Prep School Experiment (8 page)

“Explain, ‘drugging you,’” her dad interrupted.

“The vitamins we take have an experimental performance drug in them.”

“I see.” Her mom’s voice took on a condescending tone. “When you put a group of teenagers together, rumors fly.”

“It’s not like that.”

“Kaitlin, vitamins have a variety of functions. If you even believe in vitamins.” His tone said he didn’t.

“And the vitamin powder got mixed in with baking powder and I put it in my team’s food. We ate a lot of it.”

“Now, that’s something different,” Her dad sounded like the doctor he was. “You
can
get too much of a vitamin.”

“I’m taller. Four inches taller. Taller than Mom now.”

“Kids grow.”

Rhys opened the door wider. Kaitlin stood by her mom and probably topped her by an inch.

Her mom stood straighter. “Your birthday’s next week. We didn’t expect you to stay 4’10 forever.”

“The Scientist forced us to do an ice climb. One of the coordinators fell, and The Scientist ran off. He didn’t transfer to another school like the director said.”

Silence.

Rhys could only imagine the histrionics his own mom would be in at this point. There wouldn’t be enough liquor in the cabinet to cover her reaction.

Kaitlin’s mom wore a scientific, assessing expression. “You don’t really know that, Kaitlin.”

Kaitlin tilted her chin and crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s true.”

Her dad rubbed his chin. “It sounds a bit extreme. But this is Alaska. Accidents happen.”

Her mom shook her head and stepped closer to the door. Rhys eased back. “This kind of thing didn’t happen when you were at Shay Prep,” her mom said. “Maybe we should look at that.”

Kaitlin didn’t answer.

Her dad raised his eyebrows and put his hand on Kaitlin’s elbow. “Maybe this story is your subconscious way of saying you want to go home? Return with us to Manhattan?”

“No.” Kaitlin sounded miserable.

Her mom prompted, “And this boy? The one in your bed?”

“We’re just friends. We fell asleep.” Kaitlin crossed her arms over her chest. Her voice was at first somewhat desperate and then it became completely dismissive. “I barely know him.”

Kaitlin barely knew him.

Everything in Rhys stilled and hardened, making it a challenge to breathe or to move from his spot in the hallway. Was he too stupid to learn? So distracted by Kaitlin’s cuteness that he’d forgotten what overprivileged girls were like? He’d been fooled by her claiming him on day one. Sure she’d called him her match…
in Alaska
…with no one from her real life around and no access to the real world. Dangle Dr. Daddy’s disapproval in front of her, and it’s
Rhys-Who
?

He thought about the last few days and wavered.

Stop. Quit imagining what you want to see. It’s over. It’s over. It never was.

He unfroze his muscles and closed the door, breathing in and out, trying to imagine the walls as farther apart and not a cold cage. It was going to be a long eight and a half months stuck in here with her.

“We have to get to the airfield.” Her mom opened the door.

Rhys didn’t move or pretend he hadn’t been listening.

“Rhys.” Kaitlin’s lips parted and her face colored.

“Kaitlin.” He looked at her sweet, lying face. “Did you ask your parents about switching rooms so we can be together?”

Kaitlin’s eyes widened and she stared at him. “What?”

Rhys moved closer and dropped his hand to the small of her back.

Kaitlin’s eyes widened and her mouth made a small O.

“Babe?” he poked and wondered how far he’d have to push to get her parents to react. From the way her mom’s mouth pinched, and her dad’s eyes flew to his hand, not much farther.

Kaitlin’s mom took her arm and pulled her to her side, free of Rhys. “Actually, we think it would be best if Kaitlin came home to Manhattan with us.”

Kaitlin’s gaze flew to her mom and then her dad. “No.”

“Kaitlin,” her dad said. “If all you’ve been saying is true…this is for the best.”

Kaitlin’s big eyes held enough desperation to make Rhys feel a twinge, a tap on the shell hardening around him. But if she thought he’d protest, then what she’d said to her parents was right—she really didn’t know him.

Tears spilled over her pink cheeks and her mouth trembled.

Her mom stared hard at her, impatient with the emotion, and tapped her foot. “We’re not trying to pressure you, “Go say good-bye to your roommate and get your bag.”

Rhys turned and strode off in the other direction, leaving them to it, refusing to look back. He didn’t know exactly where he was going, but he needed to keep moving.

“Mr. Zukowski,” the boarding school director called out to him.

Rhys kept walking, his gait stiff, his shoulders tight.

Kaitlin had looked so pale and upset. But, this was for the best. His insides tightened, but it wasn’t because Kaitlin was leaving. It was those stupid vitamins coursing through his system—or annoyance at his own stupidity. Rich girls and boys from the trailer park didn’t belong together.

Get over it
.
He hadn’t even slept with her. He hadn’t even kissed her.
Let it go.

“Mr. Zukowski.” The director caught up to him. “Wait. There are people here to see you.”

Rhys stilled, his instincts warning him.

What people?

His eyes narrowed and he turned.

The director jerked back at his expression and cleared his throat. “Uh. This way.”

Rhys followed him into a small conference room. The room was overheated and smelled of stale coffee. A plate of hard peanut butter cookies sat in the center of the laminate table. An older couple sat in two of the four conference chairs. His tension eased. If this was some trap, these two weren’t very threatening. The woman wore a Sunday pantsuit with pearls and had salon hair. The man….

Rhys froze.

The man rose to his feet and a chill swept over Rhys that had nothing to do with the temperature in the room.

The man waved a hand at the director, dismissing him.

The door clicked shut.

The man kept his eyes on him, hazel and steady. Rhys recognized him. It wasn’t his eyes. It was more. The shape of his face. The angle of his jaw. For the first time in his life, he looked at someone and could see his own features. He looked like this man.

The man’s eyes grew watery. Then he blinked and his gaze held steady. He offered his hand. “Cal Brentwood.”

Rhys shook the proffered hand automatically, but didn’t respond.

The lady moved forward and clasped his hand between her thin cold ones. “I’m your grandmother, Clarice Shay-Brentwood.”

Shay-Brentwood. Rhys sank into a chair. These were the librarian’s parents. These were the New Yorkers. That’s about all he knew about them. But now he knew more. So much more. A universe more. The paternity test wasn’t a lie. Michelle Wentworth and Senator Steven Wentworth were his parents. He knew it as well as he knew his own face.

The couple sat down too, as if taking their cue from him. The lady said, “Michelle called and told us about you.”

“Finally,” the older man said.

The lady met the man’s eyes before turning back to him. “We don’t agree with some of the decisions Michelle and Steven have made and wanted to meet you, ask you to stay with us.”

“We feel even more strongly about that now, having arrived and hearing about you going missing,” the man said.

Rhys’ gaze flew between them. They wore a confidence that came with money and a self-possessed certainty that came with age and success.

“Come stay with us in Manhattan,” his newly-discovered grandfather said.

Manhattan, like Kaitlin. All the consequences flew through his mind, and he landed on the most problematic. “My mom hasn’t been told about the paternity test. I leave here, and she’ll find out.” Cutting off her stipend would make the beer cans fly.

A frown settled on the man’s forehead. “We don’t agree with the secrecy either. Poor woman should be told. But that’s not our call. We figure if she’s okay letting you live far away, she won’t mind you moving to New York. We’ll keep the checks going.”

“It’s up to you, Rhys.” Clarice Shay-Brentwood, his grandmother, searched his face. “But it would mean the world to us if you’d come stay.” She covered her pink-tinted lips for a second and then clasped her hands together in front of her, waiting for his decision.

Rhys assessed her and got the impression she had steel inside.

“You have the Shay-green eyes.” Her own gray eyes lightened. “They’re from my side of the family, you know.”

He didn’t, but his chest eased. Finally, the reason for his eye color. Shay. He drummed his fingers on the tabletop.
Shay.
“Kaitlin, my classmate, went to a school called Shay Prep in Manhattan. She’s going back there.”

His new grandmother smiled. “Shay Prep was founded by my family.”

“The finest preparatory academy in the city.” The old man’s head tilted, and Rhys saw shrewdness in his eyes. “We can get you in. You can finish your senior year there with your friend Kaitlin.”

His jaw tightened. “She’s not my friend.”

“Your enemy then.” The woman spoke as if in response to his expression. “There’s nothing like greeting your enemy under a sign that bears your name.”

These people were wily. He liked them. There was so much more though. He drew a pattern on the table and, giving no thought to confidentiality, told them some of the rest. “The school’s been giving us performance enhancers. And The Scientist who was giving them out, well, he might come after me. I don’t want to bring that down on you.”

His grandfather’s jaw worked. “The abuses government programs pull when no one’s watching them.” He put his hand on the back of a chair. “We have security. We want you to come home with us.”

Rhys stared at the shine on the table. He noted the pattern in the tabletop and pulled at the collar of his sweatshirt. The smell of the stale coffee overwhelmed the small space.

He had to tell them the rest. He looked past them, at the wall. “I’d have liked that. And maybe. Maybe you’d have liked me once, but with that drug, well.” He waved a hand at his head. “I don’t quite process things like I used to. It’s like I’m hyped up, like…I don’t know, and I don’t know when I’ll shake it.”

Clarice Shay-Brentwood put her hand on his arm, drawing his attention to her. Again, he got a steely impression. “Whatever’s going on with you, whatever challenges. We’ll get you whatever help is out there. If that doesn’t work, we’ll find a way to cope. That’s what families do.”

Hadn’t he been doing that for years with Mom? He drummed his fingers and considered all the options. Igloo alone in Alaska or New York with his new grandparents? Kaitlin was there. But, why should she get to stop him from ditching this rat cage? “I’ll come to Manhattan.”

October

The further Rhys got from Alaska, the more confusing he found everything. Even if his brain had been working right, he’d have found Manhattan baffling. He needed a school uniform. The uniforms Grandmother ordered arrived via a tailor. The man took his measurements and marked everything so his clothes were cut to fit: navy jacket, khaki pants, white shirt, green-and-navy striped tie.

The styles and the materials felt foreign. The clothes didn’t stop there. The tailor fitted him for a tuxedo, day suits, evening suits, casual clothes, boat clothes. He didn’t know half the references Grandmother threw at him. His feet weren’t just measured. He stood in gel blocks so molds could be taken. Everything was custom made and placed in his cedar-lined closet.

He had a floor to himself, like Christian’s suite, but literally a whole floor within the multi-storied house. The Wentworths had money, but the Brentwoods had
old
money. First-people-off-the-boat money. Before-New-York-was-New-York money.

His room held a wall of books and a wall of electronics. Everything had been decorated in black and white. His favorite spot to stand was in front of a wall of windows overlooking Central Park. The leaves were orange and red, and the grass was green. He hadn’t expected New York to be so colorful. Trallwyn, Texas stayed mostly green all year around. This place had autumn.

His mind spun while his grandparents took care of everything. The only time his brain halfway calmed was when they told him stories of the past, of his family and how they came to this country. Their stories grounded him in a way he knew any other teenager would hate. But for someone with no history, gaining hundreds of years of it was wonderful.

Tomorrow school started, and he hoped he didn’t embarrass his grandparents. He hoped his mind worked, and he hoped he’d see Kaitlin. He wanted to see the look on her face when she realized that
What happened in Alaska
had followed her to New York. There was one hurdle to face first. Tonight, his grandparents were going to tell the librarian and the senator that Rhys was here, in Manhattan.

***

If Norman Rockwell had painted this dinner, he’d have captured an incredibly modern image. The computer screen at the end of the table showed Rhys’ whole family. Live pictures of the librarian, the senator and Christian were spaced across the top of the screen. His New York grandparents were on the next row. The bottom slot belonged to the one person he hadn’t met: the senator’s father from West Texas.

The only member of the family not displayed on the screen was Rhys himself. His camera was off.

Grandfather Brentwood flattened his palms on the table. “I called this family meeting to apprise you of a new development.”

“Everything all right?” the senator asked.

“Let the man talk,” the senator’s dad said with a pure West Texas accent. “If he’s going to say something that makes me lose a tooth, I want to hear it before my steak gets here.”