Solving Zoe (10 page)

Zoe had left all her stuff on Isaac's floor, so before she could go home, she had to go back to his brownstone. It was a long, chilly walk, somehow longer than when she was carrying Ruby, and she was so drained and shaky that her legs felt like rubber bands. All she wanted to do was sit somewhere and maybe close her eyes for a minute and stop thinking about everything. But it was already four thirty, she was freezing, and she couldn't waste any more time.

As she got nearer to Isaac's brownstone, she spotted an unmistakable figure on the front steps. He wasn't sitting all hunched over, but he was wearing that embarrassing tweed overcoat.
Oh, joy,
Zoe thought, balling her hands inside her pockets.

Lucas looked up from his book and grinned at her. “So how's your reptile friend?”

“Not sure,” Zoe answered. “Fingers crossed.”

“Sorry I couldn't come with you. I was doing extremely important research for my parents. In fact, I cut my
afternoon classes to get started. These archeologists have found an ancient Mayan glyph—”

“And you hate touching lizards.”

“Right,” said Lucas, smiling sheepishly. “Sorry.”

Zoe sighed. “Listen, I have to go inside to get my books. You want to come in for a minute and meet everybody?”

He looked alarmed. “You mean the other lizards?”

“Don't worry, they're in tanks. And anyway, it's freezing out.”

“That's okay. I'm not even cold. I'll just wait for you here.”

“You sure?”

“I never speak if I'm not.” He lifted his chin defiantly, but it only made him look like a little kid. Like Spencer, almost. Well, she certainly wasn't going to stand there on the freezing steps arguing with him.

Zoe went upstairs to the iguana room and grabbed her stuff off the floor. Then she peeked out the second-floor window at Lucas. He was sitting all hunched up again, and he was rubbing his arms as if they were numb. Probably with all that traveling he wasn't used to the cold weather, she thought. He'd definitely need a warmer jacket if he was going to make it through the winter.

And then she had a funny thought:
Who would buy it for him? Signe?

She quickly fed and misted the lizards, not bothering to write down any notes. Then she went back outside and sat down next to Lucas on the rough stone step. “Thanks for waiting,” she said softly. For some reason she added, “Want some Skittles?”

“What?”

She took the bag out of her hoodie pocket. “Skittles. I don't know what the name means. The purple are good but the green are the best.”

“I know what Skittles are, Zoe.”

“Yeah? Well, you can have the rest. I'm not hungry.”

“Thanks,” he said politely. “Okay if I save them for later?”

She shrugged.

Lucas slipped the bag into the enormous pocket of his overcoat and looked down at the stone steps as if they were suddenly extremely fascinating.

“Listen, Lucas,” Zoe said slowly. “I really, really need to talk to you about something. I guess you didn't see the message on my desk?”

“What desk?”

“In Signe's room. You know. The number-color desk.”

“What are you talking about?”

“My whiteboard desk. You were just asking me what six was. And seven.”

“Seven what?”

She stared at him. “Oh, great. You're pretending you don't know?”

“I'm not pretending anything.”

“Never mind,” Zoe said tiredly. “If you want to play your baby secret agent games, go ahead. That wasn't what I wanted to talk to you about, anyway.” The icy wind was slapping her hair around, so she tucked it impatiently inside her hood. “All right, so here it is: People are getting these weirdo notes. In their lockers. First they thought it was Ezra, and now they think it's me.”

“And is it?”

“Of course not, Lucas! It's you. Right?”

Lucas didn't answer. He traced a crack in the step with his index finger.

Zoe watched him. “Why would you do a thing like that? No one's talking to me. They all hate me now.”

“So, what do you care? You have nothing in common with them.”

“How do you even know that?” Before he could answer, she said, “And don't start telling me I'm brain-damaged, because I don't want to hear it.”

He looked up. “I didn't say you were
brain-damaged
, Zoe. I said—”

“Whatever. A crypto-whatever-genius. It doesn't matter, okay? We're not discussing that reading-Zoe business, because it was a totally freak thing. And anyway it's completely irrelevant.”

He shrugged. “I didn't mention it, Zoe. You did.”

“Well, never mind, then. Forget I brought it up. And I also don't want to hear another stupid word about codes. Or ciphers.”

“Fine.” He started tracing the crack again.

“Look, Lucas,” Zoe said quickly. “What I'm trying to say is, I go to school with these kids. It's hard enough when things are normal, and now they think I'm this crazy anonymous note writer, quoting these—” She waved her arms helplessly. “
Dead
guys. Everyone thinks I'm spying or threatening them with lizards or something, and now they want to analyze my handwriting. And I think somebody told Owen, because he wants to meet with me. And my parents.”

Lucas looked up at her. “And then what?”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“So you meet with Owen. Why does that even matter to you?”

“Why? Because he's looking for an excuse to kick me out!”

“And you want to stay at Hubbard? What for? You don't seem very happy there.”

“I'm not. But where would I go? I'm not like you, traveling all over the world. I need an actual
building
—” She stopped and shook her head. How did Lucas keep managing to take over this conversation? She was the one doing all the talking. “Listen, that's not even the point, okay? The point is, why are you doing this to me?”

Lucas folded his arms around his knees. “Those kids aren't your friends, Zoe. They're being nasty to you, they're acting like you're invisible, and you're just sitting there letting it happen.”

“That's not true, okay?” She paused. Then she said, “For your information, I yelled at them in the locker room today.”

“Really? And how did it go?”

“Not…very well.” She decided not to mention Dara's reaction, because she could imagine his response:
See? I told you she wasn't your best friend.

But Lucas wasn't asking for details anyway. He beamed at her. “Well, that's still great, Zoe! You finally stood up for yourself. That's the main thing.”

Zoe sighed. “I totally don't understand this, Lucas.
You're happy because I denied writing something that
you
wrote just to get me in trouble?”

“I wasn't trying to get you in trouble, Zoe!”

“Of course you were! That's why you wrote ‘eye of the gecko.'”

“No, no! You're completely misinterpreting the whole thing. I was just helping you confront those jerks. And it worked!”

“But it
didn't
work. And I wasn't asking you for help. And what's so great about confronting people all the time? I mean, I don't want to hurt your feelings, Lucas, but everyone kind of hates you at Hubbard.”

He tilted his chin at her. “Yeah? Well, so what?”

“You don't even care?”

“Why should I? I'd rather have people respect me, anyway. And at least
I
know who I am.”

“What's that supposed…You think I don't?”

“I think you do know, Zoe. I think you know a lot of things, but then you tell yourself, ‘Whoops, never mind, maybe not.' Because you're afraid.”

“Afraid of what?”

“Don't ask me,” Lucas said. “That's not the kind of thing I know how to solve.”

Suddenly he stood up. Then he pulled his embarrassing
overcoat across his skinny chest and walked away, his floppy hair whipping in the freezing wind.

 

“Zoe? Where were you? You've got like a million messages,” called Malcolm from the living room.

Zoe tossed her backpack onto the sofa. “You mean phone messages?”

“Yeah.” He was playing Final Fantasy Something, pounding on the controller with his thumbs.

“From who?”

“Don't know,” he said, staring at the screen. “It sounded like a few different voices. But every time they just said, ‘Zoe, we know it's you,' and hung up.”

“Okay. Thanks for telling me.”

“You're welcome. Oh, and by the way, Owen called, asking for Mom or Dad. I said they'd fled to Argentina.”

“You did?”

“Duh. Of course not.” He saved his game, then shut the TV off. “What's going on, Zo?”

“Nothing.”

He raised one eyebrow.

“All right. Everything,” Zoe admitted. “But I'm too tired to talk about it right now. Maybe later.”

She went to her bedroom, where Izzy was sleeping
again, even though it was almost time for supper. Her sister's computer was on, so Zoe opened her own e-mail account. There was one message, but it wasn't from Isaac.

She hit the delete button. She knew she should be using Dad's computer, but under the circumstances she didn't think she could wait for him to get home from work. So she quickly typed:

Sometime on Saturday, Owen must have called, because on Sunday morning everyone in the Bennett family launched into Be Nice to Zoe mode.

At breakfast Mom made pancakes. This was a big deal because she was definitely not a morning person; as a general rule, it took her two cups of coffee before she could even pour herself a bowl of cereal. But there she was when Zoe walked into the kitchen on Sunday morning, standing at the stove, making Zoe's favorite breakfast.

“It'll be just a minute, sweetheart,” she said brightly. “One more stack to go.”

Zoe watched her expertly flip the pancakes on the griddle. “Thanks, Mom, but you really didn't have to.”

“I know, but I wanted to. Sometimes everybody needs a little extra treat,” she said, which just made Zoe's stomach knot up.

Then Malcolm and Isadora walked into the kitchen.

“Pancakes,” Malcolm exclaimed enthusiastically. “Can I have some, or are they all just for Zoe?”

“Zoe first,” Isadora told him. “You can have the leftovers.”

Isadora smiled at Zoe. It wasn't the old radiant look-at-me-I'm-so-gorgeous smile, but it was pretty close. Isadora was really a very, very good actress.

Mom stacked the pancakes on a platter they usually used at Thanksgiving. “Set the table, please,” she ordered. “And someone wake up Spencer.”

“Not necessary,” said Malcolm. “He's been up since five o'clock, barking like a puppy. He says if he can't
have
a dog, he'll
be
one.”

“Wow,” said Mom, laughing. “That child's coping skills are amazing.”

“Yes, they are, Mom. But mine aren't.”

Now Dad was in the kitchen, standing in front of the Thanksgiving platter. “Pancakes? All for me?”

“Zoe first,” said Mom. “Then Malcolm, then you.”

“What about you, Iz?” Dad asked. He poured himself some coffee.

“Oh, I'm off pancakes. I've been eating way too much junk food lately. Not that pancakes are junk,” she added, as if she needed to apologize to Zoe.

Soon Spencer came crashing through the door and they all settled down to a loud, happy, sticky breakfast.
Even Isadora forgot about her whole wheat toast and helped herself to a couple of pancakes. But Zoe could barely eat. The breakfast and all the cheery supportiveness obviously meant that everyone thought she was about to get kicked out of school. And sure enough, after all the pancakes were gone, and all the syrupy dishes were dumped into the dishwasher, Mom poured herself a third cup of coffee and said casually, “Zoe? Can Dad and I have a word with you for a minute?”

“Okay,” said Zoe, sinking back into her chair.

“We had a quick phone call from Owen last night. He asked us to stop by tomorrow morning before school. Do you know what it's about?”

“Probably.”

They looked at her gravely.

“I know I haven't been working very hard,” she said quickly. “I
will
work, though. I've just been kind of distracted lately.”

“With what?” Dad asked. “You don't mean the lizard-sitting, do you?”

“Of course not!” Zoe said. “And by the way, Dad. Do you know when Isaac's getting back? One of the iguanas is sick and all these people keep calling. I've sent him e-mails—”

“You have? When?”

“On Friday. And the other day. On Izzy's computer.”

Dad shook his head. “Zoe, we had an arrangement for all that. You were supposed to use my computer.”

“I know. But I couldn't because you weren't home.” Before he could answer, Zoe added, “I just needed to give him some urgent phone messages. I won't do it again.”

Dad held up his hand like a crossing guard. “That's okay. But never mind about Isaac right now. Let's concentrate on you, Zozo.” He gave Mom some invisible signal. “We were actually sort of wondering about
The Zoe and Dara Show
.”

“You were? What about it?”

“Zoe,” Mom said delicately, “is everything okay between you and Dara?”

“Why do you ask that?”

“I don't know. She's never over here anymore. We don't hear you on the phone. And you haven't been mentioning her.”

“She's fine, Mom. Just incredibly busy. She's in the musical. It meets every day after school—”

“We know the rehearsal schedule, sweetheart. We've been through it every year with Izzy.” Mom took a sip of her coffee. “So there's nothing else troubling you?
Nothing that if we knew about, we could help explain to Owen tomorrow? Because you know our job is to be your advocates. That means—”

“I know what it means,” Zoe broke in. “And I haven't done anything wrong, so there's really nothing to explain.” She definitely wasn't ready to go into the whole story about demented Lucas. She pushed a straying curl out of her face.

Mom and Dad looked at each other. Dad shrugged.

“All right, then, ladies,” he said, standing up and stretching. “I'm off to the coal mines.”

“You're going to work today?” Zoe asked. “But it's Sunday!”

“I know. Not my idea of a good time either. But I just have a couple of minor details to finish, and yet another Enchanted Forest will be complete.” He kissed the top of Zoe's head. “And then Monday I start on Lizard World.”

 

Early Monday morning Zoe walked to school with her mother and father. By now they'd given up on the Be Nice to Zoe mode and were just quiet and serious, which was a whole lot easier to take. When they were a block from Hubbard, Mom looked at her watch.

“God, I could really use another coffee,” she said to
Dad. “Do you think there's time to run into that Starbucks?”

“Sure,” said Dad. “We're supposed to be in Owen's office in fifteen minutes.”

“Okay. Then I'll meet you there,” said Zoe quickly. She ran the last block to school, even though it made no sense to be in such a hurry.

First she went to her locker to dump her backpack. As soon as she opened the door, she spotted a sealed white envelope on the bottom of the locker. Her heart pounding, she ripped it along the edge.

She stared at the letter. Then she read it two more times, and grinned. The code part reminded her of that folded-up note he'd given her that time in the cafeteria, and she refused to know what it meant. But the rest of it was amazingly perfect, like a Get Out of Jail Free card in Monopoly. All she had to do was go upstairs, show this letter to Owen, and then be on her way to homeroom. And if doing that got Lucas in trouble, it wouldn't be
her
fault. Because wasn't she also a victim of the whole anonymous note business? Of course she was!

She slammed her locker door and slipped the letter into her hoodie pocket. Then she ran up the central staircase to Owen's office, taking two steps at a time.

But just before she got to the second-floor landing, she slowed way down.

What exactly would Owen do, she wondered, if she showed him the letter? Probably kick Lucas out instead of her. Which wouldn't be so tragic, really. Lucas could just pack his suitcase and rejoin his parents in some underground temple.
The whole world has been his classroom—
isn't that what Signe had said? He was used to that; it would feel normal to him. He'd probably even be grateful to get out of this place.

But what if Lucas wanted to go to an actual school for once? It was almost October; if he got kicked out of Hubbard, it would be too late to find him some other weirdo school for sixth grade. And she couldn't imagine him in a regular bells-and-red-pens kind of school, where the kids would probably beat him up just for wearing that horrible tweed overcoat. And then as soon as he started showing off about hieroglyphics and gargoyles…. She didn't even want to think about that.

The truth was, Lucas needed to be at Hubbard, where there were other weirdo kids, and where at least Signe could keep an eye on him. If anyone didn't belong here, it was Zoe, not Lucas. Besides, Dara wasn't even talking to her, so why should she want to stay? And with all the doodling and the missing assignments, Owen had already made up his mind about her anyway. He was just waiting to kick her out, obviously. So what good would it do to get Lucas kicked out too?

By now she was on the third floor, in front of Owen's office. She stepped into the little waiting area, where Mom and Dad were sitting on the tiny sofa. Mom was
thoughtfully sipping her paper cup of Starbucks. When she looked up and noticed Zoe, she patted the seat next to her for Zoe to sit down.

“You ready, sweetheart?” she asked quietly.

Zoe nodded.

“We'll be right there with you,” Dad said.

“I know.”

Mom picked up a copy of
The Hubbard News
from the tadpole-shaped coffee table. “Oh, listen to this,” she said brightly. “Remember Izzy's friend Abigail who graduated two years ago? She just had her debut at Carnegie Hall.”

“Cool,” said Dad. He drummed his fingers.

It suddenly occurred to Zoe that her parents were nervous.
Well, sure they are,
she told herself.
It's not like Isadora or Malcolm ever got them called into someone's office.
For a strange millisecond she actually felt sorry for them. But then she told herself,
No. This is my disaster, not theirs.

All at once Owen burst into the waiting area. “Good to see you guys,” he said warmly, shaking hands with Zoe's parents. Then he ushered them into his office, where there were three metal office chairs pulled up alertly to his desk.