Seems fishy, Bess whispered.
A heart was never something to ignore. And Bess was right—it might be worrisome.
It could also be...utterly magical.
Seven
Thomas
“Do you have my keys?” Savannah ran through the kitchen. She was dressed for school, but nowhere near ready to leave.
“Did you look on the hook by the door?” said Thomas.
“Of course, I looked on the hook.” She threw her backpack down on the table and ripped open the pockets. “I swear. Why do we even have keys? As soon as they put everything I need on a microchip, I’ll be the first guinea pig in line.”
Thomas heard the keys jangling at the bottom of her bag.
“Have you even eaten yet?” she said, still rummaging. “We don’t have time for any drive-through stops this morning.”
“Not eating breakfast today.”
Savannah stopped digging and eyed him. “You never skip a chance to eat.”
“And we’re never late when it’s my turn to drive.” He walked over to the table and punched the bottom of her bag, rattling the keys. “Let’s go, Sherlock.”
“Seriously?”
A few minutes later they were both in the car and headed down the driveway. Savannah glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “You don’t have, like, an eating disorder or anything, do you?”
Thomas shook his head. “We’re supposed to be dropping time in our relay. But the last three meets, we’ve actually gained.”
“So?”
“What do you mean, so? We nearly took the state title in the four-by-two-hundred relay last year. As sophomores. That’s a big deal.”
“I’m not saying it’s not. It’s just—train hard, do your best, you know? Starving yourself won’t help.”
“I’m not starving myself.” He’d stashed three protein bars in his backpack. He wasn’t not eating; he was just trying a different approach. He’d also run three miles and done fifty push-ups before Savannah had even gotten out of bed.
Traffic was slow enough for her to turn and face him, but Thomas kept his eyes on the dashboard clock, watching the minutes melt away.
“All right,” she said. “Just cut yourself some slack. You’ve been a little distracted.”
The sentiment hit with the swift punch of accusation. “Why does everyone keep blaming the stupid podcast? I’m not distracted. If anything, I’m working harder than ever.”
Nico and Pete had been all over him at practice last night. Get your head on! Focus! All of their complaints rained down on him, even though Ro had been slowest at the last meet. Only by two-one-hundredths of a second, but still.
At one point, Nico even yelled, “Hey, look, Thomas, your daddy’s at the finish line! Run!”
Stupid Nico.
He fought the sudden urge to tell Savannah to pull over and get out of the car. He didn’t care about being late, he cared about being trapped in one more discussion about something he didn’t know how to fix.
“And anyway,” he said, “what about you? How come nobody’s accusing you of being distracted?”
“Ha!” Savannah snorted. “Shows what you know. I have been distracted, just not about our biodad.”
She pulled to a stop at the last intersection before school. “Crap!” She sank down into her seat, trying desperately to melt below the windshield. “Is that Carrie Westlund in front of us?”
Thomas twisted, trying to get an angle on the driver ahead of them. “Maybe?” He rolled down his window, preparing to lean out for a better look.
Savannah slapped his arm. “Don’t! Don’t show her your face!” She slapped him again.
“Stop hitting me!” Now he had to lean out the window just to get out of her reach.
“Get in here!” She hit the automatic window button, propelling him back inside. The window rose, pinching his arm between the glass and the door frame.
“OW!” Now he was rubbing both arms. “What is with you?”
“Just—” Savannah pounded the steering wheel with her fist. “Put it this way—I basically became an Instagram meme last weekend. No more Zombie Baby. Now it’s my turn.”
“‘#SavannahSeesDeadPeople’?”
She flashed him a shocked glance as the traffic started to move. “You saw it?”
“Don’t worry, Van. Everybody knows Carrie Westlund is just in it for the attention. And Parker White has always been an ass.”
“He tagged me alongside about a gazillion ghost hunters.”
“Ghost hunters don’t use Instagram.”
“Everyone uses Instagram!” Savannah swung wide into the school parking lot, avoiding Carrie up ahead by opting for a spot in the farthest corner from the entrance.
They had one minute before the bell.
“Wow, thanks, Van. Now we’re definitely going to be on time.”
“Save your anger for the track, dummy.” She slammed her door and sprinted for school.
“Have a good day, sweetie!” Thomas called.
* * *
That afternoon, Coach pulled Thomas aside at practice. “I’m taking you off the four-by-two and swapping in Soltis. You’re a good sprinter, but I’ve got to give your relay the best chance of getting to State.” He lifted his chin, looking for confirmation.
Thomas felt a shock of panic up his spine. “I just had a few bad days, is all.” He’d been tired, but he would come back. He’d rest hard and train hard. Isn’t that what Coach was always telling him?
Coach shook his head. “I don’t know what’s happening, T. You always come out of the blocks strong, but you’re slowing down too much before handoff. Like you don’t know how to do it anymore. This week you dropped more batons than you handed off.”
“No problem!” If it was just the handoffs, Thomas could fix that. “I’ll run drills every practice. I’ll get over it, get my rhythm back.”
“Too late for that, bud. We’re deep into qualifiers.” Coach scuffed his toe along the rubber track surface. “You seem—off, lately. Anything going on at home you want to talk about?”
Thomas said no. Because there wasn’t. “I understand, Coach. You’ve got to do what’s right for the team.” The words came out easy but ran cold all the way to his toes.
“Keep coming to practice, though. Don’t quit working.”
“I dunno. Maybe.”
Coach’s face said he already knew Thomas wouldn’t be at practice Monday. “Think about it over the weekend.” He gave Thomas a soft punch to the shoulder, then turned and walked away.
Thomas didn’t take his eyes off him until he disappeared into the school. If he had, he would have been forced to admit that Nico, Pete and Ro had stood by and watched the whole thing.
Trigg:
Ok, you just need to settle down. [yoga pose emoji]
Trigg:
Some people actually think it’s cool you have powers. [angel emoji] [praying hands emoji]
Trigg:
Taylor Parks lost her grandma a few months ago and she says she’s going to visualize her every night before she goes to sleep until she shows up.
Savannah:
OMG I DON’T SEE DEAD PEOPLE!!!!!
Eight
Thomas
“Thomas?” He should have been sleeping, but he wasn’t. Neither was his sister. She knocked again. “I know you’re awake. I can see your light under the door.”
“Come in.” He sat up and noticed he hadn’t bothered to change before going to bed. His sweatshirt and shorts both screamed Lincoln Track and Field. As if he wanted the reminder.
Savannah walked in wrapped in her quilt. “I heard about the relay. I’m sorry.”
He shoved to the side of the bed and made room for her. “That news traveled fast.”
“Nico’s got a big mouth.” She l
eaned into him, trying to nudge out a laugh. “In case you were unaware of that fact.”
He surrendered a weak smile. “He does have an awesome video gaming setup, though. Makes him worth it.” Then he did laugh. “Mostly.”
Thomas may have been cracking jokes, but they weren’t working on his mood. He couldn’t believe Coach had taken him off the relay. It was humiliating. He’d had the second-best time on last year’s team behind Pete. He’d beaten Nico and Ro, both.
But now, Soltis? He hadn’t even learned to tie his shoes until middle school. He forgot his uniform once and wore jeans to a meet. Coach wouldn’t let him on the field—and rightly so. The guy was farm league.
Several minutes went by, neither of them talking. Savannah sat back against his headboard. He ran his fingers along the raised stitching on his bedspread until the sensation all but numbed his fingertips.
“Sorry I wasn’t very sympathetic about the Instagram thing,” he said.
Savannah groaned. “Carrie Westlund is the worst. Remember in eighth grade when I had that cast on my leg? She asked me what happened, so I told her, ‘I fractured my tibia.’ And she goes, ‘Oh my gawd, why can’t you just say you broke your leg like a normal person?’”
“Seriously?”
“I know, right?” Savannah wiped a tear from her eye and Thomas couldn’t tell if it was the laughing or crying kind. “I guess I’m learning what Nora Ephron meant when she said, ‘Everything is copy.’”
She loosened her quilt, freeing her arms. “I was thinking, though. Since you won’t be at track practice every night and I’m currently social dog food—” She watched him for a reaction. “Do you know where I’m going with this?”
Of course, he did. “You want to start working on the podcast?”
Her entire face broke into a grin. The same way Maggie’s did when she met an interesting stranger, or the way their mom’s had done after finding a fresh pint of toasted almond fudge ice cream in the freezer.
“How does tomorrow morning sound?” she said.
“Early.” He smiled back. “But okay.”
At least he could quit thinking about his humiliating track failure.
* * *
Savannah took the lead on the first few episodes.
“Episode one is going to be a game of balance.” They were in the dining room the next morning, the whole red table piled high with notes and podcast research they’d downloaded. “On the one hand, we have to explain why we’re doing this and what we already know.”
“Right.” Thomas nodded.
“But it also has to be the hook. If the audience doesn’t care after the first few minutes, they won’t keep listening. And without an audience, we don’t stand a chance of finding anything new about Mom or our sperm daddy.”
Thomas scowled. “Can you quit calling him that?”
“What, does the word sperm make you uncomfortable?” Savannah smirked.
“You’re disgusting.”
She laughed. “And you’re a prude. Which you should probably get over before you get a girlfriend.”
Thomas knocked her stack of papers off the table.
“Hey!” Savannah protested. “That just proves you’re a prude and a bully.”
He knew she was trying to sound indignant, but making him squirm was one of Savannah’s favorite hobbies. He waited for her to reassemble her notes. “You were saying?”
She stuck her tongue out at him. “Anyway, dummy, episode two is when I think we should bring in Maggie.”
Yeah, Thomas figured that sounded about right. He added, “Do you think we should call her Grandma or something? Just for the podcast?”
“Why?”
“Won’t people think it’s weird we call her by her first name? I mean, we’re trying to sound mostly normal.”
“She’s the one who told us to call her Maggie.” Which was true. When they were little, she said the name Grandma made her feel old. Later, she called it old-fashioned. Eventually, she said that anyone who disliked that they called her Maggie was surrendering to antiquated patriarchal beliefs. Whatever that meant.
Savannah paused for a moment. “Mmm, no. I still think we call her Maggie. That’s her name. Let’s just not make a big deal about it.”
Thomas eyed her. “Is that going to be your answer to everything?”
Savannah didn’t bother to look up. “If it works, yeah.”
* * *
Finally, they were almost ready to record the first episode. Savannah scribbled a note on her script. Thomas scanned the settings on the monitor in front of him.
“I just want to test your audio level again,” he said.
Savannah sat up and leaned into her microphone. Her head looked double its natural size thanks to the heavy padding on their studio headphones and she had to work to keep her balance. “Testing. Testing. Mary had a little lamb. Because she was doing keto again and she was sick of chicken.”
Thomas raised a hand, telling her to wait. He notched up the bass in Savannah’s voice and equalized the output of their microphones.
“One more time.”
Savannah obliged. “Testing. Testing.”
Thomas flashed her the Okay sign and nodded. He ran a finger down the checklist he kept in his clipboard. Everything looked good.
Ready? he mouthed.
She smiled and gave him a thumbs-up.
Thomas moved the mouse across his screen, clicked Record and pointed at his sister.
“‘The Kids Are Gonna Ask. Episode one,’” Savannah began. “Here’s what we know. Bess McClair had just turned twenty-two when she and three friends flew from Minneapolis to Colorado. It was spring break, March 2002. The four women—”
“Van—” Thomas waved his hand in her face and paused the recording. “Try that again. You’re coming across like one of those crime show hosts.”
“I’m not trying to.”
“All right, let me reset.” He marked the end of the first take on his screen and clicked Record again.
Go.
“Here’s what we know,” Savannah began a second time. “Bess McClair had just turned twenty-two when she and three friends—”
Thomas stopped her again. At this rate, they’d be recording all night. “You’re still doing it.”
“What?”
“The crime show voice.” He pushed his voice deep into his chest. “Here’s what we know...”
“I’d have to go through puberty four more times and grow a penis if I wanted to sound like that.”
“Gross, Van—”
“I’m just sayin’.”
Thomas leaned back in his chair, trying to find the best way to explain. Whenever he tried to verbalize his thoughts, Savannah had a habit of responding like a jackhammer, smashing his words to bits as soon as they came out of his mouth. He had to be careful. Had to be exact. “Just...” he said, finally. “Try reading the script without making it sound as if Mom and her friends are all about to get murdered.”
Savannah’s face flashed red-hot. “Oh my god, T! Did you seriously just say that to me? As if I would ever—”
Thomas threw up his hands. “Oh right. Savannah McClair is perfect. How could I forget?” His sister’s diva act was so predictable it was almost boring. This time, though, Thomas had proof he was right. He moved the digital slider on his screen back a few seconds and pressed Play. Savannah’s voice rang through his headphones. The recording sounded as clear and resonant as if they’d made it in a professional studio, and not in their basement, with their grandmother just above their heads in the kitchen, loading the dishwasher.
“—Minneapolis to Colorado. It was spring break, March 2002.”
Thomas clicked Stop. “See? I’ll play it for you again if your delicate ego needs convincing.” He realized he was shouting, trying to hear himself above the noise c
ancellation of the headphones and pulled one ear free. He needed to bring the argument down a notch.
He took a breath. “You sound...” The words came slow and deep. “Like...this.”
Savannah crossed her arms across her chest and glared at him. Then she leaned into her microphone and articulated her next words very carefully. And loudly. “It’s called projection, dummy. Google. It.”
Thomas stood, walked over to Savannah’s chair, and knocked her headphones off.
“Hey!” she yelled.
“You practically busted my eardrums!”
“You nearly punched me in the face!”
“I did not!”
Savannah smacked him in the chest with the back of her hand. “Now we’re even.”
He smacked her in the shoulder. “No, now we’re even!”
“What the—” Savannah stood up to go in for another strike, only to get yanked back in her chair by the cord on her headphones. She squealed and rubbed at her thighs where her bare legs had ripped from the vinyl seat cushion.
Thomas laughed so hard he had to double over. He couldn’t help it. And she deserved it.
The door at the top of the stairs opened and Maggie called, “Everything okay down there?”
“Yes, fine!”
<
The Kids Are Gonna Ask
A Guava Media Podcast
Season01—Episode01
Tuesday, May 26
SAVANNAH
Here’s what we know: Bess McClair had just turned twenty-two when she and three friends flew from Minneapolis to Colorado. It was spring break, March 2002. The four women were college seniors, due to graduate in two months. It was their last vacation before they’d move on to the next chapter in their lives.
THOMAS
They could have headed to the beach like so many spring breakers their age. Minnesota winters are long and cold. But Bess loved to ski, had been doing it nearly as long as she could walk. So she and her friends rented a two-bedroom condominium in the resort town of Breckenridge, packed their bags and boarded the plane.
The Kids Are Gonna Ask Page 6