Throwaway Girls

by Andrea Contos

  “Wow. Watching you attempt an apology is almost worth being late for practice.”

  I almost laugh, but then I remember. “What happened last night?”

  The mattress shifts as he leans back. “You really don’t remember anything?”

  I shake my head, and missing Willa hits me all over again. I remember everything about my nights with her. I miss how her body fit perfectly against mine, the softness of her skin, the way my fingers threaded through her thick hair and the way her lips used to whisper against the hollow of my throat when we’d lie together and everything awful would fade away.

  It’s been over a week since her last letter — handwritten, untraceable slips of paper so I don’t “ruin my life by following her to Cali” — and with each new envelope, I wait to hear she’s found everything we had with someone else.

  She’s starting to feel truly gone — just like Madison.

  I smooth the wrinkles from Jake’s comforter. “The other missing girl — Sydney Hatton — she’s Chrystal’s niece.”

  “Yeah.” He climbs from the bed in a fluid stretch of muscle and pops open his mini fridge. “That’s what Chrystal said after I almost busted in her door last night. I knocked for five fucking minutes before she answered.”

  He yanks out a bottled water and slams the door shut so hard the fridge shakes. “You were barely standing when she finally let me in, and I had to carry you to the car.”

  He hands me the water and two ibuprofen and I turn them over, letting them roll into the lines of my hand. It’s shaking, like my body has figured out something before my brain has, because the reason tumbles from my mouth a second later. “Why were you there?”

  He stills, so quick a blink would’ve missed it. “You were avoiding me yesterday.”

  “So you followed me?”

  “No. If I followed you, I’d have stopped you from ever stepping into her house in the first place.”

  “Jake —”

  “Be mad, Caroline, if you need to.” He rips a T-shirt over his head. “I knew you were going to do something stupid. And then you weren’t answering your phone. I waited. And then I took my best guess, and it’s lucky for us both I was right, or you might be a body in those fucking woods right now.”

  I hate — no, I loathe — that he’s right. Even more, that I can’t find the words to explain why, despite the end, the means still leave me cold with unease. “Well, my stupidity got me answers.”

  “It got you comatose.”

  “You think she drugged me?”

  “You tell me.”

  “I had one sip.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yes. I’m sure.” I pop the pills in my mouth, tiny pinpoints of sweetness on my tongue, and wash them down. “She had no reason to drug me, Jake. I was going to help her.”

  “Maybe she didn’t expect you to. Maybe it’s not even her niece. Maybe she was gonna sell you to that fucking piece of shit that nearly blew my head off two nights ago.”

  “Hey.” Chrystal’s far from my BFF, and I’m vaguely remembering her threatening to call the cops and tell them about my “relationship” with Marcel if she found out I wasn’t really trying to help find her niece, but now Jake’s being a dick and it feels good to not be the only one.

  “I almost took you to the hospital. If you weren’t conscious enough to beg me not to, I would’ve. So if you’re telling me you only had one sip, then she drugged you. Let the cops find her niece. And Madison. Like my dad said.”

  “The cops aren’t looking for her niece. They think she ran away.”

  That’s why she’s so mad. Everyone is falling all over themselves to find Madison, and she can’t convince anyone her niece didn’t just leave town with her boyfriend.

  Chrystal’s voice pierces through the fog in my memories, the glaze over her eyes when she ground her cigarette onto the kitchen counter. My niece is a good student, got good grades. She’s going to community college in the fall. Already paid off her first semester’s tuition. No one’s running away after putting down that kind of cash. My sister — she’s never been the best mom, but she did what she could for Sydney. Now some maniac has my niece and nobody gives a shit.

  I rub my forehead, straining to remember. “She said, ‘Find Sydney first. Then I’ll tell you what I know about your friend.’”

  “What the fuck does that mean?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she doesn’t know anything. Maybe she’s just trying to get me to find her niece. But maybe not.”

  If the cops aren’t willing to explore the evidence Chrystal has, Sydney’s never getting found.

  And now that it’s clear Madison was involved with Chrystal in some way, it’s impossible to ignore that her story might end the same way. And, at least partly, that will be because of me.

  I blink to clear my cloudy vision. “The minute we met Chrystal, she called the cops crooked. Maybe she was right. Not just about Sydney’s case, but Madison’s too. Either they’re trying to cover it up or they’re just too stupid to put it all together, but Madison’s case is too well-known. Eventually, they’re going to pin it on someone …”

  I don’t fill in the rest — the texts from Madison that Jake left unanswered the night she vanished do the job for me. Madison was his girlfriend, sort of, and he was supposed to be there the night she went missing. They always look to the husbands and boyfriends first.

  But even if Jake never comes close to facing a trial, even if he never gets beyond questioning before his dad uses his judge status to shut the whole thing down, Jake has plans after graduation. Going into college with rumors you offed your girlfriend — even unsubstantiated ones — is not the way to earn the starting job on any sports team.

  All Jake has to worry about is himself though. I’m the one responsible for unraveling this entire disaster. And if she’s lucky, Madison is out there somewhere, waiting for me to do it.

  “Chrystal said Sydney’s mom wasn’t really involved in her life, but she must have friends. And there was a boyfriend too. Someone might be willing to talk. But, Jake —”

  I rub my throbbing temple until my thoughts become coherent, because there’s something there, just out of reach, that doesn’t fit with Jake’s assumptions.

  I close my eyes and Chrystal watches me from over the top of her glass.

  “She poured drinks for us both.”

  “What?”

  “She made drinks for both of us. I watched her do it.” I stared at her ice cube tray. “And she didn’t even know I was coming. If she poisoned me, she poisoned herself too.”

  It hits me then, what I’m really trying to say. “What if Chrystal didn’t drug me? What if someone was trying to drug her?”

  “You want to check on her?”

  “And maybe get her to talk about Madison when my brain isn’t suffocating. I also need to get my car from The Wayside.”

  “Yeah. Okay.” He rubs the back of his neck. “I’m late. I texted your mom and said I was with you last night — said you were staying on campus. My car keys are on the desk if you need to run home to change, which you should. You smell like cigarettes. See you in AP gov.”

  He slips out the door soundlessly. It’s sweet of him, but if he’s trying to protect the massive cleaving through my temporal lobe, it’s too late.

  Sometime between now and first period, I have to gather the courage to face Mr. McCormack and ask him about his fight with Headmaster Havens — to face whether he’s in trouble because of me.

  Except it turns out that’s the least of my worries.

  I rush into class with thirty seconds before the bell and pull up short when I notice that my normally talkative classmates all sit silently, unmoving, their gazes directed at the man at the front of the room.

  Headmaster Havens wastes no time telling us Mr. McCormack is on leave. Until further notice.


  Chapter Eleven

  I’ve lost track of the number of times I’ve checked my phone today.

  I sent Mr. McCormack an email. To that account, just in case the cops are reading his St. Francis one and they decide to take my concern as extra evidence of him being a violent kidnapper.

  He still hasn’t responded.

  There isn’t a single St. Francis teacher, administrator or janitor who’s giving the slightest hint about why he’s on leave, but all the rumors — championed by Preston Ashcroft, of course — say the cops spent a solid hour in the headmaster’s office before they sent Mr. McCormack home this morning.

  Jake even called his dad for intel and got shut down before Mr. McCormack’s name left his lips.

  Here’s what I do know: this is my fault.

  I’ve replayed the detectives’ expressions from that morning with Jake and Mr. McCormack at my locker so many times there’s no way to deny the truth. They started out suspicious, and then Havens saw me with Mr. McCormack. Holding hands.

  That was all they needed to confirm their theories.

  If someone told them about that night at The Wayside when he drove me and Willa home, their case would be made for them. Teacher takes interest in young student and leaves a bar with her. Two girls — one a student at the very school the teacher works at — go missing.

  And now they’re spinning his text and call with Madison the night she disappeared as some kind of pattern of behavior. But Madison’s connection to The Wayside, to Chrystal, maybe even to Sydney, is too strong to ignore. Except I can’t tell the detectives about it. Chrystal will barely talk to me, and she hates cops even more than I do. Sending them to her house to ask about Madison when they won’t look for Sydney would be a betrayal.

  It should be mine to investigate anyway. There’s a link missing between Madison and this other world in West Virginia. And I don’t know what else it could be besides me.

  If she were here, she’d nudge my shoulder and say, “You’re doing it again.” And then, not waiting for me to ask what because we both know, she’d add, “Assuming everything is your fault.”

  And then I’d flip her off and we’d both end up lighter than before.

  But she’s not here now, and this time, my assumptions are right.

  I don’t say any of that while Jake drives to Chrystal’s house for our make-sure-she’s-not-as-drugged-as-me mission. Sometimes it feels like the things we don’t say are more important than the ones we do.

  Jake’s palm shushes over the steering wheel as he turns into the mobile home park. He sidles up to a small playground, dotted with plastic climbers and a skeletal swing set, and cuts the engine. “If anything feels wrong, even a little, we’re leaving.”

  “Okay.”

  “I mean it.”

  “I’m not stupid, Jake.”

  He mutters a curse. “You could’ve died the past two nights. Sorry for trying to break your streak.”

  The truck’s interior lights blind me and Jake’s out the door before I can respond, leaving me to catch up.

  “I appreciate what you’re doing. I really do. I’m just in a hurry to find some answers, especially with Mr. McCormack —”

  “What’s the deal with you two?”

  We creep through someone’s front yard where a cheery Easter wreath hangs above an eviction notice. “The deal? He’s my teacher.”

  “Who you email.”

  “Exactly. Who I email. Not who I fuck, which is what you were asking, right?”

  His jaw twitches. “Sometimes I don’t know how to talk to you, Caroline.”

  “Why? Because I called you out on calling me a slut?”

  “I didn’t call you a slut.”

  “Sure you did. You just didn’t use those words.”

  “That’s not how words work.”

  “That is exactly how words work.”

  “I’m just saying maybe it’s time you look at the facts. I know you don’t want him to be responsible, but —”

  “He’s not responsible.”

  He kicks a rock and it tumbles end over end in a dizzying spin, until it comes to rest in a dark puddle. “Believing something doesn’t make it true.”

  I shudder, because I’ve lost track of the times I wished it would. “Neither does assuming it is.”

  “I’m not —” He huffs out a hard breath. “Maybe you’re just not the greatest judge of character.”

  It hits as hard as he meant it to, reminding me of all the things I don’t know about Madison, how he followed me here last night, how I thought Willa would never leave me — that once, I believed my parents would never hurt me.

  I whisper, “Shut up, Jake.”

  His mouth opens and closes. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have —”

  I cut him off because I can’t have this conversation right now, and because I can’t stop staring at Chrystal’s car.

  “There’s frost on her car.”

  He scans the grass at our feet and the dusting of white on the blades that have just begun to spring back to life. “It’s cold outside.”

  “She was supposed to go work earlier. I called to ask about her schedule.” And hoped they’d say she was there — walking, talking, and not comatose. “If she went, there wouldn’t have been enough time for frost to form.”

  It takes every bit of my willpower not to turn and run back to Jake’s truck. And I’m sure he hasn’t forgotten Mountain Man any more than I have.

  We stick to the darkness between the floodlights, keeping our footsteps light, and though we never discuss it, we both head to the back of the trailer rather than the front door.

  The living room and kitchen lights still glow from behind the blinds, creating a striped picture window against the darkness. Chrystal sits slumped in her recliner, her jaw slack, her glass centered in a dark pool of vodka.

  Dead.

  I squeeze my eyes shut, but it does nothing to block out the image of Chrystal in that chair. It just makes it easier for me to envision my body lying across from hers.

  A screech of plastic pulls me back to reality and sets dogs barking in the nearby yards — and Jake points to Chrystal’s now-open window.

  Her blinds sway, and I find my voice. “What are you doing?”

  He pauses. “The glass you used is still sitting on the table.”

  We stare, neither of us willing to vocalize what we’re deciding in this moment. If I crawl through Chrystal’s window and destroy any evidence I was there, it’s stepping over a line we can’t cross back. It means leaving her body until someone else reports her missing. But maybe there’s mercy in that, because justice for Chrystal probably won’t come any faster than it has for her niece.

  I press myself against the trailer, letting the cold burrow through my clothes and into my skin. “I’ll go.”

  “No.”

  “I wasn’t asking your permission. I’ve already been in there. If anyone bothers to look, my DNA is probably everywhere, not just on that glass.” I poke him in the chest. “It makes no sense for you to risk it. Now help me up.”

  He grabs my hips and shoves me upward. My face collides with the blinds, and the ridges of the window bite into my palm when I lock my elbow in place and swing my legs up after me. I slither to the floor, blinds trailing over my skin.

  A light flicks on outside and I freeze.

  Someone in the trailer next to Chrystal’s moves from behind their newly illuminated window, and I try not to breathe. Not that I want to anyway — there’s something vaguely sweet and cloying that clings to the back of my throat, mixed with the hint of rot and decay.

  From Chrystal’s body.

  If whoever’s out there sees the open window, they’ll ask questions — unless maybe the stars are aligned and Mercury is in retrograde or whatever the fuck means good things and C
hrystal likes to open her window when it’s four degrees above freezing.

  Moving so slowly my muscles creak, I stretch and press my palms to the bottom of the blinds, pulling them taut, making sure my body stays out of the window.

  My hearing numbs, waiting for anything to break the silence — a door opening, a window rising, a shout. The presence of Chrystal’s lifeless body grows stronger until I’m afraid if I don’t move or breathe soon, I’m going to scream.

  The light in the other trailer flicks off and I let out a shuddering breath.

  Clinging to the walls as much as possible, I slide, one panel at a time, until I could look at Chrystal full-on if I wanted to.

  I don’t.

  I drop to my knees and shuffle toward the coffee table, the stale scent of cigarettes coating my tongue. The glass sits quietly, a watermark stretching from its base, ice cubes long-since melted.

  My death is in that glass.

  If I’d taken even one more sip, or if Jake hadn’t come …

  My breath catches, that vision of Chrystal staring at me over her glass, but I can’t see her drinking it. And I can’t figure out why, if she did, she didn’t pass out.

  A knock rattles through the room — not loud enough for a neighbor — more like Jake reminding me to get my ass moving.

  I keep the glass steady as I grab the kitchen towel draped limply over the oven door so I can open the drawers without leaving fingerprints.

  The drawers scrape open, one of them slipping from its tracks and tilting dangerously. I’m on the sixth one before I find the Ziplocs.

  It’s not like I know people who can run forensics tests for drugs, but that doesn’t mean I can’t find them.

  I yank open the first bag and the seam rips straight down the side. Same with the second. I’m seconds from vowing to buy her name-brand Ziplocs to replace her shitty dollar store ones and tucking them inside an umbrella, and then I remember she’s dead.

  I drop the glass into the bag I haven’t ruined.

  Four steps into the living room, the bag busts open.