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“You make it sound like you were raised in the Arctic Circle,” Parker chides.
“Might as well have been. I hate the cold.”
“You should have moved to Florida, then.”
“Or Aruba,” Tee says dreamily.
“Juilliard is in neither of those places,” I point out.
Tee’s scholarship was what brought her and, as a result,meto the States in the first place. Tee's a virtuoso. A walking oboe-wielding genius.
I'm not. I'm me.
“One day, when I have a record deal, Aruba’s where I’ll live,” is my sister from another mister’s vow.
“Okay, so Tee hates the cold but what about you, Zee? Why do you hate going home?”
I let loose a deep sigh. “Nothing’s been the same since I got accused of being an arsonist and a serial killer.”
For a second, silence greets my words.
Then, Parker starts chuckling.
It morphs into outright laughter.
Evolves into wheezing.
Turns into thigh-slapping, choking barks of amusement that are somehow louder than ever over the airwaves.
“Parker!” Tee reprimands as she pats me on the shoulder, but it’s cold comfort.
“You’re not being serious.You?! A-A-A serial k-killer?”
“Why would I lie about that?”
“Ms. ‘Goody Two-Shoes’ Zee?” She breaks down into more laughter.
“If you don’t stop, I’m going to drive to Coshocton so I can slap some sense into you!”
“So, you’re a mass murderer, Ms. ‘Jaywalking should be a capital offense.’ Ms. ‘It’s illegal to return a library book late.’” She hoots. “You’re so good, it’s painful, Zee. How areyousupposed to be a psychopath? I’m not sure how you work as a paralegal for an attorney who makes it her mission to get criminals off on legal loopholes!Zee, ha.”
“Well, the good folks of Pigeon Creek don’t have as high an opinion of me as you do,” I snipe, tone bitter with the pain that lingers from their accusations.
It’s always stung that the people who’ve known me my whole life could think I was capable of something so heinous.
That one night has shaped me in ways I can’t begin to unwrap. Being a Ms. Goody Two-Shoes is one example of cause and effect.That whole nightmare taught me that good peoplecango to jail unless someone speaks out for them… which is why I became a paralegal. It’s also why I work for someone who screws with the law for shits and giggles.
“She can’t be for real, Tee?”
My best friend of twenty-four years clears her throat. “She’s not lying, Parker. The whole thing’s pretty nuts. She’d lost her parents and then her brother was announced PKIA?1. The fire was classed as her having ‘an episode.’
“You okay, honey?” Tee asks.
“Been better.”
Parker’s silence is all the more shocking for her amusement of before. “But this isZee.”
“She was only sixteen.” Tee hugs me harder. “And the stables that burned down were like… You know the Ewings?”