by Susan Vaught
“Yes?” he said to Springer, then narrowed his eyes. “Who are you?”
“Sp—uh, Sam,” Springer said. “I’m new.” He thrust out the letter. “I need to see Josh Sharp. He’s supposed to go to the office.”
“Josh Sharp isn’t in this class, Sam.”
Springer blinked. Seemed to remember Sam was actually him, for the moment. “I’m sorry, sir. This was the class number they wrote down. Would you have any idea where I should look for Mr. Sharp?”
From inside the class, we heard snickers. Somebody said, “Mister Sharp?”
The teacher glared over his shoulder at this students. “Funny. Do any of you wiseacres know which class Sharp is in now?”
“He’s in English Three, Mr. Deng,” a girl said. “One hall over to the right, with Ms. Dionne.”
“There you have it, Sam,” the teacher said.
“Thank—” Springer started, but the door closed in his face.
When Springer looked at me, I shrugged. Rude people didn’t bother me much, probably because I was rude a lot, too, even if my rude was mostly by accident. Our plan had worked just exactly like we thought. Even though we didn’t have any class schedules, we just had to start looking, and somebody would tell us the right way to go.
Springer walked over to where I was standing, and then slowly, with focus, OBWIG headed to the study hub. We turned right, then found ourselves facing another hallway full of closed doors.
No problem. We had planned for this, too. Springer walked straight to the first door and knocked on it.
Another male teacher answered. I’d seen him before, but I didn’t know his name. I bent over to work on the lock of my pretend locker, so he wouldn’t recognize me.
“Oh, I’m sorry, sir,” Springer said. “I’m looking for Ms. Dionne’s class. I thought this was it.”
“Four down,” the teacher told him, jerking a thumb over Springer’s head.
“Thank you,” Springer said before the guy managed to slam that door in his face, too.
A few seconds later, Springer knocked on the correct door. Like before, I pretended to be opening a locker, but my hands shook so badly I couldn’t even turn the knob.
Ms. Dionne turned out to be a very short lady with big black eyes and dreadlocks. She snatched the note out of Springer’s hands, and my heart almost stopped beating. As she studied it, I saw Springer back up a step, like he was thinking about running, which I thought was fine, because I was ready to roll, too. Fifteen running steps would get us back to the study hub. We could haul cookies out the front door, or blast back down the hall we came in.
“Sharp!” she barked, loud enough that Springer and I both jumped. “Office wants you.”
She handed the note back to Springer, who took it, dropped it, grabbed it out of the air before it hit the ground, and almost crumpled it in his palms.
“Apparently, you’re so bad you need an escort,” Ms. Dionne said to a lanky boy with long brown hair, distressed khakis, and hints of a chin beard who came slouching out the door. One of his white shirttails wasn’t tucked in, like it was an accident, but I wondered if it really was. He laughed at his teacher, then looked down at us and laughed again as she shut the door.
“What is this?” Josh Sharp wanted to know. “Munchkin patrol?”
“We aren’t that short,” I said.
He kept right on laughing, and I was suddenly sure, absolutely positive that my uncle Jesse would have looked something like this guy when he was alive, and that he would have laughed at us, too.
“Yeah, you’re that short,” Josh Sharp said. “And you aren’t senior high.” He pointed to our jeans. “Out of dress code. What are you doing over here? And who busted you in the eye, dude?”
“It had to do with baseball,” Springer told him, steering him down the hall away from the study hub. “This way, okay?”
“But it’s shorter to go to the office the other way,” Sharp complained, looking over his shoulder but following Springer anyway. “What’d I do, anyway?”
“Nothing,” Springer said. “Probably just, um, student council stuff.”
“Wait.” Sharp stopped so fast I ran right into him from behind.
“Ouch,” I mumbled. Then, “Sorry.”
“I resigned like three weeks ago,” Sharp said. “Why would the office want me for council stuff?”
We were so close to the back door. Like, a body length. And if we got him outside—
“Maybe I had it wrong,” Springer covered smoothly. “I just know Ms. Jorgensen wants to see you.”
Sharp’s eyes shrank to slits. “Okay, seriously. What are you two little goons up to?”
I found myself counting the almost-holes in his pants. Three total. No wait. Four. And I couldn’t see the other side—
“Sorry, Josh,” Springer said. “Uh, Sharp. Or whatever we should call you. We are up to something. I’m Springer, and this is Jesse. We’re from the junior high.”
Sharp still looked suspicious, but his posture loosened a fraction. “Yeah, no kidding—oh, wait, I heard about you. Didn’t you guys get in trouble over here yesterday? Busted a couple of bullies in the face with water bottles?”
“Springer doesn’t hit people,” I said. “I threw the water bottles.”
Sharp turned his attention to me, and his slit eyes became wide eyes. “You’re Mr. Broadview’s kid. The smart autistic girl.”
“Smart?” I echoed.
“Yeah. The one who’s a whiz with numbers.” He gave me a giant grin, sweet as any Springer could come up with. “That’s why you get to go to regular school and all, right?”
My mouth and brain seemed to be stuck on echo, because the best I could do was “Regular school.”
Sharp looked from me to Springer, who translated with “What she means is, do you remember donating to the library fund the day the fund got stolen?”
After folding his arms, Sharp nodded. “Yeah, I bring Mr. Broadview money every paycheck, because he’s seriously cool. Did you know that, Jesse? That your dad is seriously cool?”
“He is seriously cool,” I said, trying to process that other kids might see my father as cool and feeling a little jealous. And why was I crossing my arms?
Stop echoing everything!
“So you have a job?” I asked.
“Sure,” Sharp told us. “I’ve worked at Tom’s Hardware since my sophomore year. Now I’m doing the work exchange.”
“You get a paycheck,” Springer said, and I worried he was sliding into echo mode, too.
Sharp nodded. “Yeah.”
“He probably doesn’t need money, then,” Springer said to me.
“Did you steal anything out my dad’s drawer?” I asked him, hating how high-pitched my voice sounded. “Because he’s gonna go to jail unless I figure out who really took that money.”
“Hey, little dudes, I didn’t steal anything,” Sharp said. “I’m no thief. And even if I were, I wouldn’t snatch anything from Mr. Broadview.”
He seemed so believable, now that I could see into his Uncle Jesse eyes, and take in his Springer-like smile. But what did I know? I was just the smart autistic girl, or whatever it was he called me.
“He seems legit,” Springer said, making me feel a little less out of control and alien to the planet.
I nodded.
“Are you autistic, too?” Sharp asked Springer.
Springer hesitated. “I don’t know.”
“Why would you think I took that money?” Sharp asked, and he seemed to be talking to both of us.
“Your name was on the list,” I told him. “Everybody who donated that day probably saw how much was in the drawer, or read the total in Dad’s ledger.”
Sharp seemed to weigh what I said, and he gave us two thumbs up. “Not bad. Pretty smart, even. Who are your other names?”
Springer and I shared a glance, and we both seemed to decide Sharp was okay at the same moment.
“Maleka Keston,” I said.
Springer
said, “Nancy Newsom.”
Neither of us said anything about Ms. Jorgensen or Coach Sedon, but Sharp whistled low and long, like we had spilled everything. “Listen,” he said. “I’ll do you a solid, little dudes. Both of those girls have last-period band—but I wouldn’t suggest you march up to them and ask them if they stole money.”
“Why not?” Springer asked.
“Because they’ll straight-up slap your face,” Sharp responded.
“Oh,” I said, and my fingers moved to my cheek.
“Am I cleared?” Sharp asked us.
I didn’t know what to say, but Springer came up with “Yes, for now. We’ll find you if we have any more questions.”
“You do that,” Sharp said. He bowed to each of us like we were royalty, then turned his back on us and headed off to his class again.
I faced Springer. “Slapping sounds bad.”
“We know where they are,” he said. He glanced at his phone. “It’s still twenty-eight minutes before senior high classes dismiss for the day. We can make it to the gym.”
“That boy just said Nancy and Maleka are going to hit us,” I reminded him.
“I think that was a figure of speech,” Springer said. “I mean, I think what Sharp meant is, we have to be more careful when we question them.”
He was backing away, toward the doors, but I didn’t move. My joints felt icy, and my brain itched and itched and itched. “You do realize I talk about pee when I shouldn’t, right?”
Because I’m the smart autistic girl.
Springer grinned at me. “How about don’t talk about pee, okay? We’ll keep it simple.”
“No pee,” I said. “Simple.” And then, because Springer somehow made everything feel possible, I said, “Okay.”
Springer turned and started to jog toward the open door, aiming for the room attached to the gym, the one with the giant BAND ROOM placard over the door. Even this far away, we could hear the faint sound of tubas grumping and humphing, and every now and then, the crash of a cymbal.
Still rubbing one of my cheeks, I followed him.
20
Friday, Three Days Earlier, Later in the Afternoon
That’s not the principal’s signature,” Maleka Keston said, her voice cutting under squiggly blasts from people playing trombones in the next section.
She stood with her knee on a bench next to her instrument, and she waved our note at us as the other three tuba players seemed to be spitting into their mouthpieces and fiddling with valves as faraway flutes tweeted and saxophones wailed and oboes let out reedy, sad whines. Since percussion instruments were in the far left corner of the band room, grouped together and a little away from the brass and woodwinds, Springer and I had our backs to everyone else. All the instruments seemed to be arguing with each other. My brain twitched and spun and tried to leak out my ear. I crowded so close to Springer that my shoulder rubbed his. He didn’t move. A drum boomed from like five feet away, and we both jumped.
Maleka towered over us, glaring down like she planned to call the police, then pick up her big green tuba and stuff it over our heads to hold us until they arrived. Her white blouse had a starched collar, and her khakis still looked crisp and pressed even though it was late in the day. The muscles in her arms rippled and flexed as she waited for us to respond.
“It’s not Ms. Jorgensen’s signature,” I admitted. “We wrote the note because we needed to talk to you.”
Trumpets blasted all at once, and Springer and I jumped again.
I closed my eyes and waited to merge with Maleka’s tuba.
“Open your eyes, Jesse,” Springer hissed.
“Can’t,” I said. It was like my eyelids had glued themselves together. My ears wished they could stick shut, too, especially when the clarinets really got going.
“What’s wrong with her?” Maleka asked Springer. “And who hit you in the face?”
“Probably the noise,” he said. “And she’s worried about her father. That’s why we’re here. Oh, and a bully hit me last week, but it’s okay because my eye’s getting better. All the color should be gone soon.”
Pause.
Then, “Who’s her dad?” Maleka asked.
“Mr. Broadview.”
“Oh! She’s—oh.” Something in Maleka’s tone changed. “And the money getting stolen. You know, it’s bogus how they blamed him. Mr. B would never do anything like that.”
That unstuck my eyes, and I was able to look at her again, and even use my voice. “We agree. We’re trying to find out who would.”
Maleka’s gaze shifted from Springer to me. “So why do you need to talk to me?”
“You were one of the people who gave money the day the fund got stolen,” Springer said. “We thought—well . . .”
He stopped. His cheeks flushed.
Maleka stopped staring at me and studied Springer instead. “I get it. You’re being detectives, and I’m a suspect.”
“Something like that,” Springer mumbled.
She grabbed her tuba and popped out its mouthpiece.
Both of us flinched, and she laughed at us. “It’s okay,” she said. “I’ll play.” She glanced at an office door about ten feet from us, with DIRECTOR etched into the frosty glass. “We have ten minutes before Mr. Quo comes out to inspect our cases and trunks and be sure we stowed our instruments correctly.”
“He doesn’t need to see us,” Springer said.
“Or you’ll be in a lot of trouble?” Maleka gave us a look.
“You have no idea,” I said.
“Best be careful, then.” Maleka jerked her chin toward the teacher’s door. “That one’s a hard-a—um, he’s a real rule-follower. Very strict. So go on. Hurry up and ask me all your little investigative question thingees before he comes out here and busts you.”
I tried to speak, sort of wheezed, then got the words out. “When did you see Dad—I mean, Mr. Broadview that day?”
“I have his class third period, so around nine forty-five.” Maleka kept her eyes on her mouthpiece, polishing it with a cloth.
Senior high classes were an hour and fifteen minutes, so she would have been in Dad’s room until about eleven. “Is that when you gave him your donation?”
“Yes.”
“Do you give regularly?” Springer asked.
Maleka reached into the nearest trunk and took out a plastic case. As she fit her mouthpiece inside it, she said, “Not that often. We play Shakespeare Trivia on Mondays, and the losing team has to give to the fund, if they can.” She grinned at Springer, and he backed up a step. “I don’t lose often, so my team doesn’t usually have to pay.”
“Got it,” Springer squeaked.
From over my right shoulder came a lot of oboe-ing. Bad oboe-ing. It almost sounded like somebody trying to blow snot out of one side of a stuffy nose.
It was my turn to make words again, and I did my best to use it well. “Could you tell if the rest of the fund was still in the drawer when you donated?”
Maleka put her finger on her cheek, and she really seemed to be thinking, not just messing with us. “I think so. When he opened the box to drop our donation in, I saw money.”
My heart beat faster, but in a good way. So now we knew almost for sure that the money disappeared sometime between eleven and the end of the staff meeting at four thirty. I got so excited, I didn’t even think too hard about my next question, which was “What’s your financial situation?”
“That’s a nosy question.” Maleka snatched up her tuba. “You know that, right?”
I leaned away from her, wondering if she’d changed her mind about stuffing her instrument over our heads.
“Did I trespass?” I whispered to Springer.
“Maybe a little,” he said.
Maleka gently placed her tuba in the trunk with her mouthpiece. “Did you take the library fund money?” Springer asked her.
“I didn’t,” Maleka said.
“Are you going to hit us because we asked?” The question po
pped out before I could stop it.
“Trespassing,” Springer whispered loudly. “Trespassing, trespassing . . .”
Maleka rolled her eyes. “I am so not a bully. Seriously, who told you I’d hit you?”
“Josh Sharp,” I said, even as Springer said, “Nobody,” then glared at me.
I had no idea what I’d done wrong so I ignored him.
Maleka laughed. “Sharp’s a suspect, too?”
“He was,” Springer admitted, “but he’s not as much now.”
“Why, because you liked him?” Maleka laughed again.
“Yeah,” I said. “He sort of, um, looked like my dead uncle and all, so . . .”
I stopped, because even I realized how strange that sounded.
“Everybody likes Sharp,” Maleka said. “But he’s a mess. He dropped off student council last month because he got arrested.”
Cold chills plunged up and down my neck, and the world seemed to tilt a little. I tried to process what I’d just heard, but I couldn’t match that with the Springer grin the guy had given us, and—but my dad got arrested, and he was a nice guy, too, but—
“For what?” Springer asked.
Maleka waved her hand in front of her face like she was shooing a fly. “He tagged the outside gym wall with his lame initials in gold spray paint, like nobody would figure out it was him. Only J.S. in senior high. Idiot.”
“He said my dad was cool, and he has a job, so he doesn’t need the money, and we trusted him,” I said, starting to feel numb on the inside.
“Legal charges can be expensive.” She shrugged. “Just sayin’. Who are your other suspects?”
“Nancy Newsom,” I mumbled, and almost said Ms. Jorgensen and Coach Sedon and threw in Jerkface and the cockroaches for good measure, but Springer stepped on my toe and I shut up.
Most people had stopped playing instruments, and I heard a lot of paper shuffling and cases opening as Maleka’s eyes drifted over our heads, toward the front of the room where the flute players were sitting. “Okay, yeah. Nancy. She’s one to look at.”
“Because she needs money?” Springer asked.
As the other three tuba players slammed their trunks, Maleka said, “How about because she’s plain mean? Come on. I’ll give you a hand.” She turned around to the guy nearest the teacher’s door and said, “James, if Mr. Quo comes out, can you handle him?”