by Eden Beck
Scout here to see for their own eyes what’s going on at Bleakwood.
Apparently, that’s the biggest scandal of all … and one that Jasper seems to fixate on whenever I overhear him muttering to Heath and Beck.
Which they seem to be doing a lot of these days. Muttering amongst themselves.
There was a brief moment between my last run-in with Beck and the boys when I thought they might try to make things return to normal. I thought maybe Heath and Beck would finally see that Jasper wasn’t ready to be forgiven, not right away—and certainly not just so the three of them could go right back to bullying the next generation of Bleakwood students.
But then, after overhearing that conversation in the forest, it all started falling back into place.
The Brotherhood isn’t pining for me. They’re just protecting themselves from me.
They got the first real taste of danger, and their pussy asses hightailed it the other way as fast as they could. But not before starting the hunt for fresh meat, apparently.
I feel like such a fool. After everything … I should have known better.
But Heath, Heath is the one that really kills me. Every time I see him now, for going on two months now, all I see is the way he looks absolutely fucking destroyed at the very sight of me.
It used to break my heart. Now, all it does is make me furious. Like all the rest of this, it’s just some sort of shallow, selfish lie.
But it’s the lie that hurts the most.
The practice sessions become less frequent as the days progress. At first, Dean Withers had it in his head that if he gathered the four of us together almost every day after class that we would become some kind of power team that could solve puzzles better than Nancy Drew.
Instead, even he could see after a couple of sessions that the more he forced me together with The Brotherhood, the worse it got. The more distracted I became, the more erratic they acted. Any of their old swagger, their confidence, the poise that marked them for who they are, disappeared when we were all together. Whether or not that was all part of this elaborate act they’re putting together, I don’t know.
All I know is that now we only have to meet once a week, and for me … that’s already more than enough.
Sure enough, Rafael has gotten busy with preparations for the final dance, but apparently, it’s nothing like last time. Last time, when he was solely in charge of the winter formal, it consumed his life for the better part of six weeks. But that was before Bleakwood was suddenly under a microscope.
It seems that this time, his role as head of the dance committee is mostly ceremonial.
At least, that’s how he makes it sound each week when I flop myself down onto the ground between his and Neville’s bed after enduring yet another shouting match between Beck and the coach under the guise of more practice.
At this rate, it isn’t going to be Bleakwood’s reputation that gets the place sunk. It’s going to be our abysmal performance at the competition between the schools.
Rafael stops his pantomime of the dance routine he’s been practicing just long enough to glare down at me over the length of his nose. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he says, blinking furiously a few times, “or is my drama not nearly as interesting as yours?”
“Sorry,” I groan genuinely as I force myself back up into a half sitting position. “What was it you were trying to show us again?”
Beside me, Neville tries to shush me from where he’s perched on my old bed … but we’re both too late. Rafael has already launched back to the very beginning of what’s promising to be a very lengthy interlude involving just a tad too much ‘interpretive’ to the ‘interpretive dance’ that if he had his way, all us competitors would have to learn to perform.
He eventually gets to the part that requires him to apparently do sixteen full twirls in a row, and while he’s otherwise occupied Neville takes the opportunity to lean in close enough to whisper in my ear, “So any word on the takedown front?”
I roll my eyes a little even though I know not even Rafael will notice—not with the splitting headache he’s basically guaranteed after this impressive performance.
“Takedown is a strong word,” I whisper back in lieu of an answer, because in all honesty … I don’t have one.
Between classes, practice, and waiting anxiously for any news on our college applications, the idea of bringing down The Brotherhood has been little more than just that—an idea. Normally I avoid the subject with Neville. He’s surprisingly and consistently tenacious about it, which probably annoys me more than it should.
I know he’s been bullied by The Brotherhood, but he was never their literal “bitch”.
If anyone should have cause to hate them, it should be me. And I do. I just don’t feel nearly as prepared to throw myself to the wolves as Neville apparently thinks I should.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Try as Neville might over the ensuing weeks to convince me to agree to get Jasper and the others expelled, I just can’t bring myself to agree to do it.
And as it is when anyone tries to get you to do something you don’t want to do, and just won’t take no for an answer, I soon find myself avowing him and Rafael altogether. For a good two weeks, maybe more, I find myself falling into lonely—if a little intense—pattern of school, studying, and reading puzzle books.
I’m not the only one falling into a period of introspection either. The entirety of Bleakwood seems to grow quiet, as if the whole place has started to hold a collective breath.
The first event is being held at the girl’s school, but rather than wait for the shuttle to take me there I decide to head over early on my own. Or I think I’ll be heading over on my own—right up until Rafael and Neville practically accost me at the bottom of the stairwell leading up to my lonely corner of Bleakwood.
It’s all I can do to keep from screaming bloody murder at their unexpected appearance.
“You really didn’t think we’d let you stumble off into those woods alone now, do you?” Rafael asks me once I’ve recovered enough to be sure that I am not, after all, having a heart attack.
Neville just beams at his side as he helps me back up to my feet and then follows along excitedly as Rafael takes the lead into the trails. I roll my eyes once, haul my backpack up over my shoulder, and follow after him—even though in all rights, I should be the one leading us into the forest.
I am the one who runs through these woods nearly every day, after all, not Rafael.
I took up the habit again after my last gander under these branches. I’d thought I’d find fear here, memories of that haunting accident with the wolves when for a brief second a year ago, I thought there was a chance I was going to lose Heath.
Now that memory just brings sadness, but the trees themselves … I’m surprised to find that they breed no fear.
Still, I find myself stumbling at the slow pace Rafael sets.
“At this rate,” I say, finally making it over a root I never noticed before to catch up to his stride, “we’ll be there well after the event has already come and gone.” I glance over my shoulder at the courtyard one last time before we round the bend, my eyes following the line of the smooth road leading away from Bleakwood jealously. “Where’s your car, your driver, when you need him?”
“Apparently,” Rafael grunts, “not here, not today.”
I blink and reel back a bit in surprise. “Are you telling me all of Bleakwood’s rich and famous have no choice but to take the shuttle?”
“Or walk …” Rafael says, bemoaning his luck as he picks his way around a patch of earth that’s only slightly wetter than damp. “Which, by the way, I’m starting to regret now.”
I stomp up a couple of steps and whirl around to face him and Neville, one hand on my hip as the other points into their faces wagging accusatorially.
“Oh, so that’s what this is about!” I screech, gleefully. “You two needed me! It was never the other way around.”
I grin maniacally and w
hirl back around while the two of them are still spluttering to reply. I’m satisfied, at least for now, in just knowing that for once I wasn’t the one who needed guiding around the grounds of Bleakwood.
When we arrive, all in one piece and only slightly smelling of deer shit, it becomes suddenly and abundantly clear that not only are we the very last students at Bleakwood to arrive, but I have wholly underestimated the scale of this whole affair.
On. Every. Level.
The grounds at the girl’s school—which apparently, according to the stone facade placed at the entrance to the dazzling white stone courtyard has the name Ms. Harrow’s School for Girls—are less decorated for a festival so much as they are the Kentucky derby or something similar but far more elegant.
White streamers have been hung from the tall, dark lampposts lining the road up the last few steps to the school. A lawn far too green for this time of year stretches beyond it.
On the far side, I can make out what appears to me makeshift bleachers set up outside in the sunlight that has just now, at this very moment, starting to fade across the far side of the sky.
“Ah shit,” I mutter, pausing just long enough at the edge of the road to straighten up and wipe the sweat that’s started beading across the top of my brow, “I might have overestimated how quickly we could get through those trails.”
A soft round of polite clapping issues from the other side of the building, making my stomach feel like it’s wringing itself round and round.
“From the sounds of things, the events about the begin … if it hasn’t already.”
For the first time in weeks, Jasper’s eyes find mine the moment I step into the smaller tent lined up along the outside edge of the bleachers.
“Where were you?” he hisses at me as I duck behind a caterer rushing out past me and avoid looking at the coach, who’s just noticed me come in as well and looks like he’s scrambling to fix something at the last minute.
I know what that means. He’d already written me off.
Typical.
Jasper’s eyes are still on me, and I find myself shifting under the weight of his gaze. It’s been ages since he looked at me like that.
Ages since he looked at me at all.
Heath and Beck are nowhere to be seen for a moment, but then I see a shift in the light as the two of them duck into the tent after me. Their gaze follows Jasper’s to land on mine, and I see a momentary look of relief flicker across both of their faces.
Were they really that sure I was going to ghost them at the last second? What would be the point of attending all those torturous practices otherwise?
“It doesn’t matter now,” I say, nudging him to look ahead to part of the tent that leads out into a tunnel beneath the stands. A doorway has opened on the opposite side, a dim light illuminating the hastily built passage. “I think we’re about to start.”
Like clockwork, the coach puts a finger to the earpiece in his ear, nods twice, and then hurries over to where we’re seated.
Both Heath and Beck scramble over to our side.
There isn’t even time to see if they notice how close Jasper has scooted to sit beside me before the coach clears his throat and points towards the glowing exit.
“The first challenge is simple, much more a show put on by Harrow’s than anything else.”
Beck kicks one foot up onto the chair in front of him and leans in conspiratorially, “Well, I hope they’re prepared to lose at their own show. How hard can a puzzle be?”
“Infinitely harder,” the coach says, swatting Beck’s foot off the chair, “when that puzzle is a maze that Harrows just so happened to put together.”
Beck’s mouth clamps shut, and both Jasper and Heath let out a groan—almost in unison.
“What?” I ask, my head swiveling between the three of them. “What is it?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Jasper sighs, “Harrows built the maze. Of course, the Harrows girls will know the way through it.”
It’s all I can do to hide the fact that I truly. Don’t. Care.
After all, we don’t have to win this competition. We just have to compete.
Jasper must not like the lack of shock or surprise on my face, because he ducks his head and fixes me with a suspicious stare. “Why aren’t you upset?”
“All I’m saying,” I say, getting up from my chair and taking two steps toward the exit I now know is leading out into a trap of a maze on the other side, “is that maybe this shouldn’t come as a surprise after all. Did you never think to ask?”
Jasper just blinks stupidly up at me as the coach tried to usher us out the gate. “What’re you talking about?”
“You know,” I say, “one of the Harrows girls you seem so fond of. I bet they’d be all too happy to tell you their secrets with the right amount of plying.”
With that, I sweep down the tunnel through the path laid out beneath the bleachers and out into the bright spring sunlight.
And I stumble to an immediate halt.
Chapter Twenty-Five
I do not find the eyes of the crowd on me on the other side of the door, nor am I met with cheers, jeers, or even the rustling sound as faces turn to look at me.
Instead, all I find are the high, billowing white walls of a maze built from great sheets of linen tacked onto a wooden frame, and made so tall I can see nothing but the path immediately before me—one that stretches out only a few feet before it meets its first split.
Just like the rest of Harrows, this maze is surprisingly elegant. Also like Harrows, it’s somehow disturbing. I can see the play of shadows on the walls when the light shifts and find myself wondering how easy it will be to see—or hear—the goings on throughout the maze as we being to explore.
Behind me, the only break in the wall is where, up above, I get a glimpse up into what can only be described as some sort of VIP viewing platform. The light hits the glass in such a way that I can’t see who’s watching from the inside, but I do see some figures moving just out of sight.
Great. Just like creatures in a cage.
It’s only a moment later that Jasper, Heath, and Beck emerge behind me into the maze. And a moment too soon, because I hadn’t quite decided which path I was going to take.
To hell with it then.
I take off down the left path, but I haven’t gotten more than two steps before I hear Jasper whistle after me, then his voice immediately follow as he runs up around the bend and catches me by the sleeve of my shirt.
“Oy!” he says, his fingers only gripping the fabric tighter when I try to pull away. “What do you think you’re doing, exactly?”
I turn my head to glare at him.
“It’s a maze,” I say flatly, “what do you think I’m doing?”
I gesture at the short path in front of me, which curves away and out of sight instead of coming to another, immediate split. “You said the girls school has the advantage, right? Well, the only thing we can do is get started as quickly as we can and hope that somehow … we get lucky.”
“Just … just wait a second,” Jasper says as I finally wrench my arm free and start marching towards the curved part of the path. “At least, at least until you’ve heard the rest of the rules you so graciously missed when you stormed out of the room back there.”
I do pause, if only long enough to let out a long sigh and turn back to him—slower, and more resigned this time. I cross my arms across my chest and stare Jasper, Heath, and Beck down until Heath finally pipes up.
“We don’t all have to get to the center of the maze together,” he says, quietly.
“Good,” I snap, ready to whirl around and march off on my own until Beck takes a nervous half step forward.
“Wait,” he says, his eyes cutting over to his friends, “but we might need you.”
“Might?”
“We …” he clears his throat. “We’re going to find another puzzle in the middle. Something like … like a riddle, or a … a … something like that.”
&n
bsp; “So,” Jasper continues, as if he was the one speaking this whole time, “we shouldn’t just all split up. Even if the girls find the puzzle first, there’s no guarantee they’ll be able to solve it in time.”
I blink at them blankly for a moment. “Well then, you three run along together and solve the puzzle when you find it.”
I stop and look over my shoulder again. Normally being boxed in like this would leave me feeling claustrophobic, but at the moment … getting lost between these shifting sheets feels more like a strange kind of freedom than a confinement.
But then Heath’s voice carries over to me again, and just the tone of it makes me have to close my eyes for a moment just to gather my thoughts.
“Please … Alex …”
It’s soft, even quieter than before. There’s a sadness to it that I saw on his face not too long ago. A sadness that I thought had been a sham after what I overheard in the forest, but hearing it now … it makes me wonder.
Just wonder.
He must see the way I halt, because he starts stumbling over his words in a rush to get them past his lips.
“See, Alex, we really need this win. You know you’re better at puzzles than we are …”
“Better than you two, maybe,” Beck mutters before quickly backtracking by making a zipped-lips gesture and taking a half step back, hands raised in the air before either Jasper or Heath can box his ears.
“The winner of this challenge gets to choose the next challenge,” Heath continues, his tone a little more strained to stay calm and low this time, “the physical challenge.”
“So, unless you want to get stuck doing another relay race or, I don’t know … skiing …” Jasper adds, unable to hide his own impatience in his voice as he glances down at the diamond-encrusted watch on his wrist, “then we’d better at least team up to make sure we’ve got a chance once we get to the center.”
“If, we get to the center,” I remind him.
Not one of them corrects me, leaving me standing in silence for a moment as I consider what they’ve said. After a second of staring back at their expectant faces, I just raise one hand and press it to my temple to stop the headache blooming there.