Half In Love With Death (12 page)

I hurried into the kitchen. As I sat down at the table, Mom and Dad looked up at me. The room became too quiet. I wondered if I was in trouble.

Dad put down his fork. “You look different.”

“She dyed her hair, Jack,” Mom said.

He took a sip of his scotch. “For a minute I thought you were . . . .”

Mom stiffened.

“Someone else,” he said.

As she slid a plate in front of me, she knocked my glass over and rushed to pick it up. “Thank God it didn't break,” she said. “That was one of my good ones.”

We were having sweet-and-sour chicken with pineapple chunks and a cherry on top, one of my favorite dinners. As I raised my fork to my lips, the memory of Tony's kiss, sweeter than the pineapple, went through me. Dad was right about one thing. I was different. Maybe I didn't look all that different, but the feeling from being in the car with Tony was still inside me. It was like someone had turned on a light in a dark room. The shine of the brass chandelier, the delicate wheat pattern on the plates, Mom's pearly moonbeam nail polish, Dad's reddish hair threaded with gray, the sunburn across the bridge of Dicky's nose—all these things competed for my attention. Jess couldn't stay lost in a world as full of bright and beautiful things as this one.

Mom fixed her steely gaze on me. “Did it ever occur to you to ask me before dyeing your hair?”

I looked down at my plate. “I didn't think you'd mind. May helped me. My hair's the same color as hers now. We're like twins.”

As I ate a cherry, I thought of asking May to cover for me, but there wasn't much point in that. I couldn't trust her. I hoped Mom wouldn't talk to Betty about it. She gave Dad an agonized glance. He squeezed her hand. All I'd done was dye my hair. They were acting like the world was ending.

“You don't look anything like May,” Mom said.

“I think you look nice.” Dad smiled at me.

“Nice?” Mom folded her napkin by her plate. “You think it's nice that every time I look at her now, I'll think of Jess?” Her eyes gleamed with tears as she stood up.

“Frances.” He reached for her, but she walked right past him and left the room.

I turned to Dad. “I wasn't trying to look like Jess.”

“I know, kitten.” He lowered his eyes. “This has been hard on your mother.” I nodded. Lately the slightest thing could set her off, and she'd been having attacks of “nerves” and headaches and spending hours in her room. Dad finished the rest of his scotch and went over to the kitchen counter to pour himself another. He raised his drink to his lips, his bloodshot eyes not seeing me as he looked out over the rim of his glass. My appetite was gone. I hadn't meant to hurt either of them by looking like Jess. I wanted so much to tell them how Tony and I were going to find her, but I couldn't do that. If they found out, they'd never let me out of their sight.

In a few minutes Mom came back in and we finished our dinner. Dad took Dicky out to the backyard to look at the stars, but I stayed and helped her clean up. When we were through, she sat down at the kitchen table, took a few puffs of her cigarette, and then stubbed it out. “Go on outside with your dad,” she said.

As I clicked the sliding glass door shut, I turned to see her with her face in her hands, sobbing.

Dad was in the middle of the yard with Dicky. I went over to them and looked up at the faint stars dotting the darkness. Dad used to take Jess and me outside to stargaze when we were younger. Sometimes he even used his telescope. Much as I loved it, I was always a little disappointed at how small and far away everything was.

He wrapped his arms around Dicky's waist now and said, “Hey bud, did you know it would take more than a lifetime to count all the stars?” More than a lifetime, I thought. If what Edie said was true and we jumped from one life into the next, were our lives as numerous as the stars, as uncountable? A desert wind chilled the grass beneath my feet. I reminded myself that the stars were giants, even though they looked like bitter little bits of brightness from here. And lives were beyond measuring.

Dicky looked up with Dad. “One, two, three, five, eleven.”

“Just keep counting,” Dad said, his eyes on the heavens as he counted along with him.

As Dad went on and on in a singsong voice, I wanted to shout, “Don't you know Mom is crying in there? Stop counting. Stop. Stop. Do something!” But I said nothing, for fear of losing the fragile hope inside me. It was like a glass of milk filled to the brim; the slightest misstep and it would spill.

I left the two of them standing there, and headed inside. Mom had gotten up from the table and was furiously scrubbing the counter even though it was already pretty clean. She didn't turn around as I walked by, but I didn't care. Maybe my whole family was falling apart, but I wasn't going to. Dad was drinking and counting, and Mom was sobbing and scrubbing, but I was going to find my sister.

• • •

As I sat on my bed, I picked up my notebook and wrote down what I'd learned so far. Tony said he and Jess fought about dancing. Edie said they fought about her. Tony said Edie was nothing to him. Edie said they were getting married. Debbie said the man in the red car looked like a criminal. Edie said he was handsome. Lizzie hadn't even seen the red car. Edie said that Jess threatened to reveal something Tony didn't want anyone to know. Lizzie said Edie was a liar. Tony said Edie was a liar, too. My head was reeling with all of this. Someone had to be lying. Tony might even be lying, but when I was with him, I felt closer to the truth.

I went over to the mirror and looked at my hair. It made my eyes appear darker, more mysterious, like real tigers' eyes. I was glad I'd dyed it. As I pulled it back I thought of Tony looking at me as if I was Jess, but also as if I was someone new who he wanted to get to know. I touched my lips. The tingle from his kiss was still there.

That night as I was drifting off to sleep, a warm, soft feeling started at the pit of my stomach and rose up all the way through me. It was sad and sweet at the same time. In the darkness behind my shut lids I saw Tony like a strange, unearthly cartoon, his hair black as coal, the loneliness in his blue eyes like the whispering of the sea when it kisses the sand.

I wasn't hallucinating. I wasn't going crazy. I saw him in the place between lives.

• • •

On Friday I ran into Billy in the hall. He was excited about having talked to Debbie about the guy in the red car. When I told him that Debbie told me the same thing when Tony gave me a ride home, he said, “I can't believe you got in a car with that guy. We're a team. Let me handle that part, Galvin.”

“A team?” I said.

“Yeah. Detectives always work in teams.” There was a goofy grin on his infinitely freckled face. “Nice hair, Caroline,” he said.

“Glad you like it.” I pushed a strand behind my ear. For a detective, Billy had been pretty clueless about how I felt. “I'm sorry, but I think we can help each other more by working separately. I'll get Tony to trust me so he'll talk to me, and you can work undercover and find out stuff from his friends.”

He pulled me over to a locker out of the rushing crowd of kids. “Caroline, I already went undercover.”

I clutched my books to my chest. “Did you find anything out?”

“I tried to listen in while Debbie was talking to some kids, but she told me to get lost.”

I smiled. “That sounds like her. She already told you everything she's going to tell you.”

He stared at his long sneakered feet. “But something she said about the red car doesn't feel right to me.”

“Why?” I felt a flicker of fear.

He scratched his head. “Just a hunch, I guess.”

“Debbie told me the guy in the red car was blond with bad skin.” I paused. “He might be a criminal.”

“Do you think that's true?”

“I don't know. I really can't see Jess driving across the country with someone like that, but why would Debbie lie?”

“Because she's a liar?” Billy looked at me. “Her story changes every time she opens her mouth. She told you he had blond hair. She told me she didn't remember anything about him, and if I asked any more she'd have Tony take care of me.” He clenched his fist. “He better not try anything with me.”

“Debbie didn't mean it. She likes to act tough.” I couldn't believe I was defending Debbie Frank.

Billy leaned over me, his hand pressed against the wall. “But why would she tell me one thing and you another?”

“Maybe she trusts me more,” I said without actually believing it. All the different stories I'd heard made me uneasy.

He shook his head. “It doesn't add up.”

The crowd in the corridor was thinning out. The bell for the next class rang. “I've got to go,” I said.

He put his hand on my arm. “Wait. There's something else.” He bit his lip. “I
did
see something that night.”

“What?” I said.

He took a deep breath like this was hard to tell me. “Remember how I said I was riding my bike home from the party and I wiped out? That isn't exactly what happened.”

I frowned. “What did happen?”

“A car sped by and came so close it clipped me, and I went flying into a ditch.” He tugged on his shirt collar. “Caroline, there was a girl leaning out the window of the car screaming. Someone pulled her back in. It wasn't a red car. It was Tony's car, and she had blonde hair. I'm worried it might have been Jess.”

All the air rushed out of me. “Do you really think so?”

“It was dark. I was drunk.” He stared at me grimly. “I didn't think so at first, but now all this red car stuff is making me wonder. I don't know.”

I felt my hope draining away. He moved closer and placed his arm around me. “That can't be true,” I said.

“It might not have been her. The car was going so fast I didn't get a good look.” He pushed my hair off my shoulder. “I didn't mean to upset you. I just wanted to help.” My breath was coming in quick gasps. “You'll be all right,” he said softly. A couple of weeks ago I would have longed for this moment, but now all I wanted was for it never to have happened.

“Oh, God.” I shoved him away. “Why didn't you tell anyone about this until now?”

“My dad would beat the crap out of me if he found out I was at a party in the desert.” He snuck a glance at me with his pathetic brown eyes. “And I tried to tell you before but then May came by. I didn't want to make you feel worse than you already did when I wasn't sure. I'm sorry for waiting.”

“If you'd said something sooner, it might have helped us to find my sister.”

He tried to smile. “I'm helping now, aren't I?”

“No, you're not. You're a liar.”

As I rushed past him, he yelled, “Why don't you ask Tony? Then you'll find out who the liar is.”

“I will,” I shouted back.

• • •

After school I went flying out the front door. I'd run into Debbie earlier, and she'd told me to meet her and Tony in the parking lot. I was in such a hurry to get there I didn't see May or Sheila until I practically ran into them.

“What did you do to your hair?” May said.

I hesitated. It probably wasn't a good idea to mention Tony. “I dyed it. I needed a change.”

She smiled. “You did a pretty good job.”

Sheila studied me. “It's the same color as May's, but it looks different on you. I'm not sure it goes with your eyes.”

I frowned. “I've got to go. I'm on my way to meet Debbie.”

Sheila patted her puffy dark hair. “What are you hanging out with her for?”

The way she said this made me want to scream. I was so tired of everyone saying bad things about the people who were trying to help me. “Because I want to.”

“Does your mother know?” May adjusted her purse strap.

“Of course she does. I don't lie to her about everything,” I said, though lately it seemed like I did.

“I can't believe she'd let you hang out with her,” May said.

Sheila rolled her eyes and said to May, “Well, it is her mother.”

“What do you mean?” I stammered.

May wrinkled the blank page of her forehead. “Caroline, it's no secret that your mom is having a little nervous breakdown right now. And the way she let Jess run around, some people are saying . . . .”

“What? What do they say?” I asked.

“We don't want to hurt your feelings.” May's faux concern made me ill.

I took a deep breath. Sheila touched May's arm. “People are saying that if your mom didn't let Jess do whatever she wanted, she might not be missing now.”

“It's not her fault.” I could barely get the words out. “If anything, it's my fault.” There was dead silence.

May touched my shoulder. “You can't blame yourself. Jess wasn't your responsibility.” With her hand still on my shoulder, she added, “This may be hard to hear, but your mom should have checked on her when she didn't come home that night. Any normal mom would have.”

I tore myself away. “If my mom is abnormal, then your dad must be abnormal, too, because he's always hanging around with her.” I blurted it out before I even realized what I was implying.

“What do you mean?” May backed away slowly.

“You know what I mean.” I tried to catch her eye. She had to have noticed the way her dad was always hovering around my mom, putting his arm around her waist, and whispering things to her. She had to know.

“Liar,” May said, Sheila by her side. “Liar, liar, liar.” She bent over and began to cry. Sheila glared at me as if I had just committed a terrible crime.

“We almost left without you.” Debbie leaned against Tony's car. He stood next to her, smoking a cigarette, looking cool in black jeans, a leather vest, and a tight T-shirt.