Before She Disappeared

CHAPTER 26

Thirty minutes later, I stand across from Angelique’s high school, waiting for the bell to ring. Having spent hours yesterday staring at the same view through the corner grocer’s security camera, it feels like I’ve known this place forever instead of just a single afternoon.

Lotham had wanted to march into Boston Academy, gold shield flashing, and drag Marjolie straight down to the station for questioning. Fortunately, cooler heads had prevailed.

Now I have the honor of meeting up with Marjolie and coaxing her back to Lotham’s vehicle, parked several blocks away, where we can all chat privately. I’m due for work sooner versus later, so I need this to go quick and easy. No pressure.

I hear the bell start its run. There’s a roughly five-minute delay, then the front doors of the academy heave open and the first wave of students pour out, hefting their packs and bolting to freedom.

Couple of minutes later, Marjolie appears, head bent close to Kyra’s as they descend the front steps deep in conversation. Once again I’m struck by the contrast between the two. Kyra, tall and stunning even from this distance. While Marjolie walks with her shoulders hunched self-consciously. Pretty to Kyra’s drop-dead gorgeous. Softer to Kyra’s hard-edged attitude. One leader. One follower.

I feel the first prickling of unease, just as Marjolie glances up and spots me. Across the street, rows of traffic and rivers of kids between us, she falters. So many expressions flicker across her face: shame, fear, regret. Guilt. A whole boatload of guilt.

She knows that I’m here for her. That finally, this is all about her, and that stupid summer program at the rec center, and all the secrets teenagers feel the need to keep.

She turns away from her friend, already debating her options. I lean forward, preparing to give chase.

Then Kyra spies me. She grabs her friend’s arm, totally missing the nuances. She tugs Marjolie forward, and after a final tense moment, the shorter girl gives way. She lets Kyra guide her across the street to me.

This is it. Eleven months later, it’s finally time for the truth.

“I have some questions for Marjolie involving the summer program she attended with Angelique at the rec center.” I keep my voice light, tone matter-of-fact as I rattle off the story Lotham and I had concocted to justify culling Marjolie from the herd.

“Okay.” Marjolie stares down at her feet, her fists tightly clenched around the straps of her backpack.

“Whatdya want to know?” Kyra prods.

“I think it would be better if we spoke alone. Don’t you agree, Marjolie?”

The shorter girl still won’t look at me, while beside her, Kyra blinks in confusion.

“Why do you want to know about summer camp? Did you learn something more about Angel?” Kyra leans forward eagerly. “Tell us! We’re her friends, we deserve answers.”

I keep my gaze on Marjolie. “Fashion camp. You and Angelique signed up together?”

The girl nods.

“And there was this other girl, Livia Samdi, also in the class? Prone to wearing a red baseball cap?”

A look of pure misery sweeping across Marjolie’s face. “Yes.”

“Come with me,” I say gently. “It won’t take long. I just have a few questions. Nothing special.” I glance at Kyra, while Marjolie nods.

“I’ll um, I’ll catch up with you later,” she tells her friend.

Kyra isn’t stupid. She looks from Marjolie to me to Marjolie.

“I’ll go with you—”

“No!” Marjolie, tone sharp, eyes wild.

“Marjolie . . .” Kyra, her voice pleading. She’s scared, I realize. But not about what she knows, but about what she’s now realizing she doesn’t know. And she’s worried for her friend.

“I’m sorry,” Marjolie whispers. But I can tell Kyra still doesn’t know who or what her friend’s apologizing for.

“She’ll call you later,” I intervene, then I place my hand on Marjolie’s shoulder and guide her away, before Kyra can continue pressing the issue.

Kyra lets us go. I can feel Marjolie shaking beneath my touch as I lead her down the first block. Then the second. We walk in total silence, tension building.

Lotham has his tricks, I have my mine.

Around the corner, to the unmarked car. I pop open the back door, just as Marjolie’s head snaps up.

“I didn’t mean it!” she exclaims wildly. “I swear I didn’t mean to hurt her! I had no idea!”

Then she bursts into tears.

“You’re welcome,” I tell Lotham, as Marjolie collapses in the back seat and the show officially begins.

It comes out in fits. Starting with a boy, because so many stories do. The basketball player. The one Marjolie followed to the rec center because she needed to protect her territory.

Lotham and I sit in the front seat of the car, Marjolie in the back. Forget driving to the station. Our target is already pouring out her sins. We don’t have time for traffic.

Lotham has his phone on, discreetly recording away. He’s looking at anything but the sobbing girl in his back seat, so I continue to do the honors:

“You convinced Angelique to sign up with you. Your wing man—or woman, in this case.”

“She wanted to work, earn extra money babysitting. But I begged and pleaded. That was the thing with Angel. She’d do anything for her friends, and we’d been best friends since fifth grade.”

“So you and her signed up for fashion camp. Except it was never about fashion camp.”

“DommyJ.” Marjolie sighs, sobs.

“Heartbreaker?” I ask.

“I thought he loved me. I thought . . . I should’ve known better.” Poor girl, I don’t think she could look any more miserable.

“How old’s DommyJ?” I ask.

“Seventeen.”

To Marjolie’s then fifteen. “Hot?”

Lotham gives me a look, but I stand by my question.

“Totally. All the girls wanted him. But he chose me. He said he liked my smile.”

I nod sympathetically. I already know where this story’s going, and I feel terrible for Marjolie. For all the vulnerable, self-conscious girls out there who dared to believe the cool guy wanted them, when really . . .

“What happened, Marjolie? You met DommyJ, convinced Angelique to sign up for fashion camp, and then . . .”

“Angel didn’t like him. She warned me. Worse”—Marjolie smiles bitterly—“she told me I could do better. But of course, who could do better than him? I didn’t want to hear it, I didn’t want to believe.”

Marjolie presses her lips together. More tears slide down her cheek. I whack Lotham till he belatedly produces a travel pack of tissues.

“Dommy’s older, you know. He’s not the type to be sitting around at home at night, plus he has all these college friends. Hoops players who know the hot spots.”

I nod.

“During the day, at camp, he was really sweet. He’d call me his girl, walk around with his arm around me. He made me feel special. I’m not gorgeous like Kyra, or smart like Angel. I’m just me.” Marjolie shrugs. “Except when Dommy was around. Then, I was the girl other girls stared at. I was the one everyone else wanted to be. So when he said he wanted to go club hopping and I should go with him, of course I’m gonna go. Him, out on the town with his buddies, in places like that? No way he’s going home alone.”

“But you were only fifteen . . .” I prod gently.

Marjolie’s chin comes up. “I can rock it. Little more makeup, right hair and clothes. I just need an ID to back it up. And that’s okay, cuz DommyJ knows this guy. Fifty bucks for a fake. Nights out with my man, priceless.” Her lips twist sardonically. She starts dabbing at her smeared mascara.

“I didn’t tell Angel, not at first. I knew she wouldn’t approve. And she was mad at me. I’d made her sign up for fashion camp and then DommyJ’s breaks were different than ours, and I kept sneaking out to see him. She said I’d abandoned her. I didn’t mean it that way. Just . . . I was the girl making out with the hot guy in the hallway, you know. I’d never been that girl before.”

“How’d you get the fake ID, Marjolie?”

“Dommy got it. I gave him the money on Tuesday. He brought me the ID Thursday. That night we’re at his favorite club, hitting the dance floor with all his friends. He’s got moves. I got moves. He’s buying me shots. Everyone’s happy.” She hesitates, voice dropping low. “I felt like I was flying. Like it was the best night of my life. Like it would never get better than this. Then, DommyJ took me out to his friend’s car.”

She pauses. Her expression goes flat.

“Did he rape you, Marjolie?” I ask the question. Lotham’s jaw has set, his hands fisting.

“Nothing like that. I gave it up. I thought . . . I thought this is what I’d been waiting for. I thought this was the special fucking moment with that special fucking guy.” She laughs now, but it’s a harsh sound. “The next day, at the rec center, I tell Dommy I love him. I tell him, I can’t wait to go out again. Have fake license, will travel, you know. Dommy says I should bring a friend. It’s awkward, him with me, then all the guys. He says . . . He says maybe I could bring Kyra.”

Marjolie’s drop-dead-gorgeous friend. Of course. “Oh, honey. I’m so sorry.”

Marjolie doesn’t cry anymore. She is too gutted for tears. She’s right, first love feels like flying higher than the sun. And inevitably leads to the mother of all crash landings.

“I asked Angel instead. I didn’t want to believe . . .” Marjolie glances up at me. “I thought if I brought Angel, that would be good enough.”

“You asked Angelique to come with you club hopping?” Lotham is startled enough to finally ask a question.

“I showed her the ID. What’s the big deal? Even if she didn’t love partying, this is the girl who never stops talking college. She could use her fake license to sneak onto campus, take classes, whatever. It’d be good. I begged her. But she was angry. So then I told her everything. What Dommy and me did, how much I loved him. How much I needed her to do this, because I couldn’t bring Kyra. Obviously. And I couldn’t . . . I didn’t want it to end.”

“What did Angelique say?” Lotham again.

“She didn’t. She just grew quiet. Then she hugged me, like really tight. And I started to cry, because . . . I knew. I just didn’t want to know.”

Marjolie closes her eyes. Takes a big shuddery breath. “Turns out, DommyJ’s a collector. V cards. Like, is even in a competition with his buddies over who has the most. And having gotten mine . . . He broke up with me two days later. Clubbing, dancing, true love. None of it meant a thing.”

“Oh, honey . . .” I say again.

“That’s when things got weird.”

Lotham frowns, gives me a look as he twists back around in the driver’s seat. “Weird how?”

“Next week, bright sunny day, everyone’s sitting outside. Angel walks right up to DommyJ. At first, you can’t really hear them. She’s like whispering furiously, he’s totally blowing her off. Even giving me dirty looks like this is all my fault. Then she suddenly raises her voice. She starts talking, in as loud a voice as possible, that he’s a cheat. That the fake IDs he sells aren’t even worth the plastic they’re printed on.”

She has our full attention now.

“I had showed her mine to convince her to buy her own. But now she’s yelling that fifty bucks is a total rip-off. A mall cop could tell they were fake and DommyJ’s gonna get all his friends arrested. Then, she says, super loud, he owes everyone a refund.”

“A refund?” Lotham presses.

Marjolie nods solemnly. “DommyJ was furious. She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Take her fucking mouth and get out of his fucking way. Which is when that other girl, Libby, Liv—”

“Livia Samdi.”

“Yeah. Totally quiet, like never speaks at all. Everyone knows her older brother got kicked out of the program two years ago for drugs. J.J., something like that.”

“Johnson.”

“Seriously?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“She suddenly joins Angel, yelling at Dommy. Except she knows all this stuff. The fakes DommyJ is dealing don’t have the right hologram, laser printing, I don’t know. All sorts of shit. Basically, she’s also insisting DommyJ has cheated all his friends.

“Now everyone’s listening, and things are getting really intense. I mean, Dommy’s got all his buds there. Who knows how many fakes he sold them.”

“Do you know how many fake licenses he sold?” Lotham pushes.

Marjolie shakes her head.

“What about others being involved? Some of his friends also selling the IDs?”

“I just know Dommy. And he doesn’t make them. At least, I don’t think he does. He said a friend did. But when we were at the nightclub, all his buddies were using them. It’s not like they’re twenty-one.”

At fifty bucks a pop. Lotham and I exchange another glance. “Do you have your license on you?” I ask.

Marjolie hesitates, as if finally remembering she’s talking to cops. Lotham arches a brow. She relents, digging into her pack until she finds her wallet, then produces the ID. She hands it to Lotham first, who tests the weight of it in his hands, then twists it around in the light. He doesn’t say a word, just passes it to me.

Marjolie has been telling the truth. It’s cheap work. Too thin, blurry photo, not even an attempt at the holograph. In comparison, the fake license Angelique dropped the other day is a masterpiece. Fifty bucks for this? I see Angelique’s point.

“So Angelique and Livia accuse DommyJ of ripping off his friends,” I prod. “In front of everyone.”

“Angel’s trying to get back at him for what he did to me. The other girl, Livia, I don’t know what her deal is. But this stuff, DommyJ, the crowd he hangs with . . . It’s no joke. Angelique shouldn’t have been talking to him like that. Especially in front of others. Dommy gets real serious real fast. He shoves them back. Tells them to shut the fuck up or they’d be sorry.”

“He threatens them?” Lotham, clarifying.

“I guess.”

“And then?”

Marjolie shrugs. “The director guy came out. Mr. Lagudu. Break’s over, everyone back inside. Angel was still shaking, really upset. I knew she’d done it only for me, but I told her to knock it off. She was going to get herself in trouble. And I . . . I was embarrassed. Maybe I hoped DommyJ might still change his mind, take me back. But after that little display . . .” Marjolie exhaled roughly. “Angel and me had some words. Big fight, really. Angel . . . She couldn’t see it. Sometimes she was too smart, too capable. She didn’t understand what it meant to be just a regular girl like me. She didn’t understand that sometimes, her being her, just made me feel bad.”

Marjolie swallows, falls silent. “Things weren’t the same between us after that. She kept sitting with the Livia girl. Sometimes I swore they were whispering about me. I wanted to apologize, make things right. I hurt, too, you know. I’d loved this guy, then he’d gone and done . . . I don’t know. Summer camp really sucked. When it ended and school started again, things settled. Livia was gone and it was the Angel, Kyra, and Marjolie show again. I figured more time would pass, we’d grow close again. Like we used to be. Except then one day, Angel was just gone. And we never got our second chance.”

“Did you see her with Livia Samdi again? After the summer program?” I ask.

She shakes her head.

“What about DommyJ?” Lotham presses. “Any more altercations between those two?”

“Not between Angel and him.”

“But between . . . ?”

Marjolie took a deep breath. “The last week of the summer program. I’m just leaving, when I see DommyJ at the street corner. So I slow down. Cuz . . . Cuz I’m stupid, that’s why. Then I see Livia, in her red baseball cap. She’s standing right in front of him, but she’s not the one yelling this time. He’s clearly pissed off, ranting away, and she’s like cowering, trying to just weather the storm. Then he grabs her arm. I’m startled. I’ve never seen him get physical with a girl before.

“Suddenly, she gets this look. She plants her feet and stares right at him. She says loudly, ‘You know who my brother is, don’t you?’

“He says he’s doesn’t give a flying fuck about J.J. Which makes her shake her head. ‘Not J.J.,’ she says. ‘My other brother.’”

“Her other brother?” Lotham asks sharply.

“Exactly. She glances across the street. That’s when I see him. Some super-tall dude in a blue tracksuit and gold chains. He didn’t look all that scary to me. But Dommy now, his reaction . . . DommyJ drops Livia’s arm, and backpedals so fast I thought he was gonna trip over his own damn feet.”

“He saw this guy across the street, and he ran away?” Me this time, because I’m suddenly remembering my first visit to the school, the guy I spotted watching me. And possibly spied standing outside the Samdi residence, before bullets started to fly.

“DommyJ looked like he was gonna shit his pants. I’ve never seen him look that scared.”

Lotham stares at Marjolie. “What did Livia do?”

“That’s the thing. Second Dom let her go, she scampered off. But not toward the dude. In the total opposite direction. I saw her face, right before she took off down the sidewalk. I swear, she looked just as scared as Dommy. I mean, if this guy is her brother, why is she so freakin’ anxious to get away from him?”