by Lin, Harper
“Just for the holidays,” I replied.
“Maybe we can hang out, you know? I always thought that we could be friends? I mean, I see you in magazines, and I think we have similar style.”
“Oh?” I laughed awkwardly.
I really didn’t know who this woman was, and I quickly tried to figure out a way to get out of this. If she lived in this town, she might want to hang out all the time.
“Well I don’t know,” I joked. “You’ll have to pass my test. What’s your favorite TV show?”
“‘The Voice’!” she said. “I think you should be a judge on that show. You’re so much better than Shakira or Christina!”
“Oh, that’s not true. Those girls are super talented. I’ve met both of them and they’re very nice. So you’re from around here?”
“I live in Sanford actually, but I drive back home from work through this town and I absolutely love this cafe.”
She didn’t live in Hartfield. That was a relief to hear.
“What did you get?” I asked.
“The organic soy latte is seriously good. Have you tried it? What did you get?”
“I have. I love everything here, but my fave has got to be the chocolate latte. Have you tried it?
“No, but I will now that I know that Emma Wild likes it.”
This was a moment to exit. I reached for my cup on the counter and moved to the counter where all the lids were. She followed me with her drink and put a lid on her cup quickly. I hope she didn’t want to leave with me. Before I could give an excuse, she asked for an autograph.
“Sure.” I prayed that she wouldn’t ask for my number or to hang out again.
She began rummaging through her purse until she found a notepad and a pen. I put my cup on the counter to give her the autograph as she drank from her cup. When I gave the notepad back to her, I saw that her face had scrunched up.
“This drink tastes really weird. I think—“
She clutched her chest, yelping a little. Then she began to spasm. Her cup slipped from her fingers and her body fell after it.
“Oh my God!” I shrieked.
The crowd at the cafe circled around her.
“Call the ambulance,” Michelle called to Craig.
“Is she having a stroke?” a customer asked.
“Is there a doctor here?” I called out to the sea of faces.
A woman wearing pink scrubs under her winter coat stepped forward. “I’m not a doctor, but I am a nurse.”
I moved out of the way as she crouched down beside the fallen fan.
“Everybody clear out,” said Michelle. “Please give us some space.”
The customers began to go reluctantly.
“Please!” Michelle urged again. “The ambulance is coming and we need to make room.”
“I don’t feel a pulse,” the nurse said.
“The ambulance is coming,” said Craig. He stepped out from behind the counter, face beet red.
“What do you mean there’s no pulse?” I exclaimed to the nurse.
I looked down in horror at the girl who I’d just been chatting with. She’d looked so flushed and vibrant only moments earlier and now…
“She’s…?”
“Dead.” the nurse said.“I think she’s dead.”
A hush went through the crowd. Craig, Michelle and Kate all looked horrified.
I looked down again at the girl who had just claimed to be my biggest fan. She was now a corpse.
CHAPTER FIVE
I couldn’t understand what had happened. One minute she was alive and full of energy and the next minute she fell to the ground. It didn’t make any sense. I kneeled down and looked at her in that brown pool of hot liquid. Blonde hair covered her face and one of her arms was crossed over her stomach. She had mentioned something about the drink tasting strange before she fell…
“The ambulance is here.”
I looked up and saw Craig. His nervous red face loomed over me.
“Please leave,” he said.
I stood up and walked out the door, numbed by the whole incident. The chill of the winter cold numbed me further and I moved out of the way as the paramedics went in.
But what could they do if she was already dead?
The coffee shop crowd had more or less stayed put outside. I stood with them, watching and waiting.
“This is horrifying.” An old woman beside me remarked to her friend.
“Poor thing,” the other lady replied. “I hope she’s all right. Maybe she just fainted.”
All around me the townspeople talked amongst themselves. A couple of pedestrians stopped and asked what was going on. The two ladies tried to explain, but they ultimately said that they didn’t know.
“Miss?” the first lady turned to me. “Do you know what happened? Did she have a stroke?”
I couldn’t them that she was dead. “I don’t know the details.”
“I heard that you’re famous or something?” The second woman asked. “I’m sorry, I don’t recognize you, but the young lady did. Were you talking before she fell?”
“Well, yes, we were chatting when we were getting our drinks—“
Then it hit me. How could I miss this detail for so long? She had ordered a soy latte. The cup that she drank from and then spilled was dark brown. She had taken the wrong drink. Maybe she’d been allergic to dairy and that was why she requested soy. What if she had been seriously allergic to dairy?
I walked back to the scene to tell the paramedics. The police were also inside, and as I went in, I noticed Craig was talking to one of the two policemen and all of them turned to me.
“Miss?” said the cop with the scruffy bread. “I heard you were talking to the victim before she fell.”
“Yes,” I said. “Is she really dead?”
The taller cop nodded grimly. “Unfortunately she is. “We don’t know why but we’d like to know what took place between you two so we can find out more.”
I repeated what we talked about, embarrassed to mention that I was a celebrity, and that I was giving her an autograph before she fell.
“Oh, I think I recognize you,” said the tall cop. “You sang that song, ‘Cornflower Blues’.”
He looked at me with more interest.
“That’s me,” I said, and then quickly changed the subject. I told that victim had taken the wrong drink.
Her body was already removed from the floor, but the cup was still lying there. A name was written on the cup: Emma.
I looked around for my cup, which was still on the counter where I left it. It also said Emma.
“That woman—her name was also Emma?” I asked the cops.
“Yes. Emma Chobsky.”
I looked inside my drink and smelled it. Soy. It was the other Emma’s soy latte.
“Our drinks got mixed up,” I said. “She took my chocolate latte. Her drink was a soy latte. It could be that she had a severe allergy to dairy. I feel horrible.”
“Nothing’s confirmed yet,” said the first cop. “Don’t jump to any conclusions. It could’ve been a medical condition. These things happen. The coroner will do some tests and we’ll certainly tell them what you’ve told us.”
Mirabelle came in through the door, flushed from the cold.
“What in the name is going on?” she exclaimed. “Emma? What’s all this?”
Mirabelle sauntered over, clutching her pregnant belly. She was also a redhead and looked very much like me, except that she was a lot taller, with brown eyes instead of green.
I hugged her and explained everything.
“Wow,” she said. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” I said. In truth, I was a little shaken up.
“No you’re not,” Mirabelle said, looking deep into my eyes.
Tears welled up and I nodded. Mirabelle always saw right through me.
“It might’ve been my fault,” I blurted out. “It was my drink. There was something in that drink that made her ill, I’m sure of it. If it’s
not the dairy, then—”
“Then what?” asked Mirabelle.
“Poison,” I said. “Somebody was trying to poison me.”
CHAPTER SIX
“Poison?” said Mirabelle. “No Emma, come on.”
“I know I sound paranoid, but crazier things have happened.”
“Who would poison your drink in a busy cafe?”
“I don’t know.” I sighed.
Outside, the crowd was breaking apart as the ambulance drove away. The truck was in no hurry. She was dead after all.
“A lot of people hate me,” I said. “I’ve received more than a few death threats in the past.”
“Oh Emma, crazy people are always threatening celebrities. I’m surprised that you haven’t had to file a restraining order on a stalker yet. But this is small town Ontario.”
She was right. It was crazy for someone to do this in a busy cafe. If someone wanted me dead, wouldn’t there be a better way for them to do it? But I still couldn’t shake the idea away.
The cafe door opened and in stepped the ghost of misery’s past. A man in a black wool coat with the collars turned up walked my way. I haven’t seen him in nine years, but he looked the same. The same moody grey eyes, dark hair, and broad shoulders.
Sterling Matthews. My heart sped up and I turned red.
***
From age fourteen to seventeen, we were practically inseparable. We met each other in the first year of high school, since we shared many of the same classes. At first we were awkward toward each other, but once we started getting to know each other on various class assignments, we became fast friends. In groups, he never talked much, but when we were alone, that was when he shared the most.
I used to feel privileged that he would share everything with me. About his family, about how his father had left the family when he was five. How his mother was working her tails off as a single mother of five. Of how exhausted he was to be the man of the house, taking care of his two brother and two sisters when he wasn’t in school.
When he had the time to sneak away with me when we were older, I’d try to devour him with my eyes and with my passionate kisses. He was my life. My parents adored him and his mother adored me. We were so young, but if he had asked me to spend the rest of our lives together, I wouldn’t have hesitated.
The only problem was that he didn’t feel the same. A month before we were to graduate, he had acted more distant. When he saw me, gone were the excited smiles. I could read his body language, and it seemed as if he were always turning away from me.
At first I tried to ignore it, writing it off as the stress of the final exams and graduation, but July came. He worked in a grocery store and I was home most summer days, recording music on my computer. We were both waiting for fall to go to a university that was only a half an hour’s drive away.
I wasn’t thrilled about going to university, but Sterling planned to study Criminal Justice and I took English because the school didn’t have a music program. He’d tried to talk me out of going to his school before. I’d thought it was because he wanted me to study something I cared about, but it turned out that he just didn’t want me hanging around altogether.
At the end of July, I couldn’t take it anymore. I asked him to meet me down by the lake. I’d shown up first and watched the ducks float along the waters. He came and hugged me from behind, yet I sensed that something was wrong. He had hugged me as if he was hugging me for the last time.
“Can I ask you something?” I asked
“Sure.
“Do you still want to be with me?”
I watched his face carefully. A dark cloud passed over his eyes and they were impenetrable. His silence told me everything.
It was then that I knew that we were over.
Then he tried to explain.
“I don’t think you’d enjoy being at the same school,” he said.
“Bullshit. You just want to date other girls.”
Then he gulped. After a moment of silence, he took a deep breath and admitted it.
“You’re right. We’re too young to be tied down. It’s better if we experienced different things.”
“Or different girls you mean,” I said, standing up.
Sterling didn’t come after me. He pulled out a fistful of grass and played with the blades in his palms, letting the grass and the soil stain his hands.
“I think you should do what you really want to do, not what I want to do.”
He looked up at me and quickly turned away.
He had grown cold again, his shield against the world. I never thought he’d need it with me. I’d always been exposed to his soft side. But I’d been kicked out, and knowing Sterling, there was nothing I could do about it. He didn’t want me and he wouldn’t fight for me.
And I’d be damned if I stayed behind to waste my life in a small town and with a guy who didn’t even care about me. Even though I was crushed, I did realize how stupid I had been. I was all set on throwing my dreams away so that I could be with this guy. I didn’t want to study English. I didn’t want to go to University. I had just wanted to stay by his side. As difficult as it was to lose him, I threw myself into my other passion: music. So I moved to New York and kept busy.
Friends kept telling me that I’d get over him as soon as I met someone else, but every guy I dated, I had always compared to Sterling. When he used to look at me, it was as if I was the only person who existed to him. When he hugged me, I felt completely warm, secure and cared for. It was hard being sent back out into the cold after that.
Then I met Nick. That was when I started forgetting Sterling more and more.
***
Now Sterling stood in front of me. We stared at each other at a standstill, each waiting for the other to strike first. All those feelings of anguish and obsession came flooding back. The feelings had always been there, dormant; they never went away. Last I heard, he had gotten married and had two kids. That was what stung most of all. He had long moved on.
“Hi,” he said.
“Hi,” I said.
“Mirabelle.” he nodded to her.
Mirabelle smiled, but stepped back. Even she could sense the heat in this room.
“What are you doing here?” I asked.
“I’m a detective now.” He stepped in closer, under the light. Yes. He was as gorgeous as ever. A dark five o’clock shadow gave his face a more rugged look. When he grimaced, two dimples appeared at the sides of his mouth.
“Oh. You’d always wanted to be a detective. I guess you got what you wanted in the end.”
My voice came out sharp, even though I hadn’t intended it to be so. But I couldn’t put my pageant act on for Sterling. He’d know that it was fake.
“So how are you doing?” he asked.
“Fine. Everything’s great. Couldn’t be happier.”
“Having a good Christmas with your family then?”
“Yes. It’s fun. Except for this grisly death.”
Sterling looked at the spot where the body had been.
“Yes.” He frowned. “Not a pleasant homecoming, is it?”
“I’ve had better.”
“I’d like to ask you some questions.”
I crossed my arms. “I’ve said everything I needed to say to your colleagues, but now that you are here, I have something new to share.”
“What is it?”
I told him about my poison theory as Mirabelle sighed in exasperation beside me.
“How likely is it?” I asked.
“We’ll just have to see,” Sterling said. He didn’t say anything else. He didn’t say whether it made sense or if he thought I was crazy.
His vagueness made me angry all of a sudden.
“Then this conversation is over,” I said. “Mirabelle, I’ll see you at home.”
Without giving Sterling another glance, I stormed out.
CHAPTER SEVEN
After nine years, seeing Sterling still gave me anxiety. That guy still had a h
old on me. The whole day had been one dramatic incident after another, and I was spent.
When I reached my street, I was crying again. How embarrassing to run into Kendra just as I was trying to wipe the tears away. She was walking her son home.
