All The Glory (28 page)

“He’s not really a bad influence, he’s just …”

I waited for the rest, but it didn’t come.

“He’s just what? Finish your sentence.”

Bobby sighed. “I’m afraid it will make you angry.”

“Since when has that ever stopped you?”

“Since you grew up!” he yelled.

We both stared at each other, searching each other’s eyes. He had blue eyeliner on that day. I can remember it as if it were in front of me right now.

“I’m still three months away from my birthday,” I said, trying to argue a point he was making that I didn’t really understand. “I won’t be an adult until then.”

“You became an adult the minute you went over to see Jason in prison.”

His words brought a profound sadness with them. After hearing Bobby say that, it all became very clear that the last bits of my childhood had been stolen away from me. The me that started high school this year was completely unlike the me who sat on the stadium bench waiting for a football game to start. I was a different person, outside and in. I used to pray that would happen, that adulthood would hurry up and get to me; now I wished it would go away and let me be a kid for a little while longer.

“Are you going to tell me what the big deal is with this kid or what?” he asked.

I was grateful for the change of subject, so I started talking immediately. “That kid with the red shoes knows the kid who I think was Jason’s charity kid brother or whatever they call them.”

“I believe the term is
little brother
.”

“Whatever. I need to find that kid.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” I started biting my fingernail, trying to find a spot that wasn’t already gone. It was hopeless; at this point I was left with just cuticles to destroy.

“Is it something to do with Jason?”

“Yes, of course it is. Isn’t everything?” I admitted then to myself and Bobby that Jason had become my life. I never went anywhere anymore unless it was to see him or get something for him. It probably should have made me bitter, but it didn’t. It felt good. It felt
right
.

Bobby sighed. “Yes,
unfortunately
.”

I ignored that comment.

“So what is it?” he pressed.

“I can’t say.”

“Why? Is it a big secret?”

The football players for both teams came out onto the field in a steady stream, and the school band began playing some horn-heavy song that got people stomping their feet.

“I don’t know,” I looked at Bobby and shrugged, “I just want to meet him and talk to him.”

Bobby narrowed his eyes at me. “You’re not telling me everything.”

“I’m telling you that I want to meet him and talk to him. He was Jason’s friend or little brother or whatever, and yet he’s never contacted Jason that I know of and he’s quit going to that club. That has to
mean
something.” Everything means something. Nothing is random. Being with Jason and living through his tragedy on the sidelines had taught me that.

“Maybe he got let down along with everyone else. Maybe he’s broken-hearted. That seems like a natural reaction to me. Of course he’d want to be away from the source of all that pain.”

“Sure, of course it is.” My balloon burst. Bobby was making complete sense and I wasn’t. A lot of the spark left my voice. “I guess I just want to know for sure, and I want him to know that if he wants to visit Jason, I could help with that.”

Bobby crossed his eyes for a second. Then he frowned at me. “You want to bring a little kid over to visit a
murderer
?” He shook his head as he looked out onto the field. “Jesus, you really are losing it.”

I stood up so fast I knocked Bobby sideways.

“What?” he said, surprised.

“You know what, Bobby?!” I was so upset I could hardly see straight. “Next time I want your opinion on anything, I’ll
ask
for it.” I sidestepped down the row until I reached the aisle. “In the meantime, you can
stick
it!”

“Wait … what? Where are you going? Are you leaving?! But I don’t want to stick it! Don’t leave, Katy!” he yelled behind me.

I ran down the steps as fast as I could, ignoring the annoyed looks I was getting and the rowdy crowd farther down in the stands having a great old time while I fell part inside.

Bobby had always been my biggest fan and most loyal supporter, but now it felt like he belonged with all of these people and I belonged in Jason’s house, living like a social hermit with zero chance at future happiness.

I had lost everything from my old life, and it was hard even for me to believe that I had gained anything by being Jason’s one and only supporter. It felt like I had, but all the evidence in front of me said otherwise. I’d never been so alone in my life.

Chapter Forty-Four

JASON TEXTED ME USING HIS dad’s phone to ask if I wanted to come over and work out, but I lied and said I had to go to Bobby’s to work on a biology project.

It galled me to have to do it, but I texted Bobby and told him to cover for me if Jason called him. I hadn’t spoken to Bobby since Friday when I stormed off at the football game, ignoring all his texts, calls, and emails. I hadn’t cooled down enough to forgive him, and I didn’t want to say anything else I’d regret. We’d both already said plenty.

I was walking out the door to get into my car when Bobby pulled into my driveway. I couldn’t ignore him because he was blocking me in. He rolled down his window and stuck his arm and head out.

“What are you doing here?” I said in an emotionless voice. “I told you I needed you to cover for me.”

“What’s better cover than me coming to pick you up?” He grinned hugely.

I refused to be charmed. “If you’re thinking that I’m blowing Jason off because I don’t want to be with him, then you’re wrong.”

“I wasn’t thinking that. I was thinking that if it’s so important that you’d risk lying to your new best friend, then it must be something really big that I should be there for.”

A lump grew to the size of a whole walnut in my throat. My eyes stung with tears. My voice was raw when it finally started working. “That was a low blow, even for you.”

He rubbed his windowsill with his finger and shrugged. “Hey, what can I say? I’m not a very nice person when someone breaks my heart.”

I hugged myself around the middle, turning a little so he wouldn’t see my face.

“Are you going to get in the car or what?” he said a minute later.

“Why should I?” I asked, my voice still shaky.

“Because there’s a telephoto lens pointed in this direction and your blotchy complexion is going to be plastered all over the front page of the paper if you don’t hide it soon.”

I choked out a laugh and then turned to go to my car. “I have to go. Move out of my way.”

“Sorry. My car won’t work unless you’re in it.”

“Bobby!” I screamed, spinning to face him.

“Katy!” he screamed back.

I could see tears in his eyes. That’s when I knew I could push this too far, and hurting Bobby was the last thing I’d ever want to do in my life.

I swung my purse off my shoulder and slammed it down on my trunk, glaring at him. “You are so
pushy
, you know that?”

“Get in my car, bitch. I don’t have all day.”

I had to bite my tongue to stop from laughing. When Bobby called me bitch, it meant I was forgiven and life was going to go back to normal, and I really needed some normal in my life.

I grabbed my bag and wound my way around the cars to get to the passenger side of his. Opening the door I bent over and stuck my head inside. “You aren’t going to be happy about where we’re going.”

He shrugged and looked out the front windshield. “Wherever you go, I follow. BFF Code. I don’t play when it comes to The Code.”

I got in and buckled up.

“Where to, Mistress Bitchness?”

“South side. Downtown.”

Bobby tipped his head down and looked at me, pretending he was looking over glasses. “Are you completely off the range now?”

“Just go. And hurry up. It’s almost lunchtime. Church is going to be over soon.”

“Church? Oh boy. This should be interesting.”

Bobby put the car in reverse and drove me downtown. I figured I’d start my hunt for the boy with the afro there and see what I could turn up.

Chapter Forty-Five

“YOU KNOW, YOUR FACE HAS been all over the news for months. People are going to recognize you.” Bobby and I were sitting in his car, parked outside a Lutheran church just two blocks down from the Boys’ Center.

“No they’re not,” I said, opening up my big bag. “I brought a disguise.” I winked at him as I put on one of my dad’s baseball hats and a pair of big sunglasses I’d taken from my mother’s glove compartment.

“Do you have an elastic to put your hair up with?”

I nodded, finding a lost scrunchy in the bottom of my purse. I quickly threw my hair up into a bun and secured it under the bottom edge of the hat.

“How do I look?”

“Totally incognito. Who are you again?”

I grinned. “Guckenberger. Katy Guckenberger. Super spy extraordinaire.”

He snorted. “Super dork, maybe.”

Bobby and I got out of the car and went into the church, slipping into the last pew as quietly as possible. My eyes scanned the interior of the place, going from pew to pew, stopping whenever they got to a small kid about the size I imagined the boy with the afro to be.

“What are we doing exactly?” Bobby whispered.

“Looking for the boy with the afro.”

Bobby pointed. “There’s one over there.”

I grabbed his finger and yanked his hand down to the spot between us. “Try to be a tiny bit less obvious next time,” I said through gritted teeth.

“Ahhh, we’re going super-spy on this one.”

“Yes. Super-spy, super-chill, super-not-obvious.”

An older lady with gray hair and a blue hat with plastic fruit on it turned around and glared at us.

“Sorry,” I whispered, shrinking down into my shoulders.

All of the kids in this place were too little to be the one I was looking for, and we had three more churches in the vicinity to check out before I was ready to give up.

“Come on,” I whispered to Bobby. “Let’s bail.”

He slid out behind me and followed me out of the church.

“And why exactly are we hunting down a boy with an afro?”

“I told you already … he was Jason’s friend and I need to talk to him.”

“Can you tell me why?”

“No, I can’t.”

“I’m not gonna lie … that hurts my feelings to know that you’re keeping secrets from me. You’ve never done that before.”

He said it in kind of a joking tone, but I knew better. I stopped and put my hand on his arm. “Jason told me some things in confidence that led me to believe I might learn some more things about what happened that night during the incident from this kid.”

Why I thought Jason would have shared his personal problems with a kid, personal problems he talked to the coach about, was unclear even to me. But I had to know for sure that this boy had nothing to offer the people investigating Jason’s crime. If he told me he wasn’t Jason’s friend, that Jason never shared any personal problems with him, then I’d let it go. But until I heard it straight out of his mouth, I wasn’t going to be able to just walk away from it.

“Why do you think this kid has anything to do with anything?”

“Because, Bobby, friends don’t just disappear like that without a reason.”

“Uhhh … I’d think the fact that a friend murdered a guy you respect would be reason enough.”

“No, that’s not why those guys on the team stopped being Jason’s friend.”

“It’s not?”

I shook my head, frustrated with myself. I wasn’t making sense, I knew that, but I kept trying to explain. “No. They were worried about what it would say about them, not what it meant about Jason and their friendship.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Real friends, true friends, don’t walk away without a word.”

“Unless they see their friend murder someone.”

“No, because first of all, they didn’t see anything. All they saw was Jason standing there in the office and the coach on the floor. He hit his head on the desk and died. But they didn’t know the facts. They still don’t.”

“But they thought they did.”

“Maybe, maybe not … but a real friend would have had at least one conversation with Jason to find out, to see him eye-to-eye and know for sure that their friendship needed to be over.”

“So you’re saying that none of those guys were his real friends.”

“Yes, I’m saying that and I’m saying that this little kid wouldn’t have the same issues as the players.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that he’s little. He’s young. He’s … pure.”

“
Ew.
I don’t even know what you mean by that, but it sounds wrong.”

“Argh, Bobby! Stop it! I’m just trying to say that if he was Jason’s friend, and I think he was … or is … he wasn’t one of those players all up in the coach’s butt or worried about what people at school would think or what scouts would think or college entrance committees or whatever. That little kid would have made an effort to see Jason or talk to him or say something to him through a mutual friend, right?”

“He’s just a kid. I think you’re giving him too much credit. Kids are idiots.”

“No, he’s not a baby. He’s, like, twelve or something. He probably even has his own phone. He could have texted Jason.”

“Maybe he did. They took Jason’s phone, right?”

I had nothing to say to that because Bobby was one hundred percent right, and I was completely crazy. Just hearing Bobby ask me the questions made that perfectly clear.

“Whatever. I just need to hear it from him that he’s not Jason’s friend and he doesn’t want to see him anymore.”

Bobby threw his arm around my back and started walking us to the car. “Okay, crazy lady, I’m in. Where to next?”

“The Baptist church just over there.”

He altered our direction so we could walk to the church using the sidewalk on the opposite side of the street.

We reached the bottom of the stairs to the Baptist church. Singing could be heard even outside the doors. They were seriously rocking the party in there.