She’s looking down at her feet, arms wrapped around herself. There’s something she isn’t telling me. “Do you think you could let me into her room?”
Amy’s eyes flick up to mine. “Um, sure, I guess. Follow me.”
—
Amy unlocks thedoor to their room and turns on the light. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen their room. I haven’t seen it since the day I’d helped her move in. I feel guilty—Princeton’s not far from the city at all, but I hardly ever came out here to see her, and when I did, I’d come for a quick dinner and avoid campus.
The common area is what I expected: the turquoise IKEA couch I bought for Naomi, the old lamps that belonged to Margaret. Books, clothes, makeup. An antique mirror we’d found at a flea market in Brooklyn. The wall covered in Polaroids of the three of them, though fewer than the last time I saw it, some bent and worn. Tears prick my eyes, and I have to look away.
That’s when I notice a strange spot on the wall, one that seems to have been covered in fresh paint. In fact, the entire wall seems to have been recently painted and is slightly off in color. Odd. But when I turn to ask Amy, she’s gone.
I move toward her bedroom. The door is closed and blocked with crime scene tape. The police had told us that they’d finished searching her room, and we were free to gather her belongings whenever we wanted, but it’s still a shock to see it this way. Carefully removing the crime scene tape, I enter Naomi’s bedroom, pulse quickening. As I survey the room, my eyes fall on the framed photograph of the two of us on her desk, in our matching blue swimsuits, and the sight of it makes me choke up.
The rest of the space was clearly disturbed from the police investigation. Her drawers have all been opened and pawed through, fingerprint powder dusted on her desk, on the mugs and wineglass. The air still smells faintly of Naomi’s perfume: light and youthful, with notes of vanilla.
I close my eyes for a moment, steadying myself. I have to keep it together. Stay focused. Find some sort of clue. Something, anything the police might have missed.
The top drawer of her desk is filled with random items: gum, loose credit cards, lip balm.
“The police took her laptop…” I startle at the sound of Amy’s voice, and when I turn around, she’s pointing to the bottom of the desk. “But maybe check and see if they took her notebook? She kept it there, in the bottom drawer. Maybe there’ll be something useful init.”
But in the bottom drawer are just sketches and notes from class. No notebook.
“That’s weird…” Amy says, her face wrinkling in confusion. “I could’ve sworn…They must have taken it.”
I search more quickly now, going through her dresser. The pressure of tears is right behind my eyes, but I have to keep going.
After another thirty minutes, I decide it’s no use. The police have taken everything important, and there’s nothing left.
Sighing, I bend down to pick up a piece of paper that’s fallen under the dresser, and that’s when I notice it. I reach under the dresser and pull it out. A dried flower petal. I turn it over in my hand, and looking under the dresser again, there are more, and a small piece of folded card stock, all the way in the back, difficult to reach.
It’s faded, barely legible, with a gold leaf design printed around the edges, and on it, a handwritten note:Naomi, I’m sorry about last night. Let me make it up to you. —M.
“I don’t know what those are doing there,” Amy says, standing behind me. She’s reading the card from over my shoulder, and when I look up at her, all the blood has drained from her face.
Chapter Sixteen
Naomi
October 2022, seven months before her death
By the time I getto the soccer stadium, the temperature has dropped ten degrees. The wind has picked up, sending dark clouds hurtling past overhead, a disorienting contrast to the harsh glare of the stadium lights.
The game has just started, and the players are out on the field, but I don’t see Ben. I’m searching the crowd for Zee and Trey when I hear my name.
“Naomi!” Zee calls down to me. I make my way over to them, and Zee points across the field. “Hey, look at number seventeen! What a freakin’ stud!”
I’m relieved to see Ben high-five another player as he subs into the game. I cup my hand around my mouth. “Woooo! Let’s gooo!” And when he looks up and finds me in the crowd, it makes me light up.
Sometime later, I’m watching Ben send a long pass to a guy open in front of the goal when, out of the corner of my eye, I catch a small, dark-haired girl in a long pink coat watching me. At first, I think it must be someone I know, but when I turn and meet her gaze, she quickly looks away. I’m still trying to place her when I hear the halftime buzzer.
—
During the break,Zee and Trey leave in search of food, and a few minutes later, I’m watching Ben run down the sideline when a heavy arm wraps around my shoulders.
“There you are.” Liam smiles down at me, charming as ever, as if we’d planned to meet each other here. My ribs clench as I try to fight the attraction. “Liam. How’s it going?”
He moves closer, and I don’t move away. I’m hyperaware of the contact of his body against mine. The way he’s pulling me toward him.Why does he do this to me?I know this isn’t good, Liam being here. I know he’s hoping Ben will see—Liam might not want me anymore, but he doesn’t want anyone else to have me, either. The warmth of him so close to me makes every cell in my body alert, and I try to inch away from him. “We’re up,” I say, ignoring the fluttering in my stomach and pointing my chin at the field.
