Dead Girls Don't Lie Read online

  “Three days sounds about right.”

  That’s it, no first-offense warning, no leniency because my best friend is dead. It isn’t fair and he knows it. He’s just keeping the phone in case “E” texts me again.

  I’m afraid he will.

  “Have you eaten lunch yet?” Dad steps out of the way so I can come inside, but I don’t move. I’m already feeling sick because of what Dad might see, but it gets worse as a breeze picks up a horribly familiar smell.

  Everything inside of me goes in reverse. I run to the bathroom and throw up.

  Dad follows me but stays outside the bathroom door, like he’s not sure what to do.

  The smell is even stronger here.

  I keep vomiting until there’s nothing left in my stomach, but my body still wants to throw up. I lean over the toilet, my shoulders shaking with dry heaves, but nothing more comes. It’s like my body is trying to empty out everything inside: tortillas and lake water, Rachel’s text and her murder, and a long-buried memory of a place we never should have been.

  “What is that smell?” I choke out as I lean over and try to throw up again.

  Dad steps into the bathroom, reaches across the tub, and shuts the window. Then he turns on the fan. The paint smell dissipates, but I can still smell it, and taste it, and feel it clinging to my hands.

  “I’m sorry. I was painting the patio furniture. I didn’t think … you really are sick.”

  “I told you I was.” I say it because I want him to believe me and feel sorry for me, but I wasn’t sick, not until I smelled the paint. The smell of spray paint has made me nauseated since the night I saw the symbol on the wall at the old house, but it’s never been this bad.

  “I’m sorry, honey.” His voice is quiet and gentle, but I can still hear fear in it. “Are you okay?”

  I can only shake my head. I reach for the toilet handle and close my eyes as everything I ate swirls down the pipes.

  I stand up shakily and rinse my mouth out in the sink, then I wash my hands over and over again, even though the stains are only in my memory. When I look in the mirror I’m surprised to see tears running down my cheeks.

  Dad turns off the sink and pulls me into his arms. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay.” He’s lying, just like Eduardo at the lake. “Let it all out.”

  But there’s too much inside me that I can’t let out. And it will never be okay again.

  I pull away from him. “Maybe I should go back to bed.” I don’t wait for him to reply. I go into my bedroom, close the window, and climb into bed, burying my face in my blanket so I don’t have to smell the paint.

  Outside Dad is dragging the patio furniture to the far side of the lawn, away from my bedroom window. I feel guilty. For being mad at him about my phone. For getting sick over something stupid like paint fumes. For getting a weird message and making him worry.

  For ignoring Rachel’s calls and not answering her text.

  Maybe it’s better if Dad sees it. Maybe when he sees it he’ll realize what a horrible person I am. He’ll know that everything he taught me about doing the right thing meant nothing. He’ll know that I’m the kind of girl who’s more interested in a boy than in helping my best friend. He’ll know that it’s my fault that Rachel is dead.

  I lie in bed, waiting for him to find the text, but he doesn’t come. Eventually I fall into a semiconsciousness that might be considered a dream. I’m half-aware of what’s going on around me. Dad starts the lawnmower, and the smell of cut grass cancels out the leftover paint smell. My mind fills with shadows and memories.

  Rachel and I are in fourth grade again. We’re building our own world out of sticks and leaves in the old brick fireplace at the end of the playground. She finds a broken glass bottle buried in the leaves. She holds up the biggest piece, and her voice gets serious. “We have to swear a blood oath. We have to mix our blood together and swear that we’ll be friends forever, that we’ll always stay together and protect each other.”

  I was afraid then too. I didn’t want to cut my finger. I didn’t want to bleed. But I loved Rachel, and I would do anything for her.

  It was a little cut, a few drops of blood, but I thought I was going to pass out. We pressed our fingers together and let our blood run into each other. When our blood was sufficiently mingled we left our fingerprints on the contract, signed in blood.

  Then we got caught by the playground duty. I remember that Rachel got in more trouble than I did.

  The memory slips away as the door to my room opens; it’s Dad. “I hate to leave you, but I’m out of gas for the lawnmower. Will you be okay alone?”

  “Yeah. Sure.” I sit up. “I’m feeling better.”

  “I won’t be too long.”

  I lie in bed, listening. As soon as I hear Dad’s truck pull out of the driveway, I get up. I have to find my phone and erase Rachel’s text before Dad sees it.

  I scan the kitchen, but it isn’t on the table or on top of the fridge. I go into Dad’s office. The room is tiny but organized. On the wall behind his desk there’s a tall black filing cabinet and a bookcase that’s a mix of law books and how-to parenting and religious books. The only thing on Dad’s desk is a picture of me, a plant, and my phone. I take a deep breath, pick up my phone, and scroll back through the incoming calls, Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray, Ray, it says over and over again. How many times did she try to call me after I turned off my phone? I count them as I hit erase. She tried to call twenty-five times while I was riding around town with Skyler, twenty-five times, and then one text.

  I go to my messages. Besides the one from E, I have one from Taylor:

  SKYLER or EVAN??? I want dets!

  And one from Skyler:

  What r u doing 2night?

  I consider deleting those texts too. I’m not ready to answer questions from Dad about Skyler yet, especially not anything to do with how we got together. But maybe it would look suspicious if too many were gone. I decide to stick with the one I came to erase. My heart aches as I scroll back to Rachel’s text, maybe her last words:

  We’re in trouble. Meet me at my house NOW. Don’t tell your dad. Don’t call the police. Don’t tell anyone what you saw.

  What was she doing when she sent that text? Was she alone? Was she scared? Did she know she was going to die?

  Why didn’t I answer her?

  I sink into Dad’s big chair and trace the words again.

  Don’t tell anyone what you saw.

  She could only have meant the night we went to the old house. I close my eyes and think about the last time I brought it up. We were walking to her house after school. It was raining, and I tried to take the shortcut through the field that would take us in front of the old house. She stopped me, gripping my arm. “Let’s stay on the road.”

  I was wet and frustrated with her so I resisted. “This is faster, and I’m soaked. What are you so afraid of, anyway?”

  She looked at the house. “Nothing, it’s just … I can’t, okay? He died in that house.”

  There was something about the way she said it, different from before, like someone she knew had died there. “Who died in that house? That guy, the one they found after we—”

  “Shh.” She looked around, like she was worried someone was listening, but we were alone.

  I moved closer to her and spoke quieter, but I wasn’t going to let her avoid the question this time. “You saw him, didn’t you? That’s why you screamed, that’s why you ran down the stairs—”

  She stood there, shocked, like I had slapped her. I waited for her to deny it again, but she didn’t. Instead she turned pale and gripped my shoulders. “You can’t tell anyone.”

  And then I knew that everything I was afraid of was true: Rachel had seen the body. I remember the guilt and terror that hit me with that revelation. I had been in the same house where someone had been murdered, and I hadn’t done anything about it, I hadn’t gone to the police. I loved Rachel, and I trusted her, maybe too much. “You saw him, I know you did.
Why didn’t you tell the police?”

  Then she got angry. “They have pictures, they collected evidence, they have everything they need. Us being there or not doesn’t change what happened. If we go to them now, we’ll be in major trouble.”

  I knew she was right. We would be in trouble, more trouble than I’d ever been in before. I was suddenly furious with her. “Then why didn’t we go to the police that night? Why didn’t you tell them? Why didn’t you at least tell me?”

  She glared back at me, but she was fighting tears. “Because I knew you’d want to tell, and then the people who killed him would come after us.”

  I saw the fear in her eyes, and I felt it too. I thought about the person in the curtains. What if he had seen me? “How do you know that? Wouldn’t the police have protected us? We could have at least made an anonymous tip or something.” Even as I said it, I heard doubt in my own voice.

  Her fingers dug into my shoulders. “You didn’t see what I saw. You don’t know what they can do. No one is safe from them. The police didn’t protect him, and they can’t protect us.”

  “Who are they?”

  “Don’t ask that question. It’s better if you don’t know.” She started walking away, holding back tears.

  “Rachel.”

  “I mean it!”

  “No. It’s not that, it’s just … did you know him?”

  She shook her head but didn’t turn around. “He was just a gangbanger.” Her voice choked. “He got what he deserved. It’s not worth risking our lives to tell the police what they already know.”

  I stand up, thinking about what I should have said to her that day. My foot knocks against Dad’s recycling bin. On top is another newspaper with Rachel’s picture splashed across the front. I pick it up and read:

  Local Teen Found Shot in her Bedroom

  LAKE RIDGE—The town of Lake Ridge is still reeling after the discovery of a local girl who was found shot in her bedroom on June 16. Police are continuing to investigate the death, said Grant County Sheriff Eric Cross. “We suspect that gang violence was involved. There were gang tags found at the scene,” said Cross. “We’re still looking into it.”

  Rachel Araceli Sanchez, 16, was found by her mother, Araceli Sanchez, after returning home from work. Sanchez could not be reached for comment.

  “It’s horrible,” said Claire Rallstrom, 16. “She was, like, really amazing.”

  This is the first case of gang violence in Lake Ridge since another teenager, Manuel Romero, 17, was murdered last summer, the victim of an alleged gang retaliation.

  “At this point the two crimes do not appear to be related,” Cross said.

  After the initial investigation, according to the statement released Tuesday by the sheriff’s department, the case will be turned over to the Spokane Violent Crime Gang Enforcement Team.

  I reread the story, choking on the irony of what Claire said, since she and Rachel have hated each other forever. The words blur together: “gang violence,” “gang retaliation,” and the phrase “the two crimes do not appear to be related.” But I know they are.

  My phone vibrates, making me jump. I pick it up, a little afraid of what I might find. The message comes through slowly. It’s a video file, a forwarded message from a number I don’t recognize. I scroll back to see who sent it originally.

  It’s from Rachel.

  Chapter 7

  I stare at it in disbelief. What if they’re all lying? What if Rachel isn’t really dead? What if she needs my help? What if it’s not too late? My heart aches to believe that’s true. But I saw her lying in a coffin.

  The image is small and grainy, but it’s Rachel, sitting in her bedroom, alive. I stare at it a minute before I hit okay. As she starts to talk, pinpricks of pain find something solid in the hole in my chest.

  All hope that Rachel is still alive drains with her first words.

  “Jaycee, if you’re watching this, it either means this whole thing ended as badly as I think it will, or this is our twenty-year class reunion and we’re drinking champagne, eating expensive chocolate, and toasting the fact that we survived all of this and high school too.

  “If the second part is true, and I really hope it is, I’m going to bet that by now Claire Rallstrom has six kids, three ex-husbands, and weighs at least two hundred pounds. Taylor Brice married the richest guy she could find, divorced him, and now she has so much plastic surgery that her face will crack if she smiles.” She laughs at her own joke, but her voice sounds sad.

  “But if the first part is true, and I’m gone, I need you to know how sorry I am. I shouldn’t have taken you to the house that night. His secret was mine to keep because I loved him, not yours. I should have never let you get close enough to be involved. I was stupid, and now it’s too late for either of us to go back.”

  She pauses a second, swallows, and I hear fear in her voice when it starts up again. “I guess I should have told you everything from the beginning, but I thought it was more important for you to be safe than it was for us to be friends. I’m sorry for that. I probably would do the same thing again, but I’ve missed you so much.” Her voice cracks.

  My throat closes over with pain.

  “I’m sorry to ask you to do this, but if I’m gone, you’re the only one who can find out the truth.” She waits, like she wants to give me time to take that in.

  “I’ve learned a lot in the last ten months. Like who I can trust, and it boils down to two people, you and Eduardo. You, because you always do the right thing, and Eduardo, because he has as much to lose in this as I do. You can trust him, Jaycee: him and no one else. Not the police. Let me repeat that. Do. Not. Go. To. The. Police.”

  She looks behind her like she’s worried someone is listening. “Eduardo has a huge attitude problem. He hates this town and gringos and probably even fuzzy yellow kittens. He’s a hothead. If I left this up to him, someone else would probably end up dead.” She laughs, but I’m not sure she’s joking. “But he has a good heart. Trust him. You’ll need each other.

  “I’m sorry to dump this on you, especially now, when you’re confused and grieving the best person you’ve ever known.” She smiles her mischievous smile. “Okay, maybe not the best person you’ve ever known, but certainly in the top ten.” I can’t believe she’s making jokes about her being dead, but it’s so much the Rachel I used to know that I want to replay that part again and again. Then she gets serious.

  “I thought I had to do this alone. I’ve done a lot of things you wouldn’t approve of to find the answers I needed. Even broke my best friend’s heart.” She looks away, but I can tell how sorry she is. She shakes her head like she’s struggling to get control.

  “I’ve worked so hard, but there’s still something missing, something I think will end this whole thing. I’m going tonight to try and find it. If I do, you’ll probably never see this, except maybe at our twenty-year class reunion.” She smiles again, but it’s a sad, scared smile. “If I don’t make it, it’s up to you to find the truth. I told Eduardo to give you something, something that only you will understand. I know you can help me. You’re the best person I know. You always do the right thing.”

  She presses her index finger against the screen, so I can see the tiny line across the tip of her finger, the leftover scar from when we bled together. “I love you, chica. I’m sorry for everything. I miss you.”

  The video stops on that image. I press my index finger against hers through the glass on my phone, sharing the signal we’ve had since that day on the playground, the signal that we would always be friends.

  I sit back, my mind reeling with questions. She knew she was going to die. I’m sure of that now, but why? Whose secret was she trying to keep? Eduardo’s? But she wants me to trust him? Was it worth getting killed for? Eduardo gave me the loyalty pledge, “something that only you’ll understand,” but I don’t understand any of it.

  I close my eyes and slump in Dad’s chair, heartsick, wanting to help but knowing I can’t do w
hat she needs me to do. I’m not strong, not like she was. I’m the quiet one, the one who hangs out with little kids and blushes when a guy tries to talk to her.

  What can I do?

  I’m startled by my phone vibrating. Another text comes through.

  tomorrow 10 am answer then delete all

  It’s attached to a picture of the grade-school playground.

  I don’t know what to do. Answer? Delete? Pretend I never saw the messages? Take it to the police and finally tell them everything? Somehow the video from Rachel is harder to ignore than the text. Maybe because it’s more like she was asking in person.

  I scroll back to the text from “E” and compare the number from the forwarded text and from the text I just got. They’re the same. Eduardo. What does he know? What does he think I know?

  A truck drives by. It sounds like Dad. I panic, pick up my phone, and delete the last two texts and the original one from Rachel.

  I set the phone on the desk, shove the newspaper back into the recycling, and head for the door. As soon as my hand touches the knob, my phone vibrates again. I turn around and pick it up.

  4 her

  I close my eyes, breathe in, and then quick, before I can change my mind, I text Eduardo:

  I’ll be there.

  Chapter 8

  Evan said Rachel’s house was still a mess, but I wasn’t expecting this. I stare in disbelief at the front yard that until a few months ago was so familiar. The house is small, only one level, and old, but Araceli had painted it a bright yellow with white trim and a red door. There were always flowers in the yard, red geraniums in the boxes in front of the window, and the wide front porch was always clean.

  Now the house looks like the wounded remnant of a war zone. The flowers in front have been trampled. Yellow police tape, now ripped and blowing in the breeze, hangs around the perimeter of the porch, and shattered pots of dying geraniums litter the ground. The front door, the porch railing, the sidewalk in front, and the shed have all been tagged with red graffiti—circles full of the same eye shapes painted in red. I don’t know what they mean, but they’re familiar enough to make me shiver.