We Lie Here: A Thriller, page 28
“They lied to you, too.”
“They were young, Yara. Our age. And what the hell do either of us know right now about living? Clothes, cars, and dick—that’s what I care about today. You’re the one who promised to buy me a pony if I got my degree and didn’t get married.”
“Cuz you’re young,” I say. “You don’t know who you are away from this house, away from the Antelope Valley.”
She waggles her head. “I agree. That’s what I’m saying about Mom and Dad. He obviously got caught up with the female equivalent of Ransom, but back in the olden days, they had to get married. It wasn’t working out, so he was side dickin’ this hot chick named Barbara, and she got pregnant with you. He divorced old gal and married Mom. Kids being stupid and playing grown-up games. They wouldn’t be the first. Obviously.”
Tears burn in my eyes because, intellectually, this makes sense and Dominique is right. Emotionally, though? Our house was built upon the sand and now—for me at least—our foundation is being washed away.
Dominique shakes out my next dose of antibiotics. “Does it suck that you planned all this for Saturday and now your face is swollen because Mom’s ratchet BFF let her fists fly? Yes, and I’d be pissed at that.” She waves her hand, then snaps her fingers. “The math around our parents, though? Let that go.”
The pills slide down my throat as bitter as the truth I’m learning about my family.
Someone’s crying in the room beneath me.
“Kayla told me she took your DNA,” I say.
My sister sucks her teeth. “I barely touched Felicia that day.”
I rest my head on her shoulder. “Same, but she’s gotta do her job.” I pause, then add, “Especially since our parents’ fingerprints were on this letter they found in Felicia’s car.”
Dominique picks at her nails. “I really don’t care about Felicia. She was messy and disturbed. Cece said the same thing, like twenty minutes ago. And by the way, I did fix the pendant. You were talking to Shane when I put it on the dresser.”
I grunt, remembering, not remembering. My head pain turns from sharp to fuzzy, and my eyelids droop. I hear myself snore a few times, and I shift as Dominique eases out of my bed. She sets the remote control on the pillow and kisses my forehead.
The world dims . . . dims . . .
I awaken, breathless, gasping, pulse pounding.
My eyes skip around the room.
The world outside my window is dark now. The television screen brightens the room and makes shadows twist against the walls. Where am I?
Home.
Palmdale.
Bedroom.
I’d been underwater again. Sharp rocks poking my bare feet . . . Croaking frogs . . . Cold, so cold . . . I’d screamed and water had filled my mouth, my lungs . . .
The nightmare.
Feels like I’m trapped in solidifying gelatin and moving in slow motion. I rub my creaky face, then grab a bottle of water from the nightstand. The clock on the DVD/VCR says it’s five minutes after nine. The murmuring has moved outside.
“All right now,” Aunt Cece says from the driveway. I can barely make out her words. “You let me know.”
Mom shouts back, “I will. Love you.”
“Love you, too,” Aunt Cece says.
Car doors slam. A car engine starts. The front door closes.
On broadcast television, local news anchor Pat Harvey queues up the next story. Something about a body found in a car a few miles northwest of Palmdale, near Rogers Creek. “Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Detective Kayla Kozlowski says this vehicle may be connected to the murder of an aeronautics executive—”
Felicia?
The world is blurry, so I crawl to the foot of the bed to see those shots of the light-colored compact car. This car looks like the one that pulled into the parking lot behind Felicia’s Benz. As I reach to the nightstand for my glasses, I knock over bottles of water, pill vials, eye drops . . .
Was I wearing glasses when LaRain jumped me?
If so, they could’ve fallen off and landed behind our house.
I close my eyes and try to remember.
Probably?
I search beneath my bed for my glasses as Pat Harvey says, “Detectives are still in the process of identifying the woman in the car and determining if her death is a matter of foul play.”
Woman?
57.
Even at this time of night, the house makes noise. The refrigerator crunches and upchucks ice cubes into the freezer bucket. The toilets’ water tanks hiss and fill. The thermostat clicks, and the vents send frigid air to cool the rooms.
But this noise isn’t the reason why I can’t sleep.
I can’t sleep because there was a news story about a dead woman found in a car. I can’t sleep because I can’t find my glasses. Because I tried to sleep, and that nightmare kept seeping into my dreams, and I keep being pulled underwater only for my head to hit a rock and explode like dynamite. I can’t sleep because . . .
Beth Gibson.
Dad really tried to pretend that he didn’t know that name, but I saw the way his hands gripped the steering wheel, how his knuckles whitened and popped like ball bearings. How the vein in his throat pounded against his skin.
I steal over to the closet and reach into the darkness for the plastic tub I took from the cabin. I hid it beneath my suitcase and a blanket because I don’t want Mom to know it exists. I grab the binder of statements and go through more papers only to find . . .
Partial transcript of 911 call
OPERATOR: 911. What is your emergency?
CALLER: I’m at my family’s cabin—we’re visiting from LA. I just drove up and my family . . . they’re not here.
OPERATOR: Okay.
CALLER: I’ve been calling all morning but she’s . . . she’s not answering. And it looks like . . . There’s blood here.
OPERATOR: What is the address of the cabin?
CALLER: 1224 Stardust Way, Lake Paz, the green cabin.
OPERATOR: Tell me what happened.
CALLER: They aren’t here. Things are turned over. There’s blood, not a lot of it, but there’s blood, I don’t know whose blood and . . . I freaked out and drove around in case there’d been an accident but our car—it’s in the garage and there’s a note from her, I think it’s from her, and . . . she’s . . . I don’t know where . . .
OPERATOR: Stay on the line with me, sir. Okay?
CALLER: Are you on your way?
Had Daddy been the caller?
I push aside the folders, photographs, and all the other stuff that’s already told me about Elizabeth Marsh, and I find a tan Kinney shoebox, men’s size 11.
Inside: title papers for 1224 Stardust Way. That’s the cabin at Lake Paz owned by Sheldon and Maryam Marsh, my father’s . . . former in-laws. There are insurance letters.
Re: Policy AZ-3678-5002
Dear Elizabeth Marsh:
This letter is in response to a recent inquiry regarding the above-mentioned policy. The face amount of the policy is $2,500,000 with an issue date of July 14, 1989.
Also inside: a slick piece of paper with a baby’s footprints at the bottom. But the type has faded, and the purple-ink footprints have ghosted. There’s an infant’s identification bracelet taped to this sheet of paper—it’s the tag that newborns wear at the hospital. The print on the tiny identification band is also faded, and my eyes are too weak to read any remaining print.
Are these Elizabeth Marsh’s footprints?
Or . . .
Elizabeth’s daughter?
My spine sags because ohmigod . . .
She and Dad did have a child together.
Did Felicia know this, and that was yet one more reason she came to see me?
Is Felicia dead because . . . ?
Did my father . . . ?
He’s not a murderer.
Right?
I need to talk to Elizabeth Marsh Gibson.
Daddy has already lied to me by omission, and if he’s the one who . . . ? No, I can’t ask him. Mom would freak out if there’s even a hint of me knowing all that I know. Then again, what if she doesn’t know all that I know?
And now, with trembling hands, I grab my phone from the nightstand and tap the number for Elizabeth Marsh. Yes, she told me that she didn’t want to be bothered. Yes, she threatened to hug me to death if I did. She may choose to ignore me, unless she’s just been found in a light-colored car miles away from here.
Outside my room, something thumps.
I hold the phone away from my ear and hear . . .
Thumping.
Has LaRain returned to end me for good?
The squinty-eyed mystery man in the green Mazda . . . could it be him?
Thump.
Someone’s here.
Or maybe it’s Dominique pacing out on the porch?
I grab the hunting knife from beneath my mattress and hold the phone in my other hand. I can make an emergency call at a moment’s notice.
I take a deep breath and slowly . . . slowly . . . open my bedroom door.
The hallway is dark and empty. My parents’ bedroom door is closed. Dominique’s bedroom door is open. I creep to the staircase.
Downstairs, the water cooler hums. The thermostat clicks, and cool air whooshes through the ducts. My hair lifts with the chilled breeze, and new goose bumps join the old.
I whisper, “Dom, that you?”
The thermostat cuts off, and the house falls into silence again.
I hear . . .
My heartbeat.
My breathing . . .
Mrs. Duncan’s faraway wind chimes . . .
I squint into the kitchen.
The light above the range shines bright in the night, but shadows lurk near the kitchen door and laundry room. Four wineglasses sit in the dish-drying rack. A filled ashtray sits on the bay window ledge with cigarette butts stained by two different shades of lipstick.
That’s right. Auntie Cece stopped by.
I tiptoe through the empty dining room to the living room. The front door is locked. The powder room behind the staircase . . .
With my diminished vision, the prowler could be hiding behind the breakfast counter.
There’s no one behind the breakfast counter.
I release the breath I’ve been holding, but I won’t release the knife. If I could carry this knife forever, I would.
Sleepy now, I plop on the couch in the den and wipe my sweaty forehead with the tail of my T-shirt. For the second time, I dial Elizabeth Marsh’s—
There it is again!
That thumping.
It’s close.
I jerk as adrenaline spikes through me.
I slink toward the living room, then tap “End Call.”
One thump, then . . . nothing.
It’s finally happened. I’ve finally lost my mind. It feels like spinning and clanging pots and . . . Fighting tears, I let the knife fall to my side. There’s no one here except me. Maybe I will return to therapy, and this time I’ll tell Dr. Birch about my nightmares and ask her to prescribe some old-school remedies like ice baths and electroshock therapy. I’ll do anything just to be normal. Just so that I won’t see and hear shit that isn’t there.
Queasy, I tap the number of a woman who may have been found dead tonight in a light-colored car. This time, I will ignore the phantom sounds. This time, I will ignore that thump . . . thumpthump . . . Thump . . . thumpthump . . . Since I’m crazy, it doesn’t matter if I follow that sound or not, and phone to ear, I pretend that I’m not following that sound . . . that I’m leaving the den . . .
Elizabeth Marsh isn’t answering.
Thump . . . thumpthump . . .
Not in the living room, but behind me . . . in the foyer . . . thump . . . thumpthump . . . It’s here.
I stoop in front of the nook.
Thump . . . thumpthump . . .
The sound comes from inside Mom’s go bag. I pull the zipper and the bag splits open.
Thump . . . thumpthump . . .
I push past sweats, socks, shirts to reach the bottom of the duffel.
Thump . . . thumpthump . . .
Though its ringer is off, the dark-red Nokia cell phone vibrates. Beneath the screen, the number keys glow. There’s an incoming phone call . . .
My number fills its screen.
I’m calling this phone right now.
58.
No.
This . . .
I don’t understand.
Why does Mom have Elizabeth Marsh’s cell phone in her go bag?
And the phone’s charged. Does she take it out and plug it into a charger each week?
I sit in that dim foyer, the phone light the only light in this little cubby.
I dial the number that Alicia Campbell gave me again, the number that I’ve texted belonging to a woman who responded with texts of her own.
The Nokia vibrates with my number on its screen.
I hunker beside the bag and call that number again.
The Nokia comes alive again and it thump . . . thumpthumps against the floor.
There are clothes in the bag. Baggy tan cargo pants. A white tank top. Platform flip-flops.
Fashion-wise, this bag has been here since the Middle Ages. I’ve never seen Mom wearing raised flip-flops because she hates raised flip-flops. The devil’s folly, she calls them.
Also in the Louis Vuitton duffel, a matching Louis Vuitton phone book.
I flip through the pages of the book.
Dawn Gregory lives on Parkglen Avenue in Los Angeles.
Vanessa Lawrence lives in Marina del Rey.
Who are Dawn and Vanessa?
Alicia Campbell—I know that name.
Felicia Campbell—I know that name, too.
Audrey Gibson—my nana on Dad’s side.
There’s Daddy’s information from back in the day, when he lived near USC.
There are loose snapshots of me that I’ve never seen before:
An infant me at the pumpkin patch, perched on a haystack.
An infant me eating ice cream, most of it on my face.
Toddler Yara banging the keys of a piano.
These pictures worry me, gnaw at my stomach.
Dust that coats the bag reaches my nose. I sneeze three times, and my head bursts from the pressure.
What should I do?
Say nothing about this or about everything I’ve learned in the last week?
Confront Mom about this phone?
What would be her excuse?
Liz left it when she abandoned Daddy, and I found it and held on to it all this time. Why is it any of your concern, Yara Marie?
Sounds like something Mom would say.
Cell phones came into regular use during the late nineties. This Nokia’s face comes off. When did it come out? A quick Google search tells me that the Nokia 5110 featured changing fascia and debuted in 1998.
Elizabeth Marsh left Dad in June 1998, and they divorced in October 1998. She could’ve left her bag and phone, especially since she was in a hurry.
Except I texted Elizabeth Marsh using this phone number, and she’d texted me back.
How?
Could my mother be Liz Marsh?
No way. But my head swims, and I sneeze again; my skull rocks, and any deductions I’ve made are blown apart. The goop in my head has thickened as much as the goop pooled in my tight chest. My thoughts turn to sludge and lose all motion and momentum.
Nothing makes sense.
I shove the Nokia deep into the duffel bag and zip it up. I shove the bag into the cubby, then grab the knife from the floor. I can’t figure out my next steps if I’m cloudy and in pain. Hot water always opens my lungs, and so I climb into the shower, setting the knife on the sink top just in case. The hot water needles my muscles like liquid acupuncture and I want to cry with relief, but I’m too tired to cry.
Steam covers the mirror completely—no SURRENDER, no words at all. As I wrap myself in a towel, I focus on that steamy glass and wait for a sick reveal. DIE BITCH or I’M COMING FOR YOU in dripping letters.
No words. No reveals.
Back in the bedroom, I put the shoebox and plastic tub back into the closet, then turn off the television. I pop two Vicodin and fall into bed, breathing hard, in pain. I wrap the linens and comforter tightly around my damp skin. Outside, dry leaves crunch and scrape across the wasteland. For a moment, I worry about my lost glasses but remember that I can always buy an emergency pair at the mall.
I reach to pull my rubber band.
Bare wrist.
My rubber band is gone.
My pulse revs and my mind loops . . . loops . . .
I can’t . . .
59.
My vibrating cell phone eases me out of a medicated slumber. The late-night shower helped me sleep, and the barely there sunlight tells me that it’s not time yet to abandon the warmth of this comforter. But the phone keeps buzzing, and so I wiggle out of my cocoon and reach for it as little blades stab at every part of my body. I wait for the ringing between my ears to stop and for the flare of pain roaring across my muscles to taper off.
Five minutes pass before I dare to slowly reach again for my phone.
The screen is blurry.
Oh yeah. I don’t have my glasses, nor can I find them.
Shane’s left a voice mail. He tells me that he loves me, that he’s trying his hardest to race back to Southern California to feed me wonton soup and fancy gelato. “And I’m just thinking about this case with Elizabeth Marsh. I found the number to the condo property manager over on Saint Croix. His name is Winston Rhymes. Nice, right? I’m sure he can tell you if she’s been living there or not. I’ll email everything, and when you feel up to it, we can talk it over.”
I open Shane’s email.
Winston Rhymes, Schooner Bay Condominiums, Saint Croix.
What if I flew to the Virgin Islands tomorrow? A treat after pretending for my parents that everything they’ve done together has been so freaking romantic? The Emmy, Oscar, and NAACP Image Awards go to . . . Yeah, I should fly to Saint Croix.
And maybe Shane will join me.
Since I now have the energy, I call him. “And now that you’re done with the case,” I say to him, “maybe we can stay there and live happily ever after.”
