Dismantled (28 page)

“W
HAT HAPPENED TO YOUR
hand?” Erin LaBlanc asks. Vanessa Sanchez is standing beside her and they’re behind Mel and Emma, in line for the early matinee. It seems like half their class decided to come to the movies today, which is making Emma squirm in her skin. Mel’s already gotten the Captain Smellville salute half a dozen times and she’s got her little notebook out, filling pages with dashes, dots,
X
s and
O
s.

“Let’s just go,” Emma whispers to Mel.

Mel ignores her, keeps on scribbling in her ratty little notebook.

“Are you deaf now too, DeForge?” Erin asks, leaning so that her face is right next to Emma’s. Her breath smells like grape bubble gum.

“I’d be more careful if I were you,” Mel warns, still not looking up from her notebook. “Emma here’s kind of like a mad dog—you never know what she’ll do next.”

Vanessa snorts. “Right,” she says.

“Really,” Mel goes on. “She went nuts and put her hand through a window. You should have seen it. Blood everywhere!”

Emma’s body stiffens.

“Really?” Vanessa asks, staring at the bandages wrapped around the knuckles of Emma’s right hand.

“It was an accident,” Emma says, wishing the line would move a little faster. She wants to get into the air-conditioned darkness, slouched in a padded folding seat with her Twizzlers and popcorn. She has a special way of eating each Twizzler in nine bites. And she sits with her feet tucked under her so they don’t touch the floor that’s sticky with god-knows-what.

“Demon possession,” Mel says. Emma cranes her neck, looks at the concession stand in the next room as if she’s seriously focused on the price of popcorn. Everything ends with the number 9. $1.59. $4.89.

“What are you talking about, Smellville?” Vanessa asks.

“I’m just saying it happens sometimes. Like in
The Exorcist
. One minute, you’re innocently playing with a Ouija board you find in the attic, the next you’re speaking ancient languages and puking green slime everywhere.”

“Gross!” Erin gives a visible shiver.

“Tell me about it,” Mel says.

“So, Emma, are you supposed to be possessed by the devil now?” Erin asks.

Emma’s up next at the counter, so she ignores the question. “One, please,” she says, passing a crinkled five-dollar bill under the Plexiglas window.

“For what movie, dear?” the old woman behind the plastic ticket window asks. Emma’s mind goes blank. She stares up at the movie titles, but the letters are jumbled. Only the numbers seem clear.

“The one o’clock,” Emma says, squinting at the sign. “The animal movie.”

“Nah, it’s not the devil,” Mel tells the other girls behind her. “She’s possessed by Danner.”

“What’s a danner?” Erin asks.

Emma’s skin gets all prickly, as if there are bugs under it. Little microscopic ones crawling in and out of her pores.

Emma walks over to the concession stand, orders a Coke, Twizzlers, and a small popcorn, no butter. Behind her, the three girls are snickering together.
Mental,
she hears one of them say.

How could Mel, of all people, betray her? Captain Smellville herself, who wears fake glasses, cuts her own hair, and never takes showers. It’s not as if she’s got other girls busting down her door, begging her to hang out with them. She and Emma have always been best friends—the two odd girls out, destined to stick together, no matter what.

Emma heads down the carpeted hallway, past the bathrooms and through the double doors into theater 2. It’s crowded with kids, laughing, throwing popcorn. She sees a lot of faces she knows from the elementary and middle school. Dicky Jarvis is there—his mom is the accountant for DeForge Painting.

Emma likes to sit in the very back row, but all the seats are taken. She finds three open ones toward the middle and darts into one of them, not sure if Mel will be able to find her, secretly hoping she won’t. She tucks her feet under her and puts her head down, studying the ingredients listed on the Twizzler package: corn syrup, wheat flour, sugar, cornstarch, artificial flavors and colors.
A low-fat candy,
it says. She opens the wrapper, takes out the first one and puts it in her pocket. There are ten in a package and she never eats the first one. Bad luck.

The lights go down. The sound comes on, crackly and too loud, giving a message about turning off cell phones, not talking during the movie.
Be considerate,
says a man’s voice, booming in her ears.
Be considerate.

“There you are,” Mel says, plopping into the seat beside her. Emma doesn’t answer. She keeps her eyes focused on the screen. Previews. Some robot movie that looks like it might be okay, if you like robots, which Emma really doesn’t. Emma feels for the single Twizzler in the pocket of her jeans, thinks of giving it to Mel, but begins to pick it apart instead. Mel’s shoving handfuls of popcorn into her mouth, letting kernels fall onto the floor. It’s gross. Definitely not considerate.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Mel whispers, her mouth full of half-chewed popcorn. Emma keeps her eyes on the screen. “You’re wishing it was her here instead of me.”

“What?” Emma asks. “Who?”

The movie’s begun now. Someone behind her says, “Shhh!”

“Your stupid doll,” Mel says. “Maybe you two should go out on a date. Make out or something.” Mel shoves another handful of popcorn in.

So that’s what this is about. Danner. Emma should have guessed. Mel’s been acting strange since Emma showed the sculpture to her just before they left for the movies.

“What the hell is this supposed to be?” Mel had asked.

“It’s art. A sculpture.”

“It’s creepy as shit, Em. Who’s it supposed to be?”

Emma bit her lip.

Mel shook her head. “No way. You did
not
go and turn your invisible friend into a giant-ass voodoo doll.”

Emma shrugged. They went downstairs, got into Emma’s mom’s car, and headed to the movies without speaking another word.

Emma rips at the Twizzler in her pocket, which is now in sticky shreds.

“Excuse us,” Vanessa says as she squeezes by, toward the two empty seats at the end of the row.

Great. Just great. Emma looks down at the red exit signs to the right and left of the screen, wondering if it’s possible to make an escape.

Emma can’t focus. The movie is stupid anyway. Animals doing martial arts. Right. The panda bear gets hit in the crotch and the theater explodes into laughter. Emma closes her eyes.

Someone pinches her arm. “Ow!” she yelps.

“Shh!” hisses the woman behind her.

The skin on Emma’s arm is twisted this time, what everyone calls an Indian burn when there aren’t adults around, and she doesn’t need to look to see who’s doing it. Danner. Emma looks anyway, shakes her head.
No.

“Go away,” she whispers.

“You go away! It was your idea to come to the stupid movies anyway!” Mel says.

“Not you,” Emma whispers.

“If you can’t be quiet, I’m going to get the manager to kick you out,” says the woman behind them.

Danner laughs. She’s wearing Emma’s lime green bathing suit, swimming goggles, and Emma’s mom’s white rubber bathing cap with flowers on it.

Emma thinks that maybe if she doesn’t look at her for long enough, Danner will go away. She focuses her eyes on the screen, but can’t tell what’s going on. It’s all just colors and shapes, none of it making sense. Maybe she needs glasses. She sinks down into her seat, closes her eyes.

Beside her, Danner makes a wet, sucking sound. Slime through a straw. Mucus in the back of a throat. There’s a rasping gurgle and Emma closes her eyes tighter, starts rocking in her seat.

This is not happening. Not here.

It’s your imagination,
she tells herself.

She remembers Danner’s words:
Everything you have is mine.

“If we’re the same, then I created you and I can make you go away,” she whispers.

Then the smell hits her. Rot. Stagnant water. Something long dead pulled from the bottom of a well: a lost kitten, a baby no one wanted.

Stop it,
she tells herself.
Enough.

“Go away,” she whispers to Danner. “This isn’t funny anymore.”

“Damn right it isn’t,” Mel says.

“Shh!” scolds the woman behind them.

Emma covers her nose and mouth with her hand. Feels her stomach churn, the Twizzlers and popcorn dangerously close to coming back up. She opens her eyes a little, squints at the warm glow of the exit signs, imagines pushing through one of them into the cool, brick alley behind the theater. But in order to get there, she’d have to go past Danner.

Her arm is being pinched again, the skin just below the wrist bone grabbed and twisted. She looks down. Sees a pale hand, whiter than white, skin loose and sticking to the skin of her own arm, which Emma jerks away. Danner’s skin is still stuck to Emma’s arm, flapping like tiny, pale flags. Danner reaches for Emma again with her hand, which is just raw, oozing flesh.

Emma screams and lunges out of her seat. She trips on Mel’s legs and goes down, hitting her face on the seat in the row in front of them, landing on the floor, tacky with spilled soda, butter-flavored oil, and grime. She screams again. The hand reaches for her, doesn’t let go this time. Emma clamps her eyes shut tight—it’s pulling her up, toward its body. She kicks, claws, lashes out at the creature grabbing hold of her. This is not Danner, this thing. This cannot be Danner.

She’s stuck upside down in the inner tube again, her head underwater.

Everything you have is mine.

She hears voices coming at her in waves and ripples, a steady hum of words:
parents, doctor, hurt, friend
. Then she hears someone say,
Danner
. She opens her eyes. It’s Mel’s face above her; Mel’s hand on her arm. Vanessa and Erin are there, and a movie theater employee with a flashlight.

It’s not until they’ve led her into the bright sunlit lobby, framed posters of coming attractions looking on, that she notices Mel’s face. It’s all scratched up. So is her arm. One of the girls from the concession stand is handing Mel a cold cloth.

The old woman who sells the tickets is there, along with a portly guy in a tight blue suit who is asking for Emma’s name and phone number. Emma feels as if she’s still stuck underwater, and everyone else is way up at the surface, looking down. The words take a long time to reach her. If she opens her mouth, she’s sure all that will come out will be sad little bubbles, no sound.

“Emma DeForge,” Erin says. “I don’t know her number, but she lives in Langley on Route 2. She’s a total mental case. For real.”

“Oh my god,” Vanessa cries. “Look. She peed herself!”

No,
Emma wants to explain.
I’m just wet from the water. From being under the water.

The manager guy in the suit pats Emma’s arm lightly, barely touching it. “Do you have a history of seizures, hon?”

Emma shakes her head.

“Don’t worry. I’m going to call your parents,” he tells her, departing to an office in the back. She wants to ask him not to, to follow him into the office and say,
See, my parents are splitting up and if you call them, if they hear about this, then that’ll be the final straw, so please don’t, they don’t need a crazy daughter right now.
But the guy is gone, the office door closed. The old woman and the concession girl are staring at her with pity on their faces. Erin and Vanessa are whispering, shaking their heads. Vanessa takes a cell phone out of her purse, punches in a number, and says into it, “Hey, I’m at the movies and you are not going to believe what just happened…”

Emma looks at Mel, at the ragged red scratches covering her face and arm. Then she looks down at the tips of her own fingers, sees blood there under her neatly trimmed nails.

“Let me guess,” Mel says, taking a step back, away from Emma, her face twisted with fear and disgust. “Danner made you do it.”

“W
HAT WAS
S
PENCER’S ROLE
in the group?” Bill asks.

They’re sitting at the kitchen table. Tess has made them coffee. Put out some fancy European cookies from a blue tin, cookies she picked up at the market yesterday, just before seeing the flowers. Just before her decision to go see Claire.

Stop. Don’t think about that. Focus.

The trick, she thought, was not to treat Bill as an inquisitor, but as a guest.

“Cream?” she asks, holding the little ceramic pitcher. He shakes his head.

When Bill showed up unexpectedly just after Tess dropped the girls off at the movies, Tess instantly recognized him as the man who’d been watching her at the farmers’ market Saturday. If he’d been furtively following her around town he must think she had something to hide. And if he’s been up to the college, there’s no telling how much he knows already. He’s calling them a group, but hasn’t actually mentioned the Compassionate Dismantlers yet, which Tess takes as a good sign.

“Spencer wasn’t ever really a part of the group,” Tess says, remembering Suz’s own words:
A lie works best if there’s a piece of truth woven into it
. “He was kind of in the background. Not a key player.”

“Not. A. Key. Player.” Bill writes the quote down in his little notebook, nodding.

Tess glances at her watch—1:15. She adds a spoonful of sugar to her coffee even though she doesn’t take sugar. Her nervous hands need something to do. She stirs a little too long, the spoon chinking against the heavy ceramic mug.

“I understand you had a little fire here last night,” Bill says, looking up from his notes. His eyes are pure pale blue, like the sky.

His question throws her off. This is not something she practiced for.

“My studio was destroyed,” Tess says. “The firemen think it started from a candle I left burning.”

“So they don’t suspect arson?”

“Arson! No. Not at all. It was an accident.”

Bill nods. “Do you know all of your motion lights are broken?”

“I’m sorry?” Tess is outmaneuvered. Just like that.

“Shattered. Shot out maybe. Or they could have been broken by someone throwing rocks. Someone with excellent aim.” He gazes at her, waiting.

Sweat forms at her hairline and on her upper lip.

Shot out maybe. Someone with excellent aim.

Tess closes her eyes, sees Suz going under. Henry diving in after her. When she opens them again two seconds later, Henry is there, in the kitchen, not dripping wet from the lake, but dressed in painting clothes. Good, dependable Henry who has been out with a crew.

“Henry,” Tess all but gasps. “This is Bill. Bill Lunde. The private investigator Spencer’s family hired.”

Henry nods. “We’ve met.” Henry gives Bill his hand to shake.

“Oh, sorry,” Tess says, flustered. “Of course you have.”

“What would you say Spencer Styles’s role in the Compassionate Dismantlers was?” Bill asks.

Tess takes in a sharp, panicked breath. Okay, she tells herself. So he knows about the Dismantlers. It’s not the end of the world.

Not yet.

Henry stands back against the counter, bracing himself.

“Spencer was not a key player,” Henry tells him.

Bill just stares at him, then moves his eyes to Tess. He makes a show of writing the words in his little notebook: “Not. A. Key. Player.”

“It wasn’t much of a
group,
really,” Henry adds.

“What’s that?” Bill asks.

“The Compassionate Dismantlers. Suz came up with the name. But what we really were was a group of friends making art together. Nothing formal. Nothing too organized.”

Bill nods, closes his notebook, stands up. “Thank you both for your time. I can see myself out,” he tells them.

“Jesus,” Tess hisses in an angry whisper once Bill’s gone. “He didn’t believe a fucking word we said! We’re screwed!”

“You don’t know that,” Henry says.

“Damn. Damn!” Tess says. “We should have been more prepared.”

Henry looks down at his shoes.

“Did you know the lights are broken?” she asks.

“What lights?”

“The security lights. Outside. Bill says they’ve all been shot out. Or broken with rocks.”

Henry’s face grows pale.

The phone rings and they both jump.

“I’ll get it,” Tess says. As she’s reaching for it, she watches as Henry opens the sliding door in the kitchen and steps out onto the patio.

“Hello?” she says.

“Mrs. DeForge?” A man’s voice.

“Yes.”

“My name is David Macallister. I’m the manager of the Star Theater.”

Tess watches Henry moving around the yard, looking up at the lights, bending down to study the ground, looking more frightened by the second.

“I’m afraid there’s been some trouble with your daughter.”