I have to step into the room to show his girlfriend, who rises onto her elbows but otherwise stays prone on the floor, naked it seems under the blanket. She is pretty but her skin is sallow and her short, pink-streaked blond hair looks unwashed.
“Me neither,” she says finally, flopping back down. “Cute, though. You find them, you can tell them where to find me. By the way, it was Thursday.”
“What was?” I ask.
She waves her toothpick arms in the air like a marionette. “When we last saw Crystal?” She gestures to her boyfriend. “Remember, Tommy?”
“No, I don’t remember.” Tommy snorts. “How the hell do you know what day it was?”
“That guy came here and got her. And then we went to the Cumberland Farms for the Powerball. Powerball is Thursdays. We asked Crystal and the guy to give us a ride, and he said no.”
“Do you remember the guy’s name?” I ask.
“Oh, wait, yeah.” Tommy smacks a palm against his forehead. “I remember that fucking guy. That dumb accent, talking to everybody here like they went way back. Meanwhile, did you see that huge fucking watch he had on? Fucking hate guys like that.”
“His name was like a word that means something else,” the girl says. “It wasn’t like a regular name. Like Birch or Pine or something.”
“A tree?” I ask.
“No, not that,” she says. “But like that— ”
“A bird!” Tommy snaps his fingers at her. “It was a fucking bird. See, I remember shit, too.”
“Finch,” I say. “Was his name Finch?”
“Finch! That’s it!” Tommy flashes a gap-toothed grin. “Birdman, that was what I called him. I was trying to piss him off, but he didn’t seem to give a shit.”
“That must have been Friday or Saturday, though,” I say. “It couldn’t have been Thursday.”
“It was Thursday!” Now it’s the girl’s turn to yell. “Because of the Powerball! We got the fucking tickets.” She flaps her hand toward her boyfriend. “Didn’t win because we never do. Tommy’s got luck for shit.”
ALICE
I can’t sleep. I can’t eat. And each day the weight pressing down on my chest gets heavier. My friends are all fine, though. Only four days later, and it’s like they’ve already moved on.
They aren’t monsters, but it’s just so weird to me how they can put it aside. It’s not a thing that can be erased. It happened. And we did it. We are responsible.
Last night we were all together in Jonathan’s room before we were going to the Mug. A little pre-party, like the good old days. Or that’s the way everyone else was acting. Beers in hand, drinking, joking. Like that guy never even existed. Meanwhile, the whole time I felt myself sliding deeper into some dark hole.
I never went to the Mug with them. Instead, I went back to the Dutch Cabin. I wanted to see if the bartender knew where Evan was from, or even just his last name. The news had been keeping it quiet so far. And it had seemed that night like the bartender and Evan were friends. The bartender said straight out that he’d tell me, but only if I came back with cash. Fucked up, but what could I do? So I found Jonathan and he lent me the couple hundred the bartender wanted.
I didn’t tell him what I needed the money for. And, typical Jonathan, he didn’t ask. My friends wouldn’t like it at all that I went back to the Dutch Cabin, asking questions.
But it’s okay. It’s all fine. And now, I know his full name: Evan Paretsky. His family is from Hudson. All I need is to go there and talk to his mom, tell her that her son didn’t steal anything, that he didn’t do anything wrong— except for agreeing to come home with me.
I can’t tell my friends that I’m going to Hudson. They’ll completely freak. But I know what I’m doing. It’s what needs to be done.
DERRICK
SATURDAY, 7:56 A.M.
The sun was up, the light on our side of the house a filtered gray. I’d been awake for a few minutes, lying there, replaying my conversation with Maeve from the night before. I wanted to think that it had gone well. That Finch hadn’t done too much damage, telling her about my past. But I didn’t feel at all sure.
“Is everything okay?” I’d asked Maeve as we headed back toward the house once the fire was out. I’d gestured to her phone in her hand. She’d been checking it constantly. Better to focus on that than on what Finch had just told everyone about me beating up that kid.