As Darkness Falls

15

Sara drove for a few minutes, and found a high school a few blocks away. She parked on the side of the road outside it, next to the playing fields, because it seemed like the simplest place to stop. It was quiet, so they had some privacy, and they weren’t outside a house where someone might wonder if they had visitors and start peering out their windows.

She parked, and switched off the engine, and they sat there for a while. Zoe didn’t say anything.

“Are you all right?” Sara said.

Zoe nodded.

“Are you sure?”

“I’m fine.”

Sara didn’t ask again, because she didn’t want to nag. She did want to keep talking, though. She wanted to be sure Zoe was all right. She tried to think of something to say, something to distract Zoe with.

In the end she asked about the school, because it was right there, over a fence, and ten minutes walk from the house Zoe had grown up in.

“Is this where you went to school?” Sara said.

It was a bit of a silly question, because she assumed that it actually was. She was curious, though, and wanted to know more about Zoe’s past, about the good parts of Zoe’s past, and she hoped that if she started asking more, then Zoe might tell her. She also thought that talking about dull, everyday things might help, somehow. It might make this seem more like a normal visit to the city where Zoe had grown up.

Sara asked about the school, thinking she knew the answer, but to her surprise, Zoe shook her head.

“Oh,” Sara said.

“That’s the wrong kind of school,” Zoe said.

“How do you mean?”

“I went to a religious school miles away,” Zoe said. “You know, so I’d be safe from immoral influences.”

Sara looked at Zoe, wondering whether that was meant to be funny. She wasn’t sure, and Zoe wasn’t smiling, so she decided to just squeeze Zoe’s hand instead.

“And after everything happened,” Zoe said. “I went to live with a foster family. So a completely different school, on the other side of town. On purpose, I assume.”

Sara nodded.

“I always wanted to go here though,” Zoe said. “It always seemed so completely normal, whenever I went past. Normal in a nice way. With nicer people, and less fuss about churchy things.”

“It probably wasn’t,” Sara said, wanting to say something helpful. “Nicer, I mean. It’s a school. The teachers are bored, and hate their jobs, and most kids are shits to each other, wherever you are. Just as far as that goes, it was probably much of a muchness wherever you went.”

“Yeah,” Zoe said. “Still. I thought about it sometimes. Like everything would be better if I was here, with different friends.”

“Friends?” Sara said, puzzled. Thinking it was odd Zoe had said that particularly, and not anything about her family.

“Yep,” Zoe said, and went quiet again, and Sara wondered why.

Sara knew she had a compulsion to ask follow-up questions. All cops did. You asked them all day at work, and then went home to your life and something was said that seemed leading and you jumped all over it. Sara tried not to, like anyone sensible tried not to if they wanted their home life to stay peaceful. Sara especially tried not to with Zoe, but here, on this trip, with everything that was going on, she thought that perhaps she needed to know as much as possible.

“Was that a thing?” she said. “Did you have problems with your friends at school?”

“After I went to the police, yeah. A few.”

“That’s a shame.”

Zoe shrugged. “It happens.”

“It shouldn’t.”

“Lots of things shouldn’t,” Zoe said, and Sara suddenly felt awful.

“I wish…”

“Yeah,” Zoe said. “I know.”

They sat for a moment, quietly. Sara wanted to say she was sorry again.

“Things happen,” Zoe said again. “But, well… you know how I moved out of state, to get away from them all? And how you’ve known me for ages and not met one single person from my past…?”

Sara looked at her.

“Problems,” Zoe said. “Just shit. People who know nothing about anything taking sides anyway. About what you’d expect.”

“Yeah,” Sara said. “I’m sorry. I assumed but wanted to check.”

Zoe nodded, and then they kept sitting where they were.