Liar (6 page)

She pats my shoulder. “I understand,” she says.

I hope she doesn't, and follow her along the empty hall into the art room.

AFTER

“This is Micah Wilkins,” Officer Lewis says.

Two men nod. One of them, tall and thin, is leaning up against the wall. His elbow rests against someone's painting of a cow exploding. At least, that's what it looks like. The other man is sitting in a chair that's too small for him. It looks as if it might collapse under his weight. He's much fatter and more gray than the man standing. Neither of them wears a uniform and if they have guns I can't see them.

Officer Lewis gestures to the chair next to Yayeko Shoji, who turns and nods at me. Under the table she squeezes my hand briefly. For a moment I think I might cry.

Officer Lewis stands by the door. I am perched on the edge of my seat, toes flexed. I haven't been in the art room since the tenth grade. I hated it then; I hate it now. The smells of paint, paint remover, clay, glue, chalk, pencil, dust are overwhelming.

I sneeze. Yayeko blesses me.

Why is the art room never clean? I look around at the messy paintings, the sculptures, the cabinets and desks and chairs in every imaginable color.

“Micah,” the older-looking man says, turning from his notes to me and then back to his notes. “Micah Wilkins. I'm Detective Rodriguez.”

“Hello,” I say. I wonder if they picked the art room on purpose, hoping that ugly art will make us want to confess.

The other man looks down at me, bares his teeth, and says, “Detective Stein.”

I smile but it's a little smile. I glance at Yayeko; she nods.

“We're going to ask you a few questions. That alright with you, Micah?” Detective Rodriguez asks.

“Okay,” I say. It's not okay. I don't want to answer questions. I don't want to talk about Zach. I want to run.

“Anything you can think of, even if it seems kind of irrelevant to you,” Rodriguez continues. “It might help us with the case. We need you to think hard. Tell us everything you can remember.”

“Okay,” I say again.

“Did you know Zachary Rubin well?”

I shake my head.

“Did you know him at all?”

“We were in some of the same classes.”

“Which ones?”

“Biology,” I say, glancing at Yayeko. She smiles. “English, math, Dangerous Words.”

“Dangerous Words?” Detective Stein asks.

“It's a class about censorship.”

“Interesting,” he says, but I can tell he means weird.

“When was the last time you saw him?” Rodriguez asks.

“Friday, I guess. In class.” Friday night sneaking around in Central Park. “The Dangerous Words class.”

“Did you notice anything about him? Did he seem different?”

“Different?” I ask.

The man nods.

“I didn't really look at him,” I say. “He's—he was—popular. I'm not. I stay out of his way. I don't think he's ever said a word to me in school. Or me to him.”

“I thought,” says Detective Stein, looking down at me, “that this school wasn't like that. Isn't this one of those alternative schools where everyone's happy and no one gets beat up at recess?”

“Does that question have anything to do with your investigation?” Yayeko asks.

“I was just wondering, Ms. Shoji,” Stein says. “I didn't think a hippie school would have popular kids.”

“Wherever there are people,” Yayeko observes, “there are hierarchies.”

“True enough,” Stein says. “And Zachary Rubin was high in this school's hierarchy? Is that right, Micah?”

“Very,” I say. “With students. With teachers. He was good at everything. Especially hoops.”

“Hoops?” Stein says with a smirk to his voice. “I thought schools like this didn't have much of an athletics program.”

“We don't,” Yayeko says. “Not compared to more traditional schools. But some of our students are very athletically gifted.”

“Like Zachary?” Stein asks.

“Like Zach,” Yayeko confirms.

“Was he ever mean to you, Micah? Popular kids often are.”

“No.”

“Where are you in the school hierarchy?”

“Not very high.” I prefer being invisible. Not that I am anymore. Thanks to Brandon.

“Micah is one of my star students. She's popular with me,” Yayeko says, and I wish she hadn't. Detective Stein smirks some more.

“Do you think other students resented Zachary's popularity?” Detective Rodriguez asks.

“I don't know,” I say. “Probably.” Brandon Duncan certainly does. Did.

“You say Zachary was popular,” Rodriguez says. “Did you like him?”

“Sure,” I say. “I certainly didn't
not
like him, you know? He seemed like a nice guy. He never did anything mean to me. Or anyone else that I saw.”

“But some other students have?” Stein asks.

“Have what?” I ask.

“Been mean to you.”

“I can take care of myself,” I say, crossing my arms. I bet Detective Stein was as unpopular as me. More even. I bet being back in high school makes him tense. Even a “hippie” one like this.

“I'm sure you can,” Stein says. “And which students have forced you to take care of yourself?”

“No one in particular. I mostly get left alone.”

Stein stares at me. I can tell he doesn't believe it.

“Well, if you think of anything that might help our investigation,” Rodriguez says, glancing up at Stein and then back to me, “you let us know.”

I nod. “I will.”

“You can go back to class now.”

I don't. I go into the bathroom and hide in one of the stalls until the bell for next period. I don't want to hear any whispering for a while.

BEFORE

It's true that Zach never spoke to me in school. He didn't look at me either. Not before, anyway. After, he would sometimes catch my eye when he was sure no one else was looking at him or at me. Easy to find a moment when there were no eyes on me, difficult to find one for himself.

We met for the first time in Central Park. Under a bridge hung with icicles. Winter of our junior year. Middle of the day. A weekday. A school day.

I say “we met” even though we'd been in school together since we were freshmen. We exchanged a few words during the one game of hoops. But we'd been in classes ever since without so much as saying hi, how you doin'. He spoke to the cool kids. I spoke to no one, not even my teachers—except Yayeko—if I could avoid it.

Under the bridge he spoke to me.

“Micah, isn't it?”

I was staring up at the icicles. It was warmer that day and they were dripping. I wondered how long before they fell, which one would be first.

“You like icicles, huh?”

I turned to look at him. I knew who he was from his voice. I am better at voices than faces. His was deep. The kind you want to hear sing or read a sermon. So that you can float away on the words blurred together. It was too deep a voice for a sixteen-year-old boy. It was deeper than my dad's.

This time, I really looked at him. I never had before. I have learned to let my gaze slide over the surface of people without retaining anything or resting anywhere. That way no one calls me “freak.”

I saw that he was beautiful. Not weedy like he'd been in our freshman year, though still lean. Taller, too. Much taller. I guess we both were.

“I'm Zach,” he said, even though he knew I knew that. “I like them, too. Icicles, I mean. Only good thing about winter.”

We stared at each other. I saw how smooth his skin was, how fine the pores. Then we looked up at the icicles. Fifteen of them. Each one dripping.

“You think they're going to last the day?”

“No,” I said. Surprised that I could find my tongue. “It's too warm.” Why was he talking to me?

He took a step closer. “We're in biology together, aren't we?”

I nodded.

“That Yayeko is weird, don't you think? Smart though. She's probably the smartest teacher we got.”

I nodded again. No boy had ever stood this close to me before.

“I like those classes,” he said, moving even closer. He didn't mention that if we were in school where we were supposed to be, Yayeko Shoji's class would be starting soon. “Cells and glycolysis and fast-twitch muscles. I play ball better from learning all that stuff, you know?”

I nodded. I wasn't sure I could speak with his breath misting so near my own. But it was true. Yayeko taught us about life, broke it into its components, so that our movements through space made sense. When I ran I thought about the movements of my muscles and joints, the glucose and oxygen making energy together.

He brushed his lips gently along my cheek.

I didn't move. The shock of it froze me. Why had he done that? He'd never looked at me that way. He'd never really looked at me any kind of way.

His lips were dry and warm. No other part of us touched. Blood moved faster through my veins and capillaries. Without willing them to, my lips parted slightly. An “oh” escaped from me.

“Biology is probably my favorite class,” he said, letting his lips slide toward my ear, gently pressing his teeth into my lobe.

“Mine too,” I said, glad to be able to speak again. Because it was true: biology is the
only
class I like.

The smell of him was curling into my nose and mouth. Sweat, meat, soap, and something else I didn't have a word for. My pulse beat faster. I felt it in my throat. The skin all over my body tightened.

Why was he kissing me? How many other girls had he kissed like this?

“No one else notices. But I seen how pretty you are,” he said. “You got the biggest eyes.”

He kissed the corner of each and the tip of my nose with his dry, soft lips.

Something crashed beside us.

We turned.

The largest of the icicles lay shattered into hundreds of slivers of ice. I bent and picked up one of the largest pieces. Cold, and the broken edge sharp like a knife.

FAMILY HISTORY

Dad grew up with two crazy white ladies who worried about the family illness, how to increase apple and hay yields, how to keep the farm animals living longer, and whether their children were running too wild or just wild enough.

Grandmother had the one child. Great-Aunt Dorothy and Great-Uncle Hilliard had six. If he hadn't died it would probably have been more. Four of them with the family illness. Because of that they homeschooled all of them. Not Dad, who didn't have the illness. He went to a boarding school in Connecticut on a scholarship, where he was one of only five black students. None of whom he liked. He kept to himself, proving himself to be more of a Wilkins than he cared to admit. He studied French and everything he could about France, especially Marseille. Because all he knew about his father was that he was a French sailor from Marseille.

Dad went to France when he was eighteen. Worked his way over as a merchant marine, which he hated. He didn't find his father. But he did find lots of pretty French girls. Including my mom. He brought her home, though not all the way upstate. He stopped in the city and stayed there.