Big Boned

“He can’t,” Sarah says, jumping to her feet. Her eyes are wide with panic. “He can’t go to Rikers. You don’t understand. He has asthma! He has allergies!”

Cooper finally spins around in his computer chair. His expression, when he faces Sarah, is furious. He looks… well. He looks scary. Like he had this morning when he’d warned me about interfering in Owen Veatch’s murder investigation.

“Okay,” he says, angrily. “That’s it. I’ve had it up to here with this bullshit, Sarah. You tell me what the fuck is going on, or you get out of my house. No”—when Sarah glances for help in my direction—“don’t look at Heather. You look at me. Tell me, or get out. I’m giving you until the count of three. One.”

“He didn’t do it!” Sarah cries.

“I know he didn’t do it. Tell me how you can prove it. Two.”

“Because I just know! I know him!”

“That’s not good enough for the DA to drop the charges, Sarah. Three. Get the fuck—”

“He couldn’t have done it because Owen Veatch was shot from outside the building,” Sarah shouts. “And I can prove Sebastian was inside Fischer Hall at the time Owen was killed!”

“How can you possibly do that?” Cooper demands.

“Because,” Sarah says, her round cheeks suddenly going crimson. “I… I signed him in, the night before.”

“You what?”

I feel my blood run cold. But in a good way.

“She signed him in,” I say, rising from the couch and crossing the room to stand beside Sarah, pieces of Victoria’s Secret catalog crunching beneath my feet. “The sign-in logs, at the security desk. All guests to the building have to be signed in, and leave a piece of ID with the guard. What time did you sign Sebastian out this morning, Sarah?”

She shakes her head. “Late. After breakfast. It was like eight forty-five.”

I throw a triumphant look at Cooper. “After the murder could have taken place. Don’t you see? That proves he couldn’t have done it. The guard wouldn’t have let him out of the building without signing out. He couldn’t have done it.”

Cooper, however, is frowning.

“I don’t get it,” he says. “If this is all true, why didn’t the kid tell the cops when they asked him where he was at the time of the murder? Why didn’t he show them the sign-in log?”

“Because,” Sarah says, looking unhappy. “He… he was protecting someone.”

“Who?” I demand. “Who could he possibly—”

“Me, all right?” Sarah can’t seem to lift her gaze from the floor. “He’s… he was protecting me.”

Cooper, with a happy sigh, leans back again in his office chair, causing it to squeak. “And here I thought chivalry was dead.”

“It’s not like that,” Sarah says quickly, lifting her gaze, her cheeks flaming once more. “We’re not—we’ve never—”

I give her a curious look. “But, Sarah—then why else could he be protecting you?”

“I… I’d rather not say,” Sarah says. “Can’t we just bring him the sign-in sheets? Detective Canavan, I mean?”

“What were you doing all night,” Cooper wants to know, “if you weren’t having carnal knowledge of one another? I mean, if you’ll excuse my curiosity? Because I can assure you, Canavan will ask.”

“No, we can’t just bring him the sign-in sheets,” I say testily, in reply to Sarah’s question. “I want to know. What’s Sebastian protecting you from, Sarah? What—”

“And were you actually with him at eight o’clock?” Cooper asks. “You said you signed him out at eight forty-five. But were you with him the entire time from when you signed him in the night before until you signed him out this morning?”

“Would you two,” Sarah shouts, sounding like she was going to start crying again, “stop talking at the same time? It’s so frustrating! You’re like my PARENTS!”

This brings Cooper and me up short. We close our mouths and blink at one another.Parents?

“No, I wasn’t with him the whole time,” Sarah says. “And it isn’t anyone’s business what we were doing—”

“But, Sarah,” I interrupt, getting over the parent thing. Because, whatever. That’s her opinion. And did I mention her frizzies? “You know that when you sign someone in, it’s your responsibility to stay with them the whole—”

“You think you can waltz into the Sixth Precinct and tell them something is none of their business when they ask?” Cooper hoots delightedly. “Because I really want to be there when you do that.”

Then, like a sledgehammer, it hits me.

“The coffeemaker!” I cry, pointing at Sarah accusingly.

Both Cooper and Sarah stare at me as if I’ve begun speaking in tongues. Sarah’s the only one who looks slightly nervous, though.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says.

“Oh yes, you do,” I say, still pointing at her. “The storage room. Where we sat while we were waiting for the forensics team to get through with our office. I thought the guys from housekeeping were using it as a break room. There was a sleeping bag in there. And a coffeemaker. Someone has obviously been crashing in there. But it wasn’t the building staff. It’s Sebastian, isn’t it? You’ve been signing Sebastian in and letting him live there illegally, haven’t you?Haven’t you? ”

Sarah, with a shudder, buries her face in her hands. She doesn’t reply.

But she doesn’t have to. Her body language says it all.

“No wonder Sebastian didn’t tell the cops where he was when Owen bit it,” I go on. “He couldn’t! Because he knew he’d get you in trouble, and you’d lose your job for letting a student live in the building illegally. Sarah! What were you thinking? Have you lost your mind?”

Sarah drops her hands and glares at me.

“It’s not Sebastian’s fault!” she cries. “It was my idea! And it was all the stupid Housing Department’s fault in the first place! He requested a roommate who kept kosher! And what did he get? A California surfer who checked off kosher because it was the more expensive meal plan and he thought that meant the food would be better! He didn’t even know what kosher was. And then when Sebastian went to his hall director to ask for a room change, he was told there was nothing available. What was he supposed to do? Compromise his religious values?”

“No,” Cooper says. “Apparently he preferred to compromise your job instead.”

Sarah inhales so sharply that her breath hitches. A second later, she’s hyperventilating.

Fortunately I find an abandoned Starbucks sack lying nearby and, after pushing her back down on the couch again, force Sarah to breathe into it for a few minutes. Soon she’s breathing normally once more.

Sitting between Cooper and me, staring sadly at the last page of the Victoria’s Secret catalog as Lucy devours it, Sarah says, “I guess I’m the biggest idiot in the world, aren’t I?”

“Not the biggest,” Cooper offers.

“We don’t have to tell them how long you let him stay there,” I say. “We can just say it was for that one night.”

“No.” Sarah shakes her head, so violently that her long, bushy hair nearly whips both of us. “I was the one who was blinded by love. Not even real love, because it’s not as if he cares about me as anything more than a friend. Like a guy like that ever could love a girl like me.”

“Stranger things,” Cooper says dryly, “have happened. Especially after a night or two in the Tombs. He might emerge with a new appreciation for the fairer sex in general.”

I long to elbow him, but Sarah is in the way.

I needn’t have worried. She’s not listening, anyway.

“I abused my power as a resident hall graduate assistant,” Sarah says. “I lied, and took advantage of my sign-in and key privileges. I’ll turn myself in.”

“Not for nothing,” Cooper says. “But to whom? Your boss is dead.”

“Yeah,” I say. “And my inclination is to chalk it up to temporary insanity. Spring fever, as it were.”

“I’ll never speak to him again,” Sarah says. “After we’ve turned over the sign-in log and I’ve given my deposition. And the GSC has gotten the president’s office to cave to all of our demands. And I’ve found him safe but affordable housing elsewhere. And made sure he’s received proper psychiatric counseling for whatever post-traumatic stress he might suffer from all of this.”