Deadly Little Lies (12 page)

When I get home from my date with Adam, my parents are waiting up for me in the living room.

“You’re lucky,” Dad says, locking the dead bolt behind me. “You made your curfew with three minutes to spare. Your mother was a speed dial away from calling your cell.”

“Did you have a nice time?” she asks, blowing out an aromatherapy candle.

“It was fun.”

“And that’s it?” she asks. “Where is he from? What do his parents do? Does he live in a dorm?”

“Can’t this inquisition wait until tomorrow?”

“Not really.” Mom rises from the sofa. “You’re dating this boy; I want to know about him.”

“He was a perfect gentleman,” I say to assure her.

“Well that’s a relief.” She softens finally. “I think it would have broken your dad’s heart if you hadn’t enjoyed yourself.”

“No pressure, of course,” Dad says. “You don’t have to marry him or anything . . . even though he
was
the lead striker on his high school team for three years in a row.”

“I’m going to bed,” I say, eager to call Kimmie. I kiss them both good night, and head off to my room.

Kimmie picks up on the first ring: “I want every detail.”

“So much for a hello.”

“Hello . . . I want every detail.”

I give her the CliffNotes version of my date, telling her everything we talked about, and how the food was amazing.

“And
after
the food and talking?” she asks.

“What do you mean?”

“Do I need to draw you a picture?”

“We said good-bye. He dropped me off in front of my house. Then he drove away once I went in.”

“And that’s it? No smooching? No petting? Not a single brush against the thigh?”

“I’m nowhere near ready for any of the above,” I say.

“Unless it’s with a certain touch boy, am I right? Did Adam even
try
to go in for a kiss?”

“Nope.”

“Which could only mean one thing.”

“He’s not interested?”

“Even worse,” she says. “He must really respect you.”

“The horror of it all.”

Kimmie laughs and then tells me about her date with Todd. “We went to Pizza Slut and then made out in the parking lot for two hours straight.”

“Seriously?”

“I have the hickeys to prove it. I came home tonight totally exposing a really mean-looking one on my neck, but my mom was too engrossed in her Lifetime movie to notice, and my dad still isn’t home.”

“Oh,” I say, glancing at the clock. It’s a little after midnight.

“He’s been working into the wee hours of the morning,” she says, as though reading my mind. “He has a lot of clients in from out of town and he’s forced to take them out to dinner and stuff. Not that it would matter. I could probably come home nine months pregnant and neither of them would notice.”

“But let’s not go testing that theory,” I say.

“Are you kidding? I’d have to design a whole new wardrobe. Plus, I hear that feet swell when you’re pregnant. Just try to find a pair of vintage heels in a size thirteen.”

“Well, that’s a relief . . . about the pregnancy thing, I mean.”

“Speaking of relief, Todd’s completely ecstatic not to be dating Debbie anymore. You were right, by the way, she totally still blames Ben for her stint in coma-ville, hence the evil look she gave him last week.”

“Even though it was her friends who were playing a joke on her? Making her all paranoid, making her believe that she was being stalked. . . ?”

“What do you want from me? It’s just what Todd said. He also said I have a really pretty mouth. Do you think he was just sucking up?”

“It sounds like he was sucking pretty hard,” I say, referring to her hickeys.

“Well, whatever. He said Debbie and him still talk sometimes, since they both live on the same street. Apparently she thinks that if it wasn’t for Ben and his seedy past, and coming to our school, nothing like that would ever have happened.”

“Now, why doesn’t that surprise me?”

“Well, what
might
come as a surprise is the fact that Debbie hasn’t ruled out the possibility that Ben’s the one who hit her that night.”

“He doesn’t have a car.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t have an alibi either.”

“He was with
me
that night,” I snap. It’s true that he was. That was the night Ben and I ended up at Knead— the night when we first kissed.

“I knew this would make you upset,” Kimmie says. “I shouldn’t have even said anything.”

“No,” I insist. “I want to hear it.”

“Okay, well, Debbie still argues that Ben would have had enough time to drop you off and then plow her down, because Columbus Street is right near your house.”

“And the no-car factor? I mean, the witness was sure it was a car. He even knew the make and model.”

“I suppose it doesn’t help that they never found the driver, or the car itself.”

“You’re right,” I whisper. “It doesn’t help.” It’s the one tiny detail that’s bothered me all along.

March 27, 1984


Dear Diary,


My sister announced tonight that she’s becoming a vegetarian. Our mother wasn’t happy, especially since she made bacon and eggs for supper. At first she told Jilly to just skip the bacon (she’d use it in sandwiches tomorrow), but then Jilly said that she was anti-eggs too, which basically caused our mother to flip out. She threw the frying pan on the floor, told Jilly how ungrateful she is, and then stormed away, slamming her bedroom door behind her.


Jilly gave me her plate full of food so I wouldn’t have to pick mine off the floor. She fixed herself a bowl of dry cereal.


And then she smiled at me.


It was a knowing smile, as if maybe this was her way of helping me out, causing problems to get our mother off my back for a change, and onto hers.


I smiled back, desperate to ask her if that was the case, but instead I just stayed quiet, afraid that I might have been wrong. If I was wrong, I didn’t want to know it.


Love,
Alexia


I wake up early the following morning with an insatiable need to sculpt. It’s what I dreamed about all night—until the sun finally peeped in through the cracks of my window shades, nudging me to get up, to go down into the basement studio, and to feel the sticky wet earth against my fingertips.

Barely 9 a.m., my parents have already been up for hours. My mom usually does her sun salutations at 5 o’clock every morning. And Dad hits his NordicTrack around 7. Neither of them is home now, though. They’ve left a note on the fridge for me, saying they went to Raw for breakfast. And so I grab a quick bowl of sugarcoated cereal from Dad’s secret stash and head downstairs.

It’s freezing in the basement. It seems my dad left the corner window open a crack to diminish the pottery fumes he insists are real. I close it up, surprised by the strength of the wind; it blows my hair back and makes my eyes water. Still, despite the cold, the sun pours in through the glass, illuminating my worktable. I light one of my mom’s aromatherapy candles—one with bits of rose petals embedded into the wax—and inhale the tealike scent.

The clay is cool and moist in my grip. I wedge it out against my board while images of all sorts rush through my brain. I breathe through the sensation, and through the spinning feeling inside my head, trying my best to concentrate on the one image that seems to stand out against all the others. And then I begin to sculpt.

Keeping my clay thoroughly saturated with a sopping-wet sponge, I smooth my fingers over the mound, sealing up cracks and creating arches where I feel they belong. After well over an hour, the clay still doesn’t look anything like the picture inside my head. Still, I keep working, trying not to focus so much on the end product, but on the muscles of my hands as they form curves along the base.

I close my eyes again, concentrating on the image I see: a horse, its legs kicked upward as if in a jump. After several more minutes I begin to feel the head appear as I sculpt the mane. I open my eyes, feeling a flood of excitement wash over my skin, just knowing I’m getting things right.

A second later, I hear something behind me. A high-pitched whispering sound.

I stop. I peer around the basement, wondering if it was just my imagination because I know I’m alone. I listen for several more seconds, but between the wind howling outside, causing the house to settle in a series of cracks and hisses, and the perpetual pop and hum of the heating furnace, I can’t really tell.

I turn back around to resume my work. A few moments later, I hear it again—only it’s clearer this time: “Camelia,” a female voice whispers. It’s followed by a giggling sound, sending chills straight down my spine.

I blow out the candle and move toward the staircase. “Mom?” I call, wondering if my parents are home from breakfast. But the door that leads upstairs is still closed.

I start up the staircase, noticing the creaking sound beneath my feet. I edge the door open and enter the kitchen. Everything appears normal, just as I left it. But then I hear something else. The windows in the living room rattle from the whipping of the wind outside. I check to make sure the panes are locked, and then continue around the house. The front and back doors are closed and dead bolted. The driveway’s empty. And my bedroom looks exactly as I left it.

I reluctantly head back downstairs and switch on the overhead lights. Everything appears just as it should: Dad’s tool bench to the left, my sculpture studio just behind it, and all our storage to the right.

So why do I feel like I’m being watched?

I pull my sweatshirt sleeves down over my fingers in an effort to stifle the chill. Then I look back over my shoulder toward the upstairs door, wondering if I should call someone.

Instead I count to ten, reminding myself that I’m alone, that the house is locked, and that Matt is far, far away. Still, I gaze over at the basement windows, wondering if maybe the voice wasn’t part of my imagination at all—if maybe it was coming from outside somehow.

I move across the concrete floor, peeking behind old furniture and picking through boxes, until I reach the basement door—the one that leads to the bulkhead that opens to outside. I press my back against it, fighting the urge not to scream.

I mean, am I really hearing voices? Or is it all just in my head?

The image of the horse still alive in my mind, I move toward my studio, hoping my piece didn’t get too dry, that I’ll still be able to continue my work.

But then I hear more whispering: “Be careful,” a voice says, in a piercing tone that vibrates through the center of my gut. It’s followed by more giggling.

I reach for my cell phone, realizing it isn’t in my pocket. It’s upstairs. I survey the room, but I don’t see anyone. And everything remains still.

“Who’s there?” I call. There’s an icy sensation inside my veins.

When no one answers, I take a deep breath and try not to cry, wondering if maybe the answer lies in my sculpture. Maybe I need to complete the piece to understand what the voice is warning me about.

I place my hands over the clay mound. At the same moment, a foreboding feeling settles on my shoulders, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.

“Be careful,” the voice whispers again.

I clench my jaw, fighting the urge to cover my ears, even though I end up doing it anyway. My clay-stained hands slide against the sides of my face, over my ears, and I shake my head. “No!” I shout, when the whispering doesn’t stop.

I look back over my shoulder, toward the basement door that leads outside. It sounds like the giggling is coming from just behind it. I grab an X-Acto knife from my tray of tools and move back in that direction. My legs quiver with each step. The closer I get to the door, the louder the giggling sound becomes. My heart stomps. Tears soak my cheeks.

The basement door’s only inches away; I reach for the knob. In one quick motion, I whisk the door open, the knife held high above my head.

No one’s there. There’s only a set of steps leading up to the bulkhead door. Still the whispering continues. It’s just a faint, faraway voice now, too distant to make out the words.

I climb the steps and unlatch the lever that opens the bulkhead. I swing the doors open wide. Cobwebs fall, brushing against my face, landing on my lips. I wipe them away as best I can and climb outside.

My yard appears absolutely normal with its small brick patio and large grassy area. A tall wooden fence surrounds it. I pace the length, looking for footsteps in the patches of snow, but I don’t see anything. And I no longer hear the voice.

I sit down on the edge of a bench and bury my face in my hands, almost wishing someone
were
out here. At least it would explain the voices.

I wipe my eyes, gearing myself up to go back inside. I’m just about to climb through the doors, when I notice a streak of red down the side of the bulkhead. It looks like paint.

I grab the edge of the door on the right and flip it closed. Someone’s written on it. The letters RE are stacked atop the letters AD in a dark red color.

For just a moment I think it’s a message directing me to read something. But then I flip the opposite door closed and the message becomes clear: YOU’RE DEAD.