Catch up on the previous chapters here
Adam didn’t wear his dark suit and tie, which just made him look strange. Most of the check-ins happened in Waterloo, although it wasn’t like Nell and Kent snuck into the office or anything. They walked into the building like normal, which was a pretty clear sign that nobody thought they were being followed or watched or any of that. The case was cold, and they had never properly been in witness protection, so they had to take what they could get and be grateful for it.
Adam in jeans and a Slipknot t-shirt felt like a sign of the apocalypse, but that was probably better than Adam in full FBI mode showing up at their apartment, even if his severe haircut was jarring in contrast. He carried a backpack instead of a briefcase and slipped out of an old pair of loafers, offering his hand to each of them in turn. “Talked to your dad yesterday,” he told Kent.
“Yeah?”
Adam nodded and gestured for them to go on into the living room section of the apartment. “He’s going to see about getting his hands on a copy and he sends his love.”
Nell figured there was probably more than that, but communication with their families—Kent’s immediate family and her grandmother—was all done through letters and much delayed, like it was WWII and things had to be scrutinized for secret messages or revealing information. She didn’t understand how it worked, but was just glad it did, because at least it meant Gran didn’t think she was dead or missing.
“Right, so …” Adam took the chair and pulled out his own Since You Went Away, which looked far worse for the wear than the copy Art lent Nell, and a thick file. “Do you mind if …?”
Kent helped move the coffee table closer to Adam, hesitated, and then sat down next to Nell without offering coffee or anything. At this point Adam was so intent he might not have heard the question, anyway.
“First thing: the publisher’s refusing to reveal C. J. O’Connell’s full name, or address whether O’Connell is, in fact, his last name.”
Nell blinked and took Kent’s hand in both her own when he offered it. “Is that …?”
“Suspicious?” Adam suggested, then shook his head. “If it’s a pseudonym, they’ve basically promised him they won’t ever tell, barring a warrant for that information. But it also means the publisher knows something’s up, so their legal department will be sent after that to see if it’s something they really need to worry about.”
“And that helps us?” Kent asked doubtfully.
The agent shrugged. “Any cracks we can exploit … any loose lips … we might be warning him but, at this point, if this highly anticipated debut author disappears before he can do all his scheduled events, then he gets reported missing and everyone’s searching for him, anyway.”
Adam might shrug, but, if they didn’t know what O’Connell looked like, it was entirely possible he could disappear to Colchester.
“We’ve got someone on his literary agency, but I don’t have a report on that yet,” he continued, pushing the book back so he could open and page through the file. “It’s probably the same situation as the publisher, or else I would’ve heard something.”
“They’re reporting to you?” Kent’s voice was sharp.
But Adam shook his head. “They’re reporting to Kalamazoo and it’s being forwarded to me. Only one person knows Iowa has anything to do with this.”
Nell looked at Kent, because that one person wouldn’t be his dad, so there were at least two, but that just seemed like quibbling over nothing. Except … wait, did Kent’s dad know they were in Iowa? He’d called in the favor, sure, but …
“We’re looking into getting a warrant for both of them, by the way,” Adam continued. “The publisher and the literary agency. Whichever we can finagle first to get his real name so we have something more specific to work with than the entire list of people involved back in 2019.”
Nell closed her eyes, but Kent seemed alert as ever because he asked “You’re not looking back through that list?”
“I have the list, but part of this whole situation means I can’t just ask people in my office for their eyes, too, because it’s a Michigan case. In fact, I have the whole file, and I’ve been spending a lot of time with it and making comparisons lately.”
It was almost too much effort to pry open her lids again and study Adam, but yes, there were bags under his eyes. He was losing sleep over this, too, which was mostly comforting.
“Nell, I’ve got a difficult question for you.”
Like there were difficult questions no one had yet asked her. “Okay.”
“What are the chances someone bugged your apartment?”
She blinked.
“See, the part in here …” Adam started to flip through the book, then shrugged. “The narrator describes the morning after Kayleigh’s murder. He says he shows up, Rosie’s roommate lets him in, and he stays for the police interview. And it … well.” He looked at the folder, but apparently decided they didn’t really need the full side-by-side comparison. “It sounds a lot like what happened when your advisor showed up and refused to leave for the remainder of the interview, so … if someone had your living room bugged, and was listening in …”
“And just put himself in Michael’s place?” Kent mused.
Nell shook her head. “You think someone had a camera in our apartment?”
“It wouldn’t have to be a camera,” Adam almost reassured her. “A microphone would be enough.”
She shook her head again. “The whole thing was searched after Heidi was killed.”
“And he’s the one who killed her, so he would’ve known a search was coming and removed it.”
Nell tried blinking, but that wasn’t helping, so she turned to Kent.
He shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s a good point, though. And, uh … I mean, I guess it wouldn’t take much to imagine you’d cry yourself to sleep in the middle of all that.”
Well, no, and of course she had, but only when she was alone. Nobody had ever come into her bedroom, because the first time Kent was supposed to have joined her there … Nell shook her head, but she couldn’t even begin to voice all those thoughts.
“I’m just saying,” Adam protested patiently, if not gently, “that it’s a question that occurred to me considering the similarity between that particular scene and the interview records on file.”
“You … wait, okay, so …” Nell grabbed one of the pillows on the couch and hugged it. “This guy … Cal, or O’Connell, or whoever … saw me, and fixated on me, and had enough access to bug the apartment? And then … what, he listened in to see how I was taking it?”
Adam nodded. “Someone who thought he was doing all of this for you would also likely look for signs that you were grateful.”
“The late bus and Trevor stealing my parking spot, maybe, but killing my friends?” This head shake was more violent, but she didn’t bother to grab for the loosened hair clips. “He just … he …”
“Escalated.”
They both looked at Kent, who winced, but shrugged. “Kelsey and Ashley were only about a month apart.”
“So were Margaret and Trevor,” Adam pointed out.
“But they weren’t as personal.”
Nell couldn’t just keep shaking her head forever, could she? “Ashely died in a car crash. He messed with her car, not …” Not what he’d done to Kelsey, or what he ended up doing to Heidi. Those were up close. Hands-on. With them, he took his time and was right there when they died.
“He wanted something from you,” Kent said quietly, “and he didn’t get it after Margaret. In fact, he opened things up for Trevor to be more of an ass, so killing Trevor was fixing a problem he’d created. Then …”
“Winter break,” Adam agreed. “Both Kelsey and Ashleigh were during winter quarter. Well,” he added at Nell’s quick breath, flapping a hand to say that yes, fine, he knew Ashleigh’s fatal accident was the day after exams ended. “Break was bad, because you were gone for over a month, and he had to take his frustrations out somewhere. Then you’re back, but you’re spending time with them instead of him, so …
“I wasn’t even the one who had them over!” Nell protested. “That was Heidi! And then he killed her, too!”
Adam nodded again, and God, did she have to keep being right when it came to this kind of thing? “He created problems he thought he could solve for you, and he did.”
“Right, but …” She pointed at Kent. “Wouldn’t you think the long-term boyfriend would be a bigger problem for some random dude on the street obsessed with me? Because, if he had the place bugged, then he had to know Kent existed. Right?”
This time, Adam tilted his head. “You didn’t visit at all until that final weekend,” he said to Kent.
Nell could feel Kent stiffen with the implied critique. “No.”
She reached for his hand without looking away from Adam. “I was the one who went home. Weekends and breaks.”
“Right, but, as Calvin or O’Connell or whoever says, he didn’t go with you for either of the holidays. And …” Adam dropped his eyes and flipped some pages to find a calendar. “Your spring breaks didn’t match up, so Kent didn’t come to your apartment then, either.”
Kent laughed suddenly. “You think this guy didn’t even realize I exist.”
“You’re not in the book.”
“He’s in the book the night Hailey dies,” Nell protested. “She’s out to dinner with him.”
Adam shrugged. “With a friend. It doesn’t have to be male, and it doesn’t have to be a long-term relationship. And Cal doesn’t seem to think Rosie’s the kind to have a one-night stand.”
“But …” Nell closed her eyes and dropped her face into her hands like maybe that would help her headache go away. Like they could really do this, untangle the book between real life and some stranger’s fantasy, and make it work. Make it work enough so that it could all, please, God, go away.
from Since You Went Away by C. J. O’Connell (Penguin, 2024)
The problem with being resilient is that it means you have to keep being tested. And it’s not an argument to just let people flounder. Kids, for example. I keep hearing “Kids are resilient—they’ll be okay” for things that no one, of any age, should have to endure, and just because you live through something doesn’t mean you really survive it. It doesn’t mean pieces aren’t chipped off.
There was a bad car crash last night or early this morning. Rosie went home yesterday, because exams are over and things are already bad enough around here, but …
They just released the name. It’s Aster.
Rosie hasn’t responded to my text yet. I don’t want to pressure her, don’t want to push her … don’t want to demand more of her when, once again, she’s closer to the center of it than I am. I’m sure she knows by now. It’s another K student, another friend who was over at their apartment.
Aster knew Kayleigh. Aster was one of the girls who turned to Rosie for comfort.
Aster was—and why is the past tense so easy?—also the only person with a higher GPA than Rosie in their entire class. Which, fine, being K, it’s a small class, but Aster would have been valedictorian if she kept her grades up for the final quarter. Rosie was salutatorian, but I’m sure she’s not thinking of that right now.
It’s not the same as Kayleigh. That’s good, because how much tragedy can one graduating class endure? They’re all so damn resilient, it sucks. It’s an accident, and maybe Aster was drunk, but at least Aster was alone. She didn’t take anyone with her.
Rosie wasn’t going to be going home with Aster or anything, but that’s what crossed my mind first: what if they’d been together? If Rosie hadn’t already headed home yesterday, would she have gone out last night? Assuming Aster was out celebrating exams being over, considering the time. She wouldn’t have been driving back to her parents’ in the middle of the night, anyway, so that’s the best explanation. Drunk, maybe there was a deer, the roads aren’t entirely clear …
It’s hard to find that line between caring and overprotective, especially when the person you’re worried about doesn’t take good care of herself. Give her another person and she’s all over it, checking every box and thinking of every possible action, but when it comes to Rosie, Rosie doesn’t know what to do. Most days it seems like she’s lucky her breathing and heartbeat are automatic because, if she had to think about those to keep herself alive, she wouldn’t. She constantly breathes for others and forgets that she needs oxygen, too.
Rebecca Frost 
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