10. In Which Juniper Makes a Phone Call #2
“All right,” I say grudgingly. “Thank you. Tell Roland he’s a turd for me.”
Lance laughs, and his voice is lighter when he says, “Will do. Take care.”
“You too,” I say. Then I hang up, still staring at the phone long after the line goes dead.
For a few minutes, Aiden and I sit in silence. I don’t know what’s going on in his head, but mine is a mess—a tangled, thorny bush that’s growing at an alarming rate, painful new possibilities pricking at me with every second that passes.
“There’s nothing here,” Aiden says after a moment. He slams the yearbook shut, looking frustrated. “Or if there is, I can’t find it.”
I worried that would be the case. I just nod. “Do you think anyone has reported her missing yet?”
“I hope so,” he says. “But I don’t know.”
“But wouldn’t the sheriff call us for more information if someone had reported her missing?” I say anxiously. “He would, wouldn’t he?” I check my phone; no missed calls. Sheriff Garrity doesn’t have my number anyway.
“Probably?” Aiden says. “I haven’t heard from him, though.” Then he speaks again. “Why didn’t you tell your brother about what we saw?” he says. There’s nothing accusatory about it; he just sounds mildly curious.
“What, the body? That would freak them out to no end,” I say when Aiden nods. “They’d get here so fast your head would spin, and then they’d move in and start living on your couch.” I stare vaguely out the window, my eyes losing focus as my mind churns.
My mother. Her friends. The dead girl in the woods.
“You know what’s interesting,” I say slowly.
There’s a bird outside the window, perching on one of the white fence posts.
He’s completely black except for two spots of color, sunshine yellow and brilliant red.
“We get so disturbed by excessive gore in movies and all that, but when it comes down to it…” I pull my eyes away from the bird, looking down at my hand.
I hold it up to the light, flexing it, stretching my fingers, closing my fist. “When it comes down to it, we’re all just bags of blood and bone.
” I turn my eyes to Aiden, letting my hand drop back into my lap.
“The world is populated by people full of blood and plasma and all sorts of fluids. That’s all the human body is.
A sack of squishy parts and bony parts, all self-governed by an organ that just makes things up as it goes along. Isn’t that strange?”
For a second he simply looks at me, his face impassive. Then, slowly, he nods. “Yes,” he says. “I guess it is.”
Something about his expression—or lack thereof—has me backpedaling. “Sorry,” I say, forcing a laugh. “Guess that got pretty dark, huh?” Ugh. This always happens. I always open my mouth, something weird pops out, and whoever’s nearby gets scared away.
To my immense surprise, though, Aiden just shrugs.
“Not really,” he says. “Even so…” He gets to his feet, yearbook in hand, and heads in the direction of his bedroom.
But as he passes me, he looks down. Then, in a voice so matter-of-fact it can only be the truth, he says one thing: “I’m not afraid of the dark. ”
I spend the evening holed up in my loft bedroom, writing.
Now that I know how my murderer would carry the body, I can move forward in this opening scene.
Every now and then I hear the bass from the TV downstairs bleeding up through the floorboards, vibrating through the room.
You’d think that on a Sunday evening Aiden would be watching some cool action movie, especially with sound effects like that, but he’s not; I know because I stuck my head down about an hour ago to find him immersed in a documentary about the French Revolution.
I smile, my fingers pausing in the middle of typing. Aiden is a strange one. But I bet he wouldn’t run away from me even when he saw how my main characters kept killing each other. It’s like he said—he’s not afraid of the dark.
And there’s a little bit of darkness in all of us.
I’m convinced that’s true. We couldn’t shine so brightly as human beings if we never knew the shadows.
As a child I never realized that my home life wasn’t normal; I never realized that my mother was only minimally functional.
It wasn’t until I got older that those things occurred to me.
But just because I didn’t know, just because it seemed perfectly fine to me, doesn’t mean I wasn’t deeply affected by the way I was raised.
My upbringing helped shape who I am—dark, light, and everything in between.
The clack-clack-clack of my typing resumes for a moment, but then it stops again. No matter how much I try to focus, my mind keeps wandering away to other things. Or, rather, one other thing.
The Elites.
I sigh, leaning back in my desk chair and staring at the sloped ceiling.
I’ve never heard of a group of friends naming themselves something as ridiculous as Elites in real life.
That’s the kind of thing that happens in high school rom coms from the nineties.
The clique of popular girls with the impossibly thin eyebrows and butterfly clips in their hair might have a name like that.
But a group of kids in Autumn Grove, Idaho?
Of course, whatever else my mom was, she was beautiful.
There’s no denying that. She had this beautiful, naturally blonde hair, for one.
It was the kind of hair people pay a lot of money to replicate.
But she also had blue eyes, delicate features, and a slim figure.
She would never talk about her high school days, but I have no doubt she was popular.
She probably had the whole world at her feet.
Until I came along, the plus-one she never meant to bring.
But I’m here. I’m alive. And I’m going to do great things in this life of mine. I don’t need to leave a huge legacy; I don’t need to change the world. But I’m going to make my little corner of life a really excellent corner.? *
I stand up suddenly, almost without realizing it, banging my head on the ceiling in the process. My desk is tucked into one corner of the small loft bedroom, and while I can sit and stand easily enough, I do have to be careful to duck.
“Ouch,” I mutter, rubbing the top of my head.
I glare at the sloped ceiling. “Rude.” I glance down at my outfit to double check that I’m okay to be seen by Aiden; everything looks fine.
I even turned my shirt right side out earlier.
Then I spin on my heel and make my way downstairs, my feet thudding heavily on the steps.
There’s a strange sense of urgency carrying me, pulling me forward, and I almost trip in my haste.
When I reach the living room—where Aiden is now sprawled on the couch, reading a book—I’m out of breath, dragging in the oxygen like I’m drowning.
“Hey,” I say, panting.
Slowly, ever so slowly, Aiden moves his book away from his face and tilts his head toward me.
And look—I’m only going to say this once. No man has a right to look that good in sweatpants and a t-shirt, okay? When I lounge on the couch, I look like a sloppy starfish. Spread eagle, inelegant, unladylike bordering on indecent. I become part of that couch.
But Aiden just looks like he’s modeling for any number of companies. The sweatpants industry could use him for sure, as could the publishing industry, and the furniture industry may as well just hire him now and then keep him on retainer.
Ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous.
“Can I help you?” he says, cocking one eyebrow at me. He looks faintly amused, like maybe he’s noticed me checking him out.
Whatever. I will not be ashamed.
“Yes,” I say. I hurry over, my sock-clad feet slipping across the wood floor, and sit on the couch next to where he’s lying.
“Make yourself comfortable,” he mutters, scooting further into the couch so that I have more room.
“I will, thank you,” I say primly. Then I say, “You’re going to find out that girl’s name, right?”
“Definitely,” he says, turning his gaze back to his book, which he’s holding up in the air.
“You’re going to do it tomorrow?” I say.
“I’m going to do it today, if I can.” He pauses. “Except all I have is the yearbook. I’m going to look through it again in a bit. I’d look again now, but I really need to prep for class.”
“But if you can’t find her today, you’ll find her tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“Tomorrow morning, do you think?”
“Yes.”
“Can you call me when you find out who she is?” I say. I know I’m being obnoxious—when I’m trying to read and someone interrupts me, I usually want to smack them—but I need to know. I need to know who this girl is.
Finally Aiden sighs, closes his book with a snap, and looks at me. “Yes,” he says. “I will call you the second I find out. Any other requests?”
“Just one,” I say, narrowing my eyes at him.
“Don’t judge me for how I might handle this situation.
” I pause and let my eyes drop away from his penetrating gaze.
“Nothing like this has ever happened to me before, and I really don’t know how I’ll hold up.
I’m not afraid of death or what happens afterward—whether it involves an afterlife or a hole in the ground.
Those things don’t frighten me. But thinking about other people dying—thinking about other people being lost, forgotten, becoming nothing more than a faded memory…
” I shake my head. “It makes me unbearably sad.”
Then, as something occurs to me, I go on, “Maybe that’s why I feel so pulled to write murder mysteries.
So that I can remember the dead, in my own way.
So that I can find justice for the pains they’ve suffered, even if it’s only on the page.
” I sigh. “Anyway, I know I’m bugging you and asking a lot of questions.
But don’t judge me, okay? Even if I cry a lot or lose my mind or something.
And for goodness’ sake.” I point to his impassive expression.
“Do something with your face, so that I can figure out what you’re thinking.
You either look disapproving or completely neutral all the time, and I never know what’s going on in your head. It’s stressful.”
“You have so many complaints about my face,” he murmurs, amusement sparking in his eyes. “I’ve always been told it’s a handsome one. ”
“It is,” I admit. Then I grin. “Why do you think my seventeen-year-old self tried to kiss you?”
Aiden snorts. “Cut it out. Don’t flirt with me, Juniper Bean.”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I say, still smiling. I pause, then go on, “Well, actually, I might have dreamed of it a time or two, but I would never flirt with you in real life?—”
But I fall silent as a laugh bursts out of Aiden—a real, genuine laugh. “Get out of here,” he says, and his smile continues to hover as he shakes his head. “I’m trying to review the chapters I’m teaching my seniors tomorrow.”
I tilt my head, looking at him. “Do you like teaching?”
He shrugs. “I don’t love it, but I’m willing to do it.”
“I bet you’re good at it, though,” I say, trying to imagine him in the front of a high school classroom. “You were a great tutor.”
“Eh, I don’t know,” he says. He flattens his hair with one hand. “I think I’m better at teaching one on one than I am with a group.”
“Well, for what it’s worth,” I say, patting his arm, “you were a good tutor. You opened my eyes to how great reading and writing could be.”
“It’s good to hear that,” he says, and the look on his face makes me think he’s genuine. It’s a small, simple smile, but I like it. Sincerity is always attractive.
You know what else is always attractive? Aiden.
Ugh.
“All right, well,” I say, standing abruptly and backing away from the couch. I really don’t need to be noticing how attractive this man is; that way lies heartbreak. “I’m going to bed. Call me tomorrow, please, when you find out about the girl.”
Aiden nods, then turns his gaze back to his book. I assume that’s the only goodnight I’m going to get from him, so I hurry back up the big stairs, around the corner, and then up the little stairs.
And when I finally fall into a restless sleep many hours later, I dream about shadows in the forest, my mother’s laughter ringing in my ears.
* ? This is one of my favorite things about Juniper—her determination to make the best of what she has.