SHE NEVER GOT MARK’S MESSAGE. That’s the other thing I did, the thing that might have been worse than lying about the shoes. She texted him—we were sitting in the living room, and I could tell she was obsessing about something. Then she put the phone down in a huff and said she was going for a walk.
I doubt she forgot the phone. She was pissed off at whatever she had just read on it, or the lack thereof. I waited until she was gone and picked it up. I knew her passcode—she never changed it. It was 1313, her unlucky number.
I saw her message to Mark. He hadn’t written back. And as I was staring at it, the phone rang. It was Mark, calling her, just like she asked him to do.
I answered. I have no idea why I did it. I wasn’t planning to, and I wasn’t planning on doing what I did next. I wasn’t planning to be Tabby.
“Hello?”
I was sure he would know it wasn’t her. We sound extremely similar—Dad used to get us confused when he’d call the landline from the office to talk to Mom. But if Mark really knew Tabby, he would know he wasn’t talking to my sister.
He didn’t.
“Tabs, I know I fucked up, but can’t we fix it? You know you’re the only girl who means anything to me.”
“I don’t believe you.” My voice, ice-cold. “All you ever do is hurt me.”
“Come on. We’ve been through too much to just throw it all away because of one night.”
I wanted to scream. I wanted to ask, What night? What did you do? But I couldn’t, because if I was Tabby, I would know already.
“If you love me so much, prove it,” I said. “Prove it, or let me go.”
“I’ll prove it,” he said. He sounded so pathetic, in that moment, that I almost felt sorry for him. If I hadn’t known anything about their relationship—if I hadn’t seen my tearstained sister—maybe I would have felt bad for him. But instead, I was disgusted. With him, for reducing my sister into a girl he could carry in his pocket. Tabby, for letting it happen. Me, for stooping this low, for invading her privacy.
I hung up without saying goodbye. Then his text message came in. I deleted it, and I deleted his call from her call history, and I hoped he never mentioned it again.
I don’t know if what I did played a role in what happened in the woods. Maybe Tabby figured it out. Maybe Mark knew all along. But things might have been different if she had seen that message. If I hadn’t answered the phone. I guess none of us will ever know. And it looks like Keegan is going down for his role, but part of me wonders if they got the wrong person.