by Rachel Shane
Rhythm and Clues
Copyright © 2016 Rachel Shane
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electrical or mechanical means including photocopying, recording, or information storage or retrieval without permission in writing from the author.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
Cover design by Go On Write
Interior design and layout by Rachel Shane
Graphical elements from Freepik.com and Flaticon.com
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I hurry down the long hallway of Milford Brook High School, searching for the one person who will change the way everyone at school perceives me. Normally on the first day of school, I make it a point to stand out with clothes I’d doctored myself, a scowl instead of smile, and by staying quiet instead of gushing about my summer experiences. If people think I don’t care, I might believe it myself. But today I feel connected, part of something. Because finally someone knows about my home life, knows about my mother, and still wants to stand by me as a friend.
Or maybe more.
My heart squeezes at the possibility of more but I don’t know where Gavin Tully stands. I haven’t spoken to him since Friday night, when I kissed him for the first time and hopefully not the last time.
Glittery combination locks in pastel colors hang from a few of the lockers in my row. Showy, eye catching, but when everyone copies the latest trend, they all blend into one another. My own rusty combination lock, clipped from the lost and found two years ago, stands out like a busted bulb in a string of Christmas lights. Well worth the two hours it took me to crack the combination.
Thankfully my locker’s in a good location this year. Far away from Isla Gibson’s.
When I open my locker, a small slip of paper flutters out. I sigh. Great, leftovers from last year’s locker occupant. The maintenance department at this school knows how to slack off more than the students.
But I spot my name, Moxie Crane, written in scratchy handwriting on the outside of the folded sheet. My heart does a flip flop. Gavin’s handwriting.
I rip open the paper, my fingers trembling. My chest stills as I drink in the words inside.
Meet at my locker ASAP. 712. 13-42-23. Something for you inside.
I hug the paper to my chest. So he doesn’t regret what happened on Friday.
A small smile crests my lips as I shove my extra notebooks into my locker and slam it shut. My backpack swings behind me in my race to his locker. I can’t wait one more second to hear how things went with his parents. How they coped with dropping his sister off at boarding school. How Gavin feels about the newfound freedom of attending public school. And if his parents still hate me for barging into his life, corrupting him, and then busting him out of his homeschool prison.
That worry is strong enough to rip the smile right off my face.
I turn the corner and my stomach instantly sinks in my approach to his locker. He’s not there. Someone as tall as Gavin would rise above the crowd. Instead, someone else strides toward me, her bleached blonde shoulder-length hair making her tan seem even darker. And faker. Isla Gibson’s bandaid of a skirt hugs her legs in a way that would get her kicked out if administration actually paid attention. She crinkles her nose, and freckles dot the surface, which I suspect she paints on to make her look innocent and cutesy rather than the bitch she really is.
True to form, she delivers me a smile that’s part victorious and part condescending. She’s a master at screwing you over twice in one look.
My throat starts to close the way it always does in her presence. I dodge around her, keeping my head down, but elbow a guy in the stomach in the process.
I mumble a quiet apology but it’s too late. He recognizes me and steps in front of my path, blocking me with a palm on my shoulder. “Saw your mom last night.” A few of his friends nearby laugh. “Sorry, no dollar bills left for you.” His eyes trace my body, taking in the safety-pinned outfit I’d reconstructed myself, repairing the old, making it new and improved.
I shove him hard in the chest, and he stumbles backward. My pulse pounds as I amp my pace away, praying no teachers saw that. The last thing I need is detention before the homeroom bell rings.
When I stop in front of Gavin’s locker to catch my breath, Isla squeezes next to me, her shadow darkening my already sour mood. Her lips twitch as if she’s fighting a smile or some juicy gossip. My chest cinches tight as I put her victorious smile together with the fact that she’s trying to gloat about a secret. Gavin must have visited her locker, too.
“Did you get a note, too?” I ask, scanning her fingers for a scrap of paper similar to the cryptic one in my palm.
She fans herself with a packet of regular sized paper. “Note? From who?”
I stand on tiptoes and glimpse at her papers. Guitar tabs. Of course. Not a note to meet Gavin. A breath whooshes out of my lungs.
“Do you know where Gavin is? I told him I’d bring him these”—She smacks the papers in her hand—”when we hung out Friday night.”
My skin prickles. Friday night? Before or after our kiss?
“On our date,” Isla adds, going in for the kill.
My stomach drops. I kissed Gavin on Friday and then he went on a date with another girl? For months Isla had been actively pursuing him while I waited quietly in the wings, playing the role of his best friend. I grip the locker for support. Isla watches me with a triumphant expression. Taking a deep breath, I gather my composure. She’s lying. Gavin isn’t like that. He wasn’t brought up like other teenage boys.
Before I can call her on her bluff, Isla looks past me and waves at someone. “Oh my God!”
I spin around, expecting to see Gavin, but instead I see a hallucination. A girl tall enough and pretty enough to grace a runway—with a natural sheen to her wavy hair and striking brown eyes—strides toward us. Sabrina Tully, Gavin’s fifteen-year old sister. She should be four-hours away attending her first day at expensive Lockhart Academy boarding school. What is she doing here? And why isn’t Gavin with her? And stranger still, how did she get away with wearing jeans and a spaghetti string tank top instead of her usual wrinkle-free and perfectly conservative collared shirt?
“What are you doing here?” Isla asks, her tone both skeptical and excited. While Sabrina is the cause of all my current problems, my past ones originate from Isla. And now they’re BFFs. If they pooled their powers they could make Satan look like a Disney princess.
Sabrina laughs and waves her hand dismissively. “Long story.”
Isla shakes her head and makes an incorrect buzzer sound. “Not an acceptable answer.”
But who cares about that question. “Where’s Gavin?” I ask instead.
“Yeah, I’ve been looking for him too.” Isla pouts.
“Wait, he’s not with you?” Sabrina eyes me suspiciously.
With you. Probably not. Not if he’s going on dates with other girls. My chest aches.
“I haven’t seen him.”
Sabrina’s eyes dart to the note I’m folding and
unfolding in my palm. “He stayed at your house this weekend though, didn’t he?”
Isla gasps. Sabrina cranks her neck to look at the guitar tabs in Isla’s hand.
“My house? Are you insane?” His parents would never let him stay over at someone else’s house. Especially not mine. In fact, they once tried to bribe me to stay away from him.
“Huh.” Sabrina pulls out a slip of paper from her pocket the same size and shape as the one in my hands. She flashes it to me like an ID check. “My parents said he spent the weekend with you. I thought that was strange to begin with, I mean, you’re not—” In a show of major restraint, she remembers her manners and bites back the insult.
I tap the note in my hand. “He must be here somewhere because he gave me this.”
“Oh. I’m such an idiot.” Sabrina lets out a strained laugh. “He told me he’s coming to school early to talk to the music teacher.”
Isla gets a determined look on her face. “Great! I have to talk to Mr. Schneider anyway. Charity thing for my dad’s venue.”
“I’ll go with you.” I take a step toward the music room. Why would he ask me to meet him at his locker if he wasn’t going to be there?
“No! Isla should go find him.” Sabrina gives her a light shove on her back. “Alone.”
Sabrina pleads with me with her eyes, and I catch on. This is all a show. I’ve seen her do this before when she tricked her parents. She wants Isla to leave.
“Why? Is he waiting for me?” Isla looks like an overstock of guitars arrived at her address by mistake.
Sabrina nods. Isla gives me a triumphant smile, then jets off to find what I suspect will be an empty room.
“Gavin asked you to meet him here too?” I guess as soon as Isla’s out of earshot. At least Isla didn’t get a note.
“Yeah, the note was there when I opened my locker. Except, I think he meant for you and me to meet, not meet him.”
“Your locker? About that. Uh, you know this isn’t boarding school, right? I know your mom taught you everything you know. Maybe she didn’t focus on geography?”
Sabrina rolls her eyes. “There was a fire there. So I couldn’t go, but luckily, they’d already enrolled me here just in case and I could start today with everyone else.” She shrugs. “They felt really bad about it too. Whisked me upstate to some clothes outlets. I couldn’t argue with a shopping spree.” She smoothes out the wrinkles in her tank top. “Besides, this is way better than homeschool. You seriously haven’t spoken to Gavin? Or did you just lie for Isla’s benefit?”
I laugh. “Why would I try to spare her feelings?”
“I don’t know. Because maybe today seems like opposite day? I find a note from my missing brother in a locker I’m not supposed to have. I see you and Isla speaking to each other without any hair pulling.”
The floor drops out from under me. “Gavin’s missing?”
I don’t wait for an answer. I reach for the generic black padlock on his locker, twirling the dial until it pops open. For a moment, I feel like I’m betraying him. Throughout our entire friendship, he’d been so guarded, almost afraid to open up to me, revealing more of himself in bits and pieces that I worked hard to expose. And now I was violating his privacy.
“It’s just weird that I haven’t seen him since Friday. He took my dad’s car and was supposed to be at your house, but you’re looking for him too.”
I’m not sure what I expect to find inside the locker but it’s not a lone shoebox with a pink post-it note stuck on top, the words, “Open me,” written in black permanent marker. I fight back a brief smile. Post-it notes are kind of our thing.
“My brother is so weird.” Sabrina reaches for the box and yanks off the lid.
Random objects skid around inside: a red paper lantern, folded flat, with the words “band audition” inscribed in black marker on one of the sides. A leaf, brittle and veiny. A plastic bag containing what looks like flour, the words “1 of 2” written in permanent marker on the front of the bag. A fork with an ornate swirl along the handle, one of the prongs bent back just a few degrees in the wrong direction. A black Sharpie marker. One false eyelash. And the stuffed bunny he won for me Friday night. In my messy exit, I’d forgotten it at his house.
“How strange.” Sabrina picks up the white baggie and twists it so its contents shift like sand in an hourglass. She opens and smells it. “Not drugs.” She almost sounds disappointed, and I wonder how this girl who always seemed so pure and proper would even know what to smell for. “Does any of this look familiar to you?”
“All of it looks familiar. Well, maybe not that one.” I poke the bag of white powder.
These trinkets tell the story of everything important between Gavin and me. I feel like I’m punched in the gut because he wants Sabrina to know about them. He sent her the same note. But that also doesn’t explain where he is. Maybe he’s somehow making a statement. That these items don’t matter anymore. They’re junk now.
Around us, students close their lockers. Groups of people gather in clusters, discussing their summer vacations as they wander to their new homerooms. My heart thumps. Why hasn’t Gavin shown up yet?
Sabrina crosses her arms and taps her foot, creating a beat I know even Gavin could write a song to. “What are they?”
Although I’m beginning to fear all I really know about Gavin could fit in this box with room to spare, I’m positive he never does anything without a specific reason in mind. And though I may fear the worst, he’s never been vindictive. I decide to trust him, something I promised myself I would do, after doubting him in the past. “They’re all sentimental items, marking important events in our…” I was going to say relationship, but that isn’t the right word. Couldn’t be. “Friendship.” I pick up the bunny, the furry surface soft under my fingers. “I had no idea he saved this stuff.” My voice cracks.
Does this mean he cares for me like that? Or…what?
Sabrina groans. “I knew it. You’re secretly dating. God, I told Isla. But she swore you weren’t. So did he, actually.”
“We’re not dating,” I say fast. It’s not a lie. We never declared anything. I kissed him and he disappeared, leaving me a box of sentimental trinkets. That’s as far from dating as possible.
When I drop the bunny back in the box, the contents bounce, revealing a flash of pink underneath the leaf. Another post-it sticks to the underside, tiny handwriting covering both sides.
M. and S.,
I ran away from home. Sort of. At least until I can unravel this mystery I stumbled on the other day. A family secret thing. Sorry, trying to be vague. I’m leaving these clues behind as backup. So you either know where to find me, or can pick up where I left off. One of you knows where this stuff leads and the other has the knowledge to decipher the information I left you. Be careful. And don’t trust anyone else, including M+D. Destroy the notes after you’ve read them.
Love, G.
There’s so much to baffle me in the letter, but my mind immediately jumps to his closing. Love. To Sabrina or me? Or both?
She gasps. “He ran away! My parents not letting me go to boarding school must have set him off. And who are M+D?”
“Um, Mom and Dad?” I tear the note into confetti scraps and cup them in my palm.
She looks like I just killed her puppy.
I sigh. “But I could be wrong. He was acting really strange with me on Friday. And then I…” I glance at the floor. “Well, he might have ran away because of me.” After all, I convinced him to rebel against his strict parents. “Or this could have something to do with the weird phone call he received. It’s all very strange and he wasn’t exactly vocal about anything.”
“What did he mean by clues?” Sabrina glances at the box. She picks up the fork, twirling it in her fingers, examining the ornate design. “This looks familiar. I remember the engraving.”
“It’s from the Dante’s Ristorante. The night you and I met.”
Sabrina’s eyes grow wide. “We have to leave
.” She says each word slowly, punctuating the silence that now engulfs the hallway. She throws the fork into the box with a clank, slams the lid on top, and tucks the box under her arm.
Despite my reputation as a bad girl, I’ve never cut school before. I earned my bad-girl rep through gossip alone. Whoever said actions speak louder than words doesn’t go to Milford Brook. “But school—Your first day!”
“If we don’t find Gavin soon, it’ll probably be my last.”
“We don’t even know what he means by clues.”
She grunts. “I know where he is.”
I can’t argue with that. We race through the hallways, and I pray teachers will think we’re just late for homeroom. I’m trying to keep up, but my heart thrashes against my chest. Pain shoots, making me bend over for a moment as I clutch my stomach.
Sabrina stops short several paces ahead of me. “Moxie, keep up.” She taps her foot impatiently. “Don’t you care about my brother?”
I’m so not going to tell Sabrina about my heart problems. Forcing myself into motion, I catch up to her, ready to mouth off my defense, but she takes off again before I can. She rounds a corner I know we should avoid. “Wait! Not that way.”
She pauses, crossing her arms. My lungs pump desperately as I put all my strength into catching up with her.
“They monitor the exits,” I say. I know we can try and play the lost sheep on the first day card, but I doubt anything we say will grant us permission to the school parking lot. I pull Sabrina in the opposite direction until we reach the empty wood shop. “Electives aren’t used for home rooms.”
Inside the wood shop, I step up on the radiator—I’m too short to reach the window locks otherwise—and flip them open. “Where’s Gavin?” I glide the window open, a cool breeze sneaking in through the crack.
Sabrina laughs. “You really must not be dating my brother. Because you obviously don’t know him at all.”
I slip my legs through the opening and slide like dough in a pasta maker onto the soft grass. With his back to us, a security guard places bright cones by the exit across the parking lot. Because cones prevent students from ditching school. I guess the security guards rival the maintenance crew in terms of incompetency.
