Page 33

TWENTY-SEVEN

It’s been a long night.

Some people, my own mother included, assume that because someone is writing down orders and carrying out steaming entrées with extra sides of ranch dressing, that service workers deserve less respect than people with real jobs.

In reality, I’ve worked harder as a waitress than I have any other job in my life.

You stack responsibilities in your head, making sure the needs of each and every customer are met.

You learn how to read people, distinguish between the tables that want every need catered to and the ones who only want to be left alone.

And after a full night of running around, fighting what feels like a losing battle, you’re tasked with mandatory upkeep.

Tonight, that meant I was set to scrubbing the bathroom toilets and sinks.

My body aches with exhaustion, my clothes tinged with the unwelcome smells of frying grease and bleach.

At least a hectic work shift meant I didn’t have time to think about the other issues in my life.

I don’t think about Layla or the Maidens or the possibility of a killer on the loose until I’ve walked several blocks away from the restaurant.

In an instant, I remember, and from that moment on, I spy every roaming shadow and passing pedestrian with skepticism and fear.

When I walk inside my apartment and click the lock behind me, I lean against the closed door and exhale a sigh of relief. I’m home. I’m safe. Images of myself sleeping in until noon comfort me.

“You’re home late,” Crystal says.

I open my eyes and see her sitting at the dining-room table. A steaming teacup sits to her right, and she’s facing the entrance of the apartment, as though she’s been waiting on me.

Shit , I think. Because of our conflicting schedules, we’re often like ships passing in the night.

It’s easy to forget I even have a roommate, mainly because for so many years, I haven’t.

We haven’t come face to face since I caught her snooping through my computer, right before I left for Banyon’s Bridge.

“It was a busy night,” I say, hoping she’ll take pity on me and let me go to bed.

“We need to talk,” she says. No such luck.

I slump into the chair across from her and lean back, waiting.

“Are you wanting to apologize for invading my privacy?” I ask.

Crystal lowers her head, hits me with an unbothered look. Easy pettiness flows between us, the way it only can after years upon years of knowing another person.

“Do you think I should apologize?”

“Well, I’ve been kind enough to let you stay here.” My tone is pompous, nothing like how I normally speak. “You know I’m protective of my writing.”

“And now I see why,” she says. “You’re writing a story about Layla of all people. How could you do that?”

“I’m not writing a story about Layla?—”

“You used her name!” Crystal shouts. “All those details. The bar and the walk home and him .” She shakes her head, disgusted. “Why would you do something like that?”

I exhale, trying to think of a way to explain myself.

In the ten years since our friend’s death, I can count on one hand the times Crystal and I have talked about her.

We’ve both found it easier to not bring it up.

Bring her up. I’m just as ashamed of myself, but I can’t let her know that.

After years of knowing Crystal, it’s never a good idea to let her think she has the upper hand in a conversation, even when she does.

“I’ve been struggling with writer’s block,” I say.

“For weeks, I haven’t been able to write about anything.

The other night I had a nightmare about Layla.

I couldn’t get her off my mind. So, I wrote a story about what happened.

I never had any intention of publishing it.

It was just my mind’s way of getting those thoughts out of my head. ”

Crystal nods, as though understanding what I’ve said, but her simmering anger remains. “It was upsetting having to relive those details, especially knowing you wrote them.”

“You didn’t have to do anything,” I say. “You’re the one who chose to go through my computer.”

“I wasn’t snooping, okay? The screen was on, and the story was pulled up. I was curious. You always talk about what you’re writing, but I’ve never really had a look. The last thing I was expecting was to read a story about Layla.”

“It’s never happened before.” I say the next part with finality. “And it will never happen again.”

“Did your friends from your writing group read that story?”

“They did.”

Crystal clenches her jaw and looks away. “Layla deserves more than to be entertainment for some murder-obsessed freaks.”

“It’s not entertainment for any of us. I already told you; it was my own way of working out what I was feeling. None of them know that story was based on a real event.”

But at least one of them does. Two, if you’re counting Marley. The person who is toying with me and left that newspaper article at Banyon’s Bridge knows the truth of what happened ten years ago.

“The anniversary is coming up, you know,” Crystal says. She’s looking down at the table trying not to cry. “I’ve been thinking about her more and more lately.”

“I have too,” I admit, recalling the recent string of phone calls from my mother. She wants to remind me of what happened, when all I want to do is forget. “Writing that story was like therapy more than anything. I’d never use what happened to Layla for personal gain.”

Crystal nods, slowly. I sense she believes me now.

Even though we don’t talk about that night, I believe the details live in her head just as vividly as they do mine.

I believe she carries the same blame that I do.

If she hadn’t been so drunk, we would never have left her in the first place.

Although, what I did was worse. I knew Mike was dangerous, but I left her behind anyway.

I move to the kitchen, grabbing a glass from the cabinet and filling it with tap water.

I lean against the counter, drinking furiously, overtaken with a sudden need to rehydrate and cleanse myself from the inside out.

In the corner of the kitchen sits a bouquet of flowers in a vase.

A seasonal selection. Reds and greens and small white clouds of baby’s breath.

“You bought flowers?”

“No, someone sent them,” Crystal says, not even raising her head. “I’m sure they’re from Thomas.”

“He’s still trying to get you back?”

With everything that’s been happening, I almost forgot why Crystal is here. Her engagement fell apart, her wedding called off. Night after night, I’ve watched her go out on the town, envious of her ability to move on from what happened to Layla. I forget not everything has been easy on her.

I move closer to the flowers, touching them, the petals soft like velvet, the floral scent fresh and alive, at odds with everything else inside this apartment. In the center of the arrangement, rests a card. I step back so fast, I almost send the entire bouquet crashing to the ground.

“You don’t know for sure?” My voice is high-pitched and painful.

“There wasn’t a name.” She looks at me now. “Why?”

I return to the bouquet, plucking out the card. There’s only one word: Remember . Beside it, is a black heart.

“Have you ever seen one of these before?” I ask, holding out the card.

“A florist’s note?”

“No. The symbol on it,” I say, annoyed. “The black heart.”

“I guess. I mean, it’s not really that special, is it?”

But it is, at least to me. And could be, to her. For the past decade, I’ve been receiving these warnings and threats. I’ve always known they must be tied back to Layla, but I never imagined that Crystal had been receiving them, too.

“Ever since Layla died,” I begin, my voice struggling to find strength, “these weird things have been happening. I keep getting these messages, and they always have a black heart on them. Just like Layla’s tattoo.

They’ve shown up at my mother’s house, where I work, in my ex-boyfriend’s car.

Even here, at this apartment. I need to know, have you been getting them, too? ”

Crystal sits, lifting her chin just enough to let me know she’s thinking, retreating far enough to try and find an answer.

“Now that you mention it, I have received messages like that before. I’m trying to remember?—”

“How couldn’t you know?” I shout, outraged. “Someone might have been stalking you for the past decade, and you’ve never really thought about it?”

“You’re making it out to be more than it is. Like it’s some kind of threat.”

“It is a threat.”

“It’s a piece of paper. Someone messing with me. And with you, it seems. But that’s all it is. No one is actually doing anything.”

“That’s not true,” I say. “At least not anymore. Last week, someone slashed my tires and left a black heart beside my car. And remember that hit-and-run on our street? One was found there, too.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I thought it was only happening to me. But it makes sense. If this is about Layla, of course they’d be after you, too. We were both there that night.”

“No one is after me,” she says. “Someone might have been sending me messages, but that’s all it is. You can’t make them into something more.”

Her last comment bothers me. Is she suggesting I’m at fault for everything that’s happened? I’ve lost my job, my relationships, all because of the black hearts. Could it be they have ruined my life all these years because I gave them the power?

“Try to think,” I say, changing the subject. “Even one instance.”

“When I moved into my apartment with Thomas, there was one on our front door. I remember it clearly because the whole place was cleared out and then there was this random piece of paper, but I wadded it up and threw it away. I didn’t think anything about it.”

Our reactions to the same threat are jarring, really. While I’ve spent years in isolation, looking over my shoulder for the next black heart, she didn’t give the messages a second thought, didn’t even stop to consider their significance.

“I’ve been getting these since right after she died. The weekend I moved back home, in fact. I’ve been trying to figure out who it is, and this is the closest I’ve ever been.”

“I can tell you who it is.”

“Who?”

“Her parents. They’re the only ones who held her death against us.”

She’s right. The article that was left for me at the bridge was an abridged version of the saga that took place with Layla’s parents. They blamed us for her death, kept saying they’d trusted us to keep their daughter safe. Her real friends back home would never have left her alone.

“You really think they could be behind this?”

“Of course, they could. They tried to sue us, remember? They wanted to ruin our futures. At the time, I felt sorry for them. They’d lost their only daughter, but they let that grief turn into something menacing. Unhinged.”

“I’ve barely thought about them since the case was dropped.

” And, honestly, I never considered they’d be capable of stalking me.

They were so overwhelmed with grief. I remember hearing they went into early retirement, found it too difficult to leave their home, let alone follow me around town leaving messages.

The death of their only daughter ruined them.

“Maybe that’s the point.” She walks over to me, and lifts the card, reading it. “Remember.”

“They never forgave us for what happened,” I say, thinking.

If Layla’s parents have been sending the black hearts all these years, how would they have access to the stories from the group?

And how could they be linked to the murders Marley has uncovered?

It suddenly feels like there are too many crimes I’m trying to solve at once.

Maybe the same person who has been stalking me for the past decade is not the same person copying crimes from the stories.

Maybe one of the members from the group has crossed paths with Layla’s parents, and now they’re working together.

Trying to unravel these endless possibilities makes my head hurt.

I worry how much more of this I can take.

“It’s just not fair, is it? Layla had so much to offer the world. More than either one of us, if we’re being honest,” she says, wiping her nose. “Why is it always the good ones that get taken away?”

I wonder if she’s aware of Jessica Wilder’s murder last week. If she is, she hasn’t said anything about it. Maybe she read about it in the papers, and that’s why she is so emotional now.

“I’m not sure if you saw, but there was a girl who was killed?—”

“I don’t want to hear about it.” Crystal raises her hand, hardens her voice.

“I’m not like you, okay? Writing messed up stories and reading the news doesn’t help me cope with my feelings.

I try to ignore it. I want to ignore it.

I need to believe I live in a world of rainbows and butterflies, even if that’s bullshit. ”

I close into myself. It’s easy for me to brush off Crystal as materialistic, but maybe she’s unlocked the secret to moving past tragedy.

Living in the moment prevents her from being consumed by the past, and though I’m reluctant to admit it, she’s accomplished much more in the past ten years than I have, even if there have been some missteps, like with Chase.

She has a thriving career and social life.

Breaking off the engagement with Thomas was a setback, but she seems to be bouncing back effortlessly.

Then there’s me, wallowing in my own self-pity.

“Are we going to be able to move past this story?” I ask her. “I didn’t write it to hurt you or anyone else.”

Her posture softens. “Of course, we will. You’re, like, my oldest friend.”

“I’m sorry it upset you,” I say. “That was never my intention.”

An hour later, when I’m in bed, trying to fall asleep, I wonder, what was my intention writing that story? And what chain of events might I have unknowingly put into action? I’m starting to lose track of how many people have been harmed since I first wrote The Mistake .

One thing is clear: there are two new names on the Black Hearts Stalker suspect list.

Charles and Lena Williams.