Hanging by a Thread

by Sophie Littlefield

  She dug into a drawer and came up with a dish towel, gingerly carrying it over to the table. Then she looked at me and wiped her hands on her pants. They were a nice pair of linen cargo pants, but they hung on her; I guessed she hadn’t always been as reed-thin as she was now. She left a smear of tomato sauce on the fabric but didn’t seem to notice. “Do you want one? I have lasagna and sesame chicken—lasagna was Amanda’s favorite.”

  “No thank you, Mrs. Stavros. I mean … Heaven.”

  “Do you want something to drink? A soda? Tea?”

  I was thirsty from the ride but I didn’t want to ask her for anything. In the fluorescent light of the kitchen fixture, she looked almost sick, the smudges under her eyes taking on a purple shade, her cheeks hollowed and her shoulders hunched. She looked more than thin—she looked beaten. But she stared at me intensely, her eyes bright and unblinking as we sat across from each other. Folding her hands on her lap, the meal forgotten, she leaned forward. Her intense gaze made me uncomfortable and I snuck a look around. The kitchen looked clean at first, but then I noticed the overflowing garbage bag leaning against the cabinets. Maybe a friend or a relative brought groceries and did a little cleaning, but Mrs. Stavros had forgotten to put the groceries away. By the look of whatever was melting, it had been a while.

  I could see into the family room next to the kitchen. It was a much different story in there. The drapes were closed, and the television—a large flat-screen taking up most of the wall over a stone fireplace—was on, the sound muted. A nest of blankets and pillows lay on the couch and I wondered if Mrs. Stavros had been sleeping there. All around were empty plates and boxes of Kleenex, magazines and clothes abandoned on the floor.

  I felt really sad, seeing what her life was like. Still missing her daughter. Nearly a year of not knowing where Amanda was or what had happened to her.

  “Mrs. Stavros … I think I might have something that belonged to your daughter.”

  “You do?” She blinked, looking both curious and confused. That was when I spotted the vodka jug on the counter, one of the big ones like the boys occasionally brought to the beach. The liquid level was only a few inches and I wondered how much of it she’d had today.

  I pulled the plastic bag out of my backpack. Inside, the jacket was tightly wadded; you could barely tell what it was.

  I handed the bag to Mrs. Stavros, not wanting to touch the jacket. “I think this might have been hers.”

  She set the bag on the table. Then she let out a cry, yanking it savagely against her face, pressing the plastic to her cheeks.

  “No,” she sobbed in a cracked voice.

  I suddenly felt like I’d made a terrible mistake. I hadn’t come here to torture her. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I can go, if—”

  “This was Mandy’s. Where did you get it? Where?” Mrs. Stavros laid the jacket carefully out on the table, smoothing down the wrinkled fabric, touching the buttons and tracing the lines of stitching with her fingertips.

  “I … found it. A woman was selling things. Out by the power plant, where they have the flea market on the weekends. She had a table.…”

  But Mrs. Stavros wasn’t listening. She was making a sound deep in her throat, a kind of low moan. “I remember when we bought this,” she said in a voice barely above a whisper.

  “You’re sure it’s hers, then?”

  “Oh, yes. It was a limited-edition piece, they made less than a hundred. We were up in the city last summer … Mandy’s dad had gone back to Greece, so I took her for a little trip to celebrate the end of the school year. Just us girls, a shopping spree. There’s a Ripley Couture boutique on Stockton, by Union Square.…”

  I knew where she was talking about—the most expensive shopping district in the city.

  “Mrs. Stavros,” I said, deciding to take a chance. “Did anything else that belonged to Amanda disappear around that time? Maybe a necklace, a charm on a gold chain?”

  She looked at me in confusion. “Yes, but—how would you know about that? It was her favorite, the one she got when she joined Gold Key. She loved that necklace. The only time she took it off was for cheer, because they weren’t allowed to have jewelry during performances. Did you find that, too?”

  “No, I’m sorry.”

  Rachel had stolen Amanda’s Gold Key necklace after being refused membership.

  Then Amanda disappeared. And Rachel was accepted into the club. The one she was now running for president of. The one her mother was obsessed with. The one whose exclusion had made her feel like a failure.

  I remembered the emotions I had felt during the vision—the humiliation mixed with rage. That couldn’t have been enough, though, could it? Enough to hurt Amanda? Enough to kill her? Just to take her place in the club?

  “Oh, well, then. I remember everything about that day in the city. We bought a few things, got our nails done, had tea at the Westin,” Mrs. Stavros murmured. “We had such a wonderful time.”

  Two thin tears trickled out of the corners of her eyes, making their way down her pale cheeks and splashing down onto her lap without her seeming to notice. She’d forgotten the necklace already, but I wanted to kick myself for adding to her pain.

  “You say you got this at the flea market?” she said, tapping the jacket. Her eyes were so pale they were nearly colorless. “How did it get there?”

  “I don’t know. I was hoping, I thought maybe you could tell me. Do you think she was wearing it, um …” I couldn’t bring myself to say “on the night she disappeared.”

  “Everyone makes mistakes,” she blurted out. “Mandy never wanted to … One time, she stepped on a snail, out in the garden, and she cried. Over a snail. Her dad, he didn’t understand her. She always wanted a pet, but George wouldn’t hear of it. Just a kitten, I said, something of her very own. Because she didn’t have any sisters or brothers. I always hoped …”

  She was fading back into her memories, making less and less sense. Alcohol and grief had taken away her ability to reason.

  “Did she call you? The night she … When she was out, did you hear from her at all?”

  “She called that boy, Jack Dimaunahan. The police told me that. She’d had lunch with him that day.”

  “What about earlier? Do you know what she did between lunch and when she went out again that night?”

  “She came home. She was in her room all afternoon. She took a shower around dinnertime. I know because she left her towel on the floor. I could never get her to remember to hang it back up.” She flashed a brief, sad smile at the memory. “She wanted to go see Jack, but her dad and I didn’t like for her to date during the week, even in the summer. I was strict that way. So she called some girlfriend. They were going to get lattes. We went to bed after she left.”

  “Who did she call?”

  For a moment, Mrs. Stavros’s eyes seemed to focus, and she frowned. “Why are you asking me all this?”

  “I, uh …” I thought fast. “It’s just that after I found her jacket, some of the kids were talking about Amanda. How much everyone misses her. It seems like she was really special.”

  I felt guilty, playing on Mrs. Stavros’s grief this way, but it was the only thing I could think of to keep her talking.

  “She was,” Mrs. Stavros said softly. “So special. My little girl.”

  “So she called someone that night. Do you remember who it was?”

  “I wish I knew. I heard voices in the foyer—I thought maybe one of her friends in the neighborhood had stopped by, or someone could have gotten dropped off, or walked from down the hill.”

  “Did the police try to find out who she was with?”

  “Of course. They did all kinds of interviews, but they could never find anyone who said they’d been to our house that night. That’s one of the reasons they suspected she was on her way to meet Jack. They suggested we had imagined the voices.” She sighed. “And maybe we did. It’s been so long, so many times I’ve gone over that night in my mind. But you know, I never thought
it was that boy. He was a child. They both were.”

  I thought of Rachel again. Lately I didn’t know if anyone would think she was a child. It wasn’t just the drinking and the recklessness—it was like something had changed in her eyes, like they were emptier.

  Rachel had changed. But it had happened before I ever came back to Winston. She’d just been hiding it for the last few weeks. All the time we had spent laughing and talking together, creating a business and hanging out with our friends, there was something else underneath the surface, something that was eating away at her.

  Maybe, if I was a better friend, I would have recognized it right away—that the fun-loving, generous girl I’d always known was in trouble.

  And maybe, just maybe, she had never been that girl at all.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  “HOW ARE YOU?” I ASKED, PRESSING the phone against my ear and trying to sound solicitous. I’d left Mrs. Stavros sitting in her kitchen, sipping at the straight vodka she poured into a juice glass as I was saying good-bye. I had biked to the little park by the elementary school and parked under a shady tree before I called Rachel.

  “Not great,” she said in a strained voice. “I feel like I could sleep for a week. And I probably should, but we’re leaving for Monterey tomorrow night, and Dad’s yelling at everyone to get packed.”

  “Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.” Rachel’s parents didn’t want to stay in town for the Fourth; they didn’t like being around when the town was overrun with tourists. Going to Monterey didn’t seem like much of a solution, since it was bound to be just as crazy up there, but that was what they’d decided to do. According to Rachel, her mom had made the reservations ages ago. “It’s no wonder you’re tired. You’ve been partying for two days straight.”

  “Yeah. Look. I already feel like shit. If you just called to judge me—”

  “No, no, I’m sorry.” I took a deep breath. “I’m worried about you, that’s all. You haven’t been acting like yourself.”

  Rachel was silent for a moment and then she mumbled, “I know,” so softly I almost didn’t hear her.

  “Listen,” I said. “I saw Mrs. Stavros. She says—”

  “Where did you see her? She never comes out of her house anymore.”

  “She says Amanda went out for lattes the night she disappeared. With a girlfriend. Look, can I come over? I really have to talk to you.”

  This time the pause was even longer. I was sweating more than I had on the uphill trip.

  “All right,” Rachel finally said. “But Adrienne’s got piano this afternoon so it’ll have to be quick.”

  When she met me at the door, she seemed to be feeling better.

  “Okay, look,” she said, when we were in her room with the door shut. “Amanda used to use me as an excuse. Whenever she wanted to see Jack, she’d say she was with me. I’d walk over to her house, and then she’d drop me off at home and go do whatever she wanted.”

  Clearly my best friend knew a lot more than she had told me. “You said you didn’t know Amanda very well. Remember? You said you hardly ever talked to her.”

  “Well, we were on cheer together. So yeah, we talked. But, you know, we didn’t talk talk. Just after practice and whatever.”

  I thought of mentioning the necklace, but I was afraid Rachel would shut me down if I pushed her too far. I tried to think of a way to guide the conversation. “Were you … jealous of her?”

  Rachel raised her eyebrows. “Jealous? Why, because of Jack?” She laughed derisively. “Please. What’s with this weird fixation of yours, anyway?”

  “Well, the other day you said you thought you were next. That you were afraid you were going to be killed. So, you know, I care about whether you live long enough to start junior year with me.”

  Rachel blushed. “Forget about that, okay? I was drunk. I was just … messing around.”

  “I don’t know, you seemed pretty scared to me for real. Look, Rachel, it’s me you’re talking to. If you’re in trouble, if something’s going on, you can tell me, okay?”

  “I asked you to drop it.” Twin spots of color appeared on her cheeks as she bit her lip, staring at the floor. Whatever was going on, it had her shaken up.

  “But it also turns out you knew Amanda a lot better than you said you did. Things aren’t adding up, Rachel.”

  She looked up, her eyes boring into mine, sparking with anger … and fear. “Okay, and you’ve been keeping things from me, too. What the hell is that about?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “With Jack? Lara said she saw you in his truck, over at the flea market. What were you doing there? With him?”

  I sighed. “I like him, okay? I’m sorry I haven’t kept you posted on every little thing I do, but it has nothing to do with any of this.” Which wasn’t a lie. I hoped.

  “But I keep telling you he’s trouble. He’s dangerous, Clare. You know those convenience store robberies last winter?”

  “No, because I wasn’t here. I was living in San Francisco, remember?”

  “I’m just saying, they never caught the guy who was doing it. It could have been Jack—it was right after he did all that other stuff. He had a gun, Clare.”

  I laughed, because she was getting into ridiculous territory. “Someone had a gun, maybe. Not Jack.”

  “He’s nothing but trash.”

  Her words stung. I thought about how Winston was divided into haves and have-nots—maybe I could slum it with the rich kids, but there was no confusion as to which side Jack was on. “Well, you’re a snob,” I said. “And a liar, and a thief, so I wouldn’t be talking.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Nothing,” I said, avoiding her eyes. If I told her I knew about the necklace, I’d have to tell her about the visions, too. “Forget I said it.”

  “You know what, maybe you should go,” Rachel said, getting to her feet. “Maybe you ought to spend a little time figuring out who your real friends are.”

  I walked by myself to the front door of her house, my footsteps echoing on expensive marble floors. I’d never felt quite so alone.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  THERE WAS ONE PERSON IN WINSTON who I could count on to be honest with me, someone who hadn’t lied to me yet. Someone I’d been taking for granted for far too long.

  After I left Rachel’s house, I pedaled my bike back across town and up Grover Hill, where the widow’s walk on top of my grandmother’s house rose high above all the other roofs in the neighborhood, a wooden structure with the ocean laid out below like a brilliant blue carpet dotted with fluttering white sails.

  When we lived in the city, Mom would get irritable for days before one of Nana’s rare visits. She’d polish the silver and get the good china out, then disappear into the kitchen so she wouldn’t have to make conversation when Nana arrived.

  I couldn’t say that things were ever exactly good between Mom and Nana as far back as I could remember, but they used to be tolerable. When I was little, Mom used to drop me off at Nana’s house a couple of days a week, and we would spend the day playing together. It never seemed strange to me at the time, but now I realized that not every grandmother would be willing to get down on the floor and play with Play-Doh and blocks and dolls and Barbie castles, Playmobil pirate ships and dress-up clothes and toy kitchens. But Nana acted just like a kid herself, pretending to make grilled cheese sandwiches and serving them to stuffed animals, or tying gauzy scarves around herself so that she too could be a superhero and run around the backyard with me “rescuing” her spotted mutt, Peaches.

  But best of all was “make-stuff time”—Nana’s term for it—when we went into the creative room, which was another one of her peculiar names for things, sat on the floor, and did crafts. My favorite was sewing. As soon as I got old enough to hold a needle and use sharp sewing scissors, I was making projects—an uneven pillow stuffed with shredded foam, a potholder made from layers of old quilts stitched together, a doll dress created from the sleev
e of a blouse with holes cut out for arms. Nana always complimented my creations and put them into service. The leftover bits were pinned to the curtains in the creative room, until there were dozens of lumpy, odd little fabric treasures all the way to the floor.

  I remembered those curtains when I hung my wares from the sides of the NewToYou stand. It was like being back with Nana on a lazy afternoon, without a care in the world.

  Now, as I got off my bike and pushed, rather than struggle to ride up the last steep section of road, I thought about the last time Mom and I went to Nana’s house, to say good-bye before moving to the city all those years ago. A big box waited by the door. Inside was Nana’s sewing machine, the wonderful old Bernina, though I didn’t know it at the time. But Mom must have known, because she tried to leave it.

  “Well, I’ll let you know when I get the new phone number,” Mom had said, after an awkward good-bye.

  Nana had nodded matter-of-factly, finally accepting that she’d failed to talk Mom out of moving. Whatever the nature of their huge fight—and Mom always refused to tell me, saying it was “private”—Nana must have known she would make things worse by continuing to beg Mom to change her mind.

  She could not, however, resist pulling Mom into one of her bone-crushing hugs. I remember my mom didn’t hug back, which I thought was weird. Her hands, one of them tightly holding her car keys, hung at her sides as she squeezed her eyes shut, grimacing until Nana finally let go.

  “This is for Clare,” Nana had said, picking up the box, which was obviously heavy. “I’ll just take it out to the car for you.”

  “Mom, what on earth is that? I don’t have room—”

  “Now, now, you can put it in a closet until she’s older,” Nana interrupted. “It’s just a few things she likes. It’ll keep her busy so you can get settled in.”

  That had gotten Mom’s attention. I saw her hesitate, her eyes narrowed, considering. “Well … What’s in there? I definitely don’t need any more junk.”