The Lives of Desperate Girls

by MacKenzie Common

  At that moment, my eyes caught a splash of color in the otherwise anemic setting. It was lying on the ground, half frozen against the ridge of a tire track. I crouched over and peeled it off the ice, the wool mashed into clumps of snow. I felt tears gather as I tenderly cradled Chloe’s mitten, the last trace of her that I would find after her disappearance. The mitten was frozen stiff and cold in my hands, but I didn’t care.

  I stayed out there until my legs were numb beneath my jeans and my fingers swelled with cold. A single mitten was useless; you needed a pair for it to make sense.

  —

  And that was what things were like after Chloe disappeared. The first three weeks were the loneliest of my life. I thought of Chloe so often that I began to feel as if I was losing my mind. She was there when my consciousness snapped back between my eyeballs every morning. She remained until I tipped back into a restless sleep each night. I felt haunted by her secrets, and by my belief that Chloe had killed herself in the woods.

  No one at school told the cops about how wild Chloe had become. The teenagers of Thunder Creek High closed ranks, keeping Chloe’s secrets as well as their own. It wasn’t an act of charity. It was more that no one wanted to give adults access to the insular world of adolescents—especially when they all knew that no one was entirely blameless in Chloe’s story.

  Not mentioning Chloe would have been one thing. Instead, all everyone at school talked about was how much they missed her. It was as if disappearing had absolved her of all her sins. Every day I heard people talk about how outgoing Chloe was, how funny, how lively, her stellar performance in last year’s play.

  It infuriated me. The Chloe they were describing had eroded in the last year. And now, it seemed, the entire school population had embarked on a grand scheme of revisionist history. The only remaining evidence of Chloe’s troubles was the wall of anonymous comments in the bathroom. I hadn’t bothered to cover up the newest set now that Chloe wasn’t around to read them. I wondered if the girls who used those stalls shut their eyes so as not to remember how callous they had been to Chloe.

  I stopped talking to people, sick of the insincere things they said about my best friend. It all felt so wrong, to mourn a girl who had disappeared long before she actually went missing.

  Chapter Thirty–Four

  March 29, 2006

  When I finished telling Tom everything, I stared at the night sky above Thunder Creek. The stars were unfurled all around, and it reminded me of how Chloe and I had felt up here, sure that the night belonged only to us. Back then, time could slow down and you could live forever on the sensations of just one night. But this wasn’t a totally happy place for me anymore. My eyes drifted sideways toward the unbroken line of forest, where I suspected Chloe had died. Had she brought the other mitten with her to the woods? I wondered if she would be wearing it if they ever found her.

  “Since Chloe went missing, everyone’s wondered what I really know about it. And now I’ve told you the whole story,” I said, looking over at Tom. He was staring out at the trees, his brows furrowed.

  I knew why everyone assumed that Helen’s killer had taken Chloe as well; it was more than just the fact that they were teenage girls. People wanted to believe that up until the last moment of her life, Chloe wanted to be alive. Because the truth—the idea that we were all Chloe’s killers, including Chloe herself—was so much more difficult to grasp.

  I took a deep breath to quell the shaking feeling in my throat. It had been cathartic, telling Tom everything, but I had no idea how he’d react to the gravity of my secrets. They never covered this aspect of boy/girl interactions on television. But Tom and I didn’t exactly represent a normal love story: boy meets girl; boy and girl have ambiguous and semi-romantic connection; boy helps girl investigate a brutal murder replete with racial issues…I must have missed that episode of Dawson’s Creek.

  “Now I know everything,” Tom said, lighting a cigarette.

  He reached over and took my hand, enveloping it in a loose weave of fingers. He wasn’t saying much, but I could tell by the way he was squinting over his cigarette that he was trying to make sense of it all.

  “Do you want a cigarette? I know you don’t smoke, but if there was ever a time to have one, it might be now,” Tom said.

  I hesitated, unsure what it meant if I said yes. Chloe hated cigarettes. She thought they were a disgusting habit and that the only thing worth smoking was pot. I usually agreed with her. My mother’s wet coughs and the way even our tissue boxes and bath towels reeked of cigarette smoke had dispelled any ideas that smoking was glamorous. But maybe you should try everything once.

  “Okay,” I said, holding out my hand for a cigarette and a lighter.

  To my surprise, he insisted on lighting it for me. There was something strangely enticing about the way he leaned over and cupped his hand around the flame. It was a small gesture of caring, a sign of something more beneath our months of playing detective.

  I inhaled and found that smoking didn’t feel like anything new. It was the same sensation I got sitting next to my mom on the couch watching TV. Still, it gave me something to do during this heavy conversation.

  “I didn’t realize how bad it was for Chloe,” Tom said finally. “You always kind of think slutty girls are enjoying themselves. You know, maybe making some reckless decisions but living it up when they’re young.”

  “No, she was pretty unhappy this year,” I said, my mouth grimacing at how bitter the truth tasted. I could feel the tears gather in my eyes as I continued. “Everyone ground her down. They ruined her because they made her forget she was better than them. Better than me,” I choked, the tears spilling over and soaking my cheeks. “And then they changed as soon as she went missing. I don’t get why people care more about other people once they’re gone. By then, it’s too late to mean anything.” I wiped my face with my free hand.

  “Because it’s easier,” Tom said, putting his hand on my knee and squeezing. “Because when they’re gone all you have is a memory that you can make be anything you want. Real people are a lot harder to understand,” Tom said. He glanced down, his hair obscuring his face.

  “I think you’re right,” I said quietly. “Do you think Chloe killed herself?” It still felt wrong to say something so wretched out loud.

  Tom was silent. I took a final drag off my cigarette, my throat catching as the filter began to singe.

  “Maybe some mysteries are better unsolved,” he said finally. Then he stood up and grabbed my hand, helping me to my feet on the narrow platform.

  “So what now?” Tom asked as we began the climb down.

  “What do you mean? I think the investigation is over,” I said. We would never get the full story on Helen’s death, and I was worried that if we struggled for any more slivers of insight, everyone involved would be hurt, even us.

  Tom helped me down off the ladder, and when I got to the bottom he kissed me lightly, his lips grazing mine as I leaned against the chairlift. When he pulled away, his eyes had a mischievous glint.

  “You keep saying you want to teach everyone a lesson about Chloe,” Tom said.

  “Yeah, but I’m not going to, like, pull a Carrie and go crazy at prom.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” Tom said with a snort. “Look, I don’t think we can get revenge on everyone, but maybe we can make Devon, Mike and Liam pay.”

  “I’ve wanted to do that all year, but I don’t know how,” I said in frustration. “I don’t have enough evidence to go to the police, and I can’t think of any other ideas.”

  “I can. You said the worst part about all that Chloe stuff was how it was a secret, right? Well, maybe it’s time everyone knew the truth. Maybe we should make that happen at graduation,” Tom said with a smile.

  I nodded slowly. I had thought this conversation with Tom was my big exercise in truth-telling, but while I felt somewhat relieved, it hadn’t actually fixed anything. I didn’t know what his grand idea was, but I felt I owed it to Chloe to try
. If the truth didn’t set me free, maybe revenge would.

  Chapter Thirty–Five

  May 15, 2006

  A month and a half later, I went to visit Helen’s mother again. It was May; the longest winter of my life was finally over.

  I was incredibly busy with school, throwing myself into studying and begging extra work from my teachers in order to pull my grades up. My hard work had paid off. The week before, Vice Principal Delorme had informed my mom that I was on track to pass grade eleven. He was astonished that I had managed to get my grades up so quickly, but my mom wasn’t. She had always believed that I could do anything. Now I was starting to believe it as well.

  Taylor had mostly left me alone after our big fight in the hall. She said the occasional bitchy thing, and she wasn’t above shooting me a dirty look in class, but I think she realized she had gone too far with the locker graffiti and saying I might have killed Chloe. Taylor probably wasn’t going to become the next Mother Theresa, but she wasn’t evil. She just didn’t understand what it was like to lose someone.

  I was still spending time with Tom, though it was getting harder and harder to do. He was so incredibly excited about this trip. All he could talk about was beach hostels and overnight buses. He would be chattering away about his itinerary and all I could hear was the loud ticking of a clock marking time. Every time I saw him, another layer of my feelings for him came unstuck. It was ridiculous. I was falling for him even though I knew he was leaving, and that knowledge made seeing him painful.

  If hanging out with Tom left me jangled and upset, seeing Bobby had the opposite effect. I had started driving him home after school more and more often. We didn’t talk that much, we just listened to music, but I always felt relaxed afterward. When we did talk, it was usually about school and how I hoped I would pass the year. Somehow, his calmness reminded me that while failing the eleventh grade would be annoying, worse things had happened to girls in Thunder Creek.

  I had also been spending a lot of time with Jake, the trumpet player who lived in my housing complex. We didn’t have much in common other than proximity, but that was beginning to change. I had now seen the complete Band of Brothers series, and we were going to start The Pacific soon. I’d learned that history was a lot more interesting when HBO produced it, and this newfound interest was really showing in my history grades. Sometimes Jake and I even did homework together. It was kind of nice to have a study buddy.

  Lately, I had begun to notice people in a way that I never had when Chloe was here. None of them were exactly the right fit, not the way Chloe was, but together they made me realize that although I might not have a best friend anymore, I wasn’t alone.

  I turned onto the road leading up to the reserve. It looked a lot nicer in the springtime. The lawns were a lush green, a stunning metamorphosis from the matted and brown grass the melting snow always revealed. I could see children crouched over chalk drawings, their faces obscured by dark hair gleaming in the sunlight. Older people sat on their porches in rickety lawn chairs with crossword books and paperback novels.

  I still saw the poverty. The kids didn’t have as many toys as you’d expect, and the old people had the mottled brown teeth that showed they’d never been to a dentist. Dirt-matted dogs roamed the neighborhood, mutts that lived off scraps. Rez dogs had always been a problem here. I could remember my mom making me stay in the car as a kid when she came out here to buy cigarettes. Summer softened the edges of those uncomfortable truths.

  But no matter what I thought about the reserve, this had been Helen’s home. Bobby told me Helen was buried in the reserve cemetery. It was a small funeral plot in the woods, peaceful and secluded. It comforted me to know that Helen would always remain close to her family. Chloe used to worry that she would end up dying of old age in Thunder Creek. We would drive by the graveyard next to the French Catholic high school and Chloe would shudder and say, “Imagine being dead and forgotten here.” Chloe had always been so sure that one had to live somewhere important in order to have a meaningful life. But she was wrong. This little reserve in the woods was the only place in the world where Helen mattered.

  Pat was sitting on her porch when I pulled into her driveway. I could see her sturdy legs jutting out from the nylon lawn chair. She was wearing shorts and a green T-shirt from Casino Rama, a huge place on a reserve down south. My mom went there once with a friend to see Shania Twain perform. She had come home gushing about how much fun she had on her “girls weekend.” It was the only trip I could remember her ever taking.

  Pat waved at me, a smile turning up the corners of her mouth as I got out of my car.

  “Beautiful weather, huh?” she asked, the traditional way to open conversation in Northern Ontario.

  “Yeah, what a relief after the winter we had! I thought it would never end,” I replied, shaking my head in disgust. Canadians tended to take unusually long winters as a personal affront. You felt as if the seasons had betrayed you by refusing to adhere to the agreed-upon time limit.

  “Bobby’s just inside getting a Coke. You’re welcome to one too. I thought it would be nice to sit out here,” Pat said, gesturing to the lawn chairs she had arranged outside.

  “Sounds good. Do you want one?” I asked. Pat shook her head.

  “Nah, I’m trying to lose weight. I drink too much of that stuff,” she said, slapping her thigh. I nodded and went inside.

  Pat’s house was hot and stuffy. The lights were off, but the small windows that kept the cold out didn’t provide much air. We had the same problem in my house, and my mom was vigilant about keeping the curtains shut in the summer.

  Helen’s face peered out of pictures at me in the dim light of the hallway. She had been in my thoughts so much that I felt like I was recognizing an old friend. It was as if time had folded in on itself and we had become acquaintances, even though we had never actually met when she was alive.

  Bobby was in the kitchen, using his finger to dig half-moons of ice out of an ice-cube tray. The spaces hadn’t been filled completely to the top, so the ice slid away from his prying fingers. Bobby was as gangly as ever, but there was something beautiful in the way his spidery fingers fanned out from his bony wrists.

  “Hey,” I said, smiling at him.

  “Hey, good to see you,” Bobby said quietly.

  “Likewise,” I said. I watched him pour two Cokes and a glass of ice water for Pat.

  “Any word yet on your grades?” Bobby asked.

  “Yeah! I found out this week that as long as I don’t fail my exams, I’ll be a senior next year!” I said proudly.

  “Congratulations!” Bobby said, giving me a high five. It was funny how I had pushed the bar down so low this year that passing had become an achievement. I knew that I would have to do much better next year. The idea of twelfth grade made me feel relieved. It would be a fresh start after the roiling upheavals of grade eleven.

  “Thanks for being a friend,” I said. Bobby shrugged, his bony shoulders arcing through the air like the handles of a jump rope.

  “You too, Jenny,” he said. I smiled and we walked outside to meet Pat.

  I sat down on the chair and took a big sip of my Coke, trying to figure out how to start. I knew that the stuff I had found out belonged to Pat and Bobby, and that they deserved to know what I had discovered, but it was still a hard step to take. Finally, I just took a deep breath and launched in, scared that if I left it any longer I would put it off until the next visit, and so on.

  I spent the next half hour telling them everything I had learned since I’d last seen Pat. I told her how Tom and I had pieced together Helen’s last hours. Pat knew that her daughter had been visiting Jake, but she had no idea what Helen had done afterward. I told her about Helen catching the bus out to the Trapper. I described Alan, and she furrowed her eyebrows and nodded. She remembered him from his days on the reserve. I told her about Helen’s unrequited love and how she had been so embarrassed that she’d tried to hitchhike home.

  By the
end, I could tell that Pat was holding back tears, her face tight with the effort as Bobby held her hand. Bobby smiled at me, but I could see that his eyes were glistening. I kept forgetting that before he was my friend, he was Helen’s cousin, and they had grown up together.

  “And that’s what I found out,” I said. “I’m sorry if it’s upset you.”

  Pat shook her head rigidly and made eye contact. She had a strange expression on her face—the best way I could describe it was a sad strength. It was as if her grief was just another unbearable burden that she had to drag through life, trudging down a path lined with injustice.

  “Oh no, Jenny, it didn’t. I’m glad, really, to know what her last day was like. I just hate the idea that her heart was broken.”

  “I…I think Alan blames himself,” I said carefully, unsure of what her reaction would be. Pat shook her head.

  “Oh, he shouldn’t. It sounds like he was a good friend to her. Other boys might have taken advantage of her feelings,” Pat said thoughtfully, staring out at the street. The kids had used chalk to make a crooked hopscotch course. I wondered if Pat was seeing Helen as a little girl, jumping from square to square on that very spot.

  “Jenny, where did you say he worked? The Trapper?” she asked. I nodded and she continued. “I think I’ll go out there this week and talk to him. He must be feeling so alone now. If my daughter cared about him, I’d like to meet him.”

  “Sounds perfect,” I said. It was comforting to think that even in death, Helen had continued to give Alan what she gave him in life: people who would care about him.

  We lapsed into a long silence, the warm breeze feathering over the porch and across our skin. I felt a sense of relief, as if I had given Pat and Bobby a tiny bit of closure. I was able to tell Pat about another person whose life Helen had changed. And while it was likely that her last moments were filled with pain and fear, there was some comfort in the fact that Helen had spent the hours before her abduction with Jake and Alan: two people who loved her and would never forget her.