Look What You Made Me Do Page 3

  “All right,” she says eventually. “This is the spot.”

  I shiver and glance around. We’ve entered a small pocket in the forest, no more than fifteen feet in diameter, the ground flat and covered with fallen leaves that crunch noisily underfoot. A dense wall of trees surrounds us, their bare branches cracking against one another in the icy wind. The full moon glows overhead like a ghostly spotlight.

  I shiver again, and this time Becca smirks.

  “Scared?” she asks.

  “No,” I lie. I’m in a dark forest with a dead body and a serial killer a week before Halloween. Of course I’m scared. I’m not the crazy one.

  “Here. Let’s dig. You’re lucky it hasn’t gotten too cold yet; the ground’s not that hard.” She drops her end of the carpet, the body making a sickening thud as the head smacks the ground, and strides the short distance to the tree where she’s propped the two shovels she must have brought in earlier.

  My teeth are chattering, and my nose is running. I need to get a tissue, but my hands are still full so I crouch to set down the carpet as gently as I can. The rug unfurls slightly, exposing a pale foot, its toenails painted in dark polish, the color stark against the glowing white skin. Shadows from the clacking branches flicker over her flesh, and that’s when I spot it. Right there, on her ankle, a tiny dark shape, a square with a set of wings. I recognize it from the office. A binder clip.

  It looks black right now, but in the fluorescent light of Weston Stationery, it’s bright red with tiny white polka dots. Angelica boasted nonstop about her tattoo, as though it proved her dedication to the company and erased her negligible sales stats. I’d remarked on this to Becca after a bottle of wine and a particularly teary episode of The Bachelor. I told her about Angelica, how she was kissing up to our boss, trying to steal the promotion for which I’d worked so hard.

  I don’t always know how Becca picks her victims, but in this case I do know. I picked her.

  “Are you going to admire her or bury her?” Becca asks, jamming the shovel into the dirt near my foot like a stake.

  “You killed Angelica?” I can’t take my eyes off the rest of the carpet, like it’ll unroll itself and Angelica will jump out and shout Surprise! and this will all be a terrible, morbid joke. Because I know better than to do this. To talk to Becca. To tell her anything I like, anything I dislike. Anything she can use against me.

  “That’s her name!” Becca exclaims, like I’ve solved the real mystery. “Man, that was driving me nuts. Angela? Angelina? Angelica. Right. Angelica.” She drops the shovel so it topples over and bangs off my shoulder, then my skull, but I’m too numb to feel it. “Let’s bury Angelica…right…here.”

  She chooses a spot near the edge of the circle, where the gnarled tree roots disturb the earth and our fresh grave won’t be as noticeable to anyone foolish or crazy enough to venture this deep into the woods, where serial killers and their sisters wait.

  I use the shovel as a cane, propping myself up as I stand, my knees weak. “I know her,” I say inanely.

  “Knew her.” Becca’s busy testing the dirt with the tip of her shovel, as though if we dig a hole that’s an inch away from perfect, something bad will happen. Something worse.

  “Becca!” My voice is sharp, and Becca finally looks at me, her bland, beautiful face a porcelain mask in the moonlight.

  “What?”

  “I know her! People know I know her! Knew her,” I correct, before Becca can interject. “And we’re up for the same promotion! Don’t you think people will suspect me? The police will talk to me?”

  “Um…” She finds a spot in the earth she likes and digs in with her shovel, using her foot to drive it in extra hard. She’s had a lot of practice. “Maybe? But you have an alibi, right? Weren’t you at hot yoga or the gym or…” She studies me doubtfully, as though she can see my muffin top through my parka. “Something?”

  My heart, rattling like a runaway train in my chest, slows by half a second. I do have an alibi. I was at work, then hot yoga, then the grocery store. I saw Angelica at the office this morning so Becca killed her at some point when people—and cameras—can prove I was somewhere else, not murdering anyone.

  “But I knew her,” I say. “I can’t—I can’t bury—”

  Becca’s brow furrows. “You can,” she says. “You’re already here, and you have a shovel.” She sounds perplexed, like she truly can’t relate to my feelings. She does this sometimes. All the time, actually. She’s a psychopath, incapable of feeling things the way other people do, unable to register the emotional significance of language or action or literally anything, but she recognizes it. She studies it. She manipulates it, the way a sculptor shapes clay, molding it into whatever she wants.

  There’s no point in arguing with Becca. Not just because she’s likely to kill you, but because if she doesn’t win in that moment, she’ll circle back when you’re least expecting and bring it up. Again. And again. And again. Until she wears you down. Until you’re so tired you just give in. And the next time you argue, and the time after, you remember the last time, and then you just don’t bother. Becca’s focus is singular, and being in Becca’s sight line is the worst thing that can happen to a person because she never gets tired and she always gets revenge.

  I picture Angelica, her slim figure just a few inches over five feet, and position myself the appropriate distance from Becca to start digging the opposite end of the grave. She was wrong; the ground is hard. There are rocks and roots, and even through my gloves, I can almost immediately feel blisters forming. I’m sweating within minutes, damp curls poking out of my hat and sticking to my cheeks.

  “You know,” Becca says after ten minutes of silent, sweaty digging, “I’ve been thinking.”

  That can’t be good. “Oh?”

  “I need a trademark. A calling card.”

  I use the back of my gloved hand to wipe sweat out of my eyes. “What?”

  She grins. “A calling card. For the bodies.”

  “Why? They’re never found.”

  “Yeah, but if they are. Like, what if, twenty years from now, they find three of the bodies? If there’s no calling card, it’s just, like, three dumb bodies. But if I have a signature, they’re mine.”

  “Why would you want people to know they were related?”

  She stomps her foot. “Would you stop trying to ruin this?”

  “I’m not.”

  “Anyway. I know what I’m going to do.”

  I don’t encourage her, but she uses her teeth to tug off her glove and reaches into her pocket for something small and cylindrical.

  I squint in the dim light. “Is that lipstick?”

  She grins. “Yep. I’m going to put it on and kiss their foreheads. If they still have foreheads. Or somewhere. I’ll kiss somewhere. Like the kiss of death. Isn’t that amazing?”

  Obviously it’s not amazing, just like it’s obvious that telling Becca as much would be a wasted effort.

  “It’s gross,” I say instead. “Kissing a dead body.”

  She shrugs and applies a generous coat of lipstick. “No worse than kissing Graham.”

  I don’t rise to the bait, ignoring her as I fish a tissue from my pocket and wipe my nose. When I lift my head, I spot movement in the wall of trees behind Becca. It’s fast and slight, one shadow shifting among others, two pale white dots blinking, gone just as quickly as they’d appeared. I stiffen and squeak, and Becca pauses in her makeup application.

  “What?”

  My eyes are locked on the forest behind her, now dark and still. “There was someone there,” I say.

  She glances over her shoulder. “Where?”

  “In the woods. Someone watching.”

  She snorts and puts away the lipstick. “Really, Carrie?”

  “Really, Becca.”

  Becca turns to the trees and gives a pageant-like wave. “Hello!” she calls. “My name is Becca Lawrence, I’m a Virgo, I enjoy short drives at high speeds, and my greatest dream i
s to eradicate hunger in the whole world!”

  “Would you shut up?”

  The woods around us, previously dark and dead, now feel alive and watchful. Whoever—whatever—it was could still be there, just out of sight in the shadows. Or they could have circled around, using Becca’s voice as cover, approaching from—

  I yelp at a loud crash behind me and race into the center of the clearing, gaping at the spot where I’d just stood. Becca is still in the same place, doubled over laughing.

  “Your face!” she exclaims, and I see a glint of moonlight on scuffed metal where her shovel lies. She’d tossed it behind me to scare the shit out of me. And it had worked.

  “That wasn’t funny,” I snap, stalking back. “Let’s just get out of here.”

  “Hang on, hang on,” she says, lifting a hand as she crouches next to the rolled carpet. “Gotta give Angie the kiss of death.”

  “Angelica,” I correct her.

  “Of course,” she says, peeling back the carpet so Angelica’s body lies exposed and still. “My apologies, Angelica.”

  Where in life Angelica was what an older male co-worker called a “demon spitfire,” she is indeed angelic in death. Small and pale, with skin that glows in the moonlight. Her face is not damaged; it looks like she’s only asleep. The front of her white blouse is stained dark with blood and dirt, and her skirt is bunched halfway up her thighs, showing scraped knees and smears of dried blood on her calves. Her shoulder-length dark hair is splayed around her head like a fan, and Becca uses her thumb to push a strand off her forehead.

  “Ooh,” she says. “Chilly.” Then she gives a maniacal laugh that only makes this entire, dreadful situation impossibly more dreadful and leans down to press her lips to Angelica’s cold forehead. She lingers too long, knowing it makes me sick. She’s already messed with Angelica; I’m the only one left for her to amuse herself with.

  At least, I’m supposed to be. My eyes skitter around the tree line, but there’s nothing there. Not that I can see, anyway. The wind picks up, rattling the branches and the leaves, making my skin feel brittle and cold. Becca’s waiting for me to beg her to stop touching the body so we can go, but I won’t give her the satisfaction. I dig another tissue out of my pocket and wipe my nose. I don’t need Becca to leave clues on the bodies; my DNA is probably everywhere. The only consolation is that if I go to jail, Becca will go, too, and Brampton will finally be serial-killer-free.

  “Fine, fine,” Becca says, shoving herself up from the cold ground and rolling her eyes at my non-drama. “All done.” She grabs an edge of the carpet and flips Angelica’s stiff form into the grave, the body landing with a muted thunk. I didn’t like Angelica in life but I feel bad for her in death, though I know Becca will mock me and do her best to make things worse if I let on that I care. Becca can always find a way to make things worse.

  I grab my shovel and start scooping dirt back over the body, ankles disappearing, then shins, then knees. Becca does the same on the other end, obscuring the dark lipstick mark on Angelica’s forehead. It takes far less time to fill in the hole than to dig it, and maybe it’s because the work is easier or maybe it’s because I can’t stop the anxious spiders crawling up my spine, telling me someone—or something—is watching from the woods, but I can’t get warm. I’m cold, my fingers numb, thighs aching. My eyes keep darting into the trees, searching for something I don’t want to find.

  “Calm down, Carrie,” Becca says, catching me. “There’s no one out there. What kind of lunatic would be in the woods right now?” Her lips quirk at her own joke, but I roll my eyes, refusing to smile.

  She pats the earth loosely over the grave, and we use fallen leaves and branches to cover it so it doesn’t look freshly disturbed. By the time we’re done, it’s like Angelica was never here.

  Becca rolls up the shovels in the carpet and tucks the bundle under her arm. “You know what we should do right now?” she asks, leading the way out of the clearing toward the spot where our unseen watcher may or may not have stood.

  “Go home, take a shower and a Valium?”

  She laughs. “You’re so funny, Carrie.”

  I wasn’t joking, but I don’t correct her.

  “We should go to the biodome,” she continues. “They have that promotion right now where you get special glasses so you can watch all the nighttime animals come out and do their thing.”

  “Nocturnal animals,” I say, eyeballing the suspicious spot. “Not nighttime.” It’s too dark to see much, but there’s nothing to indicate anyone or anything was ever here, besides us.

  “And you’re smart, too,” she trills, grinning at me over her shoulder.

  I stick out my tongue.

  “Remember how much you loved that place when we were little? You got left behind on that field trip and didn’t even care.”

  I was seven years old and stranded at a biodome, but I didn’t mind. Seeing my classmates file out behind the teacher and parent helpers, I’d crouched behind a giant hosta and watched them disappear. I counted as high as I could until they were gone, and then I’d finally explored the biodome on my own, choosing my own path, charting my own course, however briefly.

  “It’s only eight o’clock,” Becca adds, her voice carrying through the dark forest. “And there’s that diner across the street with cinnamon buns the size of your head. Maybe we can get one after.”

  There’s no point arguing. She’ll just get us lost in the woods and nag me until I agree. I trudge after her. “Okay, Becca. Awesome.”

  “They have those fishbowl margaritas, too,” she calls. “We’ll get a couple, to celebrate your new job. My treat. I’m proud of you!”

  Chapter 2

  Weston Stationery occupies the fourth floor of an industrial building in a business park on the outskirts of town. Despite the fact that we design and sell custom and novelty office supplies, our actual work space is drab and beige. The desks are cheap composite, the computers old, the walls bare. Our view is of the parking lot and, if you squint in nice weather, the highway. This was my first job out of college so I have seniority and an arguably good desk, sitting closest to the aisle near the windows, where I can admire the scenery.

  There are two interior offices, one of which is occupied by Troy, our boss. The other is being held for either Angelica or me, whoever earns the promotion to Novelty Concept Manager, a verdict that’s been outstanding for too long. For the past few weeks I’ve shown up, tentative and hopeful, and each week Troy has mumbled some excuse about why he hasn’t made a decision. Unbeknownst to him, there is no longer a decision to be made.

  Weston is supposed to be a creative environment, but everyone except Angelica follows the unwritten office dress code of blandly business casual, which makes her absence on Monday morning particularly noticeable. It’s 10:03 a.m. when someone finally says what everybody’s thinking: “Where’s Angelica?” In an office of fifteen, it’s impossible to miss when someone is late.

  I can’t tell who said it, but as soon as the words are out, everyone’s on their feet, peeking over their cubicle walls and peering around as though Angelica’s been there all morning and we’ve just missed her. I stand and imitate the others, doing my best impersonation of Becca impersonating a real, sensitive human.

  Troy finally emerges from his office, looking like he got dressed in the dark, as always. A psychedelic-patterned tie does nothing to disguise the fact that today’s white short-sleeved dress shirt is the same one he wore Friday, coffee stain and all.

  “Troy,” someone calls, “is Angelica off today?”

  He makes a show of glancing around. “Is she not here?”

  “No.”

  “Let me check my messages.” He retreats into his office and reappears again thirty seconds later. “She didn’t email to say she was sick. She’s not in the vacation calendar. Does someone have her home number?”

  “Don’t you have it?”

  “Um.” He returns to his office, and this time he’s gone for longer
, closer to two minutes. “Straight to voicemail,” he announces when he comes back.

  There’s a long silence as we all ponder what to do. It’s too soon to call the police, and no one here is really friends with anyone else, so none of us would volunteer to go to Angelica’s house, assuming anyone knows where she lives. And it’s only been an hour since we noticed she was missing so it’s too early to sound the alarm. Or too late.

  After another minute, there’s a quiet agreement to return to our tasks and monitor Angelica’s absence. If she shows up, Troy will speak to her about tardiness. And if she doesn’t…

  I get back to work. There’s still a promotion up for grabs.

  * * *

  I meet Graham for soup and sandwiches at a small café at the opposite end of the business park. We get a small booth in the corner, where we sat on our first unofficial date just over a year ago, when he still worked at Weston. Now he sells medical equipment and wears nice suits every day. He has shiny blond hair, pale-blue eyes, and a perfect smile and passes over his unopened packet of crackers so I can sprinkle extra in my soup, just the way I like it. He doesn’t even comment that I don’t need the extra calories because, unlike Becca, he doesn’t care.

  There aren’t an abundance of dining options in the business park, and the café is crowded. The air is thick with the smell of wet clothing and minestrone, and sounds of the afternoon lunch rush battle with the two flat-screen televisions hung on the wall above the counter, both showing the same golf tournament.

  “Man,” Graham says, taking a bite of his sandwich and leaving a crescent of teeth marks in the corner. “I love egg salad. I know that’s the lamest thing anyone’s ever said, but it’s true.”

  I stir my soup. “That’s not even the lamest thing I heard this morning. Today I spent two hours discussing the tension in binder clips.”