Far From You

5

NOW (JUNE)

Harper’s Bluff is nestled in Northern California’s side of the Siskiyou mountain range, a tiny town carved out of the ­wilderness, sheltered by the piney mountains, surrounded by oak woodland for miles around, with a lake that stretches out into what you trick yourself into thinking is infinity. We’ve got a population just tipping twenty thousand, more churches than grocery stores, American flags flying from most of the houses, and REAL MEN LOVE JESUS bumper stickers on every other truck on the road. It’s not idyllic, but it’s comfortable.

I thought I was ready to come back, but the second we pass the WELCOME TO HARPER’S BLUFF sign, I wish I could tell Macy to hit the brakes. Beg her to take me back to Oregon with her.

How can I be here without Mina?

I bite my tongue. I have to do this for her. It’s the only thing I can do. I stare out the window as we pass by my high school. I wonder if they decorated Mina’s locker, if it’d been festooned with flowers and candles, notes tucked into corners, never to be read. I wonder if her grave’s the same, teddy bears and pictures of her, beaming up at a sky she’ll never see again. I hadn’t even gone to her funeral—couldn’t bear to watch them put her in the ground.

As we’re turning onto my street, Macy gets a call. Maneuvering the car into the driveway, she tucks the phone under her chin. “Where?” She listens for a second. “How long ago?” She shuts the car off, eyeing me. “Okay, I can be there in thirty.”

“Someone jump their bail?” I ask after she hangs up. Macy’s a bounty hunter, though she prefers being called a bail recovery agent.

“Sex offender in Corning.” She frowns at the empty driveway. “I’d hoped your mom would be here by now.”

“It’s okay. I am capable of being alone in my own house.”

“No, you shouldn’t be by yourself right now.”

“Go catch the bad guy.” I lean over and kiss her on the cheek. “I promise I’ll be fine. I’ll even call as soon as Mom gets home, if it’ll make you feel better.”

Macy taps her fingers against the steering wheel. She’s itching to get going, to chase down that guy and put him in jail where he belongs.

I know that feeling, that drive for justice. All the women in my family have it. Macy’s is wrapped up in the chase, in hard and fast and brutal judgment, and Mom’s is wrapped up in rules and laws and juries, the courtroom her chosen battlefield.

Mine is wrapped up in Mina, magnified by her, defined by her, existing because of her.

“Seriously, Aunt Macy. I’m seventeen, I’m clean, and I can spend some time by myself.”

She shoots me a calculating look. Then she reaches over and flips open the glove compartment. “Take this,” she says, pressing a container the size of a water bottle into my hand. There’s a white pulley at the top of it and a label with big red letters that say BEAR REPELLENT.

“You’re giving me bear spray? Seriously?”

“It’s got way better range and packs more of a punch than that pepper spray key chain stuff they sell at the drugstore in the cute pink holders, and it’s even better than a Taser,” Macy says. “Too many things can go wrong there—clothes can get in the way, the prongs don’t fully eject, some big guys don’t go down from the current. Spray them in the face with this? They’ll go down.” She takes the canister out of my hands and points to the pulley. “Press the button at the top, move it right to unlock the mechanism. Aim and pull the trigger. Don’t ever drop the can—you may need to use it again. Spray and then run. Even if your attacker’s incapacitated, if he’s got a gun or a knife or any weapon, even blind, he can do some damage. Spray, run, and don’t let go of your only weapon. You got that?”

“You’re actually encouraging me to use this?”

“If someone’s coming at you? Absolutely,” Macy says, and her voice is so serious, it sends prickles down my back. “Whoever killed Mina is still out there. You are the only living witness. And I’m pretty sure you’re about to stir up some serious shit, so be careful.”

“You’re not going to stop me?” Until I say it out loud, I realize that I’ve been waiting for her to.

Macy’s quiet for a moment. She looks me up and down, her blue eyes assessing me like she might a perp. “Could I?” she asks baldly.

My hand tightens around the canister. I shake my head.

“That’s what I thought.” Macy tries not to smile, but I catch it before she slips back into seriousness. “Do you remember what I told you the night we decided you were ready to come back home?”

“You said I was capable of making my own decisions.”

“You’re not a kid anymore, Sophie. You’ve been through too much. And though you’ve made some pretty bad choices, you’ve made some decent ones, too. You got clean—and you stayed clean. I believe that. I believe you. And it would probably be smart to tell you to move on, that letting go of Mina is the right thing to do. But I see it in you, babe, how it’s gonna eat you up if you don’t do something. If you don’t try. Just—” Her phone rings again. “Dammit,” she mutters.

I take advantage of her distraction. “I’ll be careful, I promise. Go to Corning.” I unbuckle my seat belt and grab my bag. “Kick the perv in the balls for me.”

Macy smiles. “That’s my girl.”

Our house hasn’t changed. I don’t know why I thought it’d look different. Maybe because everything else is. But the tasteful leather couches and the cherrywood table between them are still in the living room, the coffee machine in the kitchen half-full, my father’s empty mug sitting next to the sink. Just like any other day.

I go upstairs to my room. My bed’s freshly made, and I run my fingers over the red sheets. They’re crinkled at the edges, which means Mom put them on herself instead of having the once-a-week housekeeper do it.

Thinking about her struggling with them in her heels and pencil skirt, trying to make it nice for me, makes my eyes sting. I clear my throat, blinking fast, and dump the contents of my bag onto the bed before going to take a shower.

I let the water stream over my head for a long time. I need to wash the smell of rehab—lemon air freshener and cheap polyester—off of me.

For three months, I’ve been stuck, stagnant and waiting, behind white walls and therapy sessions while Mina’s killer walks. It hits me all at once that I’m finally free, and I jam the faucets shut. I can’t stand to be inside for another second. I get dressed, leave a note on the kitchen table, and lock the door behind me. The canister of bear spray is safe in my bag.

Macy was right—I’m about to stir up some serious shit. I have no idea why anyone would kill Mina. Which means I have to be prepared for anything. For anyone.

It’s getting late. But he’ll still be at the park.

The good thing about growing up in a small town is that everyone knows everyone. And if you’ve got a routine, you’re usually easy to find.

I walk to the park and get there as the guys playing soccer are finishing up their casual game, shirts versus skins. The sun’s sinking, that dusky time where dark and light are balanced almost artificially, like an old movie, saturated with hazy color. I watch from across the street and wait until a massive, shaggy-haired blond guy in a dingy white soccer jersey and baggy shorts breaks away from the group, heading toward the bathroom, the door swinging shut behind him.

It’s perfect: isolated, with nowhere for him to run. So I seize the moment.

I want to slam into the bathroom, scare the shit out of him, grind his cheek against the dirty tile with my foot until he admits the truth.

Instead, I slip in quietly and lock the door behind me once I’m sure it’s just him in here.

The toilet flushes, and my stomach leaps, part anger, part fear.

He doesn’t see me at first, but halfway to the sink he catches sight of me in the mirror.

“Shit.” He spins around.

“Hi, Kyle.”

“I thought you were in rehab.”

“They let me out.” I step forward, and when he moves away, a sweet feeling rushes through me. Kyle’s huge, thick-necked and solid—more suited for football than soccer—and I like that he’s a little scared of me, even if he’s just afraid that the junkie will do something crazy.

I take another step. This time he manages not to retreat.

But he wants to. I can see the fear in that frat-boy-to-be face.

Fear means guilt.

I pull the bear spray from my purse, unlocking it and raising it to his eye level as I step forward. “You remember that time Adam’s brother accidentally got him in the face with bear spray? We were, what, freshmen? Maybe it was even eighth grade.…Anyway, it’s one of his favorite drinking stories. To quote Adam: ‘That shit stings like a fucker.’”

I tap my finger on the trigger. Kyle tenses.

“When I was in rehab, I had a lot of time to think,” I say. “That’s pretty much all you get to do: think about your mistakes and your problems and how to solve them. But in all that time, I never came up with the right answers to my questions.

“Maybe you can help me, Kyle. Why don’t we start with why you lied to the police about the night Mina died?”