The Assignment

by Liza Wiemer

  I glance at the photo sitting on my dresser in a frame Grandpa made. It’s of the two of us outside the inn. His arm is over my shoulder and he’s smiling at the camera. I’m looking up at him.

  Nana always says that I’m the spitting image of Grandpa and that we’re a lot alike. Would I have had the courage to hide a Jewish boy, help him escape, when I was twelve?

  A sharp rap on my door makes me jump.

  “Cade?”

  “One sec, Mom.” I brush the crumbs off my shirt and scramble to open the door.

  She shifts a laundry basket in her arms, bracing it on her hip. “Would you fold these? I need to cancel and reorder items for the Stoke bridal shower next month. I swear Mrs. Stoke is going to drive me to drink with all her changes.”

  I take the laundry basket from her and set it on my bed.

  “Thank you.” She breathes a sigh of relief. “One more thing. I checked the weather report. Another foot of snow is expected overnight. It’s supposed to stop by six a.m., so hopefully it won’t delay the wedding guests.” Her voice is tight with worry. “I’ll need you to clear the parking lot and the sidewalks before school tomorrow.”

  Inwardly, I groan. “Can’t Dad do it? I’m meeting Logan early. We have to talk with Mr. Bartley about an assignment.”

  She slumps against the doorjamb. “He strained his back at work today. If he gets laid up and isn’t able to finish the dry-walling job, we’re going to be in trouble. We’re lucky he has the work. I’d do it myself, but I’ll be up all night sewing the curtains for Mrs. Hager’s living room.”

  Resigned, I give my standard answer. “I’ll take care of it.” I pick up my alarm clock and set it for 4:00 a.m.—two hours earlier than on days we have no guests. If I’m going to meet Logan at school on time, I’ll need every minute. I look up. “Anything else?”

  She hesitates, and just when she’s about to say something, a loud ting from the reception desk bell gets our attention. Her face lights up with her guest smile. She dashes toward the lobby. A few beats later, I hear her guest voice. “Welcome! How can we help you?”

  “Our flight’s been canceled. Instead of drivin’ in this mess, we were wonderin’ if you had a couple rooms available with king-size beds?”

  “We sure do. Where you folks from?”

  Texas, I peg.

  “Houston,” the woman says.

  I smirk. Grandpa would be proud, I think, and it squeezes my heart. Guessing where a person was from based on their accent was our thing. He was the master. Until I was eight, I was in awe of his accuracy. Then I realized our reservations listed guests’ addresses. When I called him on it, he nailed every walk-in’s place of origin for a month. He loved entertaining guests by doing impressions of actors, presidents, and cartoon characters. Compared to Nana, he barely had a Polish accent. Only when he spoke Polish or shared his childhood stories did Grandpa speak with a heavy lilt.

  The conversation at our reception desk regains my attention. “We’ll do whatever we can to make your stay comfortable,” Mom says. “What time do you expect to check out?”

  “We’ll have to leave by six to make our flight.”

  In a blink, my morning plans evaporate. Not only does Mom promise we’ll have a basket with Nana’s cinnamon rolls ready for their early departure, but our guests choose our two best suites with fireplaces and Jacuzzis. By 6:05 a.m. I’ll be turning the rooms over so they’ll be ready for when the wedding party’s out-of-town guests check in by ten.

  I grab my phone and text Logan. “Sorry. Can’t meet before school.”

  Without waiting for a response, I power off my phone, then head to the lobby to offer to carry the guests’ luggage to their rooms and kindle fires in their fireplaces.

  What am I doing?

  I’ve asked myself this question a hundred times since I crawled out of bed at four a.m., got dressed, and drove to the Lake Ontario Inn. My debate in favor and against barging in on Cade could fill dozens of notecards. Even as I trudge through knee-deep snow toward Cade’s lit first-floor bedroom window, there’s still no clear winner.

  I’ve never shown up at his house this early, which is why I didn’t knock on their apartment door. I stop in my tracks, glance over my shoulder, and follow my trail past their entrance and the inn’s parking lot. There’s still time to flee. Cade never needs to know I was here.

  My indecision is resolved by a bitter wind that blasts me from behind and pushes me forward. Okay, I’m going. I pull off my gloves, take my phone from my coat pocket, and text Cade. “Open your blinds. I’m outside.”

  I watch for a shift of light, a sign of movement. Nothing. No surprise since my calls have gone straight to voicemail and my texts from last night have gone unanswered. Stepping forward, I tap his windowpane. My heart drums against my ribs as I wait and wait and wait for Cade. I hunch down so close that my breath forms ice crystals on the glass. A bent slat gives me a narrow view into his closet-size bedroom. His open bottom dresser drawer touches his footboard. The sheets on his twin bed are twisted into a mess. Did he sleep as badly as I did? Half the night, I went back and forth between worrying about the assignment and rehearsing what we would say to Mr. Bartley.

  Now I’m worried Cade won’t return to his bedroom and I made this trip for nothing. Leave or stay? As I debate the merits of both sides, Cade strolls through his door wearing only a towel around his waist.

  I’m frozen in place. Cade stops, scans his room. Did he hear me tapping on his window? He rubs his eyes, confirmation he didn’t sleep well.

  Cade’s broad shoulders relax. He takes two strides to his dresser, pulls out boxers, jeans, and a sweatshirt. He really looks incredible in that towel. Look away, I tell the voyeur. And just as I turn, he drops the towel and I get a fine view of his firm butt. I scramble backward and tumble in the snow.

  Several seconds later, Cade yanks up the blinds. Kneeling on his bed, he cups his hand over his eyes and presses his forehead to the windowpane. He’s not wearing a shirt, but he has jeans on.

  “Cade!”

  “Logan?”

  “It’s me,” I say, getting to my feet.

  He unlatches the window and lifts the sill. “You scared the crap out of me. What are you doing here?”

  “Making snow angels and freezing my butt off.”

  He laughs, and it warms me to my toes.

  He motions toward my path. “I’ll meet you at the back entrance.”

  As I retrace my footsteps, I try to convince myself that the shiver that ran down my spine had nothing to do with seeing Cade in a towel. Suddenly, I’m much too hot in my winter coat. Who am I fooling? Best friend falls for her best friend. I am such a cliché and I hate clichés. I so need to shut this down. Besides, I’m pretty sure Cade doesn’t feel anything more for me than friendship. If he did, wouldn’t he have made a move ages ago?

  I take a deep breath and let it go, watch the steam float away. The moment I reach the apartment door, Cade opens it for me. He’s fully dressed, including his rare Dimple Zone smile. I melt right there.

  “So, you came for breakfast?”

  He’s teasing. I’ve never come over for any meal uninvited, even though I’ve been told I’m welcome anytime. I pull off my hat and gloves. “I got your text last night and I texted you back. If you’d had your phone on, you’d know why I’m here.” To punctuate the point, I spread my arms wide, then hang my coat on a hook as I inhale heaven. “Oh man. Nana made cinnamon rolls?”

  “Fresh out of the oven.” His eyes shift to my hair, then back to my face. His lips twitch like he’s trying not to laugh. I reach up, smooth down the strands as tiny sparks of electricity make my palm tingle. He shoves his hands in his hoodie pockets and leans against the wall. “What did the text say?”

  I sigh dramatically. “It said that I emailed Mr. Bartley and asked him to meet us before school t
o discuss the assignment.” I reach into my coat pocket and once again check my email. Mr. Bartley still hasn’t responded.

  “It said that whatever chores you had to do this morning, I’d help. We’re in this together, a team, and I’m not talking with Mr. Bartley about the assignment without you.” I take a gulp of air. “What should I do first?”

  He doesn’t say anything, just stares at me.

  “What?”

  “You know it’s four-thirty in the morning, right?”

  “Really?” My voice is thick with snark. “I had no idea.”

  “How many cups of coffee have you had?” There’s that grin again. He knows me so well.

  I give him a playful shove, then march to the Crawford kitchen to get a cinnamon roll and my third mug of the morning.

  For the past ten minutes, I’ve leaned against the wall outside Mr. Bartley’s locked classroom and watched Logan circle around like a caged lioness. We finished everything I had to do at the inn so I could be here with her. Every so often she checks her email, sighs heavily, then resumes wearing down the linoleum.

  No response from Mr. Bartley. I mentally make a list: four possible reasons why Mr. Bartley isn’t here: (1) his internet went down in last night’s storm; (2) he didn’t check his email; (3) he read it but wasn’t able to come to school early (then why didn’t he respond?); (4) he was abducted by an alien nation in need of a History of World Governments teacher (if only we were so lucky). Logan reverses directions. Her fingers tap against her hip like she’s keeping time to music only she can hear. After a few more circles, she stops in front of a poster-size sign promoting tonight’s Snow Ball dance. She waves me over.

  “Your parents’ first date was the Snow Ball dance, right?”

  “A couple centuries ago.”

  A long awkward silence falls between us. Usually I don’t have any trouble reading Logan, but the way she’s staring at the couple slow dancing in the center of the winter wonderland, I can’t help but wonder if she feels like she’s missing out. Neither of us has ever gone to a school dance, and when she turned down Mason’s invitation to prom last year, I was relieved. Despite all the rumors at school, however, Logan and I will never be more than best friends. From the day she moved to Riviere right before eighth grade, she was destined to leave. I, on the other hand, was born to stay.

  Logan turns away from the poster and starts pacing again.

  “Do you want to go?” I blurt out, instantly wanting to stuff the words down my throat.

  She stops. Surprise or maybe horror fills her face. “To the Snow Ball dance?”

  “Yes. No.” I shake my head. “Of course I don’t want to go. It was— Never mind. This morning, before we left, Dad gave me the night off.” I shrug. “It was just something to do.”

  Logan frowns. “But you hate to dance.”

  “Yup. No moves.” I shuffle like a robot. “Forget I mentioned it.” If only the floor would open up and swallow me whole. Freshman year I told Logan that I didn’t dance, but that’s because she thought Kerrianne wanted me to ask her to homecoming. Not in a million years. There’s only been one girl I’ve ever wanted to dance with, and that’s Logan. “I should really be home anyway. With the wedding guests, there will be plenty of things for me to do around the inn.”

  “Oh no. Definitely not. You’re taking the night off, with me, and that’s final. And since we want to have fun, that rules out dancing.” She smiles.

  “No dancing. Got it. We can see what’s playing at the Riviere Marquee?”

  “A movie is boring and ordinary.”

  “What else is there to do in Riviere?”

  “Leave it to me.” She sets her hands on my shoulders and gives me a shake. “I can’t believe it. You have a Friday night off! Why didn’t you tell me? We should throw a party, except I hate parties with people. What to do? Cade Crawford has the night off. How did this happen? Tell me everything. What did your dad say?”

  I’m not going to tell Logan what he really said, which was that I should ask Logan to the dance. “We’re just friends,” I’d responded. To which he’d said, “Nothing wrong with going with a friend. Your mom and I were friends.”

  Inwardly, I groan. I look at Logan. She’s waiting for an answer. “There’s not much to tell. He said I’ve worked hard and deserve a night off from the inn.”

  She slaps a hand over the slow-dancing couple and places the other over her heart. “I, Logan March, solemnly promise to arrange an unforgettable, amazing night filled with adventure that doesn’t involve dancing. It’ll be a night we’ll remember years from now, like the kind some old people get nostalgic about when they long for the wild times they had in high school.” She beams at me.

  I raise an eyebrow. “Have I mentioned that getting arrested is not my idea of fun?”

  She winks. “Duly noted.” Her gaze shifts to the wall clock, then toward the main stairwell leading to the first floor. With a huff, she asks, “Where is Mr. Bartley?”

  “Maybe the snow delayed him. We could come back at lunch?”

  “But there will be dozens of students in his room.” She goes back to pacing.

  I want to bang my head against a locker. Why did I bring up the dance? I can’t believe Dad suggested it. Worst of all, I can’t believe I’m actually disappointed. Doing something tonight is a bad idea. I’m tired of dwelling in the Friend Zone. I’m tired of pretending I don’t want more with Logan. I gotta figure out a way to cancel. Inn emergency? But then Logan might show up to help. Fake fever? Maybe…

  Logan regains my attention with her mumbling. “…why…absurd…Mr. Bartley…fake…challenge…test, assignment, debate.” None of it makes much sense to me.

  She comes to an abrupt halt. The happiness radiating off her is nuclear. Her backpack slips from her shoulder and thunks onto the floor. “I got it!” At first I think she means our plans for tonight, but then she says, “I have a theory about why Mr. Bartley gave us the assignment.” She gives me a playful shove. “There isn’t one. There can’t be an assignment because there is no legitimate debate. He’s waiting for someone to prove it. It’s a test on making moral decisions and how they impact humanity.”

  “A test.”

  Some of her conviction slips when she registers my skepticism. She unzips her backpack and pulls out the assignment. “You know those elaborate riddles that go on and on, twisting you up with too many details that you don’t see the simple solution?”

  I nod. Logan loves riddles, like the one about the plane crashing halfway into Canada and halfway into the United States with 283 passengers on board. The twisty tale ends with If there were 283 passengers and 5 crew and they all died, how many survivors died in Canada?

  The answer is zero. Survivors live.

  Logan waves the paper. “That’s what I believe Mr. Bartley did with the assignment. I bet he wanted to make it look legitimate, creating detailed instructions to get us to think. I bet he’s waiting for someone to say it’s morally wrong.

  “Let’s look at the facts.” She ticks them off on her fingers. “One. We’ve never had an assignment even remotely like this, so that sets it apart. Two. He’s a brilliant teacher, and he’s fair. Three. Giving a fake assignment is totally something he’d do. His lessons are sometimes unconventional. Four. It’s top-secret so that he can teach this lesson again next year.”

  Logan’s theory sounds thought-out, but improbable, at least to me. If she’s right, Mr. Bartley sure went through a lot of trouble to teach a moral lesson. Sterilizing an entire people is evil. Ghettos are evil. Genocide is evil. How hard is that to figure out? But I get it. I get Logan. She needs an answer.

  I have my theories, too, and as I prepared for our guests last night, one question kept popping into my mind: Could Mr. Bartley secretly be a member of a white supremacist group? My conclusion: possible, but highly unlikely. But it seems mor
e plausible than some elaborate moral test. And horrifying, so I haven’t mentioned it to Logan.

  “Well? What do you think?”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “Of course I’m right.” But her voice is laced with doubt, and her glow has dimmed like a dying flashlight on the verge of blinking out. I feel responsible for it. I open my mouth, but I’m not able to give any reassuring words.

  The bell rings. I take a step, but Logan grabs my hand. There’s desperation in her eyes. Once again, I get it. I get her. Mr. Bartley didn’t show up. He didn’t respond to her email. Someone else would brush it off, let it go, and move on. But not Logan. It cuts.

  “There’s no way he believes the Final Solution is defensible.”

  “Well,” I say, picking up her backpack and swinging it onto my shoulder, “I really do hope your theory is right because it’ll be the easiest A I’ve ever earned.”

  Two hours after school started, Mr. Bartley answered my email: “Sorry for the delay. Didn’t get your note until now. Let’s talk after class.” I would have forwarded the message to Cade, but since he doesn’t have a smartphone, he wouldn’t have seen it until he got home and logged in to the computer. So before History of World Governments, I met him outside the boys’ locker room. When I told him what Mr. Bartley said, he nodded. His expression was pensive, and he stayed quiet the entire time we walked to class.

  Sitting at my desk, I glance over at him. He’s hunched forward, legs stretched out, sketching in his notebook.

  I blew it. I blew it, I blew it, I blew it. Why didn’t I just say we’d go to the dance? Since Mr. Bartley isn’t here yet, I pull out my phone and, for the hundredth time, I text Blair.