Moody and Iris are at the kitchen counter sharing a bowl of cereal. I grab a granola bar from the cabinet and a bottle of water from the fridge. “I’m going out,” I say. “I’ll take the bike.” I need the exercise. I need to do something with my energy. I can only spend so much time in this condo with my heart and my mind fit to burst with the excitement of what’s to come. Not like Moody, who could go months without saying a word if it weren’t for us. She relives her kills, smiling to herself, twirling her hair and staring off.
And Iris, who turns oddly solemn after a kill. In the monthsleading up to it, she’s all eagerness, tapping her feet when she sits, knitting to keep her hands busy, snapping at us for the smallest offenses. Once it’s done, she turns quiet. She sleeps for days at a time, emerging only to use the bathroom and force something down so she doesn’t starve. It’s a full-soul purge, she says.
“Got a date?” Iris asks.
“I’m giving him time to miss me,” I say. “Just getting some exercise.”
Moody tosses me a retractable box cutter and I catch it with one hand. “Lots of sickos out there,” she says. “Did you hear about that man who went missing by the ten-mile marker?”
I stuff the blade in the pocket of my pink leggings. “Nope.”
It’s hot outside. The kind of searing sunlight that makes me grateful Arizona isn’t known for its humidity. But once I’m pedaling, I’m cooled by the breeze of my own motion. Rainwood is a small town with long stretches of barren road that’s perfect for solitude. Just the cacti, brush, dirt, and me. My true church.
Thoughts of Edison come to me here in all this brilliant open space. I don’t know yet how Edison’s murder will affect me. I’ve given great thought to how it will affect sweet, compassionate Jade. Walking up the church steps, organizing search parties, begging the police to take it seriously, falling into Jeannie’s arms as she pets my hair and shushes me, a daughter to her.
I ride for a long time and don’t see so much as a car passing by, so when I notice the figure in the distance, it’s an immediate intrusion. Edison floats away from me like vapors on the air.
The figure is tall, holding a bag that dangles limply from one hand, and walking back from the gas station a quarter mile away.
When I get closer, I see the short dark hair, the effortless curves and confident stride. “Dara,” I call out, and she turns her head. Shestops walking when she sees me and watches as I skid to a stop in the dirt beside her.
Something is wrong. Her eyes are bleary, and her smile doesn’t rise up all the way. Normally she has a magnanimous smile, shining with confidence, illuminating her eyes. She throws herself at the world like a dare. But today she’s subdued, and she is too exhausted to feign otherwise.
“I saw your sister yesterday,” Dara says by way of greeting. “Lisa. She seems nice. Had no idea she was staying with you.”
Yesterday, Moody donned Lisa’s persona and went out to water the potted plants we bought as an excuse to be outside, should we ever need to eavesdrop. She introduced herself to Dara and said she’ll be visiting for a few weeks to help Jade with their dear aunt’s affairs. We can smell Dara’s cigarettes from the living room, and Moody was curious about her. Moody’s prognosis: Something is off about her. She’s always home and she knows everyone’s business. She is far too young and pretty for this.
I didn’t tell my sisters about the money Dara withdrew from the ATM at Safeway. They would have wanted to take it after Edison’s murder. We never take anything from our victims—no trophies. My own rule. That’s a sure way to get caught. We come into town, kill our victim, dispose of him, and speed off with only the memory to keep us satisfied.
After we were found abandoned in our stroller, donations poured in. It was a solid year before interest waned, and then again when we were five, we were the subject of a “Where Are They Now?” episode of a daytime talk show. I barely remember being paraded with my sisters on the stage and being gifted a new tricycle—an offering for our exploitation.
The donations were put into a trust for when we turned eighteen.A cool three million dollars, which we only touch every other year or so when we return to Fresno to visit the bank in person. We take enough cash to get us through the year, but if a crime of opportunity arises, we steal cash elsewhere to make our funds last. Tips from restaurant tables, off the dressers of people we befriend, things like that.
But Dara—she needs that money. I can’t figure out what for just yet, but I know she doesn’t do anything without a reason. If it went missing, she would know immediately. She would figure out who had access to it, and how they knew she’d even withdrawn it from the ATM. I’m positive even her husband doesn’t know.
“A bit hot to be walking, isn’t it?” I say. “I would have given you a ride if you needed.”
It’s 105 degrees, and we’re both glistening, but she hardly seems to notice. “That’s okay.” She raises the bag like it’s an explanation. Through the thin plastic I see a carton of menthols, an extra-large energy drink, and a bag of Combos. “I needed snacks.”
Nobody walks four miles round trip in this weather for junk food. The gas station, I recall, also has an ATM by the door. Dara isn’t carrying a purse, but I glance at the pockets of her denim shorts and think I see the square outline of folded cash. I move my eyes back up to her face before she notices. If I ask her about the money, she’ll never tell me. But if you want someone to confess, the best way to do it is to start talking about yourself. Get their guard down, make them see you as the vulnerable one.
“That video you recorded for Edison worked,” I say. I smile conspiratorially, pretending not to see how puffy and pink her eyes are. “You’re right. That song is magic.”
She pokes me in the shoulder, and the force sends me back a step, my hips still straddling the bike. “I told you! What did he say?”
We start walking, me wheeling the bike between us. The small barrier it provides will make her feel safe.
Daraissafe with me. I have no reason to hurt her. I like her, and she helped me break the ice with Edison. She’s the eyes and ears of our little subdivision, and she knows everyone’s comings and goings. Doubtless she saw Edison drop me off last week after the fair. Edison parked under the only working streetlamp, and if Dara was looking through her blinds as she often does when she hears an engine, she’d have seen me lean over, take his face in my hands, and kiss him. A chaste kiss with our tongues kept in our own mouths. The kiss of a new, blossoming love.
I tell her about Edison’s recovery, and she frowns sympathetically. “Good for him,” she says, not a hint of judgment.
“My mother wouldn’t like him,” I say, because I want to build a bridge so Dara will tell me about her family. She’s in a passionate marriage and living next door to me in that dump. If anyone out there loves her, they have feelings about that. Her parents hate Tim because he’s always dressed in expensive suits to go to a job that doesn’t afford their precious daughter the life she deserves. She’s wasting her youth, her brain. Or Dara is their golden child who could do no wrong, and they want her to be happy. Her parents call her every weekend and pester her for a grandchild. They think she quit smoking last year.
I can’t read Dara. She may be a hundred different things. A thousand. She’s intriguing like the music that thunders into my apartment through the wall, a melody I’ve heard before but can’t quite catch.
“Are you close to your parents?” Dara asks.
“No,” I say. A small bit of the truth before I go for the lie. “They judge everything I do.”
