Vanishing Girls

And in that second I believe, truly believe, that maybe we can go back.

“Okay,” I say. “For old times’ sake. But—” I hold up a finger. “You better not say a word about that stupid video game you always play. I’ve had my pain-share for the day, thanks very much.”

Parker pretends to look offended. “Ancient Civ isn’t a game,” he says. “It’s—”

“A lifestyle,” I finish for him. “I know. You’ve told me a million times.”

“Do you know,” he says, as we start walking toward the parking lot, “it took me two years of play just to build my very first arena?”

“I hope that’s not a line you use on your first dates.”

“Third, actually. I don’t want to seem slutty.”

It’s then, walking next to Parker with that stupid costume swinging between us, throwing light in our eyes, that the plan for Dara’s birthday begins to take shape.

FEBRUARY 14

Dara’s Diary Entry

Parker broke up with me today. Again.

Happy fucking Valentine’s Day.

The weird thing is, the whole time he was talking, I kept staring at the burn mark on his shoulder and thinking about the time my freshman year we kept a lighter burning until it was hot and then made twin marks in our skin, swearing we would always be best friends. All of us. The three of us. But Nick wouldn’t do it, not even after we begged her, not even after she took two shots of straight SoCo and almost puked.

I guess there’s a reason people always say she’s the smart one.

A mistake, he called it. A mistake. Like getting the wrong answer on a math test. Like turning left instead of right.

You don’t even really like me. That’s another thing he said. And: We were friends before. Why can’t we be friends again?

Really, Parker? You got a 2300 on the SATs. Figure it out.

We talked for almost two hours. Or I should say: he talked. I don’t even remember half of what he said. That burn kept distracting me, the little half-moon scar, like a smile. And I kept thinking about the shock of pain when the lighter first touched my skin, so hot it almost felt cold at first. Weird how you can confuse two feelings so different. Cold and hot.

Pain and love.

But I guess that’s the whole point, isn’t it? Maybe that’s why I kept thinking about that time with the lighter. Here’s what nobody tells you: 90 percent of the time, when you fall in love, somebody gets burned.

JULY 23

Dara

When I get home from another day of doing absolutely nothing—killing time, riding my bike downtown, flipping through magazines at the CVS and pocketing the occasional lip gloss—I’m surprised to see Ariana standing on the front porch, holding a plastic bag under one arm. She spins around as I bump up onto the lawn with my bike.

“Oh,” she says, as if she wasn’t expecting me. “Hey.”

It’s a little after eight o’clock, and Mom must be home by now. Still, Nick’s bedroom window is the only one lit. Maybe Mom is in the kitchen, sitting in bare feet with her work shoes kicked under the table, eating soup straight from the can, bathed in the blue light of the TV. The search for Madeline Snow has consumed her—has consumed half the state—even though the news is always the same: there is none.

It’s been four days.

I think once again of what Sarah Snow said to me yesterday: The lying is the hardest part.

What did she mean?

I rest my bike on the lawn, not bothering with the kickstand, taking my time and letting Ariana sweat it out while I cross to the porch. I can’t remember the last time she came over. Even though she’s wearing her usual summer outfit, black wedge sneakers and frayed cutoffs so short the pockets stick out, envelope-like, from beneath the hem, plus a vintage T-shirt washed to gray, she looks almost like a stranger. Her hair is gelled into stiff peaks, as if she briefly stuck her head in a tub of Cool Whip.

“What are you doing here?” The question sounds more like an accusation, and Ariana flinches.

“Yeah.” She brings a finger to her lower lip, an echo of an old habit: Ariana sucked her thumb until she was in third grade. “Seeing you at the party reminded me. I have a bunch of stuff for you.” She presses the plastic bag into my hands, looking embarrassed, as if it contains porn or a severed head. “Half of it looks like trash, but I don’t know. There may be something you wanted in there.”

Inside the bag is a jumble of things: scraps of notepaper, cocktail napkins and paper coasters scrawled over with writing, a sparkly pink thong, a half-used tube of lip gloss, one strappy shoe that appears to be broken, a nearly empty bottle of Berry Crème Body Spray. It takes me a minute to recognize everything in the bag as mine—things I must have left at Ariana’s house over the years, things that must have rolled under the front seat of her car.

Suddenly, standing on the porch in front of a dark house with a flimsy plastic grocery bag full of my belongings, I know I’m going to cry. Ariana seems to be waiting for me to say something, but I can’t speak. If I speak, I’ll break.

“All right.” She hugs herself, shrugs. “So . . . I’ll see you around?”

No, I want to say. No. But I let her get halfway across the lawn, halfway back to the maroon Toyota she inherited from her stepbrother, which always smells like her, like clove cigarettes and coconut shampoo. By then my throat feels like it’s being squeezed inside a massive fist, and two words pop out before I can regret them: “What happened?”

Ariana freezes, one hand in her bag, where she has been rummaging for her keys. She doesn’t turn around right away.