by Riley Sager
Lying with my head on Jeff’s shoulder, I can hear the quickening of his heart. It’s clear he really wants me to go. I do too. I’d love to replace this city with another, just for a few days. Long enough to forget about what I’ve done.
But I can’t. Not with Sam still around. By leading me to the spot where I attacked Rocky Ruiz, Sam made it abundantly clear that she’s doing me a favor by keeping quiet. One wrong move on my part could upset the careful balance of our lives. Sam now has the power to destroy us.
“What about Sam?” I say. “We can’t just leave her here alone.”
“She’s not a dog, Quinn. She can take care of herself for a couple of days.”
“I’d feel bad. Besides, it’s not as if she’s going to be staying here much longer.”
“It’s not about that,” Jeff says. “I’m worried about you, Quinn. Something’s not right. You’ve been acting strange ever since she got here.”
I start to slide away from him. It had been such a good night until he started talking.
“I’ve had a lot to deal with.”
“And I know that. It’s a crazy, stressful time for you. But I just feel like there’s something else going on. Something you’re not telling me.”
I lie on my back and close my eyes. “I’m fine.”
“And you swear you’d tell me if you weren’t?”
“Yes. Now, please stop asking me that.”
“I just want to make sure you’ll be okay when I’m gone,” Jeff says.
“Of course I will. I have Sam.”
Jeff rolls away from me. “That’s what worries me.”
• • •
I wait an hour for sleep to arrive, flat on my back, breathing evenly, telling myself that at any moment I’ll sink into slumber. But my thoughts are an unruly bunch, always on the move, in no hurry to settle down. I picture them as part of the dream sequence from Vertigo—bright spirals that are forever spinning. Each one has its own color. Red for thoughts about Lisa’s murder. Green for Jeff and his concern. Blue for Jonah Thompson’s assurance that Sam is lying to me.
Sam’s spiral is black, barely visible as it rotates through the sleepless gloom of my brain.
When one a.m. comes and goes, I get out of bed and pad down the hallway. The door to the guest room is closed. No light peeks out from under it. Maybe Sam has returned. Maybe she hasn’t. Even her presence has become uncertain.
In the kitchen, I fire up my laptop. Since I’m awake, I might as well do some much-needed work on the website. Yet instead of Quincy’s Sweets, my fingers lead me to my email. Dozens of new messages from reporters have poured into my inbox, some from as far away as France, England, even Greece. I scroll past them, their addresses a monotonous blur, stopping only when I spot an address not from a reporter.
Lmilner75
I open the email, even though I’ve committed its contents to memory. Neon pink, if I were to use the Vertigo thought-color scale.
Quincy, I need to talk to you. It’s extremely important. Please, please don’t ignore this.
“What happened to you, Lisa?” I whisper. “What was so important?”
I open a new browser window, heading straight to Google. I type in Sam’s name and am greeted with the predictable jumble of items about the Nightlight Inn, Lisa’s death, and the Final Girls. Despite a smattering of articles about Sam’s disappearance, I see nothing that hints at where she might have been.
Next, I search for Tina Stone, which yields an avalanche of information about the many, many women who bear that name. There are Facebook profiles and obituaries and LinkedIn updates. Finding anything about a specific Tina Stone seems impossible. It makes me wonder if Sam understood this when she chose the name. That she, like I’m doing now, saw the pool of Tina Stones in the world and decided to dive in, knowing she wouldn’t resurface.
I click away from Google, going back to Lisa’s email.
Quincy, I need to talk to you. It’s extremely important. Please, please don’t ignore this.
As I read it, Jonah Thompson’s words seem to sneak into the text, transforming it into something else.
It’s about Samantha Boyd. She’s lying to you.
I’m about to do another Google search when I hear something behind me. It’s a muted cough. Or maybe the slightest creak of the floor. Then suddenly someone is there, right at my back. I slam the laptop shut and spin around to see Sam, silent and still in the dark kitchen. Her arms are at her sides. Her face is an inscrutable blank.
“You startled me,” I say. “When did you get home?”
Sam shrugs.
“How long have you been there?”
Another shrug. She could have been there the entire time or merely for a second. I’ll never know.
“Can’t sleep?”
“No,” Sam says. “You?”
I shrug. Two can play this game.
The corners of Sam’s lips twitch slightly, resisting a smile. “I’ve got something that might help.”
Five minutes later, I’m sitting on Sam’s bed, Wild Turkey in my lap, trying to keep my hands from shaking as Sam paints my fingernails. The polish is black and shiny—a miniature oil slick atop each finger. It pairs well with the scabs on my knuckles, now the same shade as rust.
“This color looks good on you,” Sam says. “Mysterious.”
“What’s it called?”
“Black Death. I picked it up at Bloomingdale’s.”
I nod in understanding. She used the five-finger discount.
Several minutes pass in which we say nothing. Then Sam, out of nowhere, says, “We’re friends, right?”
It’s another of her nesting-doll questions. To answer one is to answer them all.
“Of course,” I say.
“Good,” she says. “That’s good, Quinn. I mean, imagine what it would be like if we weren’t.”
I try to read the expression on her face. It’s a blank. A void.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I know so much about you now,” she says quietly. “The things you’re capable of. The things you’ve actually done. If we weren’t friends, there’s so much I could use against you.”
My hands tense within hers. I fight the urge to pull them away and run from the room, fingernails half-painted and streaked with black. Instead, I gaze at her sweetly, hoping she’ll think it’s sincere.
“That’ll never happen,” I say. “We’re friends for life.”
“Good,” Sam replies. “I’m glad.”
Once again, the room plunges into silence. It stays that way for another five minutes. That’s when Sam stuffs her black-polished brush back into its bottle, smiles tightly, and says, “You’re finished.”
I leave the room before my nails are completely dry, forced to turn the doorknob awkwardly with my palms. I blow on my hands in the hallway, waiting for the polish to become a glistening shell. Then I head to the master bedroom and take a quick look at Jeff, making sure he’s sound asleep before I slip inside the bathroom.
I don’t bother turning on the light. It’s better without it. I lie on the floor, my spine flat, shoulder blades cold against the tile. Then I dial the phone, Coop’s number permanently fixed in my memory.
It takes several rings for him to answer. When he does, his voice is husky with sleep.
“Quincy?”
Just hearing him makes me feel better.
“Coop,” I say. “I think I’m in trouble.”
“What kind of trouble?”
“I think I’ve gotten myself into something I can’t get out of.”
I hear the faint rustle of sheets as Coop sits up in bed. It crosses my mind that he might not be alone. It’s likely he has someone sleeping next to him most nights and I just don’t know it.
“You’re worrying me,” he says. “Tell me what’s going o
n.”
But I can’t. That’s the most twisted part about all this. I can’t tell Coop my suspicions about Sam without also mentioning the terrible thing I’ve done. They’re intertwined, one inseparable from the other.
“That’s not a good idea,” I say.
“Do you need me to drive out there?”
“No. I just wanted to hear your voice. And to see if you had any advice for me.”
Coop clears his throat. “It’s hard to give advice when I don’t know what’s going on.”
“Please,” I say.
There’s a moment of silence on Coop’s end. I picture him sliding out of bed and slipping into his uniform, getting ready to come here and help whether I want him to or not. Eventually, he says, “All I can tell you is that if you’re in a bad situation, the best thing to do is try to deal with it head-on.”
“What if I can’t?”
“Quincy, you’re stronger than you think.”
“I’m not,” I say.
“You’re a miracle and you don’t even know it,” Coop says. “Most girls in your situation would have died that night at Pine Cottage. But not you.”
My mind flashes back to that scary and tantalizing memory I had in the park. Him. Crouched on the floor of Pine Cottage. Why did that image, of all things, return to me?
“Only because you saved me,” I say.
“No,” Coop tells me. “You were already in the process of saving yourself. So no matter what you’ve gotten yourself into, I know you have the power to get yourself out of it.”
I nod, even though I know he can’t see it. I do it because I think it would make him happy if he could.
“Thank you,” I say. “I’m sorry I woke you.”
“Never feel sorry for reaching out to me,” Coop says. “It’s what I’m here for.”
I know that. And I’m grateful beyond words.
I stay where I am once Coop hangs up, the phone still in my grip. I stare at it, squinting at the glow, watching the clock at the top of the screen tick off one minute, then another. After eleven more minutes come and go, I know what I need to do, even though the very idea makes me sick to my stomach.
So I search my phone for one of the texts Jonah Thompson sent me. I text back, my fingers fighting every tap.
ready to talk. bryant park. 11:30 sharp
24.
Late morning.
Bryant Park.
A lull before the impending lunchtime crowds. A few office workers have already started to trickle in from adjacent buildings, sneaking away from their cubicles early. I watch them from my seat in the shadow of the New York Public Library, jealous of their camaraderie, their carefree lives.
It’s a clear morning, although still on the chilly side. The leaves that canopy the walkways have turned a dusty gold. Surrounding the trees are patches of ivy already girding for winter.
I spot Jonah on the other side of the park—a head of shining hair bouncing through the crowd. He’s dressed as if arriving for a first date. Checked shirt. Sport coat with pocket square. Burgundy chinos with rolled cuffs. No socks despite the fact that October’s shivery side has settled in. What a preppy douche bag.
I’m wearing the same clothes I wore yesterday, having been too tired to pick out something fresh. The call to Coop had calmed me enough to get some sleep, but even five or six hours wasn’t enough to erase the deprivation from earlier in the week.
When Jonah reaches me, he smiles and says, “A coworker and I bet ten dollars over whether you’d come or not.”
“Congrats,” I say. “You just won ten dollars.”
Jonah shakes his head. “My money was on a no-show.”
“Well, I’m here.”
I don’t even try to hide my weariness. I sound like someone with either a serious sleeping problem or a massive headache. In reality, I have both. The headache sits just behind my eyes, making me squint Jonah’s way as he says, “So now what?”
“Now you have one minute to convince me to stay.”
“Fine,” he says, looking at his watch. “But before the clock starts, I have a question.”
“Of course you do.”
Jonah scratches his head, his hair immobile. He must spend hours grooming. Like a cat, I think. Or those monkeys forever plucking things from their fur.
“Do you even remotely remember me?” he asks.
I remember him staking out the sidewalk outside my building. I remember barfing at his feet. I certainly remember him telling me the true, horrible nature of Lisa Milner’s death. But other than that, I have no recollection of Jonah Thompson, which he deduces from my lack of a speedy answer.
“You don’t,” he says.
“Should I?”
“We went to college together, Quincy. I was in your psych class.”
Now, that’s a surprise, mostly because it means Jonah is a good five years older than I first thought. Or else he’s sorely mistaken.
“Are you sure?” I say.
“Positive,” he says. “Tamburro Hall. I sat one row behind you. Not that there was assigned seating or anything.”
I do remember the classroom in Tamburro Hall. It was a drafty half-circle that sloped sharply to ground level. The rows of seats were arranged stadium-style, with the knees of the person behind you mere inches from the back of your head. After the first week, everyone more or less sat in the same spot every class. Mine was near the back, slightly to the left.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I don’t remember you at all.”
“I definitely remember you,” Jonah says. “A lot of times you’d say hi to me when taking your seat before class started.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. You were very friendly. I remember how happy you always seemed.”
Happy. I honestly can’t remember the last time someone used that word to describe me.
“You sat with another girl,” Jonah continues. “She came in late a lot.”
He’s talking about Janelle, who would sneak into class after it started, often hungover. On several occasions she fell asleep, head on my shoulder. After class, I’d let her copy my notes.
“You were friends,” he says. “I think. Maybe I’m wrong. I remember a lot of bickering going on.”
“We didn’t bicker,” I say.
“You totally did. There was some passive-aggressive thing going on between you two. Like you pretended to be best friends but actually couldn’t stand each other.”
I don’t remember any of this, which doesn’t mean it’s not the truth. Apparently it happened with enough frequency to make Jonah remember.
“We were best friends,” I say quietly.
“Oh God,” Jonah says, doing a shitty job of pretending to piece it together just now. Surely he already knew. Two girls who sat in class in front of him, neither of them coming back after one October weekend. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
No, he shouldn’t have, and I would lecture him about it if my head wasn’t hurting and I wasn’t so eager to change the subject.
“Now that we’ve established how I have a poor memory, it’s time for you to tell me why I’m here,” I say. “Your minute starts now.”
Jonah dives right in, a salesman making his elevator pitch. I suspect he’s practiced this routine. It has the smoothness of multiple rehearsals.
“You’ve made it very clear you don’t want to talk about what happened to you. I understand that and I accept it. This isn’t about your situation, Quincy, although you know I’m here if you ever do want to discuss it. This is about Samantha Boyd and her situation.”
“You said she was lying to me. About what?”
“I’ll get to that,” he says. “What I want to know is how much you know about her.”
“Why are you so interested in Sam?”
“It’s not j
ust me, Quincy. You should have seen the interest that article about the two of you generated. The Internet traffic was insane.”
“If you mention that article again, I’m leaving.”
“I’m sorry,” Jonah says, the base of his neck slightly reddening. It makes me happy to see that he’s at least a little embarrassed by his actions. “Back to Sam.”
“You want me to spill some dirt on her,” I say.
“No,” he says, the too-high pitch of his protest telling me I’m right. “I simply want you to share what you know. Think of it as a profile of her.”
“Would this be off the record or on?”
“I’d prefer it to be on,” Jonah says.
“Too bad.” I’m getting irritated. It makes my headache pulse just a little more and sends restlessness coursing through my legs. “Let’s walk.”
We start to stroll away from the library, toward Sixth Avenue. More people have crowded into the park, filling the slate walkways and angling for the coveted chairs that line them. Jonah and I find ourselves pushed tightly together, moving shoulder to shoulder.
“People really want to know about Sam,” Jonah says. “What she’s like. Where she’s been hiding all this time.”
“She hasn’t been hiding.” For some reason, I still feel the need to defend her. As if she’ll know if I don’t. “She was just laying low.”
“Where?”
I wait a split second before telling him, wondering if I should. But that’s why I’m here, isn’t it? Even though I keep telling myself it’s not.
“Bangor, Maine.”
“Why did she suddenly stop laying low?”
“She wanted to meet me after Lisa Milner’s suicide,” I say, quickly realizing my mistake. “Murder, I mean.”
“And you’ve gotten to know her?”
I think of Sam painting my nails. We’re friends, right?
“Yes,” I say.
It’s such a simple word. Three little letters. But there’s so much more to it than that. Yes, I’ve gotten to know Sam, just as she’s gotten to know me. I also know I don’t trust her. And I’m pretty sure she feels the same way about me.
“And you’re positive you’re not going to share what you know about her?” Jonah asks.
