Sketchy (10 page)

“Art class—first day of school at Packard High, looking at Willa… I saw your face. She was thinking of you—you were on her mind.”

“Bea, what are you going on about?” Marcus walks toward me.

“Don’t touch me! I’ll call the cops if you try.” I dive for my purse, my phone.

Marcus tries to snatch it from me. I kick his hand away.

He shakes it in pain. “Damn! That hurts!”

“Did you rape them? Did you kill them?”

“No! Of course not! You’re wrong, Bea, dead wrong!”

“Well, why don’t we let the police decide that!”

He throws his arms up in the air and starts backing away. “Fine. I won’t touch you. I’ll leave you alone, if that’s what you want. Just put the damn phone away.”

“Bea!!!” We both look up at the sound of my mom’s voice. “Where are you, Bea? Bea!!!”

“I didn’t do it. Any of it. I didn’t.” Marcus turns from me, hops over the creek, and walks off, deep into the woods.

I
t’s early Monday morning. I am exhausted, bone tired. But I drive down Lilac Lane. It’s a dirt road, and the mud puddles splash and muck up my windshield.

An old red antique barn is at the end of the lane. I step out of my car and into a puddle wearing my suede ankle boots.

Damn.

I hopscotch past the puddles and push at a heavy wood door that doesn’t want to budge. An old cowbell hangs to the right of the door. I pull its chain. The clanging disrupts a gaggle of pigeons on the overhead eaves, and they flutter and poop.

Crap.

I find a couple of tissues in the pocket of my new velvet coat and wipe some of the bird shit off my shoulders. God only knows what the top of my head looks like.

There’s no way I’m ringing that cowbell again. So I push
the door, hard, using all my weight, and it opens. I’m hit with the strong smell of dust and mold, and sneeze.

“Willa? Willa, are you here?” I call out.

The shop is dim, lit by the open front door. I step in a little farther and trip. The heel of my right boot breaks off on an old iron doorstop—a squirrel with an acorn in its mouth.

Shit.

I drop the heel of my boot into my oversized flap bag and hobble through the shop with my arms outstretched like a lame blind woman.

“Willa, answer me!” I call out.

I walk right into a spiderweb, brush it off, lose my balance, and fall onto an antique velvet sofa. A naked sewing mannequin plops down on my lap.

Fuck.

Her blank, glassy button eyes stare up at me as if she were the one surprised with our encounter. I push the naked dummy off my lap and stumble to the back of the shop, open a rusted screen door that’s screaming of tetanus and step into the backyard.

Willa sits on a huge tree stump. She looks like an ad in a Macy’s catalog, wearing a baby blue velour Juicy Couture tracksuit, a down-feather vest, and smoking a joint.

I hobble over to a dirty iron bench and sit.

Willa takes a hit. She holds it in for a second, then releases a steady, graceful, gray stream of smoke—like cool, liquid silver.

She holds out the joint. “Want some?”

“You have no idea how much I do,” I answer. “But no, no thank you.”

“Whatever.” Willa fingers the top of the stump. “They cut off chickens’ heads on this thing.”

“Well, that’s creepy. Why are you sitting on it?”

Willa shrugs. “Feels appropriate.” She takes another hit off the joint, squinting her eyes. “What did you say to Marcus?”

“What are you talking about?”

Willa snaps at me. “He texted me, told me to never contact him again. I asked him why and he said it had something to do with you—something you said to him. And now he won’t answer my calls! What did you say to him?”

“So you admit you know him.”

“Why the hell do you care if I do? Just get him back—I
need
him back.”

“Is he the one who raped you, Willa?”

“What?” She starts laughing. “Is that what you said to him? Christ. No wonder. No, you idiot, of course he didn’t rape me!”

“He didn’t, you’re positive?”

“It wasn’t Marcus, okay? He’s at least three inches shorter than the—”

Willa catches herself and steps off the stump.

“I thought you didn’t remember anything—who he was, what he looked like.”

“This was a mistake, calling you here. You don’t understand.”

“What don’t I understand?”

She turns on me. “I’m homecoming queen! I’m dating the captain of the football team! I’m an honor student! I’m going Ivy League! If they find him—”

“You’ll get found out?” I cut her off like a chicken head on the stump. “Is that what you’re so afraid of, being found out?”

She licks her fingers, snuffs out the joint, takes a pack of cigarettes out of her jacket pocket, exchanges the joint for a smoke, and plops down on the wet ground. The mud must be soaking through her pants, but it doesn’t seem to bother her. She lights up.

I reach out. “
That
I will take a hit of. I ran out.”

Willa hands me her cigarette. She wipes her pert nose with her sleeve, settles back, and leans against the bloody stump, staring at me. “So you don’t use anymore?” she asks.

I take a deep inhale. “No, haven’t for three months.”

She pauses. “Nothing? Not even weed?”

“Nothing.” I exhale.

“Is it hard?”

“Hard?” I laugh. “You ever try to stop a semi truck coming at you full speed? Like every day? Every hour? Every minute? Yeah, it’s hard, but better than where I was, I guess.”

“What, are you some kind of superhero?”

“Right. My cape is in my bag.” I hand her back the cigarette.

“It’s like you saw through me or something the other night.”

“Do you want to be seen, Willa?”

“What are you talking about?”

“I see that you’ve been hiding behind lies for years now. You hate the crown they’ve placed on your head, all the expectations, all those labels you just threw at me.”

“You’re wrong.”

“Am I? Well, why don’t you try taking the crown off for a minute? See how it feels. Let’s see who Willa really is.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Why
wouldn’t
you? It doesn’t impress me—you being a homecoming queen, all that Ivy League–bound shit.”

“Fuck you.” Willa nibbles on her nail.

“He raped you! He beat you—thought you were dead—
wanted
you dead. And he killed that girl, last spring in the Arb. He’s out there—he has to be stopped—and
you
are the only one who can stop him!”

Willa stands up, stubs out her smoke in the mud, and kicks the stump. “Okay, okay, okay, shut up!” she stammers. “You want to know the truth? Do you? You’re right! I hate myself!” She starts slapping her face. “I do! I hate Willa the queen! I hate Willa the cheerleader! I hate Willa the honor student! Willa the perfect daughter! I hate her! I despise her!”

“It must be hard, all those expectations.”

“And you know what?” She wipes the tears off her face, smearing mascara around like war paint. “I deserved it, what happened to me.”

“No. No, no… you did not deserve to be raped! Never, ever think that!”

She paces back and forth. “I flirted with him! I got into his car! I asked him to buy the vodka—and I was doped up on benzos—fucked up, not him.”

“Are you afraid he’ll blow your cover? Is that it? Is that what you’re worried about?”

The corners of her mouth turn down and quiver. “He was good-looking—nice clothes, cool car. He was supposed to take me for a short ride, like a half hour. A little flirting around is all I thought! I was so stupid!”

“It wasn’t your fault, Willa, none of it.”

“Yes, it was! Don’t you see?”

“You can’t blame yourself. You can’t. And
no one
will blame you. I promise you that.”

Willa climbs her way back on top of the bloody stump, closes her eyes.

I open my Moleskine, and I hear Willa’s story—the truth. The truth about what happened to her that horrible night.

It was a humid September afternoon. Willa started home from cheerleading practice with good intentions—but instead found herself pulling into a corner liquor store parking lot.

She had already popped a few downers, and was feeling pretty mellow. Her car idled as she clicked her nails on the
steering wheel, eyed the customers going in and out of the store, looked for the right person; she’d know when she spotted him.

A black convertible BMW pulled up. A handsome guy at the wheel looked over at her and pushed his dark hair out of his eyes. Willa knew she found what she was looking for and smiled, lowering her head and looking up at him with her heavy-lidded baby blues.

He rolled down the passenger-side window. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Willa answered. “Nice car.”

“Thanks.”

“How old are you?” she asked.

“How old do you want me to be?”

“Old enough to buy me vodka?” Willa held a twenty out her window.

“Sure, but only if it’s my treat.”

She put the twenty back into her purse. “Well, aren’t you the gentleman. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. What’s your name?”

“Willa. What’s yours?”

“Designated driver?” He leaned over and opened the passenger door of his car, gesturing for Willa to join him.

“You’ll give me a ride in this?”

“The ride of your life.” He chuckled.

“Wow. That’s so cool.”

Willa stepped out of her car, grabbed her pom-pom, and tickled him on the chin as she joined him. He smiled, pushed
his hair away from his eyes again, and cued the music on his car stereo to Nirvana. Keeping the car idling, he walked into the store to buy the vodka.

Holy shit, what a catch,
Willa said to herself as she pulled down the mirror on the visor above her. It lit up, illuminating her face. She freshened her lip gloss, pressed the seat warmer button, and melted with delight. The door opened, and she pushed up the visor.

“Cheers.” He handed her a bottle in a paper bag.

Willa screwed open the top of the bottle in the paper bag, not even looking at the label, took a swig, coughed a little, and handed it to him.

“I told you, I’m your designated driver.”

“Your loss.” She sipped.

He pressed a button, and the convertible top started rolling down.

She giggled. “It’s supposed to rain, you know.”

“You afraid of a little rain?” he asked.

“I’m not afraid of anything,” Willa said as she released her hair from her ponytail.

The car started off down the road, and her long blond hair blew up into the wind. She looked at the sky—blurry stars sparkled from behind the dark clouds. She relaxed, crossed her legs.

“You have beautiful legs. Long, strong, lean,” he said.

Willa smiled at him, and her cell phone rang. “Shit, it’s my mom.” She answered in a sweet voice, “Hi, Mom. Sorry
I didn’t call you. Practice ran a little late. I’ll be home in about”—Willa looked at him—“a half hour?” He nodded. “Yeah, a half hour, Mom, no later. Okay, love you, too.”

Willa put her phone in her purse. Eager to resume the vodka buzz, she took another gulp, sighed, and closed her eyes.

“What did you say your name was again?” she purred.

Willa continues on with the story, her arms hugging her knees into her chest as she rocks on the tree stump. “And he turned left, onto that road, into the gulley. I was like, ‘wait, where are you going?’ It started to rain. I asked him to close the top of the car, and he was like a… robot. Like so stiff and unresponsive. He clenched his jaw, and his lips looked like a couple of ugly worms. He parked the car by the creek and turned to me. His eyes were dark, as dark as the sky that night. And he had, like, a thing on his chin.”

“A cleft?”

“Yeah, a cleft. I jumped out of the car, tried to run, but I slipped. He tackled me and started beating me, and then he dragged me down by the creek. And I was so high, numb—I was so messed up, I couldn’t fight him, I couldn’t. He put something on my eyes—a scarf—blindfolded me, tied my arms and wrapped something around me, so tight I couldn’t breathe. And I kept hearing—a noise… a weird noise.”

“What did you hear?”

“I don’t know, like something whirring and clicks.”