“Okay, back to the table so you can all draw me your Goliath,” Riley instructs. “What’s something scary that you were able to beat, or are still trying to beat?”
The kids get to it and I retreat to a chair in my corner. Snatch my phone out of my pocket like Hot Pockets fresh out the microwave. Check it for updates. I reached out to, like, three of Sterling’s followers on Snapchat last night, but . . . nothing. I do get a text from Camila, though. Kind of. More like a string of question marks for being all MIA this weekend. My thumb hovers over the texting window, conjuring up some energy to give her a satisfying response.
“Okay, spill it.” Riley leans against the wall next to me and I shove my phone back into my pocket. Pretty hard to sweet-text Mila when there’s a Riley next to you. “What really happened to you?”
I roll my eyes. “Told you. Fell off my bike.”
“You’re sixteen, Jay. There’s no way you’re still falling off your bike.” Riley gives a smile to one of the kids who holds up his paper to show off the blob he’s calling a dog.
“Maybe I’m clumsy. Just like you told the kids.”
“Come on, Jay. Do I really look that stupid?” Her perennial ponytail is tucked up into a bun, making her eyes bigger and more prying.
“Don’t make me answer that.”
“Got into a tiff with your crew?”
I give her the side eye. “I have a crew now?” I don’t know what offends me more—her assumption, or that she’s tossing words like tiff at me without cowering in embarrassment.
“For real. Was it a scuffle over money? Someone step on your sneakers?” Riley snaps her fingers, points at me. “A girl, wasn’t it? You threw down over a girl because one of your friends got her pregnant.”
And this is exactly why I couldn’t tell Riley about Javon. Even though Javon did the slinging, she’d put me in the same category as him. To Riley, both me and Javon strut around with our pants hanging a little too low and the music from our cars a little too loud. Not that I had a car, but if I did have one, rest assured that Riley would ask me why I still used the CD player instead of XM radio.
“Okay, who’s ready for our sing-along?” I ask the kids before I say something to Riley that would blow the bun off her head.
“We’re not done with our pictures yet,” Malik tells me as he holds up his half-empty drawing for proof.
“We’ll finish them next week. Do we have any requests?” Never any point asking. We always end with “I’ve Got the Joy.” The kids love pretending to be the Devil sitting on a tack. Three requests for it later, and we’re all singing, bouncing up and down, covering our butts like we sat on something pointy.
After two rounds, Riley and I stand on opposite sides of the door, slapping fives to the kids as they file out of the classroom. When the last one leaves, I follow suit. Double-time it to get away from Riley and pull out my phone to check Snapchat again.
“Something really exciting must be happening on your phone,” Riley says, catching up to me.
I jump from her presence. Those Converses are irritatingly squeak-free.
“Is it the pregnant chick? Don’t tell me she needs you to take a paternity test.” She snickers under her breath. Interrupts it with her snort.
I stop walking and Riley crashes against my arm. “You ever notice that you’re the only one who laughs at your jokes?”
Riley’s laughter dies down. “Lots of people think I’m funny.”
“Yeah? The five-year-olds in our class don’t count.”
“Ugh. Who peed in your Mountain Lion today?”
I groan. Of course she assumes that I drink Mountain Lion instead of its name-brand cousin, Mountain Dew. I do, but still. “You do know that Lion and Dew taste the same, right?”
She snickers again. “Ninety-nine point nine percent of consumers agree that Dew is better than Mountain Lion.”
“Only you would have time to research that.” I glance down at my phone. No new alerts.
“You would have time too if you weren’t—”
I frown back at Riley. “Let me guess. Out on the street with my crew? Busting heads and taking names?”
Riley raises her eyebrows as if that thought hasn’t run laps around her brain before. “I was going to say if you weren’t always on your phone. Seriously. Who died?” She gasps and clutches her chest. “Wait—did someone die?”
I give up. Riley’s like that fly you can’t just swat away at a cookout. The one that makes you cover your soda with a napkin in case it wanted to take a dive. “If I tell you what’s up, will you stop being so extra?”
She holds up three fingers, scout’s honor style, in all her extra glory.
I pause. Riley’s the last person I’d spill my wax to, but the pressure’s been building so much that I have to let some of it seep before I explode. I step closer to her in case anyone overhears. “My sister’s been missing since Thursday night. I have no idea where she is.”
Riley covers her mouth with both hands. “Jay,” she says in between her fingers. “Jay, I didn’t know. Why are you and Ms. Murphy even here today?”
“MiMi doesn’t know anything.” I ram my fists into my hoodie’s pockets. “Don’t want to scare her for no reason.” My hands tremble at the thought of having a reason to scare her.
“No reason?” Riley’s hands drop to her sides. “Jay, your sister could be missing missing. She has a right to know.”
“I don’t know if she’s missing missing.”
“You just said she was.”
“Look, you don’t know Nic. She does this . . . thing. She tries to break free, but then shows back up at our doorstep like a stray, remorseful kitten. I can’t freak out MiMi over one of her dizzy adventures.”
“This time is different, though. I can see it on your face.”
I step back. Riley’s been studying my face enough to see a difference?
“If you’re not going to tell your grandma, you at least have to go to the cops.”
I’d laugh in Riley’s face if my throat wasn’t so tight. “Cops don’t listen to guys like me—and they damn sure don’t care about girls like Nic.”
“Not all cops are like that, Jay.” Riley blinks at me with all the sincerity in the world. Her eyes are open to possibilities, not muddied from seeing cops laughing at blissheads like Pooch instead of lending a helping hand.
I’ve said too much. I move away from Riley before I say any more. She calls after me one more time. I pause, glance at her over my shoulder.
Riley squeezes and pulls at her fingers. “I’m . . . I’m sorry.”
This time, I do let out a laugh. A small one just under my breath. “You and me both.” But not as sorry as Nic will be after we exchange a few words when she gets home.
If she gets home.
That tiny word haunts me all throughout Reverend Palmer’s sermon. If, if, if. Over and over like the chorus of a hymn. I need to reach Sterling, get some answers, to make this somber song end.
Six
I PLAYED A GAME OF HIDE AND SEEK DURING SUNDAY DINNER: hiding the truth about Nic’s whereabouts from MiMi and seeking answers about the truth on my phone. Nic still wasn’t returning my calls, and Sterling’s so-called followers were nothing more than that. Just a few wannabes who comment on Sterling’s posts for clout, with no tea to spill. So I hit up the queen bee herself on Monday morning before heading to my locker. Sterling quickstepped off Snapchat and remained MIA the whole weekend. She had to know something about Nic. Hell, Nic was probably sitting right next to Sterling while we chatted, feeding her lines. Hopefully.
I know just where to find Sterling. In the girls’ bathroom across from the gym, touching up her face to take on the role as the baddest chick at Youngs Mill High. I text Bowie while I wait—mostly so I won’t look like some creeper waiting by the girls’ bathroom. My phone vibrates in my hand and a number I don’t recognize pops up on my screen. I suck in a breath and the phone almost slips through my fingers as I fumble to answer it.
“Nic?” I ask. I plead.
There’s a brief pause on the other line. “Uhh . . . this is Joshua Kim from Taco Bell. Looking for Jayson Murphy.”
All hope seeps out of my nostrils. Taco Bell? I thought I bombed that interview so bad that they sent a crime scene cleanup crew to mop up after me. “Yeah, this is me. Jay. I mean, Jayson. Me being Jayson.” The hell, Jay? You want this guy to think you’re even more of a dope?
“Alrighty then. Well, I reviewed your application with the other shift manager. And he and I both agree—you got what it takes to join our crew.”
I stifle a laugh. What it takes probably means that I was the only applicant who didn’t come to the interview smelling of booze or bliss. Guess they’ll take someone on the losing end of a street fight over a blisshead. “That’s amazing. Thank you so much, Mr. Kim,” I say in my Whiteboy Jay voice.
“We’d love to see if you could come in to meet Maurice, the other manager. And then we could talk about . . .” Joshua goes on and on about background checks and uniforms and W-2 forms, oh my. But his words pour in one ear and leak out the other because Sterling finally slinks out of the bathroom door, heels almost as long as her legs, and reminds me I’m on a mission.
“Excellent. I’ll get back with you,” I say to Joshua right before hanging up. He’s probably regretting the decision to hire me even more, but I’ll have to kiss his ass later. Right now, I have bigger fish to fry.
I nod at Sterling and she doesn’t even flinch when she sees me. Just nods back as if she was used to having dudes wait for her. “Hey.” She runs her fingers through her blonde locks, all wavy and tousled like she just strutted off the beach, then walks past me.
What the fick?
“Wait,” I say, catching up to her. “Didn’t you want to talk to me today?” I spread my arms and present her the floor. Inside my heart is doing cartwheels. I’m doing the whole duck thing—cool and calm on the surface, but everything flailing where nobody can see.
“Oh, right. Chung asked me to edit the Run of the Mill and convince you to do it with me. I mean, nobody really reads print anymore but I figured . . .”
Sterling’s words get eaten up by static. The lit mag? The fickin’ lit mag? No. No. There has to be more. Sterling’s my window to Nic. My last gasp of hope before I let the fear of what could be strangle me.
“And don’t look at me like that,” Sterling continues. “I know how to read, Jay. I can run a lit mag.”
“I don’t give a damn about the lit mag!” The words explode out of me. Sterling jumps from the blow. “I thought we were connecting about Nic.”
“Nic?” Sterling frowns at me. “Why?”
“I asked if you’ve seen her. You told me you’d talk to me on Monday then got all sketchy and disappeared all weekend.”
“I didn’t get sketchy. My parents took away my phone because I got a stupid D on my calculus test.”
The window to Nic gets smaller and smaller. I still try to squeeze through. “Be real with me. She hasn’t reached out to you at all?”
“Jay, the last time I heard from her was on Thursday.”
Thursday? The last time I heard from Nic was Thursday night, too. “What she say to you?”
Sterling’s face shifts from day to night. Like someone came and turned off the lights behind her eyes. “I don’t remember.”
Her response sends my eyebrows flying. “Sterling, was she upset? What she say?”
Sterling rummages through her purse, searching for something. Probably a way out of this conversation. “I said I don’t remember.”
The hell. “You don’t remember anything? Did you see her in person, or was it just a text?”
“Jay.” If she could stab me with a look, I’d need at least ten stiches by now. “She hit me up by text. Shooting the shit, like always. No biggie. Find me later if you want to talk about the lit mag.” She stops her avid search through her purse and begins to walk down the hall.
“Wait . . . Sterling.” I follow her. Can’t let her out of my sight. Without her, Nic might disappear for good. “Nic’s missing!”
Sterling pauses and looks back at me. “What?”
“I haven’t heard from her since Thursday. If you haven’t either, then something’s off.” My knees buckle. Saying the words aloud almost sends me to the floor. “You know this is weird. Even for Nic.”
Sterling chews on her bottom lip, forgetting about the gloss she just slathered across it. “Look, I wish I could help, but I don’t—” Meek Foreman’s arm interrupts our regularly scheduled programming as he wraps it around Sterling’s shoulder. Somehow, she doesn’t lose her balance from the extra weight. Her shoulders must be used to all that heft after two years of on-ing and off-ing with him.
“Is there a problem here?” Meek asks, glaring at me. By the way his hand clings onto Sterling’s upper arm, this must be an on period for their love saga.
“Jay and I were talking about the lit mag,” Sterling answers for me. “And now we’re rushing to class. Right, Jay?” She raises her eyebrows at me.
Meek flexes his bicep as he continues to hook it around Sterling’s neck.
“Right,” I say.
“Let me walk you then,” Meek says to Sterling. “And Jay, don’t forget about that paper you promised to help me with. Mrs. Nelson gave me an extension.” Before turning around, he points to his eyes, then points right at me. A weekend hasn’t iced him out—he’s still seeing red over his decapitated paper. Just like his deadline was extended, so was my pending ass whooping if I didn’t come through for him. Like I didn’t have enough to worry about.
“Let me know if you hear anything else,” Sterling says to me over her shoulder. “About the lit mag.” She and I both know the lit mag was code for something else.
I scrub at my hair as I watch Sterling and Meek disappear into the crowd. My window to Nic is completely closed now. Sterling is a dead end, so the only way to reopen that window is to listen to Riley and do the unthinkable. Roll with the cops.
There’s a dance going on at the precinct on Warwick. Phones ringing off the hook, badges scurrying back and forth, rustling through paperwork. Two drunken idiots sit handcuffed, shouting insults to each other across the room, as another badge types up a report. The chaos makes me wobbly, but my purpose keeps me anchored. Never thought I’d have to turn to the cops for help. I could’ve hopped on the 107—the bus route would have taken me straight from the Ducts to the station in no time. But I took the long route. Hitched a ride on the 108 toward Patrick Henry Mall, then ordered an Uber near the food court exit just to cover my bases. If Javon and his crew spotted me here, I’d be doing more than just eating pavement. They’d rough me up real good, prop me on the hood of one of their cars and parade me around like an ornament just to make an example out of me. Everyone in the Ducts knows that the only thing worse than a cop is the snitch who squealed to them. But with Sterling being just as clueless as me about Nic, what other choices do I have?
“Can I help you?” one of the white badges in the center of the storm asks me. She has wide shoulders like a linebacker and a general don’t-give-a-fick disposition. Her eyes do not leave her computer screen, even as I approach her desk.
I place both hands on top of her desk, keep them visible. “Always let them see your hands,” Dad would warn me about the police. He never lived long enough to teach me how to drive, but we practiced drills on what I should do if he ever got pulled over.
I take a deep breath. Look at the exit over my shoulder. I could leave. Pretend I never came here and no one would be the wiser. Including me. I’d still have no answers about Nic’s whereabouts. “I need help,” I finally manage.
“Came to the right place, kid.” She coughs in the crook of her arm, gets back to her computer.
“I’d like to file a missing person report,” I try again.
That gets her attention. She raises an eyebrow at me. Leans back in her seat like she’s sizing me up. “Where’s your mom?�
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“In prison.” The words come out angrier than I expect. You’d think after all this time of her being locked away, I’d be numb to it all. Telling someone new, though, always hits a nerve I forget is there. Besides, what does my mom have to do with anything? Of course, I keep that to myself. Need to keep my cool for Nic’s sake.
“Well, who’s supposed to be watching you? Do they know you’re here?”
I frown. “I need a guardian to report someone missing?”
“Look, kid.” She leans forward now. The nicotine from her pores tickles my nose. “We get a lot of kids like you coming in here clowning around. Filing false reports is illegal, you catch me?”
“You think I’d be here if I didn’t have to be?” My patience is razor thin now. Every second I spend farting around with her is another second for Nicole to fade. “If you can’t help me, can you find another cop that will?”
The Lady Badge’s upper lip twitches as she points a finger at me, ready to give me the reading of a lifetime.
“I’ll take it from here, Colleen,” a voice says from behind me. I glance over my shoulder and a black cop peers down at me, with a beard and a frame that could rival Rick Ross’s.
“You sure? He’s a feisty one,” Colleen says, as if she hadn’t picked a fight as soon as she spotted me.
Rick Ross chuckles. “Nothing I can’t handle.” Then to me: “What’s up?”
I look over at Colleen, whose wrinkles above her brows form an angry V. Then I look at the two drunken dudes in custody, eyeballing me. “Is there somewhere else we can talk?”
He hitches his head and I follow him to a tiny room near the back with card tables and vending machines. He sneaks glances at me as he helps himself to a Styrofoam cup of coffee. “Take a seat,” he orders, pointing to one of the machines. “Hungry? Chips are usually stale, but the muffins are on point.”
“I’m good.” I sit at one of the card tables. My knee bounces up and down, bumps into the table.
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