A lawsuit.
I duck down and flip through the sheets of paper as quickly as I can. It doesn’t take me long to find out the Vreeland family sued the Godwin family a few years ago over a property line dispute when the Godwins began cutting down the Vreelands’ trees.
I’m about to ask Olivia if she knew about this, but as I turn the page, I see a deposition taken from Billy, then a freshman in high school.
Justin had a tree house in the big elm we cut down, and after it was demolished he threatened to kill me. That’s why I punched him after school.
I read the sentence twice and try to remember ever hearing about Justin and Billy getting into a fight. It’s not like they hung out together, but I never noticed bad blood, only a mutual understanding that their circles would only overlap in certain instances.
I want to keep reading, but Anjali pops her head above our side-by-side cubicles and assigns us a project. “Can you two head over tothe police station?” she asks. “Detective Hampton has some paperwork she wants hand-delivered to the mayor.”
Olivia raises her eyebrows at me with a conspiratorial look, and within a few minutes, we’re on the street, rushing over to the station. The air outside is thick and humid, and the sky is gray, clouds rolling through fast.
Once inside, I lead us to the reception area, where we’re directed to take a seat in the waiting room until they can get all the files together for us. The station is busy, with officers rushing back to their offices and the sound of urgent chatter floating through the room.
“You’d think they were trying to solve a murder or something,” Olivia whispers, and I reel my head back in surprise and try to stifle a laugh. “It’s okay,” she says. “If I can joke, so can you.”
I relent and crack a smile. “Morbid.”
Olivia’s gaze moves above my head, and a shadow from the window darkens half her face, which seems to tense.
“What?” I ask, and spin around. But when I see what she’s looking at, what’s framed on the wall, I clench my jaw. “Oh,” I say. “I had no idea that was here.”
We’re both staring at a photo of the two of us when we were fifteen, our arms intertwined, as we hold up a trophy from that year’s annual Club Tennis Tournament, which the PIPD sponsors. We’d won girls’ doubles in our age group, and our smiles take up most of our faces, our hair slicked with sweat. I peer closer at the photo, remembering how comfortable it felt as her arm snaked around my shoulders. We look so young, still growing into our features, our bodies. There’s an awkwardness about us, the way we lean into each other, but an ease, too, like if we were made to pose for a photoby some professional photographer, we were glad we could do it together.
“Your serve was monster,” I say.
Olivia shrugs. “Still wasn’t good enough.”
“What do you mean?”
Olivia’s quiet for a moment, and when she speaks, her voice is low. “I thought I’d get a scholarship to play.”
“Is that why you’re taking a gap year?” I ask.
“Yep,” Olivia says. “I got into some schools but without tennis, so I’m not exactly sure where I want to go. I was so single-minded that I didn’t really think about theschoolsthemselves. Just the teams.”
“What are you gonna do instead?”
“Iwasgoing to stay here,” she says, letting out a huff of air.
“But not anymore?”
“What about you?” she asks, changing the subject. “You’re going to Cornell, right?”
“Mm-hmm.” I clench my hands in front of my stomach. “Where are those files? We should probably be getting back.”
“You don’t sound too excited.”
“Ilikework, actually.”
“I mean about Cornell.” Olivia narrows her eyes. She knows I’m avoiding the question. “Your parents went there, right?”
“Yeah. Ethan’s, too. That’s where they all met.”
“So was it a choice? Or did you feel like you had to go there?”
Heat creeps into my chest, spreading to my collarbones, and I push myself to stand. “You really think I’m the type of person who would pick a college just because everyone wants me to go there?”
