Complicit (5 page)

Something she hadn't been able to do.

I picture Cate handling the cops the way she handled everything. Sprawled on her bed with not enough clothes on while blowing cigarette smoke out the garden window so Angie wouldn't yell at her about the smell. Angie never yelled about Cate's lungs. Just the smell.

“Look, Miss Henry,” the cops would have told her, not bothering to avert their eyes from the depth of her cleavage or the space between her thighs. “We have good reason to believe that fire was set deliberately, as a way to hurt the Ramirez family. So if you know something about that and you keep it from us, then that makes you complicit. Do you know what that means?”

“Sure I do,” Cate would've snapped right back. “I'm not stupid.”

“Well, you recently shared some of your thoughts about Danny Ramirez and Gwendolyn Wright online.”

“Did I?”

“Yes. You wrote that Danny, and I quote, ‘better not be slumming around with that Gwen bitch again.'”

“Okay.”

“You also wrote that any guy you can't trust needs to watch his back. That you'd make him pay.”

“Hmmm.”

“Isn't Danny Ramirez your boyfriend?”

“Define ‘boyfriend.'”

“Do you two spend time together? Enjoy each other's company?”

“God, that's so vague.”

“It really isn't.”

I picture Cate puffing away even harder and looking out the window. She had to see the crowd of neighbors gathering in the street.

Talking. Pointing. Wondering.

She had to know.

Our whole town was watching.

TWELVE

Friday evening, Jenny makes my head spin when I go to pick her up. This is due in part to her outfit, which consists primarily of vertical black and white stripes. But it's more than that. Way more. She's got her hair down and I'm drawn in by the way her bangs land right before her eyes. It's like she has nothing to hide. I could while away days, I think, looking at Jenny, at all the parts that make her whole.

Even though she grumbles under her breath about “archaic notions of female chastity,” I do the thing I'm supposed to do and go inside to meet her parents. I'm nervous, on edge, a lot of which has to do with my sister, but I haven't heard from her since Wednesday, so maybe things will be okay. Maybe this will all blow over.

Jenny's folks are decent enough, chastity notions notwithstanding. Her family only moved here last year so I don't know a lot about them. Her dad shakes my hand and asks about school and my future and how long I've been driving. I do my best to appear normal, composed, but by the time Jenny and I say our goodbyes, I'm kind of a wreck. My worrying's got this way of reproducing inside my head, so that the few become many, and where my original concern was about making a good impression for Jenny's family, my brain takes the liberty of expanding this into All The Ways I Could Screw This Night Up. The possibilities are endless, but recurring themes seem to be general awkwardness, telling jokes that aren't funny, and stepping in dog shit.

Jenny senses my nerves, I think, because as we walk down the steps of the house to where my Jeep's parked at the curb, she takes my hand and holds on to it, like it's not even something she has to think about doing. Like in the ways that matter, she's stronger than me.

I like that.

It helps me breathe.

 

 

We end up riding the BART train into Berkeley. That's where I've found this cool art theater right near the university that's showing a series of old Alfred Hitchcock films. I know it's sort of a long way from Danville but I don't want to take Jenny to see something dumb, like one of those fighting robot movies or that comedy with all the fart jokes. I want her to see something special. I want her to see something she'll remember.

She reads the indie newspaper on the train. It's got the schedule for the Hitchcock festival. Tonight's showing is
Spell Bound,
which is the one Dali designed the dream sequences for. The one where the therapist helps the guy with amnesia avoid a murder conviction after he's framed.

“I've only ever seen
The Birds,
” she tells me.

“Then you're missing out,” I say.

“You really like old movies?”

“I like good movies.”

“You sound like a snob,” she says, but she's laughing when she does it, so I don't mind.

I shrug. “Maybe I've just got good taste. Maybe that's why I'm with you.”

Jenny doesn't answer. She keeps reading. At some point during the train ride, she leans against me and I rest my chin on her head. Her hair smells good, like fresh rain and cut grass.

 

 

We walk down College Avenue together after the film. Everything's open late for the holidays. Christmas lights are up and the street's crowded with a mix of shoppers and university students. Jenny seemed to like
Spell Bound,
even though it's not close to Hitchcock's best, and I'm feeling pretty good about the way things are going. That is, until we pass this pet store that's got a display of kittens out front, along with a sign that says they need adopting, and my skin starts to crawl.

I don't know how to describe it. It's always strange seeing a word applied to animals that has also been applied to me. In ethics class we've talked about why it's not okay to call animals slaves because it demeans human slavery, so why doesn't the same apply to adoption? I mean, you can even adopt
highways,
for God's sake. But it turns out Jenny loves cats, so of course we have to stop in front of the pet store. She puts her face right by their cage and makes
ohhh!
and
ahhh!
sounds. One of the kittens, an orange one with a red bow around its neck, yawns and stretches and puts its paw on the bar between them. Jenny turns to ask an employee, some paunchy middle-aged guy, if she can hold it.

“You really considering adopting her?” the guy asks.

Jenny glances over at me. “Well, no.”

He shrugs. “Can't do it, then. If I took her out for everyone that wanted to hold her, she'd be exhausted.”

“Just for a minute?” I ask. “Please?”

“You slow or something, pal? Already said I can't do it.”

My muscles tense. I don't like the disappointment on Jenny's face and I definitely don't like the smugness on the employee's, but there's not much I can do to fix the situation. I wish Jenny had just lied and said she was serious about adopting the dumb cat. I mean, it's not like someone can tell if you're trustworthy or not by looking at you. But I do what I always do; I turn away from the pet store. I swallow my sense of righteousness and pride.

“Let's get ice cream,” I suggest, and Jenny nods.

The ice cream shop's located two doors down, and there's a long line spilling outside and into the street. Even in December. It's a real upscale place and the flavors they serve are ridiculous—pretentious things like lychee fruit, vintage Bordeaux, and double salted caramel, but we get to taste samples while we wait to order. I choose dark chocolate and Jenny orders honey-lavender, which makes me smile. I don't much go for the idea of eating ice cream that tastes like flowers, but I like the idea that she does. It's sweet, you know? I take a chance, reaching for Jenny's hand as we stroll and that's when I see Danny Ramirez, Cate's old boyfriend, sitting at an outdoor café.

He's with someone. A female.

Cate.

My stomach lurches.

It could be her. It really could—Danny's always stood by Cate, for reasons I've never understood. I can't get a good look at this girl, though. Her back's to me, so all I can make out is long black hair, and when she reaches for her drink, I see white skin, slim wrists, but it's not enough. I can't be sure. So I stand there, frozen and gaping, with my ice cream cone held up to my mouth that's hanging open like all my circuits have jammed, and in my mind, I will this girl to turn around and show her face so I can see if she's got eyes and a chin that look like mine, only sort of hard and haunted all at once.

Turn, turn, turn,
I think.
Show me.

Then suddenly, the winter wind blows and the Christmas lights sway and the ding-ding-ding of the holiday bells flood my senses, and the thought of seeing my sister, here, now, after all this time, well, it stops my heart and tears at my insides. It's too much. I'm overwhelmed. I don't want to know if it's her. I don't.

I can't.

I panic. Only my hands don't go numb. In fact, I have just the opposite reaction.

“Ow!” squeaks Jenny. “Jamie, what are you—”

“This way,” I say gruffly, dropping my ice cream with a disgraceful splat as I pull her right around in the opposite direction. I move on pure autopilot. Jenny stumbles on the sidewalk, but I hold her up. We march forward, like dancers on a stage, skirting a loud family that's practically taking up the whole walkway, a street performer who's singing Green Day off-key, and some scruffy-haired college student who's trying to force people into signing a petition about solar-powered trees or tax-free air or one of those nutty Berkeley things.

Once we've turned a corner, Jenny pops her hand free of mine and flexes her fingers. “What was
that
about?”

I keep walking.

“Hey!” Jenny trots alongside me. Then grabs my arm. “Come on, stop.”

I'm rattled, beyond rattled, really, but now that we've put some distance between us and that girl, now that I don't have to face the possibility of seeing my sister, I'm able to do what Jenny's telling me to do; I stop and I look at her.

I feel like total shit.

“I'm sorry about your hand,” I say. “
Fuck.
I'm so damn sorry.”

“My hand's
fine.
Jamie, what's wrong? You look upset.”

“I'm sorry,” I say again, but I'm shaking, and she sees that and I can't make her unsee it. “It's just, I've got issues with, well, with anxiety, I guess. It hasn't been bad like this in a long time, though.”

“Anxiety? Like panic attacks?”

I grit my teeth and let my eyes roll skyward. Well, now I'm embarrassed more than anything. “Sort of.”

“Because of your cataplexy thing?”

“Nah, I've been anxious since way before my cataplexy started. Since I was a kid. But like I said, it hasn't been a problem in a long while.”

Except for last Wednesday at school. During gym. When Cate called.

“Well, I'm glad you're all right.” Jenny squeezes me again, then she turns her hand over and sort of brushes her knuckles gently across my forearm. Back and forth. I suck in air. Her touch is a spark on dry tinder.

“Well, I'm glad you're so damn nice,” I say.

We both stand there, not talking, just looking at each other. More than looking, what we're really doing is gazing, and we do it for so long I start to get the feeling that nothing else matters.

It's a good feeling.

Better than good.

It's one I could get lost in.

THIRTEEN

At midnight, after my date, I lie in bed feeling both exhilarated and remorseful. The exhilaration comes from realizing how much I like Jenny, but the remorse stems from not kissing her when I dropped her off at her house. I could've done it. Kissed her. I even think she wanted me to. It's just, after how I acted after seeing Danny and that girl, I wasn't sure I
deserved
it.

I writhe naked beneath my flannel sheets, feeling the feelings of all the ways in which I'd like to touch Jenny. And have her touch me back. They're like a punishment, these feelings, imprisoning me alongside the terrible way I can't stop replaying the shy, small-fingered wave Jenny gave me as she slid out of the Jeep and said good night. A
wave.
More like a tidal wave of failure.

I writhe more.

God help me.

See, this is my worrying thing again. I mean, I'm way better than I used to be. I haven't cried for no reason or fallen down any flights of stairs recently. For the most part, I credit Dr. Waverly with my improvement. Within two years after I started seeing her, I'd completely changed. I grew a full four inches, gained twenty pounds. My lisp vanished, my hair grew back in, and people stopped asking my adoptive parents what was wrong with me. I threw myself into my schoolwork until I was my teacher's favorite, and I picked up the piano at Malcolm's encouragement: his son Graham had played, but soon I played better. In fact, I played really, really well. Concert level, even. I had
confidence.

But as much as Dr. Waverly helped, it was Scooter, I think, that did the most. He was my first real friend.

We met near the end of fourth grade, on a day when the spring sun shone into the classroom and hummingbirds danced outside the window. Our teacher stood at the front of the room and announced that a new student would be joining us. I sat up straight at my desk. The last new kid in our grade had been
me.
I wanted to be nice to this student because I knew how it felt to have people not like you. The teacher beamed and beckoned the new boy in. He was slight like I was, with big ears, preppy clothes, and an unscuffed backpack.

“Please give a warm welcome to Scott Murphy.”

“Scooter,” the boy said.

“What was that?”

“Everyone calls me Scooter.”

I perked up even more. The new boy had a faint hint of a lisp.

From the back of the room I lifted my hand and waved shyly at Scooter.

He saw.

He waved back.

And that was that. Malcolm and Angie were beside themselves that I'd made a friend. It killed their vision that I'd grow up to be the next Norman Bates or something. The only person who
didn't
like Scooter was Cate. She turned on him one of the very first times Scooter stayed the night with me.