by Susan Vaught
The stench of fire and smoke . . .
Noises in the basement . . .
“The A to Z Dictionary of Serial Killers, Miss Davis?” Ms. Malone’s voice scared me so bad, I let go of the book. My teacher pulled the heavy volume out of my slack grip. I blinked fast, trying to be in now instead of that bad, burning night.
Ms. Malone glanced at the pictures of the pantyhose and the box, and she frowned. Her back straightened, and I could swear she was getting taller. She had her ebony hair pulled back from her face and fastened behind her head so smooth and tight, her eyes slanted at the corners. Her big tortoiseshell glasses frames made her pupils look gigantic as she leveled her I do not approve stare squarely at my face. “This wasn’t exactly what I had in mind when I gave you permission to further your literary acumen if you finished your test early. Care to explain why you didn’t get a novel from our reading shelf, or where you got, ah, this bit of inappropriateness?”
She lifted the book I had checked out of the public library last week, using Dad’s library card, swearing to the librarian he needed it for his work. My brain stumbled back and forth between fuzzy images I didn’t know if I was remembering or imagining and how much trouble I’d be in when Ms. Malone called the library, then ratted me out to my parents. I knew I needed to say something quick, but I just sat there like a big duh, staring at my favorite teacher. I couldn’t see Peavine because Ms. Malone was standing between us, but I could tell he had stopped writing. Everyone had. The room had gone as silent as my house on the night of the fire.
I clasped my hands and squeezed so they would stop shaking. Ms. Malone was still staring at me, waiting. Life would have been a lot easier if I could have beamed myself to some distant planet and lived out my days hunting alien mutant rock eaters, like in one of Angel’s books. My brain kept flashing one of those monsters like a neon sign, along with an arrow and a caption.
I couldn’t help it. It was all I could see, so I couldn’t say anything to Ms. Malone, because if I said something, it would be about alien mutant rock eaters, and that would be bad.
Alien mutant rock eater. It’s so ugly, it’s cute, bless its heart.
The old intercom over the chalkboard crackled, and a woman’s voice said, “Classroom five?”
Ms. Malone didn’t take her eyes off me. “Yes?”
“I’m sending Ms. Perry to cover,” one of the office secretaries said. “Please report to Main with Fontana Davis.”
The alien mutant rock eaters in my brain exploded, and my mouth came open as the whole class went, “Oooo-ooooh.” Even Ms. Malone looked surprised. The office hardly ever interrupted class, unless somebody was in bad trouble or something awful had happened.
Mom? My belly drew so tight, my ribs ached.
Ms. Malone snapped the serial-killer dictionary closed and tucked it under her arm. When she looked at me with a question in her expression, I shrugged and shook my head. My neck felt like concrete.
“Well,” was all Ms. Malone had time to say before Ms. Perry walked in and we had to go.
When I stood and started walking, my legs and arms felt numb. I didn’t let myself glance at Peavine as I passed his desk, but I heard him sniff like he was worried.
When we got out into the hall, Ms. Malone glanced back at me, and she stopped walking. “Footer, you okay?”
I nodded, but she didn’t start walking again. The cream-colored tile under my feet seemed to grab my eyeballs and yank my head down. I didn’t want to see anyone right that second. The only thing I really wanted to do was throw up. I studied the sunlight shining in from the hall windows, and the black line of dirt that ran along the base of our purple lockers, right where nobody could sweep.
“Footer.” Ms. Malone knelt beside me, still holding on to my book about serial killers. Her free hand rested on my shoulder. “You’ve lost every bit of color in your face. Are you going to faint?”
That made me look at her. “Fainting’s for sissies.”
Ms. Malone’s face was right in front of mine. Her dark skin looked smooth and perfect. I smelled the peppermint she always ate while sitting at her desk as we worked on our papers. Her eyes seemed twice as gigantic up close, but they also seemed nice.
She smiled at me. “Lots of people faint. It’s about blood pressure and medical issues, not being a sissy. But you already look better. Want to tell me what’s scaring you?”
“No.”
She didn’t stop smiling, but her eyes dimmed, like maybe she was sad. “You afraid this is about your mom?”
The pain in my stomach got so sharp, I wrapped my arms around my middle. I belched peanut butter and jelly but swallowed it. “Yeah. A little.”
“Okay.” Ms. Malone stood, keeping her hand on my shoulder. “Then let’s go see. I’ll be right there with you, no matter what.”
Like that would help. I let out a breath as the pain eased, and my hands quit shaking. Actually, it did help, knowing Ms. Malone would be there. At least a little. That was kind of weird.
We had to walk down two long hallways, turn a corner, and walk up one flight of stairs to get to the main office. Every step seemed to take too long. When we finally arrived, the glass walls were so lined with plants that I couldn’t really see who was waiting for us inside, only that it wasn’t Dad, unless he was sitting down, because Dad was taller than the plants.
Ms. Malone went first through the door, and I came in behind her to see the office secretary, Ms. Starling, who was standing in front of one of the conference rooms with a woman I didn’t know. Ms. Starling was skinny and old, but the stranger looked like she might be a soccer star. She had dark brown eyes—wide, not warm and kind like Ms. Malone’s. Her hair was a bright shade of blond that didn’t look natural, and she was very tan. Peavine and Angel, they were real blonds. Peavine got freckles if he stayed out in the sun, and Angel got burned. This woman was a fake, or at least her hair was.
She had on a brown skirt, pink heels, and a pink sweater with no sleeves. A name badge hung on a lanyard around her neck, but it was turned around backward, so all I could see was a happy-face sticker somebody had pressed onto the plastic sleeve.
“Fontana, this is Stephanie Bridges,” Ms. Starling said in her crackly voice, gesturing at pink-sweater-high-heels lady. I swear it sounded like Ms. Starling was still talking through the old intercom speakers. “She’s from DFCS. That’s the Mississippi Department of Human Services, Division of Family and Children Services. She needs to talk to you.”
“Why?” I glanced around Stephanie Bridges, into the open conference room. Nobody was there. The shaking in my hands came back double. “Where’s my dad?” I hated how squeaky I sounded. “Shouldn’t he be here if I’m going to get interviewed by someone from a government agency?”
“No,” Ms. Starling said.
Ms. Malone frowned at her. “Don’t they need a parent’s consent, at least?”
“DFCS doesn’t need permission to speak to a child,” said the voice that came through our speakers every morning. “We’ve done this before. I know the rules.”
Ms. Malone kept frowning. Stephanie Bridges smiled at me the way people do right before they pop out with Bless your heart.
I wished I was an alien mutant rock eater who lived on any planet but this one. I didn’t want to go in that room with Stephanie Bridges. I didn’t want to talk to anyone with fake hair and a smile she didn’t really mean. Her heels were so high, they reminded me of walrus tusks. How did she even walk in those shoes without snapping every bone in her ankles?
Anything that reminded me of walruses had to be a bad omen.
“Um, no thanks.” I shook my head. If I ran for it and turned right, the massive row of plants around the front door would give me some cover as I bolted down the hall.
“You have to do this,” Ms. Starling said.
“I do not. I want my dad.” I backed up a little. Ms. Malone went with me, like she knew I was thinking about making a break for it.
“Fontana—” Step
hanie Bridges started, but I cut her off.
“I go by Footer.”
She glanced down at her papers and made a note. “Okay, Footer. I don’t want this to be hard or scary. I just need to ask you some questions.”
Her accent was way southern, like mine. She looked big-city, but she sounded like home. That was something, at least.
“Why do you need to ask me questions?” My heart pounded and pounded. I wasn’t sure I was breathing.
“Because some people are concerned that you might be in danger.” The fake smile came back.
Pound, pound, pound . . . I wanted to hide behind the plants. “What people?” My voice sounded like a mouse whistle.
“Are you new at this?” Ms. Malone asked Stephanie Bridges.
“What?” The woman stopped smiling. Ms. Starling shook her head and tottered off, muttering something about a society doomed by no discipline.
“I—yes. I’m early in my career,” Stephanie Bridges admitted.
Ms. Malone’s frown eased. She kept her arms folded, though. “How long have you been out of school?”
“I don’t think that’s relevant,” Stephanie Bridges said, but she looked at her feet like I always did when I knew I was in trouble with Ms. Malone.
Breathe. My chest moved up and down, and I felt a little better.
“Footer, this lady has a job to do,” Ms. Malone said without taking her gaze off Stephanie Bridges. “Come on. I’ll go in with you.”
“I’m sorry, that’s not allowed.” Stephanie Bridges shook her head.
Ms. Malone gave her the same glare she always used to hush me when I was making her mad. “Do you want to get this done or not?”
Stephanie Bridges pressed her lips shut, turning her whole mouth into a straight line.
“I’ll stay right with you, Footer.” Ms. Malone took my hand. “You can stop anytime you want.”
Stephanie Bridges spoke so quietly that her voice was nearly a whisper. “But I have to interview Fontana in private.”
“I’m going in with Footer,” Ms. Malone said. “If you have an issue with that, take it up with whomever you’d like.” She looked at me with her big, nice eyes. “Ready?”
She squeezed my hand.
I nodded, and we went into the conference room together.
Stephanie Bridges followed and closed the door behind us so hard, she rattled the glass panes on either side.
CHAPTER
6
Eleven Days After the Fire. What Does This Woman Want?
The conference table was long and square, and I sat on one side with Ms. Malone. Stephanie Bridges came and plopped down beside me, so I got up and went all the way to the end, where the chairs had been pushed every which way. I sat on one that wasn’t against the table.
Ms. Malone gave Stephanie Bridges a look I couldn’t read, then came to where I was and sat next to me again. Relief helped me breathe a little better.
Stephanie Bridges stared at me for a second. I looked away from her and studied the cream-colored cinderblock walls and pictures of previous principals and football teams. A room air conditioner hummed in one curtained window, making the fabric ripple. Outside the conference room, a few people moved around in the office, but I couldn’t hear them. All I could focus on was my own breathing and the rustle of papers as Stephanie Bridges moved her notes around on the smudged wood.
Finally, she stood, slid me a card with her name and number on it, and then sat again.
I thought about balling up the card and throwing it at the wall, but to be polite I put it in my jeans pocket. I could always pitch it when I got home. Besides, I wanted her name and number to give Dad, so he could tell this woman not to talk to me again without him.
Stephanie Bridges said, “Your mother was taken to Memphis this weekend, to the New Dawn program. Do you know what that is?”
The sticky-sweet sound in her voice made me curl my fingers into fists. “It’s a psychiatric unit. Mom has a mental illness called bipolar disorder. Her brain chemicals make her mood get too high or too low, and sometimes her thinking gets confused. When she takes her medicine, she does okay. When she doesn’t, she has problems and has to go to the hospital until she’s better.”
I stopped talking, and the only sound in the room was the steady hum of the air conditioner.
“I see.” Stephanie Bridges briefly looked stunned. Then she made a few notes on her papers. “And when your mother has these problems, who takes care of you?”
“Dad.” I fidgeted with the fabric-covered chair arm. The chair had wheels. It was hard not to start rolling around.
“Doesn’t your father work?”
“Of course he does. But when Mom’s sick, he changes his schedule so he’s home when I’m home. If he can’t be there, I stay with Peavine and Angel until he’s able to pick me up. Ms. Jones doesn’t have to work all the time, because she got a lot of money when her aunt died, and then she won some in a lottery. Ms. Jones is a great mom.”
Something like jealousy poked me in the belly as I said that, and I got all distracted thinking about how Ms. Jones was completely normal and Mom wasn’t, and how Angel and Peavine didn’t ever have to worry about Ms. Jones shooting snakes and getting DCFS called and ending up in a hospital.
Stephanie Bridges kept her head down and made more notes. “So you’re never left unattended?”
Dark rooms in a quiet house . . . I kept my voice completely level and calm. “I am never left unattended.”
Liar.
Dang. I didn’t want to be lying right now. Lying brought me bad luck, and I didn’t need any more of that in my life. And what was all of this about, anyway? Could it be about the Abrams farm? I already talked to the police the morning after the fire. I told them I didn’t see anything or know anything.
Liar!
From somewhere deep in my mind, the ghost of Cissy Abrams stared at me with those blank, hollow eyes.
Stephanie Bridges was talking again. “Tell me what you understand about what prompted your mother’s latest hospitalization.”
I blinked at her, trying to make myself act right.
Ms. Malone poked the arm of my chair. “Tell her why your mom went to the hospital, Footer. And be nice.”
“She hurt her shoulder and had to go to the emergency room to get it taken care of.” I shrugged like that was no big deal. “She really hates doctors, so that probably upset her.”
“Is she easily upset?” Stephanie Bridges asked.
“Not always.” Liar, liar! Bad luck! “Well, sometimes.”
The woman narrowed her eyes. “Has she ever gotten angry with you when she was upset?”
“Well, sure.” I picked at the chair arm. “But I deserved it.”
Stephanie Bridges scribbled a note. The triumphant look on her face made me lean forward. “I mean it. I really deserved it. Sometimes I do stupid stuff. Like, I accidentally lit the backyard on fire trying an experiment with a magnifying glass.”
The DCFS woman looked up slowly, her pen frozen in her hand. “You set a fire?”
Doom crashed over me like a cold wave. I wanted to fall out of my chair and die.
Ms. Malone cleared her throat. “You mean the experiment in Superspy magazine?”
“Yes, ma’am.” I tore my gaze away from Stephanie Bridges and looked at Ms. Malone instead.
Ms. Malone’s expression was relaxed, and her eyes seemed as nice as ever. “Did you use too many newspapers?”
“Way too many.”
The heat in my face faded as Ms. Malone nodded. “I did that too. Driveway still has a black spot.”
We both looked at the DCFS worker, who didn’t seem to know what to say next. She finally came up with “What does your mother do when she’s angry with you?”
“She tells me not to do stupid stuff like accidentally setting the backyard on fire.” I smiled at Stephanie Bridges. When she didn’t smile back, I said, “Sometimes she yells it?”
Would that make her happy? What did s
he want, anyway? Me, I wanted to get out of that conference room and go back to class, then go home and lie in my bed and think without anybody bothering me. Being interviewed sucked. Maybe Peavine and I shouldn’t interview any more people because it sucked so bad. We were probably earning ourselves barrels and barrels of rotten luck. Who wanted to answer hard questions like this?
“Has your mother ever hit you?” Stephanie Bridges asked like she was reading from a list of dumb questions she made up before she ever met me.
“No.”
“Has she ever threatened to hurt you in any way?”
“No.”
“Has she ever put you in danger?”
“Mom would never do that.” The tips of my fingers dug into the chair arms. “She worries about me all the time. She hurt her shoulder trying to be sure a snake didn’t bite me.”
At this, Stephanie Bridges brightened, and that doomed feeling washed over me again. “She shot the snake with your father’s largest firearm.”
Firearm? This woman and Angel would get along well. I wondered if she was going to start babbling about well-organized militias. “Yes. The Nitro. It’s an elephant gun.”
Stephanie Bridges scribbled on her paper some more, then locked eyes with me. “Did she have any training to use that weapon safely?”
“Who has training to use an elephant gun? I mean in this country. I’m sure people in Africa and India might get training, since elephants actually live there.” I shook my head. “I don’t even know why they make elephant guns, because elephants are endangered, and nobody’s supposed to shoot them. They should make walrus guns. Walrus guns would make a lot more sense.”
“I agree,” Ms. Malone said. When Stephanie Bridges stared at her, she added, “It’s the tusks,” and shivered.
Stephanie Bridges seemed to consider this but then decided to ignore it. “Your father has quite a collection of dangerous firearms, doesn’t he, Font—I mean Footer?”
She was starting to make me really mad, with all her stupid questions and stupid words. “I hear your accent. You’re not from any great-big city up north or out west, right?”
