I laid my hand on the knob and turned it.
I'd like to point out something here. I have been in Doc's room. Many times, in fact, as he is always the stepbrother I go to when I have a homework problem I cannot solve, in spite of the fact that he is three grades behind me. And I have even been in Sleepy's room since he usually needs actual physical snaking in order to wake him up in the morning in time to drive us all to school.
But I had never, ever been in Dopey's room before. Truth be told, I had always hoped I might never have a reason to cross that particular threshold.
Now, however, I had a reason. I took a deep breath and went in.
It was dark. This was because of Dopey's decision to paint three of his walls purple and one white, Mission Academy wrestling team colors. He had chosen a purple so dark it was almost black. The darkness of those three walls was only alleviated by the occasional poster of Michael Jordan urging the viewer to Just Do It.
The floor of Dopey's room was a deep carpet of dirty socks and underwear. The odor was pungent – a mixture of sweat and baby powder. Not unpleasant, necessarily, but not an odor I'd particularly want permeating my wardrobe. Dopey, however, did not seem to mind.
"Well?" He was stretched out on his back on a padded bench. Above his chest hung a set of barbells. I would not have liked to hazard a guess as to how much weight he was lifting, but allow me to assure you, with enough reps, I was quite sure he'd have no trouble heaving Debbie Mancuso out the window in the event of a fire. Which is all a girl really needs out of a boyfriend, if you ask me.
"Dope – " I took another deep breath. What was with the baby powder? Wait. Don't tell me. I don't want to know. "Brad. Were you at that party in the Valley where Lila Meducci fell into the pool?"
Dopey had reached up and seized the barbell. Now he heaved it into the air, awarding me a glimpse of his excessively hairy armpits. I tried not to hurl at the sight of them.
"What are you talking about?" he grunted.
"Lila Meducci."
Dopey had lowered the barbell until it was just above his chest. His biceps had bunched up into melon-sized balls. Allow me to point out that normally, the sight of a male bicep that size would have caused my knees to go weak. But then, these biceps were Dopey's, so all I could do was swallow hard and hope the slices of pepperoni pizza I'd downed for dinner would stay where they were.
"Michael's little sister," I elaborated. "She nearly drowned at a party out in the Valley last month. I was wondering if it was the same party you mentioned you'd been to, the one where you'd run into Mark Pulsford."
Up went the barbells.
"Could have been," Dopey said. "I don't know. Why do you care?"
"Brad," I said. "It's important. I mean, if you were there, I think you would know. An ambulance must have shown up."
"I guess," he said between reps. "I mean, I was pretty wasted."
"You guess that a girl almost drowned in front of you?" I don't have much patience for Dopey under the best of circumstances. In this particular case, my tolerance for his stupidity had dipped to an all-time low.
Dopey let the barbell fall back into its stand with a clatter. Then he sat up and regarded me testily.
"Look," he said. "If I tell you I was there, what are you going to do? Go running to Mom and Dad, right? So why would I tell you? I mean, seriously, Suze. Why would I?"
Aside from my great surprise at hearing Dopey, too, mess up and call my mother Mom, I was prepared for the question.
"I won't tell," I said. "I swear I won't tell, Brad. Only I have to know."
He still looked suspicious. "Why? So you can tell that creepy albino friend of yours, and she can put it in the school paper? 'Brad Ackerman stood there like a schmo while a girl almost died.' Is that it?"
"I swear it isn't," I said.
He shrugged his heavy shoulders. "Fine," he said. "You know what? I don't even care. It's not like my life doesn't already suck. I mean, I haven't got a hope of getting down to one-sixty-eight before sectionals, and it's pretty clear now that your friend Gina likes Jake better 'n me." He eyed me. "Doesn't she?"
I shifted my weight uncomfortably. "I don't know," I said. "I think she likes both of you."
"Yeah," Dopey said sarcastically. "That's why she's in here right now with me instead of locked in with Jake, doing whatever."
"I'm sure they're just talking," I said.
"Right." Dopey shook his head. I was a bit stunned. I had never seen him looking so … human. Nor had I known he had goals. What was this 168 business? And did he really care that much about Gina that he would think his life sucked just because he didn't think she liked him back?
Weird. Really weird stuff.
"You want to know about that party in the Valley?" he asked. "I was there. All right? Are you happy now? I was there. Like I said, I was wasted. I didn't see her fall in. I only noticed her as somebody was pulling her out." Again, he shook his head. "That was really uncool, you know? I mean, she shouldn't have been there in the first place. Nobody invited her. If you can't hold your liquor, you got no business drinking, you know? But some of these girls, they'll do just about anything to get in with us."
I knit my eyebrows. "Us?"
He looked at me like I was stupid. "You know," he said. "The jocks. The popular people. Meducci's sister – I didn't know it was her until your mom said it the other night at the dinner table – she was one of those girls. Always hanging around, trying to get one of us guys from the team to ask her out. So she could be popular, too, see?"
I saw. Suddenly, I saw only too well.
Which was why I left Dopey's room then without another word. What was there to say? I knew what I had to do. I guess I had known it all along. I just hadn't wanted to admit it.
But now I knew. Like Michael Meducci, I thought I had no other choice.
And like Michael Meducci, I needed to be stopped. Only I didn't think so. Not then.
Just like Michael.
C H A P T E R
17
Gina was in my room when I came back from my visit to Dopey. Both Jesse and Spike, however, were gone. Which was actually fine by me.
"Hey," Gina said, looking up from the toenail she'd been painting. "Where have you been?"
I strode past her and started wriggling out of my school clothes. "Dopey's room," I said. "Look, cover for me, will you?" I stepped into a pair of jeans, then started lacing up my Timberland boots. "I'm going to be out for a while. Just tell them I'm in the bathtub. It would help if you let the water run. Tell them it's cramps again."
"They're going to start thinking you've got endometriosis, or something." Gina watched as I tugged a black turtleneck sweater over my head. "Where are you really going?"
"Out," I said. I pulled on the windbreaker I'd worn the other night to the beach. This time I tucked a hat into my pocket, along with the gloves.
"Oh, sure. Out." Gina shook her head, looking concerned. "Suze, are you all right?"
"Of course I am. Why?"
"You've got kind of … well, a crazy look in your eye."
"I'm fine," I said. "I figured it out, is all."
"Figured what out?" Gina put the cap on her nail polish and stood up. "Suze, what are you talking about?"
"What happened today." I climbed up onto the window seat. "With the brake line. Michael did it."
"Michael Meducci?" Gina looked at me as if I were nuts. "Suze, are you sure?"
"Sure as I'm standing here talking to you."
"But why? Why would he do that? I thought he was in love with you."
"With me, maybe," I said with a shrug as I pushed the window open wider. "But he's got a pretty big grudge against Brad."
"Brad? What did Brad ever do to Michael Meducci?"
"Stand around," I said, "and let his little sister die. Well, almost, anyway. I'm out of here, okay, Gina? I'll explain everything when I get back."
And then I slipped through the window, and climbed down to the porch roof. Outside, it was d
ark and cool and silent, except for the chirp of crickets and the far-off sound of the waves hitting the beach. Or was that the traffic down on the highway? I couldn't tell. After listening for a minute to make sure no one downstairs had heard me, I walked down the sloping roof to the gutter, where I squatted, ready to jump, knowing the pine needles below would cushion my landing.
"Suze!" A shadow blocked out the light streaming from the bay windows to my room.
I looked back over my shoulder. Gina was leaning out, looking anxiously after me.
"Shouldn't we – " She sounded, I noted in some distant part of my mind, frightened. "I mean, shouldn't we call the police? If this stuff about Michael is true – "
I stared at her as if she'd suggested I … well, jump off the Golden Gate Bridge.
"The police?" I echoed. "No way. This is between Michael and me."
"Suze – " Gina shook her head so that her springy curls bounced. "This is serious stuff. I mean, this guy is a murderer. I really think we need to call in the professionals here – "
"I am a professional," I said, offended. "I'm a mediator, remember?"
Gina did not look comforted by this piece of information.
"But … well, what are you going to do, Suze?"
I smiled at her reassuringly.
"Oh," I said. "That's easy. I'm going to show him what happens when somebody tries to kill someone I care about."
And then I leaped off of the roof into the darkness.
I couldn't bring myself to take the Land Rover. Oh, sure, I was perfectly willing to commit what pretty much amounted to murder, but drive without a license? No way! Instead, I hauled out one of the many ten speeds Andy had tucked away along the carport wall. A few seconds later, I was flying down the hill from our house, tears streaming from my eyes. Not because I was crying, or anything, but because the wind was so cold on my face as I sailed down into the Valley.
I called Michael from a pay phone outside the Safeway. An older woman – his mother, I suppose – answered. I asked if I could speak to Michael. She said, "Yes, of course," in that pleased way mothers use when their child gets his or her first call from a member of the opposite sex. And I would know. My mother uses that voice every time a boy calls me and she answers. You can't really blame her. It happens so rarely.
Mrs. Meducci must have tipped Michael off that it was a girl, since his voice sounded much deeper than usual when he said hello.
"Michael?" I said, just to be sure it was him and not his father.
"Suze?" he said in his normal voice. "Oh, my God, Suze, I'm so glad it's you. Did you get my message? I must have called about ten times. I followed the ambulance to the hospital, but they wouldn't let me into the emergency room to see you. Only if you were admitted, they said. Which you weren't, right?"
"Nope," I said. "Fit as a fiddle."
"Thank God. Oh, Suze, you don't have any idea how scared I was when I heard that crash and realized it was you – "
"Yeah," I said shortly. "It was scary. Listen, Michael, I'm in a jam of a different kind, and I was wondering if you could help me out."
Michael said, "You know I'd do anything for you, Suze."
Yeah. Like try to kill my stepbrothers and my best friend.
"I'm stranded," I said. "At the Safeway. It's kind of a long story. I was wondering if there was any possible way – "
"I'll be there," Michael said, "in three minutes." Then he hung up.
He was there in two. I'd barely had time to stash the bike between a couple of Dumpsters in the back of the store before I saw him pull up in his green rental sedan, peering into the brightly lit windows of the supermarket as if he expected to see me inside riding the stupid mechanical rocking horse, or whatever. I approached the car from the parking lot, then leaned over to tap on the passenger side window.
Michael whipped around, startled by the sound. When he saw it was me, his face – pastier than ever in the fluorescent lights – relaxed. He leaned over and opened the door.
"Hop in," he said cheerfully. "Boy, you don't know how glad I am to see you in one piece."
"Yeah?" I slid into the front passenger seat, then slammed the door closed after I'd tucked my feet in. "Well, me too. Happy to be in one piece, I mean. Ha ha."
"Ha ha." Michael's laugh, rather than being sarcastic, as mine had been, was nervous. Or at least I chose to think so.
"Well," he said as we sat there in front of the supermarket, the motor running. "You want me to take you, um, home?"
"No." I turned my head to look at him.
You might be wondering what I was thinking at a moment like that. I mean, what goes through a person's head when they know they're about to do something that could result in another person's death?
Well, I'll tell you. Not a whole heck of a lot. I was thinking that Michael's rental car smelled funny. I was wondering if the last person who had used it had spilled cologne in it, or something.
Then I realized the smell of cologne was coming from Michael himself. He had apparently splashed on a little Carolina Herrera For Men before coming to get me. How flattering.
"I have an idea," I said, as if I had only just then thought of it. "Let's go to the Point."
Michael's hands fell off the steering wheel. He hurried to right them, placing them at two and four o'clock, like the good driver he was.
"I beg your pardon?" he said.
"The Point." I thought maybe I wasn't being alluring enough, or something. So I reached over and laid a hand on his arm. He was wearing a suede jacket. Beneath my fingertips, the suede felt very soft, and beneath the suede, Michael's bicep was as hard and as round as Dopey's had looked.
"You know," I said. "For the view. It's a beautiful night."
Michael wasted no more time. He put the car in gear and began pulling out from the parking lot before I even had time to remove my hand.
"Great," he said. His voice was maybe a little uneven, so he cleared his throat, and said, with a little more dignity, "I mean, that sounds all right."
A few seconds later, we were cruising along the Pacific Coast Highway. It was only ten o'clock or so, but there weren't many other cars on the road. It was, after all, a weeknight. I wondered if Michael's mother, before he'd left the house, had told him to be home at a certain time. I wondered if, when he didn't come home by curfew, she'd worry. How long, I wondered, would she wait before calling the police? The hospital emergency rooms?
"So nobody," Michael said as he drove, "was really hurt, right? In the accident?"
"No," I replied. "No one was hurt."
"That's good," Michael said.
"Is it?" I pretended to be looking out the passenger side window. But really I was watching Michael's reflection.
"What do you mean?" he asked quickly.
I shrugged. "I don't know," I said. "It's just that … well, you know. Brad."
"Oh." He gave a little chuckle. There wasn't any real humor in it, though. "Yeah. Brad."
"I mean, I try to get along with him," I said. "But it's so hard. Because he can be such a jerk sometimes."
"I can imagine," Michael said. Pretty mildly, I thought.
I turned in my seat so that I was almost facing him.
"Like, you know what he said tonight?" I asked. Without waiting for a reply, I said, "He told me he was at that party. The one where your sister fell. You know. Into the pool."
I do not think it was my imagination that Michael's grip on the wheel tightened. "Really?"
"Yeah. You should have heard what he said about it, too."
Michael's face, in profile to mine, looked grim.
"What did he say?"
I toyed with the seatbelt I'd fastened around myself. "No," I said. "I shouldn't tell you."
"No, really," Michael said. "I'd like to know."
"It's so mean, though," I said.
"Tell me what he said." Michael's voice was very calm.
"Well," I said. "All right. He basically said – and he wasn't quite as succinct a
s this, because, as you know, he's pretty much incapable of forming complete sentences – but basically he said your sister got what she deserved because she shouldn't have been at that party in the first place. He said she hadn't been invited. Only popular people were supposed to be there. Can you believe that?"
Michael carefully passed a pickup truck. "Yes," he said quietly. "Actually, I can."
"I mean, popular people. He actually said that. Popular people." I shook my head. "And what defines popular? That's what I'd like to know. I mean, your sister was unpopular why? Because she wasn't a jock? She wasn't a cheerleader? She didn't have the right clothes? What?"
"All of those things," Michael said in the same quiet voice.
"As if any of that matters," I said. "As if being intelligent and compassionate and kind to others doesn't count for anything. No, all that matters is whether you're friends with the right people."
"Unfortunately," Michael said, "that oftentimes appears to be the case."
"Well," I said. "I think it's crap. I said so, too. To Brad. I was like, 'So all of you just stood there while this girl nearly died because no one invited her in the first place?' He denied it, of course. But you know it's true."
"Yes," Michael said. We were driving along Big Sur now, the road narrowing while, at the same time, growing darker. "I do, actually. If my sister had been … well, Kelly Prescott, for instance, someone would have pulled her out at once, rather than stand there laughing at her as she drowned."
It was hard to see his expression since there was no moon. The only light there was to see by was the glow from the console in the dashboard. Michael looked sickly in it, and not just because the light had a greenish tinge to it.
"Is that what happened?" I asked him. "Did people do that? Laugh at her while she was drowning?"
He nodded. "That's what one of the EMS guys told the police. Everybody thought she was faking it." He let out a humorless laugh. "My sister – that was all she wanted, you know? To be popular. To be like them. And they stood there. They all just stood there laughing while she drowned."
I said, "Well. I heard everyone was pretty drunk." Including your sister, I thought, but didn't say out loud.
The Mediator #3: Reunion Page 15
