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his head through the little window above the sink. I can’t

help but think about it for a second, about him or Mom hav-

ing to open the door to the police for the third time.

For the last time.

I don’t want that for them. I’ve put them through as

much hell as they’ve heaped on me. Probably more.

But it can’t matter. I can’t let it matter. What matters is

fi nding Mina’s killer.

“Hey, wanna unclench there?” Rachel asks. She shoots

a look at the balled-up note in my hand until I relax my

fi ngers. “That’s evidence! Anyway, there’s one more thing.”

Rachel gestures at the baggie. I reach inside it and pull out

a business card.

WOMEN’S HEALTH

(531) 223-3421

“Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me,” I say. “Did you call it?”

T E S S S H A R P E

259

“I was waiting for you,” Rachel says. “But you know, it

doesn’t take a brain surgeon to make the logical assump-

tion here. You
know
why girls go to Women’s Health.”

I key the number into my phone. My mind’s racing

as it rings and rings. Finally, it clicks over to voice mail.

“You’ve reached Margaret Chase, adoption coordinator for Wom-

en’s Health. I’m on vacation and will be back at my desk on July

eighth. If you leave your name and number, I’ll get back to you

when I return. Thanks, and have a great day.”

I hang up, staring down at the phone, my suspicion

confi rmed.

“I was right, wasn’t I?” Rachel asks. “Jackie was

pregnant.”

“Margaret Chase is an adoption counselor,” I say. “And

in Mina’s interview with Matt, she asked about his and

Jackie’s sex life. He got all offended.”

“Okay . . .” Rachel says, sitting down on the edge of one

of the raised beds, gesturing for me to join her. I take the

bed across from her, sitting on the ground with my back

against the wood for support, instead of trying to balance.

“Let’s think about this. Say Jackie gets pregnant. . . .”

“And she wants to give the baby up for adoption,” I con-

tinue, looking down at Margaret Chase’s card. “She’s got

college. She couldn’t play soccer with a baby. So, she tells

Matt—and what then?”

“A few possibilities,” Rachel says. “Matt could have

wanted her to get an abortion. She refuses, so he kills her.

Though that seems kind of extreme, especially if she was

gonna give the baby up. But a seventeen-year-old with a

burgeoning drug problem probably doesn’t want a baby

260

F A R F R O M Y O U

around. And he’s probably not making the most rational

decisions.”

“What if he did want the baby, though?” I look down

at the two notes sitting in the baggie in front of me. At the

way the most important people in Mina’s life are there in

black and white, a threat to the heart of her. The only kind

that would’ve gotten her to really back off. “Family’s impor-

tant. And Matt’s dad walked out on him and Adam. Maybe

he freaked at the idea of giving the baby to strangers. Kill-

ing Jackie might not have been planned. It could’ve been an

accident. They could’ve fought about the baby and things

got out of hand. He pushed her and she hit her head or

something like that.”

“Is he an angry guy? What was he like today when you

talked to him?” Rachel asks.

“He seemed . . . tired,” I say. “Sad. He said that he

believes Jackie’s still alive.”

Rachel raises an eyebrow.

“I wish I’d known all this stuff before I talked to him.” I

look down at my phone. It’s almost six thirty.

I think about Matt in his apartment this morning, hold-

ing on to the six-month chip like it was a lifeline. David had

given me a schedule of Narcotics Anonymous meetings

and I’d reluctantly keyed them into my phone’s calendar.

I pull it up. The Wednesday meeting is at the Methodist

church—it’ll be ending soon. I bet anything he’s there right

now. Even if he’s using again, he might go just to keep up

appearances.

“Hey,” I say to Rachel. “Want to take a drive?”

• • •

261

The meeting is letting out when Rachel and I pull into the

church parking lot. People walk down the steps, mingling

at the bottom, a few pulling out cigarettes as they chat.

“Stay close, okay?” I ask her. I’ll need some backup in

case it gets ugly.

“Stick around where I can see you,” Rachel counters.

“Deal. Be right back.”

“Remember:
subtlety
!” she calls after me.

There’s a tall man with his back to me talking to Matt as

I approach. When I get to the steps, I realize it’s his uncle.

I remember what Adam had said, about family having to

make sure Matt went to meetings. I can’t imagine it, shar-

ing like that, and letting your family listen.

“Sophie.” Coach smiles at me. “Your Dad is so happy to

have you back. How are you feeling”

“Hi, Coach, Matt.” I look up at the church. “I’m doing

good. Feeling kind of stupid right now—I must’ve misread

the meeting time. I thought it said seven.”

“No, it starts at six,” Matt says.

Coach’s cell phone rings. “I’ve got to get that,” he says,

squeezing Matt’s shoulder. “Good job today,” he says in an

undertone. “Sophie, it was great seeing you. Tell your dad

I’ll get back to him about the game next Thursday.”

“I will,” I say as he steps away toward the parking lot to

take his call.

Matt’s smiles down at me. “I’m sorry you missed the meet-

ing, but there’s another one tomorrow at the Elk’s Lodge.”

If I were Mina, I’d smile back and twirl my hair. I’d ask

innocuous questions, make him feel comfortable, lull him

into my net.

262

F A R F R O M Y O U

But my edges are too sharp. I want this done.

“I’m actually not here for a meeting. I’m here to ask you

if you got Jackie pregnant.”

Matt’s smile vanishes, along with most of the color in his

face. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Look, I could be all nice like earlier, dodging around

the questions, but you’re a tweeker. Lying is what you do.

So—you . . . Jackie. Did you get her pregnant?”

I stare hard at his face, trying to see the answer in it

because I know his words won’t tell me. But there’s just

fury pulsing off him. He looks over his shoulder, where his

uncle is standing just out of hearing distance.

“You need to get the hell out of here.” He steps toward

me when he says it, and I hear a car horn blast from the

parking lot—Rachel letting me know she has my back.

“Was Detective James right?” I ask, never taking my

eyes away from him. He won’t meet them, and his shoul-

ders shake underneath the baggy polo he’s wearing. “Did

you do it? Did you take her? Kill her? Was the baby why?”

“You are so out of line,” he says. “Get out of here.”

“Or what?” I ask. “Are you going to hit me in the

head with a piece of rebar again? Try to fi nish me off this

time?”

He backs hastily away from me, all the fi ght suddenly

gone. “You’re a crazy bitch,” he says. “And you need to

leave me the hell alone.”

He stalks down the steps toward Coach Rob, and I stare

at his retreating back, at the line of his shoulders, trying,

trying
to recognize something from that night—something,

T E S S S H A R P E

263

anything
in the way he walks or sounds. Rachel comes run-

ning up to me, breathing hard.

“Are you okay? What happened?” she asks.

I keep staring after Matt until he turns the corner. “I

wasn’t subtle,” I say.

54

ONE YEAR AGO (SIXTEEN YEARS OLD)

“Why are you so late?” Mina demands as I get out of my car. She’s

perched in the back of Trev’s truck on a plaid blanket she’s spread

carefully over the peeling paint. Her legs swing off the edge of the

tailgate, a daisy fl ip-fl op dangling from her foot. In front of us, the

lake stretches out for miles, nothing but blue water refl ecting sky and

mountains. The sun’s starting to fade, and we have at least a half hour

before the fi reworks begin.

I get the plastic bag I’ve stashed in my backseat. “Fourth of July

traffi

c,” I say. “Is Trev here?”

“No, I borrowed the truck,” Mina says. “What’s in the bag?” She

makes a grab for it, and I step back so she can’t get it. She pouts, her

strawberry-red lips sticking out. “Mean.”

I just smile and set the bag out of her reach before boosting myself

up beside her.

Mina sinks down, lying on her back in the truck bed, and I follow

suit. We pass a bottle of Boone’s Farm back and forth, the fruity sweet-

ness clinging to the back of my throat as Mina traces clouds with her

fi ngers, rings glimmering in the dying sun. She describes shapes to

me, each more fantastic than the next.

“Soph, do you ever think about what’s going to happen when we

leave?” she asks.

T E S S S H A R P E

265

I tilt my head to the right so I can look at her. My hair and hers,

blond and brown, are twined together on the blanket, and she’s care-

ful not to meet my eyes.

“You mean for college and stuff ?”

Mina nods, still staring up at the darkening sky. The crickets are

starting to sing, and their chirps echo across the water, blending with

the frogs and some distant laughter from a houseboat out past the

harbor.

“It’ll be weird, right?” Mina asks. “Not to see each other?” When I

don’t answer, she turns to look at me, rolling from her back to her side,

our faces inches apart. “Won’t it be?”

“I don’t like thinking about it,” I say.

Mina bites her lip; I’m close enough that I can smell the straw-

berry gloss. “Sometimes it’s all I think about,” she says, so quiet I

almost don’t hear her. She sighs and reaches out, tucking a strand of

hair behind my ear. Her hand lingers for a moment on my skin, set-

tling into the little crook under my jaw where my pulse thumps.

There’s a
pop-pop-pop
in the air, breaking the spell. Sparks light

up the night sky in a dazzling cascade of red, white, and blue. The

refl ection of the fi reworks on the water stretches out until it feels like

we’re surrounded by light.

“It’s starting!” Mina sits straight up and hops out of the truck,

clapping her hands like a kid, and I smile as she watches the show, as

transfi xed as I am by her.

Aft er the fi nal fi rework has been shot off , the night settling into

hints of smoke and ash, Mina stands there, eyes fi xed on the sky, wait-

ing, like there’ll be one more just for her.

While her attention is on the sky, I reach back and pull out the

plastic bag I stashed earlier. When she turns around, I’m sitting on the

266

F A R F R O M Y O U

edge of the tailgate, a lit sparkler in hand, my off ering to her.

She beams at me, and I beam back.

Instead of taking it, she wraps both hands around mine, and we

stay there, me sitting on the tailgate and her standing in front of me,

the sparkler showering light between us, popping and hissing in the

air. Shadows play across her face, the light illuminating her in fi ts

and starts, and I’ve never felt more sure, and she’s never looked more

beautiful.

Long aft er the sparkler’s fi zzled out, Mina’s ash-smeared hands

hold mine between her palms.

“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” she whispers.

I hook my thumb around hers, and our matching rings click

against each other, the unspoken promise of forever . . . someday.