“What does Hickham have on you?”
She blinked up at me. “I thought you knew.”
“I don’t know what it is, but I know he has some tight stranglehold on you. And others. What is it?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“But Sylvie, you’re letting both of them control you. Wouldn’t you rather turn the tables and control your own future?”
“That’s easier said than done. You don’t know what we’ve done.”
“Not the way I see it. All I need is proof, and I can write a story, take it to the authorities, and expose whatever Hickham is doing—and, as a bonus, take Ace down with him.”
“Ace never goes down. You know that better than anyone. He’ll always get away with whatever he does.”
I bit back the sting of bitterness and tears. I choked on my fear. She knew what had happened last year. And yet she was so afraid of Ace that she wouldn’t come forward about that or what he made her do this year or even whatever it was that Hickham was doing to all of them. It made my cheeks burn and my heart beat fast, and my own words echoed in my ears: The Saints of old stood for justice, truth, and those who couldn’t speak for themselves.
“Sylvie, I decided recently to be done feeling powerless. I’m done being scared of Ace. Which, in a way, is also scary. So, when you’re ready to stop being under everyone’s thumb, let me know. Ace might get away with it, but that doesn’t mean we can’t tell the truth. What we do with the truth matters.”
I pushed past her and left the supply closet. The bell rang, and the hallway filled with kids streaming from one class to another. I felt as though I was moving with the crowd in slow motion. I felt alone in a hallway full of kids. Maybe I was right in the beginning. Maybe I knew exactly who Nate Reinhart was.
He was Ace’s friend. Someone who pretend to be trustworthy just to…what, Avery? Get close to me? Is that what he was trying to do?
It didn’t matter. He was someone who would tell Sylvie that I’d seen the list. I didn’t know how to trust anyone. Maybe I was the terrible spy, second-guessing myself at every turn. What was the saying, trust no one and validate later? No—I was doing that wrong. Maybe it was never trust, and always verify. That one applies, but I still don’t think I’m doing it right. Either way—I wasn’t sure who to trust.
I slid into my seat in the newspaper room and didn’t even look in Nate’s direction. My eyes burned as I fought back the tears and the anger that bubbled in my stomach. Mr. Knight’s eyes were boring into me from behind his desk. He could tell something was wrong, but if he asked, I was certain that I would just burst into tears and run out of the room.
All of this control was causing me to sweat and get hot. I couldn’t take it; I couldn’t sit it the same room as Nate. I wanted to yell at him. But, thankfully, the door opened, and an office assistant came in and handed Mr. Knight a note. He looked at me and motioned for me to come up to his desk.
It was my paper trail. Hickham was summoning me to his office. I could feel Nate’s eyes on me, and I wanted to glare at him so badly, but I knew it would hurt just to look at him even if my look also hurt him.
I took the note from Mr. Knight. He asked me quietly if I was okay. I nodded and slipped out of the room. Before I reached the office, I set my phone to record and slipped it into my jacket pocket. As I knocked on Mr. Hickham’s door, he called in a flat tone for me to come in. He told me to sit down and walked behind me to shut the door.
“Do you know what this is about, Avery?”
“My name is Avery Brave. And no, sir.”
He pursed his lips at my correction and folded his hands on top of his desk.
“Ms. Nightingale,” he started, “I’ve heard some rumors that I’d like to address, because they are particularly worrisome.”
“Rumors?” I played along innocently.
“Have you not heard them?”
“No, sir.”
“Can this possibly mean that you are the one who has been starting them, then?”
“No, sir. I don’t start rumors. I tell the truth.”
“So, you’re implying that the rumors are true.”
“No, sir. I don’t even know what rumors you’re referring to.”
“I think you do, Ms. Nightingale.”
I leaned forward. “With all due respect, again, sir—I don’t. I suppose you could tell me what the rumors are, and I could tell you if they are true or not.”
Mr. Hickham pounded his fist on the desk. “Don’t play games with me, Avery.”
“It’s ‘Avery Brave’.”
“Rumors like this can get someone fired,” he sneered at me in a low voice, “or get someone in a lot of trouble.” He narrowed his eyes.
“Mr. Hickham, are you threatening me in some way?”
“I can see that you enjoy chasing drama,” he said, jabbing me cryptically with his words. “I am warning you. If you have anything to do with these rumors going around, or if you are snooping in the wrong place…you could get yourself in a whole heap of trouble.”
“Well, I can assure you, Mr. Hickham, I am a reporter, so I investigate and report, but I never snoop.”
“I’m serious, Avery.”
“My name is Avery Brave. And so am I.”
I stood and walked out of his office, hiding my trembling hands in my jacket pockets where I turned the recording off. I slipped into the bathrooms and hid in the last stall and cried until the bell rang. I wiped my eyes and tried to breathe deeply to clear away the blotches that covered my face and neck when I cried. I was just about to leave to go back to Mr. Knight’s class to get my bag when two girls entered, talking.
“All I know is that’s the dumbest mistake in history.”
“I know.”
“I mean, come on, you don’t look at that kind of stuff during class. How dumb are they? You’ll get yourself on the list for that kind of stuff.”
The list? What kind of stuff?
“How do they get away with that stuff anyway? I know my mom would totally find out. She’s like a ninja or something.”
“Mine too.”
Soon, they changed the subject and left without giving any other details. As I walked to Mr. Knight’s class, I tried to put the clues together. They all got their cellphones taken away by Mr. Hickham, and he’s made a list of everyone whose phone he’s taken. They are all under his thumb. But why? Or how? And what’s he making them do?
But my thoughts were cut short by the sound of Nate’s crutches coming out of Mr. Knight’s class. I fell back and stood behind the corner that was just before the door so he wouldn’t see me. I heard him crutch away from me down the hall, and I sighed.
Entering Mr. Knight’s class, I saw that Mr. Knight had already left for the day. Nate must have been waiting around for me. I didn’t care; I didn’t want to talk to him. But I knew that it was time to talk to my parents. This was getting deep, and I knew that they deserved to know what I was getting into.
As I walked to my car, I heard my name faintly behind me. But I didn’t turn to see who it was. I was done talking for the day. The voice called again, louder this time, and I could tell now that it was Nate. He was slow enough on his crutches that I knew I could get in my car and drive away before he reached the parking lot. Which was a horrid thing to do, but it was what I was doing.
I couldn’t hear him calling after me anymore once I shut the door, but I could see him going as fast as he could on his crutches to try to catch me in my rearview mirror. My heart felt sad as I drove away, feeling the loss of whatever I had thought was happening between us. I had obviously been wrong.
9.
“I love your spirit, Avery Brave. I love your tenacity,” Dad said, sipping his coffee and crossing his legs. “But this is an awfully nasty accusation that you’re talking about.”
Mother nodded her head and looked worriedly at me. They hadn’t gotten upset when I’d told them about the field house or what I’d said to Mr. Hickham. But they were concerned about the accusatio
n I was making. And rightly so.
“I know that we’ve had a lot of accusation come from our house in the past year or so, and that didn’t go in our favor, but don’t you think that we should care about what is potentially happening to these students more than we care about how it looks to make the accusation?”
Father reached for my hand, and I held it across the table. I knew he wanted me to be safe and find some sense of normal after last year, but I couldn’t just sit back and un-see what I’d come across or un-know what I’d uncovered.
“Well, promise you’ll come to us first before you publish, okay?”
“Okay.”
“And I’m sorry that you feel betrayed by this Nate. He seemed like a good kid.”
“I don’t feel betrayed, Mom. I have been betrayed. No one else knew! He had to have told Sylvie.” I raised my voice more than I intended. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to yell.”
“It’s okay, dear. But you need to forgive him. I don’t want any of this to be about revenge. On any of them. You made a very good point about the saints of old. Stand up for justice. Speak out for those who feel they can’t. But don’t seek revenge on people just because they sin. They need forgiveness and grace just as much as you or I do. God administers justice, not us.”
“I know, Mom.” Her words struck a chord in my heart—a painful and haunting minor chord. “But what’s that quote about evil prospering because good people do nothing?”
“Edmund Burke said that,” Dad confirmed, “and you’re right. You can’t do nothing. And we’re not suggesting that you do nothing. But we just want you to be safe in whatever it is you feel you have to do.”
I nodded.
Dad sat back, dismissing the matter for the night. “Remember, we have the meeting at church tonight, but we’ll be home around ten. Okay?”
I nodded, glad I would have some quiet time alone after the day I’d just had. I told them I’d clean up the kitchen for them so they could go. They both hugged me and kissed my head as they left.
I finished my work from the class that Felix and I had skipped this morning and I worked on my article about the auditions for the play the theater class was doing this fall.
I called Carol, but she was busy with homework. I decided to call Felix.
“Want me to come over? You sound sad.”
“Do I?” I asked back, settling into one of the chairs in our home theater. “I’m okay. I’m just going to watch a movie, I think. My folks are gone, so it’s nice to be alone for a while.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“Avery Brave?”
“Yeah?”
“You know you can tell me what happened with Ace. Anytime you’re ready. You can trust me.”
I hesitated and felt my mouth open as if I was going to tell him. My heart did ache to tell him the truth. But then, the phone beeped; someone was calling. “I know,” I said. “Thanks, Felix. I’ve got another call. I’d better go.”
“Okay,” Felix said reluctantly. “Call me later if you want.”
“Okay, bye.”
I hung up and saw that it was Nate calling. I paused before answering, wondering if I should talk to him. Then, I slid the “accept” button and answered. “Hello?”
“Avery?”
“My name is Avery Brave,” I said in the same tone that I’d used with Mr. Hickham.
“What’s the matter?”
I didn’t answer. I felt the anger bubble up again.
“Avery Brave? You there?”
“I’m here. I thought you’d be at the away game.”
“I am.”
He was calling me from the game? No—I wasn’t going to fall for this again.
“Oh. Well…just send me your notes for the article, and I’ll edit them tomorrow.”
“Avery Brave—I didn’t call about the article. What’s going on? You didn’t seem like yourself in class.”
“I really don’t want to talk, Nate.”
“At all or to me?”
“Either.”
He paused, and it was awkwardly silent on the phone.
“Are you mad at me? What did I do?” He sounded hurt and sincere. But maybe this was just another ploy to get under my skin.
“You know what you did.”
“Avery Brave, please talk to me. I have no idea what you’re mad about.”
Losing my temper, I stomped my foot and yelled into the phone, “You told Sylvie!”
“Told Sylvie what? I didn’t tell her anything.”
“She cornered me today, and she knew that I knew about the list. You’re the only one who knew about the field house. You told her!”
“Avery—listen to me. I did not tell Sylvie anything. I don’t speak to Sylvie, pretty much as a general rule, ever.”
“Then how did she know?” I demanded.
“I have no idea.”
I heard someone enter the room he was in and say something to him.
“I gotta go. Call you later.”
“Please don’t,” I said shortly and hung up. Huffing heavily, I threw the phone across the room. But within minutes, I picked it back up and called Felix.
“Wanna come over?”
“Be right there.”
I met him on the front porch. He hugged me before either of us spoke. With my head buried in his shirt, I mumbled, “I didn’t know who else to call. And I realized you were my best friend. And best friends tell each other everything. So, I’m ready if you’re ready.”
Felix pulled me over to the porch swing, and we sat together. His face was pensive except for his big brown compassionate eyes.
“My dad said once that, if Ace is willing to act the way he does in public, then he knew good and well that he’s capable of much worse in private.”
I took a deep breath, then dove into my story.
“We dated for a year, almost two. I was a very different girl when we started. I was shy and soft, and, after the fact, we could all see that Ace preyed on that. At first, he was commanding but in a sort of assertive way. He’s big, strong, and decisive. Our relationship was that way too. I, the shy one, let him, the decisive and loud one, boss me around and command our every move.
“But about eight months in, he started getting angry when I would disagree. And I found that I actually disagreed with him a lot. And one night, we were kissing, regrettably, and he wanted to go further. I told him no. And I told him that, if he didn’t stop pushing, I was leaving. Well, nobody stands up to Ace without getting put back in their place. That was the first night he hit me.”
Felix’s mouth fell open. I met his eyes and raised a hand. There’s more.
“He slapped me the first time, open palm. It didn’t bruise, and no one ever knew. But it hurt so bad. I cried about it every time I looked in the mirror. I began to excuse it, because, if I didn’t, I would have to face the shame of having allowed it, I supposed.
“This continued. For months. He was a rollercoaster, and it was nauseating to keep up. But my fear was building, and I felt like I couldn’t get out. I quit talking to my parents, and I made excuses for the bruises at home and at school.
“He made me feel like it was my fault. And yet he had such a hold on me emotionally that he wouldn’t let me go, and I couldn’t get out. I was stuck in this cycle of love, lust, anger, pain, and forgiveness. And it sickens me now that I was so entrapped. But it’s true.
“The last night he hit me, I had gone to his house to surprise him. It was his birthday. He’d pressured me for so long that I was actually considering, you know…for his birthday. I can’t believe—well. Never mind.
“I walked in on him, and…what I didn’t know at the time was that he was with Sylvie. But because I caught him, he got angry. More like enraged. Because, you know, it was my fault for coming over unnoticed and not his fault for cheating on me…”
I rolled my eyes and took a breath, giving Felix time to react if he wanted since he’d sat there so pensively stoic the entire
time, but he didn’t. So, I continued on.
“Sylvie hid under the covers like a little coward and let him hit me repeatedly. I tried to block him, but he just started to kick me instead. Finally, I escaped out the door, but he caught me at the top of the stairs. He pushed me down two flights of stairs. I landed at the bottom with two broken ribs, a broken arm, and a fractured ankle. My face was black and blue as well as my back.
“When I came to, his parents were standing at the bottom of the stairs, speechless and unmoving. Instead of rushing to my aid, they rushed to his. I called the police and my parents from the floor. I’ve never felt so alone, in so much pain, or so helpless in my whole life.
“My parents and I were rushed to the hospital, and I assumed the police would be right behind us with Ace in custody. But they never came. They, his parents, blamed it on me. The used their power, money, and influence to get Ace out of any charges. We pressed charges and hired a really good lawyer. He evaded all of it. Ace concocted all sorts of stories to tell at school, and everyone believed them. If anyone didn’t believe his side, they kept it to themselves, which is often just as bad as believing it.
“So here we are. A year later. Going to our Christian school with him. Acting like nothing happened. My parents felt it was important to stay even though he got away unscathed.”
Felix sat watching me for a long moment, then wrapped me up in his lanky arms and leaned his head on mine. “You don’t have to act like it didn’t happen. You are the bravest person I know. You are not that girl anymore. You’ve been through hell.”
I felt relieved that Felix knew. “I haven’t told anyone in a long while.”
He kissed the top of my head. “I can tell that some of you is hardened because of this ordeal. I can tell where your sense of justice came from. I know why you don’t trust people, and rightly so. But I just want to say that all of you has risen.”
“I don’t think you did that right,” I whispered and giggled at the chance to turn that back on him.
He laughed. “You know what I mean.”
“Yes. And thank you.”
“Thank you for trusting me enough to tell me.”
“You know I love you, right?”
The Nightingale Files : The Rook and Queen Page 12
