The Cheerleaders(21)

A cardboard shirt box rests on the surface of the contents. I lift the top off, delicately pushing the tissue paper aside. A white lace dress and a bonnet. Jennifer’s christening outfit.

I snap the top back on and move on to the next. Pick through art projects, graded research papers, programs from her honor society induction ceremonies and wind ensemble concerts. Her flute case.

I pull out a marble notebook labeled English 10H, Mr. Ward. English, tenth-grade honors. I thumb through it, reading Jen’s haphazard script, a writing prompt copied at the top of each page. Five years from now, I see myself…Write a paragraph convincing a friend not to take drugs…Which character from a book would you like to meet and why?

A copy of Wuthering Heights. I remember reading this in Mr. Ward’s class last year, and my chest tightens. Jen was reading it when she died, and it didn’t occur to Tom to return it to the school when he came across it in her things.

I thumb through the book. She was a few pages into chapter fourteen, her place marked with a folded piece of loose-leaf paper. Green writing shows through.

I unfold it.

    I WATCH YOU CHEW ON YOUR PEN CAP WHEN YOU ARE THINKING

I WATCH YOU IN THE HALL, LAUGHING, YOUR EYES MISSING MINE

I WISH I KNEW WHAT YOU WERE THINKING

I WISH I WERE IN ON THE JOKE.



The hair on the back of my neck pricks as I skim the rest. It’s more of the same. A demented poem. A stalker’s manifesto, written in the same handwriting that’s on the note resting on my desk.



* * *



—

In the morning, I wait until I hear the clanging of cabinets in the kitchen before heading downstairs. Tom is spooning cereal into his mouth, both eyes on a copy of the Daily News.

“I think we should get security cameras,” I say.

“Oh yeah?” Tom doesn’t look up from his bowl of Cheerios. “Why’s that?”

“This house is too big. I don’t feel safe when I’m here alone.”

My mother shuts the fridge door with a thud. “You’re rarely here alone.”

Tom and I follow her with our eyes as she exits the kitchen. Moments later, she shouts for Petey to come down and eat or she’s taking the iPad away.

When the clomping of Mom’s feet on the stairs fades, Tom sets down his bowl and levels with me. “Is this about Juliana and Susan?”

My spine straightens. I haven’t heard him use their names in years. “Maybe.”

“I didn’t know this still scared you.”

A flash of me, five years ago, curled up at the foot of my mother and Tom’s bed like a dog. Too scared to sleep in my own bedroom after the murders. “Of course I get scared. I can’t just forget it ever happened.”

“I didn’t say you should. You haven’t brought the girls up in a long time, that’s all. Why are you thinking about it now?”

I don’t know if I’m imagining the note of suspicion in his voice. “It’ll be five years soon.”

“Mon,” Tom says. “Nothing like that is ever going to happen again.”

“You can’t say that for sure.”

“I can’t say for sure that a tornado won’t hit us tomorrow. But it’s still unlikely it’ll happen.”

I wonder how he thinks that’s supposed to make me feel better.

“I’ll look into cameras.” Tom stands and squeezes my shoulder. “Try to enjoy today. It’s nice out. Maybe take that fat pig of a dog for a walk.”

Hearing the W-word, Mango trots into the kitchen. Tom heads into the living room and tells Petey that he’d really better put the iPad down and eat before Mom finishes her shower.

I sit at the island. My brother plods into the kitchen, eyes glued to Clan Wars as he slides onto the stool across from me, where Mom has left an empty bowl next to his box of Cocoa Puffs.

When the sound of Petey’s crunching becomes unbearable, I stand up. I need to think; there’s nothing I can do about figuring out who wrote that poem to Jen until tomorrow morning, when I’m able to talk to Mr. Ward.

My thoughts settle on the house across the street. He or she said that I don’t know them, but he or she knows where we live. He or she is also confident that Tom is a liar, among other things. So there’s a possibility that the letter writer knows Tom—and knows him well enough to have our new address.

It’s almost as unsettling as the idea that some random creep is stalking us.

The cigarette butt by the bay window. He or she might have left something else behind.

Mango is still splayed out on the kitchen floor like a frog, his tail flicking back and forth. I grab his leash from the hook on the wall.

“Tell Mom I’m walking the dog,” I call to my brother as I steer Mango out the door. I stop short when we reach the street.

A van is parked in the driveway of the house. Next to it, a man is leaning against a shiny black SUV, in conversation with the van’s driver. Mango starts to bark; the man looks up at me.

I haven’t seen anyone outside that house since we moved in; it can’t be a coincidence that the owners or contractors or real estate agents—whoever the hell those guys are—have returned the day after I prowled on the property.

Did someone see me?

I bow my head, breaking eye contact with the man, and make a right. Keep walking until the new constructions thin out and less ostentatious houses appear.