Chapter Eleven

Someday, Daniel will wake up to birdsong and sunshine. Someday, it won’t be a pounding on the door or the incessant, shrill, beeping noise it is today. It’s still dark out. It might be early December, but waking up in the dark is still inhumane.

“Tony.” He bumps his hips back against Tony’s because, apparently, Tony slept wrapped around him like a kid with a stuffed toy.

Tony grumbles and rubs his nose against Daniel’s neck, burrowing deeper into the covers.

“Tony.” Daniel jostles Tony again, and oh, hey, that’s Tony’s erection bumping up against Daniel’s ass. That’s a nice thought. They could—

Tony shoots straight up. “Fuck,” he mutters, clawing through the covers.

An involuntary noise escapes Daniel as the cold air hits his bare skin. Fuck, they went to bed naked last night? He never does that.

He remembers stepping into the bathroom with the weight of the murder case lifted off his shoulders after telling Colette. He remembers rubbing soapy hands up and down Tony’s body, gentle and laughing. He remembers getting out of the shower with Tony, drying off, unable to stop smiling at each other, falling into the sheets. He remembers kissing until they were too tired to keep moving. At some point, they must have fallen asleep pressed close together and just…stayed like that. As a lifelong bad sleeper, Daniel is shocked at himself.

He’s also hungover.

Slowly, he sits up, rubbing at his temples as Tony rummages around their clothes on the floor to get at his phone.

“Yeah,” he croaks into it hoarsely once he’s finally managed to pick up.

In an instant, his entire demeanor changes. Tony stands up straighter; his eyes widen. “What?” he asks sharply.

Then, quietly, “Yeah, I knew.”

Finally, “I’ll be there in two hours.”

Daniel freezes, staring at him. Tony hangs up and starts grappling for his clothes.

“The police took Gianna in for questioning.” He pulls his things on roughly. He digs a T-shirt out of his backpack.

Wordlessly, Daniel slides out of bed and starts getting dressed.

They check out without breakfast, and in the elevator down to parking, Daniel silently mourns the opportunity to get to know Tony’s breakfast preferences. He’s probably a coffee drinker, and Daniel wonders if he likes it black or if he drowns it in cream and sugar. He wants to know. He’d get a coffee machine for Tony instead of the half-empty jar of instant he keeps in one of his cupboards for guests.

“Are you okay to drive?” he asks when they reach the basement. He’s not sure why it matters anymore. They’d agreed to this yesterday; he can drive perfectly well even if he’s a little hungover. Maybe Tony needs some peace and quiet. Daniel should offer. Still, it feels safer to stick to the status quo.

Tony nods.

That’s that, then.

Daniel hands him the keys, throws his things into the trunk, and slides into the passenger seat.

They drive out of the city in silence.

It’s Sunday morning, which means traffic isn’t as heinous as it usually is. Daniel doesn’t dare ask if Tony wants some music on or if he needs Google maps. Tony seems more than confident as he winds his way out of Manhattan, past Hackensack, and toward the highway. They’re past Woodbury before either of them speaks.

“She didn’t kill him.” Tony’s voice is tight.

It would be entirely out of the blue if Daniel hadn’t been thinking about it for hours..

Daniel hesitates a moment. “I didn’t say she did.”

“Were you thinking it?”

Daniel’s entire body flushes hot. He doesn’t answer.

“Because my mom told me the police showed up saying a Lobell professor told them about…about…”

Letting his head thunk against the headrest of the passenger seat, Daniel closes his eyes. “Fuck.”

“Did you?”

“No. But I told Colette.” The missing pieces are easy enough to put together. She must have called the police last night after he hung up on her or early this morning. Turns out the peace of mind brought by telling her was short-lived.

“Great.” Tony shifts, staring out the windshield stonily. “Fucking…great.”

They’re quiet again for a while, passing by signs for Walden and Wallkill and Poughkeepsie. It’s worse, this time, not only tense but accusatory.

Maybe that’s Daniel’s conscience.

New Paltz is coming up, and he can’t help himself. “The police were gonna find out eventually anyway.”

A bitter laugh bursts out of Tony. “Gee, thanks, Professor.” It sounded a lot nicer, yesterday, him calling Daniel that. “You think I haven’t been telling her that since day one?”

“I—”

“You think I haven’t been trying to get her to see that before something like this happens and our parents find out? I know I’m not as smart as you, but I’m fucking trying!”

“I never said—”

“You didn’t have to. I know I’m, like, some exciting little fling on the wrong side of the tracks for you or whatever.”

“Tony…”

“Look.” Tony speaks with an air of finality, as though all of this is a foregone conclusion and not the first time Daniel’s ever considered he might feel like this. “I was fine with that. I thought I’d get what I could take, but I didn’t realize you thought this was some James Bond bullshit where you were trying to catch my baby sister red-handed or something.”

“And how sure are you she’s so innocent?” Daniel snaps. “She was hanging out with the only student on campus who’s trying to get access to the fucking corpse.”

Tony jerks the car onto the turnoff for Kingston. “Why the fuck didn’t you tell me that? Am I that untrustworthy? Just because I fix cars for a living doesn’t mean I don’t understand how bad this is.”

Daniel opens his mouth to answer, but there’s nothing he can think to say.

When they reach the d’Angelos’ house, Tony all but jumps out of the driver’s seat, sprints to the front door, and slams it behind him.

Daniel gets out slowly and walks around the car to the driver’s side. He wonders if he should stay, if he should try to talk this out.

The front door is open now. Over Tony’s shoulder, Daniel can make out his mom’s tear-streaked face. He hears Tony saying, “I’m sorry, Ma,” over and over again as he hugs her tight.

He gets into the car and starts the ignition.

He’ll only be in the way here.

It would probably be healthy to bury himself in work or get some exercise. His workout schedule—by which he means his biweekly guilt-induced jog—has suffered under the stress of the last few weeks. Instead, once he’s home, Daniel turns on the local TV news station and watches obsessively, waiting for any report on Tony’s family.

There is none, of course. It’s an ongoing investigation, and it’s not like the police will go to the news stations out of nowhere. They might do it on Criminal Minds, but unlike Aaron Hotchner, Daniel’s willing to bet Detective Taylor isn’t using the media to pull a serial killer out of hiding.

He scrolls blindly through Twitter on his phone while he watches, too jittery to do something productive. Mari has posted photos of last night. In the corner of one, Daniel can see Tony’s arm.

As if alert to his state, Worf wanders around the living room aimlessly, squawking every now and again to remind Daniel he’s there.

His misery is only interrupted around two in the afternoon when a sudden crash and thundering footsteps alerts him to someone slamming a door and running up the staircase. It’s followed by a lot of yelling.

When it doesn’t stop immediately, he shuffles to the door and peeks out.

Andrew Clayfield is pounding on Colette’s door and shouting, “You set the dogs on her! Professor, you need to listen to me—”

“Andrew, that’s enough,” Daniel snaps, abruptly done with all of this.

Andrew’s face when he turns to look at Daniel is pale and drawn as if he hasn’t been sleeping. “Gianna d’Angelo is innocent!” he yells. “Gianna didn’t do anything wrong. I made sure of that. She promised it would work. Professor Ravel needs to—”

“Professor Ravel doesn’t need to do anything. You need to calm down.”

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this.” Andrew shakes his head. “Gianna—Professor Lombardi— It was…”

Abruptly, he turns on his heel and then runs back down the stairs.

When the building’s front door slams shut below, Colette opens her door.

“Thank you,” she says.

Daniel sinks onto the steps, rubbing his forehead. “At least call the police on him too.”

He listens from his seat on the steps as Colette makes the call. She describes Andrew’s special interests again because, apparently, no one followed up on that the last time she did. She explains how Andrew was pressuring Mario before his death, how this is the second time he’s accosted her. Daniel wonders how it ever got this far. How have none of his professors said anything before? His RAs? Shouldn’t there have been some intervention? Involuntarily, his mind goes to what Colette and Mario discussed that last day when everything seemed like a joke. Corpses and cannibalism. He shudders.

She promised it would work. Daniel wonders what Andrew imagined. What did Gianna promise him? What if Daniel was right all along, and Tony will end up disappointed in his sister? He’s sure, now, that Tony was never covering for her. He was only trying to help her. He was the only person trying to help her, given that Mario abused her trust to flagrantly. The idea that, after all that, Daniel was right and Gianna is the killer is grotesque and heinous. Far from being a comfort that Daniel torpedoed his best chance at a relationship in years over a real concern, just the thought of what it would do to Tony makes him want to scream.

After she’s done with her phone call, Colette comes out of her apartment, climbs up the stairs, and sits next to him. “I got you in trouble with your friend, didn’t I?”

He nods wordlessly, leaning against her.

She strokes a hand up and down his back.

“I think I got myself in more trouble,” he admits.

They sit there for quite a while before she tells him, “I think I was wrong about Mario.”

“Want to order pizza and get drunk?”

Colette nods. “I think…” She sighs heavily. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think we should invite Stacy.”

That gets a little smile tugging at his lips. “You feel that guilty?”

“The detective visited her three separate times this week. She deserves to know what we do.”

With a groan, Daniel gets to his feet. “Tell you what. We’ll do penance together. You invite Stacy, and I’ll make a much worse phone call. Meet here in ten?”

“Put some wine in the fridge.” She disappears into her apartment.

Daniel swallows, takes a fortifying breath, and unlocks his phone.

There are no messages from Tony, which is a given. Instead, he calls his mom.

She answers immediately. “Danny? Is everything all right?”

He closes his eyes and lets the guilt consume him. “Yeah, Mom. Everything’s okay. I just wanted to say hi.”

“I’m so glad. I’ve been worried about you.”

“I should have called earlier.”

“That’s okay, honey.” He can picture her as she talks, wandering around the kitchen because she can never keep still when she’s on the phone, wiping down counters one-handed.

“It’s not okay. I’m sorry I left so suddenly, and I’m sorry I didn’t call you earlier. And I’m sorry I don’t come home as much as you’d like.”

There’s a huff of static as she exhales loudly into the receiver, a huff of a laugh. “It’s not your home anymore, is it?”

“No. I guess not.”

He wonders if he should say more about it, apologize for not being clearer, or apologize for having found a home away from her. But she doesn’t let him.

“How’s your student doing? Is she all right?”

“She’s still in the hospital.” He then gives her a rundown of the case so far. He’s not sure why she cares or what she gets out of it, but she listens and hums appreciatively. Exactly like he did with Tony, he underestimated the power of his own silence to hurt people. If he’d talked to her more from the get-go, she wouldn’t have worried. If he hadn’t let himself get so caught up in his own brain and his hermetically sealed-off life, he could have had this with her all along.

He asks how she’s doing and about his dad, which is how he learns his dad has started work as a senior union rep in his retirement, and his mom has joined a book club. She’s reading Junot Diaz this week. He remembers the book from his undergrad years, and they chat for a while about how Diaz uses footnotes.

“Oh, I’ve missed talking to you about your work,” she says as they wind down.

It catches him so far on the wrong foot that he blurts out, “Really?”

She laughs. “Yeah, we used to talk books all the time when you were still in school, remember?”

“It wasn’t my work then.”

“But you always had a talent for it. I loved reading your essays. I knew you would do great in college.”

He swallows around nothing. “Just like you.”

“Aw, don’t flatter me.” She laughs.

“I would really love it if you came and visited some time.” It’s awkward and apropos of nothing, except that he’s been wishing it for years.

“I would love that too. How about we talk about it next week?”

“Yeah. I’ll call you.”

He feels wrung out once he’s hung up, as though he said everything he needed to and, at the same time, didn’t even scratch the surface.

For a moment, he considers using the momentum to reach out to Tony, but once he’s opened his messenger app, he realizes he has no clue what to write.

Instead, he calls up Village Pizza and orders more food than three people should eat. Then, he pours himself a glass of room-temperature white wine and puts the rest of the bottle in the fridge.

Colette was right. Stacy is subdued when she and Colette come in ten minutes later. She gives Daniel a long hug as a greeting. Even her hair seems less bouncy than usual.

“I’m so glad you invited me,” Stacy groans. “This has been…the longest week.”

“I heard you’ve been hearing a lot from the police,” Daniel agrees into the top of her head. She’s so short for so much personality.

“Yeah,” she sighs as she falls into place on his couch. “I know they’re doing their best, but between them and all the outrage on campus, I haven’t done anything this week that’s actually in my job description.”

“Same.” Daniel hands her a glass and the bottle he unearthed on his pantry shelf. “Here, drink this.” The wine isn’t chilled, but it will do.

Over probably more pizza than any of them were intending on eating, Colette and Daniel fill her in on Gianna.

“Oh, no,” Stacy gasps. “His sister? Daniel, aren’t you and he…”

Daniel’s laugh sounds more unhinged than he’s willing to admit. “Yeah, probably not anymore.”

“I’m sorry.” Colette is earnest and honestly apologetic, neither of which Daniel deserves.

He shakes his head. “It’s my own fault. Should have talked to him about it sooner. Or at all.” He still wishes she hadn’t called the police without telling him. It might have given him a fighting chance to do something about it, but the more time eclipses since Tony ran out of his car, the more Daniel realizes he was a massive dick.

“You guys.” If Stacy weren’t a half glass of wine deep and a little whiny, she would sound almost as stern as her dean-of-the-department persona. “Sorry. I mean guys and gals and everything else— It’s no one’s fault. It’s Mario’s fault.”

Colette, usually a dignified eater, shoves half a pizza slice in her mouth.

Daniel swigs his wine. Tony, at least, is definitely his fault.

“I think none of us would like to speak ill of the dead.” Colette’s tone is very carefully crafted to be noncommittal.

“Yep,” Daniel agrees.

“I also think,” she continues, “that it is becoming very hard not to.”

“Yep.”

They all drink again.

“I can’t believe no one knew,” Stacy says.

“The students knew,” Daniel points out.

Colette shakes her head. “Only the ones he was sleeping with.”

Daniel snaps his fingers. “No! Andrew knew, didn’t he? He was raving about Gianna when he was here.”

Stacy inhales sharply. “Andrew?”

“Andrew Clayfield. Remember, the one with the unfortunate…obsession with death?”

“Oh, I know.” Stacy’s mouth is a thin, grim line. “I just got an email about him resisting arrest. They’ve declared his entire floor in Norridge House a crime scene. Residence Life and Housing had to force juniors and seniors to double up for the next week.”

There are two options here, Daniel realizes. Maybe it’s the glass of wine on top of last night’s hangover and the lack of sleep making him delirious, but he’s tired of being in the dark.

“Okay,” he tells them. “I know tomorrow is a workday, but hear me out.”

Colette raises an eyebrow.

“Either…” Daniel draws the word out, aware he’s about to suggest something very stupid. “…we drink both bottles I have left in the fridge and call in sick tomorrow. Or we sneak on campus and find out what’s in his room.”

Daniel is pretty sure Stacy will nix this idea. It’s why he said it, the hope that common sense will prevail. And she does start strong.

“We couldn’t,” she gasps.

Daniel shrugs. “Probably not.”

Colette says nothing, but she leans in, eyebrows raised.

“Unless…” Stacy trails off. “This would be very silly of us; you do know that.”

“We know,” Daniel assures her. Silly is not the word he’d have chosen, but he’ll take it. Convincing Stacy feels like being allowed a sip of wine at dinner as a teenager.

In the end, they’re all academics out of curiosity and a passion for learning. Apparently, that includes learning about violent crime.

They wait a few hours until it’s past anything like reasonable working hours, even for the police. Stacy drives them to campus in her mom van, chattering nervously all the while.

“We’re really lucky we have the car tonight, you know. My husband usually needs it in the evenings. He teaches night classes sometimes, but his knee’s been acting up. What if we get caught though? What if— The police were already sniffing around Colette, weren’t they?”

“Then I suppose I will find a lawyer.” Colette doesn’t mention that now she’s gotten the police to go after Andrew and Gianna, they’re probably leaving her alone. Daniel doesn’t either, mostly because he doesn’t have the emotional energy to risk another friendship today. Especially given that he agrees Andrew and Gianna are both far more suspicious than Colette.

“You’re an administrator, not just a professor, Stacy,” Daniel argues. “You can always claim it’s part of your job to make sure students are sticking to the rules.”

“That’s a good idea.” Colette nods. “You could even tell RL and H you’re stopping by to give them a break.”

“That is such a good idea,” Stacy enthuses. “Here, call Amanda on my phone and put her on speaker.”

Daniel does, and then proceeds to witness the most awkward phone call in the history of the phone. Alexander Graham Bell was probably smoother than Stacy.

“Hi, Amanda.” She laughs nervously. “How are you holding up?”

“Oh my god, Stace, it’s insanity over here.” Amanda Polk, the head of Residence Life and Housing and a lovely person, does not get paid enough for this shit.

“Is it that bad?” Stacy has such a big fake grin Daniel practically hears her gritted teeth.

There’s some rustling on the other end of the line, the sound of other voices. “Um, yeah,” Amanda says. “We have to find sleeping arrangements for twenty students, and they’re not even allowed back into their rooms. I have no idea when we’ll get to go home for the night.”

“Aw, I’m so sorry. This is the absolute pits.”

“Yeah.” Amanda sounds confused, probably because no one has called anything “the pits” since the 1990s. “The pits. Listen, Stace. I gotta go. I’ve got five students here, claiming they forgot all the things they’ll need for the next week in the blocked-off rooms. I gotta figure out if I can let them go up and grab their stuff or—”

“Oh, no,” Stacy quickly interrupts. “I just got off the phone with Detective Taylor—did you meet her?”

“Yeah, she’s a real piece of work.”

“Um, I thought she was lovely.”

Daniel wants to bang his head against the dashboard.

It must show on his face because Stacy quickly continues with, “Anyway, she said we’ve gotta keep the students out to keep any crime scene photos off social media and whatnot. I’m driving over right now. Have the students make me a list, and I’ll go through their rooms with staff and get their things. That will free you up to find rooms and get yourself home for the night, yeah?”

It’s such a blatantly false story Daniel is absolutely sure they’re about to get busted. But Amanda must either be too stressed to think or have so much faith in Stacy’s character that she can’t imagine a world where Stacy would be anything less than honest and helpful.

“Oh my god, you’re my hero! I’ll hook you up with the master key. Let me know when you’re here!”

Stacy is shaking when Daniel hangs up the phone. “I lied to her. I lied to her. If she talks to the detective…oh my god, we’re so screwed.”

“It didn’t sound like she wants to spend any more time talking to the detective than she needs to,” Daniel points out. “We’ll be fine. And she’s giving us the master key. That’s perfect.”

“Except we will actually need to collect the belongings of five students,” Colette points out.

Daniel shrugs. “Small price to pay for not doing something illegal.”

Stacy’s laugh is high and nervous. “I think this is still pretty illegal.”

Daniel looks over his shoulder to Colette in the back seat. They’re going to have to keep an eye out to make sure Stacy doesn’t instantly blab about this escapade to the detective. She’s a great administrator and a very bad liar, and probably a much better person than Daniel.

She wouldn’t have not talked to a guy she was seeing about the possibility that his sister might have murdered someone.

She probably would never have had that thought about Gianna in the first place, and she’d have talked to both of them about it as a matter of course.

There is probably something clinically wrong with Daniel that he didn’t do those things, but at least he has something to distract himself with—namely, breaking into an active crime scene.

Amanda is so overwhelmed she presses the master key and lists of things to grab from each student’s room into Stacy’s hand and turns right back to the incessantly ringing phone. Her expression says it all. Ever since news about Mario’s death reached the student body, there have been a lot of calls from concerned parents. Now, there are probably a lot of calls from concerned and enraged parents. Lobell is not exactly an easily affordable school, and one of the few amenities is the guarantee of single rooms for juniors and seniors.

The problem about privately run colleges, according to Amanda, is that parents are super entitled. Alternatively, according to Daniel, the problem is they pay ten thousand dollars a semester and, in exchange, expect their kids to have reliable room and board and also for there not to be murderers among the student body. In his book, higher education shouldn’t be a service you buy, but that’s a battle he can’t win unless he moves to Europe, and Amanda wouldn’t care either way, especially not now. Anyhow, he’s pretty sure he, Amanda, and the parents can all agree about murderers being a net bad for the student body.

Norridge House is deserted. Technically, only the second floor is a crime scene, but if Daniel were a student living here, he’d probably find somewhere else to sleep for the night too. It’s spooky, all quiet and dark.

They get the students’ things first, collecting pajamas and textbooks in tote bags one room at a time. By unspoken agreement, they don’t split up.

“Man, I do not miss living in a dorm.” Daniel inspects the Tibetan prayer flags adorning Susannah Lewis’s window. The whole room is narrow and messy, with barely enough shelving space for her philosophy readings, still bearing the college bookstore’s stickers on the spine.

Colette shakes her head. “Another American failure to provide for the next generation. Students ought to learn what it means to live in a space that is truly their own, to take care of it, and to provide for themselves.”

“That seems a little harsh.” Stacy shoves Susannah’s little stuffed hippo into the bag along with her laptop. It’s not on Susannah’s list, but she’ll probably appreciate it. “I loved living in the dorms. It was like having a sleepover every night.”

“It had its moments,” Daniel agrees. “And it was definitely easier than renting when I was eighteen. But I would not want to live there ever again.”

For a moment, Colette looks like she’s going to fight them on it, but she takes a deep breath and relents. “I would not want to live in my first flat again either. The smoke detector was right outside the bathroom. It went off every time you showered for too long.”

They trade mundane horror stories as they make their way through the floor—from Stacy’s freshman year roommate with sleep apnea to the time Daniel got home and his roommate had accidentally exploded a jar of tomato paste across the entire kitchen and then neglected to clean it up, and Daniel freaked out, thinking it was blood.

It keeps them from thinking too hard about the room on the middle of the left side of the corridor.

Each student has a board on their door where they can write their name and leave one another messages. Susannah drew flowers all around her name, and Joaquin wrote his name in bubble letters. Underneath, someone’s asked him to keep the music down. Steve’s has a TikTok handle scrawled on it and a request to follow him.

Andrew’s board is blank.

When the last bag for the last student is full, they set them all down by the stairwell.

Stacy draws a deep breath and, armed with the master key, walks up to Andrew’s room.

Then, she pauses. “What about fingerprints?”

“I have gloves in my pocket.” Daniel been carrying them around ever since his lunch date with Tony by the Hudson, when he wished he was better prepared for the weather so they could stay in that moment for longer.

He doesn’t need to keep carrying them now.

Except for break-ins, apparently.

Stacy hands him the key.

It takes a moment, struggling through putting on his slightly-too-tight gloves and fiddling with the key, but then the door slides open, and Daniel’s breath comes out of his lungs in quick pants.

They haven’t even done anything.

“We probably shouldn’t turn on the light,” he says, more to himself than them. “So no one sees from outside.”

“Here.” Colette turns on her phone’s flashlight, aiming it low so it won’t be seen out the windows.

The room reveals itself to them in pieces, first the dusty floor, the tightly shut closet, the unmade bed. The desk is a mess, all strewn about papers, syllabi, and cramped notes on loose pages of yellow notepad paper. There are at least three different post-its that read “email report!” in scratchy handwriting. Daniel is willing to bet there’s a professor somewhere on campus missing a report. They probably just flunked him instead of reaching out.

It smells like mildew and something worse, thick and cloying.

And there, in the corner, almost entirely invisible in the dark, a photo is propped up against the wall. It’s a printout of a blurry cell phone image, taken from outside the film studies center. On it, Mario Lombardi is pressing someone up against the window of his office. Her face is turned away from the camera, but Daniel recognizes her thick, dyed-dark hair.

In front of the photo sits the source of the room’s smell. There are two bowls set before the picture, both stolen from the cafeteria. One is filled with moldy slices of toast, the other with a dark liquid.

It would be sad, it would be utterly pathetic and disgusting, except on the floor in front of the bowls, Andrew has carved words right into the linoleum in scratchy, unsteady lines: I will eat your sins.