Dare Me Part 28

Pow-pow, I can hear Beth say. I can hear Beth say. Pow-pow. Pow-pow.

A Post-it left for me on the kitchen island: "A, Debbie says someone from PD called for you. Someone steal mascot again? Love, D."

Yes, Dad, Dad, I think, holding the edge of the counter. I think, holding the edge of the counter. That's exactly it. That's exactly it.

I'm running on Royston Road when the car pulls up.

I never run. Beth says runners are uncreative masturbators. I didn't know what that meant, but it made me never want to run.

But this morning, my stepmother's klonopin still sticky on my tongue, running seems right.

Like at practice, like at games, I can forget everything but the special talents of my special girl body, which does everything I ask it to, which is unravaged and pure, baby-oil soft and fluttered only with the bruises of girl sport.

The feel of the concrete pulsing up my s.h.i.+ns is near-exquisite and when the release comes, it's like hitting a stunt but better because it's just me and no one can even see, but I'm doing it, doing it anyway and without peering out waiting for anyone to tell me I hit it, because I know I did. I know it.

So I keep running. Until all I feel is nothing.

And no one can touch me. My phone shut off, far from me, and no one even knows where I am, if I'm anywhere at all.

Except the detectives.

It's just like on TV. They pull up to the curb, and one of them is leaning on the doorframe.

"Adelaide Hanlon?"

I stop, earbuds slipping from my ears.

"Can we ask you a few questions?"

The man gives me a bottle of water. It gives me something to do with my hands, my mouth.

We sit in an office, and when the woman sees my sweated legs puckering a little on the seat, she offers me the desk chair, and she doesn't seem to care that I sweat on it.

"If you'd feel more comfortable with your parents present," the man says, "we can call them."

"No," I say, shaking my head. "That's okay."

They both look at me and nod, as if I am being very wise.

Then they exchange a quick look. He leaves, and the woman stays.

In my head, I start doing my cheer counts. One-two, three-four. I count them until my heart finally slows down. Until I can empty my face, teen-girl bored.

"We're just trying to confirm a few details about last Monday night," she says.

She has a tight ponytail that reminds me of Coach's, and a dimple on one side of her mouth. She doesn't really smile, but she speaks softly.

Somehow I start to feel okay, like having to talk to the a.s.sistant princ.i.p.al about something you know about but had nothing to do with. If you just say as little as possible, they really can't do anything.

The questions start generally, more like a conversation. What do I like about school? How long have I been a cheerleader? Aren't some of the stunts dangerous?

When the questions turn, it's a gentle turn, or she renders it gently.

"So you and Coach French spend time together outside of school?"

The question seems strange. I think I've misheard it.

"She's my coach," I say.

"And last Monday night, did you see your coach?"

I don't know what to say. I have no idea what she told them.

"Last Monday?" I say. "I don't know."

"Try to remember, okay? Were you at her house last Monday?"

That second part, a gift. At her house. At her house. If Coach didn't tell them that, who would have? If Coach didn't tell them that, who would have?

"I guess I was," I say. "Sometimes I help her with her little girl."

"Like a babysitter while she goes out?"

"No, no," I say, calm as I can. Besides, who is she to call me a babysitter? "I don't babysit."

"So just pitching in?"

I look at her, at her bare lips and badly plucked eyebrows.

"I hang out there a lot," I say. "She helps me through stuff. I like being over there."

"So last Monday you were there with your coach and her husband?"

And her husband. "Yes," I say, because doesn't this have to be Coach's story and don't our stories have to be straight for both our sakes? "I was." "Yes," I say, because doesn't this have to be Coach's story and don't our stories have to be straight for both our sakes? "I was."

"And you knew the sergeant?"

"I'd see him in school."

"Was your coach friends with him?"

"I don't know," I say. "She never said anything to me."

"You never saw them together?"

"No."

I have no idea what I've done or undone.

"And you like being at Coach's house. You like spending time there." She's watching me closely, but I can't get over the st.i.tch of stray eyebrow hair to the side of her overgroomed right brow.

How could she miss something like that? That detail, like spotting a slack move in another squad's routine.

It makes me feel strong.

Deputy Hanlon, stone-cold lieutenant, my old guise-I'd forgotten how good they felt.

"That's what I said, yes, ma'am."

I lean back, stretch my legs long, and adjust my ponytail.

"It was a comfortable place to be? They seemed to get along?"

"Yeah," I say.

"Seem like a happy marriage?"

I look at her with my head tilted, like a dog. Like I can't guess what she might mean. Who thought about the happiness of marriages?

"Yeah, sure," I say, and my voice clicks into something else, the way I talk when I have to talk to people who could never understand anything at all but who think they get me, think they get everything about girls like me.

"We like Coach," I say. "She's a nice lady."

And I say, "Sometimes she shows us yoga moves. It's really fun. She's awesome. The Big Game is Monday, you should come."

I lean close, like I'm telling her a secret.

"We kick a.s.s Monday, we're going to Regionals next year."

"We may have some more questions," the detective says, as she walks me out.

"Okay," I say. "Cool." Which is a word I never use.

Walking past all the cops, all the detectives, I raise my runner's s.h.i.+rt a few inches, like I'm shaking it loose from my damp skin.

I let them all see my stomach, its tautness.

I let everyone see I'm not afraid, and that I'm not anything but a silly cheerleader, a feather-bodied sixteen-year-old with no more sense than a marshmallow peep.

I let them see I'm not anything.

Least of all what I am.

27

SAt.u.r.dAY AFTERNOON

At home, I drag my phone from under my mattress. drag my phone from under my mattress.

There are seven voicemails from Coach, and sixteen texts. They all say some variation on this: Call me before anything. Call me NOW. Call me before anything. Call me NOW.

But first, I decide to do some stretches, like Coach showed us.

Cat tilt. Puppy dog. Triangle pose.

She can wait.

I turn the shower on and stand under it a long time.

Then I blow-dry my hair, stretching each strand out languorously, my mind doing various twists and turns.

Somewhere in the back of my head some old cheer motivational words sputter forth: Time comes, you have to listen to yourself. Time comes, you have to listen to yourself.

That seems like something old Coach Templeton-Fish-would've said, or printed out from the internet, or typed in scroll font at the bottom of our squad sheets.

As if listening to yourself was just something you could do. As if there were something there to listen to. A self inside you with all kinds of smart things to say.

My fingers touch my open computer screen, our squad Facebook page, all the cheer photos from three years of death defiance and bright ribbons.

Cheerlebrities!!!

There's one shot of Beth and me in the foreground, our faces glitter-crusted, our mouths open, tongues out, our fingers curled into the devil hand sign.

We look terrifying.

The picture was from last year. At first, I don't recognize myself. With all the paint, we are impossible to tell apart. Not just Beth and me, but all of us.