Old School Bones (2 page)

“ALL that coffee is killing me.” Gracie groans.

“No kidding. I have to pee so bad. And someone is in the freaking bathroom!” Tory stares at the closed and locked wooden door to the bathroom on the top floor of Hibernia House.

The two girls are just back from pounding double latte espressos at the school’s Tuck Shop after their three o’clock swim-team practice. Cranked to the max. And dressed for the blizzard raging outside. Gracie is doing her alternative thing in full Red Army surplus gear: olive drab great coat, watch cap pulled down over her ears. As she pulls off her woolen mittens, she is mumbling about the new year celebrations in Hong Kong today. The bobs and weaves of dragon clans through the crowd. The relentless snapping of firecrackers that lifts you right out of your body. The heavenly scent of spiced pork sizzling in a wok. The warm, moist air.

“You gotta love a school that thinks four healthy, teenage girls can make do with a one-stall bathroom and a tub/shower.” Tory pulls off her Yankees ball cap, starts shaking tiny ice pellets out of her long, blond hair.

“Idiots!” Gracie drops the rucksack she uses to carry her books. It hits the floor with a thud. She raps on the door with her knuckles. Stomps the floor with her Doc Martens. Clumps of wet snow scatter over the ancient hardwood floor. “Hey, who the hell ever is in there! Shove it along, will you? We’re dying out here. Hey Liberty…”

“Hey, Justine?!”

“Did you call me?” A voice from the stairwell. Footsteps plodding up the stairs. Slow, labored. Justine Agoropolis crests the staircase and stumbles into the common room, a tall, slender girl staggering under a backpack loaded with textbooks. A black Northface anorak sheds melting ice and snow in streams. Her face little more than a shadow beneath the hood.

“Yeah, we thought you were hogging the bathroom.”

“Well, I’m not … but I’m thinking about it.”

“After us, girl scout.”

Justine, still just a specter with eyes beneath the black hood, pivots on her left foot, looks around the room, takes in the situation. Three of the four residents of Hibernia House are lined up outside the bathroom door.

“Is Liberty camping out in the potty again? Yo, Lib, there’s a waiting line, give us a break will you?”

“Damn it Liberty, we have to pee!”

Gracie grabs the nob to the bathroom door. She rattles it, feels that the door has been locked.
Like who the hell ever locks this door anyway?

“Liberty, unlock the goddamn door and get your black ass out of there!” It is clear from the tone of Tory’s voice she thinks that playing the race card should get action.

But the only sound coming from the bathroom is the faint beat of dripping water.

“I don’t think she’s in there … Liberty?!”

“I really have to pee.”

“Maybe she locked the door by accident before she left.” Justine is sticking up for her roomie. “She’s supposed to have a singing lesson now.”

“Well, someone sure the fuck locked the door.”

“I’m going to wet my panties if we don’t get that door open soon.”

“Relax, Gracie.” Justine throws down her book bag. “Stand back.”

Gracie and Tory barely have time to step out of the way.

Their tall friend in the anorak makes a three-step, running leap for the bathroom door, a foot connecting with a marshal arts kick at latch height.

The brass doorknob flies free, hits the floor as the door snaps open.

“Oh, shit,” says Gracie, the instant she sees the blood. “Oh, Jesus, no!”

By the time the ambulance arrives, its flashing lights cutting through the darkness and the blizzard, the Hibernia House common room reeks of stress, urine, puked latte. Two campus security officers stand guard in front of the bathroom door. Two uniformed town cops and a detective move in and out of the bathroom with paper booties on their feet, vinyl gloves on their hands, digital cameras.

A police radio crackles a garbled question.

“We’re still waiting for the state boys, the M.E. and the headmaster to show up. But we got the dean of the Academy here.” A cop talking into his radio. “She wants to see what we’re dealing with. Any objection?”

His eyes shift to this dean, Denise Pasteur. She is a tall woman with a pretty, angular face, bobbed blond hair. Even in her overcoat, turtleneck sweater, and wool slacks her body puts the cop in mind of a pro tennis player. He just can’t remember which one; some Russian maybe. She stands in the middle of the room hugging Tory and Justine to her chest.

The girls are crying. Choking, shrieking. Tory’s red-and-black school sweatshirt is stained from the latte that spills in small bursts through the hand she holds over her mouth. Justine’s olive skin has turned the color of the snow outside, her lips tremble as if trying to speak. But she can say nothing, just howl between fitful gasps for breath.

“Shssssh … Shssssh. Just let all the pain go. Let it all go, girls.”

The dean looks a little shaky herself as her eyes dart around the room to the police, the school security guys. Her gaze settles on her colleague Awasha Patterson. Reads the urgency, the give-me-strength, in Awasha’s eyes. She sits on the couch cuddling Gracie in her arms. The girl’s Red Army fatigues and Doc Martens are soaked with her own pee. Her face red from tears and something else. Terror maybe.

“Oh, Liberty! Oh, fuck, why? Why?” A litany bubbles from Gracie’s mouth.

“Did you see, Dr. Patterson? Did you see the blood? The bathtub so full of blood? Not like in the movies. Not delicate swirls and trails of red curling through the bath water. But purple. Purple like a barrel of wine poured out of Liberty. Poured over Liberty. Her body just a shadow beneath blood. Only the side of her head, her black hair, her long braids. Those copper highlights, floating above the … She was sticky with it. Her nose and mouth buried in it … as if in the end she wanted to suck back her life. Did you see it? I saw. I saw. My friend. My dear friend. My Liberty. Our Liberty. Wrists sliced open. Torn envelopes, the letters gone. Help me, Dr. Patterson.”

The police radio crackling again. Someone outside in the blizzard, the night, looking for clarity. Another plea.

Awasha hears it, shivers. Holds Gracie to her breast even tighter, to give warmth, feel warmth in this storm. As her own soul unravels.

“Dr. P …?

“Are you awake? I really have to tell you something. Something happened …” The larceny of Danny’s tongue …”Liberty, can this possibly wait …?”

She squeezes her eyes shut. Remembers the giant Maushop, her mother, the red cliffs. Aquinnah. Sees the gulls swooping. Diving on the bait fish that the stripers are driving to the surface. Screeching.

“Forgive us our trespasses.”

“SIT, Dr. Patterson … Do!”

She feels a flash of color in her cheeks, the fine black hairs in the small of her back rise as her boss Malcolm Sufridge closes the door to his office behind her. It is barely seven in the morning. The snow plows are gnawing loudly at the drifts outside, cutting paths from the dormitories to the chapel for an all-school meeting in less than two hours. Classes canceled on account of death.

“We have suffered a terrible loss. Terrible. That poor misguided child. Poor child … Alas, our Juliet is dead!” Sufridge paces the floor of his butternut-paneled office, looking tormented. Hands plowing his wispy gray hair. An actor in what he surely sees as the final scene of a tragedy. His stage this cradle of power, part library/part throne room/part Gothic castle. Domain of headmasters for centuries. A place of reprimands and punishments, private coercions and mysterious pacts.

To Awasha the room reeks of authority and privilege unknown to her own people and her gender. She prefers to stand. Let the weird old man rant.

“Sit, I say, Dr. Patterson.” The baritone voice commanding.

Awasha winces. The posh English lilt, an accent descended from ten generations of Eaton dons. An accent polished by advanced degrees in letters, in British Romantic literature, in theatre. At Oxford. A tall, thin man who wears his black academic gown like a royal robe. Both students and faculty call him Bumbledork behind his back, a rude twist on the name of the folksy titan who rules the school of witchcraft and wizardry in the Harry Potter novels.

“Over here, Awasha.”

She follows the voice, its familiar female tenderness. Blinks. For the first time since she has crossed the threshold she realizes that she is not alone with her boss, with Bumbledork. Denise Pasteur is settled into one of the three armchairs circling a baronial fireplace where an immense oak log burns.

“Yes, Dr. Patterson. Come. Sit by the fire. Let it do what it can to melt our pain.”

She can feel Denise looking at her with deep blue eyes, telegraphing a sense of urgency. A need for company. For an ally.
Like swallow a little bit of your pride, girl. Sit by me.

In spite of the fire the room feels freezing to her. When she sits, she has the urge to reach out with her fingers for the warmth of her ally’s hand.

Sufridge, looking lost in his own thoughts, a player searching his brain for his next line, settles into his throne, a faded orange Windsor chair.

“We should be hugging each other in grief right now … but there are things we must talk about. Things that we must do first for the greater good of our school, our students, and all of us who serve them.

“I know this is hard for you, Dr. Patterson, but for the sake of the school, I need you to support me here. This morning our minority students certainly, but truly everybody, at the all-school meeting will be looking to you for reassurance. You are our belle weather.” Sufridge gets up from his chair. He is ready to end this meeting.

“But, sir. My girls need me. They are devastated. We are like a family…”

“This is not up for debate, Doctor. This morning shortly after nine o’clock the three of us will stand in the front of the chapel before the students and the faculty. We will lament the foolish choice of Liberty Baker to end her life. We will sing our hymns of sad farewell, we will say our prayers of forgiveness. We will offer counseling services for those in need. Then we—”

“Sir!” She rises from her chair to face Sufridge, tossing her hair out of her eyes. Something fierce, defiant, Indian has come over her. “I beg you … don’t close Hibernia House. Don’t separate the girls and me.”

They jut their jaws at each other. Tall vs. short. Headmaster vs. director of minority affairs. Europe vs. America. White vs. Indian. Man vs. woman. Employer vs. employee. She feels all of the old rivalries, the classic tensions. The bullying. And she looks to Denise Pasteur for support.

The dean of the Academy gets to her feet. Standing as tall as Sufridge, she rolls her shoulders beneath her woolen turtleneck sweater. Ever the athlete. “Can I say something here?”

Sufridge turns away from the women, away from the confrontation. Stares at the fire as if commanding it to roar. “I should dynamite Hibernia House. If it were not such an historic building … I would wipe it off the face of the earth. This used to be such a happy school!”

“It will be again, Malcolm. I’d like to make a suggestion: Awasha’s girls need her.”

Sufridge continues to stare into the fire, runs his fingers through his hair. “We will be sending out our acceptance letters for next year’s class in just a few weeks. If we let the emotions surrounding this senseless death fester, it has the potential to devastate our yield, and the trustees have—”

Awasha throws her hands in the air. “I’m not really hearing this. A girl dies. A school is buckling under grief, and we are going to talk about admission yields, about what the trustees want, about the school’s public image?”

“Please. Each of you has a point. Hibernia House is a lightning rod for grief right now. We need to get everyone out of that place for the time being. But there is no need to scatter Awasha and these girls among other dorms. It could only serve to spread the trauma.”

“But where do you put them then?”

“How about my place, Beedle Cottage?”

She gives Denise a look. As if this is too much.

“Why not?! For the rest of the year. I know it is not a place of your own, Awasha, and you value your privacy. But it is a huge place. I have four extra bedrooms that I never use. And you can have the study. I don’t use an office at home. The girls can have the game room in the basement for their TV and cooking.”

Sufridge has turned away from the fire, is looking at his dean of the Academy with a subtle squint of recognition. She has once again demonstrated her uncommon ability to navigate clear of disaster and chaos.

“Well, Awasha?”

She rubs her hands over her eyes, suddenly feeling drunk from a lack of sleep, grief, butting heads with her boss. Something feels wrong about this plan, but she cannot figure out what. She is too wasted to fight.

Denise cocks her head, a little smile of encouragement.

“WHY are they trying to cover this thing up, Dr. P?”

Gracie and Tory are sitting on the spare bed in Awasha’s new quarters in Beedle Cottage. She squints at them from her own bed. Her head in her hands, feet on the floor. Even though it is well past midnight, everyone is still wearing their clothes, shoes.

“I don’t know what you mean, Gracie.” She doesn’t see any cover-up. The funeral was three days ago, the school still thick with TV trucks and reporters camped all around the edge of the campus. She has made this point about a dozen times during the last hour and a half of unloading from the girls. Knows it is her job to listen, and not to judge, for as long as these girls need her.

But, damn, this is getting hard. How do you take a vacation from death? And the girls’ conspiracy theory paranoia.

Tory’s eyes suddenly focus on her mentor, widen. “Are you OK, Dr. P?”

She rubs her eyes with her index fingers, feels the tears starting to pool. “I’m fine Tory, I guess. Just a little off-balance. I was starting to feel alive again after Liberty’s funeral. Justine’s leaving today came as such a shock.”

“Her parents are assholes.”

“They think she would be better at home, Gracie. Who knows, maybe they are right.”

“I doubt it. They want to put her in some kind of religious school for white girls. Like where they all wear uniforms. Can you picture someone all Greek and ethnic like Justine there?” Tory is shaking her head.

“My mother called me yesterday and said my old school in Hong Kong was willing to have me back. I told her to fuck off.”

“Gracie!”

“Well, I did. And you know a week ago, I was so sick of this place I would have jumped at the chance to leave? But not now, Dr. P. Liberty needs us. If I quit her now … I freaking know I’d regret it the rest of my life. I’d be like one of those pretend friends in
The Great Gatsby,
who just walked away from Gatsby after he was killed.”

Tory huffs. “They sucked. Daisy Buchanan, Myer Wolfsheim. Only Nick Carraway did the right thing.”

She thinks back to her days as an English teacher before becoming a dean.
The Great Gatsby
always seemed a bit effete to her. Precious. Give her a Tony Morrison novel any day. Still … Gatsby died. She felt the loss of the hope he inspired in others. “Not everyone has that kind of courage, girls. Gatsby was shot to death. Murder is a pretty scary thing.”

Gracie stiffens, moving to the edge of her seat on the bed. “That’s what I’m talking about, Dr. P. I’m telling you we are not dealing with a suicide here. Liberty loved her life, loved her biology, her singing, her track. She loved us!”

“She was going to be a doctor, find a cure for cancer. Almost everybody liked her. Lib was always the one to cheer the rest of us up in Hibernia House when we got down.”

“She wouldn’t have hurt herself. Lib always said she had seen way too many blades growing up on the streets of Roxbury and Mattapan. She hated razors so much she never even shaved her legs or under her arms!”

“Really?” Something stings her in the back of the neck.

“Yes, really. Bumbledork knows it. The cops know it. We told them about twenty times!”

“But it’s like they’re deaf. Like they don’t want any complications.”

“They just want to write off Liberty as some troubled minority kid who couldn’t take it anymore so she offed herself.”

“Yeah, the detective kept asking me about her relationship with her mother. Like ‘We heard her mother was a crackhead. That’s got to be hard.’”

Awasha pictures Liberty’s mother Teddie visiting on Parents Weekend, the addict’s high-voltage eyes. She bites her lip. “It’s true.”

“But. Dr. P, you could just feel the love when her mom took us all out to dinner this one time last year. She was so proud of Lib. Damn, my parents have only been here twice in three years. I’m not slitting my wrists.”

“Your parents live in Hong Kong, not just down the street in Mattapan.”

“My dad has business in New York and New England about once every six weeks.”

“I’m sorry, Gracie.”

“Don’t be sorry, Dr. P. Just stand by us now. We need you.”

Tory closes her eyes and growls. “I’m just so angry. We told the police about that threat that Liberty got, you know? The one that said something like ‘Back off, you stupid wog.’ No one seems to give two shits. Help us, Dr. P. How do we know Gracie isn’t next on someone’s list? Maybe the killer or killers aren’t finished. Maybe there’s more death.”

Her feet, ankles hurt from the rocks. She feels the sweat in Ronnie’s hand. The greenish hatbox clutched to her chest. Gulls are screeching. A black rattling in her chest. And her brother begging, “Help me, sister.” Her heart seizing with things she should have done differently. For her mother. For Ronnie. For Liberty.
“
Forgive your children all of our trespasses.”

“I’m not a private detective or a lawyer.”

“But maybe you know somebody.”