Rebel, Bully, Geek, Pariah (8 page)

The skinny one huffed and held up his phone. “That's your nine-one-one? I thought something was wrong.”

“Something
is
wrong. You gave me a bunk combo.”

“No, you just have to be smarter than the lock.”

The smaller boy twisted the dial as York grew impatient. “See, that's why I was confused. There are only three numbers, but you spin it four times.”

“I have to.”

“You don't have to. You're just a freak.”

“And you're a moron.”

York shoved him roughly to the side in response.

Boys.

“What is all this garbage?” York dug in the bottom of the locker like a dog, sending out a spray of loose papers and gum wrappers.

“It's called homework. You should try it sometime.”

“You should try being human sometime.”

I stifled a laugh.

“Why can't you just use your own locker?” the freckled kid complained.

York finally stood up, a textbook clutched in his hand. “I don't want to see . . . anyone.”

“Just because you're not on the team anymore doesn't mean—”

The textbook hit the floor with a bang that echoed down the hall.

“Shut up about it!” York's hands pulled at the sides of his hair. “You're lucky I'm using your locker—that I'm even willing to be seen with you.”

“What's that supposed to—”

“You're embarrassing!”

I tugged my ski cap back down low over my forehead and crumpled up the remains of my lunch, my appetite gone.

“Got it,” the small boy said in an even smaller voice.

York softened almost immediately, stammering out, “Look, I didn't mean— It's not you I'm—”

But the other boy was already slamming his locker shut and rushing away down the hall. I thought I saw him brush something from his cheek as he ran, but I couldn't be sure. Across from me, York looked like he might run after the younger boy—one arm was stretched out, and his mouth was open as if to shout—but after a second he only turned back to the locker and leaned his head against its smooth surface.

He stood that way for a full three seconds before straightening up and punching the locker hard with his fist, leaving a slight dent. Then he scooped up his textbook and jogged off toward the cafeteria.

I watched him go, feeling a squeeze of disappointment in my chest. Of course he couldn't be hot and nice at the same time. That was just too much to ask of River City boys.

I pushed my squashed lunch bag to the side and tugged my algebra binder out of my backpack. Beneath the binder's plastic cover was a patchwork of old photos Mama had dug out of a box in Grandma's attic after she died: Mama in front of the St. Louis arch, Mama playing her violin on an outdoor stage surrounded by red rocks, Mama posing with roadies on top of a skyscraper in New York, Mama splashing through the waves on a beach who-knows-where.

Inside the locker behind me I'd created a similar collage, but with much more exotic locations. I was going to travel as much as Mama had, and then some. I was going to get as far away from River City as I could, and when I got there, I was going to tear off my invisibility cloak and let people see me. Until then, I just had to keep my head down and try to survive high school.

Alone in the hallway, I squared my shoulders and lifted my chin.

I'm glad he didn't look at me
.

But the problem with having only yourself to talk to is you always know when you're lying.

 

9

AS SOON AS the SUV started moving, uncertainty set in.

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“Our house?” Boston suggested as he pulled onto the road.

“Hell no,” York answered. He turned to us in the backseat. “What about you guys? Are your parents home?”

“Yes,” I said.

Andi looked away from us, out the window. “My dad's always home.”

“Are they cool?” York pressed. “Can they help us?”

Andi let out a low, sarcastic laugh. “Yeah, right.”

“My mom's cool,” I said. “But not this cool.”

For all Mama's run-ins with the law, when it came to me getting in trouble, she was decidedly
un
cool. The way she lectured me about drugs and sex and anything criminal, you'd think
I
was the one with the bad habits. I guess she just worried that she'd passed on more to me than her green eyes.

“We could go to the cabin,” Boston offered, but he didn't sound too sure.

York faced forward again and seemed to consider the idea for a moment. “It's far,” he finally said.

Boston shrugged. “Not
that
far.”

“Maybe just far enough,” York mused.

“You think?”

“I think.”

“Hey, Tweedledee and Tweedledum,” Andi said. “You want to fill us in?”

“There's a . . .” Boston hesitated and cast a sidelong glance at York. “We have a cabin.” He stopped at a red light and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, craning his neck around as if expecting police to surround us at any moment.

“Yeah, we got that,” I said wearily. “Where?”

“North,” York answered. “About an hour. Right before you get to Wisconsin. We'll just go there long enough to figure out what to do.”

Andi looked at me. “What do you think?”

I think driving out to the middle of nowhere to some deserted cabin with two boys I don't really know is the kind of genius idea that gets girls raped and murdered in the movies. But the blond bimbo always gets killed first, and since neither of us is a blond bimbo, maybe this won't turn into a slasher flick.

“I don't have a better idea,” I said.

“We can't be driving around town in a stolen cop car,” York pressed.

“We shouldn't be driving
anywhere
in a stolen cop car,” I argued.

What a colossally bad idea it had been to get back into this SUV.

“We should drive it right to a police station,” Boston said.

Agreed
.

“I told you . . . ,” York said.

“I know, I know.” Boston waved off York with one hand. “You don't want to get a DUI.”

“I don't want to get arrested for killing a cop!”

“Don't say that again,” Boston said. The light turned green, and he pressed the gas, careful to stay under the speed limit.

A fifth voice spoke up then, quieter than ours and muffled.

“Attention.”

The sound sucked the air out of the SUV.

“Attention,” the distant voice repeated.

“I thought you turned the radio off,” York said, running his fingers over the knobs and dials.

“I did, I did. It's off!” Boston insisted.

The voice spoke once more, and this time it sent a chill down my spine.

“Attention, all you little bitches in the stolen car.”

The others looked around, searching high and low for the source of the voice, but I had already found it. I raised a shaky hand and pointed to the glove compartment in front of York.

“Get off the main road,” York ordered Boston, who obediently turned down a dark side street. York opened the compartment and gingerly lifted out the walkie-talkie Boston had found. It was crackling with life now.

He turned it over in his hands, then pressed a button on the side and spoke tentatively.

“Hello?”

My hat was off my head and whipping him on the shoulder before he'd even released the button. Andi came at him from the other side with a hard slap to the head.

“Don't talk to it!” I said.

Maybe he was still drunk.

York hunched his shoulders, looking ashamed, but the damage was done. The voice knew we'd heard it.

“Do you know what happens to cop killers in this town?” It was a man's voice, low and threatening.

“Yeah,” I muttered to myself. “They go to prison.”

“They don't get arrested,” the voice said, almost as though he had heard me. “They get dead.”

I swallowed hard and heard Andi whisper “Fuck” beside me.

“It's the police,” Boston said. “The ones who—”

“Who shot at us,” York finished.

“Cop killers don't make it to jail,” the voice said. It was cold, emotionless.

“That's not true,” I said aloud. “He's trying to scare us.”

“It's working,” Boston breathed.

Well, that much I couldn't argue with.

“But there's no need for that,” the voice said. “It was an accident.”

Here it comes. The part where they try to reason with us—to lure us out.

I wouldn't take much convincing. I figured we were going to end up in a police station one way or another. At least this way we could talk to the cops before they cuffed us.

The voice spoke again. “You'll be safe if you just tell us where you are.”

“He's offering to help us,” Boston piped up hopefully.

“Sounds more like a threat to me,” I countered.

Boston pouted and steered the SUV down a narrow alley. “Police don't threaten you.”

I rolled my eyes. “Except they just did.”

It must have been nice for him, to live in his little bubble where all police were good guys and everyone behind bars was a bad guy. How conveniently black and white.

“You have two options.” The voice paused as if waiting for a reply, but we all just stared at the walkie-talkie until it spoke again. “Door number one: you tell us where you are. Door number two: you run like rabbits.”

Yes, definitely a threat.

One by one, I studied the faces around me. None of us made a sound.

When the walkie-talkie crackled again, the voice had dropped to a sinister hiss. “All right then, little rabbits . . . 
run
.”

We sat in silence for a full thirty seconds before it became clear the voice was done. Then Andi leaned toward the front seat, her voice slow and casual.

“Sooo . . . you mentioned a cabin?”

 

10

YORK DIRECTED BOSTON to keep to back roads, and the SUV wound slowly through neighborhoods and then industrial areas as we made our way toward the interstate. Boston whined a little about trusting police and
not
trusting York, but his arguments were thinner now.

“Boston, that was the scariest cop I've ever met,” York said.

“Met a lot of cops, have you?” Andi scoffed.

I answered before York could. “I've met a few. And they're not like that. That was . . . personal,” I finished.

Boston finally exhausted his protests as the sign for the freeway rose overhead. “Can they use that two-way to trace us?” He took a tense hand off the wheel long enough to point around at all the equipment in the SUV. “Can they use any of this?”

“You watch too much TV,” York retorted, but he looked over the equipment anyway. “It all looks like radios to me.”

“Not every cop car has a GPS,” I said.

I didn't add that I knew this from too much time spent sitting in police stations, waiting for Grandma to bail Mama out and listening to officers bitch about their lack of funding and everything they didn't have enough of, from GPS tracking devices to SWAT team gear.

“There's nothing else here,” York said.

Boston sighed as he turned onto the interstate entrance ramp. “You know, the longer we wait to deal with this, the worse it could get.”

“Just go to the cabin.”

“You owe me so big.”

Then we were on the freeway and flying north.

The first ten minutes on the road were made of utter silence. Andi twisted her dreads absentmindedly and watched the night fly by the window. In the front seat, Boston kept a laser focus on the road ahead, while York actually dozed off. I briefly wished I'd had some drinks myself, if it would help me sleep through this.

I clasped my hands together to keep myself from calling Mama. I didn't want to risk getting my phone confiscated again, but I knew she would start to worry soon. And a worried Mama worried
me
. She was four years clean, but Mama's sobriety still seemed like it was balancing constantly on the fine point of a knife, ready to tip off in any direction if the wind blew the wrong way. If she thought I was missing, it wouldn't be a breeze. It would be a hurricane.

Mama always said I was her reason for living—or, worse, her reason for staying sober. I guess a kid is a pretty damn good reason to get clean, and I should have been glad for that, but it weighed heavy on me whenever she said it. With Grandma gone and Aunt Ellen all but done with the drama, I was the only one left to look out for Mama. And, selfishly, I knew a setback for her would be a setback for me. I was happy back when we first built our little cocoon for two and didn't invite anyone else in. We were making up for lost time. But now time stretched out before me, full of places and possibility, and I was ready to fly away. But with one wrong move, Mama could pin my wings.

The quiet in the car was giving me too much time to think—about Mama, about the cop tumbling off the hood of the SUV, about my extremely poor decision to go along on this ride. The silence was making my mind scream, and when I thought I couldn't take it for one more second, I poked Andi.

“Ow. What?” She glared at me, and I made an emphatic gesture that I hoped would convey that she should say something. But judging by the arch of her eyebrow and the sneer on her lip, apparently the only thing my gesturing conveyed was that I might be mentally ill.

“Did you have too much to drink?” she asked.

“I don't drink.”

“And you don't talk so good, either. What are you pantomiming at me?”

“Well,” Boston said.

Andi turned her sneer on him. “What?”

“It's ‘You don't talk so well,' not ‘good.'”

“I know, moron. I was just kid—never mind.” She looked back over at me. “What are you trying to say? Spit it out.”