Authors: Amanda Flower
The studio was a small second bedroom that I had converted into an art den when I had rented the apartment. The flooring was slab-cement stained with acrylics, paint thinner, and every other possible substance a painter can spill, drop, or knock over while at work. Ina, upon hearing that I was a painter, allowed me to remove the carpet under a three-finger Girl Scout swear that I would replace it if and when I moved out. The room contained one window flanked on either side by metal shelves holding all the essential trappings of a painter’s arsenal: brushes, blank canvases, pigments, and remnants of rejected works. My easel faced away from the door and dominated the middle of the room. Across from the easel sat a decrepit sofa I’d salvaged from a Martin dorm and splattered with every shade of oil paint in the rainbow.
On the colored cushions, someone lay prostrate.
Startled, I cried out. The other person released an equally girlish squeak.
Mark.
“What are you doing here?” I gasped.
He clutched a throw pillow to his chest. “I was looking for you. You weren’t here, so I let myself in.”
“What are you doing in this room?” I demanded, to cover up my relief at finding him.
“I was looking for you, and then, I saw . . .” He gestured to my easel, which held a nearly complete twelve by fourteen portrait of a young girl. The girl was about ten, had cropped brown hair, startling blue eyes, and small features. She wore a bright T-shirt and ratty jean shorts. She perched on the edge of the front steps that led into her home. Her knees touched, and she hinged forward at the waist. The gaze held intensity and concealed amusement.
Olivia. A forgotten wedding gift.
“I haven’t slept in two days, but I was able to sleep here.” He stared at the painting and avoided my eyes. He laughed mirthlessly, bitterly. “She’s dead. Her mother called me this morning. She accused me of killing her. Is that what you think?”
I froze in the studio doorway. “Of course, I don’t think that.” Like Mark, I avoided using Olivia’s name. “Mrs. Blocken’s searching for a scapegoat. No one could seriously think you’d hurt anyone.” My conversation with Mains that morning came to mind, but I pushed it away. He might suspect Mark, but he didn’t know my brother.
Mark nodded, staring at his feet. Then he started to cry, powerful sobs that shook his entire body. I remained frozen, again wishing my more compassionate and maternal sister was with me. Something soft grazed my leg. Theodore. He walked across the room and crawled into Mark’s lap. Mark clung to the cat and wept into his thick fur. The cat purred in reply. Mark didn’t question the cat’s presence.
After several tense minutes in which Mark wept, Theodore comforted, and I idled, Mark wiped his face on the pillow that would never be quite the same. With his mission accomplished, Theodore deserted his master.
“Is there anything I can get you?” I asked.
He ignored the question. “I can’t even believe it, you know. Can you?”
“No.” Tired from standing but not wanting to move any closer to my brother, I sat on the cool cement floor.
“I knew that she didn’t love me and never did. I was just someone she used to pass the time,” he muttered. “But when I found out that she was engaged, I lost it. I thought I was over her. All those equations and theorems I put in my head pushed her out. But now, I know I wasn’t over her, I was just distracted from thinking about her. With her face splashed on the front page of the paper announcing the wedding, I couldn’t be distracted. I didn’t expect to feel that way when I heard about her wedding. I’m not a total idiot; I knew she was bound to get married some day. I wish I didn’t feel this way about her.”
“I didn’t think—”
“You didn’t think at all, India. You knew that I’d find out about the wedding, the social event of the summer.” His teary voice didn’t veil his anger. He stood up. “You should have told me, to at least prepare me. You could have done that much.”
I was fixed to the floor.
“So, I went to the Blocken house, the last place in the world I’d ever want to go, only to find my sister there, laughing and socializing with the family that I was never good enough for, that she was never good enough for.”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have agreed to do it when she asked. I wasn’t thinking about you and her. I was thinking about her and me. She is my friend . . .” It was all I could say. Mark would not understand how Olivia pulled me in with childhood memories, why I didn’t think of him before agreeing to be a bridesmaid. He wouldn’t understand why Olivia’s use of creepy Brad Coldecker had changed my mind.
Mark stepped back and laughed hollowly. “You mean she
was
your friend. She’s dead, India, dead. Do you understand that? She’s not marrying anyone now.”
My stomach dropped and tears welled in my eyes. “Mark, no. You didn’t.”
“I didn’t what? Tell me what I didn’t do.”
I stood. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“Did I kill her? Isn’t that what you want to know? No. But thank you for your sisterly faith. Did I see her on campus yesterday? Yes. I couldn’t believe that she actually came to see me. But she wasn’t alone.”
“Who else was there?”
“I didn’t see anyone. I only heard her talking to someone. Since she wasn’t alone, I went back to my office and waited for her to come to me. After a half hour, she never showed, and I went to the fountain and found her.” His voice trailed off.
“What were they talking about, Olivia and this other person?” I said Olivia’s name for the first time since I’d found Mark in my studio.
Mark swallowed hard. He walked directly to my easel and kicked it over. Both easel and canvas clattered to the floor. We both looked at the damage. The sharp edge of the metal easel had torn a five-inch gash into the canvas just above Olivia’s head. With a moan, Mark pushed past me and fled the room.
After a moment of paralysis, I followed him. At the front door, he struggled with lock and bolt.
“You have to tell the police what you heard.” I said, frightened by his behavior but also terrified for him. “You have to. If you don’t, even if they can never prove that you attacked her, people will still think you had something to do with it. You have to prove them wrong.”
He continued to wrestle with the door. His mania made it impossible for him to manipulate his hands correctly.
“Don’t you want to be cleared, Mark?”
I heard the mechanical click as the bolt recessed into the wooden door frame. Mark threw open the door and was gone.
Chapter Fifteen
I tried Carmen’s cell phone number but only got her voice mail. A quick rap battered my door. I peered through the peephole and saw just the crown of Ina’s white permanent.
“India Veronica Hayes, you open this door to an old woman.” Her head bobbled aggressively. “I’ll get louder. I’ll wake up the whole street from their Sunday naps.” More quietly, she added, “And anyway, Dearie, I’m your landlord, so I have a key.” She waved my apartment key over her head where she knew I could see it. It dangled from a three-inch-wide blue glittered shamrock.
I opened the door. “Home invasion, Ina?”
She sniffed. “What’s that unbelievable racket I heard through my wall?”
Ina had changed from her Sunday morning green suit into pink capri pants and matching tank top.
The loose skin under her upper arm waved as she shook her index finger at me. “What on earth is going on over here? First, I see you peel out of the driveway without waving hello, when Juliet is in the car with me of all things. Then, I overhear you screaming like a crazed banshee. It was all I could do not to come busting in here when all that yelling was going on.”
Ina shuffled further into the room. I shut the door behind her. Wouldn’t want to wake those Sunday nappers. She perched on the edge of the rocking chair, feet dangling above the floor.
“Spill it,” she ordered. “Man trouble got you, honey? I tangled with some of that in my day. Tell me the problem, Ina has the answer. I’ve been on this earth a lot of years, and I’ve learned a thing or two about handling a man. How do you think I managed not being saddled with a husband and a screaming brood of my own?”
Ina took a breath, and I jumped in. “It’s Mark.”
“Oh, I see. It’s about Olivia, is it? The accident was a terrible thing. Juliet had all the juicy gossip about it. And did she ever lord that over me, seeing how my tenant was at the scene of the crime yesterday and neglected to tell me the biggest news flash since Stripling got city-wide sewer.”
The migraine threatened to resurface. “I didn’t deliberately not tell you.”
Ina blinked, probably trying to digest the double negative. She’d placed me on the defensive and retarded my grammar.
“Is that why that bloody Englishman was over here yesterday? About Olivia?”
“Yes. I don’t have time for this. Mark ran off.”
Ina cocked her head to the side and her face softened. “I’m sure he’s fine, lassie. Maybe he went over to the hospital to visit Olivia.”
“Olivia’s dead.”
Ina covered her mouth like a heroine in a silent film. My phone rang. Irritation replaced the horror etched on her face. She scowled when I picked up the phone.
It was Carmen. “I’ve had about enough of your cryptic voice messages, India. What’s this about Mark?”
With Ina listening opened-mouthed, I told Carmen about Mains’s visit after church and finding Mark in my apartment. For once, Carmen listened without interruption.
“Okay, first relax. Mark’s probably at his office taking his frustration out on that five-hundred-dollar calculator of his. Try not to worry.”
“He was livid.”
“He needs time to cool off. You can’t canvas Stripling trying to find him. He wouldn’t—he won’t do anything stupid. Mom and Dad are at the Chaulkers for the afternoon. Wait until they get home. The last thing Mark needs right now is them on his case. He obviously wants to be alone, and you know as soon as Mom finds out she’s going to be all over him. I’ll call Mom and Dad later in the afternoon.”
Carmen’s strategic planning provided me the illusion of safety.
“How are you?” Sisterly concern inflected her words.
I choked for a second and turned away from Ina, who was still on the edge of her seat. Her expression was equal parts concern and barely contained excitement.
“I’m fine.”
“Do you want me to come over?”
“No, don’t bother. Ina’s here.”
Carmen laughed. “I’m sure she’s doing her best to comfort you.”
“Of course.”
An hour later, when Ina realized I wasn’t going to rush out the door in search of Mark or take her other suggestion and visit the mourning Blockens, she stomped out the door, claiming that she was missing a program about Irish folk singers on the public television station.
The remainder of the day, I floated around my apartment, starting a multitude of pursuits, but finishing nothing. I tried to read a novel, but the words blurred on the page. I started to tidy my bedroom, but after making my bed, I dropped a pile of dirty laundry on the floor and gave up. I picked up one of the dozens of half-full sketchpads that decorate my apartment and etched thumbnail sketches on the thick paper. The poor renderings frustrated me. I ripped the page out of the wire-ring notebook and threw it into the small hallway. It bounced off my studio’s door. I didn’t enter the studio or upright the toppled easel and painting. I’d simply shut the door.
I hoped all afternoon and into the evening that Mark would call. He never did. My mother eventually rang and chastised me for not calling her at the Chaulkers. She agreed with Carmen that Mark needed time alone, although I knew she was dying to counsel him. I went to bed early, hoping that Olivia would call in the morning to tell me she’d found a miracle self-tanner or a ridiculous hat for me to wear during the wedding. Or even a golden dress.
The next morning at Ryan Memorial Library began with a staff meeting and with Jefferson Island complaining about the Dewey Decimal System. Even when I was in top librarian form, I wasn’t up to hearing one of Jefferson’s cataloging speeches, and with events of the previous day still fresh in my mind, I wanted to run screaming from the room.
“If Martin College is going to transform itself into a university within the next ten years, it is imperative that we find another way to organize our resources that allows for growth,” Jefferson said.
It was a diatribe we’d heard countless times before.
Lasha interrupted him, “We will consider your recommendation, Dixie. Are there any other issues that should be brought in front of the entire group?”
Jefferson frowned. “I made a slideshow to illustrate my argument.”
Lasha’s expression looked pained. “I think it would be best to email it to the staff, so each librarian can review it as he or she has time.”
Beside me Bobby snickered. I bet he wasn’t going to be watching Jefferson’s slideshow.
“Well if you think that that’s best. However—”
“Excellent, I think this meeting’s over, people,” Lasha declared and rose.
“But,” Jefferson began. “I brought it with me . . .”
However, it was too late—the room emptied before he could boot up his laptop.
Behind the reference counter, Bobby slipped into one of the high chairs.
I took the other. Seeking a distraction from my thoughts, I studied Bobby’s get-up. “What’s with the suit, Bob-o? Have an afternoon dalliance planned in the stacks?”
Bobby adjusted his perfectly straight collar. “Regrettably, no, but thank you for the idea. I’m having lunch with Bree and have to exude some level of professionalism.”
“Really?”
Bobby gave me a sideways glance, “Yes.” He paused. “I’m sorry about Olivia.”
“How’d you hear?” I asked. I slapped my forehead in mock surprise. “Duh, Bree told you. Over breakfast, maybe?”
Bobby ignored my acid tone. “She called me after they removed life support yesterday morning. She was with the family and Kirk when they made the difficult decision. It’s been hard for her.”