Let's Start at the Very Beginning...

Chapter One: Juliet

 

 

FAR TOO MANY THINGS ARE SPINNING AROUND in my head for me to keep track. I back up slowly, banging into the creaky wooden door—the same one that locked on Violet and me, the night we were trapped with a psychopath in November. Could it honestly have been that far back? I’d come out to this place to escape my troubles, and yet these same troubles have found me all the same. My mind wants to go over everything and make sure this is all still real. It’s hard to believe that it is.

     It’s difficult to pinpoint when it all began. Possibly right in the heat of the action, in this stupid house the night we first met the Sinj twins. Or when I started hearing voices in my head. But I think a story such as this one calls for a bit of background, so I’ll start in one of the final weeks of October. Halloween, the age-old bridge between winter and fall, was creeping closer; after that, the cold season would begin in earnest.

     It was to be the last Halloween we could maintain some sort of innocence as ninth graders before we were expected to do something with our lives. I wasn’t too worried about the college prep scene—I practically had a basketball scholarship waiting for me anywhere I wanted to go. I’d won state for our high school team as an eighth grader, division one. But I didn’t plan on slacking off. Sports could only get you so far, as my parents kept telling me. I know my mother would prefer it if I took a break now and then to spend more time studying, but since athletics had always come so naturally to me, I couldn’t imagine living otherwise.

     It was a Friday when we hit the very tip of the iceberg, so to speak. I’d located my first hour class and joined my three good friends Josh Striker, Ryan Eirah, and Adrienne Cigam at our usual table. Mrs. Bergan, our plump and perky high school bio teacher, always allowed a quiet buzz to fill her classroom as we discussed the experiments before class.

     Or, if we discussed what she thought were our experiments.

     This gentle buzz was what met me as I slipped into the room, trying to disguise the fact that I was running a few minutes late. Of course, while I could hide from Bergan, my friends were another matter entirely.  

     Biology was the only class all four of us shared, and though they were my closest friends, this was probably a good thing. I can’t begin to explain how grateful I am that Ryan’d stopped a half-asleep Josh from accidentally killing me with a scalpel back in September while dissecting a cow eye. I’m sure it would have been slow and painful. Mrs. Bergan had been quite cross about that little incident, but Ryan managed to sneak us out of trouble, as usual, which was just fine with me.

     The perks of having a charming best friend.

     The room was arranged with lab benches set up into four-person tables around the room. There wasn’t really a “front” or “back” of the room; just Mrs. Bergan’s desk and a projector on one end, and a large black counter in front of the material cabinets on which she usually laid out lab equipment. That morning, she’d placed multiple craft materials with magnetic parts for our long-term project meant to demonstrate the 3-D structures of proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. I snagged a thick paper packet of lab instructions and questions before sleepily sliding into my seat at our bench.

     “Morning, sunshine,” Ryan drawled with a friendly smirk. We’d been friends since before first grade and he knew full well I wasn’t an early riser.

     I think my response was to mumble incoherently and rub my eyes with the back of my hand. Lately every night felt like a battle trying to fall asleep, and once I was out, I was a rock for about two hours. Then I’d wake back up to start the cycle all over again. Adrienne had asked if I was turning into a vampire once. I remember glaring daggers at her and yawning pitifully. Of course, she would say that—her olive skin always looked healthy, and Josh’s distant African heritage ensured he looked perpetually tanned while I generally lost my summer color around February and then truly did start to look slightly vampiric if I didn’t get enough sleep.

     Honestly, ancestry aside, I still didn’t understand why I was always the only one who looked like Frankenstein in the morning in the middle of fall. I knew for a fact that Josh often stayed up ‘til sometimes two in the morning honing video game skills after Taekwondo practice, or football practice, or whatever it was he was trying out at the time. Ryan busied himself with at least three different sports at once and I’d even gotten texts from Adrienne in the wee hours of the morning asking when an essay was due. And yet she still looked perfect and well put together, shoulder-length brown hair brushed and shiny, and hazel eyes bright as if she’d slept like a baby the entire night.

     I couldn’t imagine how she knew how to do that when only her dad raised her—maybe girls knew how to look nice instinctively? I don’t know. Still, I wished I had a trick like that; it would get my mother off my back about going to school looking like a maniac.

     The bell rang a few seconds later, quieting the morning chatter of the classroom and signaling the official start of class. Mrs. Bergan bustled into the room, bidding us all ‘good mornings’ as she crossed to her desk. Josh quickly pulled the remains of a blueberry muffin out of sight before she could confiscate it. She gave him a stern look to remind him about the strict no-food-in-the-lab rule and Josh responded with a cheesy half-smile. Not half as charming as Ryan, our Josh, but he still tried.

     Bergan pursed her lips, but continued to the black supplies table.

     “Now, does everyone have one of these?” she asked, holding up one of the packets. It seemed as if she were bursting with energy—the perfect foil to my current situation. “Yes? Yes? Good. Well, then I suppose you all know by looking at the front page that starting today and through next week, we’ll be continuing our unit on organic molecules by modeling them. Now, although we aren’t using any chemicals or breakable objects, I still feel obligated to warn all of you of the dangers of the lab…”

     Next to me, Ryan groaned and slid down further in his seat, closing his usually cheerful gray eyes as if preparing to take a nap. It seemed like every time we started a new lab—and occasionally even before we took down a few simple notes—Mrs. Bergan felt “obligated” to warn us of “the dangers of the lab”. That morning, I blew off her entire introduction speech about safety and what we were supposed to be doing. I’d heard it all about two-dozen times already and could probably quote it as well as Josh could cite Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First?” routine.

     I wasn’t the only one daydreaming. Josh doodled absently on a notebook that wasn’t his; Ryan twisted rubber bands into a giant bouncy ball; Adrienne clicked her pen in and out absently and flashed me a Mona Lisa smile when our eyes met. At another table, fellow basketball player John Kahrn was already playing with materials he must have smuggled while walking past the equipment table and Elena Johnson giggled while Clive Meisan played with her hair.

     On his way back from sharpening his pencil (mid-lecture, too; Bergan didn’t even notice) Ryan raised his eyebrow at the two of them. “Honestly, Meisan, leave the poor girl alone,” he muttered with a roll of his eyes. He withheld a smile. “Don’t you know better than to play with your food?”

     “You’re one to talk,” Meisan replied, almost too quiet for me to hear. It sounded like one of those automatic responses a person doesn’t really think through before saying to save face. But he still turned very obviously to look at Adrienne.

     Ugh, Clive Meisan. I’d like to think I’m a fairly a reasonable person. I didn’t tend to judge people without getting to know them first, and I didn’t like picking fights, but for some reason or another, from the moment we set eyes on one another, Clive Meisan and I agreed to disagree. He was one of those guys—the kind who got around and didn’t bother hiding it. The guy who seemed somehow older than the rest of us freshmen, like the puberty stick whacked him a couple years early. Worst of all, he was perpetually ready to compete with me when I just wanted to be left alone.

     I wasn’t exactly sure what happened next, but Meisan suddenly dropped the strand of Elena’s hair that he’d caught between his fingers and frowned. He must have had half an ear out for whatever Mrs. Bergan was saying and was now looking up to where our portly science teacher was standing with a shy, nervous girl next to her. The girl was blond and probably a full five inches taller than Adrienne—relatively tall for a girl, I guessed. Whoever she was, her name, which I’d missed, was what had startled Meisan. Odd. She must have followed Bergan into the classroom and I just didn’t notice. I’d gotten used to new faces back in September when classes started, but a new student in October was a bit of a surprise.

     Apparently, Mrs. Bergan had introduced her and told her where to sit, but we’d all been too dazed to care. As she walked past our lab table to take her seat, I nudged Ryan, who cracked open his eyes.

     “Hey—you catch what her name was?” I asked, tilting my head in the direction of the blond girl.

     “Hmm?” he said, sitting up straighter and turning so he could see who I was talking about. He frowned for a second, much the same way that Meisan had—like he recognized her from somewhere—but the moment passed and I didn’t think any more on it. Ryan shrugged. “No idea; does it matter?”

     I supposed not, but not knowing still bothered me. I tried to blow off the fact during the rest of biology, sure that there must have been something wrong with me to care this much about someone I hadn’t even met yet—but each time I attempted to push the thought out of my mind, the more it popped back up. Ryan had to elbow me in the ribs several times to get my attention back on track while we started our lab.

     Did I have a crush? I didn’t think so. I’d always sort of had a thing for brunettes. So, what was it, then? 

     This continued to bother me until the bell rang again, releasing us from the first of seven classes before the weekend.

     I waited for Ryan at the door while he dallied a bit, cramming books into his backpack. The blond girl lingered a few seconds as well, rechecking a schedule she had. Meisan watched her curiously, but she didn’t notice, and muttered a quick “excuse me” as she brushed past, keeping her head down.

     “Moved on already, have you?” Ryan asked Meisan as he crossed to the door. “Elena will be heartbroken.”

     Meisan shrugged, shouldering his own backpack. “Can’t help but notice a new face,” he said.

     “Hmm, well, I wouldn’t waste your time on that one; she looks too smart to even consider it.” Ryan patted Meisan’s shoulder in a false show of sympathy and then finally made his way to the door.

     “What was that all about?” I asked him quizzically.

     Ryan shrugged. “I didn’t like what he implied about Adrienne earlier,” he admitted. “And you know me—I had to have the last word. I just hope he actually leaves her alone…I doubt that girl would appreciate being hassled her first day here.”

     I thought about the blond girl and gave a short whistle before clicking my tongue sympathetically. “Hope she’s a good runner.”

     Ryan grinned wryly. “Yes, I’d imagine that would help.”

     My next hour, gym, was several stories down from the science wing, but I had five minutes to get there, so I could take my time. I found it a little odd to have gym so early in the morning when I’m still too asleep to even be thinking, but as my mom would say: “It gets your blood flowing!” She’s into the whole “waking up at five in the morning and drinking a smoothie before running a couple of miles”. I personally enjoy sleeping in until ten and indulging myself with waffles, whipped cream, and syrup.

     And now I want waffles. Great.

     I quickly changed in the locker rooms and made my way towards the field house. I shared this class with Ryan and Adrienne—who had gotten her schedule changed around for reasons only known to her.

     Our current unit was baseball. Yes, baseball in October. Ms. Hirsh, our Hispanic and sarcastic gym teacher, was aware that this sport was completely out of season but simply didn’t care. She also insisted (much to most of the girls’ chagrin) that we all played with a real baseball. There would be no softball softies in her class, thank you very much.

     We’d been playing baseball that entire week so far and kept the same teams each day. Losing team had to run a mile and a half as fast as they could at the end of class or they’d be late for third period. Winners got let out early. Not much of a prize, I know; but it was nice to have a few minutes to relax before dashing off to third period.

     Luckily for my morning drowsiness, I was confident that we’d win those extra few minutes. Ryan and I had gotten paired on the same team and Ryan was a wizard with a bat in hand. I’ll always remember the first time my dad came to one of our Little League games in second or third grade. He’d whistled, impressed, when Ryan hit a triple the first time he ever picked up a bat. “That kid’s got talent,” he’d admitted on the car ride home.

     I was too little to care about “talent”. As long as we got those nice shiny champion trophies at the end of the season, I was one happy eight-year-old. Now, though, my gym grade was evidence of my dad’s prediction. See, just because she liked going against the grain, Ms. Hirsh didn’t give anyone bullshit grades. If you wanted that A, you had to work for it just like any other class—Ryan and I were simply lucky that between the two of us, we could handle just about any sport Hirsh threw at us. Poor Josh was stuck flying solo fifth hour and always muttered beforehand at lunch that she was a bristly army sergeant reincarnated.

     Actually, maybe I should amend my statement about Hirsh and grades; there was one place she fudged things a little: Adrienne didn’t need to care about gym grades. She ran on the cross country team, of which Hirsh was one of the assistant coaches, and everyone loved her. She probably could have brushed her hair the entire period and still gotten an A.

     That morning, kids lounged about the field house, waiting for the bell to ring and messing around with leftover equipment from the class before us. I was one of the only ones who saw the new girl slip into the gym. She was still in a pair of black leggings and flowered blue skirt. She approached Ms. Hirsh just when Hirsh was yelling at a pack of kids on the bleachers—something about grabbing mitts and bats and heading out to the diamond. I wasn’t sure why, but something made me a little nosy and I lingered near the crate of mitts, pretending to be looking for the perfect one.

     “Um, excuse me, Ms…Hirsh?” shy girl asked tentatively. She sounded like a mouse creeping up on a hawk and asking not to be eaten. Her timidity was probably why Hirsh didn’t bite her head off immediately.

     “Yes?” Hirsh said gruffly, turning.

     “I apologize for not changing, but things were a bit chaotic this morning since we just moved and I didn’t have time to put my contacts in before school. Now, I know it’s a little unusual to let students skip out of class, but without my contacts, I don’t have any depth perception, so…”

     I thought Hirsh would crucify her for even suggesting that playing baseball without depth perception could be dangerous, but she was already nodding. “Quite understandable. I’ll make an exception just this once, but don’t you forget those contacts again, all right?”

     The new girl bobbed her head up and down, relieved that our frightening little gym teacher had taken pity on her. “What’s your name again, dear?” Hirsh continued. “I know I have a note here somewhere…Colin Basalt, what are you still doing here?!” I just about jumped out of my socks. “Grab a mitt already and get over to that diamond! Go!”

     Admittedly terrified, I grabbed a mitt at random and sprinted for the door where Ryan was shaking with laughter.

     “Awake now?” he asked as we headed across the street to the baseball diamond at Kirby Park. He was walking next to Adrienne, an arm around her waist, and she smirked at me with a knowing expression.

     “Not sure,” I admitted. “Sometimes I think I’m never awake.”

     Ryan nodded, still grinning, and started to whistle a show tune. The rest of our class was scattered about in twos and threes, complaining about how cold it was that morning, and a couple of guys were swinging aluminum bats at each other’s heads.

     “Hey,” I found myself saying. “That blond girl from bio? She doesn’t have any depth perception; isn’t that weird?”

     Ryan rolled his eyes. “Not really. My dad doesn’t have depth perception, either. And why do you care so much? She’s going to think you’re stalking her. Ya creep.”

     I was going to point out that Ryan had acted weird when he first noticed the new girl too but decided against it in front of Adrienne. He was right and it didn’t matter.

     The rest of the day passed in a blur. Josh and I doodled our way through Spanish; then I aced a World History quiz and blew right through geometry, English, and woodshop like they were no big deal. Strangely enough, as the hours ticked on, I crept further out of daydreaming and Ryan seemed to take my place in it. What happened at the end of school was a perfect example.

As soon as the last bell rang, I made my way to the front of the school. Josh and Ryan usually met there to walk home with me, sometimes with a couple of sports buddies as well if they were headed the same way. But Josh’s older brother, Mike, was coming home from college for the weekend, which meant his mom was picking him up via car—no walk home for him, leaving me to wait by myself while a quick after-school ritual took place.

     I watched Adrienne approach Ryan with a smile, meeting him as was habit before she took off for cross country or musical rehearsals depending on the time of year. Usually, Ryan was always on his toes; she couldn’t have snuck up on him if she tried. But not today. He looked slightly green. And extremely distant. Which wasn’t like him in the slightest.

     “Ryan?” I heard Adrienne ask, a frown finding its way onto her face.  

     “Hey, Juliet,” he said, seeming to notice her for the first time. It was a joke nickname he’d given her a long time ago after reading the Shakespeare play in seventh grade, and it had stuck.

     Adrienne talked with him for a while as I waited, but their conversation didn’t last too long and when it was over, Adrienne was walking away with confusion plastered on her face.

     “Hey, Adrienne,” I said, intercepting her. “Something wrong?”

     “I’m not sure,” she admitted. “He seemed…upset about something.”

     “Huh, really? I hadn’t noticed,” I lied, suddenly anxious to be off. “Well, gotta run,” I said, wincing at my phrasing. The girl was in cross country, Colin. That probably wasn’t that funny to her. Sure enough, she looked a little pale-faced, despite her summer running tan. But I didn’t think my bad pun that had done that.

     “Colin, I think I—” she started, touching a hand to her head. And then she started to fall, pitching forward like she was about to faint.

     “Whoa, careful there,” Ryan was there in a blink to catch her. Good thing, too, because I was too startled to respond. “You okay?” he asked as he helped her back up with a smile. It was like someone had thrown a switch and we had the old Ryan back again.

     It was odd: she’d said that Ryan looked unwell, but I wondered if Adrienne was coming down with something. Her hair, which had been arranged so nicely this morning, was now askew and the knock-out hazel eyes that I’d heard even a few upper classmen mention were dull and tired.  

     “Maybe you should skip running today,” I suggested, but she shook her head. Adrienne hated the thought of slacking off; even if she was hacking up a lung, she’d probably still be out running so as not to break the habit.

     “Can’t,” she said, “we have a meet tomorrow and I—”

     But of course when Ryan interrupted her, she listened. “Adrienne, cut practice. It’s just one; I’m sure Coach Dell will understand. Besides, maybe with some rest you’ll feel well enough to compete tomorrow.”

     Adrienne didn’t look happy—anyone who’d known her since grade school knew that running was her way of dealing with her mom’s death when she was little—but she gave in with a nod. “Sorry, you’re right, I’m being stupid. I’ll just…call Dell and let him know.”

     “Think you’ll be fine getting home? Your dad’s still at work, isn’t he?” Ryan said.

     “I’ll be fine,” Adrienne reassured him. “I’ll catch a ride with someone. Besides, aren’t you two walking?”

     The two of us exchanged an embarrassed glace. Right…neither of us had thought about that.

     Ryan shrugged nonchalantly. “Just thought I’d offer.”

     Adrienne blushed, pleased, but she still looked a little under the weather to me. “That’s sweet,” she said, “but honestly, I’ll be fine. Go do…whatever you boys do on Fridays. Au ruvoir.”

     She gave us a one-handed wave, trying to play off the fact that she’d almost passed out on the sidewalk, and headed back towards the school. Ryan and I watched her until she was inside, as if waiting to see if she’d fall over again.

     “You think she’s OK?” I asked, a little unsettled by all the weird things happening today And honestly, Adrienne was so stubbornly independent sometimes that I wondered if she’d bother asking for a ride at all or if she’d try walking the several miles separating the school and her house.

     Ryan narrowed his eyes. “I don’t know,” he admitted, “but I think I’ll call Mr. Cigam and let him know what happened.”

     “Sure,” I acknowledged dryly as we turned to start walking. “That way, if she never makes it home, he’ll at least know where to start looking.”  

     Ryan answered grimly, “If anything happens to Adrienne, I’ll be out there helping them look for her.”

     And wasn’t that the truth.  

 

 

 

Chapter Two: Eirahs

 

 

I ENDED UP WALKING TO THE EIRAHS’ HOUSE with Ryan instead of heading home. I was so distracted thinking over everything that had happened that day that I didn’t notice when I forgot to turn at Olive Street until I arrived at Oak with Ryan. He didn’t hesitate to invite me in—his parents wouldn’t mind—but I still felt a little sheepish. Who else do you know who couldn’t habitually walk home on a Friday afternoon?

     “Hello Colin!” Mrs. Eirah greeted me with a wide smile as we walked into the kitchen. Odd as she could be sometimes, almost like those mythical TV mothers from the 50’s, Mrs. Eirah was one of the nicest people on Earth. She was already at work on an early dinner and was wearing a red and white striped apron, her purse flung on the counter as if she’d just gotten home a few seconds ago herself. The scent of baked goods lingered in the air, making my stomach remind me how far away lunch had been.

     “How’s my second son doing?” she joked. “What’s new at school?”

     “Oh, you know: same old,” I said, settling in for some small talk while Ryan slipped into another room to make the call he’d promised. Apparently, he’d forgotten his cell phone again and though I offered to lend him mine, he opted to wait until getting home, sure that Mr. Cigam would probably be busy anyway, so he’d be leaving a message.

     Ryan was like that—he thought of everything. Except, apparently, his cell phone.

     “I have a job for you,” Mrs. Eirah admitted, like she’d just remembered. I half-expected her to ask me to help clear out the garage or rake leaves or something—both things I wouldn’t mind doing—but, as I should have guessed, manual labor was the last thing on Mrs. Eirah’s mind.

     “I tried a new recipe for muffins: pumpkin gingerbread with walnuts. I’m counting on you boys and Mr. Eirah to tell me how they are…and be honest! Your mom suggested I try entering something in the State Fair eventually and I want to make sure I’ve got everything all sorted out.”

     I was all too happy to oblige. Mrs. Eirah was one of the best bakers in the world; even my mom admitted to that. When it came to birthdays—mine, Ryan’s, or even my little sister Caron’s—Mrs. Eirah was always in charge of the cake. No colored-plastic frosting for us, oh no. We got spoiled rotten with baked goods. Since she only worked part-time, Mrs. Eirah spent the extra hours perfecting her baking and sewing like some sort of multi-faceted talent machine. I’d say that’s where Ryan got his jack-of-all-trades skills from, but they’re not blood-related. With both of his parents fair-haired in contrast to his own pitch-black mop, Ryan didn’t even look like them.

     Yeah, I might have forgotten to mention that, but Ryan was adopted. Mrs. Eirah suffered from lead poisoning when she was a little kid and knew from a young age that she was infertile. So she and Mr. Eirah went right ahead with looking for an opportunity to adopt and viola, my best friend wound up here with only the name “Ryan R.” to identify him.

     No one knew what the “R” stood for, but I guessed it must have been the initial of his actual last name. The two of us used to try and guess what it meant and Adrienne used to tease him it stood for “Romeo” after he fell into the habit of calling her Juliet, which was really stupid, but it was all in fun. We’d probably never know, and that was just fine with me.

     Mrs. Eirah’s baking, as could be expected, was perfect.

     “How is it?” she asked excitedly as I took my first bite.

     “Delicious,” I told her with my mouth full, starting to wonder how long exactly a phone call could take a person.

     Mrs. Eirah was thrilled. “Oh, good! There’s not too much ginger?”

     I shook my head and bit off another large mouthful, intent on finishing the whole thing off in three bites. Lucky thing Josh wasn’t around, or these things would be gone already.

     “You wouldn’t mind taking one up to Chris, would you?” she asked, referring to Mr. Eirah by his first name and handing me another muffin. “He’s always so busy,” she noted. “He’s even stuck taking work home and chips away at it during the afternoon before going back at night.”

     “No problem, Mrs. E,” I told her.

     Honestly, I was happy to get to see Mr. Eirah again. He was one of those brilliant, quieter-type guys. I didn’t actually know what he did for a living since it had never been explained to me very well, but I knew that he had degrees in science, math, had been pre-med at one point, and read up on a lot of history as a hobby. One of those crazy geniuses, I guess. Just like Mrs. Eirah, he’d always liked me as if I was one of his kids—possibly even more than his own son, though neither of us would admit it—and he always seemed to have a smile and a basketball tip for me.

     I exited the kitchen as Mrs. Eirah started humming to herself and I took the familiar path down the hall to the back of the house where Mr. Eirah’s study was. Peeking in the room, I saw him sitting perched on the edge of his seat at his desk, leaning over what looked like miles of paper and diagrams. A big book, probably as big as one of my school textbooks, covered with a dark green cloth lay underneath the papers, crumpling some of them underneath it like a massive paperweight.

     He looked so stressed out that I almost felt guilty disturbing him.

     I coughed slightly and waited, but Mr. Eirah must have had a lot on his mind, because he didn’t notice me at all. Entering the room, I went over to deliver the muffin-gift.

     “Uh…Mr. Eirah?” I said, causing him to almost jump out of his seat.

     “Oh, Colin, didn’t see you there,” he said, sounding as if he were the one apologizing to me.

     “Yeah, just here with a muffin for you,” I told him, feeling a bit embarrassed at my intrusion. I glanced at some of the stuff he’d been scribbling on, which looked like architectural blue prints or something like that. “What are those?”

     Mr. Eirah sighed, “Part of a job I should not have taken…Did I hear you say something about a muffin?” I could tell he was purposefully trying not to seem so tense in front of me.

     “Oh, yeah, here. Mrs. E wants our opinion on them—apparently, my mom has her all psyched up about the State Fair.”

     “Ah, about time,” Mr. Eirah said with a nod, “though I don’t think I have the heart to remind her that it already came and went.”

     “It’s practice for next year.”

     “Ah. Of course.”

     Right then, I heard Ryan in the kitchen, asking his mom where I’d disappeared off to, and I said a quick farewell to Mr. Eirah before ducking out of the room again, meeting Ryan out in the hallway.

     “How’s Adrienne?” I asked. “Did she get home okay?”

     “She’s fine,” Ryan reassured me. “Her dad said she already called him and told him. She caught Mrs. Striker before she left with Josh and snagged a ride from them.”

     Whew. After the close call in front of the high school, I felt almost physically relieved to hear that Adrienne made it home all right. All we needed was for her to conk out right before Sectionals in cross country—it would have just killed her to miss that. And then we’d have never heard the end of it.

     I didn’t stay at the Eirahs’ for too long, since Ryan seemed so distracted and I could sort of feel the tension running high in the house from the demands of Mr. Eirah’s job. It didn’t occur to me until the next morning on Saturday that Ryan hadn’t looked too well himself, and I thought I might as well check in. Ryan never got sick, so I thought this was…weird.

     I had to wonder if he and Adrienne were about to start an epidemic.  

     I tried calling his cell phone (I hate texting), then the house phone, but no answer. In fact, I was told by an automated voice that my call couldn’t be completed as dialed. I couldn’t think of any reason why the Eirahs wouldn’t be home on a Saturday morning, but I wasn’t about to make a big deal about it. I’d see Ryan Monday and mention to him that it looked like his house phone needed some repairs.

     The weekend flew by, and I went to bed Sunday night without too much bothering me—not knowing that this would be the last time that I slept in a relatively sane state of mind.

     When my eyes finally blinked open the next morning, I glanced over at my alarm clock, wondering how much time I had left before it went off, and got an awful surprise. Apparently, my alarm already had gone off, and I must have slept right through the stupid thing because red little numbers were glaring 7:21 in my face.

     Flying out of bed, I jumped in the shower, dressed, grabbed an orange, and headed out the door by 7:34. Mom had already left with Caron to drive her to the grade school before heading over to the kindergarten class that she taught, which meant I was expected to make the twenty-minute commute to school on foot. Usually, I didn’t mind walking, but when school started at 7:45…Even at a run, I knew I was going to be late.

     Biology was already five good minutes into class when I skidded in, and I knew that if I was late again Mrs. Bergan would start complaining to the attendance office and I’d probably lose my exam exemption.

     I quickly spotted Josh with his baggy jeans and outrageous striped shirt next to a—thankfully—a much healthier-looking Adrienne, both waiting at our usual table. But no sign of Ryan. Great. I slid over quietly and joined them, running a hand through my damp hair to try and dry it out faster.

     “Where’s Ryan?’ I asked as I sat down. Strangely enough, being late to school suddenly made me a whole lot more awake.

     “Hello to you, too,” Josh grumbled. He appeared to be in a sour, gloomy mood despite the rare weekend spent with his brother.

     Adrienne, though, bothered to address my question. “Don’t know. I guess he’s still sick, but I’m not sure.”

     Still sick. So Adrienne had called, too. Or texted. I assumed her efforts had been slightly more successful than mine.

     Josh cut in. “Come on, people; why are we worrying about Ryan when we’re the ones about to fail biology if we don’t get working on this lab?”

     He was being a bit inconsiderate, but honestly, I’d be worried if he wasn’t. That was just Josh.

     “Um, right,” I agreed, looking at the jumble of clip-together pieces that we’d claimed for ourselves and thrown in a plastic bag last Friday. Only, Ryan was sort of the man with the plan. I’m going to just go right out and admit that I had no idea what his design was and it was too late to try and start over—Mrs. Bergan had a limited supply of lab materials and there were only bits and pieces left over in bins, in case we lost something important.

     “Umm…do either of you know what Ryan was doing?” I asked, gesturing to the twists of material he had started building into organic molecules. Unfortunately, he hadn’t gotten far enough for us to be able to distinguish which bits were supposed to be the protein, which one was the carbohydrate, and which the fat polymer.

     Adrienne shook her head in response and Josh circled a doodle he’d drawn in his notebook of the three of us being spitted on a lightsaber wielded by some sort of Sith lord that looked strangely like Mrs. Bergan.

     That sort of answered my question.

     I let out a low whistle. We were going to have to take apart Ryan’s hard work and start over. “How much time do we have to finish this thing, again?” I asked.

     “Until next Tuesday,” was Josh’s sullen reply.

     “That’s still plenty of time,” I said, trying to be optimistic.

     Josh shook his head, though. “We’re supposed to be taking notes every other day or something like that, so we got less time than we think.” He glanced around the classroom where everyone else was working diligently, a few overachieving students even opting to try the project solo. “Man, I wish we were closer to that table so we could copy them—they look like they’re actually accomplishing something.”

     I followed his gaze to a lab station across the room from us and gave a quiet curse. Because it just had to be Meisan, didn’t it?

     “Cheating is for thugs, Josh,” Adrienne chided as she tried to look up a picture of proteins in our textbook.

     She struggled with connecting two pieces together, trying to get them to resemble something from the book, and I took them from her and put them together myself. She gave me a grin in thanks and we continued to stumble through the experiment the best we could while Josh droned on about all the work that he wasn’t doing.

     Then one of his comments registered as something important. “Hey, look who it is,” he said, and I looked up from my work to see whom he was talking about: you guessed it. The new girl with no depth perception. The blond mass of long hair that she had down on Friday was pulled back in a neat high ponytail.

     She was at a lab station across from us, concentrating easily on the task ahead of her as if she didn’t even need to plan what she was doing but just expected it to all fit together in the end. Even though Meisan’s group was further along than her, it seemed like she was confident that her design was going to work. The fact that she had drawn out a design on graph paper, yet another part of the assignment, put her another step ahead of us.

     Josh leaned across the table and stage whispered to me, “Think I could join her? Then I wouldn’t have to do any work at all!”

     “Josh,” Adrienne said, not even looking up from the secondary protein structure she was trying to fix. “First, you’re not doing any work anyway. And second, she already said that she was fine working by herself until the seating arrangements could be changed. Besides, Bergan picks the groups and I hardly think that she’d stick the new girl with us because…”

     “Yeah, I know, we already have four people. I was just wondering cuz Ryan’s not here today,” Josh muttered and went back to his sulking. I’d have to ask him later what was bugging him so much.

     “What’s her name?—I didn’t catch it before,” I said, relieved that I could get that answer finally without getting poked at for it.

     “Violet something,” Adrienne said dismissively. “I can’t remember her last name.”

     “It’s Aquavet,” someone cut in with a drawl. “You know—like the Scandinavian drink?” It was Meisan, leaning on the table next to Adrienne. Apparently, he’d gotten up for some reason or another and decided to make my day miserable by stopping here.

     “Losing your magic memory?” he asked Adrienne, completely ignoring Josh and me. I wasn’t sure if I should be thankful or insulted.

     I settled on insulted.

     “I hear she had something like the highest GPA in the county from where she came from. Creepy-smart little bitch. The only reason she’s even in this class is cuz the school requires you to take biology while you’re here, but she’s taking chemistry at the same time. But I guess we should expect her to be some sort of weirdo, being named after a liquor and all.”

     “That’s aqua vitae, you idiot,” I snapped, irritated that he’d tried to reference the same joke twice. “And before, that the term was used to talk about baptismal water.”

     “How do you even know that?” Josh muttered, apparently forgetting that my dad had started learning Latin and was prone to spout random Latin facts occasionally.

     Meisan wasn’t paying attention, though. He ran a hand through his hair and glanced at Adrienne to see her reaction. I, on the other hand, shot a look at Violet to see if she’d heard what Meisan said. Judging by the unreadable peek she gave us, I’d say she knew exactly what was going on over here.

     “Don’t you have a lab partner, Striker?” Meisan continued, raising an eyebrow. “You’re all short one person; aren’t you worried about failing this class? Of course, you would anyway without Adrienne here…”

     “We’re expecting Ryan back tomorrow,” I cut in sharply.

     Meisan stood up straight and blinked.

     “Who?” he asked, and the genuine confusion on his face would have convinced almost anyone that he had no idea who I was talking about. I had an excellent insult on the tip of my tongue that would probably have earned me a very stern lecture if Mrs. Bergan overheard, but Adrienne stopped me from using it.

     “Get lost,” she snapped before I could even open my mouth. Meisan chuckled and muttered a few nasty terms, but left us in peace. I was left wondering what in the world that little exchange with him was about when the shrill sound of the bell ringing pierced my thoughts.

     What did he mean by pretending that Ryan didn’t exist?

     We stored the unfinished molecules behind Mrs. Bergan’s experiment counter, where she swore it wouldn’t be touched by any of the AP Bio kids, and headed off to our next classes. The usual drill.

     When I entered the field house, there were already a couple of kids warming up before Ms. Hirsh got us together to start the next sports unit: soccer. Not exactly my favorite, but at least I could shoot some hoops while I waited for class to start.

     A couple of guys had already stolen my idea while a gaggle of girls blathered gossip in a corner behind the bleachers. Adrienne waited for me at the other end of the gym, expertly juggling a soccer ball—a leftover skill from when she used to play club soccer. I snagged a basketball from a nearby cart and dribbled quickly down the court to join her, brushing up on a few tricks as I went. When I reached the basketball hoop closest to her, I executed a perfect layup before retrieving the ball.

     Standing under the hoop, I took a hook shot. Swish. Basket number one. I dribbled lazily and took a few steps back. Swish. Basket number two.

     Adrienne absently counted her juggling nearby. She desperately wanted to break her record of one-sixteen even though it had been years since she’d played soccer. Cross country and horseback riding had all but consumed her life in the summer and fall, school musicals and plays during the winter and spring. I guess with nothing but an empty house to get back to at the end of the day, she liked to keep busy.

     “Hey—Colin—guess—what?” she asked me in time with the bounces as she tried to keep counting as the same time. Swish, I popped another basket.

     “What?” I asked as I made a half-hearted shot from the free-throw line and was surprised when it actually went in.

     “I went—to the office—to ask—for Ryan’s—locker combo—so I could—get his homework—for him—and the secretary—didn’t even know—who he was.”

     “What?” I repeated stupidly, and my surprise cost me a clumsy shot from the three-point line. Brick. The ball bounced away from me, forcing me to chase after it like an idiot before I returned to Adrienne and her story.

     “Sorry,” I said when I got back. “What do you mean?”

     “I said—she—couldn’t find—any record—of him—on the computer,” she repeated. Her frequent pauses were starting to get on my nerves.

     “Sorry, I’m still not following you,” I said, shooting and making a three pointer. Adrienne stopped bouncing the soccer ball and caught it.

     “When I asked about Ryan, she just started at me and said, ‘Who?’ And I said, ‘Ryan Eirah. He’s in ninth grade with me and I’m supposed to get his homework for him if he’s sick.’ And she looked really confused and checked the database for enrollment on her computer and then said, ‘Sorry, dear, but there’s no one by that name here on the roster.’

     “I even spelled his last name out for her and she still couldn’t find anything,” Adrienne recalled. “Isn’t that strange?”

     “Yeah. Very weird,” I muttered as the shrill sound of Ms. Hirsh’s whistle called us over of the other side of the room. I felt bad for my teammates, because I knew I was going to be far too distracted with this information in mind to pay one bit of attention to what was going on. I mean—first Meisan, then the school secretary and even the school roster?

     A loop of that stupid pre-recorded phone message kept playing over and over in my head: “I’m sorry, your call cannot be completed as dialed…” I felt like my head was about to explode from all this nonsense.

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