High and Dry

by Sarah Skilton

  Maria Posey took one look at Ellie, saw she was worth knowing, and invited her to be a songbird. Ellie was just an okay singer—which suited Maria fine. That meant she wouldn’t be competition.

  The day I saw Ellie’s message to me in the paper, I made it a point to say hi to her in no-man’s-land before the game. I’d had my eye on her for ages but acted like my interest was brand-new. I asked what she was doing after the match, and she said she was hoping I would ask, and the rest is too happy and painful to go into.

  Today’s issue was the first since our breakup and I guess I thought there might be a mention to close it out, a hidden message, something from or about her.

  I skimmed the whole page, fighting off the pounding headache that dehydration, dead alcohol, and reading on a bouncing bus induced, and that’s when I saw it. The final message. They were listed in order received, so it must have been added right before deadline last night.

  “To ChD. If you find it, don’t give it to her. I’ll pay more. IM 10 2nite.”

  The flash drive again!

  Ryder’s warning came back to me. I’d been so caught up in my Ellie call last night I’d forgotten about the conversation that preceded it.

  I read the message three more times, my heart racing. The person who’d written it was willing to pay for the drive. If I managed to find it, there were apparently several interested parties.

  I dug through my backpack for Bridget’s list of suspects and leaned over to the clogged pores in the seat ahead. “You know this kid Danny? Who’s he run with?”

  They looked at each other, decided it was safe to tell me, and nodded. “He’s with the art kids—charcoal sketches, that kind of thing.”

  “Who do I need to see? Is Jake still in charge?”

  They nodded again.

  “I’ll square things with Jake, but in the meantime, can you find Danny this morning and tell him I want a word? Tell him to meet me at the water fountain outside the art room after first period.”

  “Okay,” the first clogged pore said.

  “So what do we get for facilitating this?” the second clogged pore said.

  I laughed. “You get me not kicking your ass.”

  They looked nervous for a second, so I rolled my eyes. “What do you think is fair payment?”

  “At the soccer game on Friday, we might have dates …”

  “Uh-huh,” I said dryly.

  “If we come up to you, act like we’re pals. And maybe see that we have good seats.”

  Having had little to no truck with them before today, I understood within five minutes why it was so tempting to beat the crap out of freshmen; but I also had to admire their style. “Sure, fine. What are your names?”

  They told me and I promptly forgot, but that was okay because I was good with faces. I’d put on a nice show for their supposed girlfriends and maybe pay for a couple of hot dogs and Cokes to be sent over to their section.

  I dismissed my new foot soldiers.

  I couldn’t believe it was only Tuesday morning, only forty-eight hours since West Side Story Maria had been dumped at the hospital. She should’ve been heading to school right now with the rest of us. She should’ve been pissing off the other songbirds by practicing her concert solo in the hallway. She should’ve been looking all around with those big, sad eyes of hers and taking in the same weary world as me.

  As head of the art kids, Jake controlled who interacted with his charges. Art boys were notoriously bullied by upperclassmen, more so than the rest of the groups combined, so Jack was overprotective.

  If I’d approached Danny out of nowhere to question or accuse him, it’d be like declaring war on every potter, jeweler, painter, sketcher, and wind chimer at school. Worse, they had an alliance with the drama kids, and you did not want to make enemies of the drama kids. Not because they were scary; they were just … dramatic. They would band together, write original arias and skits about you, and corner you in the hallway or cafeteria to publicly shame you for what you’d done. Sometimes it went on for days.

  Since the library was no-man’s-land, a lot of romances originated there. If you couldn’t or didn’t want to wait for a formal introduction, you could meet on the sly in the stacks, but it was all on the down low and could easily backfire.

  I prided myself on my social mobility. I was welcome with the beckhams, a few other sports that overlapped, the songbirds (because of Ellie), and several people in my neighborhood (Bridget, plus now the clogged pores from this morning). I had some unofficial clout with the journos because of my dad’s job, and his occasional columnist work for the Palm Valley Register. He’d given my classmates a tour of the newspaper office last year. That might’ve been one of the reasons Bridget had asked me for help; it was quicker for me to interview the people on her list because I didn’t have to schedule as many meetings as the one I was about to.

  I hovered outside the art classroom, waiting for Jake to show and watching the clock. I took out Bridget’s list of names again and studied it. Josh was crossed off definitively, but before I could cross off Maria Posey, I had to make sure that one of the other ID numbers matched Oscar, her tutor. It did. Seemed she’d been straight with me. I crossed her off and shoved the list away in time to see Jake approach. He was wearing overalls and a Nine Inch Nails T-shirt, both dotted with paint.

  “Charlie.” He nodded shortly.

  “Jake,” I replied.

  “The bell’s imminent.”

  “I know. Sorry to keep this last-minute, but I need to speak with your boy Danny after first period, at the water fountain. Nothing serious, just getting data for a friend about an incident in no-man’s-land Friday morning.”

  “What makes you think Danny has anything to do with whatever’s going on?”

  “I’ve been told he might have seen someone swipe a flash drive that didn’t belong to them. I’m looking at Danny as a witness, not a suspect, and I’ll treat him accordingly.”

  Jake’s expression remained blank. Impress me, soccer boy.

  “I also told two freshmen to make the intro for me, on the bus this morning,” I added.

  That seemed to do the trick. “So he won’t be ambushed?”

  “No, he’ll be expecting it.”

  Jake nodded again. The bell rang. I looked at him for final confirmation.

  “I’m going to allow it,” said Jake. “But next time give me twenty-four hours’ notice. And I might drop by.”

  We shook hands and went our separate ways.

  Danny was a quivering wreck at our meet-and-greet. I think my minions from the bus told him I was a bruiser or something. He looked more like a seventh grader than a freshman, and he reminded me of Ellie’s brother, who actually was a seventh grader. I tried to put Danny’s mind at ease.

  “Hi. Thanks for agreeing to this. I’m Charlie.”

  “I know.”

  “Look, I just want to know if you saw anything suspicious in the library, second period, on Friday. A friend of mine had a flash drive stolen.”

  “Who’s your friend?”

  “Bridget Flannery.”

  His face got pink. Jesus, he was blushing.

  “You know who that is?” I said.

  He nodded, apparently mute with lust. I was glad his sketchbook was in front of his crotch.

  “She was sitting at the computer near the far left window,” I said. “Where were you sitting? Did you see anything?”

  “Is she your girlfriend?” Danny asked. He seemed to be fundamentally confused about the order and purpose of a Q & A.

  “She lives next door to me,” I replied, with all the patience I could muster. “Did you see anything?”

  “She lives next door to you?” he sputtered. “Ohhhh my God.”

  “Yes, that’s how our real estate agent listed the house. Bridget-Adjacent Property.”

  “Can you see in her window?”

  “I’m gonna pretend you didn’t ask me that, Danny.” Maria Posey was so right; names could be used as i
nsults all day long, and there was no shortage of targets at this school.

  “I just—”

  “Stop dribbling down your shirt and answer the question. Did you see anyone take a flash drive from that or any other computer at the end of second period?”

  “No.” Danny shifted from one foot to the other. “But—”

  My patience careened downhill like an out-of-control skate-board about to crash. “But what?”

  “I don’t want to get anyone in trouble …”

  “You’re gonna be the one in trouble if you don’t answer me.”

  “It’s just … I was at the library second period last Friday, but Bridget wasn’t.”

  I stared at him. “Bridget wasn’t there?”

  “No.”

  “And you’re sure we’re talking about the same Bridget?”

  He placed his sketchbook under his armpit and made the universal sign for “hourglass curves” with his hands. I was embarrassed on his behalf and pushed his hands away, just when Jake walked up, of course.

  “Everything cool here?” Jake demanded, moving protectively in front of Danny.

  I leaned around him to address Danny. “Your perv-in-training was about to sketch me a picture.”

  Danny opened his sketchpad and pressed it flat against the wall. He rapidly drew a picture of a girl’s face with his charcoal.

  “If she’d been there, I would’ve noticed,” he said.

  “I believe you,” I said. The likeness was uncanny. I half expected the drawing to come to life and make an obscene gesture at us with its tongue.

  I tore the picture out of Danny’s sketchpad, handed the pad back to him, and said, “I might need you for a favor later. Check in by the fountain again tomorrow.”

  “Will Bridget be there?” he asked eagerly.

  “Sure,” I said, but it was a lie.

  “You’ve been lying to me.”

  “Well, hello to you, too, grouchy,” Bridget said, twirling the combination on her lock. “School bus not what it used to be?”

  “I didn’t see you offering to give me a ride,” I snarled. “Thanks, neighbor.”

  She was incredulous. “If you’d been nicer to me last night, maybe I would have.”

  “Nicer, like hands-on? Never gonna happen again. Now, give me a copy of your schedule.”

  She opened her locker, but I slammed it shut and leaned against it, blocking her access.

  Her eyes narrowed. “Why?”

  “I want to know where I can find you at all times.”

  “Wow, Dix, I’m super-flattered, but—” She flicked her head to the side.

  “You want me to move? You want your books for third period? Hand over your schedule.”

  She pulled out her iPhone, which was off, and mimed tapping out an e-mail. “Dear Ellie, wass up girlfriend? Charlie tastes like cheap whiskey and despair, how could you ever let him go? And ‘send.’”

  “Thank you, school board, for jamming our cell phones,” I said. “As long as we’re on campus you have no power over me.”

  “Because it would be so much trouble to send those texts when I go out to lunch.”

  “I erased the texts.”

  She’d forgotten; you could tell. Her voice changed to false confidence. “I … kept backups. I learned after losing my flash drive.”

  “I don’t believe you. So I’m off the ‘case’ unless you come clean with me.”

  She sighed and opened her Trapper Keeper, where her schedule was taped to the inside flap. I scanned it quickly, shaking my head with disgust.

  “You don’t even have study hall second period.”

  “Most of the time, no,” she admitted. She rifled through a couple of folders until she found a little slip of paper, which she flashed in front of my eyes for about a millisecond. “A pass from the guidance counselor. Special circs.”

  “How come your freshman stalker doesn’t remember seeing you?”

  “I wore my glasses that day. I’d pulled an all-nighter.”

  “You have an answer for everything. Guess I’m not asking my questions quickly enough.”

  I stepped aside and she opened her locker to get her books. A folded piece of notebook paper fluttered out from the vent. “What’s that?” I said suspiciously.

  Bridget bent over to get it. Traffic in the hallway screeched to a halt.

  She slowly straightened up, cupped her hand around the piece of paper, and read it. The contents made her face blanch.

  “What’s it say?” I asked.

  She slapped the note against my chest. “Still think I’m lying to you?”

  I peeled the note out of her fingers and read it aloud. “‘I know someone who has something of yours. What’s the information worth to you? Write a number on the back of this paper and Dix will give it to me.’”

  My expression must have changed, because suddenly Bridget was in my face.

  “You know who it’s from, don’t you?” she demanded. “If you know, you better tell me.”

  “I’ll take care of it.” I pocketed the note and got the hell out of there.

  I’d recognize Ellie’s handwriting anywhere, even if it hadn’t been on dark blue stationery, written in white pen.

  THE MOBILE ESTATES

  AT LUNCH I COULD BARELY CONCENTRATE ON MY MEETING with Ryder.

  He asked if we could walk back to his place for leftover pasta. I said I wasn’t hungry so it didn’t matter to me. We set off down the sidewalk, and he lit a cigarette the second we stepped off campus.

  “Rough about Ellie,” he said.

  I nodded thanks. Rougher now that she was apparently shaking down Bridget for cash. If she’d needed money, why hadn’t she come to me?

  “Dumping you over Christmas break? Damn.”

  “I know. I drank a gallon of eggnog at my cousin’s.” And wine. And whiskey.

  “You had her longer than anyone thought you would, though,” he said with a laugh, punching me lightly in the shoulder, and I had to laugh, too. I don’t know why. That’s how it was with Ryder. He could say anything, but instead of being offended, you saw the awful truth of his words and they struck you as genuinely funny. Besides, hadn’t I spent the last eight months thinking the same thing?

  He offered me a drag of his cigarette. I took a puff, handed it back, and shoved my hands in my pockets without response.

  “Freaking songbirds, right?” he said after a while.

  “What?”

  “I saw you with Bridget in the hall,” Ryder continued. “Are you rebounding? I don’t think it counts if you just bounce between the same two.” He cocked his head to the side, considering. “Unless of course, they’re in the same bed …” He grinned.

  I rolled my eyes. “No, man, Bridget’s a pain in the ass. We’re just handcuffed together in hell.”

  “I guess who you choose depends on if you’re in the mood for a deficit or a surplus,” he said.

  I knew what he meant. Ellie was svelte; Bridget was … an hourglass motion in a hornball art kid’s hands. They were both pretty, so personality trumped all. “She’s got nothing on Ellie,” I said.

  “Maria Posey called me a cylon the other day. I don’t even know what that shit means. Chicks around here need subtitles.”

  “You’re with Sound of Music Maria?” I said with surprise. They hadn’t seemed together, but why else would he have been at her party?

  “‘With’ is a strong word. ‘Tormented by,’ maybe.”

  “If you’re a cylon, it means you’re a robot who looks like a human,” I explained. “It’s from Battlestar Galactica.”

  “Like, ‘I-am-a-robot’?” he said robotically.

  “No, they look and sound exactly like people. I guess she meant you’re acting inhuman, or cold, or something?” Weird that Posey, of all people, would have nerdish leanings.

  “I always forget you’re into comics.”

  “It’s a TV—never mind. What was the context?”

  “I wouldn’t help her out
with something.”

  I laughed. “I wouldn’t worry about it. Posey’s kind of hyperbolic.”

  Ryder raised his eyebrows in agreement and flicked his cigarette to the pavement.

  We were passing the old baseball diamond, and just by looking out there at the empty grass I could conjure up that sense of liberation and chaos and pure joy I’d experienced when Ryder threw the bat for me.

  Despite the stench of cigarettes that clung to his clothes and the restless look in his eyes, it was impossible for me to separate the Ryder of today from the Ryder of Little League.

  We reached Mobile Estates, the cruelest euphemism in the world, even worse than Inland Empire. Both terms slapped you in the face about how crappy things were and then told you to smile about it. If trailer parks were “estates” and sprawling, bankrupt counties with no future were “empires,” then “faking it and faking it hard” applied to society as a whole, not just Palm Valley High School. What a dismal revelation.

  Did that mean I had to pretend to be a jock the rest of my life?

  Ryder halted abruptly, so I did likewise. “Did you have a chance to think about what I said yesterday?” His tone had changed. We were being serious now.

  “Maybe if I had more information …”

  “So me asking you to back off isn’t enough?” Ryder said.

  He didn’t wait for me to respond, just started walking again as though the matter were settled.

  We entered his family’s trailer and made ourselves comfortable at the table.

  Ryder’s older brother, Griffin, was in the other room, playing the latest Grand Theft Auto derivative. Muffled explosions, screams, and gunfire filtered out from under the door. Griffin had dropped out of school to work construction, but I don’t think it took.

  I was glad Griffin was in the other room. He always made me nervous.

  Before we moved to Palm Valley, Ryder’s mom used to teach home ec at Palm Valley High and Ryder’s dad worked night security at one of the local military suppliers.