chapter thirty-2

I felt acid in my mouth as everything started to crack and splinter, shattering at the corners, until it all crumbled in front of me and landed at my feet. It was as if she were someone else, someone other than my sister, Emily, the girl I'd spent summer evenings licking strawberry ice cream cones with or riding beside in her Mini Cooper listening to the country music songs that were always blasting from the speakers. "Emily," I rasped, my mouth dry as sweat collected on my forehead, panicked and afraid and confused. "What did you do, Emily?" I felt as if I were about to retch onto her carpet, the room beginning to spin at the corners. She took the bag from me and shrugged. "I killed Griffin Tomlin. It was the only way to get him to leave you alone." My chest started to ache as my heart beat unevenly, as if the muscles were working against each other and twisting in opposite directions. My mouth filled with saliva, my stomach threatening to heave. "I never wanted you to . . . to kill him. Emily, oh my—" I covered my face with my hands and I tried to breathe in, out, breathe in, out, to stop myself from hurling at the thought that she'd actually murdered someone. But nothing could stop the churning feeling in my stomach that caused my hands to grow clammy and my head to go dizzy. She'd killed him because of what I'd told her. "Yeah, you did," she told me, speaking as if it were obvious, and if I hadn't been so terrified or revolted, I would've got annoyed with her for it. "That day at the barn? You said you just wanted him to go away? You know, get run over by a bus or die of dehydration as a result of massive diarrhea?" I blinked at her, really believing I was about to pass out. "You killed him because of a joke I made?!" "Okay, well, no. But I couldn't keep letting him hurt you anymore. He was never going to leave you alone, so I decided I had to kill him," she told me, letting out a slight laugh as she shrugged, like it was that simple, that casual. I didn't want this, I wanted to tell her—I never wanted Griffin Tomlin dead—but nothing would come from my lips except for breaths I couldn't remember taking. All I could imagine was his body floating in his pool, or the casket in front of the pulpit at the church that afternoon, or all the tinfoil-wrapped dishes in the trash cans at the curb of the Tomlins' house. That was because of me. Because of what I had told her about Griffin. I didn't want this, I wanted to scream but, as always, my voice left me when I needed it the most. "Everything I do," she told me then, her voice coaxing and wrong and too close, "is for you, Clara. So you can be safe now." And then she smiled again as she reached out and wrapped her arms around me, drawing me close to her. My muscles stiffened under her arms as she nuzzled her chin against my shoulder. I stood, my hands limp at my sides, unable to lift or move them. When she pulled away, I realized what shade her eyes looked to be in that moment. Griffin Tomlin's eyes were the color of the surface of the ocean. And Emily's were the color of its depths. It was the end of September, just that time when the bright green leaves became tinted with oranges, yellows, and reds outside the windows of the house. I was spreading crunchy peanut butter over my toast as I glanced over at Emily, sitting on the barstool beside me, eating her cereal as she scrolled through her phone. Every time I looked at her, I couldn't help but think of what she must have seen that night she'd murdered Griffin, if maybe he'd fought her or begged or screamed, and it made my chest ache. She'd become him in that moment, someone capable of ignoring the pleas and cries of someone else desperate to keep what belonged to them, and I wanted to retch at the thought that it was because of what I'd told her. I never wanted that. I never wanted her to become like him to protect me. I wanted to be safe. That was it. And now I was, but it felt wrong. Like everything in me was weighed down by something even heavier than the fear I'd felt before. And all the while, it was as if none of this mattered to her. She was still the same, eating her cereal and on her phone, untouched. She'd killed someone. She'd watched the light leave his eyes. She'd left him in his backyard to drown in the pool waters as his blood tinted them red, and then she'd gone to bed, as if it had never happened at all. The doorbell rang, and I looked over my shoulder as my father took one last sip of his coffee and got up to answer it. Emily still stared at her phone, unbothered, her thumb scrolling as I craned my neck to catch a glimpse of the front door when my dad opened it, revealing two men standing on the doormat outside. They were both wearing blazers and ties, one wearing jeans while the other wore khakis. I thought they were from a church or something, asking if we wanted to buy a Bible or join their congregation, until I saw the glint of their badges on their belts. "Mr. Porterfield?" one of them asked. When my father nodded, almost as if he were stunned into silence, the man continued. "I'm Detective Marsh and this is Detective Anders. We're investigating the murder of your neighbor, Griffin Tomlin." My father's brow creased. "We already spoke to police officers a few weeks ago. None of us saw or heard anything that night." "Well, sir, we found a couple of text messages from one of your daughters on his phone sent about an hour before he died. Is . . ." I turned to Emily as she looked up, finally no longer unbothered, untouched, something bleeding into the greens of her eyes that also resembled fear. She looked at me, speechless and astounded, and I realized it wasn't fear in her eyes. It was shock. She'd never thought she would be caught. "Is Emily Porterfield here?" But— My father cleared his throat. He was scared for her. "Yes, she's here." —she was wrong.