First We Were IV

by Alexandra Sirowy

  Viv came forward. Harry placed the dagger in her open hand. She held its glinting tip to the moon. “The Order of IV offers a blood sacrifice to the Mistress.”

  Vaguely I thought too late, though Goldilocks’s blood hadn’t seeped onto the rock. She was posed, a dead ornament, left to the elements with vicious indifference.

  Viv pierced the flames with the dagger. We’d agreed to prick our fingers, so when Viv dragged the tip along her palm, I gasped. She cut a diagonal line.

  “Blood for the Mistress’s blood moon,” Viv said with feral delight. She bent and left a smear of blood on the rock.

  She passed the knife to Graham, who stuck the blade into the flames. He let out a sharp exhalation when it broke skin and left a smaller black smear by his feet. “For the Mistress.”

  Harry went next. Trickles of sweat or absinthe—the bottle was being passed again—slid between my breasts. I held my breath as Harry brought the dagger to his palm. His head was cocked to the side, his thin, long nose casting a shadow on his cheek as the dagger moved. “For the Mistress,” he murmured.

  My knees went springy as I accepted the knife. It required more pressure than I anticipated. I tried to blink away the tears as I knelt and wiped the blood on the rock, tiny particles of stone and dirt digging into the wound, bringing on a new wave of tears. “For the Mistress.”

  The green bottle traveled. There was blood on the glass and I was light-headed with relief that the cutting was over. Graham took the final gulp and hurled the bottle out into the darkness. I never heard it break.

  Viv was motionless except for her fingers swirling at her sides, like she was stirring the heat rippling off the fire. She’d worn a white lace bra transparent enough to hint at nipple.

  She was the first to start pirouetting. It was stupid and dangerous to be drunk and dizzy between a bonfire and a drop. But we were bigger than four kids who could be injured. We were eddying, swirling human pinwheels.

  I twirled and the fire zigzagged. Our laughs funneled into the sky. We switched off gravity to float for a time. Eventually someone caught me by the arm. I came to a stop against a chest harder than my own. Graham had removed his glasses and from that angle I saw he’d smeared blood on the underside of his chin. I unsteadily tried to wipe it away.

  “Time to offer our secrets to the Mistress,” Graham’s voice rumbled from his chest to my ear. Viv and Harry were holding hands and leaning away from each other, spinning and giggling. We had agreed to share secrets after each rebellion. But Slumber Fest’s secret had been postponed to be shared under the blood moon. Another offering.

  I sat in front of Graham, his bent legs my recliner. Viv was poised and glowing. Harry was on his back, arms crossed and supporting his head. I imagined he was counting the stars. He said to no one in particular, “The twinkly bits are just distractions from seeing what else is up there.” No, not counting the stars. Harry was trying to decipher the dark.

  Graham said, “Me first.”

  My head was going haywire. Viv was laughing for no apparent reason, and each laugh was an invisible finger drawing hearts on my arms. Graham’s knees were hot on my shoulder blades. I shifted and the hooks of my bra bit into my spine and his knee. My bra was touching Graham. I wondered if he wanted to reach up and unhook it. Sometimes you imagine things you don’t even want.

  “Tell us all your secrets,” Viv said in a placeless accent.

  Harry did a slow clap. “Man up,” he shouted. He and Viv giggled.

  “You’re all yammed off too much absinthe,” Graham said. “You all know that I’m a kid of divorce,” he continued drily. “My dad doesn’t call or e-mail or text. He’s never sent me a birthday card, not even a shitty free e-card. So I, uh, well . . .” I couldn’t see it but was dead certain he was smiling mischievously. “Last November sixteenth he wasn’t going to get away with it again. I looked up his address online. You guys know that website Busy Bunny? The one you post small jobs that you’re willing to pay people to do? There’s a website that’s similar but for minorly illegal stuff. I hired someone to take a dump on my father’s porch”—a beat—“every day for the week of my seventeenth birthday.”

  “Evil genius,” I said as Viv cried, “That’s the most disgustingest, grossest—ugh, I freaking heart you.”

  “Seven hot, steaming dumps are too good for him,” Harry said. He was trying to sit cross-legged but wasn’t flexible enough. “I can’t outdo that. Let me think. Ummmm.” He twiddled his fingers on his chin. “Okay. Here’s my most embarrassing moment that almost no one knows about and will instantly be forgotten by you guys. I can’t believe I’m gonna tell you this.” He shook his head at himself. “Remember that really lifelike fairy statue my mom has in our backyard? The topless fairy my mom called whimsically erotic when she brought it home?”

  “Oh yeah,” Viv said. “I used to stare at her boobs wishing mine would grow as big.”

  “You’re not the only one,” Graham deadpanned.

  “Hey.” Viv flung her hand in Graham’s direction.

  “Let me finish. Your chest did get as hefty as Harry’s mother’s topless fairy statue.”

  “You did not just call a part of me hefty.”

  “Let Harry finish,” I shouted.

  “Thank you.” Harry bowed his head. “I was twelve, yeah? And there were boobs in my yard. My mom caught me touching them and touching—fill in the blank.”

  “Twelve-year-old Harry was jerking it while fondling a garden gnome,” Graham stated.

  “She was a garden fairy.” Harry covered his face.

  I squealed.

  “Same difference,” Graham said.

  “This would make the best comedic monologue ever.” Viv sighed.

  “Viv,” Harry said sternly.

  “It would. Me now.” She straightened the lace on one of her bra cups and rested a finger on her bottom lip. Her face saddened. “I’ve never been kissed,” she said. “By a boy, I mean, because Izzie and I used to play this Sleeping Beauty game.”

  “Shit,” Graham said.

  Harry crawled over to pat her on the shoulder.

  I stared. Viv kissed a guy named Dylan during our only year at sleepaway camp together. She called him the Labrador because of the bouncy way he followed her around. Her second kiss, and first official boyfriend, was at drama camp the next summer. There were games of spin the bottle after that. Rushed makeouts in the woods behind the cabins.

  “Seventeen and never been kissed,” she said. She looked apart from us, as though she had stepped onstage. I swallowed. Why was Viv lying? Maybe in a way she never had been kissed? She’d never gone out with anyone at school. She felt underappreciated outside of her theater life. Not by me. Or perhaps my first instinct, that the three of us had become the audience, was correct. It didn’t matter to me in the moment.

  “My turn,” I announced. I wanted to boost Viv up closer to the moon, convince her she mattered. “My secret is that I love Viv more than I love anyone.”

  Viv shimmied her feet in the air and exclaimed, “No fair. I could have said that about yooooooou.”

  Graham’s legs pulled away from my spine; I caught myself before falling. His features were neutral, the smear of blood a slash under his square chin.

  Viv was asking Harry how many girls he’d kissed and I wanted to listen in, but Graham wouldn’t release his hand when I tried to pry it from his lap. He was angry, and as far as I could gather, it was with me.

  Then those dimples divoted his cheeks and I thought him a second away from tickling me or bursting out some ridiculous comment about the history of kissing.

  “Hey, Vivy. You want to be kissed?”

  Viv and Harry turned in unison; two puzzled faces. I was waiting for Graham to add, “Got you” or “So kiss Izzie again.”

  Instead Graham was up, offering Viv a hand. They were standing chest to chest before I knew it. Harry raised his dark eyebrows at me. I shook my head. Graham was holding Viv’s bare waist. His fingers were resti
ng where her lower back connected to her butt. Graham was touching Viv’s butt. I let a hysterical giggle rip free.

  Viv tilted her chin, parted her lips, and her eyelashes fluttered shut. An expert kisser. That’s all I saw because Graham’s giant head closed in on her delicate face.

  I closed my eyes and held my head. “I think I’m hallucinating. Viv . . .” She had had more kisses than Graham. At drama camp, during those all-night games of spin the bottle and truth or dare, Viv had probably kissed more girls than Graham ever had. The two of them were kissing.

  I dropped my hands. The bonfire gobbled up the last sticks. I was sweating but cold. I wormed closer to the fire. Still cold. My stomach contracted for food. The kiss ended. I can’t say who pulled away first because I was staring at Harry, whose expression was bewildered. Pleasantly, though. Not the twisted-up puzzlement I felt on my face.

  Viv’s fingers fitted with mine. I was skidding forward in time. A few seconds here and there. The apple trees swayed overhead. When did we clamber off the rock? Viv’s lips were red and bitten and I wondered if it was because of Graham.

  Viv and I were dancing and then we were pinkie swearing. So serious about a topic that gave way to laughter. We were holding each other tight enough that it should have hurt. Our cheeks pressed together. Viv whispered, “Top secret . . . always wanted to kiss him.” I nodded solemnly like I shared the same secret desire of wanting to kiss Graham, when I already had kissed him, three years earlier, and never dreamed of repeating it. But no—it wasn’t the time to tell Viv about that kiss.

  One of the boys took up howling again. The other was on the rock dousing the fire. The eclipse had ended. The moon was white and watchful once more.

  Too late. It had missed everything.

  12

  Our bodies blasted through the orchard. I careened off course. Viv caught my arm. Then we were at the pool, midflight, loose cannonballs smacking the deep end. Messy, explosive splashes.

  I surfaced and shouted, a spray of water from my mouth, “Ina and Scott will hear.”

  Viv’s rivaling yell, “They’re in Santa Barbara.”

  “I knew that.” My words turned to bubbles underwater.

  Harry had gone inside in search of food. Graham was heavy-lidded watching us splash from the diving board.

  “When I have my first starring credit and I buy my McMansion, I’m going to have a pool with a lazy river and rapids,” Viv said breezily.

  I crawled up the deep end’s ladder and drew in a pool recliner with my toe.

  “Don’t crack your head open,” Graham called as I teetered above the cement before sliding onto the inflatable. I stuck my tongue out at him.

  “And I’m going to have a squad of hot pool boys that service my lazy river.” She paused to giggle into her hand. “And I’ll have one of those cabana poolside tiki bars. And you guys know I’ve always wanted a giant trampoline.”

  “A giant trampoline?” Graham said. “That’s not dreaming big, Vivy. You’ll need one of those skydiving simulation rooms if you ever want me to come visit and kiss you again.”

  “You’re making me lose my appetite,” Harry said on the deck, a plate of hot dogs in one hand and barbecue tongs in the other.

  “Tofu?” Viv asked. She was also on a pool inflatable, her favorite, in the shape of a unicorn, her head resting against the back of its head, its horn appearing to rise up from her crown. She had one thin wrist in the water, gently circling.

  “Yes, your majesty, the phony meat will be grilled to a char just the way you like it,” Harry said.

  We ate like that, chlorine-puckered fingers stuffing food into our mouths, stomachs cramped with giant bites. We found room for ice cream afterward.

  The newly full moon lowered. Graham had gone to the barn for sleeping bags but hadn’t returned. Viv fell asleep in a deck chair, snoring lightly in intervals. Harry and I treaded water.

  The pool lights were sunken midday suns. Harry floated in their glow. I’d noticed his boxers were see-through when wet twenty minutes earlier as he backflipped from the diving board. My chest was flushed and my eyes practically ached from not peeking again.

  “Are you weirded out that I’m a lawn gnome–fondling deviant?” he asked, brushing one of the inflatables away as it floated slowly and steadily at him.

  “I always suspected you had a seedy underbelly.”

  He paddled in a tight circle. My legs were tired and I let myself slip under before kicking up. When I paid attention again, Harry was closer. “I can’t get what Denton said about Goldilocks out of my head. He didn’t even try, did he?” Harry said.

  I shook my head. “No. She wasn’t worth investigating. To him.”

  “My mom started talking about it after my dad was attacked. Stuff like, ‘Look what they get away with in Seven Hills.’ ”

  “They?”

  He shook the hair from his eyes. “Guys, I guess. Rich ones, since this is Seven Hills.”

  “All that Rags and Riches crap—Amanda and Conner are worthless. You know that, right?”

  The grim line of his mouth softened. “I know you’re smart, Izzie. I know I’m going to miss hearing what you think after you move for college.”

  I flicked water his way. “We’re going to text every day.”

  “Shake on it?” He extended a hand. I took it. Two shakes and our joined hands sunk under the water. I had to let go to keep treading, otherwise I would have held on longer.

  I glanced over to Viv, pale and motionless. Something in the way she was positioned on the lounger brought me back to Goldilocks. The way she looked when I found her. An abrupt ache filled me. “I can’t get how Goldilocks was posed out of my head. Arms and T-shirt and rocks forming wings. Just like the birds the scientists dug up. Wings and birds and girls, they’re always here,” I said, tapping my forehead. “That was the point, huh? On Goldilocks’s walk from the tunnel to the gas station, she encountered the guy who killed her. He hit her with his car. Accidentally or on purpose. Finished her with his hands. Definitely on purpose. Then he needed to get rid of her. He thought fast. Settled on the creepy rock, mystery surrounding it. Put her there. Gave her wings. Made it look convincing. Mysterious. Connected to the weirdo rock. Confused people. Made it look like the farthest thing from what it really was.”

  “What was it?”

  “A plain old murder. Violent. Guy killing girl. It’s usually guys.”

  “No ritual murder?” Harry asked.

  “Probably not. He hit her with a car—that doesn’t say ritual. There’s never been anything else to suggest someone’s obsessed with the rock. But so what if the killer was inspired a little by it? Doesn’t change anything. Goldilocks is dead. Killed here. Killed by someone in Seven Hills.”

  “After my dad was attacked, I got nightmares,” Harry said. “Always the same. I’m walking through the rear hall at school, like he was. I see the shadows on the bleachers by the soccer field and the red butts of cigarettes in the dark, and I go over, like he did. But then I hear a girl’s voice. In the dream it’s Goldilocks. I run up to the bleachers, but she’s disappeared and these faceless guys kick me bloody on the ground like they did my dad.”

  I was silent, searching for a way to phrase what I wanted to without worsening Harry’s pain. “When we were talking about playing pranks on Seven Hills, you said the city deserves it. You were angry,” I said.

  “I am angry. Don’t I look it?” In a moment of lightness, he growled. His jaw sharpened and his brows slanted inward. “What if my dad had taken a hit to the head? What if the guys hadn’t stopped when they did? The district said it must have been teenagers from another high school on our campus to party. My dad interrupted. Why would kids from Lovett or Arcadia drive forty-five minutes to drink on our soccer field?”

  My fists were clenched under the water. “Who do you think it was?”

  Harry stared intently at me, then shook his head. “Maybe some older college kids home for Friday night? But I believe they’re f
rom here, just like the guy who hurt the girl. No one wants to look too hard because they don’t want to believe their neighbors or neighbors’ kids could be that messed up.”

  The wind swooped down on us and I shivered at its invisible force. Its timing set us on a doomed course—how many people can say that about the wind? It made me think of the Order, our very own invisible force. Our power. How we could wield it. “We’re not just four dorks having pizza-eating contests anymore,” I said. “We’re the Order of IV. We cut down Bedford. We can find who jumped your dad.”

  He blinked at me for a time, trying to work it out. “My parents want to move on. It would upset my dad if I did stuff to bring it up.”

  I chewed my bottom lip. “Goldilocks, then,” I said. “We can make the police investigate her death.”

  “How?”

  “New evidence they can’t ignore.”

  He raised a dubious eyebrow. “They ignored a dead body.”

  “It’ll be loud and in their faces. And we’ll keep doing it—whatever it is—until they start looking for who hurt her.”

  I waited as he blinked at me, something flickering in his eyes. “What?”

  “You.” He gave the side of his thumb a nibble. “I wish the others would let you talk more.”

  I didn’t shrink from the compliment; didn’t really take it as a compliment, actually. “I don’t need anyone to let me talk. If there’s something I want to say, I say it.”

  “But Graham and Viv are loud and you’re a good listener.”

  “You listen.”

  We were silent except for the water slapping the porous walls of the pool. I swam for the ladder and hung there. Harry paddled and hooked his elbows so we were side-by-side.

  I released one hand from the ladder and faced him. I was aware of every little drip of water needling his neck. I wanted to kiss them from his skin. A flicker of nerves in my chest. Yes, Viv had been right. At least about this. I noticed Graham and Viv, but I observed Harry in a different way. I wanted unfriendly things from him. I pictured sliding down the wall until our fronts met, wrapping my legs around his waist. Pressing. Whatever usually prevented these thoughts from rising to the surface had been undone by the absinthe. My hand moved from the ladder to the wall.