by Meg Cabot
“Never mind,” Cooper says. He seems to be as hyper-aware as I am that everyone is listening to our conversation—well, what they can hear of it above the screaming and the band. “We’ll talk about it at home.”
Hideously relieved, I say, “Fine. Just leave him here with me. I’ll look after him.”
“He’s not bad company, actually,” Cooper says, gazing down at my dad, who is standing stock-still in the middle of the bleachers—unconscious that all the people behind him are trying to see around him—staring at the game. I guess it’s been a while since he’s been at a live sporting event. And the game is pretty exciting, I guess, if you’re into that kind of thing. We’re tied at twenty-one. “Hey. Is that popcorn?”
Sarah surprises everyone—well, okay, me, anyway—by showing she was paying attention to us all along when she shakes her head and says, not taking her gaze from the court, “It’s almost gone. Make Heather go get more.”
“Get me a soda,” Pete says.
“I could use some nachos,” Tom adds.
“No!” Magda shrieks, apparently at a call down below. “He really is blind!”
Cooper says, “What?” and slides down into the seat I’ve vacated. “What was the call?”
“Offensive foul,” Magda spits. “But he barely touched the kid!”
Shaking my head in disgust, I turn and make my way down the bleachers toward my father. He is still staring, enraptured, at the ball court.
“Dad,” I say, when I reach him.
He doesn’t take his eyes off the game. Nor does he say anything. The scoreboard over the middle of the court is counting down the time left in the game. There appear to be nine seconds left, and the Pansies have the ball.
“Dad,” I say again. I mean, it really isn’t any wonder he doesn’t realize I’m talking to him. No one has called him dad in years.
Mark Shepelsky has the ball. He’s taking it down the court, dribbling hard. He has a look of concentration on his face I’ve never seen him wear before… not even when he’s filling out a vending machine lost-change report.
“Dad,” I say for a third and final time, this time much louder.
And my dad jumps and looks down at me—
Just as Mark stops, turns, and throws the ball across the court, sinking it into the basket right before the halftime buzzer goes off, and the crowd goes wild.
“What?” Dad asks. But not me. He’s asking the fans around him. “What happened?”
“Shepelsky made a three-pointer,” some helpful soul shrieks.
“I missed it!” Dad looks genuinely upset. “Damn!”
“Dad,” I say. I can’t believe this. I really can’t. “Why’d you come to the house? You said you were going to call first. Why didn’t you call?”
“I did call,” he says, watching as the Pansies run from the court, high-fiving one another, their expressions ecstatic. “No one answered. I thought you might be trying to avoid me.”
“Did it ever occur to you I might not be avoiding you?” I ask. “That I just might not have gotten home yet?”
Dad realizes, I guess from the stress in my voice, that I’m not happy. Plus, all the action on the court is over for the moment, so he actually spares a second to look down at me.
“What’s the matter, honey?” he asks. “Did I screw up?”
“It’s just,” I say, feeling idiotic for getting so upset, but unable to help myself, “things with Cooper, my landlord… I mean, they’re delicate. And you showing up like that, out of the blue—”
“He seems like a nice guy,” Dad says, glancing over at where Cooper is sitting. “Smart. Funny.” He grins down at me. “You certainly have your old man’s approval.”
Something inside me bursts. I think maybe it’s an aneurism.
“I don’t need your approval, Dad,” I practically shout. “I’ve been getting along fine for the past twenty years without it.”
Dad looks taken aback. I guess I shouldn’t blame him. It’s not his fault what he seems to think is going on between Cooper and me isn’t.
“What I mean is,” I say, softening my tone guiltily, “it’s not like that. With Cooper and me, I mean. We’re just friends. I do his billing.”
“I know,” Dad says. He looks confused. “He told me.”
Now I’m confused. “Then why’d you say you approve? Like you thought we’re dating?”
“Well, you’re in love with him, aren’t you?” Dad asks simply. “I mean, it’s written all over your face. You might be able to fool him, but you aren’t fooling your old dad. You used to get that same look on your face back when you were nine years old and that Scott Baio fellow would come on TV.”
I gape at him, then realize my mouth is hanging open. I close it with a snapping sound probably only I can hear over the din of the gymnasium. Then I say, “Dad. Why don’t you go sit down with Cooper? I’ll be back in a minute.”
“Where are you going?” Dad wants to know.
“To get the nachos,” I say.
And stagger away to do so.
14
I saw the house where we used to live
And remembered you, and all we did
I always thought without you I’m sunk
But the truth is, in bed, you kinda stunk.
“Ballad of the Ex”
Written by Heather Wells
I’m not totally unfamiliar with the layout of the Winer Sports Complex. I’d signed up for a twenty-five-dollar-a-semester aerobics class there last semester, after passing my employment probation, and had even shown up for one session.
Unfortunately, I’d soon learned that only skinny girls take aerobics at New York College, and that larger young ladies like myself—if the waifish young things were to be able to see the instructor around me—had to stand in the back, where we, in turn, couldn’t see anything, except tiny arms flailing around.
I quit after the first class. They wouldn’t give me my twenty-five dollars back, either.
Still, the lesson at least familiarized me with the sports center, so that during halftime I’m able to find a ladies’ room deep in the bowels of the building, where there isn’t a mile-long line to use a stall. I’m washing my hands afterward, gazing at my reflection in the mirror above the sinks and wondering if I should just let nature take its course and go brunette, when a toilet flushes and Kimberly Watkins, in her gold sweater and pleated skirt, comes out of a nearby stall. Her red-rimmed eyes—yes, definitely red-rimmed, and from crying, I’m pretty sure—widen when she sees me.
“Oh,” she says, freezing in her tracks. “You.”
“Hi, Kimberly,” I say. I’m pretty surprised to see her, too. I’d have thought the cheerleaders got some kind of special VIP bathroom to use.
But maybe they do, and Kimberly chose to use this one because in here, she could cry in private.
She seems to recover herself pretty quickly, though, and starts washing her hands at the sink next to mine.
“Enjoying the game?” she wants to know. She apparently thinks I can’t see that her mascara is smudged where she’s wiped away her tears.
“Sure,” I say.
“I didn’t know you were a fan,” she says.
“I’m not, really,” I admit. “They’re making us attend. To show everyone that Fischer Hall isn’t really a Death Dorm.”
“Oh,” Kimberly says. She turns off the water and reaches for the paper towels at the same time I do.
“Go ahead,” she says to me.
I do.
“Listen, Kimberly,” I say, as I dry. “I paid a little call on Doug Winer today.”
Kimberly’s eyes go very wide. She seems to forget her hands are dripping wet. “You did?”
“I did.”
“Why?” Kimberly’s voice breaks. “I told you, it was her freaky roommate who killed her. Her roommate, not Doug.”
“Yeah,” I say, tossing the wadded-up paper towels I’d used into the trash. “You said that. But it just doesn’t make sense. Ann’
s no killer. Why would you say she was? Except maybe to throw the police off the scent of the person who really did it.”
This gets to her. She averts her gaze, and seems to remember her hands. She pulls out a wad of paper towels from the dispenser on the wall. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says.
“Oh,” I say. “So you’re saying you didn’t know Doug deals?”
Kimberly purses her perfectly made-up lips and stares at her reflection. “I guess. I mean, I know he’s always got coke, I guess. And E.”
“Oh,” I say sarcastically. “Is that all? Why didn’t you say something about this before, Kimberly? Why were you trying to make me think Ann was the guilty party, when you knew all this about Doug?”
“Geez,” Kimberly cries, tearing her gaze away from her reflection and glaring at me. “Just ’cause a guy deals drugs doesn’t mean he’s a murderer! I mean, heck, a lot of people deal. A lot of people.”
“Distribution of controlled substances is illegal, you know, Kimberly,” I say. “So’s possession. He could go to jail. He could get expelled.”
Kimberly’s laugh is like a hiccup, it’s so brief. “But Doug Winer’ll never go to jail or get expelled.”
“Oh? And why is that?”
“He’s a Winer,” Kimberly says, as if I were supremely stupid.
I ignore that. “Did Lindsay do drugs, Kimberly?”
She rolls her eyes. “Geez. What’s wrong with you? Why do you care so much? I mean, I realize you’re, like, a frustrated ex-rock star or something. But nobody listens to your music anymore. Now you’re just a desk jockey at a Division III school. I mean, a monkey could do your job. Why are you trying so hard?”
“Did Lindsay do drugs?” My voice is so loud and so cold that Kimberly jumps, her eyes wide.
“I don’t know,” she shouts back at me. “Lindsay did a lot of things… and a lot of people.”
“What do you mean?” I narrow my eyes at her. “What do you mean, a lot of people?”
Kimberly gives me a very sarcastic look. “What do you think? Everyone’s trying to make out like Lindsay was some kind of saint. Cheryl and those guys, with that stupid sweater thing. She wasn’t, you know. A saint, I mean. She was just… Lindsay.”
“What people was she doing, Kimberly?” I demand. “Mark and Doug and… who else?”
Kimberly turns back to her reflection with a shrug and dabs at her lip gloss. “Ask Coach Andrews,” she says, “if you want to know so badly.”
I stare at her reflection. “Coach Andrews? How would he know?”
Kimberly just smirks.
And my mouth falls open.
I can’t believe it. “No, come on,” I say. Lindsay and Coach Andrews? “Are you serious?”
It’s right then that the ladies’ room door opens and Megan McGarretty pokes her head in.
“Gawd,” she says to Kimberly. “There you are. We’ve been looking all over. Come on, it’s time to do Lindsay’s sweater.”
Kimberly flashes me a knowing glance, then turns and heads for the door, her pleated skirt swishing behind her.
“Kimberly, wait,” I say. I want to ask her what she means about Lindsay and Coach Andrews. She can’t possibly mean what I think she means. Can she? I mean, Coach Andrews? He seems like such a… well… putz.
But Kimberly just sashays out of the room. Not surprisingly, she doesn’t even say goodbye.
I stand there, staring at the door the girls have just disappeared through. Lindsay and Coach Andrews?
But even if it were true, and he’s a potential suspect, I can’t think of a reason why Coach Andrews might kill Lindsay. Lindsay’s over eighteen. Yeah, okay, the college disapproves of faculty sleeping with their students. But it isn’t like Coach Andrews would ever get fired over it. He’s Phillip Allington’s golden boy, the man who is going to lead New York College back to Division I glory… somehow. Or something. Coach Andrews could sleep his way through the entire Women’s Studies Department and the trustees wouldn’t blink an eye, so long as the Pansies keep winning games.
So why would he kill Lindsay?
And what had that little brat called me? Desk jockey? I’m way more than just a desk jockey. Fischer Hall would fall apart if it weren’t for me. Why does she think I’m asking so many questions about Lindsay, anyway? Because I care about that place, and the people who live in it. If it weren’t for me, how many more girls would have died last semester? If it weren’t for me, nobody would get their vending machine refunds. How would Kimberly Watkins like living in Fischer Hallthen?
Fuming, I leave the ladies’ room. The hallway outside is dead silent. That’s because, I realize, the girls have started their tribute to Lindsay back in the gym, and everyone has hurried back to their seats to watch it. I can hear the faint strains of the school song, played real slow, just like they’d said they’d have the band do it. I sort of want to be in there watching, too.
But I haven’t gotten Tom’s nachos yet, or Pete’s soda. Not to mention Cooper’s popcorn. Now is actually a good time to do so, with everyone inside watching Lindsay’s sweater ascend to the rafters. Maybe there won’t be a line at the concession stand.
I turn the corner, hurrying past empty squash court after empty squash court—if Sarah ever took a serious look around the sports center, she’d come up with a lot more reasons to complain about how the Psychology Department is treated. There must be twenty or thirty million of the Winer family’s dollars poured into this building alone. It’s almost brand-new, with special ID card scanner gates you have to pass through to get in. Even the soda machines have built-in scanners so you can buy a can of Coke using your dining card… .
Except, for such fancy, new-fangled soda machines, they sure seem to be making a funny noise. Not the usual electronic—and, let’s admit it, to a soda-lover, comforting—hum, but a sort of thud—thud—thud.
But soda machines don’t thud.
Then I see, suddenly, that I’m not the only person in the hallway. When I come around the side of the bank of soda machines, I see that the thudding noises are coming from the hilt of a long kitchen knife as it repeatedly strikes the ribs of a man in a sports coat and tie. The man lies slumped against the wall to one side of the soda machines, and above him crouch three other men, each wearing half a basketball over his face, with small slits cut out in the rubber so that they can see.
When all three men hear my scream—because if you come across a scene like this when you are just walking along minding your own business, thinking about nachos, you’re going to scream—they turn their heads toward me—three half basketballs, with eye slits cut in them, swiveling my way.
Of course, I scream again. Because, excuse me, but, creepy.
Then one of the men pulls the knife out of the man on the floor. It makes a sickening sucking sound. The blade that has just come out of the man is dark and slick with blood. My stomach lurches at the sight of it.
It’s only when the man with the knife says, “Run,” to his companions that I realize what I’ve just done—stumbled across the scene of a crime.
But they don’t seem interested in killing me. In fact, they seem interested in getting away from me as quickly as possible, at least if the squeaking of their sneaker soles on the polished floor is any indication as they flee.
Then, the New York College fight song (Hail to thee New York College / Colors gold and white / We will honor you forever / Bite them, Cougars, bite! — the words to the song not having been changed after New York College lost its Division I standing and mascot) playing dimly in the background, I sink to my knees at the side of the injured man, trying to remember what I’d learned in the emergency first- aid seminar Dr. Jessup had over Winter Break. It was only what information they could cram into an hour, but I do recall that first and foremost, it’s important to call for help—a feat I accomplish by whipping out my cell phone and dialing Cooper’s cell number, the first one that pops into my head.
It takes him three rings to
answer. I guess Lindsay’s tribute must be especially moving.
“Somebody’s been stabbed by the squash courts,” I say into the phone. It’s important to stay calm in an emergency. I learned that during my assistant hall director training. “Call for an ambulance and the cops. The guys who did it are wearing basketball masks. Don’t let anyone in basketball masks leave. And get a first-aid kit. And get down here!”
“Heather?” Cooper asks. “Heather—what?Where are you?”
I repeat everything I’ve just said. As I do, I look down at the stabbed man, and realize, with sudden horror, that I know him.
It’s Manuel, Julio’s nephew.
“Hurry!” I shriek into the phone. Then I hang up. Because the blood from Manuel’s body is starting to pool around my knees.
Whipping off my sweater, I stuff it into the gaping hole in Manuel’s stomach. I don’t know what else to do. The emergency first-aid course we took didn’t cover multiple stab wounds to the gut.
“You’re going to be all right,” I tell Manuel. He’s looking up at me with half-lidded eyes. The blood around him is gelatinous and almost black as it seeps into my jeans. I stuff my sweater more deeply into the biggest hole I can find, keeping my fingers pressed over it. “Manuel, you’re going to be fine. Just hang on, okay? Help will be here in a minute.”
“H-Heather,” Manuel rasps. Blood bubbles up out of his mouth. I know this is not a good sign.
“You’re going to be fine,” I say, trying to sound like I believe it. “You hear me, Manuel? You’re going to be just fine.”
“Heather,” Manuel says. His voice is nothing more than a wheeze. “It was me. I gave it to her.”
Pressing hard against the wound—blood has soaked through my sweater and is gathering under my fingernails—I say, “Don’t talk, Manuel. Help is on its way.”
“She asked me for it,” Manuel says. He’s obviously delirious with blood loss and pain. “She asked me for it, and I gave it to her. I knew I shouldn’t’ve, but she was crying. I couldn’t say no. She was… she was so… ”