The Falling of Stars: A Psychological Thriller Read online

  Also by Traci Finlay

  The Rules of Burken

  Copyright © 2019 by Traci Finlay

  All rights reserved.

  Edited by Joyce Sweeney (sweeneywritingcoach.com) and Erica Russikoff (ericaedits.com)

  Formatted by Jovana Shirley (unforeseenediting.com)

  Cover design by Rena Hoberman (coverquill.com)

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  To everyone suffering from depression and feelings of worthlessness…

  I understand you. I see you. I love you.

  And I am so, so proud of you.

  Stay strong, tiger. You got this.

  CONTENTS

  National Suicide Prevention Hotline

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  Two and a Half Years Later

  National Suicide Prevention Hotline

  Acknowledgements

  If you or a loved one are struggling with suicidal thoughts or depression, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Hotline.

  Call 1-800-273-8255

  Or text HOME to 741741

  Your worth is not determined by the lies in your mind.

  1

  EVE

  Malik holds my hand as we walk toward the gravesite. He hasn’t held my hand since he was about ten. Is it awful that I’m finding a silver lining at this teenage funeral because my sixteen-year-old son is holding my hand? I duck my head as my eyes well for the nine-hundredth time in two days. Something else for me to feel guilty about.

  Malik is spooked; I see it in his eyes. Jordan’s passing is tragic. A child taking his own life is never easy, but this hits home for Malik, I can tell. Childhood friends—nostalgia. Distanced with age—guilt. The thought of sweet, fourteen-year-old Jordan, fresh out of puberty, with a gun to his head—unfathomable.

  My grip on his hand tightens as we head toward the tent and chairs and gathering people. Not too hard—it may remind him that he’s holding his mommy’s hand, and he might let go. But hard enough to let him know he’s not alone. Every single person drooping over that hole feels some sort of guilt. We all feel we could’ve prevented it somehow. We all take blame for Jordan’s suicide, regardless of our degree of separation.

  I’m surprised when Malik returns my squeeze hard enough that it borderline hurts. I turn my eyes up to him. Up. I’ll never be cool with my kid being taller than I. “I can’t look at his mom,” he whispers, swiping his hand roughly over his mouth and down his chin. His eyes dart in all directions—the hearse, a patch of trees, headstones, people—anything that is not the mother of Jordan Sawyer.

  “I know,” I whisper back, and forcefully turn my eyes in the direction he can’t—Jill Sawyer molded into a folding chair, her feet planted on the turf leading up to the hollowed earth that waits to envelop her son. “I can’t even imagine, Malik.” I swallow hard because Malik is already breaking down, and one of us needs to hold it together.

  I see the tight group of teenagers the same time Malik does, because I feel his hand releasing mine to go join them, but I’m not ready. While their presence gives him strength, it’s tearing mine down, and if he lets go of my hand I’ll cry. “Malik?” I say desperately. His head swivels toward me at the sound of my voice cracking, and he’s looking at me like he’s concerned, and it’s disconcerting that we’re switching roles right now, but we’re still connected by the fingertips and frozen at arm’s length, and he needs to know. “If you ever—” I involuntarily swallow.

  Malik lets go of my hand but steps toward me, shoving his hands in the pockets of his dress pants. “What, Mom?”

  I glance back and forth from the ground to his chest—his black dress shirt, his silver tie. I can’t meet his eyes. “If you ever do … what Jordan did. If you ever feel like, like that’s what life’s become. That you need to—to do that. I mean, please don’t. I hope you never do. But if you do, just … put the gun to my head first. Okay?” And now I look into his eyes. Silver-blue, just like mine. The only part of us that looks alike. Only now, mine are pleading and his are registering. “I’d rather you blow my brains out than to turn me into...” I can’t say Jill’s name.

  Malik’s face sobers, assuming the parental role as quickly as I relinquished it. He gazes over my head toward Jill and pulls me into a hug. “I promise, you drama queen. Now stop being so extra.”

  I hate how soft I’ve become; I’m the parent. I should be comforting him. Now I feel even more guilty because my actions made him look at Jill when he just said he can’t look at her.

  I release him and dab at my face, forcing a smile. “Go see your friends.” There. I’m a parent again.

  He chuckles, though, and shakes his head, putting his hand on my back and guiding me toward the turf. “We need to talk to Jill, Mom. She needs all the support she can get. Those guys can wait.”

  I sigh. I hate when he adults better than I do.

  We wait awkwardly as a mute Jill receives hugs from people I don’t recognize. Any other day, I’d ask her who they were, but not today. At least a hundred people are standing around, and yet I can hear each of their heartbeats, the blood swooshing through everyone’s veins. The whispers are monotone, the condolences so hushed and repetitive they’ve become background noise. A breeze sneaks through the herd of us, causing palm trees to rattle above our heads and putting a damper on the heat that is a Miami autumn. October is just as scorching as July, but today is unseasonably cool. And by cool, I mean eighty degrees.

  The couple moves on, and Malik leans down first to hug Jill. She immediately reacts to his embrace, crying and wrapping her arms around his neck as she stands. “Oh, Malik. You were his best friend growing up. You were like his big brother. He loved you so much. Thank you for loving him and for being such a good friend.” She’s looking him up and down and tracing her hands along his arms, his shoulders, as if Jordan would manifest from Malik’s teenage body. As if visions of their sleepovers and bike rides and bonfires are radiating from him. She touches his face—his jaw is quivering—like it’s the only teenage boy’s face she’ll ever touch again.

  “I’m sorry,” is all Malik can manage, and my heart breaks. Malik hadn’t hung out with Jordan since middle school three years ago. And even so, each phone call and every visit was initiated by Jordan, who at that time was an eleven-year-old desperate to salvage a childhood friendship with a hormone-raging, thirteen-year-old Malik waging wars in his head over girls and sports, and there wasn’t much room for the immaturity that was Jordan Sawyer.

  Jill turns to me. “Eve!” she sobs int
o my shoulder. “Eve, why did he do this?” She pulls away and stares into my eyes. Waiting. She actually wants me to answer this question.

  Time halts, and I can’t breathe. I finally manage to shake my head. “I don’t know, Jill. I’m so sorry.” I glance at Malik—who also seems to be experiencing this horrific time-annihilating phenomenon—and flick my gaze toward his friends. He graciously bows out just as Jill’s wife, Petra, approaches and puts her arm around Jill’s shoulder.

  Petra and I lock eyes and smile sadly before she gazes back toward the ground, her hand rubbing Jill’s back. I’ve never been able to break through Petra’s shell, even though I’m Jill’s oldest friend. I’d known Jill before she even knew she was gay. I tell myself Petra is simply an introvert and not to take it to heart. She seems to really love Jill, and that’s all that matters.

  Jill buries her head in my shoulder again, and I wrap my arms around her. There’s nothing to say to a mother whose child took his own life, so I just say, “I love you, Jill. I’m so sorry,” over and over until Petra gestures toward the others waiting to give condolences. Like a robot, Jill turns to the people behind me.

  I move toward Petra. “How are you holding up?”

  Petra sighs and tugs a curly strand of hair. “I’m okay. Thanks for asking, Eve. You’re the first person to ask me how I’m doing.”

  I give her a sympathetic look. “Don’t take it personally. It’s just that Jill is, you know, the biological mom. Stepparents always get pushed to the side, I’m sorry.”

  She clicks her tongue. “Nah, I get it. Jill and I’ve only been together a few years. I guess people would think Jordan and I weren’t close. But I loved that kid, Eve. I did.” Her eyes mist and she shifts her feet, her hand returning to Jill’s back to absently rub.

  “I know you did.” I glance over at Malik, who’s gelled right into his group of friends. Population: two boys from Malik’s JV football team, and four girls. I know them all from the sophomore English classes I teach at their high school.

  I’m just about to turn my attention back to Petra when I see Malik’s hand graze across the back of one of the girls—a cheerleader, probably. Her back is to me, so I can’t tell who she is. But she turns her head to whisper to Malik, and I recognize her profile. It’s Creed Holloway. Definitely not a cheerleader.

  I’m trying to figure out what this anomaly of sophomores is doing at a freshman funeral when I feel a hand being shoved into mine and is shaking it. I look at my hand, my eyes following past the connected one, up the arm, and into the eyes of a woman who looks identical to Petra, only with longer hair. “…this is Eve Hunter. Eve, this is my twin sister, Mallory.”

  “Mallory,” I repeat. “Nice to meet you.” I’m confused as to why I’m being introduced to Petra’s sister, but apparently I missed an entire conversation spying on my son, so who knows what I agreed to?

  Petra turns to Jill, who’s hugging Jeremiah Lorrey, the high school superintendent and my boss, and I realize Petra’s just pawned me off on her sister so she can get back to Jill and the condolences.

  “So, Petra says your son was friends with Jordan?” Mallory’s sustained blinks indicate her high level of curiosity toward my answer.

  I nod. “Yes, Malik grew up with Jordan. He’s right there.” I gesture toward his group.

  She turns back to me with a puzzled look. “The blonde one?”

  Now I feel guilty. She doesn’t know our story. “No, the darker-haired one.”

  She looks at me again, and I can tell it’s just not registering. “The who now?”

  “The boy with the dreadlocks.”

  She masks the inevitable shocked look, her eyes darting from my pale skin and reddish-blonde hair to my honey-colored son with light brown, shoulder-length dreads pulled back in a low ponytail. I clear my throat. “His dad was … not Irish, like I am,” I say and pray she doesn’t ask questions about Malik’s father.

  “Ah! How old is he?”

  “Sixteen.”

  I wait for the second look of shock that always comes after realizing we’re different ethnicities—the one that says I barely look older than sixteen myself, thanks to my petite stature and the freckles across my nose. “You must’ve been a child when you had him. How old were you?”

  “Sixteen.”

  She blinks rapidly as she does the math that makes me thirty-two. She hasn’t upset me; I’m used to this. The events that led to Malik don’t matter, because he’s my son and I love him beyond comprehension. But I really, really, really don’t want her to ask about it. I pretend to scratch my face with my left hand, giving her a glimpse of my wedding ring so she can conclude that I’m happily married. I really wish my husband were here right now.

  “He’s breathtaking, Eve.” She turns back to Malik, who’s swaying next to Creed and inching closer to her with each sway.

  I thank her just as the minister begins reading from Psalms, and the crowd hushes. I feel a small hand slip into mine—Jill’s. Holy crap, how did I end up next to the grieving mother during the most horrible time of her life? Should I move and let someone closer to her stand here? I look at my colleagues—Mr. Lorrey and a few other teachers who taught Jordan’s freshman classes—but in order to join them, I’d have to abandon the grieving mother who grabbed my hand in the first place.

  Besides, I am the closest thing to family. Jill hasn’t been close with hers since she came out twelve years ago, so I straighten my shoulders and accept my fate at her right hand with Petra at her left as we hear about valleys of shadows of death.

  The minister finishes, and the casket is mechanically lowered into the ground. I hear sniffling and soft sobs throughout the gathering; Jill is a stone. I close my eyes and try to remember the last time I saw Jordan, but I can’t. It must’ve been July when I gave him his acceptance letter to Liberty School of Excellence. I pulled some strings for Jill, bypassing a waiting list to get Jordan enrolled in the most prestigious private school in Miami-Dade County for his freshman year—the perks of being staff. I remember how she peeled around the room, clapping and cheering, and Jordan looked back and forth from me to the letter, his crooked grin waxing wider with each second. “Malik goes to school there?” he’d asked in his squeaky, pubescent voice.

  No, that couldn’t’ve been the last time, because I ran into him the first week of school and asked him how he was doing. I try to remember his response, if he’d given any indication of being suicidal. I just don’t remember. I’m angry with myself. I should’ve been more involved. I should’ve sought him out. I should’ve—

  My thoughts are interrupted by Mallory saying it was nice to meet me, although not under the circumstances, and she hopes to see me again sometime, although not under the circumstances. I return her sentiments and turn to Jill. She’s hugging the last of the mourners, and I can tell she’s exhausted. I look at Petra. “She needs to rest.”

  Petra nods just as Jill pivots toward me, her eyes having gone from glazed to fiery in about two seconds. “I need to tell you something, Eve.”

  I start. “What is it?”

  “The cops don’t want to hear it because they deal with teen suicide every day, and they don’t care. But something happened to Jordan to make him do this. I know it.”

  Petra rolls her eyes behind Jill and shakes her head at me. I hesitate before responding. “What do you mean, Jill? What happened?”

  Jill shakes her head frantically, and for a second I think she’s having a seizure. “I don’t know. Something, someone was putting a bug in his ear. I’m going to find out. Will you help me?”

  Petra looks attentive now, her droll dismissal of Jill’s conspiracy morphing quickly to unease at her call to action. She puts her hands on Jill’s shoulders. “Jill, you have to stop this,” she whispers like she’s speaking to a five-year-old. “Let the cops do their investigating. You can’t ask Eve to involve herself in something that you don’t know is true.”

  Jill shrugs Petra’s hands off. “I do know.” She’s s
taring at me. They’re both staring at me, waiting for my response.

  But I don’t know what to say. Jill is acting pretty erratic right now, and it does sound like a desperate plea for a mother to have some sort of closure after her son’s suicide. But what sort of monster would I be to say that to her right now? Her son just lowered into the earth moments ago? I bite my lip as Malik saunters toward me, his friends long gone.

  “Why don’t you go home and rest, Jill? We’ll talk about this tomorrow, okay?”

  2

  EVE

  I cower in my backyard, leaning against the house and taking a long hit off a cigarette. It’s ironic that as a kid, I had to hide smoking from my parents, and now as a parent, I have to hide it from my kids.

  It’s dinnertime, I know. But I need a break. That funeral was emotionally draining, and it’s taking my entirety not to cry. Besides, on my counter sits a Crock-Pot, and in that Crock-Pot are all the ingredients for chili. It’s been simmering for hours, and I’m grateful for Crock-Pots on days when funerals just suck the life out of you. I’ve got a cornbread in the oven—so domesticated and Octoberish! Misleading, I know, since Miami doesn’t have fall, and I’m feeling far from domesticated right now.

  I peek in the kitchen window as I flick ashes off my cigarette and watch my husband, Alex, grating a block of cheese into a bowl and dicing up onions. Thank God for wonderful husbands.

  I scamper toward the side of the house, stepping through wet grass and avoiding scattering lizards, and glance into Malik’s bedroom window. He’s at his computer, a YouTube video streaming as he tips back in his chair.

  Xander, my eight-year-old son with Alex, bursts into the room, causing Malik’s chair to nearly topple over. I twist away from the window before I’m caught spying and smoking.

  “Get out, Xander!” Malik’s voice muffles through the window. I hear Xander’s high-pitched arguing (“I’ll show you the dark side!”) and peek in just in time to see Malik jump from his chair, causing Xander to rush out the door. I chuckle and exhale a stream of smoke.