I said hi and then turned my attention to Nick, who was getting out of the passenger side.
“Well,” Mr. Jarvis said. He looked from me to Nick. “I can trust you to come inside when you’re finished out here?”
Nick was staring at me. He was trying to give me an Antoine blank-look, but he wasn’t succeeding. Nick isn’t like Antoine. He doesn’t always like to say what’s going on in his head, but he has way more trouble hiding his feelings.
“Yeah,” he said to Mr. Jarvis. “I’ll be right in.”
Mr. Jarvis went inside. I circled around to where Nick was standing. At first, he wouldn’t look at me. Then he slipped a hand in mine.
“I went back to the coffee shop to look for you,” he said. “You were gone.”
“I waited for half an hour.”
“I’m sorry. But Beej is. . . emotional, you know?” I couldn’t say I even cared, but I held my tongue. “I had to get her calmed down.”
“How are you getting along with your aunt?” I said.
The question seemed to confuse him. “My aunt?”
“You’re supposed to go and live with her in two more weeks, right?”
He looked down the driveway to the road. “I’ve been thinking maybe I’d do something else.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
“Maybe a group home.”
“You’re in a group home now,” I said.“You’ve been telling me ever since I met you that you can’t wait to get out.”
“That’s different,” he said. “I’m here because I have to be. I’m talking about a different kind of place, you know, where a bunch of kids live together and someone runs the place but there aren’t so many rules.”
“You think you’d like that? Better than living with your aunt?”
He looked directly at me. “I think it would be good for me.”
“Because of Glen?”
“Come on, Robyn—”
“I really like you, Nick,” I said. “I care what happens to you. But you always act like you don’t trust me.”
He looked at me for a long time. For awhile, his face was hard and his nostrils flared out. Then his breathing got quieter and he shook his head.
“If I live with my aunt, something bad is going to happen,” he said.“She’s crazy about Glen, but he doesn’t want me around. And whenever he gets mad, which he does every time I go there, she gets mad too. At me. She says she’s tired of being alone and she really likes him and she wants it to work out between them. If I go to live there, she’s only going to end up sorry she ever said I could stay there in the first place. Anyway, I bet Glen will eventually fix it so she throws me out. But if I go and live someplace else, she’ll still be my aunt, I can maybe see her from time to time.” When he looked at me, I had no trouble reading the hurt on his face. “I don’t want her to hate me, Robyn.”
I slipped my arms around his waist. He didn’t pull away. After awhile, he wrapped his good arm around me and held me close. His chin rested lightly on my head. It felt good.
“Nick?”
“Mmm?”
I liked how warm I felt pressed up against his chest. I liked that he sounded so content, like a cat purring. I was sorry that I was probably going to mess it all up.
“Trisha’s father gave me a letter. Trisha’s mother wrote it. He asked me if there was any way I could get it to Trisha.”
I felt him go rigid.
“What did you tell him?” he said.
“Nothing.”
He pulled away from me. “Then why did he give you a letter for her?”
“I told him when he gave it to me that I didn’t think there was anything I could do. I didn’t tell him anything else. How could I? I don’t know anything.” Nick kept staring at me. “But I think Kenny does, and so does Beej.”
He stepped away from me, his eyes cold again.
“Come on, Nick. Trisha’s mom is really sick. She just wants to know that Trisha is okay. All I want to do is give her the letter. That’s all.” Then, because it didn’t look like he was going to offer, I had to come right out and say it. “I need your help.”
“This has nothing to do with me. It has nothing to do with you, either.”
“She’s in my history class,” I said.
“So?”
“So we were working on a project together. But she didn’t get a lot done, probably because her mother is so sick. I could have been nice about it, but I wasn’t.” I told him what had happened. He looked at me strangely. Maybe he was having trouble picturing me being a total bitch. I couldn’t make myself meet his eyes. “That same day, she took off.”
“That’s the personal reason, huh?”
I looked up at him.
“In the restaurant,” he said, “before Beej showed up. You said you had a personal reason for wanting to find her. That’s it?”
I nodded. “I think Kenny Merchant might have some idea where she is. And I know Beej knows something. I was looking right at her when she saw Trisha’s photograph. I saw the look on her face. That’s why she ran out of the coffee shop, isn’t it? Why you had to calm her down? She thought you were going to tell me something.”
He kept looking at me. “I don’t know where she is.”
“But Beej knows, doesn’t she?”
He said nothing.
“I could have told my father,” I said. “But I didn’t. I haven’t said a word to him.” Yet. “I know you think it’s none of my business, and maybe you’re right. But I feel bad about what I did. You think it’s up to Trisha to decide what she wants to do. I agree with you. But Nick, I feel sorry for her mother too. That’s why I want to deliver the letter to Trisha—so Trisha can see for herself how her mother feels. She can decide for herself what she wants to do. I’ll meet her anywhere she wants.”
“And maybe while you’re delivering it, you could apologize to her, is that it?”
I felt my cheeks redden. “Maybe,” I said.
“Hey, Robyn?”
I looked up at him again.
“Do you really think someone would run away and stay away this long just because you said something stupid?”
“Everyone says she takes off whenever she’s upset or angry.”
He didn’t look convinced.
“Even if I’m only partly responsible, I want to apologize,” I said. “All I’m asking you to do is ask Beej.”
He shook his head. “It’s none of my business.”
“Have you talked to Trisha?”
“I’ve never even met her,” he said. “I don’t want to get involved.”
“Can’t you just ask Beej? Please?”
“And if she says no, what are you going to do? Tell your dad? Get him to go after her, even though you have no real idea what’s going on and why Trisha ran away?”
I looked down the street, at the nice, peaceful neighborhood. The man who had been raking his lawn before was carrying bags of leaves out to the curb for pickup. The guy who had been sitting in his car reading the paper was still sitting, still reading.
“I’ll make you a deal,” Nick said finally. “I’ll ask Beej—ask her, that’s all—if she’ll give your message to Trisha. If she won’t, that’s the end of it. If she says she knows where Trisha is, then it’s up to Trisha what happens after that. Her, not you. And you have to promise that no matter what Trisha says, you won’t tell your dad anything. Not about Trisha, not about Beej, not about Kenny. Deal?”
His purple eyes searched mine while I thought it over. What if Trisha refused? What if it turned out that Beej knew where she was? Could I really keep that information from my father?
Someone called out Nick’s name. It was Ed Jarvis, standing in the door to Somerset. Nick waved at him and said he’d be right there. Then he looked back at me, wanting my answer.
“Deal,” I said.
Iarrived home about five minutes before my mother. She looked tired when she came through the door. She set down her bulging briefcase and dropped her keys in the
bowl on the little table in the front hall. I stood in the door to the kitchen, waiting to see if she was going to apologize for the night before, or at least relent on grounding me. But all she said was,“Have you eaten yet?”
“I was just going to make myself a sandwich,” I said.
“Good. Because I don’t feel like cooking. I’m going to take a bath.”
Another bath? My mother was normally one of those people who didn’t feel right unless she was spending every minute of her day doing something productive. Taking baths was for when she was (a) dead tired or (b) depressed. She had taken a lot of very long baths when she and my father separated. There had been a pattern then. Bath, then robe and head towel, then ice cream.
She climbed halfway up the stairs, turned, and said, “You’re still grounded.”
Okay, she was in that kind of mood.
I was making my sandwich when my father called. “Cheer up, Robbie,” he said when I told him about the grounding. “It’s only one weekend. When you’re sprung, we’ll do something fun, okay?”
I said okay. I hung up and finished making my sandwich. I was taking the first bite when Morgan called.
“I talked to Billy,” she said.
“And?”
I heard a long sigh. “And I told him that I really like him—as a friend. He turned bright red, you know, the way he does.” Like cherry lollipops. “We’re going to a movie tomorrow. You know, like buddies. I don’t suppose you want to come? Help make sure that Billy understands?”
“I’d love to,” I said. “But I can’t. I’m grounded.” I told her what had happened. “Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m pretty sure Billy understands.”
“He’s a sweet guy!” she said. “I just don’t want to go out with him.”
I told her, “Have fun.”
“Right,” she said. “And you be good.” As if I could be anything else, stuck in the house all weekend.
My mother stopped by my room after her bath. She said she was sorry she had to ground me. Had to. She said it was the only way she could think of to make sure I knew she was serious. For a moment, I thought she was going to say it was for my own good. Thankfully, she didn’t.
She was at my door again first thing the next morning, dressed in a business suit even though it was Saturday morning. She had to go to the office, she said. Then she had to meet with a client.
“I’ll check in with you,” she said.
“Okay. But don’t freak out if I don’t answer the phone. Try me on my cell, okay?” My mother’s eyes narrowed. “I’m stuck here all day, right? With nothing to do, right? I figured it would be a perfect time to clean out the garage.” Her eyes got even narrower. “There’s no phone in the garage. You’ll have to get me on my cell.” When she finally nodded, I said, “You’re welcome.”
“Thank you,” she said.
I absolutely intended to spend the day doing what I had promised to do. I even made it out to the garage. I was standing in the little square of clear space in the middle of it, trying to figure out where to start, when I heard, bah-buh-duh-duh-dah-dah. . . .
I rolled my eyes. There was nothing like motherly trust.
Except it wasn’t my mother.
It was Nick.
“She said okay,” he said.
“Beej?”
“She said Trisha wants the letter from her mother. I’m downtown at the youth center—come meet me. I’ll be outside. I’ve got the dogs.” He meant the dogs from his Saturday dog-walking job.
I hesitated. I could have told him it would have to wait till Monday. Or I could just go and do it. With luck—with good planning—I’d be back well before my mother returned home. And if she called to check on me, well, she was going to call my cell. She’d never know I’d been away.
“Hey, Robyn? You still there?”
“Yeah.”
“Beej says if you want to do it, you have to come right now.”
I said I’d be there as soon as I could. After I hung up, I closed the garage door, stuffed the envelope from Carl Hanover into my bag, and hurried toward the nearest bus stop. I checked out the neighbors’ houses to see if anyone my mother knew was outside doing yard work or getting into a car—anybody who might see me and might mention it to my mother, so I could say, “Well, at around such-and-such time, I ran to the store for more garbage bags (note to self: buy garbage bags on the way home, or, better yet, rubber gloves; forget garbage bags, buy rubber gloves) because you wouldn’t believe all the gunk that collected under Dad’s workbench, the one he never used. It was just a quick trip to the store and, believe me, it wasn’t any fun.”
I got lucky. Our street was quiet for a Saturday morning. I saw Mrs. Giles come out her side door and head around to the back of her house. I don’t think she saw me. I saw a shabby-looking guy shove a handful of flyers into the Carlings’ mailbox and then cut across their lawn to the house next door. I saw a car near the end of the Bellagios’ driveway, but it wasn’t Mr. or Mrs. Bellagio’s car. They drove his and hers midnight blue Prius. This was a beat-up old gray car with a guy in it wearing aviator sunglasses. He seemed to be checking out something on a clipboard. Some kind of salesman? Maybe a meter reader. Other than that, there wasn’t a soul around.
I got lucky with the bus too. One came along almost as soon as I reached the bus stop. Nick was waiting for me on the sidewalk outside the youth center.There were two big dogs with him. His left arm was still in a sling, so he was holding their leashes awkwardly with his right hand. I knew both dogs. One was a black mammoth named Orion that Nick had helped train at the animal shelter over the summer. The other was a German shepherd named Bunny. The name was someone’s idea of a joke, I guess, because Bunny did not look even remotely bunnylike. Nick had told me more than once that there was no way the dogs would ever hurt me. It didn’t help much. Dogs make me nervous. Big dogs scare me.
“Come on,” Nick said.
We hadn’t gone more than two steps when I heard, bah-buh-duh-duh-dah-dah. . . .
“My cell phone,” I said. “Don’t ask.”
I dug in my bag for my phone and then panicked. We were standing on a busy downtown street. Traffic swirled around me. Whoever was on the other end of the phone—my mother, for example—would hear that sound. I glanced around and spotted a used-book store that looked almost deserted.
“I’ll be right back,” I said to Nick. I stepped inside the store and answered my phone, doing my best to ignore the troll-like man glowering at me from behind the cash register.
“Oh, hi, Mom,” I said. “Sure, I’m fine. There’s a lot more stuff in here than I thought. I don’t know if I’m going to be able to get it all finished in one day.” Might as well prepare her for a less-than-spic-and-span garage when she got home.
My mother sounded mellower than she had when she’d left the house. She said not to worry—whatever I didn’t get done today, I could do tomorrow. She’d be home by six. After that, we’d order pizza and maybe she’d pick up a DVD on the way home. In other words, in her own way, she apologized.
By the time I finished my call and went back outside, Nick was pacing on the sidewalk.
“Beej is going to think we’re not coming,” he said. He nudged me with his sore arm. I followed him and the dogs down the street and around a few corners. I hesitated when he stepped into an alley. A long, dark alley littered with dumpsters and garbage that hadn’t made it into the dumpsters.
“Come on,” Nick said. When I didn’t follow him immediately, he said, “It’s okay, Robyn. I’d never let anything happen to you.” He looked down at the dogs. “Neither would Orion or Bunny.”
I stuck close to Nick while trying to keep my distance from the dogs.
The alley turned out to be the entrance to a whole network of alleys that runs behind stores and office towers. Nick led me through it as if he were guiding me through his own house, which made me wonder. I thought I knew a lot about Nick. But I obviously didn’t know everything. For example, I didn’t know
how he had managed to acquire an intimate knowledge of downtown back alleys.
Finally, Beej and her bulging backpack appeared from behind a dumpster. She looked all around, frowning, to make sure that we hadn’t been followed. It didn’t seem to make any difference when Nick told her that it was all good. Her eyes darted here and there, taking in every inch of the alley. She thrust out her hand.
“Give me the letter,” she said.
“I’d like to give it to Trisha myself,” I said.
Beej’s suspicious look grew even more suspicious. “I knew there was going to be a catch,” she said. “Look, Trisha wants the letter, but she doesn’t want to see you. She doesn’t like you and she doesn’t trust you. Okay?”
It wasn’t exactly okay. “I’d like to give it to her in person,” I said, “so I can tell her parents that she’s all right. Her mom’s also hoping that she’ll send back a note, you know, since she hasn’t called home or anything since she left.”
Beej shook her head. “If you want her to get that letter, you have to give it to me.”
I looked pleadingly at Nick, but all he did was shrug. He wasn’t going to help, and Beej wasn’t going to budge.
“Okay,” I said. “How about if Nick goes with you? He can see how Trisha is and he can tell me. Then I can tell her parents.”
“What’s the matter?” Beej said. “Don’t you trust me to tell you the truth?”
“Do you trust me?” I said.
She smiled, but there was nothing lighthearted about the expression. “Sure, okay,” she said, just like that, without any hesitation. “Nick can come.”
Nick handed me the dog leashes and took the letter. He stuck it in his pocket and squeezed my hand.
“Stay here with the dogs, okay?” he said. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
I looked doubtfully at the two animals and even more doubtfully around the litter-strewn alley.
“Orion won’t let anyone mess with you,” Nick said.
I looked at the big black dog. He had terrified me the first time I met him and, to be honest, he still scared me. But he was used to me, even if I wasn’t used to him. And Nick had complete faith in him. So I nodded. When Nick and Beej walked down the alley together and disappeared around a corner, I moved closer to the dumpster. Dogs or no dogs, I didn’t want anyone who might see me standing deep in an alley, far from the bustle of the street, to get any ideas.
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