with what she hoped was a confident smile. “Really.” She pecked Trevor’s cheek, and despite her fear, a rush of pleasure raced through her, making her rapid heartbeat enjoyable for once. “And I’ll see you tonight.”
“I’ll be back here around seven. With bells on.” He waggled his eyebrows, but then the smile dropped from his lips while his cheeks went red. “Oh my God, I don’t even know why I said that. I don’t even know what that means.”
Bex giggled, allowing herself to sink into the fantasy of snuggling with Trevor at a regular high school party, someplace with a twinkly lit backyard garden and low music. It didn’t matter that Chelsea, Laney, and five dozen other kids would be there. It didn’t matter that the music would be blaring—something loud with a thudding bass since everyone was crazy about Death to Sea Monkeys here—and kids would be screaming and squealing as they bumped around in someone’s living room.
“Can’t wait,” she said simply.
Bex whiled away the hours by alternately doing her homework and rummaging through the pantry looking for something to eat. She knew she should be hungry because it was near dinnertime, but every time she thought about food, the butterflies soared in her stomach and she knew she couldn’t eat. Trevor was going to pick her up in an hour, and they were going to be at a party, together.
Just like a regular couple.
Her cell phone pinged with a text from Michael: Wrping up here. Be home in about an hr.
Bex texted back.
Chelseas party is 2nite! Might leave b4 u get home.
Michael: Almost 4got. Be safe. No blankets, no booze, 11:30 curfew. Dad’s rules.
Dad’s rules.
Bex was smiling so hard her cheeks hurt. Did Michael really think of himself as her dad? His rules were lame—very dad like—but Bex loved that someone was looking out for her. She was still grinning when she heard the doorbell ring. She went to answer it, glancing at her phone to see that Trevor was more than an hour early. She shook off her nerves and glanced through the peephole, thinking if she saw him before he saw her, she would have the opportunity to wipe the puppy-love grin from her face.
But the porch was dark.
Bex flipped the light switch and looked again but nothing happened. The bulb must have burned out, she decided, as she steeled herself with a nice, not maniacal, smile.
“Hey, Trev, you’re—”
The bulb from the porch light rolled across the welcome mat.
“Did you take that bulb out—?” But Bex couldn’t finish her sentence. She felt the crushing weight of a hand on her chest, fisting over her shirt as she stumbled backward. The man from the funeral, from the phone call, forced his way into the house, slamming the door and whirling Bex around in one fell swoop. She heard the slam of the door at the same moment his hand clamped over her mouth.
“Don’t scream. Just listen to me, Beth Anne.”
Seventeen
Beth Anne.
Her whole body was simultaneously leaden and made of glass. Tears sprang into her eyes as the man clamped his other arm across her arms, tight enough across her chest that he made it hard for her to breathe. Her subconscious told her body to move. Squirm. Kick. Bite. But the command died in her paralyzed body.
“I’m not a bad guy,” the man whispered, his breath a mix of stale coffee and mint. “I’m one of the good guys. Promise you’ll listen and you won’t scream?”
Bex nodded, hating the feel of his lips so close to her ear, the way his breath broke hot and moist over her cheeks. He loosened his hand.
“You should know that my parents will be home soon. And my boyfriend.”
“That’s good,” the man said. “You shouldn’t be alone.”
Bex felt herself start to tremble as he released his grip on her. She knew she should run or try to remember some of the training she’d learned at the one self-defense class she had ever taken, but her mind and her body couldn’t seem to connect.
“Who are you? What do you want from me?”
The man turned her around to face him, speaking slowly. “Don’t you remember me?”
Bex studied the man’s face. She thought back on her father, the way she remembered him, before he disappeared and every image she saw was his mug shot on the news. She knew what he looked like—shouldn’t every daughter know her father?—even if she had to search a distant memory. Shouldn’t there be some innate connection that linked one of them to the other—genes or blood or—she felt her throat constrict—behavior? This man’s face had just a vague familiarity.
He was still gripping her firmly, now by the shoulders, when Bex felt her knees buckle. She went deadweight, straight to the ground in a flash, crouching low before lunging for the stairs. She vaulted forward, her fingertips digging into the carpet, her socks slipping as she tried to gain traction. There was distance between her and her attacker. The air sliced as he reached out to her, his fingertips grazing her neck and sending a fresh wave of gooseflesh all the way down her spine, icy jabs to her very soul.
