obsession

ten

Jane.

The smell of pancakes. Bacon, sizzling in grease atop the stove, popping. I inhale. Nothing feels better than when Jane makes breakfast. I let the glowing warmth take me over, and I doze off again, into a blissful dream.

"Tate."

I jump and my eyes pop open. Jane is standing at the end of my bed, her white hands holding onto my bed rail. 

"What?" I ask, still feigning sleep. My voice is deep and hoarse.

"The police are here, Tate," she says gently, and comes over. "You need to come with me, okay, love? It's about Margot."

That's when the poison begins to seep through my skin. My stomach seems to wither within my body. 

"What?" I ask again.

"Come on, sweetie," she says, tugging at my comforter. "You need to answer a few questions."

I throw it over and follow Jane, still in my unicorn pajamas. I don't allow myself to be embarrassed as I see three cops, sitting at the breakfast nook, with a pot of coffee between them, steam rising and clouding their faces.

They shake my hand. Their hands are cold and I almost jerk back out of instinct, but I just look at them. I try to stare right into them, as if the words would jump right out of them.

"I'm Detective Tofflemire," the tall man says. He has slick black hair and a small mustache. The type of man Jane would point out and call handsome. 

"I'm Tate," I reply.

He smiles warmly. But it doesn't ease me whatsoever. "Hi, Tate. We're here regarding a friend of yours. Margot Ishmael."

"Yeah," I say, weakly. "She's my best friend."

The two other officers look uneasy, but Detective Tofflemire keeps his composure, smiling warmly. The poison spreads. 

"We're here wondering if you knew if she had contact with some friends. Boyfriends, maybe. People who could've been with her last night."

"Yeah," I stumble out. "Yeah, she had a boyfriend. She called me last night after they got in a fight."

One of the officers instantly perks up and begins to write down my statement with a green pen on a yellow pad of paper.

"Sit down and eat some breakfast," Detective says gently, "and you can tell me all about it."

I sit in an easy chair, a plate of food before me, but I don't touch it. I don't even look at it. "She called me last night and said her and her boyfriend, Charlie, got into a fight. She told me he hit her, and I got upset and told her to come over. We were supposed to have a sleepover. I was going to make her feel better."

I pause, and they wait patiently.

"She never came. I figured her mom wouldn't let her use the minivan that she always takes. Margot doesn't have a license, so she usually takes the car. I thought she might've been caught or something."

"Thank you, Tate," the detective tells me. He smiles his wide, warm smile again, although the situation is the furthest thing from warm. I want to tell him to stop, but I know that never in a million years would I have the courage to do so. "Earlier this morning, Margot's mother was about to head off to work when she contacted us, saying her daughter wasn't in bed. She panicked, but figured she would be with you."

"I'm sorry," is all I can say weakly, because what else could I say?

"Thank you for your time, Tate. You did great. You've really helped us a lot. And please, try to enjoy your day without much stress."

I notice then that Jane is clutching onto my shoulder as if her life depended on it, like I could disappear, any second.

When Margot and I had met, we were four years old. She'd thrown a ball across the yard during preschool and it'd hit me directly in the side of the face. I remember picking it up and throwing it right back at her after I'd gained composure, sobbing, and it hit her in the back of her head. We both were screaming and so we'd been sent to the nurses office. We were both sitting in there, frowning and holding ice packs to our heads. The principal told us to apologize to each other.

It was foggy after that incident, but somehow we'd ended up at the same table during lunchtime in kindergarten. I remember she forgot her lunch, and I could tell she was trying her hardest not to cry in front of everyone. I felt a pang of guilt and gave her half of my peanut butter sandwich. She said she hated peanut butter, but I saw her eating it anyway.

After that, she started following me everywhere around the playground. When I would be on the monkey bars, so would she. Eventually, we started talking after I accused her of being a stalker. And after discovering we had every single thing in common, we played together every single day.

When we were eleven, Margot's uncle had died and her mother was a wreck. We were upstairs in her bedroom when she confided in me that she hated her uncle because he had done things to her when he was alive. She made me promise that I would never tell a soul. We pinky-swore on it. 

I was always fascinated with Margot, with her strawberry-blonde hair and her full lips. I was jealous of her pink, lavish, fluffy bedroom. But all of it came with a price when it came to Margot- and I always wondered how she'd stayed so strong. 

"I would never make it out alive without you," she said to me when I'd asked her. 

We pinky-swore we would stick by each other to the day we die; that when we have children our first names will be their middle names- boy or not. 

I told her my biggest fear was being kidnapped. She told me her biggest fear was everyone forgetting her, and I always told her that that would never happen.

"Kieran's called the house for you," Jane tells me, but I tell her to tell him that I'm not home. She shrugs and hangs up the phone before reappearing in my bedroom a few moments later. She sits on the edge of my bed and holds my warm arm with her cold hand. 

"I'm sorry about Margot," she whispered. "But trust me, angel, more often than not in situations like these, they're always okay. She's gonna be okay."

"Yeah," was all I could say. 

"We really should get you something to eat," she says softly. "I'm so worried about you, Tate."

"I'm just not hungry," I confess. "I'm too worried about Margot to be focused on food."

"I know. But listen- she'll be okay. Right now, you need to care for yourself in this hard time," she says. "I'm going downstairs and I'm going to make you some dinner. I expect you to eat."

She disappears from the room and I sigh, screwing my eyes shut. 

Then, a tap on my window. 

Just as I was about to guess it was just a rock, there were a few more rapid taps to the window. I sit up instantly and turn towards it. 

Kieran is outside of my bedroom window, in a red baseball cap, and my eyes widen. I run to it. "Kieran! What are you doing here?"

He frowns. "I called and Jane said you weren't home. I got worried. And here you are, at home."

"So you came to my bedroom window?" I hiss quietly. "Look, I just lied because I'm going through a hard time. Margot is missing, and I'm worried sick. I just didn't want to see anybody."

He goes quiet and just looks off into the distance, still frowning. "Okay. Take as much time as you need, I guess."

He slides down the pipe connected to the side of my house and disappears into some hedges. I look after him and feel my stomach start to twist. 

Part of me wants him to come back, and for him to kiss me and keep looking at me with his big, bright eyes. 

The other part of me wants to hide away forever.