by Gail Giles
I put my head in my hands. “I'd try to take David with me sometimes, like out to the park or to the movies, anywhere, just to get him out of her sight, and she'd call my cell. Screaming at me to get David's ass back home. He had to clean his room. I had to mow our lawn. Did I think I could keep everybody else's lawn perfect and our house looking overgrown and abandoned? Did she always have to be the joke of the neighborhood because of her sons?
“I thought I'd get some peace and quiet at school. But if she wasn't calling to bitch about David, David called crying because she wouldn't leave him alone. And I didn't realize how dark and moody I had gotten. I wouldn't do the frat-boy thing. Wouldn't go hang at the bars because of all the noise. My roommate was a Lit major and nicknamed me Lord Byron, started telling the other guys about my constant phone calls and overhearing someone crying. He asked if I was screwing my sister. I told him I only had a brother and then the gossip went around that I was screwing my brother. Nope, college wasn't the rescue I thought it would be.
“She never let up. It didn't matter that I was out of her sight lines.”
I looked back up. “It. Never. Ended.”
I pushed my palms against my ears. “I was going out of my mind.”
CASS
There's always a deal waiting to be made. That's what Ted always said. It takes the right person to recognize the deal and the time to make it. Could I make a deal with Kyle? Hell yes. I'd done it before. I found the right time and the person to make the deal to become the first junior Homecoming Queen.
“Derek, hey.”
“Hey, Cass. Looking great, as always.”
Grin/head tilt. “Derek, let's go out and talk a minute.” The back-to-school party smelled like beer and sounded like a thunderstorm.
The music followed us out to the pool but I led Derek to the far end, turned, and smiled up at him.
“Cass, as much as I'd like it, I know you didn't bring me out here for a make-out session. What's the deal?”
“Derek. Isn't the football team sick of a band nerd getting Homecoming King every year? Don't you think after sweating through two-a-days, taking jour hits on the field, that you deserve that picture in the yearbook? Why does somebody that doesn't do more than get a paper cut from his sheet music deserve the recognition?”
Derek's smile straightened and his jawline hardened. I'd hit the hot button.
I pressed. “I'm sick of it. Homecoming is about football. But band is huge and has to vote for their own nominee for Homecoming Queen. And the Queen's escort is the King.”
“And I need a history lesson because ?” Derek said.
“Because this is the year to change all that.”
“Cass, you have my attention,” Derek said.
I didn't need the grin or the head tilt now. I had just sold him his shortcoming. I pulled him down and we sat in the grass. I started ticking the selling points off on my fingers.
“You are the best quarterback our school has had in years. You've got a shot at All State. You are the real deal. You have no steady girlfriend. I'm the girl people vote for. I've spent two years getting my name on ballots. People see it enough, they see my face out there enough, I smile enough, and they learn to vote for me. Together, we'll pull in more than double our votes.”
“But…”
I put a hand on his knee. “Let me finish. Every member of the team votes for me. Not just varsity—JV, sophomore, freshman, all those teams. And, the word goes out that any team member with a girlfriend has that girlfriend vote for me. It's his duty to do that for his varsity quarterback. Now think about that a minute, Derek.”
Derek's brow furrowed, then he looked at me like he saw the sun rise. “A lot of those girlfriends are in band.”
“Yes, they are. We not only consolidate votes among the football teams, which you guys haven't been doing, we steal votes from the band. And you, Derek, will be the Homecoming King. The varsity quarterback. The way it should be.” I had just wrapped it up in a bow.
“But what about us? The you-and-me kind of us?”
“We have a good time. We date, go to the things where we'll be seen. If you want to see someone else on your private time, that's cool. After Homecoming, you don't have to be stuck with me. This is all for what should be, and yes, so I have something nice for my resume. But, personally, I'm tired of the band thinking Homecoming is their private territory.”
Derek stood and helped me up. He hugged me then put out his right hand to shake on it.
“We've got a deal, Cass McBride.”
If I could sell Derek, I could sell Kyle. Where was Kyle? It had to be Saturday and it had to be late. Kyle must have gone home for the night. It was night and I was alone in this box and no one knew where I was.
So I lost it. This time not to panic, but to sorrow. I didn't think I had any tears left but they came. And grief lives right in the middle of your chest. Your heart doesn't break; it dissolves, leaks away, and it hurts. It hurts.
I wanted my mom. I wanted her to hold me and stroke my hair off my forehead and sing that Cajun nursery song that she sang when I had a bad dream. I wanted to hug her and smell her shampoo, not dirt and urine.
A hot wad of pain in my left calf interrupted my self-pity. The muscle was knotted hard. Charley horse? Think. Pull your toes back, not forward. Hard. Pull hard. I anchored my heel on the coarse surface. God, that hurt. I couldn't reach my toes with my fingers so I had to force my muscles to pull my toes back.
I would win against this pain.
Cass McBride gets what she wants.
I forced my heel down harder and my toes back more.
My back muscles were rigid. From forcing my toes? Because I'd been in one position so long? My throat was tight.
Panic now. Like a big black vulture spreading his wings over me, hovering. Always there, waiting for me.
I screamed. Shredding my throat yet again. I scrabbled and clawed at the top of the coffin and thrashed back and forth, banging my shoulders against the sides of the box. The crate, Kyle called it.
God, I had to calm down. Stop. Please, please stop, Cass.
I had to live through this night.
Gould I sleep? Would I wake up again? How do you sleep when you keep panic away with pain?
No, I couldn't sleep.
But, I would calm down.
What was that song my mother sang?
Front, petit front
Yeux, petits yeux
Nez de croquant
…
Quiriquiqui
I would sing that song. I would breathe in and out.
I would live through this night.
BEN
“Tell me you guys have something,” Ben said.
The four uniforms assigned to the case sprawled in aluminum chairs around a battered table.
The first officer up glanced at his notes. “School counselors all came and started calling kids that knew the girl. The counselors told the kids they phoned to put out the word to anyone they knew that might have information or just wanted to tell us something about Cass to come by the school. Saturday makes it hard, but we got a whole boatload of kids. Some just wanted attention; a few wanted to be someplace besides home; some get off on being part of the action, right? But ya never know. Summarizing seven hours of listening to all her ‘really good friends,’ Cass McBride was: stuck-up, the friendliest girl in school, a bitch, an angel, too rich for her own good, generous to a fault, a slut, an ice princess, outgoing, shy, totally unstable, knew what she wanted and how to get it, smart, dumb as patio furniture; and whatever happened, she deserved because she treated people like crap, or else she didn't deserve anything like this because she gets along with everyone.” He flipped his notebook closed. “Same old, same old. If she gave the talker the time of day, they loved her; if not, Cass was bad news on a biscuit.”
The officer frowned and flipped his notes open again. “Oh, Susan Allison, wants to be called Firefly, weird haircut, earrings as big as golfballs, all tha
t black-and-white makeup stuff, says she's pretty sure Cass was pregnant.”
“Pregnant?” Ben asked.
“Pregnant. Firefly reports catching Cass in an early-morning hurl a couple of days ago.”
Ben was marking a dry-erase board. “Guessing Cass and Firefly weren't friends?” He wrote pregnant on the board. “We won't spend time on this now. We can ask the best friend. But my gut tells me no.”
He pointed to the board. “Leatha. She makes sense. I think Cass is how she describes her to be. But that leaves us with a big nothing.”
Ben looked at the clock. At the crime board. Back at the clock.
“We're past the first twenty-four and we've got nothing?”
KYLE
“I don't know why I didn't figure out that David would pick Cass when we made the plan. I mean, you've seen her. Doesn't she look sort of like an old, hard version of Cass? And she knew who Cass was. She was always asking for our school newspaper and checking out the local rags and Cass was always there. She'd either tell us over and over again about how she used to be just like that, only she was a cheerleader to boot. She was popular in high school, she was always in the paper, she was Miss Wonderful. Or she'd rant that Cass had a father who made a decent living. Cass had a father that people respected. Cass's family belonged to the country club. Cass was a child to be proud of. Cass didn't lurk around in shadows. Cass wasn't an embarrassment.
“Why didn't I see it coming? But I didn't. I never thought David would aim that high.”
I could almost hear her in my head asking the question I didn't want to hear. Who told David to aim high? And who taught him to climb that tree?
CASS
“Still there?”
Fear had worn me down, and this raging thirst had tired me, but his taunt lit my fuse. This was a game of wits now.
“I'm here.”
“I'm disappointed. I thought you'd be scream ing or at least crying. Afraid I wouldn't come back?”
I fisted my left hand, but kept myself together. Was it still Saturday? Was it Sunday? How was I supposed to figure out time? “You stayed away a little too long and missed all that.” I sighed loud enough for the radio. “I'm screamed out. Cried dry. I figure I can't do shit but wait. For you to show up or me to die.” I paused for a long beat. “You're holding all the cards, right?”
He paced across me. Static came from the radio and he didn't say anything. He hadn't expected that. Good.
“Burying somebody alive pretty much guarantees you the edge,” Kyle said.
My heart squeezed again. Never underestimate your opponent. I tried to convince myself that I wasn't in a box, in a grave. I was lying on the ground under the night sky, eyes closed.
When I felt the blood finally begin to pump again, I thought, Don't beg; don't demand. Make jour voice say “I respect you.” “Are you going to do all the talking or can I ask you anything?”
“That depends on the questions,” he said. Those were the words. His tone said—Don't push me.
“First, can I say his name?” Good girl, Cass—get permission, make him think he's in charge. I licked my lips. So dry.
“Bitch, I want you to say his name. David. He's not a nobody you scrape off the bottom of your shoe. That's why you're here. He's a person and you treated him like dirt and now he's dead.”
The sudden flash of his hatred startled me. I knew he was crazy, but his brand of crazy had seemed—cold and calculating. This was instability and that was a lot more dangerous. I gulped in the air again. Slow.
Slow.
Slow.
“I hear you…and there's no reason to mess around with anything but the truth. And I know that I must be responsible for David.” Kyle was quiet. I seized the moment and went on. “And I'm as self-centered as you say I am, but I didn't know David.”
“You didn't want to know him.”
I waited a few seconds and mellowed my voice to smooth and conciliatory. “He asked me out, I told him that I was busy. I wrote a crappy note. He found it and I'm sorry that happened. But I didn't know I was anything but a blip on his radar. I didn't know I could be that important to anyone.”
“Don't feed me this Miss Innocent shit.”
I gave Kyle another cooldown moment.
“I want you to tell me about David.”
I waited. He wasn't talking. I breathed a little deeper. Calmed down. “I don't believe you would do something like…this. You've got to think I deserve it. If I did that kind of…damage, then I…well, I don't know what to think. I need to know something about David before I can understand how I did this to him. Can you explain it for me?”
He punched on the radio but didn't talk. Static. The white noise told me a lot.
Finally. “I won't tell you to help you feel better. I'll do it to make you suffer.”
I didn't care why the bastard talked. As long as he kept it up.
And I'll keep agreeing with you, Kyle, as long as you give me something to use. I know what my fear is. I need to know yours.
He didn't speak for a long time. Too long. He needed a nudge.
“I don't want to pry into anything that's just between you and David, okay?”
Nothing.
“But I heard he left a note.”
“David left a note all right. And the note is all about why you're in that box.”
The anger had flashed and was cold now.
“The cops took it, but left us a copy. To see if we could make sense of it.
“They didn't need to leave a copy. I'll never forget a word. See what you think David meant.”
The radio clicked off. Was he crying now?
Or struggling not to?
The walkie came back on.
“It wasn't addressed to anyone. He wrote it on copy paper with a marker. Black. Medium tip. Neat block letters. Easy to read. Nothing all drama queen—like, scrawled in messy letters in his own blood. He even used a safety pin—a safety pin—to attach it to a hunk of his chest. Went right through the skin and some fatty tissue with the prong and back out and clipped the point into the capped end. That's David, orderly and precise. Didn't want to let that note flap away in the wind.”
The radio clicked off again.
Why? Kyle was struggling. His emotions were frayed and close to the surface. He didn't want me to know.
Weakness.
My enemy's weakness is my advantage.
But, I had underestimated him before. If I pushed too hard or too fast, he might just walk away.
The walkie popped to life:
WORDS ARE TEETH.
AND THEY EAT ME ALIVE.
FEED ON MY CORPSE INSTEAD.
BEN
“Tyrell, you get anything…?” Ben wiggled his ringers in the air like spider feet.
Tyrell shook his head. “Nah, no weird vibes. Talk to Roger about insects.”
“Arachnids,” Roger said.
“Gesundheit. Anyway, all I got are guys that got shot down. Girls who were jealous. Girls who wished they could be her. That's it. That whole school's a mess. Remember the suicide Tuesday? Then a kidnapping on Friday.”
“Right, I got that too,” Roger said. “The whole heebie-jeebies thing. Nobody sees a connection, though.”
“We'll come back to that.” Ben jabbed a finger at Roger. “Go.”
“I talked to the teachers. I've got a good tape from an English teacher I want you to hear. For the rest of Cass's teachers, they all see her the same. Driven. Say she smiles and compliments and says the right things. But the smart ones say they feel manipulated, hmmm, ‘worked,’ one of them put it. But she's a good student, organized, assignments prepared and on time. No discipline problems. Well dressed and turned out. Pleasant. Yada yada. The kind you recommend to universities, but never feel close to. But the history teacher…” He trailed off.
“What?”
“History teacher was a mess. Said this was the second time in a week the cops had been to see him. The kid that killed himself had been in o
ne of his classes too.”
Ben sat forward. “Did she—”
“Know him?” Roger finished. “In class with him, but the teacher, a coach, said they didn't travel in the same circles. Said the boy flew too low for her radar. For anybody's radar, really. He didn't think Cass would know his name except for when they had a moment of silence in class for him the day his death was announced.”
“We need to—”
“I already checked into the kid. David Kirby. Death officially suicide. No hint of foul play. Note pinned to the kid's body. Talked to the investigating officer. Said the mother was the one that needed hanging. A piece of work. I called McBride and asked if Cass knew the Kirby kid. He said no. He didn't even know about the kid's death. Said Cass didn't go to a funeral. Doesn't look like we've got any connection.”
Ben and Roger eyed one another. “But,” Ben said.
“But, it feels wrong somehow,” Roger answered. “Or maybe right.”
Ben looked at the clock. “It's two in the morning. Let's get some sleep and be back here at seven and listen to the teacher's tape.”
KYLE
“She didn't want much to do with him. Except when she was ranting at him. He was like a little puppy. Sweet, but I had to watch him all the time. He couldn't take care of himself. Anybody could have killed him with a good kick. I liked taking care of him when we were little.
“But when he got in school he got picked on. He didn't know how to make his way. There's something about a kid who wants too much. Wants people to like him, I mean. School kids whiff that stink of desperation on you and they turn into sharks in a feeding frenzy.
