It was late when I woke up, well into the afternoon. I had been drifting in and out of a dream full of dead people, Danielle and Brandon and my mom. In the dream I was dead, too. I didn’t mind it. It was safe, quiet. I woke to sirens singing on the nearby freeway and an image in my head, the untied lace of Brandon’s shoe. I thought I could smell the air in his house, too full of him, his body turning into particles you could breathe.
I tried to sort out my thoughts: Brandon killed Danielle. The conspiracy I had imagined with Sally and the money, none of that was real. Danielle got killed because Brandon lost his temper. I still couldn’t imagine it, but like Ash had said, I didn’t really know the guy. I thought of him saying I didn’t belong with Danielle’s friends, that I deserved better. I liked how concerned he was about me—it was nice, knowing somebody cared, was paying attention. But I recalled Audrey’s face as she drove away and left me on the sidewalk in front of Brandon’s house. I hoped she was okay. I made coffee and texted her again, then went for a run.
I picked up a sandwich and took it home, showered, ate. Even though I was worried about Audrey, I felt better than I had since I found out Danielle was dead. It was relief, I realized. I was glad the whole thing was resolved. And maybe I was looking forward to seeing Ash next week. I wondered when he’d call.
A knock came at the door. I opened it to Audrey, standing on the stoop. She looked terrible, like she hadn’t slept, like she’d been crying since I saw her last.
“Hi,” I said.
“Please,” she said. “Can I come in?” Her voice shifted and cracked.
I nodded, stepped back for her to enter. She embraced me, clung to me. Her breath on my neck made me shiver.
“What happened to you?” I said.
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t, I didn’t, I’m sorry . . .” She was a mess.
“Come sit down,” I said.
She wouldn’t let go of me, she clutched my arm as I walked her to the couch.
“I’m going to get you a drink,” I said. “I’ll be right back.”
She nodded but looked terrified. I brought the whiskey from the kitchen and poured it in glasses. I handed her one. I lit a cigarette and gave it to her.
“What’d you do? After you left?” I said.
“Finished off the coke,” she said. “Drove around.”
“I called you like ten times. I didn’t have a ride home.”
“My phone died. I was pretty fucked up. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “It’s no big deal.”
“The cops,” she said. “What happened?”
“They said he OD’d. They asked a ton of questions.”
“What’d you tell them?” she said. I’d never seen her look so anxious and vulnerable.
“Just that we went by there to check on him.”
“You mentioned me?” Her voice rose in pitch. “Why did you do that?”
“You don’t have to worry, Audrey. They’re saying Brandon killed Danielle.”
“That’s bullshit.”
“Audrey, listen to me. Brandon did it, then killed himself. The cops won’t bother you about anything now.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Ash told me.”
“And you believe him,” she said. “You think Brandon killed her?”
“The cops do. I didn’t know him that well.”
And now, I thought, I never would. I’d liked Brandon, I genuinely had. But what did I know about anything? I wasn’t a cop, I wasn’t even close to Danielle, not anymore. I’d never seen her and Brandon together, didn’t know what they were like. There were plenty of reasons to think he was guilty.
“When did you last talk to him?” I said.
“I went over there a few days ago. A day or two after the funeral. It seems like so long ago.”
“I wonder if he was already planning it then.”
“What? Killing himself? He didn’t say anything like that. He was crying. We talked about Danielle.”
“You really don’t think he could have killed her?”
“I don’t trust cops,” she said. “He was my friend.”
Her voice fell apart at the last few words. She was shaking. She looked so frightened and confused. As much as I wanted it to all be over, I kind of agreed with Audrey. It was too hard to imagine Brandon killing Danielle. Suicide I could believe, but not murder. Not like that.
“Audrey,” I said. “I’m sorry, we can talk about something else.”
“Let’s go somewhere,” she said.
“Okay.”
We took my car and traveled east along the bayou, a black emptiness that smelled like soggy garbage. We rolled down the windows and I listened to the air change pitch at each tree we passed. She loaded her pipe and handed it to me, and we smoked. Audrey seemed calmer, now that we were moving.
I followed her directions, steering the car through streets I didn’t recognize until we came to a corrugated metal building with a neon Lone Star sign in the window. Inside were two pool tables, a bar, and some scattered mismatched chairs. It was muggy and smelled like stale beer and piss. Audrey engaged a squirrelly guy in whispered conversation and went with him into the men’s room. I ordered Jack Daniel’s, which managed to taste both watered down and too bitter. After a couple of minutes the guy walked out of the bathroom and Audrey waved me over. I took my drink in with me and she locked the door.
“It’s shit, but it’s not nothing,” she said, unwrapping a twist of plastic.
We each had a bump. It was shit, dirty and speedy. A grain of it lodged in my sinus cavity. It hurt. I tried not to touch the walls in the filthy men’s room, which made no sense because I undoubtedly had already snorted up whatever diseases were in there, along with the rat poison in the coke. I relaxed against the damp concrete. I was so tired of worrying about everything. It was good to surrender. I gritted my teeth. It was good.
We went to Audrey’s place. She lived nearby, on the first floor of a shabby apartment complex. Her unit was bland and cheap, carpeted in beige. A thrift-store couch upholstered in pink and mauve floral tapestry stood against a windowless wall. The walls were bare, the furniture buried under clothes, magazines, half-drunk Diet Cokes.
I made an attempt to clear the table, piling crumpled receipts and dirty dishes and envelopes of Val-Pak coupons. Audrey plugged in her phone, then poured two big glasses of vodka over ice and brought them to the kitchen table. She set to work chopping the rest of the coke, smashing the crystals into dust. She held her hair and did a line before sliding the plate to me. I was glad to see her looking more like herself.
“Guess I’ll have to find another gig now,” she said.
I hadn’t thought about the fact that she’d be out of a job. “What will you do?” I asked.
“He’s not the only dude around with a video camera.”
“My old job is probably hiring. You could be a barista.”
“Yeah, perfect,” she said. “You’re hilarious.” She snorted another line. “This friend of mine moved to Phoenix. She said the money’s great, dancing. And it’s not humid.”
“Humidity’s good for your complexion. I read somewhere it prevents wrinkles.”
“Who cares?” she said. “It’s not like we’re gonna get old.”
I wanted to argue with that, but then I thought of Danielle, and Brandon. My mom was thirty-nine when she died. Why would I think we’d be any different?
“We should go,” Audrey said. “You and me. Why not?”
“Phoenix?” I said. It sounded like nowhere.
“Okay, how about Alaska? Brazil? Wherever.”
“I don’t have a passport,” I said.
“Me, either. We could try California. Out west. This town is such a shithole. We could leave right now and be in El Paso in twelve hours. We’re high, we won’t get sleepy. Besides. What’s here for me anymore?”
I looked up, moved by the desolation in her tone.
“I’ve always lived here,” I said.
“God, I’ve been everywhere. I don’t think I’ve stayed anyplace a whole year since I was fifteen.”
“After your mom died?”
“Yeah. And my stepdad died that same year.”
“You didn’t tell me that before. How awful.”
“Yeah, well. I didn’t care. I hated him.”
“Why? What was he like?”
“He was a drunk fucking asshole. He started fucking me as soon as my mom went in the hospital.”
“Shit, Audrey. How old were you?”
“Thirteen.”
“Jesus.”
“Yeah,” she said.
She leaned over the plate and inhaled a line. She cut one for me, but I didn’t want any more. I felt woozy and twitchy. Audrey took a cigarette from the pack on the table and lit it, started talking again.
“We did it every night. He was ugly . . .” She shuddered and took a sharp drag off the cigarette. “I used to get mad at my mom for marrying this ugly man. I wished he was handsome—I thought it would be easier. I felt shitty being mad at her when she was sick, and she needed me to be strong. She always said that to me. ‘Be strong for me, pumpkin.’ I tried to. I tried hard. After she died . . . He drank as soon as he woke up in the mornings. He was always pissed off.”
Her voice was oddly calm, didn’t match what she was saying. I was horrified, thinking of Audrey as a child, helpless and alone. I couldn’t see how she could be so fun, laugh so much, even while all this had happened to her. Maybe I’d been lucky, with no dad around. I touched her hand across the table. She didn’t notice.
“I dressed up in her clothes for him. My mom was gorgeous, I mean dazzling. I wore her slips and her dresses but they didn’t fit right, they were too big. He said I looked too much like her, and he couldn’t stand to see me. Before, that’s why he liked me, ’cause I reminded him of her except not sick. And then, boom, he changed his mind. He didn’t like me anymore. He hated me. It didn’t matter how good I was, how hard I tried.”
“Audrey, I don’t understand,” I said. “You wanted him to—”
“He was all I had,” she said. “He wouldn’t fuck me or let me do the things he liked. Rub his neck, or get him more ice for his drink, we didn’t have to have sex. He wouldn’t. He didn’t even take ice anymore, he drank from the bottle. One day he just shoved me out and locked the door. He didn’t want me. He wanted to drink.”
The bitterness in her tone scared me. She bent over the coke and inhaled, pushed the plate to me.
“Do it,” she said. “Be high with me. Please.”
My heartbeat was a rapid flutter and my jaw hurt from clenching. But how could I say no? I snorted the line she cut for me.
“Danielle knew,” she said. “Danielle knew the whole story. If she were here I wouldn’t have to talk about it.”
“We don’t have to,” I said. “But it’s good that you told Danielle.”
“Why?”
“Because she was your friend. She cared about you.”
“Yeah,” she said. “And now she’s dead. And bloody, and . . .”
I reached across the table and hugged her. She felt stiff in my arms.
“It’s okay,” I said. “You can trust me, too.”
She stared at me for a second and said, “It was fucked up.”
“It sounds totally fucked up. It’s horrible.”
“You don’t even know what I’m talking about. I mean the night he died. He passed out on the couch and he wouldn’t wake up. I kicked him, and all he did was groan. I took every single bottle. He drank those big handles of vodka. Half gallons. We always had extras, he was afraid of not having enough. I drank a little and poured out the rest. Splashed it on him. I had to wake him up, that’s what I was trying to do. He was out cold and I just kept pouring. I soaked his clothes and the couch cushions with vodka. And the carpet around him. I spilled it everywhere. It got on the walls, the curtains, on the garbage piled up, old newspapers. I knew it was bad, but it was fun, too, like kind of satisfying.”
“Shit. What’d he do?” I asked.
“He didn’t wake up,” she said.
“He was dead?”
“No. He died in the fire,” she said.
“What fire?”
“It lit up really fast. I didn’t expect that, I was only trying to wake him up.”
“You set a fire?”
“I told you it was fucked up. I lit a match, and I ran and hid in our neighbor’s barn and watched. It smelled terrible. I walked all night to the interstate.”
“You killed him?”
“You hate me now,” she said.
“No,” I said. “No, of course not.”
“Don’t bullshit me. Tell me the truth. You hate me.”
“Audrey, you were just a kid. You didn’t know what you were doing.”
But I watched her, wary. She rose from the table, opened a closet door, and pulled out a duffel bag. She shoved in makeup and clothes.
“Come with me,” she said.
She dropped the bag, knelt in front of me, and laid her head in my lap. I petted her hair. Her story broke my heart. I didn’t know what to say. Then I realized that nothing had changed except my knowledge. Nothing had changed for Audrey. She had always lived with this—half an hour ago, five years ago. It would never leave her alone.
“Please,” she said. “We could go to Hawaii.”
“Hawaii sounds cool,” I said.
“We could go there for Danielle. Like, to honor her.”
“For Danielle? What do you mean?” I asked.
“’Cause she never got to. She was gonna move there with the money.”
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“The money from the land. From her mom. She was getting a shitload. She was all excited, saying Brandon was right, with that much cash she could quit working, go off somewhere. She went there once and she loved it, she said she could live on the beach and go to massage school or some shit like that.”
“But she fought with Brandon. She didn’t listen to him.”
Audrey shrugged. “She changed her mind. She talked to her mom and worked it out so she was getting way more money.”
Sally had told me the same thing and I hadn’t believed her.
“If she changed her mind, why would Brandon kill her?” I said. “It makes no sense.”
“Exactly,” Audrey said. “That’s what I’ve been saying.”
“How do you know all this? About the deal with Sally? How do you know about Hawaii?”
“She called me. Didn’t I tell you? I went there as soon as I got her message.”
“Went where?” I said. “When was this?”
“Help me pack this shit. Hey, here’s your dress. I told you I’d give it back.”
She tossed me the yellow sundress that she’d borrowed. I ignored it and it fell to the floor. I could hear blood beating in my head. My mind, slow and cold, tried to put it together. Danielle and Brandon fought, and Danielle went to the motel. At some point she called Audrey. Danielle changed her mind about the land, like Sally said. She talked to Sally and negotiated her new deal. Audrey went to meet her.
“You were at the motel,” I said. “That’s what you’re telling me?”
She kept filling the bag, her back to me.
“Did you see Brandon there?” I said.
“No.”
“Did you see anybody else? What time did you leave?”
“I don’t know, I didn’t keep track.” She turned to me, stricken. “Do you think if I stayed, she’d still be alive?”
“Oh, god. You’ve been driving yourself crazy, haven’t you?”
“I guess,” she said.
“What about what’s-his-name? Eddie?” I said. “The guy Danielle would meet there.”
“How the fuck do you know about Eddie?”
“Ash told me.”
Audrey laughed. “I forgot I told him about that. That’s not even his real name. We called them all Eddie.”
“What do you mean, all? How many were there?”
“I don’t know, a few. It wasn’t even the money. She liked it, she got off on it. Dani was so twisted.”
“Well, maybe it was one of them?”
“No one was there,” she said. “Just us.”
“Did the cops know this? When did you leave?”
“Let’s do some lines, all right? Is there any more?”
“I can’t,” I said. “I don’t feel well. Come on, tell me what happened.”
“She was saying this stuff, her big plans, and I was like, okay, cool. Hawaii, right? Let’s go. But she goes, ‘Audrey, I was thinking by myself. Leaving everything behind.’ Like I’m what she wants to get away from.”
She started to cry again, stuttering over the words. It annoyed me. I felt impatient.
“Go on,” I said.
“Everybody leaves me,” she said. “Everybody.”
“What happened, Audrey?”
“Look, it doesn’t have to be Hawaii. Let’s go to California. You would like California. I’ve been there before. I’ve been to the ocean. Have you ever seen the ocean?”
“No.”
“Please come with me,” she said.
She hunched over the coke on the table. She was blotchy from tears, skinny and red-eyed as a drowning kitten. I could easily picture her at fifteen, hiding in a dirty barn. She didn’t look pretty, or like anyone I wanted to go anywhere with. I thought of Danielle, her head beaten in, the blood.
“It was you,” I said. “You killed her.”
She sat in the kitchen chair, trembling, her big eyes open. She didn’t say a word. She didn’t say no. After a minute she took a breath and said, “Come on. We better go.”
She reached for my hand and I heard a guttural animal noise coming from my own throat. I recoiled and she gripped my arm, fingernails digging into my wrist. Our eyes met. I couldn’t hold her gaze.
“We can be together,” she said.
“No,” I said.
She was hurting me. I tried to pull my arm away from her. Her blow knocked me into the wall. I hadn’t seen it coming. I shook my head, dizzy and stunned, and doubled over as she pummeled my torso with her fists. She was stronger than I thought. She hit me again and again. She kept coming at me. I used the wall for support and kicked her shin, yanked her hair, and pulled her off.
She lunged at me. I grabbed her arms and tried to hold them at her sides—if I let go she’d attack me. I shoved her down and knelt on top of her. She kicked and struggled. I didn’t know how to fight. I didn’t want to hurt her. I had to make her stop but I wasn’t strong enough. She shoved me and I stumbled and fell. I scrambled back, to the wall behind me. The vodka bottle had rolled into the corner and I reached for it. I felt a kick to the side of my head and slumped against the wall. Audrey kicked me again and I curled into a ball over the bottle. I could hear her breathing. She leaned over, panting, her hand on the couch for support.
“You don’t love me,” she said.
I stared up at her. I could barely breathe.
“You always leave,” she said. “Everyone leaves.”
She moved towards me, knelt, and then lunged at me, her fingernails pushing at my eyes. I raised my arm, brought the bottle down on her head. The glass didn’t break. The thud traveled up my arm, to my stomach, between my legs. I hit her again and the bottle broke into shards that cut my hand. She fell to her knees and collapsed sideways. I heaved, tasted vodka and bile. My body convulsed and a froth filled my head. My vision wobbled. I struggled to focus. I stayed where I was for several minutes, watching Audrey. She lay still, in a heap. I was afraid she was dead at first, but then I saw her breathing. I backed away from her, still holding the jagged broken handle of the bottle in one hand, in case she attacked me again. I ignored the blood streaming down my arm and found my phone with my other hand. I called Ash, cleaned away the drugs, and sat down on the floor. I watched Audrey’s chest rise and fall, shallowly, while I waited for the sound of sirens.