What We Saw (8 page)

CONNIE BONINE BARELY
looks up from the TV when the bell jangles over the door at Second Sands Treasures. Her husband, Willie, had three storage units packed with crap when he died in the First Gulf War. His jeep got smacked by an armored Humvee in a freak accident on a base in Afghanistan, and in a town without a Goodwill at a time before eBay, Connie smelled a goldmine.

Using Willie's pension, she leased an empty storefront to sell off his junk, and though she never cashed in on much of her late husband's stuff, she has successfully cornered the market on the old clothes of anyone who's passed on since 1992. Now most funeral arrangements include an appointment with
Connie the week after the graveside service or internment. Her rusty old delivery van will show up anywhere in town to cart away the belongings of your deceased friend or loved one, free of charge. For those too overwhelmed with grief to do the job themselves, the fact that Connie will sell everything off at a small profit seems to be a fair trade.

The people who left this stuff behind may be dead, but the smell of Connie's store is a living thing. Mothballs from your grandma's basement mixed with old rubber shoe soles, and long velvet drapery panels filled with cigarette smoke that can stand up on their own. It's the scent of trash that never became treasures, left to molder for a couple decades.

Mrs. Bonine's hair is a bomb blast of wiry gray curls that would spill down her back if she didn't have it all tucked up into a bright blue Buccaneers bandanna. This grooming annoys my mother. Once a year or so when Mom manages to wrestle away from Will the shoes he's destroyed and jeans he's outgrown, she drops off a bag of donations and huffs about why
Connie won't cut that mess
once we're out of earshot.
Or at least color it, for heaven's sake.

Behind the counter, an old thirteen-inch black-and-white TV pulls in a grainy signal. It looks like Mrs. Bonine's watching the news on a microwave. I imagine saliva pooling inside her down-turned mouth as she waits for the
beep
and am jolted back to reality by a voice I recognize. Sloane Keating gives a preview of her “full report at five” on the “Coral Sands Rape Case.” Something about those words—lined up all in a row like
dominos—stops me in my tracks.

Rachel and Christy are already picking through the racks of ancient dresses. Will and Tyler have found an old drum set. Mrs. Bonine glances over as Ben and Lindsey lean in on either side of me to hear the news. Her lips stretch and roll like a lazy cat in a sunny spot, a smile lighting up her face and lifting her off the stool behind the counter.

“I have a Buccaneer in my store! Wait!” She holds up her hand, palm out. “Don't tell me.” She squints and chews her cheek. “Starting forward. Jersey is . . . seven . . . ?” (She squints one eye open.) “No! Seventeen. Cody! Is it . . . Barry? No! Don't tell me . . . Ben!”

Ben smiles and nods.

Connie Bonine beams at us in victory, then remembers the TV and grabs a pair of pliers, jamming them into a small hole next to the screen where a knob apparently used to be. She gives a sharp twist and Sloane flashes once, then flattens into a glowing line that shrinks to a tiny pinprick of light.
Going . . . going . . . gone.

“Terrible news. Those boys must be friends of yours?”

Ben nods slowly.

“Well, I just think it's awful what that Stallard girl is doing to them. Dragging their good names through the mud. If you ask me, they oughta arrest her mother and put that poor girl in a good Christian home.”

“Did they say her name on TV?” Lindsey stops Mrs. Bonine with a question.

“What?” She turns back to the TV as if to check. “Oh no. No, no. They won't release her name. Not that they have to around here. LeeAnne comes by looking for white shirts to wait tables in all the time. Used to hold the good ones back for her, but I can assure you that won't be happening any longer. That little girl of hers was in here, too, just the other day—Saturday, in fact. Day of this party everybody's so worked up about. Whining at her mama about having to buy other people's old clothes. Well, beggars can't be choosers, I say, but they can at least cover up their butt cheeks, for Chrissake's.”

Connie stops and eyes Ben, feet to forehead. “You're here for the Spring Fling, huh?”

“How'd you know?” Ben grins. I can tell he's enjoying the VIP treatment. It's like this pretty much everywhere in town. People might not know who represents them in Congress, but they can pull up a varsity Bucc's jersey number on sight.

Ben's arm slides around my waist, and Mrs. Bonine smiles. “Oh my. Is this pretty little thing here your girlfriend? Now that's the kind of girl to date.” She grabs Ben's arm, then winks at me. “I'm gonna borrow him for just a second, sweetheart.” She steers Ben toward the back of the store like she's a bulldozer in tennis shoes. “C'mon with me. You're a couple feet longer than most of my customers, but I keep a stash of big-and-tall things in the back.”

The point of Spring Fling is to look ridiculous without crossing the line into absurdity. As we pick through Connie's treasure
trove of ancient fashions, Christy holds a flash of jade against my chest, the hanger under my chin. “Look familiar?”

“Should it?” Rachel asks.

Christy blinks from Rachel to me. “Oh, man. You two were drunk Saturday night. Stacey was wearing a red top cut almost exactly like this one.”

Stacey's outfit surfaces through the fog that surrounds my Saturday memory. Red halter top, tiny black miniskirt. Spinning around Dooney's kitchen, throwing her arm over my shoulder.
You're empty, Kate. Time for some shots!
Her tipsy whoop as Dooney pours tequila. Rachel's laugh as she licks the back of her hand so the salt from the shaker Stacey is holding will stick. The burn of the liquid. The bite of the lime. Stacey turns away, but I reach out and grab her arm.
No, wait! One more shot! Don't be a quitter!

“Don't you remember?” Christy pulls the sides of the flimsy top across my body. The fabric doesn't quite make it under my arm. She laughs. “More side boob than the law allows.”

“I remember,” I mumble.

“Sort of wish I didn't,” says Rachel.

“Oh, c'mon. Where's your sense of humor?” Christy tosses the halter top back onto the rack and flips through more hangers, draping every other garment over her arm, and grinning as she hunts for the perfect outfit. She doesn't seem fazed by the arrests or the accusations. I've always envied her ability to let bad news roll off her back. She could lead a pep rally on the deck of the
Titanic
.

“This whole thing is making my stomach hurt,” I say.

Christy shrugs a
whatever
my way and barrels into one of two makeshift dressing rooms. She tosses a rainbow of polyester pantsuits on the stool by the mirror and jerks the curtain closed. Christy shops like she plays goalie: Divide and conquer.

Rachel sighs and shakes her head. For perhaps the first time in our friendship, she's fine with not talking about something. I'd rather not discuss it either, but this isn't a comfortable silence. It's like someone has poured itching powder all over us, only we're pretending nothing's wrong and trying not to scratch ourselves. I can hear Christy pulling clothes off and on, laughing and groaning at the results.

“Find anything good?” I ask Lindsey.

She shrugs. “Feels weird shopping for a dance when all this is happening.”

“Well, we don't really know for sure what's going on,” Rachel says, pulling a dress off a rounder behind me.

“Yeah.” A funny sensation crosses my tongue as I say that word. My agreement tastes sour. Don't we have a pretty clear picture of what went on? I smile at Rachel and keep looking for something to wear. I've flipped through a whole rack, but wasn't really paying attention. I keep seeing Stacey in that halter top.

Christy sweeps open the curtain to her dressing room. “Boom. Mic drop.” She struts out in a powder-blue pantsuit that looks like a costume from an old disco movie, dancing over to us, bell-bottoms swaying. The rest of us laugh so hard we can't speak.

Lindsey regains composure first and shakes her head in amazement. “It's perfect.”

“Right?” Christy is as pleased as we are. “I'll tell you one thing, Stacey woulda been just fine if she'd worn this to Dooney's.”

Letting things go is not Christy's strong suit. I hold my breath for a second hoping that Rachel will allow the moment to pass, but she doesn't.

“Wait—what?” Rachel cocks her head to the side.

Christy sorts through a bin of platform shoes. “C'mon, Rach. Stacey went to that party looking for trouble.”

Lindsey frowns as Rachel turns back to us, her wide eyes encouraging me to jump in at any time. Instead, I stay silent.
Please let's not talk about this here.
I try to beam the words into Rachel's brain, but she misses my mental text message.

“I think she went to that party for the same reason we all did,” Rachel tells Christy. “To have some fun.”

“And how do we know she didn't have fun?” Christy asks. “Maybe she had too much fun and regretted it in the morning. So she freaked out.”

“It doesn't look like she's having much fun in that picture,” Rachel says.

“It was one snapshot,” groans Christy. “For all we know, Stacey
posed
for that.”

“And then filed charges?” asks Rachel.

Christy seems to ignore this and keeps digging through shoes. As I turn to ask Rachel's opinion of a butter-yellow
princess dress, Lindsey pipes up. “I'm just really confused.”

“It all seems pretty obvious to me,” says Christy. “Stacey's been trying to get with Dooney all year. Probably threw herself at all those guys when they went downstairs, then changed her mind after she got what she wanted.”

Lindsey frowns, running her finger across the sherbet-colored marabou on the dress draped over her arm. “I don't think that makes sense.”

“Me neither,” says Rachel. “How do we know those guys didn't make a pass at her?”

“Whose side are you on?” Chirsty asks. “I mean, Dooney and Deacon are morons, sure. But they're
our
morons. They're not animals.”

“I know, I know,” Rachel says. “It's just . . . why are we automatically assuming
the guys
are the ones telling the truth?”

Christy's eyes go wide. “Excuse me? Did you see the skirt Stacey was wearing at that party? I have washcloths made of more fabric.”

Rachel nods as she heads into the dressing room with a few selections, but her face looks like she caught a whiff of rotten eggs. “Stacey's clothes were pretty revealing,” she says through the curtain. “My mom wouldn't have let me walk to the kitchen in that outfit she was wearing.”

“Wait,” Lindsey says. “Just because she's wearing skimpy clothes means that she's lying about those guys forcing themselves on her?”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” says Christy. “It's Stacey's word
against theirs. She's accusing them.” Christy settles on a pair of platform shoes and turns to address me and Lindsey. “Look, this is not rocket science. It's common sense. If you don't want to work a guy into a lather, keep your cooch covered up.”

I laugh in spite of myself because of the way Christy says “cooch.” Rachel giggles from behind the curtain.

Lindsey smiles, but she's not letting it drop, and part of me wants to run over and put my hands over her mouth.
Please don't egg Christy on.

“I dunno.” Lindsey sounds unconvinced. “Look at Beyoncé and Miley. They dress like that. Sometimes they wear way less than Stacey was wearing. Does that mean they want guys to have sex with them even if they say no?”

Rachel whips open the curtain. “Everyone! Shut up and look at me.”

She poses, like a print model, her hands tangled in her hair, holding it up from her shoulders. The dress is a crimson eighties number with an asymmetrical neckline. The short, shiny red skirt fits her perfectly. The triangular top bares her shoulders and seems to be supported from within to keep its shape. The whole thing is finished off by a bow at the waist with a giant rhinestone center. She looks like a character in this old movie Will and I watched the other night on cable called
Heathers.

“How
very
,” I say.

“That's the one,” Lindsey agrees.

Rachel walks out and steps into a pair of the highest heels I have ever seen. There are bows across both toes, and she
immediately grabs my shoulder for balance. “Oh my god!” She laughs, struggling to stay upright. “And I'm not even drunk.”

Christy takes Rachel's other hand to steady her.

“It's just so scary,” Rachel says.

“Walking in those shoes?” I ask, hoping to avoid a return to the subject at hand.

Rachel takes a few halting steps forward. “No. I mean, this whole thing at the party.” She stumbles back toward me and steps out of the shoes.
“
I don't know Stacey that well anymore. I only know that when you wear sexy clothes, guys get all turned on, and if you're drunk and they're drunk, you have to be really careful.”

“Do you?” Lindsey frowns. “There were plenty of girls wearing sexy clothes and drinking that night.”

Rachel glances at me and I can tell she is thinking the same thing I am: We were both drunk, too. This unspoken thought hangs there between us like the funk wafting up from all of these dead people's clothes. Is the ghost of somebody's grandma shocked and appalled that we're discussing this in public? Part of me is.

“I just don't believe Dooney and Deacon would have sex with a girl who told them no,” Christy says. “They could be with any girl they want. They're not that stupid.”

“What if she didn't tell them no because she couldn't?” Lindsey asks quietly. “What if she was too drunk to say anything?”