Look What You Made Me Do Read online

  I take a break from my binder clip design and search Brampton serial killer, reasoning that if everyone else is doing it, it will look strange if I don’t. The first page is various links to the local paper, all of which I’ve already scoured, and the second is more forums playing host to crime buffs and theorists. I skimmed those last night, and none of them have come close to identifying Becca or someone like her. They’re of the very strong opinion that the killer must be a man, since women don’t have the propensity for this level of sustained violence.

  Or they’re just better at covering it up.

  There’s a new link on page four, one I haven’t seen yet. It’s an article in a small paper from the next town over, and it’s called “We Love You, Fiona McBride.” Automatically, my mind flashes to the posters disintegrating all over town, hanging in tatters from lampposts and bus stops. Her parents—who actually appeared to care that their daughter was missing—have been holding their breath, waiting for that fated phone call from the police, telling them their daughter’s body was among those found in the park. But she wasn’t.

  I skim the rest of the article. Despite the guileless face smiling cheerily in the photograph, her parents describe Fiona as troubled and destructive, headed down a clichéd, dangerous road. They had last seen her three days before they reported her missing because she’d taken to running away or spending nights with friends, both of which meant squatting in local drug dens. A sweep of the known haunts had turned up nothing, with a few rumors that Fiona had been there briefly but not returned. She hasn’t been seen since.

  To the best of my knowledge, Becca doesn’t kill this frequently. If Fiona disappeared two weeks ago, it would be just a week between killing Fiona and Angelica. In my experience, Becca kills about once a year. But the alternative to Becca being the killer is that there’s a second serial killer in Brampton, and even though I’m alarmingly inured to Becca’s hobby, my mind is both unwilling and unable to wrap itself around the possibility of two prolific killers calling our small town home.

  I close the article. I know some people say the not knowing is the hardest part, but as someone who knows her sister is a serial killer, I respectfully disagree. I would much rather not know. Knowing opens up too many possibilities in my mind, too many paths to follow, never knowing where they lead, or along which one Becca is lurking. It’s the story of my life, and I hate it.

  I spot the time on the corner of my monitor: 11:58 a.m. I’m due to meet Graham for lunch at the Thai place in the business park, so I pull on my coat and head for the elevator without making eye contact with anyone. After my interview with Greaves, murmurs started that I didn’t seem quite sad enough about Angelica’s death. Coupled with the promotion dangling over my head like a sword, the office has banded together like a miniature, ineffective mob, leaving me the odd woman out.

  The icy air outside is a slap in the face. It feels colder than it did this morning, the sky more blue, the sun searing my eyes. Even without the buffer of the clouds, the temperature is near freezing, and I shrug deeper into my parka and jam my hands into my pockets. I didn’t bring a hat, and now I glance longingly at my car as I walk past, my ears already aching with cold.

  I stop.

  My car is in its usual parking spot next to the lamppost, and it’s hard to tell in the bright sun, but it looks like the interior light is on. I squint and walk closer, frowning when I realize the driver’s-side door is open. Brampton may be small enough that people seldom lock their doors, but we always close them. I try to think back to three hours ago when I arrived at work, but it’s such a routine trip that I can’t decide if what I’m remembering is from today or the thousand other days that came before it.

  I circle the car, parked innocently in a long line of equally uninspired cars, dirt flecked across bumpers, the windshields smudged with leaky stains left by the salt from the roads. Bending slightly, I squint to look into the driver’s-side window, but nothing inside the car is out of order, and when I pull open the door and stick my head in, it looks and smells fine, too. I shiver when a gust of icy air reminds me it’s November and give up my inspection. It was probably just me, stressed and careless. If someone was going to steal my car, they could do a lot worse than forget to close the door.

  I hustle across the business park, the ten-minute trek increasingly windy. By the time I arrive at Thai Me Up, my curls are a tangled nest, and my cheeks are so cold I can barely smile when I spot Graham at a small table by the window. Wearing a navy suit with a red-and-white-striped tie, he looks like he just stepped off his nonexistent private yacht. After a morning of people avoiding eye contact and whispering behind my back, his genuinely happy-to-see-you smile warms me more than the restaurant’s unreliable heating system.

  “Hey,” he says, wrapping me in a hug and kissing my cheek. “You look pretty.”

  “I’m freezing.” I slip out of my jacket, shivering in my black sweater and trousers, and take a seat, the dim lights of the restaurant glinting off the standard decor of carved wooden wall art, gleaming gold Buddhas, and framed photos of the Thai royal family. A server comes by with a cup of tea, and I gratefully wrap my hands around the porcelain, letting the heat seep in.

  “Are people still being weird?” Graham asks. I told him about the awkwardness with my co-workers, and because he used to work at Weston, he understands better than anyone.

  “No more than usual.”

  “And no word on the promotion?”

  I shake my head. Graham’s the only one who understands how it’s possible to feel sad about Angelica and still want the job.

  “You’ll get it,” he says.

  I worry the cup between my fingers. “I don’t know. Troy’s not exactly decisive, and this might be the reason he needs to stall indefinitely.”

  Graham studies me for a minute, and my heart skips a beat. Not the giddy, excited kind of skip like when we first met, or even ten days ago, but the paranoid kind. The kind that makes me wonder if he sees something in my face, if he secretly believes I had a hand in this.

  “It’s about that painting, isn’t it?” he says finally.

  “What?”

  “The stapler painting. The one you’ve had in your bedroom closet for months, waiting to hang in your new office.”

  My heart thuds painfully against my ribs. “No,” I say, my tone unconvincing.

  Graham laughs. “Why don’t you just hang it at home if you like it so much? I can help you. Then, when you get the job, you can bring it to the office.”

  “I don’t want to hang it at home,” I say, too sharply. Defensively. “It’s for work,” I amend, when Graham lifts an eyebrow. “Like a reward. Hanging it before I get the promotion—if I get it—is like popping the champagne before the party. It’s premature.”

  “Okay,” he says. “Up to you.”

  The server chooses that moment to return, interrupting the mild tension. Graham and I don’t really fight. It’s one of the things I love about him. With Becca, it’s the constant, quiet battle to not give in to her petty jabs, the nonstop effort of restraint. Graham rarely takes offense at anything, and he’s never hurtful. He’s uncommonly kind and self-aware, the polar opposite of my sister. Spending time with Becca is like tiptoeing through a war zone, waiting for the death blow at any second. Being with Graham is like going for a normal walk, anywhere, anytime.

  I order the lunch special I always get, and Graham does the same, giving me a questioning look before ordering a plate of spring rolls for us to split.

  “Sorry,” I say when the server is gone. “I’m really stressed.”

  He reaches over to touch my hand. “I get it. Everyone is. The stuff that’s been going on, it’s crazy. Maybe you should spend more nights at my place.”

  The offer’s not even lecherous. He truly thinks he could protect me from Footloose, who I’m 92 percent certain is my sister. Graham and I live on different sides of town, which puts us each closer to our jobs. Driving from Graham’s place would add
nearly thirty minutes to my commute; same for him if he stays with me. Because of it, we normally spend weekends together, not weeknights, to cut back on morning travel.

  “What do you think’s going on with all that?” I ask, avoiding the suggestion.

  A flicker of hurt crosses his face but is gone just as quickly. “I don’t know what to think,” he says. “A serial killer? Using Brampton to hide his bodies? It’s insane, and it’s all anyone at work is talking about. One of my clients was saying that his neighbor’s cousin disappeared three years ago, and they never knew what happened. There were rumors about him having money trouble and hiding out from loan sharks or something, but the family never believed it.”

  I think of the pictures in the paper this morning. “Was he one of the bodies they found?”

  Graham shakes his head. “Not yet.”

  I gulp my lukewarm tea. If it wasn’t one of the bodies at Kilduff, it could very well be someone I helped Becca dispose of. I rack my brain, trying to think back three years. I’ve always made a point not to learn the names of Becca’s victims or her reasons for killing them, but sometimes she talks while we’re working and I get the information whether I like it or not.

  The thirteen bodies I’ve helped hide have blurred together in a horrible maelstrom, but one of the reasons they haven’t been investigated more—or as part of a terrible whole—is because Becca occasionally makes an effort to create a reason for the disappearance, just like Shanna’s impromptu Mexican vacation. Gambling, sex trafficking, and mental illness are a few of the stories she’s planted. One missing person a year isn’t likely to point the police in the direction of a serial killer; thinning the odds with her rumors makes it even less likely.

  “What do you think the deal is with the missing feet?” I ask as the server returns with the spring rolls. If she overhears, her expression doesn’t change. She’s probably heard nothing but serial killer talk for the past few days.

  Graham takes a spring roll and dips it into the dish of pale-yellow sauce. “I don’t know. I mean, what if this is all a crazy coincidence? What if animals gnawed off the feet and the bodies are a random assortment, not just one guy dumping them there? What if we get everyone worked up and paranoid, and it’s all for nothing?”

  I stare at him, surprised. “Do you really think that? All those bodies…are a coincidence?”

  Honestly, it’d be great if the police took that approach, but the idea is even more mind boggling than the possibility of Brampton playing host to two serial killers.

  He shrugs. “I’m just saying, it’s too soon to jump to conclusions. And you, living alone in that old house, I don’t want you to be afraid.”

  I think of the creaks and groans I ignore on a daily basis, the ones that have started to sound increasingly ominous since the discovery of Angelica’s body. And while I don’t agree with the “coincidence” theory, I do agree that it’s too soon to jump to conclusions, though I don’t know which one’s worse: My sister’s an even more insane serial killer than I already thought or she has competition?

  * * *

  For the third night in a row, I return home to a cold, empty house. The door is locked, the kitchen is clean, and there are no cereal bowls in the living room. No Becca.

  I tell myself to relax as I hang my coat. That what I should be feeling is relief, not unease. But like so many Brampton residents, I’m uncomfortable. Even the small chance that the person responsible for the bodies in Kilduff is not my sister has me on edge.

  I head for the kitchen, tossing a tray of frozen pasta in the microwave and pacing as I wait for it to heat. My eyes lock on the warped back door, time and weather pushing it inward in a gentle swell, the white paint peeling. The door is about six feet away, but I squint at it anyway, the brass knob gleaming too bright in the fluorescent light. I step closer, bending, and use my hand to shield against the glare.

  It’s unlocked.

  It’s one of those tiny locks set into the knob, turned horizontal when locked, vertical when open. And now it’s vertical. To be sure, I reach out slowly and turn the knob, waiting for the telltale catch I felt this morning when I did the same thing from the opposite side. This time, there is no catch. The knob turns 180 degrees, popping slightly, the door groaning as it tries unsuccessfully to release from the jamb.

  The microwave beeps, and I jump away from the door as though I’ve been burned. My heart hammers, and I feel flushed and hot, jittery. This has to be Becca. It has to be. She still has keys so she could have let herself in and unlocked the back door in order to retrace her steps into the backyard and…What? Come in through a noisy, stuck door instead of creeping in through the front? She might get a kick out of messing with me this way, but above all she’s lazy, and the extra effort isn’t her style.

  I glance out the window over the sink into the backyard. It’s dark outside and too bright inside, and I can’t see anything. I pinch the lock and turn it to horizontal, the tiny piece of metal suddenly feeling small and insignificant.

  I retrieve my dinner from the microwave, the ravioli still frozen in the center, the white sauce burned to brown around the edges. I stir it up and chew carefully, eyes on the window. I never got around to hanging curtains in here so anyone outside could easily see me and I wouldn’t be able to see them.

  I take my meal into the living room and sit on the couch to eat. I reach automatically for the remote but think of the nonstop news cycle, serial killer serial killer serial killer, and decide against it. My eyes flicker to the curtains on the front window, white with yellow stripes, now closed. For a second, I feel relieved. Then I stiffen in my seat.

  The curtains were open when I left this morning.

  I glance around for more signs of change, any shift in my environment to suggest I’m not the only one in it. The lamps are in place. The couch cushions are in order. The lonely picture on the coffee table is still upright, me and Becca, mugging for the camera when we were kids, matching red bathing suits and sandy legs from a day at the beach.

  I get up and walk to the curtains. They stop three inches from the ground and my eyes scan the space between the hem and the carpet, looking for two socked feet, size nine, belonging to Becca.

  There’s nobody there.

  I reach tentatively for the fabric and pull back one side and then the other, swallowing hard as I peer into my small front yard. I’m not sure what I’m expecting. I parked there half an hour ago, walked up the steps, and opened the door. It’s just dead grass and an oak tree that’s lost its leaves. My car doors are closed and locked. I triple-checked before coming inside.

  I let out a shaky breath.

  This is Becca’s petty way of getting revenge. She’ll probably laugh it off later, whenever we make up, and tell me to be grateful she didn’t run me over. So I left some footprints and closed the curtains! You never told me not to!

  I tell myself to calm down. I know better than to react to this. She doesn’t even need to be here to enjoy the results of her stupid pranks. She’s probably at home, wrapped in a blanket, watching The Voice and smirking when she thinks of me here, finding her little discrepancies. When we were growing up, she used to run up the stairs ahead of me at bedtime, switching off all the lights. The house was old, and the only switch was at the top, meaning I had to climb the dark stairs and enter the even darker hall, lined with yawning doorways, knowing Becca lurked in one, waiting to jump out and terrify me. The anticipation was always scarier than her actual attack. It got to the point where she’d just run up and get in bed, leaving me to tiptoe tearfully up the stairs, waiting for the inevitable, hearing her snickers when it didn’t come.

  I give up on the cold pasta and take it to the kitchen, tossing the half-full tray in the trash. I have the house on a timer so the heat should come on about thirty minutes before I get home, but it barely works. The one—and only—good thing about Becca letting herself in is that she always blasts the heat so it’s warm when I get here. I hear the furnace in the baseme
nt, rumbling frantically as it tries to do its job, but it’ll be awhile. The sweater I wore to work is too thin, and I blame the cold for my goose bumps, not my overactive imagination.

  I head for the stairs, stopping at the bottom, knowing there’s a real chance Becca is up there, plotting her ultimate scare. Unlike when we were kids, there’s a switch down here, so I flip it on and listen. No telltale creaks. No snickers.

  I steel myself and start up the stairs, making myself climb at a normal speed, no tentative crawl. I step over the howling third step from the top and pause on the tiny landing. There are two small bedrooms up here and one bathroom. If Becca wanted to scare me, she’d be in my room, since I rarely use the other.

  I hum to myself, unconvincingly calm, and flip on the light in my room as I enter. If I’m expecting something terrible, I’m disappointed. It’s the same as I left it this morning. Neatly made queen bed and heavy wooden bedroom set inherited from my parents, the wood too dark.

  It’s an older home so the closet is small, but unlike Becca, I don’t have so many clothes that I require my own dressing room. The wooden doors are closed, as always, hiding my jumble of boring sweaters and blouses, work pants and skirts. The stapler painting is in there, too, the one I’m waiting to hang when I get my promotion.

  I reach for the door handles—tiny crystal orbs, original to the house—then I hesitate. If Becca’s here, this is where she’ll be. My bed is too low to the ground for her to hide underneath, as she often did when we were kids, reaching up to grab my foot if it hung over the edge of the mattress.