Good Morning, Killer - April Smith [10]
Andrew, as if we hadn’t heard this already from Mr. Meyer-Murphy: “How in hell do you make a car out of paper?”
“It’s stupid,” Stephanie replied. “The teacher gives you the answer.”
“What about Juliana?”
“She just never showed up.”
“Where were you supposed to meet?”
“At the bus stop.”
“What did you do when she didn’t arrive?”
“Called her cell. Got a recording, so I figured, whatever.”
“You called her from where?”
“A pay phone.”
“You sure?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You could show us which one?”
“If I could remember.”
Her cheeks were hot. She knew I would check it out.
Ethan was fidgeting with a silver chain that went from his belt loop to his wallet. He began flipping the wallet open and shut.
“What’s this?” asked Andrew, holding up a small black cone.
“Incense.”
“What’s wrong with incense?” demanded the boy.
“Watch out,” I told him, “or you’ll grow up to be a lawyer.”
“My dad already is a lawyer.”
Andrew nodded sagely and took his time replacing the incense on the little china plate. The boy’s eyes followed.
“What do you think happened to Juliana?” Stephanie was anxiously hooking the hair behind her ears with both hands now.
“We’re working on some theories. Tell me what it’s like at Laurel West.”
She shrugged. “A lot of people think it’s cold, but it’s really a good school. The teachers really care.”
“A lot of homework?”
They nodded in unison.
“Lots of pressure?”
“If you’re motivated, you’ll make it there.”
“And you’re motivated?”
“I want to get into a good college.”
“What about Juliana? Was she motivated?”
Ethan, carelessly: “She tried too hard.”
“Like how?”
“With the other kids.” He was suddenly uneasy. “I don’t know.”
“She’d invite you for a sleepover,” Stephanie jumped in, “and if you couldn’t come, she’d like keep on asking. Incessantly.”
“She could be a pest?”
“She didn’t mean to be. She was just—”
Andrew: “Out of it.”
“Kind of, socially … I don’t know. I don’t want to say retarded.”
I was becoming more and more impressed by the way Stephanie reached out.
“We were on swim team together. She tried to be friends with the wrong people, and it just didn’t work.”
“She was playing the violin?” said Ethan. “And the bridge just flew off.”
They chuckled.
“Once, she couldn’t even get the case open. I felt sorry for her.”
Stephanie was holding something in her hands, a contraption made of lined paper and fasteners and rubber bands.
It is not unusual for people to give themselves away unconsciously. Once I interviewed a suspect who was wearing a white gold chain he had taken from a drug dealer he had just stabbed to death.
“What is that?” said Andrew. “Is that the car? Can I see?”
“Sure. It had to really work.”
Andrew twisted a paper clip, which torqued the rubber band up tight. He put the thing down, and it scurried across the red maple floor like a beetle.
“Cool.”
He had to retrieve it from under my chair.
“And what does that say right there? Looks like ‘Stephanie Kent and Juliana Meyer-Murphy’ and—what else? Help me out, I don’t have my glasses.”
He handed the car back to Stephanie.
And forced her to read the date she had written on the wheel, a date that was two weeks before.
“Is that the day you turned the project in? Two weeks ago? So you and Juliana weren’t working on it yesterday, were you?”
“We had other homework.”
“But why did you tell us, first thing, when we walked in here, that you and Juliana were getting together to make a paper car?”
Andrew and I seemed morbid and heavy with our serious questions and oversized adultness in that fluffy room. I wanted to go home and throw on a pair of jeans.
“Why did you say that, Stephanie?”
Stephanie’s creamy complexion turned pink. All at once.
“I don’t know—”
“Don’t trip,” Ethan warned.
I stood up. My back was stiff from wearing heels all day. “I think we’d better get your mom in on this.”
“No. You don’t have to.”
“When are you going to tell us the truth?”
Stephanie said nothing, trembling lips compressed. Her fingers held the denim coverlet, trying