The Collective(5)

“Maybe when they die.” I’m joking, I think.

He sighs, condensation spilling out of his mouth. “That anger, Cam. That’s what I mean.”

“Look, I can’t help the way I—”

“And it isn’t doing a thing to them. You get that, don’t you? They’re going on with their night, drinking champagne, toasting their award-winner. They don’t think they’ve done anything wrong, and they never will. They see themselves as the victims. They see him as the victim.”

“How do you know that?”

He stares at me for what feels like a full minute.

I pull my coat closer. It’s cold out, but not with the energizing bite of a typical winter night. It’s more insidious, the chill seeping under the collar of my coat, through the weave of my tights, sliding down the back of my neck until my whole body is shivering and it feels more feverish than weather-related, not energizing at all. “I didn’t want to show you this,” Luke says.

He’s scrolling through his glowing phone, and then he’s handing it to me. I gape at the screen: The Blanchards grin back at me, hands grasping each other’s shoulders. Harris holding his golden award. A perfect little family.

Luke follows Lisette and Harris on Instagram (the father, Tom, doesn’t have an account). I know this. In fact, I was the one who asked him to do it, more than a year ago, figuring I’d get blocked if I tried. But the photo still gets to me. How could it not? Imagine looking at a posed picture of your child’s murderer. Imagine him basking in the warmth of his parents’ embrace. Imagine he’s staring straight at the camera, smiling up through his eyes, healthier and happier than you’ll ever be. . . .

“Read the caption,” Luke says.

I read, my fingernails digging into my palms.

Kudos to our Harris, recipient of the Martha L. Koch award!!! It seems like just yesterday you were a little boy, chasing Buster around the yard and dreaming of playing for the Yankees. Now you’re all grown up and surpassing OUR dreams. We couldn’t be prouder of the brilliant, thoughtful young man you’ve become!!!! #blessed I skim the comments—hearts and happy faces and praying hands sprinkled throughout them like confetti.

“Did you see the last comment?” Luke says.

I do now. It’s from Lisette. I look up at him.

“You see what I’m saying? Do you understand?”

“There’s a video?”

“There’s always a video.”

I glance back down at the screen, read the rest of the comment: To those of you who wrote us after seeing the video: Thank you, dear friends, for all your support. But this is a deeply disturbed woman. Please DON’T HATE HER. We DON’T. We forgive her, and you should too.

“‘We forgive her,’” I whisper.

“Do you understand, Cam?”

I don’t know what to say. I don’t understand anything in the world. Nothing makes sense. Nothing is fair. I haven’t understood anything since he killed her.

“Excuse me?”

It’s an older woman in a camel hair coat, and she seems to have appeared out of nowhere. She places a light hand on my shoulder, and my first thought is that she’s a Protect and Serve fan, wanting Luke’s autograph. “I won’t take up too much of your time.” She says it to me, though. Not Luke. “I know you’ve had a rough night.”

Condensation rushes from my nose. I glance at Luke, who is shaking his head. Then back at the woman. There’s something about her I know, but I can’t figure out what that thing is. “You’re a reporter,” I try. “I’ve seen you on TV.”

Luke hails a cab, steps back as it screeches to the curb. “We were just leaving,” he says.

“I’m not a reporter.” The woman clasps my wrist and stands very close to me, as though we’re not strangers at all but confidantes, in on the same secret. Her eyes are blue, and startlingly bright. I do know you. Where do I know you from? She takes my gloveless hand and presses something into it. A business card.

“It’s a group,” the woman says. “For people like us.”

“People like us?”

“I know who you are.” She is still holding my hand and grasps it tighter, her skin cool and dry. “I know how you feel.”

She leaves. As I slip into the cab, she hurries to the end of the street, her silver hair catching the glow of the streetlight. In a flash, I understand who she is and why she looked familiar to me. She’s one of the two women from the Brayburn Club—the ones whispering, like snakes.

I settle into the back seat and open my hand and stare at the business card: black, with one word written at the center in elegant white letters. No address. No phone number, email, or website. Just that one strange word: Niobe.


“WHAT DID THAT reporter give you?” says Luke once we are in the cab, speeding downtown through the empty streets toward an all-night diner on Greenwich that he knows of.

“She’s not a reporter.”

“Really?”

I don’t tell him where I’ve seen her before. I’m not sure why. I’ve only spent seconds with this woman, but I feel strange about those seconds, as though they’re something to be guarded. “She said she wasn’t.”

I almost don’t want to hand him the card, but I see he’s noticed it and so I do.