GEORGIA HEADED home on Ridge, turning west and then south on Asbury. She started looking for a place to park on a side street, but a large orange U-Haul in the middle of the road blocked her. She cursed, squeezed by the truck, and drove further down the block. Five minutes later, she found a spot, parked the car, and jogged back to her building. As she approached, two men were hefting a large bureau toward her front door.
She cut across the grass past the men and climbed up three steps. The door opened into a vestibule just big enough for six brass mailboxes and a small table. Normally junk mail, coupons, and flyers were fanned across the table, but today they were strewn on the floor. She scooped up a couple of pizza delivery coupons. She hoped whoever was moving in was almost done. It was nearly dusk, and despite what the Chamber of Commerce proclaimed, Evanston wasn’t the kind of place to keep your front door open after dark.
She started up the stairs to the second floor. A loud thump made her stop.
“Hey, man. Can’t you be more careful? This belonged to my grandmother.”
“You want a professional mover, hire one,” the other man grumbled.
Georgia peeked over her shoulder. The men looked about her age. One was husky and big like a defensive tackle. The other was tall and thin with sandy hair, long on top, but razor short on the sides. A pair of glasses slipped down his nose. He was wearing jeans and a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. The strain of the load made his biceps stand out nicely.
She watched them brace the bureau against the railing as they hoisted it up the steps. It would be a sharp ninety degree turn to get it inside. As the man with the glasses gripped the table and maneuvered it sideways through the door, the light glinted off a thin gold band on his left hand. Georgia turned around and continued up the steps.
She let herself into her apartment, kicked off her boots, and grabbed a pop from the fridge. She took it back into the living room, which doubled as her office. The apartment was spare, even severe. A plain brown couch, beige curtains, two easy chairs, a desk with several shelves above. Once upon a time, she’d collected things: candles, a clock, a bronze rooster, a cloisonné bowl. They were packed away now. Better not to have too many possessions. Who said that? Some French writer, she thought.
She had two jobs lined up: a skip trace, which, if the Internet Gods were favorable, might only take a few hours, and a possible insurance fraud scam. There was no reason she couldn’t handle another job. As a cop, she’d multi-tasked for years.
The problem—as it always was—was money. There probably wouldn’t be much if she took Cam Jordan’s case. Then again, this was the kind of work she’d been yearning for. Something that required more than taping an adulterous affair. She hadn’t confirmed it with Ruth Jordan or the public defender, but she assumed her task would be to establish reasonable doubt that Cam Jordan had killed Sara Long. At least enough to convince a jury.
She’d have to insert herself in the middle of other people’s lives. Which presented a problem. People on the North Shore didn’t take kindly to interference by outsiders. And up here people considered anyone they didn’t already know an outsider. There was also the pressure of a heater case, one that the State’s Attorney apparently wanted to wrap up fast. And she’d be facing her former partner on the other side. That didn’t bother her; she could run rings around Robby Parker. And she did have some knowledge of teenagers on the North Shore from her stint as youth officer. She even knew one or two who might talk to her.
Peeling off her jeans, she went into the bathroom in her underwear. As she splashed cold water on her face, she heard banging and a curse coming from the hall. Groans and scuffles as the furniture was hauled up to the third floor. The new tenants must be moving into the apartment one floor up and across from hers. At least they wouldn’t be thumping on her ceiling.
She rolled the can of soda across her forehead and sat down, tapping a finger against the can. Then she got up and grabbed the cordless phone on her desk. She punched in a number.
***
Lauren Walcher’s hand shook so much she was afraid she might stab herself in the eye. She lowered the mascara brush and stared at herself in the mirror. Thick black hair framed an oval face with blue eyes, thick lashes, and pale skin. With or without the mascara, she knew she was attractive. Even her mother, during those rare moments of intimacy, still called her Snow White. She remembered as a little girl trying to find the magic mirror on the wall. She was sure it was hidden underneath the wallpaper in her bedroom. All she needed were the right words, and the mirror would magically swim to the surface and tell her who was the fairest one of all.
Now, her face illuminated by the theater lights, Lauren knew better. The mirror would never appear. People carried their mirrors on the in-side. They should. Most people were ugly. She raised the brush again and leaned toward the glass. She’d bought the mascara at Sephora last week for twenty-five dollars. It was good stuff. Everyone used it. She tried again to apply it, taking care there were no clumps or goop, but the tremor in her hand wouldn’t stop.
She took a breath to steady herself. She couldn’t fall apart. Everything depended on her. Where was he? She’d called him an hour ago. He always called back. A chirp from the computer sounded, alerting her to an incoming e-mail. He did have a Treo. Maybe he was e-mailing.
She went into her bedroom, a lavender and white kingdom with a huge four poster bed. The dainty print canopy matched the quilt which blended with the curtains and the carpet. A collection of teddy bears and other stuffed animals were piled in a corner. Her mother kept telling her to get rid of them, to give them to needy children. But Lauren couldn’t bear to part with them. She’d named them all.
Next to the menagerie was an arrangement of shelves, drawers, and desk, holding her CD-DVD player, TV, and computer. She clicked on the e-mail. It wasn’t him. She read the message, made some notes, and typed a message back. Then she rummaged in her bag for her cell and made a call.
When she finished, she popped in a CD and lay down on her bed. John Mayer’s mellow voice welled out of Bose speakers. She closed her eyes. What was the last thing Sara heard before she died?
***
It was the beginning of junior year. The toughest year, everyone said. Term papers, ACTs, grades that counted. The powder puff football game in the Forest Preserve was the last frivolous activity before they knuckled down. Even so, Sara hadn’t wanted to go. Neither did Lauren, but she thought it was important to make an appearance. Sara wasn’t convinced until the night before when she called Lauren to say she’d come after all.
“How come you changed your mind?” Lauren asked.
“I need to talk to you about something,” Sara said.
“Is something wrong?”
“No. I—I just want to talk.”
Lauren and Sara had drifted apart recently. After being best friends for years, she wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was just the way it had to be. Now Sara seemed to be opening the door again. At least a crack.
“Okay,” Lauren replied. “We don’t have to stay long. We don’t even have to play.”
The morning of the game was one of those late summer days that breaks your heart with its perfection. A warm sun, a soft, cloudless blue sky, the trees and bushes still plump and green. Lauren waited for Sara at the field. They’d be in and out in a flash, then head over to Starbucks.
She hadn’t counted on the seniors. She didn’t know they were planning to haze them that day. When Heather and Claire ran up, breathlessly whispering what they’d overheard, Lauren scowled. How could her friends be so excited? They seemed almost hungry for the chance to be humiliated. Lauren wanted to leave right then. She should have.
Two seniors sauntered over, both holding cans of beer. Lauren knew them; uninspiring girls whose interests were limited to boys, clothes, and cars. One of them twirled a lock of hair. They wanted Sara, they said.
“Sara?” Lauren replied. “What for?”
The girls exchanged glances. “She needs some attitude readjustment,” one said.
Lauren crossed her arms.
“She thinks she’s hot shit,” the other chimed in. “It’s time to teach her a lesson.”
“Sara? Are you kidding? What the fuck are you talking about?”
“You know.” The first girl threw her a meaningful look.
An icicle of fear slid down Lauren’s spine. “No. I don’t.” Sara was beautiful. Every boy in school probably had wet dreams about her. But Sara didn’t flirt. Or lead them on. Lauren had seen her back off when some guy mustered up the courage to approach her. Still, that didn’t stop people from being jealous.
“You ever heard about invasion of privacy?” The second girl took a swig of beer.
So that was it. Lauren broke eye contact with her.
“She’s got to stop messing around in everybody’s business. Trying to know it all,” the first girl said. “She’s not Diane Sawyer. Time for her to realize that.”
Lauren shrugged, as if it couldn’t mean less to her. Except it did. Sara had been getting a reputation for asking personal questions. Trying to find out who was doing what with whom. She read other people’s notes, and someone even accused her of stealing their diary, although why anyone was dumb enough to bring a diary to school was another thing. Lauren thought she knew why Sara was doing it and warned her to tone it down. Sara countered that she wasn’t the only one. Heather, for example, was worse. But Heather wasn’t beautiful like Sara.
Now Lauren steeled herself. “What are you going to do?”
“Actually, you’re going to do it. You and her other little friends.”
When they told her what they wanted her to do, Lauren didn’t like it. Still, if she didn’t go along, the seniors would make her life miserable. Sara’s too. That was something they didn’t need. So when Sara arrived, Lauren told her to be cool and just go with the program. Let them take her into the clearing and put the bucket on her head. Sara hesitated but finally agreed once Lauren promised it would be over in a few minutes and everyone would tell her what a good sport she’d been. Sara always wanted everyone to like her.
Lauren was sure Sara would find her way back to the field. But then she heard the clang of the bat against the bucket. And what sounded like screams. Not just screams of surprise or annoyance. Lauren knew they were screams of pain. Unbearable, excruciating pain.
***
Lauren turned the music up. Shake it off, she ordered herself. She went to her closet, threw open the door, and pulled out a pair of jeans and her Prada jacket. She glanced at the clock-radio on her nightstand. Almost seven. Her parents had strict rules about being home on school nights, even if she didn’t have any homework. Which was usually the case. Unless there was a paper, Lauren could get most of her work done during classes or study hall. Whoever said high school was hard must have been stupid. She slipped on her clothes, then shut down the computer.
As she crept down the stairs, she stayed close to the banister. The stairs didn’t creak on that side. The wicked witch was talking on the phone in the kitchen. Lauren pictured her mother perched on a stool near the wall where the granite counter met the Mexican wall tiles. She’d have downed two glasses of wine by now, but her makeup and hair would still be perfect. So too, the body she spent hours sculpting at the gym, just so she could replicate what Lauren took for granted. Lauren couldn’t resist a smirk.
The hard part was getting out the door. Usually she went out through the garage, but that meant walking through the kitchen. If she was quiet, she could probably duck out the front. The red alarm signal would blink, but with her mother on the phone, chances were she wouldn’t notice.
She slunk past the Chagall in the hall. Her parents never tired of telling everyone it was an original, and if anyone had the gall to ask how much it cost—which was exactly what they wanted—they’d paste on a bland look and say, “Oh, that’s something we never discuss.”
She got to the door and stopped. No warm, mouth-watering aromas drifted out from the kitchen. Only the antiseptic smell of cleaner and furniture polish. Homey smells were for company only. Her mother had taken to bringing things home from FoodStuffs. There was no reason to cook, her mother claimed. Lauren’s father rarely made it home for dinner, and he didn’t like to eat things that had been sitting out. The first part was true. Her father never came home before ten. But the “sitting out” part was bullshit. The meals her mother brought home from FoodStuffs had been “sitting out” in the store for hours, sometimes days.
Lauren listened to her mother’s conversation. It was about Uncle Fred; how he died in the fire a couple of weeks ago. Just when he was struggling to come back from the stroke. Lauren had loved Uncle Fred, and she cried when she heard the news. When she was younger and her parents were out of town, he’d take her out for dinner. Sometimes a movie. But then there was the stroke, and he wasn’t the same. Her mother thought that’s how the fire started. He probably turned on the stove to cook something and forgot all about it.
Then Sara was killed by that creep a few days later, and Lauren cried again. Why did death take the people she loved? If this was what life had in store for her, she didn’t want any part of it.
Now she pulled the door open, slipped out, and quietly closed it. She skipped down the three concrete pads over the goldfish pond. Her mother always corrected her. They were koi, not goldfish. How many other people had fishponds in their front yard? Then again, how many other people lived in a house like this?
She opened the door to her Land Rover and got in. Keying the engine would give her away. Even her half-drunk mother couldn’t help but notice. She started the car anyway.