Frenzy

by V. J. Chambers

  I could meet this weird guy at midnight tonight and give him the money.

  Or I could stay home and pretend I never got the phone call.

  Of course, he knew who I was. He’d seen me use the money to buy drugs last Friday. So, it stood to reason that he might come find me. And when he did, he might be really mad.

  He might… hurt me.

  So, I could go to the cops.

  But I didn’t like cops. I’d never liked cops. And besides, I wasn’t exactly squeaky clean myself. I didn’t need a lot of attention drawn to myself.

  I could tell my dad.

  My dad could probably make the whole thing go away.

  That was what he did, after all. He made things go away, didn’t he?

  No. I wasn’t going to my dad. I was going to handle this on my own. That was the reason that I’d come to this school in the first place. To get a fresh start. On my own terms. To get away from my family. To be my own person.

  I had to go see that guy.

  I had to give him his money.

  And maybe it would be that simple in the end. Maybe he’d take it, go away, and I’d never even have to see him again.

  God, I hoped so.

  * * *

  The art building was one of those weirdly shaped structures from the 1970s—all angles and jutting wings with sharp, clean lines. It stood on top of a hill on the opposite side of campus than my dorm. Behind it, there was a huge parking lot, which was also the only place that freshmen could park on campus. My own car was here, but I didn’t go stand next to it, because I didn’t want the guy who’d called me to know which car was mine.

  I still wasn’t sure how he’d figured out what my name was.

  Maybe he’d just asked around. I was new. It was a small school and a small town. I supposed I kind of stood out.

  It was frigid in the midnight air. I grasped at the woolen texture of my gloves. The tips of my fingers were getting cold. So was my nose.

  Everything around me seemed frozen and blue in the darkness. Where was the guy?

  How much longer was I going to have to wait out here?

  I huddled inside my heavy coat and peered out into the darkness.

  My surroundings were still and quiet.

  I hadn’t heard from Wyatt.

  I’d thought about calling him a few times, but I didn’t know what to say. If he wanted to talk to me, wouldn’t he have called?

  I remembered the things that he’d said to me, that he thought we were meant to be, and that I was beautiful and amazing.

  I remembered the way it had felt to kiss him, the sensation of his touch on my bare skin.

  I’d thought it meant something.

  But I guessed I’d been an idiot.

  Maybe he was afraid to call me. Maybe he thought that I wasn’t interested in him since I’d run out of his apartment that morning. Maybe he was sitting at home right now, thinking about me, wondering where I was, wondering if I was thinking about him too.

  Maybe I should call him after I handed off Cori’s money.

  Hell, maybe I should have called him to ask about the guy who wanted the money. Maybe Wyatt would know who Cori had been mixed up with. He’d said that they’d hooked up, after all. And he seemed to remember her.

  But I knew I was fooling myself. Wyatt had gone cold to me immediately after he found out that I was Jill’s roommate.

  He’d asked if I was sleeping in Cori’s bed.

  Clearly, it freaked him out. In his mind, I was a replacement for Cori or something, and the idea that he’d been with me must have turned him off.

  He didn’t like me.

  Of course, maybe it had been because we were high. Maybe we didn’t actually like each other. Maybe we’d just been fucked up on ecstasy, and we’d only thought we liked each other.

  But I felt like I liked him. Really, honestly did—not just because of the drugs. I would have liked the chance to get to know him better, at any rate.

  I bounced on my feet, rubbing my gloved hands together. I was getting very cold out here. My nose was completely numb. My fingers weren’t far off. I clenched and unclenched my fists, hoping to urge some blood back into them.

  Maybe the thing with Wyatt was all for the best, anyway.

  I hadn’t seen much of Jill this week. She’d told me that she was okay with my hooking up with Wyatt, but maybe she wasn’t. Maybe she was avoiding me because she actually hated my guts.

  God. I’d barely gotten here, and I felt like I’d already screwed everything up.

  There was a noise behind me.

  Footsteps.

  I turned.

  A man was approaching me. He was wearing a hooded sweatshirt underneath a big flannel coat, and I couldn’t really see his face. I could see that he was skinny and tall. “Molly?” he said in a deep voice.

  I nodded.

  He approached me and stopped in front of me.

  I craned my neck up to look at his face. But I couldn’t see much. The hood obscured his features.

  “Well?” he said.

  Oh. Right. The money.

  I fumbled in my purse for the envelope. I handed it to him.

  He looked down at it.

  I wrapped my arms around myself, taking a step back. Was there anything else we needed to do here?

  “Where’s the rest of it?”

  “What?” What was he talking about? He hadn’t even counted it. “I told you I spent some of it.”

  He waved the envelope at me. “This can’t be more that two grand.”

  “Um, yeah,” I said. “About that.”

  He shoved it in the pocket of his coat. “Where’s the rest of it?”

  I shook my head. “That’s all there is.”

  He moved through the darkness like a cat. His hand wrapped around my throat.

  I choked.

  He squeezed, and pain shot through me, tinged with bright fear.

  “This is only about a third of what Cori owes me,” he said, loosening his grip but still holding onto me.

  “That’s all there is,” I said, my voice a squeak. “It’s all I found.”

  “Don’t lie to me, Molly.”

  “I’m not lying. That’s all I found.”

  “There’s more money than this. You need to bring it to me.”

  “No, there isn’t,” I said. “That’s it. I didn’t find any more.”

  “You can’t pull a fast one on me. I’m not the kind of guy you want to cross.”

  “I swear.”

  “You’d better find that money,” he said. “I know where you live, you know. If you don’t give it to me, I’ll find you. You won’t like what I do to you.”

  My heart was exploding in my chest. Adrenaline was pumping through my veins. I scrabbled at his hand, which he still had wrapped around my throat. “Let go of me. That’s all I have.”

  “Tell me you’ll bring me my money.”

  “I don’t have your money.”

  “Try again.” He shook me.

  “I’ll tell the police,” I said. “I’ll tell them all about you.” I wasn’t sure why I yelled that out. It probably wasn’t going to make him less likely to hurt me.

  “No, you won’t.” His mouth curved into a smile. “Molly Colligan going to the police. Now that’s a funny thought.”

  Shit. He knew who I was. Really knew who I was.

  He leaned close, whispering in my ear. “You’ve got two weeks. Get me my money.”

  Then he let go of me and melted into the darkness.

  I watched him go, my heart in my throat.

  When he was out of sight, I started to sob.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “You don’t understand,” I said to the woman at the Resident Life Office. “I can’t live in that room anymore. I just can’t. You have to find someplace else for me to live.”

  The woman gave me a bored look. “Did Jill put you up to this?”

  “What? No,” I said.

  “She came in here a week ago comp
laining when you moved in,” said the woman. “I told her she had to get over it. There are zero open spaces on campus. You got that? Zero.”

  “At orientation, a girl I was with was moving into one of the lounges. I can live in a lounge.”

  She shook her head. “The lounges are full.”

  “But I can’t stay in that room.”

  “Sorry,” she said. “I can’t help you.”

  “Please.” I was feeling frantic. If I got moved to another dorm then that stupid guy wouldn’t know where I lived anymore. He couldn’t come and find me, and I’d be safe.

  She sighed. “I know Jill can be a little… well, difficult. But I don’t have any other options for you. You’ll have to try to get along with her.”

  “It’s not about Jill,” I said. “Jill’s fine.”

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  “It’s… just… bad there,” I said. What was I supposed to say? Some drug dealer knew where I lived and I wanted to hide from him?

  She gave me a withering look. “Miss Colligan, maybe in your last school, you could make demands like that and people would care, but around here, we don’t treat people like princesses.”

  “I’m not asking to be treated like anything,” I said. “I just want a new room. Couldn’t I switch with someone?”

  “Find someone who wants to switch,” she said. “Now, if that’s all, I have other things I’ve got to work on.”

  My shoulders sagged, and I turned away from the desk.

  This sucked. This completely sucked.

  I banged the door on the way out. Not that it mattered, but it made me feel a little bit better to have some kind of outlet for my frustration.

  I didn’t know what I was going to do.

  I yanked the hood of my coat up over my head. It was mid afternoon, but it was still freaking cold outside.

  The fact that it was cold pissed me off too. The fact that it was January. Maybe if it had been April, things would have been better.

  Of course, hadn’t some famous dude said that April was the cruelest month?

  Whatever.

  I really didn’t want to call my dad. But if this guy was threatening to hurt me, what choice did I have? My dad would probably be able to figure out—

  Hey. Wait a minute. There was that Levi guy crossing the street. Coming straight for me.

  He was the only person at the party who’d seen me with all that money. I guessed it was possible that someone else had seen, but I knew for a fact that he’d seen it, because he’d gotten all weird about it.

  He was the guy who’d sold me out.

  I stalked over to him. “Thanks a lot, fuckhead.”

  He lifted his head. His bloodshot eyes barely seemed to focus on me. “Whoa.”

  “Don’t pull that shit with me,” I said. “This is all your fault.”

  He squinted. “Hey, you’re that girl that lives with Jill now, right? Molly?”

  “Don’t play dumb. You know who I am, and you told that guy about me.”

  He snickered. “Hey, it’s kind of funny that your name is Molly, and you bought molly from me.”

  I narrowed my eyes. The next person who made a joke about my name was getting my fist in their teeth. “You told him that I had the money. You fucked everything up.”

  He furrowed his brow. “The money? Cori’s money?”

  “Yes. That money. Now some crazy guy knows where I live, and he thinks I’m trying to double-cross him, and it’s all because of you.”

  “A crazy guy?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “He says it’s his money, not Cori’s.”

  Levi rubbed his chin. “We shouldn’t talk about this out here.”

  “Whatever. Just because you’re stoned and paranoid—”

  He reached out and took me by the arm.

  “There you go grabbing me again.”

  But he didn’t let go of me. He led me around the building, away from the other students who were milling about.

  I pulled my arm away from him. “What the fuck is your problem?”

  He held up a finger. “Look, first of all, I didn’t say anything to anybody about that money. So, you can stop being pissed at me or whatever.”

  “Oh, sure you didn’t.”

  “I didn’t.” He seemed serious. And like before, he seemed to have dropped his whole stoner demeanor, like it was an act or something. “Second of all, that guy you’re talking about? That’s probably Professor X.”

  I’d heard that before somewhere… “That was on the envelope. Prof. X. #3.”

  “You’re talking to him?”

  “He called me and wanted his money back.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Cool. Then tell me how to get in touch with him.”

  “No,” I said. “I’m doing anything for you. You are so weird, Levi. And you’re kind of creepy on top of it all.” I started to walk away.

  He grabbed me again. “Don’t walk away from me.”

  “Stop touching me,” I snapped.

  “Promise me you’ll talk to me.”

  I sighed.

  He raised his eyebrows.

  “There’s nothing to talk about.”

  “Look, Professor X is a cook,” he said.

  “A cook? What? He makes cakes or something?”

  “You met him?”

  “Kind of. It was dark, and he had this hood, and his face was all shadowy, and he was really scary.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t him. Maybe it was a flunky or something, but it doesn’t matter. He made contact with you.” He dropped my arm and rubbed his forehead. “That’s good. That’s really good.”

  “Whatever,” I said. “I’m leaving.”

  “Don’t leave,” he said. “When I said he was a cook, I mean he cooks ecstasy. It’s not an easy thing to do, okay? It’s not like meth, where you can get all the raw ingredients from cold medicine. This is heavy-duty chemistry, you got it? So, Professor X is the ecstasy cook. His stuff probably supplies half the country. Everything else comes all the way from the Netherlands.”

  “Oh.” Now, I was starting to get even more freaked out. “Well, that’s bad. Because I think he’s going to kill me.”

  “What?”

  “The money,” I said. “He called me and said he wanted it back. So I met with him to give it to him. But he said that Cori owed him three times that much. And he said I only had two weeks to get that money to him. And then he said he knew where I lived. So, I think that was a death threat.”

  “Wow.” Levi blew out air, his cheeks puffing up. “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. You’re going to tell me how to get in touch with him, and I’ll take care of the money stuff.”

  “I don’t know how to get in touch with him,” I said. “Why do you want to get in touch with him anyway?”

  “Because I want a direct connection to the source,” said Levi. “I used to buy stuff from Cori, but I had to pay her markup. Now you’ve got a line to the guy who makes the shit. And if I can get that, I’m golden.”

  “You want to talk to him because you’re a drug dealer.”

  He glared at me. “Not so loud.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Well, like I said, I don’t know how to get in touch with him. Sorry about your luck.” I did start to walk away at that point.

  He followed me. “Molly, wait a second. How did he get in touch with you?”

  I picked up the pace. “He called me.”

  He matched my stride, falling in step with me. “So, you’ve got his number on your phone.”

  “No,” I said. “He didn’t call my cell phone. He called my dorm phone. And it doesn’t have caller ID.”

  “Shit.”

  “Oh, stop acting like it’s the end of the world,” I said. “You’re not the one who’s going to die.”

  “You’re not going to die,” he said. “Work with me here.”

  I rounded on him. “I never want to see you again. Stay away from me.”

  He sighed.

  But
he let me go.

  * * *

  I swung open the door to my dorm room.

  Jill was sitting on her bed, her head in her hands.

  Parker stood next to her, lighting her glass pipe.

  I closed the door.

  Jill lifted her head. She looked at me, then she focused on Parker.

  He blew out smoke.

  “Jesus, Parker, use the toilet paper roll thing.” Her voice was shrill. She grabbed it off of her dresser and waved it in in his face.

  He snatched it from her. The toilet paper roll thing was a cardboard cylinder from a toilet paper roll that had been stuffed with several dryer sheets. “At a time like this, that’s what you’re worried about?”

  “Yes.”

  He took another hit and blew out the smoke through the roll, right in her face.

  Now the room smelled like someone had been smoking pot in a laundromat.

  Jill put her hands on her hips. “The R.A. will smell it, and we’ll get in trouble.”

  “Fuck the R.A.,” said Parker.

  The R.A. was the Resident Assistant, an upperclassman who was paid to live in the dorm. She was one part den mother and one part hall monitor.

  Jill sat back on the bed and put her head in her hands again.

  Parker slammed the pipe down on her dresser.

  “Careful,” she said. “You’ll break it.”

  I was still in the doorway. The tension filled the room as thick as the marijuana smoke. “Um… you guys want me to come back later?”

  Parker looked at me. He laughed, but it was bitter. “You didn’t hear? They found Cori’s body.”

  I took a step back. I collided the door. Its solidness felt comforting at my back. “What?”

  Jill lifted her face. She nodded.

  “Cori’s… dead?” I said.

  Parker approached me. He put his face inches from mine. “They pulled her out of the river. She was tied up and weighted down with bricks. Been there since the beginning of break, they think.”

  Behind him, Jill made a little noise.

  I swallowed, shrinking from him.

  “That’s not the best part, though,” he said. He looked back at Jill. “Is it?”

  “Fuck you, Parker,” she said.

  He turned back to me. “She didn’t die before she went into the river. She fucking drowned to death. She was dumped in alive.”

  I felt ill.