Don't Try to Find Me: A Novel (9 page)

“Nog?” His eyebrows are raised, like he’s mocking me or daring me to go on. Keep talking, keep lying, go on and incriminate yourself.

“Yes. Pumpkin nog coffee, or something disgusting like that.” I smile again in the pretense that we’re having a human moment.

“You’re saying you were in line the whole time? When the drive from Starbucks to your work is less than five minutes?”

“It took me a few minutes to park. And I might have been checking my e-mail.” Except I don’t have a smartphone. Only Marley and Paul do. Does Strickland know that?

Okay, so I was with Michael. But I didn’t invite him; he showed up, unannounced. What else could I do? He’d driven hours. I had to meet him.

You’re not supposed to lie to the police, not even about small things. Especially about small things. It makes you look guilty of bigger ones. But Strickland’s got it in for me. There’s no way I can confide in him about Michael.

“I wanted to relax before going to work,” I say. “I wanted some time to myself to enjoy my coffee. So I lied about the flat tire, and I sat in my car for a while, and then I drove to work.”

“You needed to relax. Were you under some particular stress?”

“Did I say ‘need’?” I really couldn’t remember. “No, no particular stress. I can be an anxious person. I’ve always been that way.” That, at least, is true.

Strickland nods rhythmically, like something is becoming very clear to him. Then he says, “The backpack Marley had on her that day, it must have been pretty fat with clothes. Much bigger than it would be on a normal day. And shaped differently, too, with clothes instead of books.”

“It must have been. I didn’t notice.”

“You didn’t notice,” he repeats.

“No. I was focused on not being late. I mean, on Marley not being late.”

“Because she said she couldn’t be late.”

“Right.” He’s trying to trip me up, to make me traverse ground we’ve already covered, and it scares me. I sense his subterranean pleasure. He’s not supposed to show how much he likes doing this to people, exerting his authority. I read somewhere that the psychological profile of cops and criminals is similar. They both love power and intimidation.

“And you didn’t ask her why she couldn’t be late.”

“Right.” I look down at the table and then up at the whiteboard. “Believe me, I’ve been regretting it ever since. There were a lot of things I should have said to Marley that morning.”

“Like what?”

As if I’d tell him. “Anything that would have changed her mind.”

He flips his book shut. “I’ll let you know when I have more questions.”

When, not if. “I’m happy to cooperate,” I say. He stands up. “I know it looks bad that I lied to Nadine. But I dropped Marley off at school just like I said. Then she ran away.”

He doesn’t respond. In his eyes, I’m guilty of something, and he intends to find out what it is.

“Is this about the TV interview?” I obviously failed to be effusive enough about the police’s efforts. Is that what’s turned me into a suspect?

“I didn’t watch any interview,” he says. I guess cops can lie with impunity.

Imaginary Facebook

Marley Willits

Says teen angst is for suckers

1 second ago

B. likes this.

I was bored all day. I didn’t feel like reading any more of
Invisible
Man and so many of B.’s books feel like what I’m going to be subjected to when I go to college anyway.

I’m still planning to go to college. I bet my father thinks I can’t get there without him, or his money, but I will. I’ll be enrolled under my new name, whatever that turns out to be.

At least B. left me the cell phone, so I could text him when I felt like it. But I don’t feel very interesting today. There was nothing on TV, I couldn’t stream any videos or visit websites, and I wasn’t in class surrounded by people I could make fun of to B. It’s like, who am I if I have nothing to react to? I finally know the answer to that riddle about the tree falling in the forest with no one to hear it: No, it doesn’t make a sound.

B. sent me some sweet texts, letting me know he couldn’t wait
to get home to me, telling me how pretty I am when I sleep. I told him how hard it was to be alone in the apartment all day. He wrote that it wouldn’t be like that for too much longer, that he hoped I’d be patient with him. “Tell me u’r with me so far,” he texted, and I smiled, remembering the best e-mail I’d ever gotten. The best anything, really.

I understand where he’s coming from. I think about how anxious I’d be if loving someone could get me arrested. But he made it sound so different, before I came out. We were supposed to go to restaurants and cafés and his favorite bookstore (it has a funny name I can’t quite remember—the Optimizer, the Stimulator?); we’re supposed to be hanging out with his friends.

I know he wants that life for us, too. He’s just scared to have it before we’ve taken all the steps on Disappeared.com. He wants me to have a driver’s license with my new name and a birth date in 1996. I get that. But every night, we eat dinner and hang out and then he says he’s too tired to go to the website; he promises we’ll do it soon.

He’s asked me to be patient, and I can do that. I’m not all about my own agenda, like his other girlfriends were. He’s been what I needed this past year, and now I’m going to be what he needs. I mean, I really think I would have gone crazy without him to talk to, without someone to love me.

He came home in a decent mood, gave me a big smile and a hug, but then he asked, “Oh, you didn’t make anything for dinner?” like he was disappointed.

“I don’t really cook,” I said.

“I bought some cookbooks for you. They’re on that shelf.” He pointed. “I thought since you’d be home a lot, in the beginning, you might want something to do.”

I didn’t come here to be a housewife, so I changed the subject to Disappeared.com. Now that’s a recipe I’d love to follow. “We should get started before it gets late,” I said. Then I felt like kicking myself. Didn’t he, just today, ask me to be patient?

Instead of looking annoyed, B. gave me this really great smile and said, “Can’t I keep you to myself for a while longer?” He was looking at me so adoringly that I wanted the moment to last. I wasn’t going to pin him down with specifics.

I also let it slide because I feel like things are a little tender between us, like a layer of skin growing back after a burn. (Ms. Finelli would like that simile, I bet.) But I don’t know why it should be that way. We haven’t done anything bad to each other.

It might be a normal adjustment period. I don’t know for sure, since I’ve never even had a boyfriend, and now we’re living together. I wish I had someone to ask.

B. and I ate tuna fish sandwiches and talked about what we might do this weekend. I’m really excited about it. Time away from the apartment, time to get in a groove together. Since B.’s nervous to be out in public, I told him we should take a road trip. I asked him where the nearest beach is, and he said it’s about two hours away. I said, “That’s perfect!” and looked up Saturday’s weather in Wilmington. It’s going to be 80 and sunny. Perfect squared.

I didn’t tell B. that I left the apartment for a while today. I didn’t really have a choice. I was going stir-crazy, and with my history, I can’t afford any kind of crazy. It wasn’t a big deal; no one saw me. But it would stress B. out, and what he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.

I don’t have a key to the apartment so I left it unlocked. Then I had to prop open the back entrance with a piece of wood, but B. said he’s the only one who uses it anyway. There weren’t any neighbors around, or even any cars parked on the street. Kind of weird, how we never hear the neighbors either: no shoes on the stairs or overhead; no one’s TV or music; no laughter or fights. B. said that the building is just really well insulated. He told me that a bunch of artists rent studio space, and this one girl paints on huge canvases, the size of our living room. “What does she paint?” I asked. “Feet,” he said. I started to laugh but he told me it was sort of abstract and conceptual, and I’d
understand if I saw her work. I hope I will one of these days. I’d like to meet an artist, even if she’s a foot painter.

Then I think of Hellma’s feet—her toes, to be specific—and I’m not in any rush.

Mostly, by now, the bus ride has receded. It feels like it happened to someone else, or like a movie I saw. But I try to avoid any reminders.

So I snuck out today, just for a little while. I wanted to go to the drugstore and buy some perfume. I figured that if I smelled good, B. might finally make a move. I didn’t know where the drugstore was, since I couldn’t go online to look it up, but I thought there would have to be one if I walked far enough. Which direction, though? There was no one to ask. Durham was dead at three in the afternoon, at least in this neighborhood.

It’s not a bad neighborhood, exactly. I didn’t feel like I was going to get grabbed. But it’s kind of desolate. A ghost town, for a ghost girl.

There were industrial buildings that looked deserted and industrial buildings that had probably been converted into apartments, based on the number of cars parked on the street. I walked for what seemed like a long time but was probably only ten or fifteen minutes. I was drenched in sweat. You know how they say it wasn’t so bad, it was a dry heat? Well, North Carolina is definitely wet heat. It completely sucks. I’m going to need a new wardrobe, as much as I hate to show my arms. They’re pale and flabby. I guess I could start doing push-ups in my free time, since I have so much of it. For sure, I need to get some flip-flops or sandals. My Uggs feel like a form of self-immolation.

This girl in an old Jeep was slowing down for a stop sign just as I reached the corner. She looked like she could be in college. Maybe B. even knows her, not that I can ask her that yet. She had blue streaks in her hair and piercings on her nose and lips. She stared out at me in a way that was unsmiling but not unfriendly.

“Do you know where the nearest drugstore is?” I panted.

“Do you even know where you are?” she said. Then she smiled. “Get in. I’m going that way.”

“Thanks.” I opened the door gratefully. “It’s not too far, is it?”

She started driving. “Not really.”

I was starting to worry about how I’d get back to B.’s, if there was a bus or I’d have to walk. I tried to memorize the route we took. She was right: It wasn’t so far. But I wasn’t 100 percent positive I’d be able to retrace it either. I felt a little panicked. If I didn’t pull this off, I’d have to text B. I’d have to explain myself.

It was funny, how I’d left the apartment because I was so eager for human contact, and now I couldn’t seem to find anything to say. She didn’t tell me her name or ask mine. That was convenient, given my legal situation, but not so great for the loneliness.

As she let me off in front of a CVS, she said, “Are you okay?” One of her lip rings was nearly blinding in the sunshine.

“It’s just so hot.”

“This is nothing compared to summer.” I’m not sure what vibe I was giving off, because she suddenly didn’t seem like she wanted to leave. “Do you know how to get home?”

Just take a bus across the country again. No, that’s not home anymore. “I’ll be okay.” I smiled at her, and she shrugged, like “It’s your life,” and then she drove off. I realized she didn’t have an accent. Not a Southern one, I mean. She could have been from California, for all I knew. I immediately regretted barely talking to her.

But if I’d liked her, what would I have done about it anyway? I couldn’t tell B., “Hey, I made a new friend today!” I don’t get to make new friends yet. First, I’ve got to shed my old identity and don a new one, like a superhero putting on her costume. Super . . . Vicky? No, that’s not it.

Inside CVS, I sniffed all the different perfume bottles. I don’t normally wear perfume, but there are a few on my dresser back home. They’re all from department stores, and they smell light and clean. Cheap perfumes smell cloying, like they’re made of dark purple flowers. None of them smell like me.

I wonder how long those bottles will sit on the dresser, how long my parents will keep my room the same waiting for me to come back. I can see my mom crying on my bed, hoping.

I wouldn’t mind her knowing that I’m alive. I didn’t leave to torture her. Not entirely. If I called, I could tell her that I’m alive but I’m not coming home. They can go ahead and clear out my room. They should know I haven’t changed my mind about them, and I’m not going to. A good-bye note followed by a good-bye phone call more than a week later—what could be more final?

I looked down at the phone in my hand. I could do it. There was no one to stop me. But what if the police somehow traced the call?

A saleswoman with poodle hair started dusting nearby. It was so obvious that she’d been told to do that. Management thought I was going to steal something. I hate that about being a teenager. You’re an instant suspect.

So much for human contact. This was reminding me why I mostly don’t need people. They’re a lot of work for not a lot of payoff.

To mess with the poodle, I moved over to the cosmetics. I picked up eye shadows and blushes and lipsticks, roamed a little, and then put them back on their racks. I didn’t plan to buy any of it, but it was kind of fun to waste her time. She trailed me for a while, and then a customer asked her where to find something, and that was the end of the game.

It was a stupid game for me to be playing anyway. What if they mistakenly thought I took something and hauled me in the back and asked for ID? What would I have done then?

I decided I’d buy a fruity body wash and matching lotion and get out of there. It’s probably not the smartest use of my finite resources, but at some point, when I can work under my new name, I’ll replenish them. Maybe I’ll work at CVS, and I’ll spend my time “dusting” next to people my age. No way I’d ever do that.

I started walking back to the apartment. It was nerve-wracking, because I kept thinking I’d made a right and should have made a left, or vice versa. It’s like when you take a multiple-choice test and find
yourself debating whether to change the answers. It’s best to stick with your first instinct, they say. So I never doubled back, just kept going, and eventually, I was in the ghost town again. Trapped between worlds, like a soul in transition, that’s how it feels. Like I’m not in California anymore, but I haven’t fully materialized here yet either. Like I’m not fully me, I’m still just a bunch of molecules.

Being alone so much makes my thoughts weird.

I tried to explain that to B. tonight, and he nodded like he understood. His eyes have a lot of pain in them. I didn’t see it in his photos. It makes me want to stand by him no matter what. He needs proof that there are good people in the world.

B. wanted to read together, but I said tonight, it was my turn to do something I’d always wanted to do. I smelled sweet from the extra-long shower I took when I got home, and I was soft with lotion. I moved right next to him on the futon and gave him one of my earbuds. We listened to “To Be in Your Eyes.” All right, it was cheesy, especially since I’d done it pretty recently with Kyle. But it had worked then.

I started singing along really softly: “And I’m waking to this aching / and it’s breaking me in two / all the space / all the waste / all the distance between me and you.” I cried a tiny bit, realizing B. was right here with me and not knowing what to do with it, whether he wanted me, if I should have come here at all. It was the first time I let myself really feel that this might have been a mistake.

I couldn’t wait anymore to find out the ending; I had to turn the page myself. I leaned in and kissed him. I was so happy, thinking, It’s happening, it’s finally happening! and we fit together really well. Our tongues did, I mean. Like, perfectly. I wanted to flatten myself against him so I could feel all his muscles. Every part of me wanted to connect with every part of him. It was getting more intense and I was so in love and so turned on, which has never happened before both at once, and then . . .

B. pulled away and said he needed to take a shower.

“Why?” I asked.

“It’s just”—he hesitated—“where’d you learn that headphone thing? And the way you kiss.” He didn’t sound accusing or mad. It was more like he ordered one kind of girl online, and this other kind of girl showed up at his door.

I’ve let him believe I’ve only kissed a couple of guys, because he seems to like that. Is that the same as lying?

I felt ashamed. I was acting like Trish, forward and full of myself, and that’s not who he wants to be with. And the headphones were a trick.

I couldn’t figure out what to say. I just stared down at my hands.

“It’s my job to kiss you,” he said. I guess he meant it’s the man’s job. He can be old-fashioned, which I like. He’s not a California guy, that’s for sure.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“You don’t need to apologize.”

Hug me! Kiss me! Let’s try it again!

But instead he left the room, and I heard the shower start running.

This’ll get better and easier. I know it will. This is where I’m supposed to be.

I love him.

I do.