This Is Where the World Ends(7)

“It was easier,” I tell the policemen.

The less fat detective writes something down. “Why’s that?”

I shrug. Shrugging doesn’t uncover my ass anymore, because I have a real shirt now. Hah. “You said you talked to everyone at school. Can’t you figure it out?”

They watch me. I watch them back. Neither of them have answers.

“What happened?” I ask them.

They don’t answer. They just keep asking questions. About that night. About what happened before the bonfire. If I was with her. If I knew she was planning a bonfire. If I know why there was another fire by the quarry. If I drank that night. If I knew beforehand that her parents would be out of town that weekend.

I don’t know why they’re talking to me at all.

I don’t remember.

“Her parents,” I repeat when they ask me about them. “Her parents don’t like me.”

“Why’s that?” the less fat one asks again.

“They just don’t. Janie’s parents. She didn’t like them, did you know that? Have you talked to them?”

They nod. Their lips are tight and they do not speak more than they have to. I don’t like them. I don’t like either of them, but they are going to find out what happened. Because Janie is gone. Janie Vivian is gone.

I repeat this to myself, in my head and out loud, and try to keep breathing as the world keeps tilting sideways. We are nearly upside down.

“Do you know why she went?” I ask them. “Why did she go to Nepal?”

“What?” the less fat one says.

“That’s right,” the fatter one says. He’s giving the other one a look like a warning. “Nepal.”

“Why’s she there?”

They look at each other, the policemen.

“Why’d her parents let her? They would never let her. What about school?” School. “She’s doing her senior project on fairy tales.” Out loud, deliberate. Sudden, because that’s how the memory comes and goes. Papers by the Metaphor, my voice and hers. Feathers. Scissors. Senior projects. We are seniors, because Janie moved the day before senior year. Her hands with chipping nails, her voice laughing because. Because her parents wanted her to do her project on American economics. Her eyes were pale that day. Her hair was everywhere.

Fairy-tale miracles. And I chose religious apocalypses.

She had laughed when I told her, because we didn’t even plan this. We balance the world, accidentally.

And now it’s tilting. It’s tilting and tilting.

I look up, or down, maybe. The policemen are still watching.

“Her parents are crazy,” I say. “They got half the library banned. Did you know that? Sophomore year, I remember all of that. Janie wanted to read Mrs. Dalloway, and Virginia Woolf was a lesbian. And they didn’t want Janie to become a lesbian. Her uncle’s on the school board, and her parents made him ban half the library.”

“I remember that,” says the less fat one. “A few years ago, right?”

“Sophomore year,” I say. “And she crawled into my room one night and we took my dad’s car and went to Goodwill. We bought books—she had a list of banned books. She left them in the trunk and the next morning we went to school early and she set up a library in her locker.”

I don’t tell them how she made me tie a black T-shirt around my face like a ninja mask. I don’t tell them how I didn’t do much more than watch her. I don’t tell them how she looked, her hair falling out onto her shoulders and freckles sharp. I don’t tell them how I loved her, how I loved her apocalyptically. I don’t tell them how she stole her dad’s credit card, or how she took his favorite book from his bedside and burned it while I watched.

It’s a good snapshot of us. Representative. Janie, furious and full of ideas. Me, following.

“You drove to Goodwill as sophomores?” asks the police officer.

“Janie drove,” I say. “Janie had her permit.”

“Right,” the fatter one says. He is cautious now, slow. I am talking too fast, using my hands too much. I take a breath while he says, “That’s right. It’s all right.”

The less fat one keeps scribbling.

I might be getting her into trouble.

“Don’t tell anyone,” I say to them. “Especially not her parents. Especially not her dad. Janie and her dad don’t like each other. Does he know about Nepal? He would never let her go to Nepal.”

They still do not look at me.

“Who else have you talked to?” I ask them.

The less fat one narrows his eyes. “Just about the whole school, kid.”

“The whole school?” That’s a lot of people. “Huh.”

“But we’d like to talk to you again in particular, Micah,” says the bigger one. “And a couple more people too.”

“Who?”

“Some of Janie’s friends. Piper. Wes, Ander.” He watches me too closely. “Did you know them?”

“Not really,” I tell them. “Janie likes Ander, so I hate him on principle.”

“I should hope she likes him,” the bigger one says. He’s trying to smile, he’s trying to lighten the mood, but we’re in a f*cking hospital and my head is broken. “They were—they are dating.”