Nice Girls(33)

I thought of DeMaria’s messy bedroom, untouched since July. No detective had yet to investigate it.

“We are nearing the two-week mark since Ms. Willand disappeared. And I can speak for both Martin Willand and Heather Willand when I say that there is a real sense of urgency in this case. We are mounting a full-scale search operation this Saturday in coordination with the ‘Find Olivia Willand’ search committee. Please visit their website and sign up to volunteer. We have twenty-seven hundred acres of land to cover again at Littlewood Park Reserve, so we need all hands on deck for this operation.”

The big search was on Halloween.

Dad exhaled and went back to his food. He would go—the Willands would expect it. He didn’t bother to ask me if I would.



Before I went to bed, I looked up the “Find Olivia Willand” website. The layout was simple, but the Willands had posted several photos of Olivia on the site. They showed her as a toddler on a blue tricycle, posing in her high school graduation robe, and grinning beneath a white veil at her First Communion.

I had a lump in my throat, looking at each photo, one after the other.

On Halloween, the volunteers would flood Littlewood Park Reserve once again. I now had a chance to go back, to revisit the place where Olivia and I had spent our childhood together. I owed it to her, after all the other chances I’d skipped.

But I hated the idea. The park reserve had too many memories. It seemed wrong to go, as if I would be encroaching on her park, on her neighborhood, on her life, even after she’d made it clear long ago that I wasn’t welcome. We had moved on from each other, hadn’t we?

After a long moment, I clicked on the Volunteer link.

It led to an online form.

I entered my name, cell phone number, email address. I submitted the form before I could stop myself. Then I closed the laptop and settled into bed.

I had a couple of days to figure out what I would do on Halloween.

But first, I had my own lead to focus on: La Rue, the restaurant where DeMaria had once worked.

I had no idea if DeMaria Jackson and Olivia Willand were connected. I hadn’t found anything that remotely linked them.

But after the stunt I had pulled on Leticia Jackson, I owed her something out of our interview, even if she would never find out about it.



On Thursday morning, I showed up at Goodhue Groceries, miraculously healed.

“Look happy, Mary,” Jim chided, patting me on the shoulder. “You’re not sick anymore, and you’re at work again. That’s something to be happy about.”

I smiled blandly as Jim left my checkout lane.

The morning passed by in an anxious blur. I had four different customers who griped at me in the checkout lane, arguing over coupons and weekly deals. One customer asked me why I was “overcharging” on candy even though Halloween was only a couple of days away.

“I’m not paying over five dollars for this bag of chocolate,” said a man, chucking the candy off the conveyor belt. “No one should waste their hard-earned money on this.”

I gritted my teeth, smiling back politely.

At lunch, I waited to see if Dwayne would come in. But after twenty minutes had passed, it seemed like he would eat later. He had been too busy on the floor to even say hi.

I shoved in my earbuds and skimmed through the news on my phone.

Ron suddenly joined me. He said nothing as he plopped down with a steaming container of ravioli in his hands, his gaze intensely focused on it.

I went back to scrolling through the news. A minute later, I felt Ron lean toward me. I pulled out an earbud.

“Ivy League Mary . . . how’s it going?” Ron asked. His voice was monotone.

The nickname sounded odd from his lips, as if he were struggling to climb through the syllables. He’d probably heard it from Dwayne or Jim in passing.

“I’m fine. How are you?”

“I’m okay. I have a lot of comp sci homework,” said Ron, shrugging. He was chewing through his food, barely looking at me. Up close, his arms looked thin beneath his green work polo.

“So . . .” he continued. “Are you doing anything for Halloween?”

“I’m working the closing shift.”

“You’re not hanging out with anyone?”

“I am,” I blurted out. “I made plans to go out with friends.”

It wasn’t a lie. Back at school, I was supposed to go out on Halloween. My friends and I had three parties to attend and then we agreed to wing the rest of the night. I had even arranged my work schedule there around it.

Halloween was an institution in college, the time of year when students got sluttier, more monstrous. They wandered in one drunken haze from the bars to the house parties to whatever place was still open at 4:00 a.m. It was the messiest event of the entire school year. I loved the complete lack of inhibition, as if putting one mask on stripped another mask off. I loved the camaraderie and the decorations.

It was supposed to be my last Halloween of college, the end of an era.

Now those plans had vanished completely.

“You and your friends are free to stop at my place. I’m having a small party on Halloween night. There’ll be booze,” Ron added, as if it were contraband.

I could smell his hot ravioli breath. My stomach lurched.

“Our plans are pretty tight. Sorry,” I said.