“Say it,” I insisted, stiffly wiping my tears.
Keira breathed a long inhale, then pressed her hands into a prayer position at her lips. Pain hung in the air between us. This was the last moment of my normal life, of our normal lives. I knew it, as surely as I knew it was Friday, March eighth.
“They’re…they’re dead,” Keira said.
And that was it.
The next evening, Keira moved out of the dorms and back into our brownstone. She planned their funeral. She bought our groceries. She fought with social services. And she cried herself to sleep.
Now it was my turn.
Now she needed me.
Keira was missing, and I had to find her.
Chapter Five
Time passed.
I yelled, I bargained, I pleaded—but no body was found. No attacker brought to justice. No one would listen.
Keira was gone. Simply gone.
DNA confirmed that the blood was hers and, given its significant volume, the case was ruled a “probable homicide,” as Dawkins predicted. The Globe carried the story for a couple of weeks, so did the local TV stations, but then the case got cold and a little girl was kidnapped in Southie, consuming the headlines. We were old news.
Even Charlotte stopped looking, and I thought her faith in her hacker powers was unrelenting. At twenty-four, she was a software engineer at one of the largest firms in Boston, who transformed into “ChartreuseWeb” every night. She was famous in underground cyber circles. Only, after weeks locked in her room, sifting through emails, bank records, phone calls, and hacked security footage, all she turned up was a low-res video from a local juice bar showing a white SUV leaving our street around the time Keira probably was taken. She didn’t even get the license plate.
That was when she gave up and planned a memorial.
It was held at BU’s Marsh Chapel. A poster-size photo of Keira’s face was mounted to cardboard and placed on an easel at the altar.
I wore a black dress. Charlotte never left my side. Neither did Randolph Urban, my parents’ former colleague and best friend. In fact, half of Dresden attended in a show of solidarity, including Marcus and his parents. Turned out his parents didn’t work for Boston General, but instead were high-ranking researchers for the Dresden Corporation who were simply utilizing the hospital’s facilities. They’d been with the company for a decade, meaning our parents probably knew one another, though I didn’t have the energy to ask, not even when I saw them at the post-memorial brunch that Urban hosted. It had been only three years since he’d hosted the same brunch for my dead mom and dad.
Only Keira wasn’t dead. I couldn’t shake the image of my sister out there, breathing, scared, captive, and alive. But even Charlotte dismissed my claims. She thought Keira was murdered, and, sure, she wanted to find her killer, but that wouldn’t bring Keira back. I was alone in hoping for that possibility. Actually, I was alone, period.
So I returned from the memorial and crawled into bed wearing my itchy bereavement outfit, picturing my sister’s photoshopped face on that poster. I shoved my guilt into my belly and tried to shut out how much I’d failed her.
I’d let this happen. I walked away from her door.
I walked away from her.
I pulled the covers over my head and breathed in the silence, the darkness.
I shut my eyes. I rejected the world, and I fell into the funk.
Chapter Six
One month later...
June
The trays of food came three times a day. My bedroom door opened and in came Charlotte with a well-balanced meal. Oatmeal. Turkey sandwich. Pizza. Oranges. Sometimes I ate it. Mostly I didn’t.
Instead, the trays served as a way to acknowledge the passing of time. It was hard to tell day from night anymore. My blinds were always shut. I stayed in bed.
The door opened again.
Spaghetti.
Keira and I ate spaghetti almost every night after our parents died. It was cheap, easy to make.
Keira…Keira…
I scrunched my eyes. I went back to sleep.
July
“Mom, I know you guys are her guardians, but I don’t know if moving her is a good idea. She won’t even leave the bed,” I heard Charlotte say through my closed bedroom door. She was standing in the hallway. They were talking about me. Again.
“That’s exactly why she needs to leave. You don’t know how to help her,” said Mrs. Conner. It sounded like she was dragging something.
“And you do? You don’t even know her.”
“That’s my point, and we’re legally responsible for her. What if she…hurts herself? That will be on us.”
I’d thought about a fistful of pills. Really, who would miss me?
Keira, I thought, every time. Keira would miss me. Maybe she is out there, maybe she needs me… My head hurt. I rolled over, pulling my covers over my eyes.
“Charlotte, I know you’re doing your best. But this is over your head.” It was her father’s voice, deep and authoritative. “The psychologists think she needs a stable influence. She needs to return to her routine.”
“And what routine is that? Her entire family’s dead!” Charlotte snapped.
“Don’t you think we know that? But we finally got the school to pass her from eleventh grade. She won’t even have to take her finals. Come September, she can start her senior year, and everything will be better.”
“Do you honestly think that’s possible?”
“Yes. And you’re moving in with us, too. You both need to get out of here. The memories…they’re horrible.”
More silence. Then my bedroom door creaked opened. I tugged down my bedsheet and saw Charlotte standing backlit in the doorway alongside her parents. They had stuffed suitcases, a steamer trunk. I could see my puffy silver down coat bundled under her father’s arm. They’d been touching my things.
“Anastasia, it’s time to get out of bed,” her father said sternly.
I didn’t move.
“We’re here to take you home,” her mother added, her bright red hair in a messy bun. She was holding a Sam Adams box full of my shoes. She’d taken them from the hall closet. I squinted my eyes. On top of the pile of sandals and boots sat Keira’s gray and pink work sneakers. They had no right to touch them. They belonged to her, in this house.
“Look, my parents think we should come home with them for a while.” Charlotte pleaded their case. “They’re your guardians now, and we don’t want the social workers to threaten foster care again.”
I continued staring at Keira’s sneakers. The hot pink laces were still double-knotted in bows. She never untied them, just wiggled her feet in.
“It’s time to get up,” Mr. Conner insisted, the wrinkles on his face setting deeper. “Let’s go.”
He flicked on the overhead light; the dusty bulbs stung my eyes as he reached for a black wool sweater on the back of my desk chair and tossed it into a liquor store box. Then he moved to my bookshelf, grabbing paperbacks at random and flinging them into the pile. He grabbed a white fuzzy teddy bear holding a heart-shaped pink pillow claiming, “I love you beary much.” He chucked it into the box. For an entire year, Keira and I gave each other only drugstore presents—partly because of financial necessity, and partly to be ironic. That was my Valentine’s Day gift from her. She’d placed it on my pillow along with a bag of conversation hearts, which she knew I hated but she loved. Now the bear sat on my shelf, smiling. It was mine.
I started screaming.
Like, screaming.
I’d never heard that sound come out of me before. It originated somewhere in the back of my throat, somewhere that burned.
Everyone froze, and I kept yelling. Then cursing. Then flailing.
I couldn’t leave my sister. Or my parents. Or this apartment. It was all I had left.
What if she comes back? What if she comes back? What if she comes back?
They left my room.
August
“An
astasia, talk to me!” Charlotte shouted, shifting the bed with her weight. “You can’t keep going like this!”
I swung my head toward her. I had been taking a nap. Her disturbance annoyed me.
“My parents are talking about group homes, hospitalization,” she squeaked. “You’ve got to snap out of this.”
The threat registered in my brain. I had been told I didn’t look healthy. I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to look, and I was too tired to care.
“Anastasia, there’s something I need to tell you.”
I closed my eyes. I wanted to sleep, and the light in the room was too bright. Charlotte had lifted the blinds.
“Look at me. Open your eyes.”
I struggled to push up my heavy eyelids, my vision blurred.
“I don’t know how you’re going to react. I could be making things worse. The shrinks told me that you can’t take much more. They’re worried you’ll shut down further.” Charlotte was rambling. It was hard to concentrate on the words. There were too many. “But I don’t see how you could get any worse. It’s been months, and you’re still a zombie.”
She shook my leg. I let her.
“Look at me.”
I tried to focus my eyes on hers.
“The cops found surveillance footage of Keira and the guy who took her, Craig. He was at the hospital.”
I blinked.
“Did you hear me? Someone called in an anonymous tip. They’re still trying to track down who, but it means somebody out there knows what happened to her.”
It was as if her voice suddenly pierced my brain, a pang of clarity.
“The cops never would have found the footage otherwise. Keira wasn’t even working at the time, and she was nowhere near her floor. She’s outside in the back near the ambulance dock, and I swear she’s with Craig.”
My eyes blinked rapidly as if a blindfold had been removed. I sat up, my muscles stiff.
Everything around me suddenly seemed shinier, louder.
“Anastasia, did you hear me?” Charlotte’s freckled face sparked to life.
I coughed, my throat raw from disuse. My covers were damp with sweat; I peeled them off, stretching my legs.
I got out of bed.
...
I ran a comb through my dark, wet hair, split ends brushing my back. My shampoo smelled pungent, citrusy. It hurt my nostrils.
“Can I come in?” Three taps sounded on my bedroom door. Charlotte opened it before I could answer.
“You look so much better.” The relief in her voice was as if she’d just finished a marathon; there was a distinct air of “thank God that’s over.” Only it wasn’t over. Part of me still wanted to curl up and go back to sleep, but I couldn’t do that anymore. So I tried to smile, hoping to ease her mind, but it actually hurt. Who knew cheek muscles could atrophy? I rubbed my jaw.
“I think we need to burn these sheets.” She looked at my bed, rumpled with unwashed, previously white linens, and pretended to gag. “Seriously. It’s ripe in here.”
She was right. When I returned from the shower, I detected a very strong odor coming from my room that I hadn’t been aware of before: BO, dirty laundry, and humidity. Her parents had begged me several times to let them clean the room, but I refused. It would have meant leaving the bed.
I turned to my closet and reached for a pair of jeans. I hadn’t worn much more than PJs lately, and I was surprised to see I owned ten pairs of jeans. I had no idea. I’d never seen them all clean and stacked up before. I yanked some skinny denim over my hips. They were much looser than I remembered. I must have lost weight.
“I’m ready.” I nodded, eying her nervous expression as she leaned against the doorjamb. She’d promised to take me to the police station, but she seemed to be already regretting the offer, like any contact with my sister’s case might send me spiraling back to my rumpled bed.
“You sure? Because we don’t have to go right away,” Charlotte insisted, tugging anxiously at her frizzy curls. “I plan on hacking into the police system and downloading the footage tonight anyway. So if you want to wait till tomorrow, we could just watch it here.”
“No. I gotta do this,” I said, marching past her at the door. “I need to see my sister, the sooner the better.”
Chapter Seven
Charlotte and I sat in a windowless room at the police station waiting for Detective Dawkins. My knee couldn’t stop bopping. I glanced at the giant mirror on the wall so reminiscent of TV crime dramas, I had to wonder if a team of detectives was sitting behind it, watching us as they drank stale coffee in environmentally unfriendly Styrofoam cups.
I needed to see my sister alive. It was the only thing squashing my grief.
I fidgeted in my metal chair, yanking at my T-shirt. I felt exposed being out of my bedroom, like I’d walked through the squad room naked with tragedy.
“You okay?” Charlotte asked again.
“I’m fine,” I muttered, already knowing how often I’d be repeating this sentiment. “You don’t have to keep asking.”
“Yeah, well, maybe someday I’ll describe exactly how bad you’ve looked these past two months. ’Cause you weren’t the only one grieving, you know,” she grumbled, aggravated, and I felt a pang of guilt. Charlotte was abandoned by both the Phoenix sisters, and forced to be the de facto head of a family that wasn’t even her family. I didn’t think “sorry” would suffice.
The door to the interrogation room swung open, and Detective Dawkins walked in carrying a large black laptop. She rested it on the metal table and pulled out the chair across from me, its legs squeaking on the linoleum like cardboard edges rubbing together. A shiver crept up my spine. She plopped down with a sigh, looking like she’d aged a lot in the weeks since I’d seen her last. There were squishy bags under her coffee-colored eyes, and her full lips looked dry, almost cracked.
“Anastasia,” she greeted. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”
I fought the urge to roll my eyes. Obviously, I didn’t feel better. Did she really think there was an alternate reality where a person could return home to a bloody tub from a slasher film and then “feel better” in a few weeks. But I nodded in response.
“Charlotte, you were right. You got through to her.”
Charlotte stared at her hands, at least having the good sense to realize it was bad form to discuss me right in front of me.
I pointed to the laptop, ready to move on. “You want me to watch the footage? You think I can help?”
“Well, help might be too strong a word. We just want you to tell us if you see anything odd. You knew her best, you might notice something we don’t.” Dawkins flipped open the laptop’s oversized screen and moved her finger across the black mouse pad, cueing some software.
Charlotte looked like a Saint Bernard eyeing a steak. “That’s an impressive system.”
“Well, after the marathon bombings, our analysts got an upgrade to the forensic video equipment.” Her tone was matter-of-fact, but I could tell by the light in her eyes that she was thrilled with her toy.
To me, it looked like we were watching the video on split screen, only we weren’t using the second screen. I was guessing it was for enlarging images or doing some sort of manipulation, but I didn’t ask. Bordering the window that held the black and white footage were multiple boxes showing squiggly lines, folders, and scales with adjusting levels. It reminded me of the software music producers use, only as soon as she pressed play, I realized I was wrong.
There was no audio.
“Just tell me if you see anything,” she instructed again.
Keira walked out, and breath instantly expelled from my lungs. Tears flooded my eyes. It was an involuntary response. There was my sister. Alive. Healthy. No blood.
She turned toward the camera, whipping her long platinum hair behind her bony shoulder. It was tied in a loose ponytail at the base of her neck, strands falling into her face. She was wearing light-colored scrubs, probably peach, and those familiar pink sneake
rs Charlotte’s parents tried to confiscate. There were small silver hoops in her ears, and her forehead was shiny. A few moments later, a man stepped out behind her. He wasn’t facing the camera, but it didn’t matter. I would have recognized him in a pitch-black pit—long, greasy blond hair, tall posture, and a too-wide wrinkled T-shirt covering the thick muscles that moved beneath it.
My face burned as I sat back in my chair, my still-damp hair clinging to my cheeks. I held my breath. It was him. Craig.
I scrunched my eyes tight as I pictured him dead and beaten. I pictured his body in a tub full of blood. I pictured my knuckles raw from hitting him again and again. My fingers formed fists in my lap.
“It’s okay,” Charlotte whispered.
But we both knew it wasn’t.
I looked back at the footage, and Craig reached for my sister. He held her hand. And for a few moments, they just stared at each other, arms dangling, fingers entwined, looking comfortable, familiar.
They really had been dating.
I’d always suspected that he was the guy she had been asking about earlier and the reason for her “double shifts.” But even so, she didn’t introduce him to me at the party, and especially not as her boyfriend, not as anything more serious than a hookup. Why would he visit her at work?
I watched as Keira let go of his palm and started talking rapidly, her eyes wide and her lips flying. We couldn’t hear what she was saying, but she looked upset. No, she looked worried. Like she did before we got our parents’ “life insurance,” when she wasn’t sure her paycheck would keep the lights on.
Craig’s large hand reached out once more, rubbing her shoulder, stroking her face. He looked almost tender, and she leaned in to his embrace.
White fire zipped through me. I wanted to strangle him. Then her.
My teeth ground together, and for the first time I realized how angry I was at my sister for letting him into our lives, our home. Because as much as I hated myself for not opening the bedroom door that morning, part of me also hated her for letting him behind that door in the first place. She let him do this to us, and now, who knew what he was doing to her. All because her grief had morphed into an unfathomable case of poor taste in men.
Proof of Lies (Anastasia Phoenix) Page 5
