by Sheela Chari
“Guys . . .” Caddie moaned.
“There’s no way out, guys,” JP said. “Pick, I thought you disengaged the alarm!”
“I think I just unlocked the front door,” Toothpick said ruefully. “Now I remember — Jonas said if the alarm isn’t fully turned off, it silently calls the police. No warning.”
Downstairs, they could hear the front door banging open.
“Great! Caught!” JP groaned. “Mars, you haven’t said a word.”
“Pick, what does ad astra mean?” Mars yelled.
“We’re caught, Mars! No time left!” JP yelled back.
The sound of people entering echoed through the house. “Come out now. This is the police!” Then footsteps on the stairs.
“Hurry, Pick,” Mars urged.
Toothpick’s phone had found the answer. “It means ‘to the stars,’” he called out.
Caddie gasps. “Wait, that’s . . .”
And then it was like Armageddon as the police stormed the room.
Mars
guys sry
Caddie
did u just get home Mars?!
Mars
police had so many Qs
JP
anyone else grounded
Mars
meee
Caddie
my parents still deciding
they were too mad at the police station
Toothpick
no science channel for a month
JP
aw sry Pick
Mars
anyone hear from Aurora again
JP
gawd mars think about someone else for a change
Mars
but she said ad astra!!!
JP
it means to the stars so what
Toothpick
I think mars is talking about the podcast
Mars
OP says it every time
JP
Again so what
Caddie
sry guys falling asleep GN
Mars
GN caddie
JP
Gn
Toothpick
over and out
Mars
Aurora?
Mars
we got ur msg did u mean who I think u mean??
Mars
weird the cops came right after you texted
Mars
r u even getting these
Mars
sry I keep texting it helps me think
Mars
the envelope for jonas is another clue right
Mars was in bed, lights off, the podcast running in his ears, when he suddenly sat up. Had he heard right? Mars hit rewind.
Ever wonder if that’s true?
If they’re building that bridge, designing that tunnel,
WORKING THAT SECOND SHIFT?
Wait a minute. What?
Because Mars did wonder about his mom’s second shift. He did wonder why she didn’t have a normal job. JP’s dad was a professor, and their mom was a lawyer. Caddie’s parents were teachers. Toothpick’s dad was a dentist, and his mom worked in a bank. Normal jobs with normal hours. Mars didn’t even know what his mom did.
What if she was involved in something dangerous? What if it was shady or against the law? When Mars and his mother had driven to Tacoma last weekend, there had been picketers on both sides of the highway. On one side there were signs that read: HUMAN RIGHTS 4 ALL HUMANS. On the other side: ILLEGALS, GO HOME. He’d asked his mom, Are we illegal? She said, No, of course not. She had shown him his papers before. Even so, Mars was never sure.
Mars listened to the podcast over and over. It made no sense. And yet in some mysterious way, it did. Didn’t the podcast say before that something big was going to happen? Then something had. Aurora and Jonas were both gone. And now it said his mom was lying to him. Just where did Ma go on her second shift? Did Oliver know something Mars didn’t? Was Oliver trying to warn him?
In the car on the way to school, Ma went over everything: Don’t mention last night. Don’t mention the police. Don’t mention Officer Kaiser.
“Ma, the school knows what happened,” Mars said, exasperated. “That’s why we’re going.”
“Well, you don’t have to talk about it,” she said. “Sometimes they’re trying to get you to say things so they can punish you more.”
“What can they do now anyway? Give me detention for life?”
They watched as a school bus turned in front of them. Then Ma continued, telling Mars all the reasons he had to shape up, that detention was no place for him. At the stoplight her eyes fell on him.
“What, looking at your phone again?” she asked, irritated. “Did you even hear one word I said? Always listening to that podcast! That Oliver Pruitt, he can’t —” She bit her lip.
“He can’t what?” Mars asked pointedly. “At least he tries to be helpful. He isn’t lying about himself like . . .”
Ma gave him an incredulous look as if he’d told her the world was spun out of cotton candy.
“Oliver Pruitt tries to be helpful?” she repeated. “Well, that’s a first!” Her eyes narrowed. “What did you mean about the other part? About him not lying? Is someone else lying to you?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Mars mumbled. “And I wasn’t listening to the podcast. I was reading the comments. Did you know a bunch of kids are missing around the world? And no one knows why.”
The light turned green. “Missing kids, huh?” Saira asked, her eyes back on the road.
“It’s wrong, Ma. Whether it’s someone else or your best friends.” Mars stared out the window. “I can’t keep letting it happen.”
Ma drove on for a moment, but instead of continuing into the school lot, she suddenly veered to the right and pulled up to the curb.
“Whoa. What’s going on?” Mars asked, surprised.
She shut off the engine and looked at him very intently. “Mars. Mars, beta. I get what this is about. You can’t be worrying about everybody else. You think if you find Aurora, it’s like you finding your dad.”
“No, don’t start that,” Mars groaned. “Why do you need to have theories about me? I’m fine.”
“I’m serious. You carry that in you, and you shouldn’t. Mars, you are very special. I have always known that about you.” Her face softened. “You will do many wonderful things in your life.”
“Then why do I keep screwing up?” Mars asked.
“Don’t see it that way. Look at all the science contests you have won. And that automated glove warmer. Very clever. I use it every day.”
“Yeah, well, it ignited Mrs. Baker’s desk in science. That’s one of the reasons I’m in detention.”
“You think so? And not because of the flashing light bulbs in English class, or the beeping circuit board in the principal’s office?” Saira’s voice was pointed. “Sometimes Mars, you are brilliant. And sometimes you are a buffoon. All these tricks you play on the school? Why? You need to think before you act, beta. Thinking is your strongest weapon.” Her cell phone rang. She looked to see who it was. “I have to take this.” She answered the phone. “Tell me,” she said. “Tumne kya suna hai?” She continued in Hindi, talking in a low voice for about a minute. “OK, OK. Theek hai.” She hung up.
“Who was that?”
She started up the car and drove back into the street. “Nobody. My brother.”
“Brother?” As far as Mars knew, his mom was an only child.
“OK, kind of a brother. Everybody is a brother when you’re in India.”
This was a weird explanation. Plus, now she seemed distracted, like there was something she wasn’t telling him. Mars studied her face for clues, but her eyes were stony and unreadable. Are you hitting a snag? he wondered.
After they parked and walked inside the school to the main office, Ma reminded Mars about everything all over again. “Be your best,” she pleaded with Mars as they stood outside the principal’s door. “Listen to what Principal F
agan tells you. This might be your last chance, Mars.”
Fagan didn’t care to hear the other side of the story.
“This is very concerning to our school’s reputation,” she said as soon as Mars and his mom sat down. “Every year, our students take the GIFT test, and every year, a handful of our very best gain admission to Pruitt Prep. That’s not magic. We’re lucky to get those precious few slots because we have a special relationship with Pruitt Prep. And while it takes years to build a solid reputation, it only takes a few minutes to destroy it.” She looked hard at Mars.
“Surely what Mars did can’t affect the rest of the school,” Ma murmured nervously.
But Fagan was on a different mission. “It’s not just Mars who was caught,” she continued frostily. “We have already talked to Caddie’s, Randall’s, and JP’s parents over the phone. They have all assured me that this kind of thing won’t happen again. I believe them. Because Mars, even though your friends are a group of misguided misfits, there is still a chief instigator. And that person is you.”
“I’m not an instigator,” Mars said hotly. “What about Aurora and Jonas? Has anyone figured out where they’ve gone?”
“Aurora and Jonas are not your concern,” Fagan said. “Let’s focus on your disruptive tendencies and how we can stop them from affecting your friends. They have received a warning. And you, Mars, a one-day suspension from school. Starting now.”
“Suspension!” Ma gasped. “That will look terrible on his transcript.”
“It looks better than expulsion,” Fagan said calmly. “We’ll see you back in school tomorrow, Mr. Patel. With no more problems, I might add.”
Outside the principal’s office, Saira Patel finally glared at Mars. “Manu . . . what am I going to do with you? You heard what the principal said. Your disruptive behavior is affecting everyone — your friends, but most of all you. You can’t be sneaking around at night.”
“But Jonas and Aurora —”
“You can’t be worried about them. Don’t you see, Mars? It’s time you stopped hanging around them. It’s time you got serious.”
“But they’re my friends.”
“No, I’m starting to see it now — what the problem is.” Ma’s voice wavered. “Maybe it was wrong to live in Port Elizabeth. There are too many distractions, too many problems. We shouldn’t be here. We should go far, far away. We should live with my cousin in Cleveland.”
She had thrown this line at Mars before, about her cousin in Cleveland. It was the last thing Mars wanted to hear.
Her phone rang again. She turned it on. “I said I will,” she said tersely, and hung up. She saw Mars watching her. “I really have to go.”
“Was that your ‘brother,’ again?”
Ma looked uncomfortable. “Listen, Mars, can you promise me you will go straight home? No talking to anyone, no hanging around. Go straight home and text me when you’re there.”
Mars wanted to find out more about who had called her, but just then behind her, he saw Caddie coming in through the front door.
“Fine, Ma,” he said to her hurriedly. “I promise.”
Saira looked at him uncertainly, and then she was gone, her shoes making a light tapping sound on the hallway floor.
Fagan poked her head out of her office. “Mars Patel? Are you still here? You do understand what a suspension is?”
Mars cringed, seeing students in the hallway turning to gawk at him. After Fagan went back into her office, he ran up to Caddie. “Cads, hey, wait up!” He hadn’t seen her since they’d been separated at the police station the night before.
She stopped to give him a furtive look. “Mars — I’m not supposed to talk to you. My parents are really mad.”
“But Caddie,” Mars said slowly. “I didn’t show you what JP found. I think I have an idea where to go, but I need your help.”
“Mars, I can’t.” Caddie looked unhappy. “My parents are now saying they want to send me to boarding school in New Hampshire.”
“New Hampshire?” Mars repeated. “But that’s so far away. Why?”
“I don’t know. They think you’re a bad influence, Mars. They think you’re the reason I’m always getting into trouble.”
“I am the reason you’re getting into trouble,” Mars said. “But that’s, like, our thing.”
“Well, they think I’m going to screw up the GIFT, too,” Caddie said. She pointed to a poster for Pruitt Prep on the wall where a life-size Oliver Pruitt watched them, smiling. “The test is in two days.”
“You’re going to do great, Caddie. How hard can the GIFT be?”
“I’m not like you, Mars,” she said. “I need to study, not get distracted. And I don’t want to go to New Hampshire.” Her eyes were dark pools of sadness behind her glasses. “I’m sorry, Mars. You’re going to have to do whatever it is without me.”
“But Cads,” Mars said. “You’re the one who balances me —”
“I don’t think so, Mars.” She cut him off. “Not anymore.” She hurried away down the hall.
Mars stared at the Pruitt Prep poster. He’d thought the day couldn’t get worse, but it just had. Aurora was gone. Jonas was gone. He was suspended. He was probably going to fail the GIFT. And now he had nothing left, not even Caddie to help him figure out where his life was going.
In front of him, Oliver Pruitt continued to smile mutely, as if he had all the answers but he just wouldn’t say.
“How do I get to the stars?” Mars wondered out loud. He pulled his hood over his head and walked out into the misty morning.
Epica Hernandez had a big bow on her head today, and to JP, it seemed like the perfect target. Maybe a spitball would get Epica to shut up for once, JP thought. Just one quick lob and —
“I heard Mars Patel broke the law,” Epica announced to anyone listening. “He’s expelled. Which means he won’t take the GIFT this week.”
“Dude, Mars is expelled because no one can stand him,” Clyde Boofsky said.
JP glared at them both. “He’s suspended, not expelled, OK? He’ll be here to take the GIFT, Epica. And I bet he’ll do tons better than you.”
Epica was unimpressed. “Maybe I should call him at home and ask if he needs help studying. And, like, charge him money for it. That’s the only way Mars will pass the GIFT.”
The spitball idea was looking more and more appealing. Too bad it wasn’t JP’s style — leave that to the Boof. On the other hand, Epica had brought up something else that was weighing on JP’s mind. Mars at home, all alone.
JP looked up at the board where Mr. Green was going over algebra homework, and raised a hand. “Mr. Green? Can I go to the nurse’s office? I think I’m going to barf.”
Mr. Green turned around warily. “Are you sure?”
JP stood up in front of a sea of faces. Epica looked nervous and the Boof was snickering.
“I might hurl any moment, and I can’t control where it lands,” JP said, staring at Clyde Boofsky. “Like remember last week?” That got the Boof to stop laughing.
Last Monday JP’d coughed up a can of root beer all over Clyde’s desk. Aurora had had an extra can of root beer that JP guzzled too quickly right before walking into algebra. It was great upchucking it all over the Boof’s binder
Mr. Green relented at last. “Hurry,” he said.
JP practically sprinted out the door. Their stomach was fine. It was Mars they were worried about. If they knew Mars, the one thing he hated was being by himself. Why else was he always getting himself into trouble? So he could be with the rest of them in detention. Duh.
JP didn’t bother stopping at their locker. There was nothing they needed, just their phone, and the battery died anyway right as JP stepped outside the school. Gawd, JP never remembered to charge it until it drained. Somebody needed to come up with an invention to help you remember all the things you needed to remember and forget all the things you didn’t.
Because even if JP forgot to charge their battery, they never forgot the stupid thi
ngs people said to them. Like Clyde Boofksy always did that thing where he pretend-sneezed and said “boy-girl” as soon as JP sat down.
But it wasn’t just the Boof.
JP’s mom could be hurtful, too. This morning she’d said, “Why don’t you wear something different, honey? Wouldn’t it be easier?”
JP grimaced. “My clothes are how I show the real me. Don’t you get it?”
JP’s mom didn’t. Not really. Because every time she read in the newspaper about someone getting harassed, she got scared the same thing would happen to JP. Recently in Seattle, someone beat up a teenager wearing a skirt on a bus because they didn’t look like a girl or a boy. The teenager ended up needing stitches.
“The world still sees everything gendered,” JP’s mom said. “We don’t, but they do.”
JP looked at their outfit: Arsenal sweatshirt, sparkly orange scarf, fleece shorts, multicolored leg warmers. Arsenal was JP’s favorite soccer team, orange their favorite color, shorts were good for running, and leg warmers were cozy for when it rained, and it always rained in Port Elizabeth. It made sense to JP. The rest of the world needed to get on the same page.
When JP got to the apartment building, they climbed up the branch of a nearby tree. Climbing came naturally to JP. They liked to feel their muscles work as they pulled themself up. Mars’s room was on the third floor — an easy jump from the tree to the fire escape outside Mars’s window.
He was lying on his bed when JP rapped on his window.
“Open up, Mars! I don’t have all day,” JP called.
Mars jumped up in surprise. The window squeaked as he pushed it open. “What are you doing here, JP? Aren’t you supposed to be . . . ?”
“Yeah, yeah, algebra,” they said. “Who has time for that? Figured I’d bother you instead.”
Mars’s face brightened. “You didn’t have to come,” he said apologetically. “I don’t want you in more trouble. What about your parents? Weren’t they mad about the police?”
“Nah, don’t worry. I can take care of myself.” JP looked past his shoulder. “Is that a bag of chips I spot?”