“Gabi?” I recognize Bruce’s voice before I look up. He and Katie are standing over me, their backpacks strapped over both shoulders.
I scramble to my feet. How much time have I wasted? Got to move!
“Go home, Bruce. Take Katie with you.”
Bruce looks at his watch. “Not time yet. See?”
I grab one of each of their hands in mine. “Go to the office. Please. Sit with the nurse. Tell her you feel sick.” Assuming the whole school is not blown to smithereens in the next ten minutes, Simon Blackwell will be gunned down in front of the entire school population. Bruce doesn’t need to see that.
“Lookie here, a little reunion of the lunch bunch.” Beth’s tone is playful teasing and I whirl to face her. I must look a mess, because she says, “Gabi? Oh my god. What’s wrong?”
“Beth.” I grab at her shirt, frantic. “Take Bruce and Katie to the office.”
“Did someone die or something?” Her eyes widen.
Not just yet. But maybe soon. I shove their hands in hers. “Please. If our friendship means anything to you, do this for me. Trust me.”
I see the meaning of my words sink in. “Okay,” she whispers.
And then I can’t waste another second. I turn in the other direction and force my way through the crowd. I check my phone, hoping to see a missed call from my dad. Nothing. So instead I text Chloe, Miguel, Janae, and Garth. On a whim I add Eric. Important. Can anyone put their eyes on Simon Blackwell? The only reason I know his last name is from looking at his yearbook picture. Scrawny kid, junior, school-issued camera. Text me if you find him. Don’t approach him, just text me. And then I text Dad. Just Simon’s name and these words. Suicide by cop. I hope he knows what I mean. I hope he has his cell phone on. And most importantly, I hope I’m on the right track.
I get three texts back at once.
From Janae and Eric. Simon Blackwell? Who’s that?
From Garth. That puny kid from calculus?
To him I respond. Yes. Him. Do you see him?
No. But I’ll look.
I turn around, and the world blurs. I feel sluggish, like I’m underwater and my limbs are heavy. I’m trying to push through people, scan the crowd, but my eyes fail me.
When I spot him, everything sharpens. He’s wearing a bulky backpack that looks stuffed with books. But maybe it’s stuffed with enough explosives to create a crater in the earth. He walks like it’s heavy, like it’s weighing him down.
I don’t want to take my eyes off him, but I have to. I scan the crowd for our campus police officers. I feel like I’m playing Where’s Waldo? Because they’re all in uniform. They should be easy to spot. But they blend in, disappear. Until the crowd moves, shifts through space, and I do see one. No, two. I see two uniformed officers. One in the stands, looking outward. One on the field, looking at the stands. One of the officers twists toward me and I see his face. Officer Murphy. The jerk who drove me home from Cruz’s party. Great. Just who I want protecting my school. The cop with a chip on his shoulder, according to Dad.
I shift my eyes back to Simon and his backpack. He has moved. He’s quick, and it takes me a moment for my eyes to settle on him. I realize I’m holding my breath. Once I grab him with my eyes again, I start to breathe. But only for a moment. Because he’s looking directly back at me. His face grim and determined. Like he knows what’s coming next won’t be fun, but he feels compelled do to it anyway.
He nods at me. Slightly. An acknowledgment that we both know what’s happening. And the game is officially on.
Stranger’s Manifesto
Entry 23
All along I knew
It would come to this.
That’s why I’ve been writing these
Ridiculous wannabe journal entries.
Because I knew it would end this way.
And I knew I’d want to tell the world why.
Stupid me
For thinking the
School administrators or campus supervisors
Might be sufficiently suspicious
To search me.
Or whip the metal detector out
And use it.
For once.
Stupid me
For entertaining the thought
That someone would care enough
To stop me.
Apparently, no one can.
Because I still float,
Invisible as dust.
Lost.
Forever.
39
The sound of Chloe’s cell phone interrupts my panic. She has different rings for each of us. This one’s the theme song from the Winnie the Pooh movie. At first I feel irritated with her. She knows better than to take her phone off vibrate at school. It’s going to get confiscated.
And then the meaning of the ringtone sinks in. It’s the tone that means Dad is calling her. Why is he calling her? Why not me? Suddenly I realize that when I left the message at Dad’s office, I didn’t identify myself. I just said I was his daughter. Maybe his cell is still off. Maybe the officer at the department called him on the intercom in his car. Maybe he hasn’t seen my text yet.
The music continues. People turn to look, chuckling at the song choice.
I see her suddenly in the crowd, fumbling in her pockets to try to find the cell, to silence it. She’s wearing her bright red “Yes, they are real” shirt with big white letters across her boobs. She’s maybe twenty feet from Simon.
“Hi, Dad!” she answers, and I can hear her from here. I flick my eyes over to Simon. He is watching me. “No, I didn’t call you. Maybe it was Gabi.”
Simon’s eyes narrow. His skin deepens in color.
I push through the crowd, moving closer to Chloe.
He does too.
Simon gets there first. I watch as he slips his arm through hers, gripping it, and speaks in her ear. Her shoulders droop, and she drops her phone. Leaves it there on the ground to be stepped on. Simon whispers again in her ear, turning his head to look at me. His eyes are pointed, and I know exactly what they’re saying. They say, Stay away. Don’t get too close.
Chloe is his hostage.
The phone in my pocket vibrates. I glance at it as I move, hoping it’s a text from Dad.
It’s Garth. I see him. He’s with your sister. What do you want me to do?
It’s hard to text and walk and keep my eyes on Simon and my sister at the same time. But I do. I text blindly, hoping I’m hitting the right keys.
Tell the others where he is. Get close, but not too close.
I edge forward. My senses are on overdrive. I see every slight movement in the crowd. I hear the sounds of people chatting, moving forward, the sounds of the band warming up, getting ready to play a song.
I see my preppy wrestler bodyguard in the corner, eyes on me, and I want to scream at him. What good is he? He’s too far away for me to reach him, and it’s too risky to yell, so I just gesture with my arm for him to follow me. I hope he has a gun.
Simon and Chloe walk stiffly, like their bodies are connected and they have no joints. He leads her to the stadium, to a spot on the side. His positioning is genius. There is no one behind him. Everyone is in front of him. He can see the stands. He can see the stage. He’s driving this train wreck.
Students settle into their seats. The band is playing strains of Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind.”
I see Chloe’s face. Her eyes must be filling up, because her mascara is beginning to drip. Her whole body is shaking uncontrollably. She says something to Simon. Gestures to her backpack. He seems to be listening. Gripping her arm still, but listening. He slips her backpack off her shoulders. Unzips it for her. Pulls out our photocopies of the pictures. Looks at them. Nods.
He turns to me, his eyes pointed, but the anger is gone. He nods his head again. I know he is trying to say something to me. But I don’t know what. I want to scream, What? What? But I don’t.
Text from Miguel. Garth and I are close enough to tackle him. We can totally take him.
You tell us when.
I search the crowd and see Miguel and Garth, as close as they can be without alarming Simon. They are both wearing sunglasses, looking like Secret Service men, their eyes hidden. I text back, K. But I don’t know when to say “when.” I don’t know what Simon has in that backpack. My sense is that he’s got some kind of explosives. Probably fake ones meant to look real, but who the hell knows? I can’t make that judgment call. If they tackle him, we might all go down.
Another text from Miguel. I love you.
I realize something. I love him back. On some level I didn’t totally trust him until now. Like maybe he had some part in this bomber mess. It’s such a huge relief that he’s not involved. I promise myself that if I live through today, I’ll tell him that I love him.
No wait—what if either one of us doesn’t live through today? I text him now, even though I know I’m wasting precious time. I love you too.
The president of the LGBTQ Club is speaking. About remembering Jo and giving her a moment of silence. And plugging his club. Not to be outdone, the chair of the Suicide Prevention Committee steps up and talks too. He says something almost identical and then plugs his committee. The band will play one more song; we will all have a moment of silence to remember Jo; and then the cheerleaders will perform.
Simon turns Chloe, all stiff, to face me and whispers in her ear. She and I lock eyes. Hers are a mess. Mine might be too, for all I know. But whatever he said must have been reassuring. Because her face has relaxed. She looks the way she used to as a kid, when she knew she was going to get a shot at the doctor’s office. She’d lie on her stomach, butt bare, waiting for the poke.
At first she’d cry, but then I’d hold her hand and help her count the cars in the parking lot. “How many red cars do you see, Chloe? How many blue? Here, let’s link pinkies. We won’t let go until it’s over. It won’t hurt, Chloe, if we count the cars. It won’t hurt much.”
We must be on the same wavelength, because she moves her left hand slightly, like she’s linking pinkies with an invisible someone. I know it’s a message to me.
The moment of silence must be the longest minute in the history of man. Three uniformed officers are in the crowd, moving down slowly, edging toward Simon. I wonder if he sees them. Dad must have gotten my text. I see other movement. Four adults I don’t recognize, in plain clothing, positioning themselves around the stadium. Sharpshooters?
I text Dad again, hoping he got my original text, even though he never responded. He’s got Chloe. He wants you to kill him. Suicide by cop.
People are taking the moment of silence pretty seriously. This surprises me a little, because normally we get the half-swallowed giggles, the whispers, the jackasses who make fun of it. Even the cheerleaders have stopped stretching for a moment. They stand hand in hand, their heads bowed.
I inch forward. Simon is angled away from me and cannot see my movement. This is my chance. I have to get closer. I can’t give Miguel and Garth the go-ahead, but I can’t stand being so far from them. So I inch. And inch. And inch. Until I’m five or six steps away from Chloe.
The moment the band starts playing again, there’s movement. The cheerleaders drop their hands and come out on stage for their performance. And Simon moves. He whispers one more time in my sister’s ear, and then he whips out a gun. And places it against her temple.
Stranger’s Manifesto
Entry 24
Remember Jo’s game?
What’s the best way to die?
She never said hanging, remember?
There’s another one she never said.
Suicide by cop.
All you gotta do is get them to think you’re a threat
And think you’re armed.
And then you don’t have to do a goddamn thing.
And your parents don’t never have to know that
You wanted to die.
Better they think you’re a criminal
Than that you want out.
Out early.
40
I’m not sure people would have noticed right away if it hadn’t been for me. Because the people in the stands are busy watching the cheerleaders, and the music is loud. But I scream. The kind of bloodcurdling scream you’d hear in a horror movie. Both Miguel and Garth move instinctively forward, like this is the time to tackle the guy, but then they both freeze. Probably because of the gun pointed directly at my sister’s brain.
The officers all draw their guns in unison, but I can tell they are too far for a good shot. The sharpshooters draw their guns too. I can see the bugs in their ears and their mouths moving as they position themselves.
Simon is going to die.
Chloe is not going to die, I tell myself. She’s not. I won’t let her.
But maybe we’re all gonna die. If he has a bomb in his backpack, it will go off when he hits the ground.
I’m no longer using my brain. I’m just reacting. My body’s in motion, and it’s barreling toward my sister. I realize this is stupid—that I’m making the sharpshooters’ job way harder. Dad will probably ground me for life. I realize this on some removed level, like this whole thing is happening to someone else and I’m watching a movie. But I can’t stop.
Someone shouts, “This is the police. Drop your weapon!”
Simon’s stance does not falter. Chloe’s eyes are closed. Her arms hang down, her pinky still curled like we are linked together.
I am running-leaping-lunging toward my sister. As I pass him, I feel Miguel’s hands reaching for me, trying to hold me back, but I am slippery and I am Superwoman. Nothing can stop me. Not even a bullet. As I leap toward my sister, Simon turns his head slightly. Our eyes connect.
Right before the first blast, I see Simon smile.
Time has turned all choppy. I get bits and pieces of input, but I’m not sure it’s in order and I can’t stop screaming.
Me, Simon, and my sister falling backward together like we’re in one big group hug. Probably from the force of the blast. Sharpshooters don’t miss, do they?
The sounds of mass chaos. People running in all directions. Screaming. Panicking. Me squished to the ground, stuck, unable to move.
There is blood now. I smell it before I see it. I feel it next. Warm and sticky. Somebody is bleeding.
Miguel scoops his arms through mine and pulls me backward, away from the pile. The screaming is fainter now, losing strength. I watch as Miguel examines me—my head, my chest, my arms, my torso, my legs, my feet. He must be looking for the source of the blood.
“I think you’re okay,” he whispers, and I bury my head in his chest. I breathe him in, all the way in, as if his fabric-softener scent could clean my mind.
The screaming stops. It was all coming from me. I stay there in the safety of his arms while the police and emergency personnel intervene. He won’t let me get up, but I’m glad. Because if I’m okay, that means the blood is coming from Simon. Or my sister. And I don’t want to see.
Miguel pulls me gingerly to standing. I hold my face to his chest.
A moment later Chloe joins my Miguel huddle. She wraps herself in with us, her body still shaking, and I hold on to her like I never have before.
I hear Miguel sniffling and I know he’s crying too. He stays there, holding us together, keeping us from seeing the blood or the mess.
And then I see Dad’s shoes. He folds into us as well. I feel Miguel pull back, pull away, like he doesn’t want to intrude on a family moment. But my dad holds him there. Miguel relaxes into us.
I don’t know how long we stand there. I just know that when we move from that spot, there is no sight of Simon and my pinky is sore from having been linked with Chloe’s for so long.
Stranger’s Manifesto
Entry 25
Pain.
It hurts.
I hurt.
From the center of my soul.
I’m a piece of shit.
A disgusting piece of shit.
There’s a blackness leakin
g through my veins,
Infecting every part of me,
Pumping through my body
Like my heart is some kind of evil machine.
And it hurts.
I can’t make it go away. The pain.
Nothing helps.
I can’t survive like this much longer.
I’ll do anything to make it go away.
41
EARLY MARCH
Simon is alive.
He held my sister hostage, the lunatic. He deserves to be dead.
But he also whispered in her ear. He told her he wouldn’t hurt her. That she should close her eyes and she wouldn’t see anything. That he was sorry, but this is what he had to do. That he didn’t see any other way.
Sharpshooters are trained to kill.
But Dad is the boss. He got my text, and he’d been compiling and analyzing Simon’s profile since day one. His gut feeling told him that I was right. This was Simon’s very public attempt at a suicide by cop. But it was his daughter up there with a gun to her head. Could he take a chance that he was wrong?
Simon was shot four times within two seconds. One shot to each hand, one shot to each kneecap. Zero shots to the heart, brain, or stomach.
So he’s alive. Probably wishes he’s dead. But he’s alive.
When they search his locker, they find a package on his neatly made bed. It’s wrapped up with a bow. At first the bomb squad is called in to open it. But it’s just a bunch of papers. Titled “Stranger’s Manifesto (As If You Care).” It’s a whole bunch of journal entries he’d written like free-form poems. Based on what Dad tells me about them, I think they were Simon’s attempt to explain himself. The newspapers are saying he had a God complex. They interview some top psychologists who talk about sociopathology and narcissism and the desperation of our youth.
I collect everything. I read it once, and then I put it away in my own little box at the back of my closet. I know my parents will think I’m obsessed if they see it. But I don’t ever want to forget what happened. I figure if I keep these things in a box, then I can look at them when I want to remember and allow myself to forget about it the rest of the time.
Are You Still There Page 20