Macy sits back in the booth, lifts her chin, and peers at me, a sad sort of knowing in her face. “I’m more interested in what you have to say.”
“I— You—” The words stick in my throat, and then it’s like she’s pulled a plug inside me. A garbled sound wrenches from my mouth, tight and incoherent with relief. “You’re going to listen to me?”
“You’ve earned that from me,” Macy says.
“But you didn’t visit. You never wrote. I thought that you—”
“Your mom.” Macy’s mouth flattens. She has that look in her eye that she always gets before she goes off on a job. A coiled tension that’s dying to leap out. “This has been hard on her,” she continues. “She trusted me to get you clean, and she feels like I’ve failed. Plus, when I found out she’d sent you to Seaside, I may have said some things.”
“What things?”
“I bitched her out,” Macy explains. “And I shouldn’t have, but I was angry and worried. I asked her if I could go see you or at least write, but she didn’t want me involved. I love you, babe, but you’re her kid, not mine. I had to respect her wishes—she is my sister.”
“So you stayed away.”
“I stayed away from you,” Macy says. “But I didn’t stay away from the case.”
I sit up straighter. “What’s that mean?”
Macy opens her mouth, but closes it when the waitress stops by our table, setting the bill down. “You girls take your time,” she says. “Let me know if you need any boxes.”
Macy nods her thanks and waits until the waitress is off taking another order before turning back to me. “Your mom had made her mind up about what happened to you. But I was the one who got you clean. I spent more time with you last year than she did. And I couldn’t do anything for you while you were at Seaside, but I knew how much Mina meant to you. And I knew that if you had any information about her killer, you would have come forward, even if it got you into trouble. I couldn’t shake that feeling, so I put some calls in to a few old friends from the force, asked around, got my hands on the reports, and the head detective’s take on things didn’t click. Even if you and Mina had been out there to score, why would a dealer leave the drugs? That’s evidence.
“The killer shot Mina. He could’ve easily shot you, too, getting rid of both witnesses, but he chose to knock you out. That tells me it wasn’t random; it was targeted. And if he planted the pills on you, that means it was planned.”
Something close to relief starts to uncurl inside me. Everything that she’s saying is everything that I’ve thought, over and over, while I’ve been locked away. Why did he leave me alive? Why did he plant the pills? How did he know enough about me to plant the right pills?
“I didn’t know the pills were in my pocket,” I say. “I swear. He must have put them there while I was unconscious—he was gone when I came to. And Mina was…” I have to blink hard and swallow before I’m able to continue. “I had to stop the blood. I used my jacket, but it wasn’t…I left it there, after she…after. It wasn’t until Detective James came to the house that anyone even mentioned drugs. Then it didn’t matter to Mom or Dad that my tests from the ER came back clean—they wouldn’t listen to me. No one would.”
“I’m listening,” Macy says. “Tell me what happened. Why were you girls out at Booker’s Point in the first place?”
“We were going to our friend Amber’s party,” I say. “But halfway there, Mina said we had to take a detour to the Point. That she had to meet someone for a story she was working on. She was doing an internship at the Harper Beacon. When she wouldn’t give me any specifics, I just figured it was an errand for her supervisor, or maybe an interview someone had to reschedule. I didn’t want to make the trip—it was way out in the boonies, and Amber lives on the other side of town. But Mina was…” I can’t say it, that I couldn’t ever deny her anything.
My hands shake, rattling the ice cubes in my glass. I put it down carefully, knotting my fingers together and studying the table like the answer to everything is hidden between the glitter in the Formica.
I haven’t talked about this honestly since the police first questioned me. Dr. Charles tried her hardest, through broken furniture and weeks of silence, but I’d twisted the truth to suit the person she thought I was.
With Macy, I’m finally safe. She’d yanked me back from rock bottom once, and I know she’d do it again. But I’m not at the bottom anymore. I’ve found my footing in that precarious middle place, the gray area where you trade addiction for something almost as dangerous: obsession.
“I saw him before Mina did,” I say. “I saw the gun in his hand. I saw he was wearing a mask. I knew…I knew what he was going to do. I knew there was no way I could outrun him. But Mina might have. I should’ve yelled at her to run. She could’ve gotten away. She would’ve at least had a chance.”
“There’s no way to outrun a bullet,” Macy says. “He wanted to kill Mina. That was why he was there. You couldn’t have stopped him. Nothing could’ve.”
“He said something to her. After he hit me, I fell, and as I was blacking out, I heard him. He said, ‘I warned you.’ And then I heard the shots and I…I couldn’t hold on anymore. When I woke up, it was just us. He was gone.”
My hands are shaking again. I tuck them underneath my thighs, pressing them hard against the red vinyl booth.
“I told Detective James all of this. I told him to talk to the Beacon staff. To ask her supervisor what she’d been working on. Did he check her computer? Or her desk? She wrote notes on everything—they have to be somewhere.”
Macy shakes her head. “He talked to everyone, Sophie. Mina’s supervisor, her fellow interns, even the cleaning lady who worked the night shift. He dragged in every known dealer in three counties for questioning, along with most of the kids in your grade, but didn’t find anything to warrant further investigation. Along with a witness testimony that was—well, shaky.” She fiddles with her fork, looking up at me. “Without any fresh evidence or a miraculous confession, it’ll be dismissed as an unsolved drug-related murder, and that’ll be it.”
I feel sick inside and grit my teeth. “I can’t let that happen.”
Macy’s eyes soften. “You might have to, babe.”
I don’t say anything. I keep quiet.
We get up, she pays the bill and tips the waitress before we leave the diner. I’m still silent, the idea of never knowing who took Mina away from me burning in my chest. But somehow, as always, Aunt Macy hears the words I can’t say. When we’re in the car, Macy reaches over and takes my hand.
She keeps it in hers the entire drive home.
It feels like a safety net.
Macy is always poised for my inevitable fall.
4
NINE AND A HALF MONTHS AGO (SIXTEEN YEARS OLD)
“You’re a fucking sadist,” I snarl at Macy.
It’s been three days since my parents shipped me off to Oregon so Macy can “straighten me out,” as my dad put it. Three days since I’ve had any pills. The withdrawal is bad enough—like my body is one giant, throbbing bruise and spiders crawl underneath my sweaty skin—but the pain, undulled and persistent, is too much to take. With the pills, I can move without it hurting too much. Without them, my back is killing me and my leg’s always giving out. Every movement, even turning over in bed, sends sharp flares down my spine that leave me breathless, pain-tears tracking down my face. The pain, full-force for the first time since the accident, combined with the withdrawal is excruciating. I stop getting out of bed. It hurts too much.