Jane was nice, Isabel thought. With a nice voice, Isabel always noticed that. And a thoughtful manner, kind of welcoming, like a friend. Not like that other one, the bossy one, acting like a second-rate alto who always wanted center stage. Jane was clearly, like, sincere. Somehow you could tell. And successful, and engaged in her profession. Isabel felt it, the connection, soon as the two older women entered her apartment.
After that scary phone call with the Tosca music, Isabel had first decided not to say another word. Not about anything. But then, she’d regrouped. First of all, it was probably a dumb coincidence. Who knew what they used for “hold music” these days.
“My whole life is not a melodrama, Fish.” She had said that out loud. “Why am I making it one?” She wouldn’t mention the mysterious call to Jane and Fiola, because really, what could anyone do? So she’d screwed her courage to the sticking point, like they said in drama class. And, with her newfound resolve, she wasn’t waiting until tomorrow to call. Still, she was surprised these women had been able to come so instantly. Maybe it was fate, or whatever controlled the universe.
“O Fortuna,” she’d sung the portentous notes of the Orff, holding out her arms dramatically, head high. She missed performing, so much. But it was too—she blew out a breath. One step at a time.
She didn’t want Jane and Fiola to be here at the same time as Grady, so she’d stalled her dinner for a while. Grady might not be the delivery person tonight, anyway. She could never predict. O Fortuna.
Now Jane was asking her something. About Professor Morgan. Isabel stared at the wall, envisioning the last time she’d seen her professor.
“Yes? Wondering what?” She blinked away the memory and turned to Jane. She loved Jane’s hair, the way it naturally curled under, wondered if that chestnutty color was real. Good makeup, too, not too stagy or TV. When was the last time she’d entertained at her apartment? Not that this was “entertaining.” This was revenge. Or … justice.
“By any chance,” Jane said, “do you have any pictures of Professor Morgan? I mean, there’s probably one on the website, we haven’t looked, but now that we’re here … maybe a video?”
Isabel tried to read the expressions on Jane’s and Fiola’s faces. Video? Did they know? Jane didn’t know. She couldn’t know. They were reporters. Reporters always asked for photos and video.
“I’m sorry, Tosca.” Jane smiled. At the nickname, Isabel guessed. Or maybe mistaking her hesitancy for reluctance. Or criticism.
“Part of the job, unfortunately, to ask,” Jane went on. “If you don’t have any photos or videos, you don’t. It’s fine.”
“Let me think,” Isabel said. Stalling. If they wanted to see only Avery, they wouldn’t have to watch the whole thing, of course. She’d downloaded the clip from YouTube the day after the party, thank goodness, because it wasn’t online anymore. Amazing that he’d posted it in the first place! She’d figured—hoped!—the police would want it at some point, because even though it wasn’t exactly evidence, it was certainly proof. Of, of … lots of stuff. Should she show it?
Maybe. Because more important, Jane couldn’t possibly know about her “Someday” file. And she never would. The video had once been on YouTube, Isabel reminded herself. Maybe they could retrieve it anyway. Jane was so nice, and seemed like she was really trying to help her.
“There’s kind of a video,” Isabel began. And from Jane’s expression, Fiola’s, too, she knew this was a good thing. Maybe if she could help them, they could help her. Somehow.
“I, um, haven’t really looked at it,” she said. “It was, like, in May.”
“Kind of a video?” Fiola said. “Can we see it?”
“Great,” Jane said. She gave her producer a funny look, then reached out, spreading her palms as if to smooth out wrinkles in the air. “Whatever, okay? No pressure. But would you mind showing it to us? Forgive me.”
For what? Isabel thought. But kept silent.
“Because, you know, we’re TV.” Jane looked apologetic, tilting her head as if she wasn’t quite sure she should say this. “And if there are no pictures, there’s no television. We could alter it however you want, blur faces. Not say where it came from, not ever, since absolutely everything between us is confidential. In every way, until you say it isn’t.”
That was an easy one.
“I’ll never say it isn’t,” Isabel said.
“Done,” Jane said. “It’ll always be confidential, one hundred percent. So, the video?”
Isabel had to decide. Her apartment was so silent, she could almost hear Fish swimming through the ferns, layered with the sound of the three women breathing, and all the traffic below filtering through her open balcony window. Yes. Show it. It existed, and pretending it didn’t was like hiding her head in the sand.
“It was a fun event, kind of a rehearsal,” Isabel began. “We were just practicing for another show we were putting together. We did one in April, and…”
“Okay, terrific.” Jane was nodding, looking appreciative. Isabel tried to remember exactly what was on the video. Probably, maybe, she shouldn’t have mentioned it until she’d looked at it again, but now Jane and Fiola were here, and being so nice … She kept saying the word “nice”—she had to get out more! Talking to real people. It was such a relief.
“I’ll get it for you.” She couldn’t very well take it back now, or make up some excuse about how she couldn’t find it. It took two seconds to boot her laptop, bring up the file, click it open. “I haven’t watched it for … a while,” she said. “But I know Professor Morgan is on it.”
She almost burst into tears as she saw it, hadn’t expected that gut-chilling reaction, hadn’t known what to expect, really. That soft May night, lanterns twinkling in the leafy trees, yellow and red plastic cups, and everyone in shorts and T-shirts, long floaty skirts. A little night music, Isabel thought, as she watched the people she used to know laughing and chatting.
“That’s Avery Morgan,” she said, pointing. Professor Morgan was smiling, talking to someone Isabel couldn’t see. She narrowed her eyes. That weasel Tarrant, the creep, keeping off camera. He’d acted like he owned the place, and owned Avery, though he probably thought he was being discreet. You had to be a better actor than that to fool Isabel.
“So thin,” Fiola said. “Pretty, like a movie star.”
“She came from Hollywood, did something in films.” Isabel knew this from class and Google. “Yes, she is. Was.” Hard to believe she was gone, she commanded the screen so completely. Life changed so quickly, so irrevocably. Haunting, now, to see the past captured: the sounds and the gaiety, the twinkling lights and the carefree faces. No one knew that so many lives were about to change.
“Who took the video?” Jane asked, eyes still on the screen.
“Oh, I—don’t remember.” A lie, a big one, but there she would not go.
“Uh-huh,” Jane said. Seemed to believe her.
The students began to line up. Neesha, and Claire. She missed them, so much. The kick line started. She must have been up in the bathroom when it began.
Avery Morgan stood, her hair thrown back, plastic cup in hand. Tarrant was never shown in the video, Isabel noticed. Weasel.
“Over here!” Avery-on-tape called out. “Isabel!”
Every cell in Isabel’s body froze. The hair on the back of her neck prickled. Her heart sank to her toes. She’d forgotten this part. And there was no way, now, to prevent it. If she reached out and bashed the mouse, making it stop? What good would that do? It was too late.
“Isabel!” Avery Morgan was waving. At her. Now she remembered that, remembered it all. There she was, looking happy and free and—Avery had flung one arm around her. Kissed her on both cheeks, like she always did. They both turned, waving at the camera, Isabel picking up her red cup, toasting the night.
It made her sick now, to see it.
Jane reached over, clicked the mouse. The scene froze, an unmistakable and irrefutable tableau. “Should I—we—pretend we didn’t hear that, Tosca?” Jane whispered, touching, briefly, a gentle hand to Isabel’s shoulder. “It’s okay, you know. You can trust me. Us.”
See? She knew Jane was good, knew she would protect her. They were in it together. One hundred percent, Jane had said. The three of them stood there, bearing the weight of their new knowledge, Fiola looking at the computer screen, Jane looking at Isabel.
“Yes. No,” Isabel said. “Yes.”
JANE RYLAND
“Yes.” Tosca said it again.
This was astonishing. Why had the girl shown that video if it revealed her real name? She’d told Jane and Fee she hadn’t watched it for a while. Why not, if it was such a treasured memory? But then, these days, that was typical, standard, everyone took photos of their every move. How many photos were in Jane’s phone right now, snapped and then never looked at again? People documented everything these days, but that didn’t mean they ever referred to any of it again. So, yeah, believable.
“That’s me,” Tosca was saying. She was looking at the floor, or at her bare feet, or at the woven sisal rug. “I’m Isabel. Isabel Russo. A senior. I graduate next year. I guess you’d find out eventually. Not that it actually matters, right? Because you’ll never use it, or tell anyone.”
Fiola extended her hand to shake Isabel’s. “You’re a rock star, Isabel,” Fiola said. “We appreciate this.”
Isabel took her hand, silent. Then nodded, as if making a decision. “Thank you,” she said. “If I can help even one person, it matters.”
“Exactly,” Fiola said. She glanced at Jane. “I understand.”
“Thank you, um, Isabel,” Jane said. “And of course. One hundred percent confidential.”
Jane watched as Tosc—Isabel. It’d be hard to think of her as that right away—clicked the mouse again, and the video resumed. Dancing, now, a kick line of smiles and enthusiasm. Jane recognized the summer’s top video, re-created, gesture for gesture, in this Boston backyard. The hostess—teacher, professor, mentor—was now dead. And one of the students in it, smiling and singing for the camera, was now a victim of sexual assault and afraid to give her real name. Life, Jane thought.
The camera panned across the dancers. Avery Morgan, all in white, waved at the lens. So happy, Jane thought. Life is so short.
In the background, someone else entered the shot. A young man, clearly the delivery guy. Three pizza boxes, a brown paper bag balanced on top.
“Oh,” Isabel said. Jane felt her energy change.
“What?” Jane asked. Isabel had put her fingers to her mouth. She hadn’t taken her eyes off the screen.
“Nothing,” Isabel replied. “Nothing.”
“Pizza,” Fiola said.
“Yeah. Beer and pizza.”
Pizza. Which reminded Jane she was starving, which reminded her of dinner, which reminded her of Jake.
Jake. Who was working on Avery Morgan’s possible murder. The video continued for a few more moments, faces Jane didn’t recognize, probably would never see again. But what would Jake see? A video full of possible suspects, or at least people who knew the victim. Clearly he’d want to watch it—it might even help him solve the case. Could she tell him about it? Somehow? He could have found it on his own.
And then she had another thought. Why would Isabel keep it?
“Isabel,” Jane began. She had to ask, even though it was iffy, and problematic, and every other thing that made journalism a constant battle. Campus sexual assault, insidious and pervasive, the unspoken but shared lifelong trauma of so many young women. A crime that, unlike many of the punishable-by-twenty-years-in-prison rapes that occurred off campus, was too often covered up, papered over, dealt with by silence and fear.
Another difference made it more terrifying. Often, so often, the women knew their attackers. Had to go to class with them, see them in the hallways, watch them laugh with other people. It was a crime where the criminal was known.
Where the criminal was free. Like nothing ever happened.
But Isabel “didn’t like” to go outside.
Jane took a deep breath, trying to balance propriety and curiosity and urgency and compassion. “Isabel? Is he … in this video? Was this the night … it happened?”