The Last Good Girl (35 page)

She pressed her back against the tower and inched farther along the concrete ledge, away from the window. The breeze ruffled her hair, blowing wisps back from her face. She gazed out over the campus.

Anna stepped toward her. “Emily.”

“Don't come near me,” Emily said. She lifted a foot from the ledge and dangled it out in front of her. Anna's stomach somersaulted. The concrete apron below would be a deadly place to land. Anna recalled a case she'd had two years ago, where a woman had been pushed off a three-story balcony of the U.S. Capitol. When her head hit the ground, her skull had shattered. This was higher. Anna swallowed back a wave of nausea. She could not come this far, finally finding Emily—a live, whole girl—only to watch her kill herself.

“Emily,” Anna said, staying perfectly still. “This isn't the answer.”

Emily put her foot back, so both feet were on the ledge. She turned to look at Anna.

“I'll bet you came from a really nice family, didn't you?” Emily said.

Anna shook her head. “What?”

“I'll bet your mom loved you, and you knew it. I'll bet your dad checked your homework every night. So of course this wouldn't seem like the answer. But to someone like me—who only gets love and protection when I'm dead—well, this seems pretty logical, right? I'm not trying to be, like, melodramatic here. I'm just saying. What's the point?”

“The point is, dead girls can't tell their stories,” Anna said. “You have a story to tell.”

“Don't you get it? I told my story. I told it over and over. To the Disciplinary Committee. To my dad. On BlueTube. It didn't matter. Only dying did.”

“People will listen to you now,” Anna said. “That's for sure.”

“You didn't answer my question about your family.”

“Okay.” Anna slowly stepped toward the window. Emily shook her head and Anna stopped moving. “Okay. I'll tell you about my family. My mom was beautiful and kind and had a weakness for my dad. He used to beat her up.”

Emily was listening, so Anna kept talking. She wasn't sure that the story of her childhood was going to inspire anyone to live. She wasn't trained in talking down someone contemplating suicide. But she remembered hearing somewhere that you just got them talking. The longer they talked, the better the chances of a good outcome. Anna hated talking about her family. But she would, if it kept Emily from taking that last step. She let the words flow out of her.

“He kept apologizing. And she kept forgiving him. Saying he'd do better, he'd change. He was never kinder to her than right after a beating. And she wanted to believe the best in him. She wanted to believe that he could change, for her, and that she could help him. So she kept taking him back. And things would be okay for a while. Until they weren't, and he'd beat her up again.”

“He sounds even worse than my dad,” Emily said. “And that's a high bar. How'd you get over it?”

“I'm not sure I ever really did,” Anna said slowly. “I think I spent a lot of my life looking for the dad I never had.”

She thought of all the bad-boy boyfriends she had in high school and college. At some point, she'd realized that if she kept dating the worst guy in any room, she was going to end up just like her mom. Getting engaged to Jack had been the final proof that she was not destined to relive her mother's life.

“So how'd you end up here?” Emily asked softly.

Anna glanced back into the dark room. Sam was gone. Anna was alone talking to Emily.

“I'm in the same place you are,” Anna said. “You and I are standing in exactly the same place.”

“No. We're worlds apart. You got over it.”

“Mm,” Anna said. “ ‘Got over it' is not how I would describe myself. Every day, I muddle through. I try to do the best I can with what I've got.”

“The thing is,” Emily said, “this is the best I've got.”

“No. You're so much more than this.”

“Stop. Not you too. I'm so sick of being a good girl. These ridiculous expectations. Be sweet, be polite. Play well with others. Don't complain. Laugh at ‘boys being boys.' Don't ruin anyone's life, even if they ruined yours. Go along, be easy, be nice. Always, always, be nice. God, we're so trained up, from the moment we can talk. Make everyone else happy. Smile and laugh and fucking take it.”

Sirens wailed. Anna could see blue and red lights flashing in the distance.

“Come on down,” Anna said softly. “Come back. We'll fight this together. I've been looking for you for so long. I feel like I know you—but I don't, not really. I want to get to know the real Emily Shapiro. I want to help you. I'll fight for you. With you.”

“You already did. But you can't get me what I want.”

“What do you want, Emily?”

“I want to go viral.”

She was smiling at Anna as she jumped off the ledge.

L
ater, the news stations would play the video over and over, at actual speed and then again in slow motion, in loop after loop, repeating on local channels, on national outlets, on YouTube and BlueTube and Vine. Emily standing on the ledge of the clock tower, bending her knees and springing up ever so slightly before going down. The lights meant to illuminate the tower lit Emily's fall spectacularly. Her long brown hair escaped from its band and flowed around her head. Her arms wafted to her sides like wings. In slow motion, she floated toward the ground, her hair swirling around her like she was underwater. At real speed, she just stepped and fell. It took less than two seconds for her to go from the top of the tower to the concrete below.

A few local reporters had gotten there just in time to catch Emily jumping. They'd heard Sam's calls for backup on their police scanners. They arrived moments before the police did, just in time for their camera operators to jump out of the vans, race to the tower, and point their cameras at the girl on the ledge.

The anchors narrated what the video cameras had captured. “Emily Shapiro, the girl who has been missing for a week at Tower University, suspected of being kidnapped and murdered, was found alive,” said NBC Local 4 anchor Carmen Harlan, “only to throw herself off Tower's five-story clock tower before firefighters could arrive.”

They showed the video again, in slow motion: the flowing five-story fall, Emily's long hair billowing in the wind. And the landing, the most telegenic part of all.

She landed on Sam.

Not squarely on her. Emily's ankle caught Sam's shoulder, knocking the FBI agent down to the sidewalk. Sam's head hit the cement, hard. The stations played that over and over too. Sam's skull knocking the cement. A grimace of pain, before her eyes shut. A gash on her temple and a pool of blood. Emily herself fell into the heap of mattresses that Sam had been dragging under the window.

“Emily Shapiro is in the hospital, with serious injuries,” said Fox 2 anchor Huel Perkins.

“A mattress, or even a stack of them, is not sufficient to break a five-story fall,” said 7 Action News anchor Stephen Clark, “although Emily Shapiro's exact injuries are not being disclosed by the hospital at this point.”

“Her parents have not returned calls from this station,” said Harlan.

“We've received word that the FBI agent who saved her life may have sacrificed her own,” Perkins said. “Agent Samantha Randazzo was rushed to the hospital with life-threatening injuries.”

They played a video of EMTs carrying Sam away, her dark curly hair spilling over the side of the stretcher. Sam was pale and motionless. They loaded her body onto an ambulance and sped off into the night.

“Neither the hospital nor the FBI has any comment at this time,” said Clark. “According to FBI sources, the agency will not issue a statement about a fallen agent until her family has been notified. We'll keep you posted with any breaking news. Stay tuned.”

A
nna woke up disoriented and sore. She was curled in a scratched pleather chair she'd never seen before. The bright, unfamiliar room smelled of bleach and metal. She slowly unfurled herself and looked around. The walls were mint green; a curtain hanging from the ceiling separated two beds. One was empty. Sam lay in the other. Her eyes were closed. A bag of saline dripped clear liquid into an IV tube going into Sam's arm. Anna finally recognized where she was. She'd spent the night in this hospital room by Sam's side.

Anna pulled the chair next to Sam's bed and held her hand, which was cool and dry. Sam wasn't the touchy-feely type. Anna never would've dared hold her hand if she were conscious. The fact that she wasn't slapping Anna's hand away was frightening.

Anna sat there for a long time. The sun rose outside, shining into Anna's eyes until it got so high she couldn't see it anymore. Medical personnel bustled in and out of the room, checking Sam's monitors, replacing saline bags, giving her shots through the IV. Sam didn't move. The monitors beeped and whirred, the fluorescent lights hummed and flickered, footsteps in the hall clicked and clacked. The noises were driving Anna crazy.

Anna picked up the remote control and turned on the TV mounted on the wall.

Barney Shapiro was holding a press conference on the lawn of Beaumont Hospital—which was where Anna was. She might be able to see them if she went to the window. She was too exhausted to check. His ex-wife, Beatrice, stood next to him, solemn and quiet. He spoke somberly into a microphone.

“First, Beatrice and I would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to all those who came together to try to find our daughter. We have been overwhelmed by the generosity of friends and strangers. Thank you for caring, for your time, for your efforts. They were not for nothing. They helped Beatrice and me get through a very rough time. Thank you.

“As you may know, my daughter was found safe and alive yesterday. We are unbelievably grateful and relieved. We're still working with authorities and witnesses to discover what led to her disappearance. We are happy to announce that Emily is doing well. She suffered only a broken ankle from her fall, which is a miracle. We will be reaching out to counselors to get the help Emily and we need.”

“I hope they know some good counselors,” Anna murmured. “I hope they put 'em on retainer.”

Barney gripped the podium and pursed his lips in the universal signal of a man who is in deep, deep shit. “I am also announcing that I am stepping down as president of Tower University, effective today. Obviously, this is a time when my family needs me. Resigning will allow me to spend the time necessary to help heal with my daughter. As of tomorrow, a committee will be formed to search for a new president. But in the interim, I'm pleased to announce that Dr. Susan Blum will be named acting president of the university. She brings to bear the knowledge, wisdom, and skills that this university so badly needs.”

“And the ovaries,” Sam whispered.

“Yeah,” Anna said. “Sam! You're up! How are you doing?”

“I can't believe she broke my fucking shoulder.”

“It's your head we're all worried about.”

“Eh. I've got a thick skull. When can I get out of here?”

“Soon, I hope,” Anna said. She pressed the call button.

On the screen, Barney stepped aside and let Dr. Blum take the podium. He and Beatrice left the stage and walked together toward a waiting car. Kristen LaRose was nowhere in sight.

Dr. Blum spoke into the microphone, “I'm honored and humbled to take this role. I hope to keep steering the Tower University ship in the profitable direction that President Shapiro so skillfully did. At the same time, I hope to focus on issues of gender equality here on the campus, making sure sex-abuse survivors are heard and recognized. We will be hiring a new Title Nine coordinator and a team of consultants . . .”

“About time,” Sam said. She started to sit up.

“Hey, wait,” Anna said. “Stay in bed. I called for a nurse.”

“I don't need a nurse. Where are my clothes?”

“I'm not telling you where your clothes are. Lie down.”

Sam pushed the bedsheets away, swung her legs over the side of the bed—then closed her eyes and swayed. Anna caught her before she fell to the floor. She held Sam's shoulders and gently laid her back down on the pillow.

“You stubborn mule,” Anna murmured. “Cut that out.”

Sam nodded and didn't try to get up again. A nurse finally came in. “Oh, look who's up!” she said cheerfully. “You'll have a lot of people happy to see you.”

The nurse took notes in Sam's chart and spoke to her. “We were worried about you for a while there. But we gave you a CAT scan, and everything inside is looking good. No internal bleeding. Just a good old-fashioned concussion, which is like a bruise on the brain.”

“Will it affect how I think?”

“You might get headaches. Let us know if you have nausea or vomiting. But you were lucky. I'd say the most you'll suffer is some mood effects—like being more prickly, grumpier for a bit.”

“Even more than usual?” Sam said.

The nurse smiled at her. “You also broke your shoulder. It'll need time and rest to heal. You won't be able to do gymnastics.”

“Never my thing,” Sam said. “Is Emily in this hospital?”

“I can't answer questions about other patients.”

“I'm the FBI agent on this case. Her parents signed a medical waiver.”

“I gave it to the front desk,” Anna said.

“Ah, right. Ms. Shapiro is right down the hall.”

“Is she okay?”

“For the most part,” the nurse said. “You did a wonderful thing.”

Sam met Anna's eyes. “If you hadn't kept her talking, I never could've gotten those mattresses there in time.”

“I'm a lawyer. Talking is pretty much all I've got.”

“Can we go see her?” Sam said to the nurse.