For the Best

by Vanessa Lillie

  “What about Kara?” I ask as we follow her inside. “Have you spoken to her . . . what was your name?”

  “Lydia.” She crosses her arms in her flowy top, which matches her magenta yoga pants. She’s pretty in a young way: full cheeks and curvy body she probably hates but will miss later when her curves turn to shapelessness.

  “Kara and I were best friends in undergrad,” Lydia says softly. “But she’s been so random since grad school.”

  Phillip hangs back as we take a few more steps inside. Likely he senses Lydia’s interest in speaking to me.

  “Can I record this conversation?” I ask. “My audience would be very interested in your perspective as Kara’s good friend.”

  Her face lights up. “I’m studying to go to J-school. That means journalism.”

  I nod, as if I didn’t know that. “I have contacts with several people in local news. Are you more print or broadcast? Surely broadcast, someone as pretty as you.”

  That gets her to smile. “I don’t know, maybe. I like sharing my opinions.”

  “Perfect,” I say as she leads us inside the living room of her apartment. It’s small but will do the trick. “The afternoon light is beautiful in this corner. Why don’t you sit in this chair? I’ll be here, like Barbara Walters.”

  She blinks at me and scrunches her face.

  “Katie Couric?” I try again.

  Recognition dawns. “I love her. The Today show hasn’t been the same.” She glances down at what she’s wearing. “Should I change?”

  “Let’s keep it casual,” I say. “Authentic.”

  She nods, as if there’s nothing more authentic than faded Lululemon. “I don’t want to spread rumors. Kara and I used to be really close.”

  “Of course.” I hand my camera and tripod to Phillip, who sets up the gear as I adjust the chairs and fluff the pillows. I swipe the curtains open. “How’s the lighting?”

  Phillip unfolds the camera’s view screen and nods. “We’re all set.” He also pulls out a notepad, ever the diligent journalist.

  The corner where we’re set up contrasts with the rest of the apartment, which is dingy and sad. But with bright sunlight through the sheers and colorful pillows on the overstuffed chairs, it’s cheery, as if Kara abandoned something lovely.

  “We’re all set, Lydia. Scoot to the edge of the chair,” I say from my many media trainings. “Chin up, tits out.” That tip was from Elle, and it gets a giggle. I pull a lipstick out of my bag. “Do you want a touch-up?”

  “Sure,” she says, seeming to relax even as I apply the glossy pink. I dab a bit on her cheeks and hope she’s feeling a real connection.

  “Perfect. Now tell me everything.” I hold my breath as Lydia begins, transforming herself from dumped best friend to angelic victim.

  VIDEO TRANSCRIPT 7

  PERSONAL VLOG

  INT. LIVING ROOM—DAY

  LYDIA MUSS sits in a printed chair in her living room, across from JULIET WORTHINGTON-SMITH.

  JULIET

  (looks at camera)

  I’m Juliet Worthington-Smith, and my search for the truth about the murder of Dr. Castle continues. As I shared in my last video, a young woman named Kara Nguyen was seen romantically and violently kissing Dr. Castle in the alleyway where he was murdered two weeks later. Thanks to help from you, we’re one step closer to finding her.

  This is Kara’s former roommate and ex-best friend, Lydia.

  (turns to Lydia)

  Thank you so much for speaking to us today.

  LYDIA

  No problem. I’m so sorry about everything that’s happened to you.

  JULIET

  Thank you. Can you tell me how you met Kara?

  LYDIA

  Sure—I was friends with Kara, best friends, for three years of undergrad at Brown. She graduated a year before me and started grad school, so nothing needed to change. But then, well, things did change.

  JULIET

  What happened?

  LYDIA

  She met someone. Well, you know who she met.

  JULIET

  Dr. Castle, her professor?

  LYDIA

  (nods disapprovingly)

  She hardly dated. She had one crazy ex, but really she worked hard and hung out with me. Her art is, like, all that mattered. She was obsessed. I mean, her art is a little out there, but I never said that. I supported her.

  JULIET

  It sounds like you were a really good friend to Ms. Nguyen.

  LYDIA

  I tried to be. I couldn’t believe it when Kara told me she was seeing Dr. Castle. Actually, that’s not true. She didn’t tell me. She moved out after I saw them . . . together.

  JULIET

  No warning? No explanation about why she was moving out after years of friendship?

  LYDIA

  Literally none. Before she moved out, I told her she had to stop. She can’t date a married professor. But she said I didn’t understand. She’s always been that way. Thought she was so much smarter than everyone.

  JULIET

  You were worried about her?

  LYDIA

  Kara is lonely, I think. Still, you can’t sleep with a married professor. I mean, people do, obviously, but God, that’s so gross. So immoral, you know.

  JULIET

  When did you see them together?

  LYDIA

  They were leaving an apartment, I guess her new place, on Thayer Street. Right by that sex shop. It was late, and I was out with friends. Kara and Dr. Castle were all over each other. I went up to her and grabbed her by the arm. Tried to get her to leave with me. He was mad. He yelled for us to leave them alone. I couldn’t believe it. He’s a professor. He shouldn’t act like that.

  JULIET

  Did Ms. Nguyen say anything?

  LYDIA

  (tears in her eyes)

  She didn’t seem to care, which is unlike her, you know. I mean, she does research, but her spirit, her soul, is art. She seemed cruel then, and I knew we’d never be friends again. He broke us up. He ended our beautiful friendship.

  JULIET hands LYDIA a tissue.

  JULIET

  Was Kara ever violent?

  LYDIA

  (eyes go wide)

  With me?

  JULIET

  With anyone?

  LYDIA

  (sniffs and wipes a few tears)

  Kara had a lot of mood swings. Maybe broke a few dishes when she was frustrated or whatever.

  JULIET

  (looking surprised)

  She threw dishes?

  LYDIA

  I don’t want to make her look bad. But yes, she had a temper. I mean, she’s like a brilliant artist.

  JULIET

  (scoots forward in her chair)

  Lydia, this is very important. Do you think it’s possible she could seriously hurt or even kill someone?

  LYDIA

  (eyes even wider, full of tears)

  You don’t . . . you don’t know?

  JULIET

  (looks at the camera)

  Know what, Lydia?

  LYDIA

  (starts crying)

  She already did.

  JULIET

  What?

  LYDIA

  (nods as tears fall)

  Come to her room. I’ll show you.

  Chapter 15

  “I’m stopping the camera.” Phillip stands and throws down his notebook, then turns off the recorder. “Lydia, to make that kind of accusation against Kara, let alone on camera, you need evidence.”

  Lydia nods, as if she’s got Kara’s best interest at heart. I like this girl. She’s good at pretending she has no idea how awful she’s painting her once best friend. “It’s in her room,” she whispers.

  “Show us, please,” I say with all the urgency I feel. We’re close to something big. I can feel it. Finally, evidence that has nothing to do with me.

  Rising in her yoga pants and flowy top, Lydia leads us down the hallway. “I d
idn’t know what to do with it.”

  “What?” I say again, stunned by the implication. “A body is in her room?”

  Lydia giggles, as if I’ve made a joke. The laughter continues as we follow her down a hallway. Phillip sends me a look, and I glare at him. Maybe Lydia is nervous, though she does sound a little unhinged.

  She pauses in front of a door. “Kara’s art is her confession. Her whole room is an art, uh . . . what’s the word?”

  “Installation?” I offer, completely confused.

  “Yes! She had an assignment to explore her darkest moment to begin to heal.” Lydia puts her hand on the doorknob. “For Dr. Castle’s class last semester. Kara said that she had never, you know, made amends.”

  “For what?”

  Lydia nods toward the door where we’re standing. “I’ll show you.”

  The door opens, and it’s completely dark inside, as if there are no windows. “Where’s the light switch?” Phillip asks behind us.

  “Oh, she took the fixture out of the ceiling. And painted the walls red.” Lydia pulls her phone out of her pocket, and a beam of light shines. “Use your phone flashlight. That’s how Kara wanted people to experience it. Well, I heard her tell Dr. Castle that when she brought him here to see it.”

  “He was here?” Phillip asks softly.

  “Yes,” Lydia says. “She wants people to use their phones, ‘creating the slivers of memory.’ Go on.”

  Phillip and I do as she asks, shining the small lights on our phones, but it’s still hard to see. The floor appears to be covered by black plastic.

  “Start over here,” Lydia says.

  We follow her to the corner of the room, with the crinkle of plastic under my heels and flashlights our only way of seeing. “It feels like a crime,” I say softly, mostly to Phillip, who murmurs his agreement.

  “This is her progression as an artist.” Lydia shines her flashlight low to the ground but still on the red wall. There are white chalk drawings—at first scribbles, like a child’s. Then sketches form a simple sun and then a dog with an oddly long tail. Then several horses in a garden with oversize flowers. Finally, a family of stick figures with Xs on the eyes. “She re-created her art as a girl.”

  Lydia continues to lead us along the wall, each of us shining lights on different images.

  “Careful, the desks are here.” She flashes her light on several school desks in the center of the room. There are strange clay sculptures on the desks. An oversize ashtray that seems to have long fingers where you ash the cigarette. A broken mug with Mom drawn into it.

  Then Lydia pauses. “Here’s her confession.” She flashes her phone light toward an easel that only has red splatters on the canvas. Then the light illuminates brushes on the ground, scattered next to a paint can, which also has the same red paint. “I need your lights to show everything.”

  Our three lights come together on the ground, where there’s an outline of a body like a crime scene, but within the chalk outline Kara has filled in vivid details. The jeans with flower patches and striped top. A Coach purse drawn in perfect detail, with a thin chain. The face, though—the girl is screaming, as if in pain. There’s blood, dried paint or ketchup, maybe. It looks real, and it’s leaking from the side of her head.

  “What happened?” I whisper.

  “Kara never told me. When she brought Dr. Castle here for her project, I listened in the hallway. I didn’t hear everything perfectly, but Kara attacked this girl in high school. She picked up her paint pail and threw it at her head.”

  Lydia turns the light onto the turned-over pail, and there’s the same red blood dripping down the side.

  “Hit that girl right on the back of the head.”

  “Like Dr. Castle,” I whisper.

  “Was she okay?” Phillip asks.

  “Kara was locked up for a year after.” Lydia turns the light to her round face, full of fear as her gaze makes its way back to the chalk lines on the ground. “I think she killed that girl.”

  Chapter 16

  It’s a short walk to the sex shop where Lydia saw them leaving an apartment. I managed to upload the vlog post at the Coffee Exchange, which is right by Lydia’s place. I’m not sure how we’ll capture Kara’s old room—maybe if we can bring in lights.

  Phillip has been mostly silent, and I wonder if he’s happy we have a real lead or bothered that it’s finally possible that I didn’t do it.

  We stroll along Wickenden Street as the sun is getting low, though I still have about an hour before I need to pick up Fitz. There’s a mix of restaurants and bars with a few apartments over them. An antique shop has been closed for a few hours, while a whiskey bar props open its door.

  “You have to admit, that’s pretty suspicious,” I say, tired of guessing his thoughts. “She’s not just a sweet little art student.”

  “I never said she was.” Phillip slows his pace. “But she is a person who has been accused of serious crime.”

  “I know,” I say, more defensive than I’d prefer.

  “We need to ask her first. Give her the benefit of the doubt before accusing her of any murder.”

  “Like Dez did to me. Thanks to you.”

  Phillip holds up a palm. “I am sorry that happened. But there’s real evidence tying you to the murder. We have one photo from two weeks before. A little hearsay. We need to be careful.”

  I stop firm, getting in Phillip’s face. “You’ll give Terrance’s mistress, who probably murdered another girl, every chance, but I get none?”

  Phillip touches my shoulder. “Jules, don’t get upset. Why don’t I take what we’ve found to Detective Ramos? We could mess up their investigation if we’re not careful.”

  I pull away. “I thought you already told him about Kara.”

  “Let me try again,” he says. “If there is another murder tied to Kara, they’ll listen. It’s better than dumping it on your vlog.”

  I don’t agree, but then again, Phillip isn’t the one with his whole life swirling the drain. “Let’s see what Kara says first.” I start walking again, and we pass a group of college kids already drunk with a whole night of fun ahead of them.

  “I’m sure she’s upset and knows we’re coming,” Phillip says.

  Let’s hope.

  We arrive at the sex shop, Mister Sister, with the slogan beneath, “More toys than the devil has sinners.”

  “Cute,” I say, thinking I may have been in there one night with a bachelorette party, maybe, or a bachelor party I glommed on to. It’s fuzzy. There’s the storefront and then a side staircase with a neglected banister. There’s no last name listed and only one buzzer.

  “Let’s try to keep it professional,” Phillip says. “Follow my lead this time.”

  It’s as if he knows I’m locked and loaded to push Kara’s buttons. I gesture for him to go first, and he rings the Nest button below the small camera.

  “What do you want?” says a young woman’s deep voice above us.

  Looking up, I see Kara leaning out the window three floors up—or a version of Kara, with newly buzzed hair. “Nice do,” I say, half meaning it.

  Phillip shoots me a sharp glance and then leans back to look up again. “Hi, Ms. Nguyen. I’m Phillip Hale, and this is—”

  “The bitch who murdered Terrance,” she says.

  I stop craning my neck and instead lean against the paint-chipped banister at my back. “Still your lead?” I murmur to Phillip.

  He doesn’t answer but continues, “We think there’s been a few misunderstandings,” he calls up. “Please, can we speak to you privately?”

  “No.” She leans over on her elbows. “And if you ever bring that bitch back here—”

  “You’ll hit me in the back of the head with a paint can?” I say brightly.

  “How the hell do you know . . . ?” Her eyes narrow. “Damn Lydia.”

  “Did you put it on your grad school application?” I say a little louder than I should. But I want her nervous enough to let us in with
my camera. “Assaulting another student? That might nicely complement sleeping with a professor, right? If your thesis review committee are curious.”

  “Are you threatening me?” Kara yells down.

  Phillip sucks in a breath but waits.

  “With everything I know about you, there’s no need for threats,” I say. “Open the door.”

  She calls me several names I’ve been called before and slams the window.

  “You have to back off,” Phillip says. “She may be completely innocent.”

  “First person I’ve met who is,” I say with more bitterness than I expected.

  She stomps down those several flights of stairs, and finally, locks click, and the door swings open. Kara is short, which is saying something, since I’m not exactly tall myself. She has a presence despite her thin frame and petite stature. The glossy bob cut has been replaced with an edgier half-buzzed cut matching her go-fuck-yourself attitude. She wears a paint-splattered T-shirt with the sleeves cut off and huge armholes. The shirt is cropped to show the men’s boxers hanging off her hip bones.

  “What do you want?” she says to Phillip.

  “May we come inside, please?” he says in his most kind and reasonable voice.

  “She’s not coming in my house.” She shifts her pretty face toward me and keeps her body blocking us from the landing. “I’m about to call the police.”

  “Go ahead,” I say. “I’ll make a quick video about your art project. See if any old Brookline classmates—or hell, that poor girl’s family—want to talk about what you did. Maybe email the link to your professors at Brown.”

  She slams her palms against the doorframe. “Fine.”

  We follow her through a dirty hallway and then up two flights of stairs. She punches a code into a keypad, and more locks click. After she leads us through a dim stairwell, there’s a change in the hallway, cleaner and brighter, and the door she leads us to is new, wooden, and a beautiful dark brown. She opens it with a skeleton key, and a beep sounds from an alarm as she opens the door.

  “Take your shoes off,” she murmurs, and I can see why. The room is pristine, serene, large, and open. It’s almost dark out, but her windows are west facing, so there’s a soft glow lighting up the black marble tiles. The walls are all pale gray, and the furniture is sparse. She has a long couch in an L in the corner, likely custom, and a sleek kitchen, where every appliance is hidden. She has a woven mat rug on the floor and an expensive bed low to the ground in the other corner. There are blank canvases lined along the wall that’s not all windows. It’s all minimalist, but still tastefully opulent.