Kiss Kill Vanish (15 page)

Marcel. The
now
Marcel. He would have access to money.

I refold the paper and clutch it harder between arm and body, suddenly conscious of my heart racing with the
click-click-click-click
of the trains speeding past.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

“Y
ou.”

Me. I can't think of a single response for Marcel. Not one for this moment. Not here on this lip of crusted snow with grave markers and dead flowers between us. Not with the last of the mourners still milling around like black ants on white cement. Different rules apply.

I take a step forward. His eyes are lighter than I'd remembered, his lashes blond. Maybe it's the lack of eyeliner, but he looks younger. His hair has been washed and cut and gelled perfectly into place. His skin looks polished to a shine, but drained of blood. He glows like a pearl.

Everyone around us is moving. His parents are wandering, robotically shaking hands and kissing cheeks, but Marcel seems pinned to this spot in the universe at the crest of the steps that lead from the cathedral to the graveyard.

“Nice hat,” Marcel says, but the usual sardonic tone has been flattened. He might even mean it.

I tuck a stray strand of hair up into the black pillbox. A scoop of black netting separates my face from the world. It
is
a nice hat—thrift shop find of the year. Nanette's white coat covers the plunging neckline of grim reaper velvet, so as long as I stay buttoned up, I'm funeral appropriate. “I didn't want anyone to recognize me,” I admit before realizing my mistake.

“Who would recognize you?”

Wouldn't I love to know. I glance around, wondering if my father has replaced Lucien's watchful eye on me with someone else's. “I thought your parents might. I'm the girl in Lucien's paintings.”

“Trust me. His paintings are the last thing on their minds.”

I missed the service intentionally, watching from a distance and wandering over once the crowd started to disperse. But now I'm close enough to see that Lucien's mother has the white-blond hair and porcelain features, his father the narrow eyes. I can see their expressions too. She looks vacant in the pharmaceutical way; he appears mortified but stoic.

“Shouldn't you be over there with them?” I ask.

“I should correct what I said about his paintings,” he says, unnervingly straight-faced still. “
I
am the last thing on their minds.”

As if on cue, both turn and start walking toward the cathedral. I wait for Marcel to move away from me, to follow them, but he doesn't.

“We came separately,” he explains.

I set my face against the wind, trying not to show shock or pity or whatever it is I feel towards this scrubbed-clean tragedy. And who am I to judge? My father is a monster and my mother abandoned me.

“Did you just get here?” he asks. “I didn't see you at the service.”

“I didn't want to intrude.”

“So why come at all?”

The words are abrasive, but his sincerity disarms me. “Lucien was my friend.” Does saying it make it any closer to true? I'm not sure. “Can't I just be here to pay my respects?”

He stares into my eyes, and I feel layers of false words and costumes being stripped away.

“Fine,” I say. “I came here to see you.”

He sets his jaw, not letting my eyes slip away. He's always been sallow, nearly yellow, but he's a different kind of pale today. Gray. Miserable. Not drunk. That look in his eyes now is disbelief, and I see why. Nobody came here to see Marcel.

The inappropriateness of what I came here to do slams into me, and my breath is gone. I can't ask him for money.

“Why?” he asks.

“I don't know. I thought . . .” I falter and start again. “Are you okay?” I hear myself ask.

He doesn't answer.

I'm an idiot.

“No,” he says finally.

Silence. The cold is pulling and pushing us at the same time, making me dizzy. I feel like we could fall in any direction.

“Do you want to go somewhere?” he asks.

“Where?”

“I don't know.”

“Okay.”

I follow him to his car, something generically sporty and angry-looking, and get in. It doesn't feel like I have a choice, like this sudden sympathetic urge I'm experiencing is more of a compulsion than a decision. I sneak a sideways glance. He looks so wretched I almost want to squeeze his arm and tell him things will be okay.

“Movies?” he asks.

“Sure.”

Marcel doesn't take me to the towering Cineplex Odeon. I'm relieved and worried at the same time—a testosterone-based, mindlessly violent action movie is what we need here. Something mind-numbing, please. Instead, we go to the Cinéma du Parc, where we stand and stare at the handwritten board.

“I've seen the Swedish ones,” I say.

“And I've seen the Japanese one,” he says. “That leaves French or Italian.”

“Will the French one have subtitles?”

“Probably not. Who runs away to Montreal when they don't even speak French?”

“I'm not a runaway.”

He shrugs. “Italian historical romance it is.”

Marcel takes our coats to coat check, doing an average-to-poor job of not staring at my cleavage, and I silently curse Lucien for this dress. Then I remember he's dead.

There's no talk of money. Marcel buys our tickets, a cellophane bag of cinnamon walnuts, another of dark-chocolate-dipped apricots, and two black cherry sodas, while I wait and wonder. Where are his friends? Why isn't he with his parents? Why, when we've never had a single civil exchange, am I the one with him after his brother's funeral? Why is he not getting drunk or stoned out of his mind right now?

We survey the empty theater from the entrance.

“Where do you want to sit?” he asks.

I point to the last row. “If you don't mind sitting so far back.”

“I don't care.” I follow him to the middle of the row, where he sinks into a seat—old-fashioned, plush velvet.

He twists the metal top off a soda and hands it to me with the sweet fizz bubbling and dribbling over my hand.

I could've opened it, but it doesn't seem like the right moment to chide him for overstepping. We'll do chivalry versus feminism another day. Or not. “Thanks.”

We sit in silence. I stare straight ahead, waiting for someone else to come in. Anyone else. Anyone at all. But apparently nobody in Montreal is interested in this particular low-budget Italian historical romance, because Marcel and I are still the only two takers when the lights dim and the velvet curtains part. As the screen flickers to life, I locate the exits and consider bailing before this gets any more awkward.

But the movie begins and I'm still sitting beside Marcel. My hand is slick from the glass bottle. My tongue tingles from the fizz. I guess I'm staying.

It's thirty excruciating minutes of bad acting and cheesy lines before Marcel makes his move. He stretches out his arm, slides his soda into the cup holder, and leans forward.

I hold my breath, gripping the chair arm between us.

He dips his head to his hands.

I shrink into my chair. I don't understand.

He starts to cry.

An Italian show tune breaks out, covering whatever sound he might be making, and all I have is what I can see: his long, slumped torso shuddering with the light from the screen illuminating his back.

I know what not to do. Instinctively, I know not to put my hand on his back. I don't rub his shoulder, or commit the unpardonable sin of trying to hug him. I sit. I watch him bounce as sobs shake his frame.

Ten, twenty, thirty minutes grind on. The musical Italian voices rain down, but I can't look up to read the subtitles. I can't look away from Marcel. The longer he cries, the more uncomfortable my own empathy makes me. I don't want to identify with Marcel, but if one of my sisters killed herself, the pain might kill me, and right now, watching him cry, it doesn't matter that he's a drug-addled douche bag, or that he and Lucien acted like they hated each other. Maybe I should hug him.

Finally, his shoulders go slack. Relief. Almost.

He doesn't sit back immediately, and I realize the worst of it: we have to suffer through the rest of the movie, say words to each other, maybe even make eye contact. The lights will go back on eventually. I wait for him to turn to me and in some way acknowledge what has just happened, but he doesn't. He leans back in his chair and watches the rest of the movie.

And so do I.

“This is a dump,” he says, eying my building as he pulls up to the curb.

“Why, thank you.” I struggle with my seat belt and its foreign prongs.

“Need some help with that?”

“No.” I jab and yank for a few more seconds before the lock clicks open, releasing me.

I look at Marcel. Crying makes everyone ugly. Marcel's face is swollen, sweaty, and red, but he's not ugly, not quite. His eyes save him. They're raw and glittering, like polished ice. I could almost reach out and cup his face in my hands. I should tell him how sorry I am.

He hands me the untouched bags of walnuts and apricots. “Take these.”

“Sure.” No need to be shy about free food. “Thanks.”

“We should do this again sometime.”

I can't tell if he's joking. “Yeah.”

It doesn't matter, though, because I'm leaving. Emilio is coming for me. And Marcel will get home and realize that he's just sobbed and sobbed beside a girl he finds ridiculous, his dead brother's dress-up doll, and the shame will eat him up.

I reach for the door handle.

“Wait,” he says, thrusting his phone at me. “I need your number.”

I hesitate, take it, and type in my number. If he calls, he's officially lost his mind. Not in a good way.

I'm back in my closet beneath my scratchy blanket when I realize I can't ever ask him for the money Lucien owed me for the cemetery sitting, let alone beg him for more. He'll remember this day and feel used, like his grief has been poached, though I'm not sure why I care. Losing my mind. Not in a good way.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

S
even minutes.

I texted Emilio today. Three times. I shouldn't have done it, but it's been five days since I've heard his voice, and all the bad things that could've happened started multiplying and skittering around in my mind like crazed insects, and suddenly I was back in Emilio's closet staring through that crack, but this time it was my father holding the gun and Emilio cowering by the wall. I had to talk to him.

But now it's worse. It's much worse, because I texted him and he didn't respond, so I texted again, and still nothing, so I texted again, and now I'm lying here staring at the clock, waiting for time to inch forward so I can leave for Soupe au Chocolat. The sun only just set, but Jacques closes early on Sunday, so I can be there all night if I want.

Six minutes.

For sanity's sake, I remind myself of the things I know. Emilio said it was too dangerous to keep that phone on him, so it must be stashed away somewhere with all my unread texts piling up. He can probably only check it once a day. If that. And if he's working insane hours for my father, maybe he can't check it at all.

But reviewing the few things I know doesn't make me feel better about the things I don't know. Like, why give me a way to get ahold of him when I can't really get ahold of him at all? And why did he have that cell phone on him anyway? Who just walks around with a secret cell phone in case they're going to need one? The questions are like links in a chain—no answers, just another link and another link and another link, until the chain is too heavy and wrapped around me.

Five minutes.

Food-wise, these cinnamon walnuts are the best thing to happen to me in a long time. They're crunchy and sweet but not cloyingly so, and salty too. My bed has taken on a cinnamon scent and gritty feel, but I don't care.

I examine the contents of the bag. I've managed to ration them out for several days, but today is definitely the end. I eat the final walnut, then hold the bag up to my lips and pour the crumbled spice-roasted dregs into my mouth. More cinnamon in the bed. Whatever.

The food situation is approaching dire. I've identified several problems, the first being my lack of cooking skills. Rice is cheap, but I burn it. Every time. I'm good with peanut butter and jelly, but that's getting old. Pasta is easy enough, but I despise having to horn my way into that greasy kitchen and use the scratched, carcinogen-leaching pots and cabbage-shellacked utensils. Everything I make in there ends up smelling like fish sauce and leaving an oily film in my mouth.

Four minutes.

That leaves eating out. I've discovered the great tragedy of purchased food: expensive = delicious, cheap = revolting. I realize that it's my stupid rich-girl upbringing screwing me over, but I'd still rather buy one tray of high-grade sushi and starve for the rest of the week than eat fourteen 7-Eleven cheese dogs. It's supposed to be a little warmer tomorrow, so maybe I'll go sit in my old spot outside the Metro and make some pity change.

At least I have more chocolate bars beneath my bed. Jacques left me another box last time. I was so happy I almost cried.

I miss yesterday, when I still had the chocolate-dipped apricots. Those were harder to hoard, though—fewer of them to begin with. But apricots are a fruit. I may have even absorbed vitamins from them.

Three minutes.