Chapter Fifty
I positioned the canvas on the wall. The watercolor that captured Lake Michigan at sunset, the lighthouse, and the spray of wildflowers. Leah's painting.
The canvas had been slashed, defaced, but the restoration expert had worked miracles. If you looked closely, you could still see where the wound had been, faint seams like scars.
Mia stood in the doorway watching me. We hadn't discussed where to hang it. We knew it belonged here, in our living room, where we could see it every day, a reminder of Leah's life, her creativity.
"Do you think it's straight?" I asked.
Mia tilted her head. "A little higher on the left."
I nudged the corner up. "How about now?"
"Good enough for you, Mom."
I made a face at her; she rolled her eyes. The ghost of a smile touched her lips.
One month had passed since Rowan's arrest. Thirty-one days since the truth cracked open the life we'd built here and revealed the rot festering beneath. The ugliness, the secrets, the lies.
Rowan had been charged with murder in the first degree.
She sat in a county jail cell, denied bail, waiting for a trial that would determine whether she'd spend the next thirty years behind bars.
The confession I'd tricked from her had given the D.A.
's office everything they needed to lock her away.
When the detectives searched her home, they found a collection of copied keys hidden in her nightstand, mine included.
She kept them like trophies, silent proof of the control and power she wielded over the people who trusted her.
The neighbors who'd smiled at her. The mothers who'd sat beside her at fundraisers, galas, and PTA meetings, believing they were safe.
She wasn't in control anymore.
Last week, Camille met us in her office with a stack of papers and a measured smile.
With Camille's help, Mia's sentence had been reduced to simple assault.
The juvenile family court had sentenced her to 500 hours of community service, in which she'd participate in an anti-bullying program, sharing her story with thousands of students within our local school district.
None of it brought Leah back.
The fallout still haunted us. The unforgiving public did not absolve Mia for her role in the bullying or Leah's death. Not that they should, but the continued media persecution wasn't an easy thing to endure, but we had to.
This was our life now. Choices had consequences. So did our mistakes, however unintended.
I'd put Mia in therapy. Money was tight, it was always tight, but Mia needed this, and I would do whatever I had to do to help her.
I'd also removed her social media accounts for the foreseeable future.
We talked every night out on the patio, overlooking the water as the sun set fire to the horizon.
Now, the scent of cut grass drifted through the open windows, mingled with the distant thrum of a mower and children's laughter. Outside, early summer had arrived in a burst of green.
Apollo's nails clicked across the floor as he settled at Mia's feet with a contented sigh. She reached down to scratch behind his ears.
I moved into the kitchen and started the coffee maker. We carried steaming mugs to the back patio and stood near the edge of the crumbling bluff. The concrete had cracked further in recent weeks, with another slab loosening, sloping toward the beach far below.
Like our house, we were living on the edge. Our lives a bit unstable perhaps, but also incredibly beautiful.
The lake and its endless shifting light spread below us. Sunlight on the water flashed like thrown coins. From here, the beach looked smooth, clean, pure.
"Do you ever think about that night?" Mia asked.
She still had nightmares several times a week. So did I. "All the time."
She shivered, though it wasn't cold. "I still feel like it was my fault."
I placed a hand on her shoulder. For a long moment, I couldn't speak. How do you tell your daughter whose hands pushed a girl who died that she still gets to live? That she will carry this the rest of her life, and the burden will be both unbearable and survivable?
"What Rowan did was deliberate," I said. "You made a mistake. Rowan made a choice. Intent matters."
Mia's eyes filled. I wasn't sure she believed me, but the words needed to be said. I would keep saying them until someday, she did.
Apollo nudged my leg with a cold nose, impatient for his walk. I patted his head. "Just a second, buddy."
After we finished our coffee, I headed to the mudroom to grab his leash. The familiar framed photo caught my eye on the shelf near the window. The one with the six girls on Rowan's boat last summer.
A shudder passed through me. In the photo, they looked like any group of teenage girls: sun-drunk, immortal, safe.
But I could see it now, the way Chloe's arm draped possessively over Mia's shoulder, how Leah stood slightly apart, already on the outside.
How Zara's smile didn't quite reach her eyes.
Or maybe I was reading into it, seeing the cracks before everything fell apart.
"You coming?" Mia yelled from the kitchen.
I turned from the photograph, clipped Apollo's leash to his collar, and took him on his walk.
The neighborhood we'd once chased like a promise had shed its sheen. At the Alistair house, Whitney unloaded groceries from her car. She and Peyton came and went with their heads down, no longer queens of the neighborhood but pariahs instead.
Whitney glanced up as we passed, then quickly looked away. The little Pomeranian yapped furiously at us, desperate for attention. Apollo ignored him. So did we.
Mrs. Atkins sat on her porch as usual, monitoring the street with sharp eyes. She nodded a greeting. I waved back. Some things never changed.
But others had. The Westinghouse mansion stood empty, a FOR SALE sign prominent on the lawn. Rowan's prized roses had withered. Her husband had accepted a job in Grand Rapids. After the LakeshoreTea account had been traced back to Chloe, the school expelled her.
Last week, Camille mentioned seeing Chloe's Instagram account online. She'd posted from her new private school, smiling in a crisp uniform, surrounded by new friends, thriving.
It was Chloe's mother, not Chloe, who'd killed Leah. And yet I couldn't help the surge of anger at Chloe for the vile acts she had committed, for her casual cruelty, her petty malice toward Leah, Mia, and the other girls she'd hurt.
Once again, she'd gotten away clean, free to torment new classmates, neighbors, and supposed friends. Justice was never fair, I'd learned. And seldom blind.
But I couldn't dwell on things beyond my control. We had to move on, or the unfairness of it could drive a person to become bitter, depressed, and miserable. I didn't want to live like that.
Down the street, we spotted Alexis walking a golden retriever puppy, her little brother Falcon watching intently as the dog frolicked around his ankles. The kids looked lighter, happier, with color in their cheeks.
Two weeks ago, Brooke had voluntarily entered rehab, announcing her secret alcohol addiction on her social media accounts. The family had started therapy, even Jason.
"Alexis apologized," Mia said. " She said she was sorry for going along with Chloe. That she realized how toxic it all was."
"That was brave of her."
Mia shrugged. "We're not friends. But we're not enemies, either."
It was something. A small step toward healing. Tomorrow, Camille and I had made plans to meet at Forté Coffee in St. Joe, just to talk. Another small step in the right direction.
We took the wooden stairs down the bluff. New warning signs were bolted to the posts. The air cooled as we descended. Sand crusted our toes.
The beach stretched empty but for a solitary figure walking along the waterline. As we drew closer, I recognized Vivienne Cho. She was wrapped in a light cardigan despite the sun, her black hair shot through with gray and twisted into a loose bun. Leah's jade pendant rested at her throat.
Vivienne saw us and stopped. For a beat, I thought she would turn away. Instead, she waited.
"Hello, Dahlia," she said. "Mia."
"Vivienne." I didn't ask how she was. There was no adequate shape for that question. "It's good to see you."
She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. The wind tugged at her cardigan. "We’re selling the house. Daniel and I can't stay. Too many memories."
"Where will you go?"
"Chicago. Near my sister in Rosemont."
Apollo bounded up to her, offering his head to Vivienne, who stroked his snout. "Leah loved this dog. She would come home smelling like wet fur."
"My old paper asked me to write about what happened here," I said. "A book. They have interest from several publishers. If you're willing, I'd like you to help me tell Leah's story right. I won't do it if you disapprove."
It was the only thing I knew how to do. I couldn't bring Leah back, I couldn't undo what happened on that bluff, but I could make sure people remembered her as more than a tragedy. As a girl who loved art, dogs, and her friends. As someone who mattered.
Her eyes found mine. "I know you'll tell the truth."
We stood together with the waves rippling behind us, the sun rising high in the cloudless sky. She looked out at the water. The lines around her eyes had deepened.
"I don't blame you, Mia," Vivienne said. "I want you to know that. What you did was a mistake with grave consequences, but Rowan took my daughter away from me, not you."
Mia made a sound like a sob in the back of her throat. "I think about her every day. I miss her every day."
"So do I." She reached out and touched Mia's arm. "I find comfort knowing Leah had a real friend. Someone who loved her."
The simple grace of it cracked something open in Mia. She bowed her head, shoulders shaking as she wept. I slipped an arm around her, felt the tremor pass through both of us.
Vivienne resumed walking. Her slight figure grew smaller against the glittering horizon as the wind kicked up, ballooning her cardigan like wings.
We watched her until the distance softened her into the shoreline, while Apollo cannoned into the shallows and barked at his reflection with bemused delight. Gulls skated the updrafts over our heads, flecks of white against the cobalt blue.
"It's still beautiful here," Mia said.
"It is." I slid my hand into hers. We stood that way, not speaking, until the sun warmed the tops of our feet.
"Ready?" I asked.
She wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand and looked toward the stairs, then at me. "Yeah."
We turned toward the bluff. The stairs creaked under us. Halfway up, Apollo paused to look back the way we'd come, tongue lolling, ears forward, and then tugged onward, eager for home.
At the top of the staircase, the yellow caution tape flapped in the breeze. I rested my palm on the weathered railing, felt the heat of the sunbaked wood, and held on.