"And since we received no note authorizing your absence, I called your parents."
Like the crazed Rottweiler on its short chain, the ideas lunge at me: Parsnip. Calling my house. Telling my mother I took off from school. Or. She called my dad. So he knows I lied. To his face. After he made my all-time favorite breakfast.
Terrific.
"To the office." Parsnip points at the door. "Now."
***
Ellis's office is a shrine to higher learning. On the headmaster's mahogany desk, St. Jerome sits, one plaster fist tucked under his chin in the Thinker's Pose. On the windowsill, Socrates gazes out at the soccer fields, reminding the jocks that an unexamined life is not worth living.
Aside from those two, I sit here alone. Parsnip has left me to wait. This is what they do: leave you here to tremble in fear, recognize the error of your ways.
But I'm not feeling it.
Five minutes later, Ellis strides through the door, his concerned frown tight as his bow tie. He deliberately takes a seat so that Socrates is right over his shoulder. I think Ellis must be one of those grownups who never left prep school. Smudge away the gray hair at his temples, erase his paunch, and you'll find a private school kid who dreamed of becoming headmaster because it means he will never have to use a simple word because the big ones sound smarter.
"Raleigh,” he begins, “Our educators take their mission at St. Catherine's quite seriously. And when students sally forth into the streets—"
Sally forth? Isn’t that a cartoon?
—it's a clear exhibition of utter disrespect for hard work and the rules, which clearly state campus parameters." He takes much-needed breath. "Miss Harmon, you've been with us for eight years. You are fully cognizant of school rules until—" he taps the desk, "you met up with Miss Levinson. As we all know, bad company corrupts good character."
I want to sally forth from this room.
"Have you nothing to say?" he asks.
"Not really."
"You can tell me," he says.
"Tell you . . . what?"
"Where Miss Levinson is hiding."
"I don't know!"
He leans back in his hard wooden chair. Tenting his hands, he gazes over the steeple of his knuckles. “The other educators and I have noticed the influence Miss Levinson exerts over you, the detrimental friendship that has formed. You've become wise in your own eyes, Miss Harmon."
"You're wrong."
"You presume incorrectly." He gestures to the window where Socrates perches. "Why don't you tell me how you two burned that field, for instance?"
I gaze out the window, saying nothing.
"That misbehavior is expected of Miss Levinson. She's compelled to go too far. But I've received some disturbing reports recently, how you're not completing your assignments—"
Sandbag.
"And now we see you leaving campus without permission."
My voice rises. "I don't know where she's hiding. But I know she didn't run away. Something happened to her."
He sighs, dropping the tented fingers.
"I will let you in on a little secret," he says. "We've known about the move to New York City for quite some time. Her mother apprised us of the transfer weeks ago. Thoughtfully, I might add. We've been prepared for her ruse."
"Ruse?!"
"And we are fully cooperating with the Richmond police. I was, until today, considering you an incidental victim of Miss Levinson's cruelty toward her mother. But today's truancy changes that perception."
"So you're not doing anything to help find her."
"Find her? On the contrary, we've informed the police. Our school is ready and willing to aid."
I can't believe my ears. Or my eyes. Ellis looks so . . . "You're glad she's gone."
He gazes at me a long moment. "Miss Harmon, what would you propose we do?"
"Crank up the phone tree. Tell people to look for her. Create a committee—you did that for the stupid toilets in the gym."
After a moment's silence, he swivels the chair, gazing out the window at the empty field. "You may find this difficult to believe, but I am as distressed about Miss Levinson's disappearance as you are."
"Last time you started the phone tree, you called everyone."
"And learned my lesson."
I can’t help it. “So when you heard she was moving away you, what, you threw a party?"
He swivels toward me, his mouth so tight it's lipless. "I've been patient with your insubordination. But my patience has been wasted on you. Expect to hear from Mrs. Parsons regarding your detention. Unless . . . " His pause is long. "Unless you'd like to tell me where you went and who you saw."
Part of me would love to describe Y'landa Williams for him. But my inner attorney warns me about how deep a grave can be dug. "I had an errand to run."
"An errand." He leans his elbows on the desk, leaning toward me. "Miss Harmon, we've bantered long enough. Tell us where Miss Levinson is hiding. We will be merciful."
"I have nothing to tell you."
"Tell the truth, and all will be forgiven. No one suspects you of being the mastermind of this ill-conceived plan."
I don't want to talk to him, but he needs to hear the truth. So he can stop believing the lie that she's hiding. So I tell him about the soil: in her tires, in the shoe found at the quarry. The soil that proves Drew went to the St. Christopher's baseball field—and I don't know why.
But just as I'm about to explain my morning errand to Southside, he says: "Soil."
I wait. His tone is strange.
"Soil," he says again. "Would this soil have to do with geology, perhaps?"
I know one thing. Ellis would savor any chance to ship Teddy back to West Virginia.
"Miss Harmon?"
When I don't answer, he reaches out and presses a button on the phone base.
“Miss Parsons, would you please send Mr. Chastain to my office?"
I stare at Socrates. There's a bitter flavor in my mouth, maybe like the taste of hemlock. "I will swear on the Bible," I tell Ellis, "I do not know where Drew is.”
"Indeed."
I begin sweating in a really bad way--that mix of fear and adrenaline.
But when Teddy finally rolls into the room, he completely ignores Ellis.
“So how'd it go?" he asks me.
"Begging your pardon," Ellis intones, “this is my office. I'm conducting this discussion."
"Yeah, you hauled Raleigh in because she took off. But I told her to go."
"You told her." Ellis sounds like he's talking to a child. The educator at his finest. "You told Miss Harmon to leave campus?"
"Yerp." Teddy pours out hillbilly accent. "I needed me some tacky paper."
"Perhaps," Ellis's lip seems to curl. "Perhaps I misheard you. You requested—"
"Tacky paper. You know, what you civilized folks call fly paper? Lab's out. I sent Raleigh to git me some."
Ellis likes to quote Socrates as much as he can. He's often telling us to become "citizens of the world." He likes to go on about diversity. Maybe that's why he hired Teddy--nothing says diversity like a guy in a wheelchair. Unfortunately, Ellis's idea of diversity isn't someone who thinks differently from him.
"Miss Harmon," he says in that same educator tone, "why would you choose not to reveal this telling detail during our conversation?"
"You were asking about Drew. Where she's hiding. And she's not hiding."
"Okey dokey, that settles it," Teddy says. "Where's the tacky paper? I need it next hour." He backs up the chair, making room for my exit. When I stand, I feel a wash of relief. And gratitude for this man, rolling for the door.
"Mr. Chastain," Ellis says.
I freeze.
"Would you mind remaining for a moment?"
"Actually, I would," Teddy says. "But I've noticed my particular preferences don't hold no water 'round these parts."
When I walk out of the room, alone, a bad feeling settles in my gut.
***
At the final bell, I know there's only minutes, maybe only seconds. Because not only am I grounded, but it's also about to get much worse when I go home and face my dad.
Only I need to see Teddy first, thank him for what he did today.
He's cruising around the Earth Sciences lab, bending low to pick paper off the floor. But he's not shooting three-pointers.
"Thank you," I tell him.
"You're welcome." He rolls around the back of the room. "And enjoy it because from here on out, you're on your own."
His eyes. The green color doesn't look right. Not cold, like Tinsley’s. But . . . wounded.
"What did he do?" I ask.
"Gave me notice."
"What does that mean?"
"He's been keeping a file. And it's getting fat."
"But you're Teacher of the Year."
"Not this year."
"So?"
"He can fire me. And I want to stay here."
"When you have to deal with him?!"
"I don't care about him. He's a flea at the circus."
"Then quit. Any school would take you."
"Raleigh, I'm a geologist. All the way down to the toes I can't feel. But I found out something else. Something I like more."
"Torturing Ellis?"
"Well, yeah, it is fun. But it ain't important. No, I found out what it’s like to get a student champing at the bit, dying to learn, begging for knowledge. And that is one total unmitigated blast."
"Unmitigated—did Ellis make you use that word?"
"I'm as serious as an egg-sucking dog. Every sub-moron science-hater in this school is totally worth that one great student."
I nod. “I get it. Drew."
"The girl's a genius, no doubt about it." He stares at me, the green color shifting in his eyes. "But for her, teachers probably just get in the way. But you? Lemme ask you. How'd you find that Petersburg granite?"
"I don't know; I looked at a map. At the library."
"See, there’s something inside of you. Instinct, Raleigh. You’ve got it. And it makes me swallow all my pride and refuse to let Ellis kick my crippled butt outta this place until you graduate. And then, you'll run right past me."
“Well, you're in a wheelchair."
He laughs. Throws his head back, howling.
I’m glad he's laughing. But when he looks at me again, the expression on his face makes my eyes burn.
He asks, “You get what I'm saying?"
I nod. Just like I nodded with my dad’s question this morning.
But, no, I don't get it. At all.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
And I just don't care anymore.
I don't care if I'm grounded for a month, or six months, or a year. So instead of riding home, I bike to Drew's house.
More fallen leaves smother the driveway and front steps, and the back door—as always—is unlocked. Isaac Newton sits in his usual spot in the sunroom, hissing as I pass by into the kitchen, the den, then upstairs.
Inside Drew's bedroom, I stand for a long moment, listening with my eyes closed. I can hear the whispery sound of her planetary mobile, shifting above my head because I've disturbed the air molecules in here. When I open my eyes, hoping for a fresh perspective, everything looks the same.
I walk to the bookshelves. Richard P. Feynman's books take up two shelves. Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman beside The Pleasure of Finding Things Out waiting next to Perfectly Reasonable Deviations.
Wrong.
Alphabetical order. Even textbooks inside her locker are kept in alphabetical order.
But here's Feynman, her idol, with books running S-T-P.
Wrong.
I cross the room to her closet. Two hangers empty. I try to remember—wasn't it one hanger before? The empty space is still on the floor, where her Converse All-Stars would be. But now that blankness glares up like some nasty theorem about negative space being just as powerful as positive space.
I check all the books. But come back to Feynman. They're the only ones out of order.
S-T-P.
As in, S-T-O-P?
Downstairs I search the kitchen and find another negative space that's even more startling: the wine rack is empty.
Not one bottle.
I check the trash. Nothing there.
Backing up, closing my eyes again, I tell myself it's Wednesday. Only Wednesday. The perfectionist alcoholic usually makes it to Friday. But with all this stress—would Jayne really not drink?
I open my eyes. Newton is mincing into the room. Expecting me to feed him.
But his dish. I stare at it. The brown mush fills the bowl.
Somebody’s already fed him.
The feeling quivers down my arms. The back door. It's always open. I know that. And of course Drew knows that. Drew also knows that Jayne will leave for work every day, no matter what, even if her daughter is "officially missing."
I see that last sentence written in her notebook. The sentence that's so very Drew: "If this is true, then . . .."
Then Drew could sneak into the house during the day. Change her clothes. Grab a book, get something to eat. Feed Newton. Pour out all of Jayne's wine.
If this is true then . . .
Then she is hiding.
Somewhere.
I walk outside, crunching over the dead leaves, gazing into the trees that circle the back yard. Stripped of leaves, the trees don't offer anywhere to hide.
The river?
But this time of year people are still launching canoes and kayaks, stealing these final sunny days for paddling season. Someone would see Drew. Report it. Her disappearance has made the news now.
I close my eyes once more, willing my mind to answer another hypothesis.
First: Drew would choose to hide where no one could find her.
Second: That means some place nobody ever goes.
No one.
Except.
Maybe.
Me.
***
The litter, I never really noticed all the litter before. Empty soda cans. Crushed paper bags. Kudzu vines around every surface, greedy to obscure. I kick away a brown bottle, lean into the vines, and feel around for that one loose board.
The tunnel exhales on me. Standing in the dark, feeling my heart pound, I smell the mildew and moist minerals, like a black ocean that goes on forever.
"Drew?" My voice shakes.
I take another step inside. I told her, told her how this geology gave out, the rocks collapsed on the men, still inside the steam train. Her eyes grew bright.
"You have to go check it out," she said.
"Right, only one small detail: I'm afraid of the dark."
She rolled her eyes. "What's the law of conservation say?"
"Energy can't be created or destroyed. It can only change form."
"Okay, so take the energy from your fear and change it into courage."
"Just like that?"
"Yes." She nodded so vigorously her wild hair bumped up and down. "Just like that."
I release one long slow breath, telling my pulse to quit freaking out. Another step. Another breath.
"Drew—it's me!"
My eyes are adjusting because the ground is coming into focus, the gray sediment rising to the curved stone roof. That glossy shine on the walls, the ground water weeping. When suddenly the space shrinks, I crouch, dropping to my stomach. Crawl.
"Drew!"
Her name echoes back, comes back, but sounds muffle from the blood throbbing in my ears. I keep calling, calling, and the next thing I know, I'm perched on the ledge. The black hole drops out.
"Drew?"
It comes back: "Who?"
I flip over, swallowing hard. My breath hits the stone above my face. No flashlight. No—wait. I twist on my side, fingers shaking as I dig into the pack. The cell phone, I know it's in there.
Something scurries across the soil. A tingle slithers up my bare legs.
"Drew?"
It's a whisper.
And the reply only comes from my mind: She's not here.
She's not.
But that litter? Somebody else is here. Panic spears my heart. I scramble, turn around, cell phone in hand, holding it so the light shines in front of me. As fast as possible, I worm my way back and stagger to a crouch. Fall. Get up. Scramble a few more feet forward. Fall again, the tiny light growing blurry. The tunnel seems to widen. I dive toward the end, find the boards, slap them until one feels loose, shove it with all my might—screaming along with the rusty nails.
I can barely see my bike, the sun is so bright. Running, bottles clanking against my shoes.
She is not here.
I push my bike over the rough terrain, running with one sickening thought repeating in my ear like the echo inside the tunnel.
She is not here. Not here.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
But Helen is.
"Surprise!" my sister exclaims when I walk into the kitchen.
I stand speechless. Shocked. Sweaty. Speechless.
Helen points at my legs. "What've you been doing?"
I look down. Blood trickles from my knee, tracing down my shins. My blue-plaid skirt is almost brown with dirt. But that's not the worst thing. I look up again.
Helen. Here.
Like some cruel substitute for my best friend.
"I thought you weren’t coming home until tomorrow."
"Yeah, well, it's going to be parents’ weekend at Yale." She makes air quotes around the words "parents' weekend."
"So?"
"So everybody kept asking when my parents were coming. I made up so many stories I couldn't remember what I said. And these people are not as dumb, not like Richmond. At some point, somebody was going to figure out I was lying. So I split."
She shrugs. Her auburn hair falls loose over her shoulders, the faded jeans smeared with acrylic paint that slant across her thin legs like war paint. I hate to admit it, but Helen is one of those artists who look more like a model.
"Where's the whiskey?" she asks.
"I don't know."
"Dad keeps a bottle somewhere, for medicinal purposes." Another set of air quotes around those words before she begins yanking open every cupboard, searching inside.
I walk over to the stove, hoping against reality that my dad will also cook dinner. But substances are simmering in pots, each one a different shade of brown. Like dinner might be various consistencies of mud.
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