OCDaniel (11 page)

“Because I'm wearing clothes from Walmart?”

She laughed. “Because you're a guy. I happen to think you dress nice.”

“My mom does my shopping.” Did I just say that?

She laughed even harder. “You're honest, I'll give you that. Well, tell her I say ‘well done.' ”

I was pretty sure my feet weren't even touching the floor anymore. I was stepping on cracks like it was my job. All I could focus on were brown eyes and cappuccinos and that smile that I felt in my bones. It didn't even matter where I was or where I was going. For a second she was everything around me.

Ahead, two people emerged from a classroom. Sara and Miss Lecky, walking in our direction.

As we closed in, I glanced at Sara, but she was looking pointedly ahead. Everyone was silent as we passed, and Sara didn't look at me once. I looked back, but her ponytail just bounced away down the hall. Raya watched her as well.

“Do you ever wonder what's actually wrong with her?” she asked softly.

“All the time,” I murmured.

  •  •  •  

Sara knocked on my door at five thirty. I was still recovering from another ugly practice. I had missed an extra point kick during a scrimmage, and Coach Clemons had thrown his clipboard across the field and stormed off. Even Max had looked disheartened. I was seriously considering running away to Mexico before the game. In Mexico, football was actually soccer, and I figured maybe I would be better at that.

And now I had a new problem. I had kind of assumed Sara would stop by after dinner, so I was alarmed when I opened the door and saw her standing there, her arms folded across her chest.

“Ready?” she asked tersely.

“Um . . . yes,” I said. “Come in. Did you . . . Where did you tell your mom you were going?”

“I don't talk to her, dingbat,” she said. “I left a note in my room saying I was going to the library. I do that a lot. No one even wants you to talk there.” She looked past me, frowning. “Are you about to eat?”

“Sort of.”

“That could be awkward. Can you skip it and say we need to study?”

“Way ahead of you.”

My mom tried to insist that we join them, but I finally managed to convince her that Sara had already eaten and that she had to be home by seven, so we needed to get started. My mom looked past me at Sara, clearly itching to question her, but she gave in. We hurried upstairs before my mom could change her mind.

Pointedly leaving the door open, I turned to see that Sara was already sitting at my desk, opening my laptop.

“Hey,” I said, hurrying over to make sure my book wasn't open. Thankfully, it was minimized.

Sara looked at me, raising an eyebrow. “Touchy much? I won't read your writing. But if you let me, that would be a real sign of trust. Star Children are supposed to stick together. It's one of the tenants.”

“What tenants?” I asked incredulously.

“Just some things we are supposed to live by,” she said. “You can read them online. We have to stick together, we have to always pursue truth and justice, we have to trust each other and not be so paranoid when I want to read your writing. . . .”

I just stared at her.

“Fine,” she muttered. “May I use the Internet?”

“Yeah,” I said. “What are we going to do . . . Google search him?”

“Done that,” she replied. “This time we're going to do a background check.”

“Is that legal?”

She glanced at me. “With his permission.”

“And we have that?”

“I have all his credit card numbers, Social Security number, and just about everything else we need to impersonate him. I checked his wallet.”

I frowned as she opened up a web page.
WE DO BACKGROUND CHECKS!

“So why do you need me?”

“Because you're going to request that it go to your email as a potential employer,” she said. “My mom insists on checking my emails. And I wanted your permission. Do I have it?”

“I guess.”

“Good.” Her fingers flew over the keyboard in a near blur.

“Are you, like . . . a hacker?”

She laughed. “Not quite. But I probably could be if I wanted to. Password?”

I didn't say anything. She turned and looked at me expectantly, and I sighed.

“Starwarsrules, all one word”

She smiled. “Agreed.” She continued typing furiously and then sat back. “Submitted. We'll find out tomorrow if John has been arrested for anything. It's a start. But we need more.”

She suddenly turned and looked at me.

“You were talking with Raya today.”

“Uh . . . yeah.”

She was staring at me intently again. She didn't even seem to blink when she made eye contact. Her eyes were big and oval, and every time I saw them, they were greener, like a lush Amazonian canopy.

“What do you see in her?” she asked.

That caught me off guard. “I don't know. She's . . . pretty.”

“Lots of girls are pretty.”

“Yeah . . . I know. But she's also smart, and funny. And . . . I don't know. I just like her. Why?”

Sara shrugged. “Just wondering. You look like a lost puppy when you walk with her.”

She stood up, and I shifted backward a half step. She was only about a foot from my face; I could almost smell her breath—Listerine. It smelled like the blue kind. She looked at me for a moment.

“Girls make you nervous,” she said. It wasn't a question.

“No,” I said quickly. She just stared at me. “Maybe a little.”

“Can I try something?”

I felt budding panic in the very bottom of my stomach. “Okay.”

She gently took my hand in hers, pressing her thumb to my palm. “What do you feel?”

“Um . . . you?” I said.

“Try harder,” she replied sarcastically.

I thought about that as she lightly brushed her thumb along my palm.

“I feel . . . tingling . . . electric tingling in my hand and into my arm. I feel the hairs standing up on my arm, and goose bumps.”

“Good.” She moved her hand up and caught my arm, right where my biceps should have been. She slowly let her hand fall down my arm. “Now?”

I could almost feel the sweat forming on my forehead. I barely managed to speak. My whole body was constricted with nervous energy. “Umm . . . more tingling. Now into my neck and shoulders, and down my back. I feel . . . hot on my cheeks.”

She smiled. Then she dragged her fingers along my neck and cheek.

“Stay still. I'm going to close my eyes.”

“What?”

“Just stay still.”

I did as I was told. My whole body felt spasmodic.

“I call this ‘the Blind,' ” she said, closing her eyes. “I used to do it with my dad. We would close our eyes and think about how we would describe people if we couldn't see them. If we could only use our hands.”

I felt her hand moving across my face. It was soft, barely touching sometimes and then finding my nose and cheeks and chin, and then soft again across my mouth. I felt it more than I had ever felt anything else.

“But it's a great way to heighten sensations,” she said. “You have nice high cheekbones, like a royal or something. Pointed chin, larger nose, but not too big, and nice lips. Better than they look.”

I wasn't sure how to take that.

“Try me.”

“I don't know—”

“Do it.”

I closed my eyes, reached out, and hesitantly put my fingers to her cheeks, half-expecting her to recoil. She just stood there silently. I ran them down her cheeks, which were smooth and rounded down to her chin. My whole body was screaming with nervousness, but I kept going, running them over her rounded lips and up over her thin eyebrows.

“Well,” she said. “Do I feel pretty?”

I quickly pulled away. “Uh . . . yeah. You have nice eyebrows.”

She opened her eyes, smirking. “Really? Eyebrows?”

“What was the point of that?”

She shrugged. “Girls make you nervous. I wanted you to think about what nervousness actually felt like. Then I wanted you to get used to it. The only way to get over nervousness is to face it. That's what my therapist always tells me, anyway.” She winked and plopped down onto the bed. “Now you have touched a girl. It wasn't that scary, was it?”

“Sort of.”

She laughed. “Don't be silly. Now sit down. I want to show you something.”

I sat down beside her, my skin still prickling.

She withdrew a piece of paper from her backpack and laid it on the bed. It was a blueprint drawn on chart paper. The detail was impeccable. Even the objects were identified by label and size.

“What is this?”

“John's house,” she said simply. “I went there once with my mom.”

“You drew this from memory?”

“Yes. Now, notice where his bedroom is. I only got a peek, but there were two dressers and a nightstand. I suspect his room is where he would keep any potential weapons, letters, or nefarious secrets.”

I glanced at her. “Why are you showing me this?”

She smiled, as if I had asked a stupid question. “Because we're going to break in,” she said. “But don't worry. This time I'll be going with you.”

“You're joking, right?”

I waited for her to laugh. She didn't.

She frowned. “It wouldn't be a very funny joke. Though, humor isn't my strong suit. Let me guess. . . . You're afraid.”

“We're investigating him for a murder,” I said incredulously. “Of course I'm afraid.”

She nodded, turning back to the blueprint and studying it intently.

“Fair,” she replied. “But don't worry. He works until ten thirty on Tuesdays. We have tons of time. And when I said ‘break in,' I meant I stole one of his keys. We're just going to pop inside.”

I rubbed my forehead, trying to remember how I'd gotten myself into this situation.

“It's still breaking in.”

“Of course,” she said. “But sometimes the law has to be bent to be properly maintained.”

“That doesn't sound right.”

She looked up at me, a small crease forming between her eyes. “Are you coming or not?”

“Fine,” I murmured. “What time are we going?”

“Seven,” she said. “After his last break, in case he ever goes home for dinner. We'll be in and out in thirty minutes. Bring gloves, just in case. I also have baggies and swabs for blood testing.”

The color drained from my cheeks. “Blood testing?”

She waved a hand in dismissal. “Unlikely. Any questions?”

I didn't even know where to start. I looked at the blueprint, shaking my head.

“Can you tell me a bit about your dad? Why would John even kill him?”

She paused, and then neatly folded up the paper and put it back into her bag.

“Fair question. My mom and dad got married only a few months before I was born. They were both good parents. My dad and I were closer, maybe because he didn't try as hard to make me normal. My mom wanted me to be better. She was the one who always took me to doctors.”

I watched her absently scratch her neck as she spoke.

“They fought sometimes, but it wasn't bad. In any case, they were obviously worried about me. I'm an only child, so I got to be the favorite by default, but I think they wished they'd had another kid.”

She was still moving her fingers around her neck. It was late evening now, and the sky was almost dark.

“Why do you say that?” I asked.

“It's tough having a crazy for a kid,” she said, shrugging.

“You don't seem crazy,” I said.

“Thanks. But I didn't talk to my parents much either, to answer your question.”

She said this very matter-of-factly too, but her eyes were on the bed.

“Why?”

“I don't know. I didn't have anything to say, I guess. But my dad and I still hung out when he was around. He left a lot, though. I don't know if it was for work. I think my mom was having an affair.”

I looked up at her. “How do you know that?”

“Text messages. Emails. It was obvious, but not to my dad. I didn't tell him.”

I didn't know what to say. “So, what happened?”

“Things continued. He was gone a lot, but he always came home. He used to tell me he would never leave me, and that he loved me, and that he was going to take me away sometime for a trip.” She spoke with no emotion, but I noticed her eyes were glassier. Her hand scratched faster. It was starting to grasp, like she was trying to catch something under her skin. “Then one day I woke up and there was a note on my desk. The note I showed you. And then he didn't answer his cell or emails, and when I asked my mom where he went, she just said he was gone. And then John started showing up at our house.”

I watched as her hand grasped at her chest.

“Are you okay?”

She stood up, not meeting my eyes. “Fine,” she said. She started to walk around, and her hand didn't leave her chest. “I don't feel good,” she muttered, looking around. “I feel sick.”

I stood up, alarmed. “Like . . . do you need to puke?”

“I don't know,” she said quickly. Her eyes were glazed over, but there were tears slipping down her cheeks now. “My chest hurts. I can't breathe. I don't feel good.”

She was pacing frenziedly, her hands on her chest.

“Do you want me to call your mom?” I asked.

“No,” she said. “Maybe. It's okay. It's happened before.”

Tears were streaming down her flushed cheeks now. She sat on the bed and then curled up into a ball, wrapping her free arm around her legs. She was shaking. Then I knew what was happening. The Collapse.

I sat down next to her. “You get them too,” I said gently.

“Yes,” she murmured. “I get them too.”