Modern Monsters (Entangled Teen) (6 page)

Chapter Eight

Apparently evidence does not matter once a group of high school students gets wind of a juicy rumor. They grab it in their teeth and run with it like wild animals, zeroing in on the person it’s about. Technically, that person would be Callie but since she isn’t here…I’m next in line.

It’s a subtle change. People stare at me. They whisper in class and then twist to look in my direction before someone nudges them and whispers, “Don’t stare!” I am this dark shadow to point at and talk about in the halls. Suddenly everyone was Callie Wheeler’s best friend just so they can say how they saw this coming, how they knew I was the sort of person to do something like this. Aaron watches me like a hungry lion, and it’s all I can do to hover close to Brett’s side because it’s the only place I truly feel safe from being eaten alive.

It isn’t just them, either. It isn’t school and it isn’t home. Thursday afternoon as Brett and I are walking to his car, someone whose face looks vaguely familiar approaches with a smile. I start to ask what he wants but Brett grabs my arm and begins dragging me full force to the car. The man follows right on our heels and I see he has a recording device of some kind in his hand, holding it up as he begins to say, “You’re Victor Howard, right? Just a moment of your time!”

Brett pushes me into the passenger’s seat before I’ve fully realized what just happened and he whips around, glaring. “No fucking comment,” he says, before getting into the car and speeding out of the parking lot.

My heart is galloping at a steady hundred miles an hour. “W-w-what—”

“Craig something-or-other,” he hisses. “He’s from one of the local news stations.”

I swallow hard. “I d-don’t understand…”

“It’s a small town, Vic. The media must have gotten wind of it and want to find out more.”

No. It still isn’t processing. Me, the guy who has flown under the radar all his life, the designated driver, the nobody…and now the news wants my story? This confuses me more than anything else, but I can tell Brett is livid.

“They’ll turn this into a fucking sideshow,” he growls. “For you and Callie both. Don’t talk to them, no matter what, got it?”

“But…” If I tell my side of the story, wouldn’t that be a good thing?

“
No matter what,
Vic. My dad is going to tell you the same thing.” At the next stoplight, he looks over at me. “Promise?”

I slump back into my seat and close my eyes, unsure what to do with the overwhelming sense of nausea overtaking me. “I promise.”

Friday morning, Craig something-or-other is back. This time with a camera in hand. He doesn’t approach us, but I see him from across the parking lot snapping pictures while I stare, dumbfounded. Brett shoves me to his side and I duck my head as we hurry to the school, taking solace inside where—I’m guessing, hoping—a reporter can’t follow. Mr. Mason told me the same thing Brett did: not to talk to him under any circumstance, and that he’s probably been to my house and doesn’t yet realize where I’m staying. That could change soon.

I am beyond exhausted. I sit numbly through classes. By the time we get to lunch, I have to quietly excuse myself and slip outside to be alone. Not that Brett listens. He follows and sits next to me on the bench and asks me what’s wrong while I’m slouching forward, pressing my palms into my eyes, trying not to cry.

Brett says nothing but I feel his hand on my back, reassuring. My whole body aches from the built-up tension. I thought with the DNA test cleared, this would be over. Yet I feel like it’s only the beginning.

I tried to call Mom a few nights ago to tell her about the DNA results. She didn’t answer. She didn’t call me back.

Indifference:
lack of interest, concern, or sympathy. Unimportance.

What is it they say?
The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference.

I wonder if Craig Something-or-Other has shown up there. If he’s snapped pictures of “the rapist’s mom” while she fled from her car to the house. If he asked her questions…if she answered them.

After school, I’m not feeling up to waiting around while Brett is at tennis practice. I would walk home, except I’m worried of what might be waiting there for me. An angry mother? A prying reporter? Instead I’ll head to Brett’s car and do some homework or play on my phone.

I haven’t even reached two steps into the parking lot when an old blue sedan pulls up alongside me and the tinted window rolls down to reveal Autumn behind the steering wheel. I remember her threat about plowing me down with her car and go still, staring at her.

She says, “Get in.”

“If I s-say no, are two g-guys in suits and sunglasses going to get out and m-make me?”

Autumn actually smirks. “No, just me. Come on.”

This is all sorts of a bad idea, and yet I find myself circling around to the passenger’s side door, opening it, getting in, and dropping my bag to the floorboard. Autumn waits for me to buckle up before driving off.

“W-where are we going?”

She keeps her eyes glued to the road. “Shut up and you’ll find out.”

I run my hands over my knees, swallowing past a dry throat. “I got into the c-car with you; the least you can do is t-tell me where you’re taking me.”

Autumn purses her lips. “And I appreciate your cooperation, but I’m not telling you anything. So either watch and see, or jump out at the next stoplight.”

“I’ll h-have you know that no one will pay my ransom if this is a k-kidnapping,” I try to joke. Autumn’s mouth actually twitches a little at the corners, like she’s trying not to smile, but she doesn’t reply.

You know, if she wanted to tie rocks to my ankles and throw me in the river, no one would even notice I was gone for at least twenty-four hours. More than enough time for her to drive to Mexico.

But Autumn doesn’t take me to the river. She drives to a little town house complex where she parks in a spot assigned number forty-two and twists in her seat to look at me. “You tell anyone about this and you’re dead. You got it?”

“Uh…o-okay. Where are we?”

“My house.” Autumn gets out of the car and I follow suit, leaving my backpack behind. She lets us inside where we walk through a modestly furnished living room and upstairs to what has to be her bedroom. Autumn insists I go in first. I have no problem being invited into Autumn Dixon’s room, but this isn’t under the conditions I would have hoped for.

When I step inside, the first thing I see is Callie Wheeler sitting on the bed.

Immediately I freeze and try to back up. Autumn shuts the door and leans against it, effectively cornering me, preventing me from fleeing shy of throwing her aside or something. My heart leaps into my throat and I look from Callie to Autumn and back again. “W-w-what—”

Callie rises from the bed, holding out her hands. “Calm down, I promise this isn’t anything bad.”

“Well, my dad does have a chain saw in the patio storage,” Autumn drawls. When neither of us laughs, she rolls her eyes. “Oh-kay, well, I’ll be downstairs. You sure you’re all right?”

She clearly isn’t talking to me. Callie smiles a little and nods. Autumn slips out of the room and I find my feet itching to chase after her and demand to be taken home. “If th-they find out I’m here and there’s still a temporary restraining order…”

Callie silences me with a raised hand again. “I’m really sorry we had to trick you here, Vic. I knew you wouldn’t show up if she told you what was going on.”

Got that right. I stare at her, wordless. Is this some kind of plot? Is Autumn downstairs calling the cops and telling them I’m here?

She wrings her hands together. “I just…I had to see you. I needed to apologize.”

“A-apologize?”

“Things…moved really fast.” She won’t meet my eyes. “Autumn convinced me to tell my parents, and…the police were here and asking me questions, and they kept pushing. They wanted a name, any name. I was afraid if I didn’t think of something to say, they wouldn’t investigate at all and so—”

“So I was the scapegoat,” I finish drily.

Callie lifts her eyes a little, shoulders slouched. “You were the only thing I remembered.”

I want to be angry with her, and I can’t manage it. I’m not Callie. I don’t know what she went through those first few days, or what she’s still going through. Not for a second do I think she named me out of malice, but because she felt it was the only choice she had. This is going to scar me until they find who really did it, yes.

But it’s scarred Callie Wheeler for life.

“The lab results d-don’t fully clear me,” I point out, leaning back against the door. I feel like distance between us is good, so I refuse to move farther into the room. “S-so what makes you sure now that I, you know, didn’t do it?”

Callie sits back down on the edge of the bed and hugs her knees to her chest. “I remember throwing up and you taking me upstairs. Then it gets kind of fuzzy…but the more I think about it, the more I remembered you leaving. Like, I remember opening my eyes and seeing you walk out the door. The next time I woke up…” She trails off and it’s then that I notice how pale her face is, how accented the dark circles under her eyes are, and it’s not because she isn’t wearing makeup. She looks…haunted. “I couldn’t see him…”

She leaves it at that and I don’t push. Honestly, I’m not sure I want to know all the details. “I’m s-sorry, Callie.”

She shakes her head. “I don’t know why you’re apologizing.”

“B-because…I should have stayed. All of this could have been avoided.” If I’d found another girl at the party to look after her or something, anything. This is just as much my fault as it is anyone’s. Callie doesn’t correct me, either. She just looks at me with sympathy and regret because undoubtedly she wishes I had stayed, too.

“Everyone involved has regrets,” she says quietly. “I regret drinking. You regret leaving. Autumn regrets not going. She was supposed to come with me, you know, and when she found out what happened…she hasn’t stopped blaming herself. In reality, it’s no one’s fault but the person who did it.”

“A-and you’re certain now that person wasn’t me?” I have to ask, because this—her answer—could determine a lot in the coming weeks or months or even years.

Callie admits, “Completely? No. But it’s a feeling, and I’m tentatively trying to go with it for now. Sorry, I’m afraid that’s the best I can offer at this point. I’m looking at you and I just don’t feel like you were capable of it.”

Not the best response, but… “I’ll take what I can get.”

She brushes the long blond hair from her face and turns away, a haunted look passing over her eyes. “I think that’s all any of us can do right now.”

Autumn drives me home without saying a word. I can’t think of anything to say to her, either, so I don’t bother trying to make small talk beyond giving her directions. She pulls up to the curb—where there are no reporters waiting for me, thank God—outside my house and stares straight ahead. “I guess I owe you an apology, too.”

The sullenness of her tone almost makes me smile. “No, you don’t. Y-you didn’t know.”

She presses her lips together thoughtfully and then turns off the engine. When I get out of the car, she does, too, and begins to follow. I don’t ask what she’s doing because it’s obvious: she plans on coming in with me. Holy shit. I’ve never brought a girl home. Mom will still be at work so it’ll just be us, but still…

I let us inside, heart thudding loudly against my ribs. The living room seems like as safe a bet as any, so I gesture for her to make herself comfortable. “S-something to drink?”

“I’m fine.” She toes off her shoes and sinks down into the couch, one leg tucked up beneath her. Still nothing as to why she followed me inside. Brett has been my only houseguest, and he’s easy; he’ll help himself to whatever he wants. Autumn, though, looks around the living room in mild curiosity and I’m stuck standing there awkwardly, unsure of how to proceed. “Jesus,” she finally says. “Stop hovering. You’re making me nervous.”

Muttering an apology, I quickly sit on the other side of the couch. “Um…”

Autumn doesn’t look at me. “I’m going to find him, you know. I’m going to find whoever did this to Callie and I’m going to ruin him. I don’t care if it was you or someone else, I’ll find out.”

Some of the rigidity slips out of my shoulders. If this is what Autumn wants to talk about, I can listen. She always appears to be ready to burst at the seams, and I can’t help but wonder if she has anyone else to talk to about it. Certainly what she says to Callie will be more on the supportive side and less angry, and besides that…I can’t shake what Callie said to me about Autumn blaming herself for this. “I want to find him, too. I want to help. If the cops can’t do anything else, th-then maybe you and I can.”

She scoffs. “Working with the rapist suspect to find the real rapist, huh? There’s an idea.”

“C-can I ask you something?”

“I guess.”

“You’re taking this whole thing really personally. I m-mean, she’s your friend, but—”

“She’s my best friend,” Autumn corrects. “When she first moved here, she could have easily fallen in with the popular crowd. And she started to, initially. Then she saw some girl being a bitch to me in the halls every day for no reason, and she ditched them, just like that, and took my side. She’s the sweetest, most loyal girl you could imagine…but she’s also really gullible. I wanted to keep her safe, and I guess I’m just pissed at myself for failing.” Autumn shifts to pull her other leg up and turns to face me fully. A frown twitches at her brow. “If this is question time, it’s my turn. Why aren’t you, like, pissed off? I’d be pissed if someone accused me of rape.”

I smooth my hands over the tops of my thighs. “I-I don’t know? ’Cause I g-guess it’d be worse to be Callie, so I don’t feel like I should complain.”

“Just because one person is going through something painful doesn’t mean what you’re experiencing is somehow less relevant.” Autumn twirls a strand of hair around her finger. Her nails are painted gray and filed to short, slightly dulled points. Somehow it suits her. All claws and fangs but not as sharp as she first appears. I smile a little.

“I’m n-not mad. Not to say I’m thrilled, either, but I’m trying my best to get through it.”