28 #2
Half an hour later I was in the back seat, hidden beneath the empty M-branded paper bag from Nicola’s Macca’s run.
I could see, peeking out between the carefully placed rubbish, the gap between the driver’s and front passenger’s seats.
Through the windshield the library’s arched roof was silhouetted against a purpling sky.
Last time I was here, I was printing off my certificate. It was a strange thought, one I didn’t know what to do with other than voice it. The librarian let me steal a plastic sleeve. That was nice. I wonder if she still works here.
Nicola’s gaze flicked up to meet mine in the rearview mirror and then danced back down again.
She was back in the driver’s seat, leg bouncing, hands shoved into her armpits.
She’d turned an ancient-looking radio on when we’d pulled up.
The song that was playing now was full of sawing violins and raw-throated vocals.
I couldn’t tell if it was a love song or a breakup song.
When it finished, half a dozen ads played; then another song started, this one a cacophony of pounding drums, clapping hands, and long, happy shouts.
“Feeling kinda envious of your time-control powers right now,” Nicola muttered.
Oh yeah, it’s awesome, I said, letting sarcasm soak the words in my mind. The best part about being dead.
Another ad break.
Another song.
“I bet Ginger wouldn’t let you steal a plastic sleeve,” Nicola said, bitter. “Her eyes would go all big, and sad, and she’d tell you how she’d love to help, but that’d be against the rules and she can’t ever, ever break the rules.”
Another ad break.
Another song.
I was just starting to think that perhaps Ginger wouldn’t show, that we’d be able to go back to Nicola’s place, watch TV, and pretend none of this had happened, at least for a few days more.
It was a disturbingly beautiful thought, one I wanted to be true more than I should have.
But then Nicola sat up straighter, and I knew we weren’t going to be so lucky.
“Not a word, Lu,” she said softly. “That was your promise. Not a word. I . . . I won’t be able to do this if you’re talking too.”
Not a word, I said.
Only a few seconds later the passenger’s side door opened and someone sat down.
I couldn’t see her. Not really. Hidden in my pile of rubbish with only a narrow opening, I couldn’t see more than the hem of a pink maxi dress and the edge of a tan pleather handbag.
But her voice, when she spoke, was achingly familiar.
“Hello, Nicola.”
“Hey.”
“Thank you for . . . um . . .”
“What did you want to talk about, Ginger?”
Ginger exhaled slowly. “So . . . that’s how it’s going to be?”
“Yeah,” Nicola said. “That’s how it’s going to be.”
I shifted slowly, carefully, until Ginger’s halo of blonde curls came into view, poking out from behind the headrest. Just like in a corny daytime movie, the music on the radio turned sweet and warbly when I saw her. A love song, one I recognized, old and nostalgic.
When we were kids, Ginger had always been the queen bee, the star of the show, the Barbie doll, all glittery and perfect. Except she’d also been nice, which was unfair. You shouldn’t get to be beautiful, popular, and nice. But that was the Ginger Béliveau brand.
Except she wasn’t Ginger Béliveau. Not anymore. She was Ginger Lawson now.
“You know,” Ginger Lawson said, “it’s unfair that you’re angry at me.”
In the rearview mirror, Nicola’s eyes slid closed for a moment. “Unfair?” she repeated in a flat monotone.
“Yes. It’s unfair. You’re the one that made up stories about my husband, vandalized half the town, hacked into Lucy’s Meta account.”
“Lucy told me her password,” Nicola said, eyes opening, face blank and unreadable. “Not exactly a master hacker over here.”
Ginger turned her head, and I caught a glimpse of her profile, pensive lips, round-tipped nose. “I didn’t know you and Lucy were so close.”
“Yeah. Well. Life’s full of surprises.”
“I suppose that’s true.”
“Look,” Ginger began. “I . . . I’m sorry that we’re not friends anymore but—”
Nicola switched off the radio, killing the song mid-crescendo and plunging the car into a sudden, suffocating silence. “Say that again.”
“I, um . . . I’m sorry that . . . that we’re not . . .”
“Say it.”
“I just meant . . .”
“I have hearing loss,” Nicola reminded her, voice pitched low and angry. “Say it again. I need to know I heard you right. You’re sorry that we’re not what?”
“Friends anymore,” Ginger said, louder.
“Oh. Right. That makes sense. You’re sorry because when I told you what happened to me, you didn’t believe it.”
“You said you didn’t remember what happened,” Ginger argued weakly.
“And then later, you told me it was him, but that didn’t make sense.
Kyle was . . . Kyle had never been . . .
and now this? I don’t . . . I don’t understand.
I never did. Why do you hate him so much? Why do you think Kyle killed Lucy?”
“Why do you?” Nicola replied.
Ginger exhaled sharply and shifted in her seat. I saw her hand on her bag, nails short and dull, which didn’t seem right. Ginger liked pretty nails. She always had. Even back in primary school she used to color her nails in with markers and Wite-Out.
“Please don’t do that,” Ginger said.
“Why not?” Nicola said, voice sharper now, her anger leaking out into her words, making them quick and barking, like bullets spat out of an automatic rifle.
“You wouldn’t be here, with me, the sad, broken, crazy lady, if you thought he was innocent.
You think maybe, just maybe, I’m right. You think maybe, just maybe, he did it. ”
“Why do you think he killed Lucy?” Ginger asked again. “Please.”
“She told me.”
“Who?”
“Lucy.”
Ginger’s plain nails dug into the sides of her plain handbag. “I shouldn’t have come here.”
“You wanted an answer,” Nicola said. “I gave it to you.”
“No,” Ginger said, her own voice sharpening for the first time. “No. I wanted the truth, not this. Pretending she’s here, pretending she’s haunting Kyle, that’s . . . that’s not right, Nicola. Lucy is gone, but that doesn’t mean you get to use her like that. She deserves dignity.”
“Oh, I don’t think Lucy is really all that concerned with dignity. I think her priority is bringing her killer to justice, don’t you?”
“She’s missing,” Ginger reminded Nicola. “She might not even be dead.”
“She’s dead. She’s been dead for years. She was murdered the night of your tea party.”
“How do you know?”
“Lucy told me.”
“If you try to tell me you’re a psychic, then I get out of this car, and I don’t come back,” Ginger said. “Do you understand? I mean it, Nicola. I know I’m not as smart as you, but I’m not an idiot. I’m not going to buy the ‘I see dead people’ line. I want the truth.”
“Sure,” Nicola replied, voice tight. “I understand. The truth.”
“So tell me the truth.”
“Lucy told me,” Nicola said again, slow and low.
“At your tea party. She told me Kyle was coming over to her house that night, and she was scared of him, didn’t know how to tell him she wasn’t interested.
I tried to tell the police, years ago, but they didn’t believe me.
Honestly, I didn’t fully believe it myself. Not until he hurt me.”
“And that’s the truth?” Ginger asked.
“That’s the truth,” Nicola lied.
“That’s why you vandalized the sign at the mall? Why you sent us all those posters in the mail? Why you hacked into Lucy’s account and sent him all those messages?”
“Yeah,” Nicola said.
A silence descended, thick and heavy. I couldn’t tell how long they sat like that, without saying a word. It might’ve just been a moment, stretched long by an eddy in the time stream. Or maybe it was just them, sitting side by side for a minute, then two, then four, not saying a word.
I stayed still, hidden in my pile of rubbish, watching Nicola’s eyes in the rearview mirror, Ginger’s hand on the edge of her purse.
“You sounded like her,” Ginger said finally, voice soft and unsure again. “In those messages. You sounded just like her. And I don’t just mean the voice message. The text ones too. You sounded so like her it was . . . it was scary.”
“It’s your turn,” Nicola said.
“My turn?”
“I answered the question. Now you do it. Why do you think Kyle killed Lucy?”
“I-I don’t,” Ginger stammered. “I mean, he wouldn’t. He barely even knew her, he told me. She was Krissy’s friend, not his. It wouldn’t make any sense.”
“You don’t have to be friends with someone to kill them.”
“No, I . . . I know that. I just . . . He told me he didn’t do it.”
“So you asked.”
She didn’t say anything.
“Why, Ginger?” Nicola said, softer. “Why do you think he might’ve done it? Did he say something? Do you know anything?”
“No. No. He never said anything, he just . . .” Her fingers were digging into the sides of her purse.
“Kyle was really freaked out when all those messages started appearing around town,” she said, so fast it sounded like the words were tumbling over each other to escape her mouth.
“At first I thought he was just angry. I would be angry too, if someone did that to me. But he . . . he wouldn’t come to bed.
He paced the house at night. He started drinking again, and drinking a lot, even though he’d promised he’d quit. He was acting . . .”
“Guilty,” Nicola said.
“Scared,” Ginger amended quickly. “He was more scared than I’ve ever seen him. He smashed stuff, he locked himself in the bathroom, he cried. I’ve never seen him cry before, not ever. But he’s been crying all the time now. I kept telling myself it was just stress.”
“What’s he got to be stressed about?” Nicola asked.