Good Neighbors(32)
Shelly Schroeder. Shelly Schroeder. Did you have a secret?
Nikita Kaur asked her son Sam to repeat every detail of the story, one more time.
He remembered something new: comments Shelly had made about Arlo Wilde. Nikita asked him to repeat these. She had her husband, Sai, listen. Sai, knowing that his son was both eager to please and easy to influence, said it was probably nothing. Still, Nikita had Sam repeat it to Cat Hestia, and then the Ponti men, who reacted with shocked outrage. It’s outlandish, Sally Walsh said, though when she went home and relayed the story to her wife, Margie, they agreed that it added up. Even if Julia’s story was true, and they’d been racing each other to the far edge of the park, Shelly was far too smart to use a dangerous slab for a shortcut. What if Julia was lying, to protect someone? Perhaps something had driven those girls. Perhaps… they’d been running from Arlo.
The Hestias asked their daughter Lainee, who corroborated and also embellished Sam’s story. Lainee wasn’t malicious, just immature. Sheltered her whole life, she lacked the ability to extrapolate that her story might get Arlo Wilde into serious trouble.
Mrs. Jane Harrison asked Dave to corroborate: Did Shelly tell you kids that Arlo Wilde was bothering her? Mouth agape in disappointment (how could his mother make such a reckless suggestion?), Dave said: It was a crazy lie Shelly made up like she always used to make things up, because she was batshit. Then he ran away to punch some pillows, not because he was mad at his mom—she’d done so much dumb stuff that his fists would fall off if he punched something every time that happened—but because he’d talked about Shelly in the past tense. And he owed it to Shelly, his first kiss, and the only one he’d ever kept a secret, to believe until the end.
At last, Nikita forced Sam to repeat the story to Linda Ottomanelli. By this time, Sam had become reluctant. He did so haltingly, with tears.
Upon hearing this news, Linda Ottomanelli took it upon herself. She was obliged, as Rhea’s best friend (and a little threatened, that it was Nikita who’d unearthed this inside poop). She decided to distill this hurtful hearsay—this gossip—and locate the truth. She went to the Roosevelt Field mall and bought the latest PlayStation. Promised the boys they could have it, so long as they tried their best to remember. Then she asked them the same question she’d asked a dozen times before, only this time, she gave them Sam Singh and Lainee Hestia’s version first. Then she asked: What happened?
The boys corroborated the story. But because they had a cruel streak, they added something, too. She said he’d done it to her, Mark said. I think that morning. That’s why she was bleeding. It wasn’t period. I think that’s why she was so mad. Yeah, Michael added. She called him a rapist. She was screaming all about how he raped her. She was scared he was gonna come after her.
Weeping with fear and confusion and sadness and even gratitude that her own children seemed healthy and unscathed (or was it possible they’d been tainted, too?), Linda rewarded them with the game system, then walked straight to Rhea’s house, breathless and terrified and feeling just a little bit of the German word that means delight in the tragedy of another.
Rhea thought about Shelly’s body, which still might be found. She thought about the dog, perfectly preserved. She listened to Linda’s story; let it sink and fill her, like crawling along the bottom of a wine-dark sea, and opening wide.
* * *
Fourteen days into the search, representatives from the police department rang the Schroeder bell. Heads heavy, they informed Rhea (Fritz was at work) that they’d been unable to pass a final tidal tunnel; the last possible place that Shelly’s body might be. They’d need several days to shore it before they could resume their search, and even then, the tunnel might be too narrow to traverse. They would have to send for small divers trained specifically for such tasks. Unless Shelly’s body had gotten into the sewer system, this was the last place she could have drifted.
In situations like this, the waiting tended to be more excruciating than the answer. They believed that Rhea ought to schedule a memorial service. It was time to stop hoping.
Slowly, because her knee had been acting up, Rhea came forward. Shook hands and thanked them for coming. She’d already prepared a list of funeral directors, blown up a seventh-grade class photo. It wasn’t that she’d hoped for this. Not that. But she’d prepared.
Maple Street watched this interaction through their windows. They witnessed, so she would not have to go through it alone.
Saturday, July 24
Sheened in sweat, the people of Maple Street sat up. They bathed and powdered and perfumed and then sweat through, their skin a fragrant crust. They dressed in black. They put out dark suits and muted dresses for their children. The Walshes came out early. After that, the Hestias, then the Pontis: Steven, Jill, Marco, and Richard. Quarrelsome Tim and Jane Harrison demanded that their children choose which parent to ride with. Elder brother Adam picked his mother. Younger Dave opted out. He stayed in his hot box of a bedroom, wishing the PlayStation’s connection worked, so he could lose himself into Deathcraft, and forget this whole, terrible thing. The divided house, of course. Not Shelly, whose death was still too raw for him to believe.
The Atlases did not attend, as Bethany had spent the night throwing up. The Singh-Kaur family departed in their Honda Pilot, each kid bopping in headphones to music on separate screens. Peter Benchley didn’t go, but watched from his attic perch. Dominick and Linda Ottomanelli knocked on 118’s front door, and the Schroeder and Ottomanelli families collected on the porch. The adults, having seen too many movies, wore sunglasses and knocked back shots of whiskey. Then they headed for their cars, so they could caravan.