Nearly Gone (7 page)

The bell rang, marking the end of seventh period, and Rankin’s last chem class of the day. I stood in front of the bulletin board, waiting for the room to clear, staring at my most recent test score. The one that solidified the gap between Anh’s and my final grades and perfectly positioned her for a stronger lead. Cumulative scores wouldn’t be posted until Friday, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out what a ninetyfour percent would do to my grade.

When the last of the students filed out, I slumped into my chair. Why was I even there? Marcia was gone, and no amount of wishful thinking would bring her back. You don’t get credit for just showing up.

Without a word, Rankin placed my graded test on the table in front of me.
I stared at the exam. Through it. To the blue graffiti on the surface of my desk. The words
DEAD OR ALIVE
showed through the paper, less like a fading memory than a lingering promise, making it impossible to think about anything else.
Rankin tapped my test with his lab marker. “I expected a closer race. You’re letting Anh get ahead of you. And TJ’s not far behind.”

I stopped looking through the paper to look at it, all the blue notations where half points had been deducted for stupid mistakes. The blue ink. Rankin’s standard-issue indelible blue marker. We all had them. Every chemistry student. The same kind that was scribbled all over my test. All over my desk. On Marcia’s arm. Emily’s had been ten. Marcia’s was eighteen. But why? What was the connection? The message carved in my lab table in physics suggested there’d be others.

Better luck next time.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Rankin said, “but you’ve still got four weeks, and the scholarship is based on cumulative scores.”
I nodded. The largest scholarship in the history of West River—$25,000 dollars for one qualified junior, based on academic achievement and community service. Straight A’s in chemistry and five hours per week volunteering . . . and
voilà
! A big fat college tuition. One every year for one lucky student until the bucket ran out.
This was my year. My only year. My ticket out.
And I was blowing it.
“Well,” Rankin said decidedly, “we can’t have you falling behind in your community service. It’s deeply troubling, and I know it’s hard, but try not to let this loss distract you for long. You’ve worked hard, and I’d hate to see you lose your momentum so close to the end of the year.” He patted my shoulder gently. The touch was unexpected and I bit my lip trying not to jerk it from his hand, grateful for the barrier of fabric between us. I didn’t want to feel his disappointment in me. Or his pity. “I’m late for a faculty meeting.” He checked his watch, and lumbered to his desk. “I took the liberty of making other arrangements for you today . . .” He paused, raising an eyebrow. “. . . if you feel you’re up to it.”
I nodded again.
“Good. Your new mentee will be here shortly. He needs basic chemistry.” He bent to scoop up a stack of books and muttered, “Very basic . . .”
As Rankin shuffled out the door, another figure shuffled in. They exchanged polite hellos in an awkward dance, Rankin clasping his disheveled stack to his chest and a short, squarefigured boy squeezing in around him. I tutored Teddy Marshall on Thursdays and I was surprised to see him so early in the week. His special ed class was in a small wing on the other side of the school, and we rarely saw each other outside of our weekly lessons. He beamed, his small eyes shining behind thick corrective lenses, his tongue peeking through the gaps in his teeth.
“Hey, Leigh!”
I forced a small grin, but wasn’t able to make it stretch further than that. “Back at you, Teddy,” I said, trying to be cheerful for his sake.
He extended a stubby fist in my direction, leading me through a complex handshake involving a lot of knuckle thumps and hand slaps that had him laughing as I struggled to keep up. Teddy was a toucher, but I’d never tried to dissuade him. His joy was pure and sweet, like honeysuckle blooming, the sun-warmed taste of it on my tongue.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, feeling a cloud lift. “I thought you were my Thursday date?”
“Yeah, I’m your man on Thursdays all right. But my mom says I have to go to the cardiologist this Thursday, so I won’t see you.”
“Oh.” I scratched my head, remembering Rankin’s comment about “very basic chemistry.” “So you’re here today instead?”
“Nope.” He tucked his thumbs under the straps of his backpack and rocked on his heels. “I’ve got soccer practice today. We’ll need to find another day for our date.”
“Soccer?” I paused, sensing an opportunity to ask the question I hadn’t been able to ask Jeremy that morning in his car. Teddy was the water boy. He probably knew everyone on our team. Anh said the police thought Emily’s number might have been connected to the soccer team. That maybe it tied to a jersey number. “Do you know who number eighteen is?”
Teddy scratched his head and blinked. “There is no eighteen on the team.”
“How about North Hampton’s?”
He thought for a minute. “They don’t have an eighteen either.”
So much for the police’s theory on jersey numbers.
Better luck next time
. I hated to think there would be a next time, or that I’d have to wait until Friday to find another clue.
“Everything okay, Leigh?” Teddy frowned.
“Everything’s fine.” I pulled out a calendar, shaking off an image of Marcia on the bottom of the pool. “We can’t meet this Friday. It’s the junior class trip to the amusement park, and you and I have a date to ride the carousel instead. How about the Friday after that?”
Teddy stripped off his backpack, reached inside, and handed me a permission slip bordered with stars and space shuttle clip art. The bottom portion for his parents’ signature of consent had already been cut away, leaving only the flyer for a field trip to the National Air and Space Museum. “Mrs. Smallwood is taking us to the Smithsonian next Friday. I asked if I could bring a date, but she said it’s just for the special ed kids.” He blinked both eyes in lieu of a wink. “
I
think you’re special, but she says you can’t go.”
I ruffled Teddy’s hair, soaking him up. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll talk to Mr. Rankin and see what we can figure out. I’ll see you at the carousel.”
Teddy flashed an enthusiastic thumbs-up and raced off, leaving behind his field trip flyer.
“Teddy, you forgot your—” I started to call after him, before I spotted the writing on the back of the yellow page. The details of our “date” to ride the carousel. Beside it, two stick figures held hands. They both wore glasses, and one had frizzy hair. I bit my lip and smiled, despite my foul mood. When I looked up from his drawing, he was gone.
I sunk back into my chair and rested my head against the tabletop. A mild headache was starting just behind my eyes. I couldn’t afford to miss any hours, and my mentees were dropping like flies. I smelled indelible ink where my forehead rubbed against my blue test score, and it felt like salt in a wound.
I wasn’t sure how long I’d been lying there when something eclipsed the fluorescent light, casting a long shadow over the length of the table. The sharp, oily smell of leather bit my throat and I raised my head.
Lonny’s friend stood over my desk, staring at my test. His hair fell over his forehead, framing his face in knife-like points long enough to brush his collar. Two silver loops pierced his right brow over the same steady blue eyes that had watched me leave school Friday night.
I sat straighter in my chair. No one else had seen me. He couldn’t prove I was there. I had nothing to be afraid of. I flipped my test over, sliding it a few inches down the desk. He didn’t register the hint.
“Can I help you?”
He looked me over, starting with my hair. It was twisted into a tight knot at the back of my head. His eyes continued down with little interest and paused at my T-shirt. It was two sizes too large and the sleeves hung to my elbows, but right now it didn’t feel big enough. I crossed my arms around myself.
“You’re Nearly?” His voice was dark and rough around the edges. A perfect fit.
“What do you want?” Somehow I doubted he’d come to apologize.
He glanced at the clock. “It’s three o’clock. I’m here.”
“So?”
The corner of his mouth pulled into a grin. “So, you’re supposed to tutor me. Rankin told me to be here at three.”
No. Freaking. Way.
His eyes bored into mine, a whole conversation passing before either of us could blink.
“Rankin was mistaken.” I snatched up my book, determined to find some other way—
any
other way—to fulfill my community service requirement.
“No problem.” He shrugged, watching me wrangle textbooks and calculators into submission. “How about tomorrow?”
“Booked,” I said without looking up.
“Wednesday?”
“Geometry with Kylie Rutherford.”
“Thursday?” he asked with a sarcastic undertone that put me even further on edge.
I zipped my pack closed.
“Let me guess. You’re washing your hair on Thursday?” He reached for a stray lock. My whole body tensed and something on my face must have changed his mind. He paused, his hand inches away, and a slow grin crept over his face. He leaned over the desk, his voice low. “Or is it swim practice?”
I couldn’t speak. Up close, his eyes were suffocating and deep. I flashed back to Marcia’s dead blue face. He was too close, he’d seen too much, and my thoughts scrambled and blurred.
“No!” It came out loud enough to wipe the smile off his face. I cleared my throat, hiding my bare hands under the table. His eyes trailed after them. “I tutor Teddy Marshall on Thursdays.”
He shook his head and half smiled, as though he found me entertaining. “I get it. You’re busy.” He slid something across the table. “Maybe a few hours after school sometime?”
I waited for his hand to retreat before reaching for the scrap of paper. A phone number. His phone number. I shoved it back across the table, and his hand closed over mine, trapping it between us. I sucked in a surprised breath as his emotions crept into me. He was suspicious of me. And conflicted. Guilt and self-doubts simmered just below the surface, under that cocky self-assurance he wore like a leather skin.
I jerked my hand from his, dropping the number. He hadn’t wanted to give it to me anyway. I’d tasted his regret when he did. “What’s your name?”
“Reece.” He gave me a skeptical once-over, then extended his hand. “Reece Whelan.”
I didn’t take it. I watched him, brain skimming around the edges of a memory.
He dismissed the rebuff. “So, are we cool or what?”
Whelan . . . We’ve got a kid inside . . . get me everything he can on Nearly Boswell.
I stood up, gears clicking in place as I grabbed my pack and made a beeline for the door. No, we were absolutely not cool.

The next morning, when I opened my locker, a wad of paper and a pink slip ruffled between the vents. The pink slip was from Rankin, telling me I needed to reschedule two hours of tutoring this week, for Teddy Marshall  .  .  . and Reece Whelan.

The wad of paper had been folded and crushed to fit through the vent. I peeled it open. Chapter one of a basic chemistry textbook had been ripped from its binding, and blocky blue ballpoint letters were inked over the top of the page.

I NEED YOU . . . PLEASE.—RW
I balled it between my hands and pitched it onto the floor of my locker. Reece Whelan could forget it. I knew he was working for Nicholson. No way was I letting him follow me around and spill the details of my miserable life to the police just so he could hold on to his
Get Out of Jail Free
card.

The first period bell rang. I set my mental timer for five minutes, barely enough to cross the length of the school and up two flights of stairs before the tardy bell. If I cut through the courtyard, I’d make it with seconds to spare. I turned, smacking into a wall of black T-shirt.

I leaned back against my locker, my pulse sky-rocketing. “Do you always sneak up on people like that?” I angled to shove past him, that too-close feeling snaking through me.

“Hey, wait up.” He grabbed my wrist and I snatched it away with a curse. The rush of his emotion was cold and sudden, like someone had dumped ice cubes down my back.

“What the hell is wrong?” He lowered his voice. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I said to make you so mad yesterday. If you don’t want to hang out after school, it’s cool. I get it.”

I drew in a deep breath, passing it off as impatience. It wasn’t a psychic smell. It was him. A spicy masculine-smelling soap mingled with the tang of his leather jacket into something warm and appealing. I massaged my wrist. “It’s not
cool
. Just leave me alone.” I pushed past him, careful not to touch him, and kept walking.

He followed me and I had to work twice as hard to stay ahead of his long strides. He was almost as tall as Jeremy.
“Hey,” he said, his tone carefully measured. I could actually hear the effort in his restraint. “Can you slow down a little?”
“No.”
“Why?” He hovered, one step for every three of mine. I slipped between snuggling couples, jostled through groups of broad-backed jocks. He was impossible to shake. The throng of oncoming traffic parted for him with a reverse magnetism.
“I’m late for class,” I snapped.
“So?”
“So, maybe it’s okay for you to ditch. You can just take it again. Some of us have scholarships to worry about.”
Reece jockeyed himself in beside me. “I don’t want to take it again. That’s why I asked you to tutor me.”
I stole a quick glance at his face. He was clean-shaven and his hair was combed neat.
“I’m not going to tutor you,” I said. “I told you yesterday.”
He muttered something under his breath and raked a frustrated hand through his bangs.
“Look, can we start over? I’m not sure what I did to piss you off. All I did was introduce myself and ask for help.”
“Yeah,” I said, recalling my visit to the police station. “I can totally relate.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Never mind.”
“Fine, I’m starting over.”
“Good luck with that,” I mumbled.
The burr was back in his smile, his voice bristly. “It’s nice to meet you, Nearly.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Don’t call you what?”
I stomped past the library doors, marking the halfway point to class. I wished I could move faster, but my legs burned and my lungs were tight. I was all elbows and knees, hands in my pockets as I pushed through the crowd.
“Leigh. You can call me Leigh.”
“Leigh?” He wasn’t even breathing hard. “Why? Don’t you like your name?”
I rolled my eyes. “Just trying to blend.” A point a narc should sympathize with. “And for the record, no, I don’t like my name.”
“So, Leigh,” he said. “Can I ask you something?”
In two minutes this conversation would be over and I’d walk into a class he wasn’t qualified to set foot in. “What?” I kept my pace brisk, taking the stairs two at a time.
“Why do you hate me so much?”
“I don’t hate you.”
“Well, you obviously dislike me.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “I’d have to know you to dislike you, and I don’t know you at all.”
“That’s exactly my point!” He blocked me with a long, deliberate stride just before I reached the door to the science wing. “I’m trying to get to know you. Why are you making this hard?”
I tried to step around him, but he wouldn’t let me pass. “I didn’t think
easy
was part of the job description.” I cringed, berating myself for saying it out loud. I told myself I should just walk away, ignore him and he’d lose interest. But he kept pushing. And even though it was stupid, something inside me couldn’t resist pushing back.
He shook his head. “You’re not making any sense. I don’t follow.”
“Yes, you
do
follow me. You’ve
been
following me. And I’d like you to stop!”
I looked at the clock behind his head. I had thirty seconds to end this conversation and get my butt to class. I felt the curious onlookers hovering nearby. “This is a complete waste of my time,” I muttered.
He ground his teeth and glared at me, looking insulted. “What are you saying? You think I can’t learn this stuff ?”
“Move!”
“Not until you tell me why helping me is a waste of your time.” His peppermint breath touched my face. Who was he trying to impress?
“Seriously?” I threw my hands up. “One day you’re kicking my books across the hall. The next, you’re giving me your phone number. Who the hell do you think you are?”
His dark eyes flashed back and forth between mine.
“What do you want me to say?” He raised his arms over his head in surrender. “You’re right. It’s no secret where I’ve been. I did some pretty stupid shit and spent a whole semester in juvie. I’m probably not worth your time.” He rested his hands loosely on his hips, glanced furtively around, and lowered his voice. “But aren’t you being a little hypocritical?”
I stiffened, darting nervous glances as people walked by. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
He answered in a low rumble, the words barely a whisper. “I know where you live. What your mother does for a living. That’s no secret either. So why is it okay for you to try to make something of your life, but not me?”
I’d expected him to bring up what he’d seen on Friday night—my daring escape from the crime scene at school. Not my mother. I wasn’t sure which was worse.
“Rankin says you have to tutor me to qualify for some scholarship.”
“I don’t have to do anything,” I snapped. But he was right. If I refused to take Reece on, I’d fall short on my qualifying hours. The door to my future would zip shut like an empty suitcase and I’d be stuck in Sunny View for eternity. I let out a long breath, taking in the winding tattoo on his arm and the piercings in his eyebrow, already regretting what I was about to agree to.
“What?” His half grin curled like a beckoning finger. “Do I look dangerous?”
“You could say that.” I looked away from his lips.
“I just want to pass chemistry. Please.”
Passing chemistry wasn’t all he wanted, but Rankin had me between a rock and a hard place. Whelan’s eyes widened, sensing an opening. They were lighter, warmer with his smile, and dangerous enough to make me forget about everything—even Marcia. “So what do you say? Meet me after school?”
I bit my lip. Nicholson set this up so Reece Whelan could spy on me. Get close. Get information. But I wasn’t guilty of anything, so what did it matter? Maybe the solution to my problem was the narc standing right in front of me. If he saw that I was just a boring, normal person with a boring, normal life, that information would make it back to Nicholson. Getting to know Reece might get the police off my back.
“Just chemistry,” he promised, palms raised in mock subjugation.
Right. Just chemistry. It all boiled down to one undeniable truth. Reece Whelan held my scholarship in his slippery lying fingers.
“Fine,” I said before I could change my mind. “Four o’clock.”
He flashed a self-satisfied one-hundred-watt smile and turned to go.
“I hope you’re worth it,” I called after him without thinking.
Reece’s boots paused on the tile. He turned to look at me, and his smile was gone.
• • • I took my bag lunch to the library and headed to a small table in the back. Jeremy was at our usual spot, hunched over his iPad. Several large maps were open and spread all across the table. I set my backpack on the floor beside him with a heavy thunk.
“Where were you after first period?”
“Why? Did you miss me?”
“Of course.”
“And all this time I thought you only loved me for my Twinkies.” A slow smiled curled his lip, and I was relieved that whatever tension there had been between us the previous morning seemed to be forgiven. He looked from his iPad to one of the maps, carefully marking a point with a yellow highlighter. “Tell me again why we’re doing this?”
“Because I won’t survive the summer if we don’t.”
“Syracuse is only six hours away. I have a car.”
“And I don’t. So we need to figure out how we can spend weekends together while you’re away on this internship.”
He dropped his chin in his hand. “I have a better idea. How about if I just don’t go.”
“Are you kidding? This photojournalism program is the perfect opportunity for you!”
“It’s at Syracuse. I don’t want to end up at Syracuse for college. My
mother
wants me to.” Because it was far away. Because it’s easier to push someone away than to look at them too closely and see the pain you’ve inflicted reflected back in their eyes.
“Does it matter that it’s what your mother wants? Syracuse is a great school.” And a chance for him to finally get away from his father. “You’d be a fool to pass up a chance to live on campus for a summer. You’ll be a shoe-in when you apply in the fall.”
“I’m not going to New York.” He tossed the highlighter on the map. It was a local map. Maryland, DC, and Virginia. He’d highlighted all the schools I planned to apply to.
I shouldn’t have been happy about that, but I selfishly smiled. I didn’t know what I’d do if Jeremy left for four years—he was my best friend. I picked up the highlighter and a bus map and asked, “Where do we start?”
“University of Maryland,” he said, studying me sideways. My smile widened. College Park was just over thirty minutes away.
“Your mom is going to throw a fit.”
“My mom doesn’t have to know.”
I picked up the route map where Jeremy left off, plotting bus stops and transfer points between bites of my sandwich.
“Nearly,” Jeremy said after a few quiet minutes.
“What?” I asked. “Do I have jelly on my chin?”
He was quiet for a minute and then reached inside his backpack. When his hand emerged, he was holding a photograph. “Remember when I took my dad’s poker money and paid your rent? When I went back to return the cash, I found something. I wasn’t sure if I should show you. I didn’t want to make you sad.”
He set the photo down in front of me. A group of men stood arm in arm in front of a banner. It read
Belle Green Poker Club
.
I recognized my father immediately. It was like catching my reflection in a mirror. His eyes, his nose and cheeks and smile, were mine. Warmer than his sterile face on his driver’s license photo, it was like he was looking at me. I touched the glossy surface, memories of him coming back in a rush.
His arm was thrown over the shoulder of one of his teammates. As if reading my mind, Jeremy reached over my shoulder to point them out. “That’s Vince’s dad. And the one to Mr. DiMorello’s left is my dad. The short one is Eric Miller’s dad. And the one on the end is Emily Reinnert’s dad, I think. I’m not sure who this one is,” he said, pointing to the man my father had his arm around. The man’s face was partially torn away.
“It was stuck to the back of another photo. I had to pull them apart, and tore a piece. I’m sorry.” He shrugged.
“Are you kidding? This is amazing, Jeremy.” I threw both arms around his shoulders before I realized what I’d done.
Jeremy’s shock hit my skin first. Then his pain. It was physical. He sucked in a breath and winced. His arms remained rigid at his sides.
I shut my eyes, wanting to cry for him.
“He caught you returning the poker money, didn’t he?” I whispered without letting go.
Jeremy slowly lifted his arms and wrapped them around me, his emotions distilling into something tender and confused. “It’s okay. The look on your face when you saw that picture made it all worth it.”
A throat cleared behind me. Jeremy and I pulled apart and Anh set her bag down on the table, covering our maps. “Am I interrupting something?” she asked. Jeremy glanced guiltily at the folder Anh carried under her arm. She set it on the table. It was a summer internship application. To Syracuse.
We all took turns staring at one another through an uncomfortably long silence.
“You’re not interrupting anything,” I told her. “I was just leaving.”