She knew that he hadn't been buried yet, and maybe that was why he kept coming. Maybe once his body began to break down inside its coffin, he wouldn't show up at the foot of her bed. Since Trixie had returned from the hospital, it had been like old times - Zephyr would come over after school and tell her everything she was missing: the catfight between two cheerleaders who liked the same guy, the substitute teacher in French who couldn't speak a single word of the language, the sophomore who got hospitalized for anorexia. Zephyr had also been her source of information about how Bethel High was processing Jason's death. The guidance counselors had led an assembly about teen depression; the principal had gotten on the PA during homeroom announcements to have a moment of memorial silence; Jason's locker had become a shrine, decorated with notes and stickers and Beanie Babies. It was, Trixie realized, as if Jason had grown larger than life after his death, as if it was going to be even harder now for her to avoid him. Zephyr rolled over. “Do you think it hurts to die?” Not as much as it hurts to live, Trixie thought. “Do you think we go somewhere .. . after?” Zephyr asked. Trixie closed her magazine.
“I don't know.” “I wonder if it's like it is here. If there are popular dead people and geeky dead people. You know.” That sounded like high school, and the way Trixie figured it, that was more likely to be hell. “I guess it's different for different people,” she said. “Like, if you died, there'd be an endless supply of Sephora makeup. For Jason, it's one big hockey rink.”
“But do people ever cross over? Do the hockey players ever get to hang out with the people who eat only chocolate? Or the ones who play Nintendo twenty-four/seven?”
“Maybe there are dances or something,” Trixie said. “Or a bulletin board, so you know what everyone else is up to, and you can join in if you want and blow it off if you don't.”
“I bet when you eat chocolate in heaven it's no big deal,” Zephyr said. “If you can have it whenever you want it, it probably doesn't taste as good.” She shrugged. “I bet they all watch us down here, because they know we've got it better than them and we're too stupid to realize it.” She glanced sideways at Trixie.
“Guess what I heard.”
“What?”
“His whole head was bashed in.”
Trixie felt her stomach turn over. “That's just a rumor.”
“It's totally not. Marcia Breen's brother's girlfriend is a nurse, and she saw Jason being brought into the hospital.” She popped a bubble with her gum. “I hope that if he went to heaven, he got a big old bandage or plastic surgery or something.”
“What makes you think he's going to heaven?” Trixie asked. Zephyr froze. “I didn't mean ... I just. ..” Her gaze slid toward Trixie. “Trix, are you truly glad he's dead?” Trixie stared at her hands in her lap. For a moment, they looked like they belonged to someone else - still, pale, too heavy for the rest of her. She forced herself to open her magazine again, and she pretended she was engrossed in an ad about tampons so that she didn't have to give Zephyr a reply. Maybe after reading for a while, they would both forget what Zephyr had asked. Maybe after a while, Trixie wouldn't be afraid of her answer.
* * *
According to Dante, the deeper you got into hell, the colder it was. When Daniel imagined hell, he saw the vast white wasteland of the Yukon-Kuskokwim delta where he'd grown up. Standing on the frozen river, you might see smoke rising in the distance. A Yup'ik Eskimo would know it was open water, steaming where it hit the frigid air, but a trick of the light could make you believe otherwise. You might think you see the breath of the devil. When Daniel drew the ninth circle of hell, it was a world of planes and angles, a synchronicity of white lines, a land made of ice. It was a place where the greater effort you made to escape, the more deeply entrenched you were.
Daniel had just put the finishing touches on the devil's face when he heard a car pull into the driveway. From the window of his office he watched Detective Bartholemew get out of his Taurus. He had known it was coming to this, hadn't he? He had known it the minute he'd walked into that parking lot and found Jason Underhill with Trixie.
Daniel opened up the front door before the detective could knock. “Well,” Bartholemew said. “That's what I call service.” Daniel tried to channel the easy repartee of social intercourse but it was like he was fresh out of the village again, bombarded by sensations he didn't understand: colors and sights and speech he'd never seen or heard before. “What can I do for you?” he asked finally.
“I was wondering if we could talk for a minute,” Bartholemew said.
No, Daniel thought. But he led the detective inside to the living room and offered him a seat.
“Where's the rest of the family?”
“Laura's teaching,” Daniel said. “Trixie's upstairs with a friend.”
“How'd she take the news about Jason Underhill?” Was there a right answer to that question? Daniel found himself replaying possible responses in his head before he balanced them on his tongue. “She was pretty upset. I think she feels partially responsible.”
“What about you, Mr. Stone?” the detective asked. He thought about the conversation he'd had with Laura just that morning. “I wanted him to be punished for what he did,” Daniel said. “But I never wished him dead.”
The detective stared at him for a long minute. “Is that so?” There was a thump overhead; Daniel glanced up. Trixie and Zephyr had been upstairs for about an hour. When Daniel had last checked on them, they were reading magazines and eating Goldfish crackers.
“Did you see Jason Friday night?” Detective Bartholemew asked.
“Why?”
“We're just trying to piece together the approximate time of the suicide.”
Daniel's mind spiraled backward. Had Jason said something to the cops about the incident in the woods? Had the guy who'd driven by the parking lot during their fistfight gotten a good look at Daniel? Had there been other witnesses?
“No, I didn't see Jason,” Daniel lied.
“Huh. I could have sworn I saw you in town.”
“Maybe you did. I took Trixie to the minimart to get some cheese. We were making a pizza for dinner.”
“About when was that?”
The detective pulled a pad and pencil out of his pocket; it momentarily stopped Daniel cold. “Seven,” he said. “Maybe seven-thirty. We just drove to the store and then we left.”
“What about your wife?”
“Laura? She was working at the college, and then she came home.”
Bartholemew made a note on his pad. “So none of you ran into Jason?”
Daniel shook his head.
Bartholemew put his pad back into his breast pocket. “Well,” he said, “then that's that.”
“Sorry I couldn't help you,” Daniel answered, standing up. The detective stood too. “You must be relieved. Obviously your daughter won't have to testify as a witness now.” Daniel didn't know how to respond. Just because the rape case wouldn't proceed didn't mean that Trixie's slate would be wiped clean as well. Maybe she wouldn't testify, but she wouldn't get back to who she used to be, either.
Bartholemew headed toward the front door. “It was pretty crazy in town Friday night, with the Winterfest and all,” he said. “Did you get what you wanted?”
Daniel went still. “I beg your pardon?”
“The cheese. For your pizza.”
He forced a smile. “It turned out perfect,” Daniel said.
* * *
When Zephyr left a little while later, Trixie offered to walk her out. She stood on the driveway, shivering, not having bothered with a coat. The sound of Zephyr's heels faded, and then Trixie couldn't even see her anymore. She was about to head back inside when a voice spoke from behind. “It's good to have someone watching over you, isn't it?”