Page 47 of She’s a Doll

Nicola didn’t answer. She didn’t need to. The answer to that question was painfully, wretchedly obvious. We lived in a small town, the sort where each family had an aisle in the cemetery and the local paper reported on the primary school soccer game. If everyone blamed Grandma for my death, then no one would ever treat her the same way ever again. There’d always be sideways glances, insults whispered behind cupped hands.

Gossip never died in this town. It took root. I didn’t need to hear it to know what shape it would take. My grandma had already lost a daughter. Now a granddaughter . . . She was driven mad by grief. That was what they’d say. She had a violent history, signs of mental illness. It was only a matter of time.

“I’ve never been to New Zealand,” Nicola said softly. “It looks nice.”

It did.

In the photo, the sky was a pristine blue and streaked with long whips of white cloud, the grass was shining gold, and the sun whited out one corner of the picture. Grandma and Auntie Dawn were standing at the edge of a lake, hiking boots muddy, cheeks flushed hot, blotchy pink. The water behind them reflected the rugged, snow-covered peaks on the horizon.

I looked at those mountains and thought of Grandma’s favorite shirt. My other pair of shoes are skis. I wondered if she’d tried skiing yet. I wondered if she loved it as much as she’d imagined she would. I hoped so. I hoped Cookie was with her, prancing in the snow, big, happy, and dumb.

I stared at the photo until Nicola’s phone went dark. The black screen reflected my face back at me, dusty and one-eyed, broken and patched back together, coy smile still locked in place.

I thought she’d died, I muttered. When I saw her stuff at Trash N’ Treasure . . .

“Her stuff’s there?”

Yeah. It was. Some of it. Her books. Her chair. What does it matter?

“There could be some evide⁠—”

Stop. Please. I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to think about this. I don’t want to retrace my steps. I don’t want to dig through the pieces of my life looking for clues. I don’t want to make a game of my own murder.

“I’m not trying to make a game,” Nicola said. “I’m just . . . shit. I’m sorry. I’m just trying to do the right thing.”

I know. And that was what made it worse. I knew Nicola thought what she was doing was right. I knew that perhaps, in some other, less fucked-up world, it would be. Handcuffs and a prison cell for him. A bright, heavenly light for me. But that wasn’t right, that wasn’t real. That was the sort of thing that only made sense in TV shows, where endings were scripted and not . . . senseless, random, crushing.

Why did Kyle do that to me?

Why couldn’t I stop him?

What’s going to happen now?

Nicola was swiping and tapping at her phone, frowning and chewing uncertainly at her cheek.

What are you looking for?

“There’s another photo you need to see, and this one isn’t going to be fun. But I think you need to understand that . . . well . . . you’ve been gone for a long time.”

I know that.

“Yeah. You do. But also, you don’t. Because . . .” She sighed. “Because this shit isn’t black-and-white. It should be. Believe me, I know it should be. But it isn’t. There are people in the crossfire. People I think you care about.”

What are you⁠—

“Promise you won’t hide behind my TV again.”

Why?

“Promise.”

No, I snapped. No, I don’t promise. What’s⁠—

She turned her phone around again, showing me a new photo.

A wedding photo.

A young couple standing beneath a flowery arch.