Chapter 7

“Reverend Arden gave me a ticket to tonight’s Messiah!” Maryam waved one of the coveted pieces of cardboard as she bounced into their shared mobile home.

The words struck Juliana with a wave of guilt and fear. Unable to reveal her unproved, incomplete theories, she could only smile to share her roommate’s excitement. “You have only a few hours to prepare. What will you wear?”

Maryam had a colorful collection of shalwar kameez—pants and shirts—that she wore every day, but she also had an enviable collection of heavily embroidered Punjabi dresses. If Maryam hadn’t been one of the shortest people on campus, and Juliana one of the tallest, she would have borrowed any of Maryam’s outfits in an eye blink. They both had dark hair and eyes and brown complexions, so they favored bright reds and golds and blues—a fact that gave her pause now.

As far as she was aware, even though the students working at JACAD were both male and female and predominantly people of color, only girls with light skins had received tickets. Juliana had wanted to believe that most of the lucky ticket-holders came from English-speaking families like hers and were better able to communicate. But she’d seen blond German and French girls who barely spoke English receive the coveted symphony and theater tickets before she had been offered one. Again—that could be a notion developed out of offended feelings of rejection.

She’d only recently switched from offense to concern after realizing that the girls who received tickets often started dating the men they met outside the school. Several were long-time students who had given up their studies and not been seen again.

The roommate she’d had when she’d first moved here haunted her. Esther had been one of the second year students. She’d been dating a wealthy older man whose identity she kept secret. When they’d broken up, Esther had been angry for weeks. Then she’d packed her bags and said she was going home. Why hadn’t she let Julie know she’d returned safely home as she’d promised?

Julie would like to believe that Maryam receiving the ticket was evidence that her observations of prejudice over the tickets were incorrect. And if the tickets brought Maryam in contact with wealthy older men, then Julie hoped her friend was sensible enough not to fall prey to temptation.

That did not mean she should send her friend out completely unprepared. Juliana prayed silently as she helped her roommate choose the perfect outfit, but at the same time, she was building an emergency kit in her mind.

“How will you go to this place?” Juliana asked.

“They send a car,” Maryam said with relish. “I am so tired of that rattily old bus! I know I am to aspire to a life of poverty, but the bus stinks.”

Like Juliana, Maryam came from a fairly well-to-do, educated family and was accustomed to a higher standard of living than an aging trailer park. Her much older brother worked at the embassy, but so far, he’d been too busy to bother taking Maryam anywhere.

“Do you know if there will be others with you?” Juliana hunted through her trunk for the items Zander had insisted that she bring with her to this country.

Studying their tiny wall mirror, preening with the gold embroidered shawl she’d flung over her thick dark hair, Maryam shrugged. “I’ve not heard of others. I guess I will find out. It does not matter. For a change, I will see the rich and glamorous part of DC, and enjoy real music! One needs the occasional reward. I’m sure you’ll be offered one soon.”

Juliana didn’t say that she’d already turned it down or she’d ruin her friend’s pleasure in the moment. “I’m sure you will have a lovely time, but it is a big city, and you are unfamiliar with it. You should not go unprepared. Take your phone, some money, and a credit card. Zander gave me this whistle flashlight. It can serve as an alarm. You are not large enough to fight, so if there is trouble, run and cry for help.”

Maryam looked at her as if she were crazed. “What kind of trouble would there be in a concert hall? And how could I run in these?” She held up one foot bearing her favorite pair of high heels.

“I would suggest wearing the gorgeous gold slippers instead, but you could pack them in your purse, just in case,” Juliana urged. “What if there was a fire? Or a terrorist attack?”

Her roommate rolled her eyes. “This is America. We are safe here.”

Not from the kind of predators Juliana feared. She packed the items into Maryam’s gold purse. “Take them for me, so I can sleep while you are out having a good time. Do you have 911 programmed into your phone?”

After much good-natured arguing, she sent Maryam into the world as prepared as was possible.

Now, she had to find a printer for her photo and some way of locating the coordinates Zander had sent. Sneaking and stealing weren’t her favorite pastimes, but she’d been left with little choice. Perhaps she should have gone into DC and slipped away, but then she wouldn’t be able to come back here. And if she couldn’t work here, she would have no means of uncovering whatever was going on.

Because her fears for her missing roommate Esther were based on her terror of what the photos on her video cameras had revealed.

I admired the evergreen fragrance of the tipsy tree framed by our large front window. “It’s fat,” I said dubiously, studying the thick layers of long needles.

“I vote we wrap an apron around the bottom and put a hat on top and call it Mrs. Frosty Claus,” Patra said, sipping at her coffee and tilting her head to the angle of the tree. She looked as if she’d just dragged out of bed and pulled on leggings and Sean’s sweatshirt. She’d stacked her heavy chestnut hair on top of her head in a precarious knot. I tugged my own plain black braid self-consciously, knowing I could never achieve Patra’s casual glamour.

Maybe I should have tried. I quickly shut out the wayward thought of Graham’s empty office.

EG sent Patra an evil look and dug through the box of ornaments.

Zander and I had unanimously voted to rewrap the delicate ornaments in a stronger box and had bought “learner” sets of plastic and wood from a drugstore. We’d gone a little crazy, so there was roping and tinsel and blinky lights. We’d torn them out of their packaging and repurposed one of Magda’s dusty boxes to hold them. Until this moment, EG had accepted them with delight.

“There’s no star,” EG said with a pout after she’d spread the loot across the priceless Persian carpet.

“No angel either?” Nick asked, occupying the Morris chair. Nick didn’t do casual. For our Christmas tree experience, he was wearing gray pin-striped trousers and a pink dress shirt with contrasting collars and cuffs that matched the stripes of his trousers. At least he wasn’t wearing a tie.

So, I wasn’t proficient at decorating trees, and Nick wasn’t educated in choosing one. I hadn’t known a star was required, and he hadn’t known to check the trunk. I sipped my tea and dismissed the critics in favor of action. “I don’t suppose there’s any way of making it stand straight?”

We all studied the crooked trunk nailed onto a rather rickety cross of two-by-fours.

“We’d need a saw to cut off the bent part, and then we’d have to saw off the lower branches.” Tudor pointed out the obvious. Garbed in his usual grunge, his auburn curls needing a cut, he had his ever-present tablet in hand and was poking at some game while keeping up with the conversation. Sixteen was an awkward age. He didn’t want to appear childish like EG, but he was as interested in the production as any of us.

Graham and Mallard still hadn’t returned. I was convinced that if Mallard were dead, he’d come back to haunt us over the destruction of his parlor. I studied the mess EG had created.

“I’m guessing we start with the lights,” I suggested. “And we can look for a star or angel later. It probably ought to be something special to celebrate our first Christmas together.”

EG accepted that. She tugged out a string of lights and looked expectantly at Nick, who just grinned at her and shoved a cookie in his mouth.

We’d spent some valuable family hours bonding over cookies before we started on the decorating. The results were predictably disastrous but edible. Luckily, we didn’t have high standards when it came to our own cooking.

Zander took the string of lights, studied the crooked tree, and drew the coffee table up to it. I watched in trepidation as he stepped on the expensive antique, but the sturdy legs held up to his weight. He carefully clipped a light near the top, and wound the string as far as he could reach. Almost as tall as Zander, Tudor finally dragged himself up to grab the string and wind it around the back.

The rest of us threw out various instructions on where and how to fix the lights, and Zander and Tudor cheerfully ignored us. We were a masterpiece of international holiday good cheer and incompetence.

“Those are perfectly hideous ornaments,” Nick murmured as I perched on the arm of his chair and watched EG hang the first red ball. “If you want to hide the real stuff, you could have at least bought from somewhere besides Tar-zhay.”

“Not enough time. When we have more time, I think we ought to make our own, or hang ones that have meaning to us.” I pulled the oval frame from my sweatshirt pocket and showed it to him. “Or you could hang this if you’re feeling really sentimental.”

He took the frame and studied our mother and her parents. “I see where we get our cheekbones and why Magda calls herself a Hungarian princess. That looks like pearls on her little round neck, and our grandmother is wearing a fortune in rubies. I don’t suppose you found a box labeled jewels.”

“No, but you’re free to search for yourself. Bring spider spray, a vacuum cleaner, and an army of dust mops.” I left him with the frame and went to help EG hang a feathered hummingbird toward the top of the tree. I had no idea what birds had to do with Christmas, but it was red and gold, as specified.

I needed to be researching those articles I’d discovered last night, but I’d promised EG a Christmas tree party, and I couldn’t renege on that. I’d spent a few hours early this morning looking for information on the girls in the articles, but without Graham’s access to police records, I was stymied on the crime details.

I was almost desperate enough to start tracking Graham—almost, but not quite there yet. I was holding out hope that Juliana would respond to her twin’s pleas.

Finally, the tipsy tree was dripping with festive glitter. We drew broken cookies to determine who got to turn on the lights. Everyone made certain EG got the smallest one. Proudly, she plugged the string into the extension plug we’d had to run under the sofa to one of the room’s few sockets.

I waited for something to explode. Instead, the colorful strings lit up the evening shadows, casting a magical rainbow over the gloomy parlor. Smiles broke out around the room. I tried to store this moment in my heart, with my family all together, safe and happy—except for Juliana.

Later, after we’d consumed our makeshift dinner of store-bought cider and sushi and sat admiring our blinking tree against the night sky, Zander’s burner phone finally beeped.

Julie clung excitedly to her new, unbugged phone, her brand new lifeline to the outside world. Whoever she’d texted last night—she hoped and prayed it was Zander—couldn’t possibly have found the photo she’d hidden in the cache yet, but she was counting the minutes. Unless they really were magic, the genie who had provided this link to safety would have to wait until daylight to find the heavy burden she’d been carrying these last weeks.

Following the directions in Zander’s code last night, she’d barely been able to make her way through the woods in the dark and cold. She’d almost given up several times, until she tried to think like Zander. He’d always been good at natural hiding places.

Zander was here, she knew it. Her hopes would soar—except Maryam wasn’t home yet, and the sun was almost up.

She tried to pray, but the knowledge that if anything happened to her friend, it would be her fault, blocked all else from her mind. She should have said something, reported something, taken the ticket herself. . . .

She returned her gaze to the phone. She could still call for help. Maybe it wasn’t too late. But what would she say? I saw them bury a body and Esther has gone missing. . . . But she didn’t know that the body was Esther or that Esther hadn’t simply been too angry to let the school know she’d left.

And if it turned out that gangs were using the park to bury their victims, the park might be shut down, the reverend’s good work could be ended. . . .

At last, as dawn lit the clouds, she saw Maryam trudging down the muddy path to the trailers. Her lovely gown looked bedraggled, her gold slippers were tattered and mud-caked, and she had only her shawl to cover her shoulders.

Juliana tried not to panic. She put on more coffee and ran outside carrying the cheap down coat she’d bought from a departing student.

She wrapped the coat around a shivering Maryam and let her rest some of her weight on her as they trudged back to the trailer. Fretting, she wished she was strong enough to carry her friend.

“Do I need to call a doctor?” Julie asked, not knowing what else to say.

Maryam laughed hoarsely. “No, not unless they make bandages for stupidity.”

Julie tried to feel relieved, but Maryam looked as if she’d been through hell. She sent her to the meager shower, turned their propane heater on high, poured coffee, and set the mug on the bathroom counter.

Maryam looked a little more herself when she emerged from the shower wrapped in the thin cotton robe she’d brought from home, her hands hugging the hot mug. “Thank you. I thought I’d never be warm again. I’m not sure I’m made for this weather.”

Julie dropped the coat over her shoulders again. “I have some battery-operated warming socks someone gave me. Let me fetch those.”

Maryam didn’t argue, so Julie knew she was badly shaken. Maryam always argued. Finding the socks and watching her put them on, Julie finally demanded, “Now tell me what happened, all of it, even the stupid parts.”

Maryam grimaced. “Simple, I became scared, I ran, and as you predicted, I knew nothing of where to go because I was too stupid to learn how to travel without a hired driver, and I forgot to charge my phone.”

“Start at the beginning,” Julie warned. “What scared you?”

“It is silly,” she insisted. “The symphony was wonderful. The Kennedy Center. . . awesome. And the people! So many people, so many cultures, it made me feel as if I was at the center of the universe.”

Julie longed to see such a place, to be part of such a scene. Her few brief forays since her arrival in the States had only been around suburban Alexandria and a school bus tour to the Smithsonian, with a glimpse of the Capitol. “So you arrived safely enough,” she said, hoping to urge her on.

“A lovely black sedan, a smooth ride, I am just stupid,” Maryam repeated mournfully.

“You are not stupid. You saw a beautiful place, heard beautiful music, but you were alone, were you not?”

Maryam sipped her coffee and hesitated. “I arrived alone. The usher took me to my seat. The people around me. . . They wore diamonds and expensive suits. I did not belong.”

“Now that’s stupid,” Julie rudely pointed out. “Your gown is woven with gold thread and cost as much as an Italian suit. You could have worn gold had you not chosen to leave it at home. You belong in that place as much as anyone. Were there not people there in jeans and sweaters who looked much more out of place than you?”

“Possibly.” She sighed. “But I couldn’t tell it from where I was seated. All around me were wealthy people. The women wore furs. I did not even bring a coat.”

“Because you don’t own one and won’t wear mine,” Julie said, hoping the only problem was Maryam’s class consciousness. “The lack of fur did not scare you.”

“No,” she said sadly. “It was the gentleman sitting beside me. I finally realized that everyone around me was part of a couple, and the gentleman on my right was treating me as his date, even though he did not know my name.”

“Okay, that’s creepy,” Julie agreed. “He must be one of the sponsors who donated the tickets, though. He could have just been being friendly, knowing you were from the project.”

Maryam wrinkled her nose. “He did not ask about the park. He asked if women wore diamonds and furs in my country. He made one of the women show me her ring. I was very uncomfortable. And then when the lights went down and the music started, he tried to hold my hand.”

She visibly pulled herself together while Julie tried to imagine how this could be so terrible.

“I shook him off and put my hands in my lap. But when I was caught up in the music again, he put his arm around my shoulder and groped me. That’s when I got up and left. The driver was waiting at the door, as if he’d been summoned.” She took a deep drink of her coffee and finished wanly, “I feared they meant to kidnap me, so I ran for another exit.”