Secrets (9 page)

“Cute?” Marcus repeated. “You think she’s cute? That’s it? She’s an artist, you know. Did you know that?”

He’s trashed,
Anthony realized. “Like I said, I’ve just seen her around, so-”

“She’s much more than cute,” Marcus continued.

“The guys-they don’t get it. They think
I’m
psycho to go for some psycho girl when I was with Dori. You know
Dori?”

Anthony shook his head. “I don’t know that many people yet.” He glanced around the dark backyard, hoping he’d
spot someone from the team he could call over. If he found Marcus someone else to talk to, then Anthony could cut
out. But he didn’t see anyone he knew.

“Dori’s beautiful, okay? And when I was with her, she was always doing stuff to make me happy. Little presents.

That girlie, you know…” Marcus took another swig of beer or tried to. Anthony figured out his cup was empty before
Marcus did.

“But Rae. Rae’s…
Rae.
The other guys don’t get that. They’re like, ‘You’re whipped, Salkow. Just shut up already.

You can have any girl you want.’ They just don’t get it.” Marcus leaned toward Anthony, so close, they were almost
touching noses. “But you get it, don’t you?”

Anthony moved back a step. “Yeah. Want to go back inside? Get a refill?”

Marcus leaned back against the tree trunk and slowly slid down it until he was sitting on the grass. “I want her
back so bad. But I don’t deserve her.”

Anthony scanned the yard again. There had to besomebody here who could get him out of this friggin’

confessional. But no.

“I hurt her, man. I really hurt her.” Marcus grabbed Anthony by the knee, and Anthony squatted next to him, torn
between pitying the guy and wanting to pulp him. “I
hurt
her.” His voice came out all quivery.

Crap,
Anthony thought,
any second now he ’s going to be bawling.

Little spurts of guilt kept going through Rae as she looked at Mandy’s tear-stained face.
You can’t give up now,
she
told herself. She placed her hand lightly against the door- /
Gwa. ^a/›ies
/ n
ot
h
i
n
g
ever works/
stay home sick again /

–not trying to hold it open, just trying to get Mandy to reconsider. “I know it’s hard,” Rae said quickly. “My mom
died practically right after I was born, and it’s still hard for me to talk about it. A year-a year, that must feel like
nothing.”

Mandy pulled in a deep, shuddering breath and wiped the tears off her face with her sleeve. “Sometimes,” she
admitted. “And sometimes it seems so long ago that I can’t even really remember her face all the way, or, you know,
how her voice sounded.”

Keep her talking,
a calm, cold part of Raeinstructed. But she didn’t want to coax Mandy toward going deeper into
the pain. It wasn’t right.

“You have pictures, though, right?” Yana jumped in. “And probably even videos.”

“Yeah, but it’s not the same,” Mandy answered.

“Of course it’s not the same,” Rae said, shooting Yana an abort-the-mission look. There had to be some other
place to get the information she needed.

“My sister practically has this shrine in her room,” Mandy confided, opening the door a little wider, although not
wide enough to be an invitation to step inside. “Pictures and clothes and perfume. It’s kind of sick. I just-I couldn’t
even sleep with all that stuff around me. Em-that’s my sister-keeps saying if I don’t pick some stuff out of what’s left,
she’s taking it all.”

“You should have a couple of things,” Rae told her. “You don’t have to have them out. You don’t even have to look
at them-don’t ever if you don’t want to. But someday you might get the urge, and if you do, there should be a box in
a closet somewhere waiting for you. I have one.”

Rae pictured the cardboard box of her mother’s things that her dad had in his closet. Five years ago she would
have wanted to burn the stuff if she’d had the chance. Forget five. Even a year ago. But now… now Rae was
starting to understand a little about hermother. And although what her mother had done horrified Rae, she had to
accept that learning everything about her mother was essential to staying alive herself.

“Maybe you’re right,” Mandy said.

Rae had gotten so deep in her own thoughts that for a moment she had no idea what Mandy was talking about.

“She’s definitely right,” Yana answered. “If you want, we could help you.”

You’re pushing her too hard,
Rae thought. But to her surprise, Mandy swung the door open wide. “Actually, yeah,
that would be good,” Mandy told them as Rae and Yana came inside. “I don’t want to do it alone, but my sister or my
dad…”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t want to look at my mom’s stuff with my dad. I know I’d start getting all worried about how he was
feeling,” Rae said.

“Did your dad… did it take him a long time to-” Mandy closed her eyes for a long moment, then opened them. “To
get back to normal?”

Normal. Such a funny word.

“I remember him being normal when I was a little kid, doing all the dad stuff,” Rae answered. “But really, I don’t
know how well he was coping. He’s okay now, though, I think. Sad sometimes. But okay, too.”

Mandy nodded. Her face looked tight, like she was struggling to keep her expression from cracking. “Okay, so, I
guess we should get started,” she finally said. She started fiddling with her long, light brown hair but didn’t take one
step. “Maybe you’ll find out what you wanted to know when we look in the boxes. You thought there was some
group our mothers were in together, right?” Mandy asked.

“Uh-huh. Some New Agey kind of thing. I hardly know anything about it,” Rae said.
Except that some one in prison

knew about it,
Rae thought, a little shiver running through her as she remembered touching that fingerprint on the
basketball the prisoners had been playing with. And that someone was disturbed-no, frightened-that Rae might
have been born while her mother was in the group. “Did your mom ever mention it?”

Mandy shook her head, then she started making a thin braid in a section of hair near her face.

She’s getting scared,
Rae thought.
She’s going to back out.

“How did your mother die?” Mandy suddenly blurted out.

She’d rather do anything than face whatever is in those boxes,
Rae thought.
Even ask questions about my mom.

“She… the doctors weren’t really sure,” Raeanswered slowly. “It was like her body was somehow turning against
itself, destroying itself. They couldn’t figure out what was happening or how to stop it before it was too late.”

Mandy shuddered. “That sounds terrible,” she said. “I’m sorry.” She paused, still carefully braiding her hair. “With
my mom it was even faster,” she said, her voice shaky. “She was on the way back from the store, and these guys,
these guys jerked her out of the car at a red light and shot her. Then they stole the car.” Mandy blinked rapidly. “She
would have given them the car. I know she would have.”

“Bastards,” Yana muttered.

“Yeah,” Mandy said. “And we got the car back, anyway. They killed her for a car, and the cops ended up getting it
back from them. It’s out in the garage under this sheet. It’s like a ghost. I don’t even go out there unless I have to.”

She undid the braid seconds after it was finished, pulling at it so hard, Rae was afraid she was going to rip the hair
right out of her head.

“Come on. The stuff’s in my sister’s room.” She turned on her heel and led them down the hall, past the living
room, past the kitchen. She stopped in front of a closed door. “My sister hates it if I go in without asking.”

“Is she here?” Rae asked, surprised. The househad an almost empty feel. She’d assumed Mandy was the only one
home.

“No.” Mandy gave a nervous laugh. “So I guess it’s stupid to worry about it.” She slowly turned the doorknob,
then pushed the door open so hard, it banged against the wall. “Don’t know my own strength,” Mandy mumbled as
she led the way inside.

God, it is like a shrine,
Rae thought, taking in the little bouquets of dried flowers on the dresser and the dozens of
photos of a woman who was probably around Rae’s dad’s age. Each photo had a little candle stationed next to it.

The air held the fragrance of the candle wax and of recently burned incense.

Rae’s heart constricted as she thought about what it would be like to lose her father. She’d never known her
mother, but her dad… he was like air, a constant, essential thing in her life, even if she didn’t think about him that
way most of the time.

“The boxes are under the bed. Let’s take them to my room,” Mandy said. Rae could see why she was eager to
leave. The room was beautiful, but it was creepy, too.

“Can we help you carry them?” Yana asked, already heading for the bed. She was in extreme pushy mode,
definitely borderline obnoxious, but Rae was glad she was there. If Rae and Mandy werealone, they could end up
frozen in place forever. At least that’s how it felt.

“Okay,” Mandy told Yana. “It’s the two flowered boxes.”

A second later Yana was on her knees. She pulled one of the boxes free and handed it to Rae- /why?/shouldn’t
have/why?/why?/

–then grabbed the other one and stood up with it cradled in her arms. “Lead the way,” she told Mandy.

“My room’s kind of a sty,” Mandy admitted as she walked them over to a closed door a little farther down the hall.

With an embarrassed half smile, half grimace, she opened the door.

Mandy’s room didn’t smell like incense or candles. It smelled like… pizza. Rae tracked the odor to a pizza box
almost buried under a pile of dirty clothes. Mandy wasn’t exaggerating about the state of her room. There were piles
of junk on every flat surface-except the bed. It was a peaceful island in the middle of the chaos. “I guess I’ll just put
this here,” Rae said, setting her box at the foot of the bed. Yana placed her box next to Rae’s.

“Sorry about-” Mandy made a helpless gesture.

“Hey, makes me feel at home,” Yana said. “You should see my room.”

Rae was pretty sure Yana was lying, remembering the row of flowers Yana had planted along her frontwalkway.

But lie or not, it worked. Mandy sat down cross-legged in the middle of the bed, patting spots on either side of her.

Rae and Yana took the invitation, then silence began to fill the room like cold water.

Mandy just kept staring at the boxes, and the quiet began to feel like a weight on Rae’s shoulders, on her chest.

“How should we do this?” Yana asked, the silence sucked down the drain at her words. “Rae and I could hold
stuff up and you could tell me keep or not keep-unless it would be weird for us to touch the stuff.”

“No. No, that would be good,” Mandy answered, starting a new little braid.

That was lucky. Rae hadn’t even thought about what she’d do if she couldn’t get a chance to touch the objects
and pick up whatever thoughts she could.

Yana gently removed the cover from the box closest to her. She pulled out a pink sweater, beaded with a snowflake
pattern.

“Not keep,” Mandy said quickly. “She hated that one.”

“For the not-keep pile,” Yana told Rae, handing her the sweater. Rae noticed that the tag was still on it. She ran her
fingers lightly across.

The rest of the sweater had a few fuzzy, grief-soaked thoughts. Nothing else. Rae carefully set it down.Yana pulled
a gray zip-front sweatshirt out of the box. The front pocket had come loose on one side, and the tie was missing
from the hood. Mandy reached out and took the sweatshirt, then brought it to her face and pulled in a long, deep
breath. “Keep,” she said, her voice muffled. Reluctantly she handed the sweatshirt to Rae.
smells like my

That thought was so clear, it had to be Mandy’s. There was more fuzzy grief, probably from whoever packed the
box, but there were many more happy thought fragments, fragments about dogs chasing sticks, tide pools, kids
splashing.
Beach vacation,
Rae figured.

Yana pulled out another sweater. Mandy shook her head. “This is the only piece of clothing I want.” She took the
sweatshirt away from Rae and tucked it under one of the pillows on the bed.

Rae started to tell her that the smell would last longer if Mandy kept the sweatshirt wrapped in plastic, then
changed her mind. That sweatshirt should be touched, not turned into an artifact.

“Just more clothes in this one,” Yana said. “You sure you-”

“Yeah,” Mandy answered, patting the pillow the sweatshirt was nestled under. Rae returned the pink sweater to the
box, letting the old thoughtsroll through her. Yana firmly replaced the lid.

“Okay, next one,” Rae said, sliding the other box over in front of her. She shot a glance at Mandy to make sure she
was doing all right. All right as she could be, considering, Rae decided. She took the lid off the second box and
removed the first item-a miniature red toy car with two little men in it, one blond, one with dark hair. /
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