Dare Me Part 29

The front windows of Coach's house are still rimy from last night's frost, and Caitlin's paper snowflakes scatter across. A lamp glows inside.

It has the feel of a fairy-tale cottage, like one of those paintings at the mall.

Caitlin stands inside the front door, two fingers punched in her mouth. Usually so tidily groomed, her hair looking oddly knotted, like an uncared-for doll. Breadcrumbs scatter up her cheek.

She doesn't say anything, but then she never does, and I twist past her, my legs brushing against the barbs of her ruffled jumper, which seems more suited for July.

She likes to look pretty, Coach always says, like that is the only thing she really knows about her. Coach always says, like that is the only thing she really knows about her.

"I didn't think they'd get to you so fast," Coach says. She's washing the windows in the den, wielding a long pole with a squeegee at the end, and a soft duster beneath it. "I was calling and calling. I thought for sure I'd get to you before they did."

There's a sheen of sweat on her face.

I don't say anything because I want that sweat there, at least for now. She's made me sweat enough.

"It just seemed easiest to tell them you were here that night," she says. "If you were at my house, then I couldn't possibly have been at Will's."

She looks at me, from under her extended arm, elegant muscles spun tight.

"And you couldn't have been there either," she adds. "So we're both covered."

"What about Matt?" I say, dropping my voice.

"Oh, he's back," she says, gesturing out the window. "He's outside."

In the far corner of the lawn, I spot him sitting on the brick edging of an empty flowerbed.

I can't figure out what he's doing, but he's very still.

I've never seen him like that, or outside at all. I wonder if he feels peaceful.

"No," I say, regaining my focus. "I mean he told the cops you were home asleep, right? Which is what he thought anyway?"

Why did you need me as your alibi, I want to say, I want to say, when you had him. when you had him.

"This is better, Addy," she says, the words just tripping from her tongue. "They never believe the spouse. And he was asleep, that's not much corroboration..."

She stops for a second, eyes fixed on something on the windowpane. A smudge I can't see.

"I used to use newspapers," she says. "Then Matt bought me this thing." She touches her fingers to the duster at the end of the pole. "It's lamb's wool."

I keep waiting for her to say sorry, sorry I didn't warn you, sorry I didn't prepare you, sorry I didn't protect you from all of this. sorry I didn't warn you, sorry I didn't prepare you, sorry I didn't protect you from all of this. But she's never been a sorry kind of person. But she's never been a sorry kind of person.

"Coach," I say. "Don't you want to know what I said to the cops?"

She looks at me.

"But I know what you said," she says.

"How do you know?" I say, kneeling on the sofa where she stands, barefoot. "I might have blown it without even realizing it."

"I know because you're smart. I know because I trust you," she says, and lifts the pole again, telescoping it higher. "I wouldn't have gotten you into this otherwise."

"Gotten me into what?" I say, my voice sc.r.a.ping up my throat. "Coach, what am I in?"

She will not look at me. She's looking out the window.

"My mess," she says, her voice smaller. "Don't think I don't know that."

I follow her gaze.

Far back on the lawn, Matt French has turned and seems to be looking toward us. Toward me.

I can't make out his face, but it's as though I can.

"Coach," I say, "why was your hair wet?"

"What," she says, swooping the squeegee back up the window.

"When I got to Will's apartment that night," I say, my eyes still on Matt French in the backyard, his rounded-over shoulders. "Why was your hair wet?"

"My hair wet? What kind of...it wasn't wet."

"Yes it was," I say. "It was damp."

She sets the pole down.

"Oh," she says, looking at me at last. "So it's you who doesn't trust me."

"No, I..."

"Did the police...did they...?"

"No," I say. "I just remembered it. I'd forgotten it and I remembered it. I'm just trying...Coach, he was wearing a towel, and your hair..."

Something is happening, that vacant, efficient expression slipping away, revealing something raw, bruised. It's like I've done something powerfully cruel. "I took a bath before I went over there," she replies. "I always did."

"But, Coach..."

"Addy," she says, looking down at me, the pole piercing the cushion, like a staff, or sword, "you need to stop talking to Beth."

A burr rises up under my skin.

"Because she just wants her pretty doll back," Coach says quietly, lifting the pole again, pressing the squeegee against the window, making it squeak.

I feel something tighten in me and have a picture suddenly of Beth's fingers circling my wrist.

Then at last, I say it. "You never told me about the bracelet."

"The bracelet?" she says, finally releasing the pole and descending from her perch.

"My hamsa bracelet."

"Your what?"

"To ward off the evil eye. The one I gave you."

She pauses a second. "Oh, that, right. What about it?"

"Why didn't you tell me the police found it?" I say, then wait a beat before adding, "under Will's body."

She looks at me. "Addy, I don't know what you're talking about."

"You mean they didn't ask you about it? They found the bracelet under Will's body."

"They told you that?" her voice bounds.

"No," I say. "Beth did."

I start to feel like my feet are going to slip out from under me, even though I'm sitting down.

We're standing in front of Coach's bureau, her smooth mahogany jewelry box before us.

She sets her hands on either side and lifts the top with a shushing sound.

We look at the tidily arranged bracelets woven into the soft ridges. Her tennis bracelet, a few neon sports bracelets, a delicate silver-linked one.

"It's got to be in here," she says, fingertip stroking the velvet. "I haven't worn it in weeks."

But it's not.

I look at the box, and at her, at the way her face looks both tight and loose at the same time, veins wriggling at her temples, but her mouth slack, wounded.

"It's here," she says, sliding the box off her bureau, everything tumbling radiantly to the carpet.

"It's not," I say.

She looks at me, so helpless.

For a long time, maybe, we are both kneeling on the floor, fingers nuzzling into the carpet weave, shaking loose those filmy bracelets, tugging them from the caramel-colored loops.

That beautiful carpet with its dense pile. At least five twists per inch.

"Addy, you've listened to Beth, now you need to listen to me. If they found that bracelet, a girl's bracelet like that, like one of yours," she says, pointing to my arms, ringed with friendship flosses, neon jellies, a leather braid, "don't you think they'd have asked you too?"

There's nothing I can say. I watch her as she walks into the bathroom and shuts the door.

Neither of us wants to reckon openly with how deep Beth's trickery may go and neither of us wants to reckon with why I have believed her.

I hear the shower start and know I'm meant to leave.

Being part of a pyramid, you never see the pyramid at all.

Later, watching ourselves, it never feels real. Flickering YouTube images of b.u.mblebees swarming, a.s.sembling themselves into tall hives.

It's nothing like it is on the floor. There, you have to bolt your gaze to the bodies in your care, the ones right above you.

Your only focus should be your girl, the one you're responsible for, the one whose leg, hip, arm you're bracing. The one who is counting on you.

Left spot, keep your focus on the left flank. Don't look right.

Right spot, keep your focus on the right flank. Don't look left.

Eyes on the Flyer's eyes, shoulders, hips, vigilant for any sign of misalignment, instability, doubt.

This is how you stop falls.

This is how you keep everything from collapsing.

You never get to see the stunt at all.

Eyes on your girl.

And it's only ever a partial vision, because that's the only way to keep everyone up in the air.

On my way out, I see Matt French still roaming around the backyard. It strikes me how few times I've seen him without his laptop in front of him, or his headset on. He looks lost.

I stop at the kitchen window, wondering what Coach has told him. What he believes.

Matt French reaches out to a branch spoking from a tall hawthorn bush, the one Caitlin is always cutting herself on, its hooks curling under her feet.

He looks no sadder than usual, which is sad enough.

Suddenly, he looks up and it's like he sees me, but I think I must be too far, too small behind the paned window.

But I think he sees me.