Just to be sure, I moved farther into the room. The air grew thicker, heavier. It smelled stale, like the door and windows hadn’t been opened in months. The darkness brightened slightly when I neared the wall of windows, thanks to a high full moon. Reaching the first window, I looked out at the ocean crashing onto the shore a hundred feet below, then turned and peered around the room.
My eyes had adjusted enough to see several feet in front of me, and I didn’t know whether to be reassured or disappointed when I saw that the room was empty. There was no furniture, no dresser for crystal perfume bottles to line. The mirrors had been removed from the walls, exposing peeling wallpaper. And just as it had in Betty’s room, the carpet had been ripped up, revealing dull wooden planks.
If she’d somehow come back to life, this wasn’t where Zara was hiding.
“Sleep,” I said quietly, starting back across the room. “You need it. Now.”
My eyes were fixed on the door as I walked, so I didn’t see the lamp in the middle of the room until my right leg knocked into it and sent it clattering to the floor. The sudden noise shattered the silence, and I lunged for the lamp to keep it from rolling and waking Paige downstairs. My fingers grabbed the base, and I gently turned it upright and placed it on the floor.
My entire body ached to run back downstairs, but I stayed put long enough to tug on the lamp’s thin, short chain.
The bulb glowed white. In its illuminated circle I could see a cord that ran from the lamp base and plugged into an outlet on the nearest wall.
And lying on the floor nearby, a rowboat oar, its trail of shiny red anchors glittering like garnets in the bright light.
“I
T’S RAINING RATS
and spiders.”
I stared at the windshield. The wipers fired back and forth, but the water streamed down the glass like they were still.
“Rats and spiders?” Paige repeated.
Dad smiled at her in the rearview mirror. “Way back when, Vanessa didn’t like the idea of cute cats and dogs falling from the sky. She was, however, indifferent to rodents and creepy bugs. We’ve been using the phrase to describe heavy rain since.” He paused. “Isn’t that right?”
I could tell he wanted me to share the story of how we had eventually decided on rats and spiders—which included a lengthy family process of elimination involving charts and lists that had taken place over two nights and lots of Chinese food—but I wasn’t in the mood. I was tired, achy, and still trying to make sense of everything that had happened over the weekend.
“Yes,” I said instead.
“Well,” Paige said, “it’s definitely an accurate description of what’s going on out there. Thanks again for the ride, Mr. Sands.”
“Thank you for taking the scenic route with me while I dropped off books to a colleague. And if the weather’s still this bad after school, just call and let me know. I—”
He slammed on the brake. I jerked forward, hard enough to make the seat belt lock and tug me back.
“Dad, what—”
The car swerved to the left, interrupting me. It swung back to the right, and then left again. As Dad spun the steering wheel, fighting to regain control on the slick road, I dug my feet into the floor and grabbed the ceiling handle. In the backseat, Paige squealed; I glanced in the side-view mirror just as she covered her face with both hands.
A second later, the front left tire hit a curb. The car rocked, then stopped.
“Oh no,” Paige breathed.
My fingers shook as I tried to unbuckle the seat belt. The latch gave on the third try, and I twisted in the passenger seat to look in the back. “Are you okay?”
She, too, was looking back, through the rear window.
“Paige,” I said. “What is it?”
“It’s bad,” Dad said. “Call 911. I’ll be right back.”
“Wait—”
But he was already gone.
Paige’s eyes were wide as she turned back and slid down the seat. “There’s a bus. Turned over, on the pier. Its front end looks
like a giant accordion.”
“Did you see what happened?”
She shook her head. “The rain was too thick.”
“Can you please watch my dad?” I asked, rummaging through my backpack. I found my phone and reported the accident. After I hung up, I climbed between the two front seats and stood on my knees next to Paige.
The bus’s back end was hanging over the side of the pier by the aquarium. It was hard to tell what had caused the accident, as dozens of cars now filled the road in front of the pier. Many people approached the bus to try to help, and others stayed near their vehicles, talking on their cell phones and gesturing wildly.
It didn’t take long for the police to arrive. Ambulances came next. Then fire trucks. Dad talked to several officers, apparently telling them what he’d witnessed. Paige and I watched through the window until the emergency workers emerged from the bus with the first passenger on a stretcher. From our position fifty feet away, I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman, but one thing was clear: the passenger wasn’t moving.
Dad returned moments later, completely drenched, and we took a long, slow detour around the accident. By the time we pulled up to Hawthorne, first period was half over.
“If we hurry, we can still make the alumni assembly.” Paige threw open her door and dashed through the rain, using a copy of A
Winter’s Tale
as an umbrella.
“Vanessa…”
I’d started sliding across the backseat but stopped when Dad spoke.
“You’ll be careful?” he asked.
I looked at him. “With what?”
“With…” He looked out at the school, through the wind-shield, and back at me. “I don’t know. Never mind. Have a good day, okay?”
I climbed out of the car and closed the door. Standing on the sidewalk, I watched him drive away, hardly feeling the rain soak my hair, my clothes, my shoes.
Did he know something? Did he know that I knew something? Or was his cautionary request simply a result of seeing an entire busload of people, all of whom had mothers, fathers, family who cared about them, careen toward tragedy?
“Vanessa!” Paige shouted. “Come on!”
I waited for the Volvo to round the corner before turning and running up the steps. Paige held open the door for me and then hurried down the hall. I wanted to ask what the big deal was, but Paige was too fast. The distance between us grew as we neared the auditorium, and when she reached the entrance, I was so far behind she pointed inside, waved, and disappeared.
I was still several feet away and considering spending the rest of the period in the girl’s bathroom when Ms. Mulligan poked her head out of the auditorium.
“Vanessa,” she whispered loudly. “You’re just in time!”
In trying to avoid eye contact, I caught the flyer hanging next to the auditorium doors.
“The Annual Alumni College Roundtable?” I read out loud.
“The most anticipated event of the entire application season,” Ms. Mulligan said.
“It sounds great,” I said, backing away, “but I actually have a huge AP calc test later that I need to study for. And I need to keep up the grades if I’m going to get into a great college, right?”
“I can help.”
I spun around to see a boy I didn’t know standing by a nearby water fountain. He used the end of his tie to wipe his mouth before smiling at me.
“I have study hall this period, and I’m an excellent tutor,” he said. “I’ve been studying calculus since sixth grade.”
“How long ago was that?” I asked.
“Three years.”
A freshman. He couldn’t have known Justine, so he wasn’t offering out of sympathy. And I’d never seen him before let alone talked to him, so chances were slim that he was confusing me for someone he actually knew.
“I’m also fluent in four languages,” he continued, stepping toward me. “Do you take French? Spanish? How about—”
“Thanks, but I think I’m okay. And I probably should check out the roundtable for at least a few minutes.”
His face fell. Consoled by the fact that students were expected to be quiet during assemblies, which meant I could use the time to sort out my thoughts in a notebook, I followed Ms. Mulligan inside the auditorium.
“I saved you a seat.” She took my elbow and steered me toward the faculty and staff section.
Hoping for an alternative, I scanned the room for Paige, finally spotting her, seemingly transfixed, in the front row. Several empty seats surrounded her, but I wasn’t about to sit that close to the stage or be so exposed to the rest of the senior class. The back row would be ideal, but a quick check showed only one empty seat.
Right next to Parker King.
“I’m going to sit with friends,” I whispered, pulling away. “But thanks.”
I didn’t wait to see if she was disappointed, surprised, or both. Instead, I veered toward the back row before I could change my mind. I excused myself as I climbed over a dozen pairs of feet and ignored my classmates’ annoyed looks. At least they were all girls, which was one benefit of sitting by Parker.
“Hi,” I said when I finally reached the empty seat.
“Hey,” he said, not looking up from his iPod.
“Do you mind… ?”
He glanced at me, then at the chair. “No,” he said with a shrug. “Whatever.”
Puzzled, I sat down. Part of me was relieved that Parker wasn’t instantly smitten like so many other guys seemed to be… but a bigger part was confused. He’d talked to me on the first day of school, supposedly without knowing about Justine.
He’d made a point of trying to find me when he’d found a picture of her. And we’d spent quite a bit of time together in the park last week.
Not falling at my feet was one thing. But after all our recent interaction, now he acted like he didn’t even know who I was.
I sat back and watched his thumb move around the iPod’s small white dial, turning up the volume. Caleb had used music to tune out Zara and encouraged Simon to do the same. Was that what Parker was doing? Trying to drown out some sort of signal I didn’t know I was sending—or how to control?
I took out a notebook and turned to a blank page. As I pretended to write down what the guest speakers were saying, I snuck quick glances at Parker. His hands weren’t shaking. His knees weren’t trembling. His forehead wasn’t perspiring. If being near me made him uncomfortable enough to turn up the volume until I could hear it coming from the plastic buds in his ears, he didn’t show it.
“Freshman year’s many things.”
The familiar voice caught my attention. I looked up to see Justine’s friend Natalie Clark, whom Paige and I had run into in the Common on the first day of school, at the podium onstage.
“It’s fun.”
I sank lower in my seat as she smiled and addressed the crowd.
“Exciting. Intellectually stimulating.”
I raised my notebook to hold in front of my face.
“It’s also really hard. Especially when you’re dealing with external challenges.”
I was too late. She’d spotted me. Our eyes met, and her head tilted.
“College can be difficult all on its own, but when you’re also struggling with personal issues on top of classes and homework, the way I’ve been, the way others in this room certainly are and still will be months from now, it can be unbearable.”
She didn’t look at anyone else while speaking, so I knew these words were meant for me. I looked down at my notebook and scribbled quickly, hoping she’d think I was appreciatively transcribing her helpful speech.
“Hey.”
I was so determined to avoid Natalie’s sympathetic stare I didn’t realize Parker was talking to me until his thumb was on my hand. The gesture stopped my pen instantly.
“Want to get out of here?” He’d removed one earbud and now leaned toward me, his face blank.
“Yes.”
He looked past me to the faculty and staff sitting a few rows down. When they appeared to be sufficiently distracted, he climbed onto his seat and dropped over the back of the chair. I hesitated before doing the same, and took his hand when he offered it. He released mine as soon as my feet hit the floor, which helped ease my nervousness. His female fans started whispering once they realized what we were doing, but if their disapproval tipped off Ms. Mulligan or any of her guidance-counseling cohorts, we were out of the auditorium too fast to find out.
In the hallway, he walked ahead of me, not bothering to make sure I followed. And I almost didn’t; when we neared the library I was tempted to go inside without alerting him, but I was curious. About where he was going, why he’d asked me to come, and why he acted around me the way he did. So I trailed him through several other hallways and to a set of wide, dark wood doors.
“The Eric C. King Water Polo Lounge?” I asked, reading the sign above the doors.
“It should be empty now.” He took a key from his pants pocket, then unlocked and opened the door. “After you.”
I stepped into the large room. It was filled with leather couches and chairs, sleek silver tables, and a flat-screen TV so wide it took up the entire length of a wall. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the natatorium. Banners, trophies, and team photos were displayed throughout the room.
“Your dad must be proud,” I said, nearing a framed photo of Eric C. King himself. In the picture he was cutting a satin ribbon that hung across the very doors we’d just passed through.
Parker ignored the question. “You know, you’re only the second girl I’ve had up here.”
I shot him a look.
“Not like that. I swear. Despite popular opinion, I actually
don’t
spend all my free time hooking up.” He paused. “Do you know Felicia May?”
“The gymnast?”
“Right. After she came to a match last year, she wouldn’t leave me alone. She e-mailed me twenty times a day and followed me all over school.”
“What a hassle.”
“Thank you. Not everyone is as understanding.” He grinned. “Anyway, one morning last March, Felicia followed me to what had been up until then a guys-only haven. I tried to get her to leave, but she wouldn’t, and once we were inside I had to bring in reinforcements. She didn’t last very long with the rest of the water polo team up here, watching and critiquing the girls’ swim team practicing down below.”
“Critiquing?”
“After spending so much time in the water, we’re all excellent judges of form.”
I rolled my eyes as he took two bottles of water from a refrigerator. He handed me one, then flopped on the couch and turned on the TV. I still didn’t know why he’d asked me to come here with him, but he certainly wasn’t acting like it was because he couldn’t wait for us to be alone together.
“Are you seeing anyone?” The question was out before I knew I wanted to ask it.
Something flashed across his face—disappointment, or regret. But it was fleeting, and in the next moment he winked at me. “Why? You interested?”
“I have a boyfriend,” I reminded him, my face flushing.
“And?”
“And my locker’s next to Sarah Tepper’s. I overheard her talking about you the other day, so I just wondered if you guys were going out.”
“Nope.” He raised the remote, changed channels. “I’m not going out with Sarah Tepper—or anyone else. Nor do I want to. Feel free to post that on the school Web site. Maybe they’ll leave me alone.”
He said this casually, easily, not like he was harboring deep, secret feelings for someone. And being in love was the only reason he’d be immune—or whatever you wanted to call it—to the signals other guys responded to.
There went that theory.
“Wow.”
I followed his gaze to the TV—and a live image of a toppled bus, its front end completely crushed.
“The driver died,” Parker said, reading the text running along the bottom of the screen. “Four are missing and eight others are in critical condition. Bummer.”
He raised the remote and changed the channel again.