Chapter Thirty-Three

Now

FEBRUARY 13

TESSA WALKED ALL THE WAY home. She walked and walked and walked, trying to feel anything other than disgusted, gross dismay. Maybe Lilly had been right all this time. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to know the truth. Maybe the truth was just a set of broken pieces that didn’t all quite line up. Shards of semi-truth, sharp as fangs.

When she got to their block, she sat down on the driveway between her house and Boyd’s, numb. A statue.

She was still sitting there when the sun finally cracked over the horizon.

Still sitting there, shivering, sleepless, when Boyd stepped out of his house the next morning.

“Tessa? Jesus, Tess! What are you doing up this early? Out here?”

She looked up, her head heavy. Boyd was wearing boxers, flip-flops, and a T-shirt. His hair was all over the place. He must have gotten straight out of bed.

He’d been gone a little over a week, but it felt like much longer. Like he’d become a different person in the meantime. Standing on the porch for that frozen second, he wasn’t her Boyd. He wasn’t even Boyd at all. He was just a guy. A slightly too tall, slightly too gawky, but still oddly cute guy. A stranger. He’d aged in ten days, and she hadn’t. This whole time, she’d been on pause.

And then he was at her side, helping her off the gravelly concrete. Her legs felt weak beneath her. The dawn was blooming behind his head.

They both stood there, facing each other. He was still holding her hands.

He cleared his throat, staring at her, expressionless, waiting. There were tears in his eyes.

“So, you’re home now,” she said. “And I have the proof. I know it wasn’t you, I—”

“Tessa,” he said softly.

She had planned to tell him everything. All about Mr. Green and the affair. The final missing puzzle piece. And she would tell him.

But right now, what came out of her mouth had nothing to do with any of that. It had nothing to do with Kit at all.

“Do you, um, remember that afternoon when we were in my room, studying AP Bio?”

His eyebrows seemed to soften at the edges. His lips seemed to curl up—but only a tiny bit, like he was too afraid to show either sadness or happiness, so his face paused somewhere in between.

“You know. The time, we, um . . .”

He took in a breath, and even though it was a tiny breath, she could hear it. “Kissed,” he said.

She nodded.

“Yeah.” He swallowed.

She didn’t say anything. She was trying to say something but she wasn’t sure what.

“Of course, I remember,” he added. “I—”

“You said something then. About Olivia Khan. You asked if I remembered the time you guys dated in middle school. But then, we were interrupted, and, um, well, I never got to ask you why you brought it up.”

He was still sort of looking at her in this way where he could be squinting or trying not to cry or trying not to burst into a huge smile.

“Yeah . . . I think maybe I remember saying that.”

“So?” she asked, looking up at him, her whole body, from her toes to her chest to the top of her head filling with something she couldn’t quite name. A warmth. A feeling.

“Well, this is sort of embarrassing, I guess. But you know how she sort of dumped me for being . . . well, in her words, a prude?”

Tessa couldn’t help it. Maybe it was the surrealness of the whole night, her lack of sleep. She laughed.

“Well,” he went on, “it was partly that. I mean, I was only thirteen and I wasn’t, like, you know, ready for under-the-shirt action or whatever it was she wanted to do. But it wasn’t just me chickening out.”

“TMI, but okay . . .”

“See, we were kissing, and—”

“Not that I need to picture that,” Tessa interjected.

He shrugged sheepishly. “Well, we were kissing. On the playground at school or whatever. And she pushed me away and said, ‘This is dumb.’ And I was like, ‘Why?’ and she was like, ‘Because I can tell that you don’t really want to be with me,’ and I don’t know what I said, but I was just trying to focus on figuring out what the hell she was talking about. As I’m sure you know, I’ve never been that good at knowing what girls want. So anyway, then she surprises me and is like, ‘Come on, I know you don’t like me because I know you like someone else.’”

Tessa stared at him, feeling much the way he’d just described he felt then—confused. Wondering what he was getting at.

He cleared his throat. He was squinting, like he did when he was struggling to get the right words out. “And the thing is, she was right. All that time ago. Three years? It was eighth grade, so a little more than three years ago. Anyway, she had it right on the nose.”

“Had . . .”

“She knew that I liked you. Even then. I think it’s possible everyone knew. But I didn’t, until she said it. And I think I still didn’t really know it, didn’t want to commit to it in my head, that I was stupidly, dorkily obsessed with you. I’m not sure I knew what to do with the information. I didn’t want to ruin everything if you found out and didn’t like me back.”

“You were obsessed with me in eighth grade?” Tessa asked, heat burning her cheeks, and a tiny pang slicing into her ribs—a sudden nostalgia for something she’d never get back.

Now he finally let himself smile. “No, idiot.”

“Oh. Wait, what?”

“I am in love with you.” His voice dropped to a tremor. “Always have been. That’s . . . that’s what I was trying, in my terrible, awkward, sucky way, to say to you. What I’ve been trying to say to you. What I should have said sooner.”

The words poured over her. She should be happy—so happy. This was what she wanted to hear. But the way he was saying it, with such sadness in his voice . . .

“But why didn’t you just say it?”

“I kept wanting to . . .”

“You did?”

He nodded, sheepishly. “Of course, but with everything that happened . . . it just seemed wrong.”

She swallowed hard. “I may have found the answer. It’s going to be okay, Boyd. It’s all going to be okay. We know what happened now.”

He let out a whimper, but tried to smile.

“Boyd,” she whispered. She leaned toward him, unable to stop the gravity forcing her closer, like maybe his existence could stop her from cracking completely, from crumbling.

He nodded, swallowing hard.

“I want to kiss you again.” Her voice was so thin, it almost wasn’t there.

He laughed, but it was half a sob. “Me too,” he whispered.

She smiled, but fear jagged through her. “I think I love you,” she said.

Then he was crying. She hadn’t seen him cry since seventh grade, when his dad had gone on a bender, and Boyd had thought maybe he was dead. Found him on the living room carpet, facedown.

“Don’t cry,” she said.

“I love you too, Tessa.” He was smiling and crying at the same time. He interwove his fingers through hers.

“So do it,” she said quietly. “Kiss me.” She tugged him a little closer.

“Tessa,” he said, touching her face. It sent shivers through her. “What if this all falls apart? What if it ruins everything?”

Tessa shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know anything. Except what I feel right now.”

Boyd smiled. “You know what? Screw it,” he said, and leaned down toward her, and wrapped his arms around her, surrounding her in his sleepy, cozy, early-morning smell, and kissed her.

He tasted like tears—and home.

There was more to be done. She had to see Lilly.

“Wake up,” Tessa whispered, hovering over Lilly’s bed.

Lilly threw back her covers and started to scream but calmed down. “We need to talk.”

“Why are you . . .” Lilly sighed. “Never mind. I should be used to this kind of thing by now.”

Tessa was still buzzing from her break-in at the school. Still reeling, still worried she was going to be sick. But layered through it was Boyd’s kiss, lingering on her lips.

She sat down on the edge of Lilly’s bed. “Lilly, I need to tell you something serious. I’m not sure you’re going to be ready to hear it, but you need to know the truth.”

Lilly stared at her. “Okay,” she said slowly, sitting up and rubbing her eyes.

“Mr. Green. The English teacher. He and Kit were . . . a thing.”

Lilly gaped at her. “Holy fuck.”

Tessa swallowed. This was going to be difficult, but she had to get it out. She’d already done it once tonight, after all. “It was supposed to be a secret. Obviously. But I think—I think she threatened to tell, and he . . . he . . . He’s the one who killed her. He kept saying he didn’t want to hurt her, but . . . Look, we have to tell the cops. It needs to come from you. You’re the one who originally said you saw Boyd out there, and they need to know he’s innocent, and—”

“Wow.” Lilly was looking at her with an expression both of sadness and of hope. “Kit,” she said. “And Mr. Green.”

“I know, it’s hard to believe.”

Lilly shook her head. “Not that hard, though.”

For the first time, a thought occurred to Tessa. What if Kit wasn’t the only one? What if Kit wasn’t the first girl he went after, the first one he threatened. . . .

She pulled her list out of her pocket. The one she’d written down all the clues on, at the school library.

“What are you doing?”

“Laying out all the evidence. We’re going to have to report everything.”

Lilly sat up straighter, nodding. “Okay.”

Next, she pulled out the creepy note she’d received the other day, the one that had mysteriously appeared in her pocket. The one that said, This is your last warning. You’re making a mistake.

Next, she pulled out the poems—the ones she’d taken from Mr. Green’s office.

Then she pulled out the boy shorts she’d found with the Lupine tags still on.

“Wait a second,” Lilly stopped her. “Let me see those. Where did this come from?”

Tessa shrugged. “It was Kit’s. Matches the bra she had on that night . . .”

“Holy shit,” Lilly gasped. “So she’s the one who stole them, not him.”

“What?”

Lilly looked at her. “Nothing, forget it,” she said. “I just—there was this night where she was late to pick me up from Lupine. She said she had to use the bathroom, but after that night, this bra set went missing. Margaret thought I had stolen it, and I thought it was . . . Anyway, I think I might be able to get my job back now. And my boyfriend, for that matter.”

“Your . . .” Tessa looked at her. “Your what?”

Lilly blushed. “Patrick Donovan. We were hanging out a lot this fall . . . I never said anything because Kit kept telling me to stay away from him. And now . . . well, after I ran into you in the woods this weekend, after we got home, I called him. He told me the truth. That he was worried that his uncle was the one who had done something. That his uncle was the one who found Kit’s shirt. But Liam’s so weak, it didn’t really seem possible he could have done anything that bad. Patrick told his aunt, and they are going to put Liam in a home. Patrick’s been helping her out. But he . . .” Here Lilly blushed again. “I think he likes me back. I think we are going to work things out.”

But Tessa was still stuck on the shirt—the strawberry cutout shirt Patrick had been holding in his hand, like a rag. “I don’t know, Lilly, I—I guess I don’t think he did anything wrong. Not anymore. But why was Kit so against it?”

“She thought he was a drug dealer or violent or something, but she was wrong. I know him. I trust him.”

A drug dealer.

Tessa thought of the pills that had been mentioned in the autopsy report—the ones found at the site that night. “Are you absolutely sure, Lilly? That he wasn’t carrying pills or anything?”

Lilly shook her head. “The only person I know carrying pills around lately is Mel.”

Tessa went cold. “Mel? What do you mean? What kind of pills?”

Lilly shrugged. “To be honest, I don’t really know. Do you think I should be worried?”

Tessa didn’t know. She didn’t know what to think. It all felt so complicated. Mr. Green had all but confessed to her. But there were still pieces that didn’t add up.

She looked out the window, to the sky. She could make out a star or two, fading into the morning light. She knew how far that light had to travel to get here. It looked faint—hardly there at all—but in fact it was a light that was many times more powerful than the sun. It was just far.

Just far.

Or even if the star itself had burned out a million years ago . . . its light was real, anyway. Its light was still here. And it was still reaching her, even from out there in the cold, dark universe.

“Lilly, go back to sleep. I still have something I need to do.”

And amazingly, Lilly did—after crying into Tessa’s arms until they were both shaking.

Tessa tucked her back in, waited until her breathing slowed.

Lilly had mentioned a diary—her diary.

It was easy to find.

She kept it right underneath her bed.