My Side

by Norah McClintock

  My Side

  My Side

  Norah McClintock

  Copyright © 2013 Norah McClintock

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced

  or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including

  photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now

  known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  McClintock, Norah

  My side [electronic resource] / Norah McClintock.

  (Orca soundings)

  Electronic monograph.

  Issued also in print format.

  ISBN 978-1-4598-0512-5 (PDF).--ISBN 978-1-4598-0513-2(EPUB)

  I. Title. II. Series: Orca soundings (Online)

  PS8575.C62M97 2013 jC813’.54 C2013-901875-1

  First published in the United States, 2013

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2013935297

  Summary: When Addie is publicly humiliated, it is terrible,

  but when she finds out her best friend was involved, it is almost unbearable.

  Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing

  programs provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through

  the Canada Book Fund and the Canada Council for the Arts,

  and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council

  and the Book Publishing Tax Credit.

  Cover image by Getty Images

  ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS ORCA BOOK PUBLISHERS

  PO BOX 5626, STN. B PO BOX 468

  VICTORIA, BC CANADA CUSTER, WA USA

  V8R 6S4 98240-0468

  www.orcabook.com

  16 15 14 13 • 4 3 2 1

  Contents

  Addie’s Story: Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Neely’s Story: Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Addie’s Story

  Chapter One

  I stand at the curb and stare straight ahead. I am trembling all over. This is no exaggeration. My knees are shaking. My hands are shaking. My fingers are dancing, and there is nothing I can do to calm them. I am like a little kid shivering after being in the water too long, except that my lips aren’t blue and my skin isn’t wrinkled like a prune. Also, I’m nowhere near the water, even though I feel as if I am drowning. I can barely breathe.

  “Maybe this isn’t a good idea,” my dad says. He’s been saying it for days.

  I shake my head. “We agreed.”

  “I think you’re underestimating—”

  “I’m not.” I snap the words at him like rocks launched from a slingshot. And there it is—a combination of anger, tension and terror. If I close my eyes, I am sure I will see a question flashing at me in neon letters—“Why are you doing this?”

  Everyone has been saying the same thing to me—my mom, my dad, my brother by email from university, my grandma down in Phoenix, my doctor. “Addie, don’t.” They’re like a chorus.

  But if I don’t do this, where does that leave me?

  Who will I be then?

  I’m late, but not really. It was planned this way—not by me, but by my dad—so I would get there without everyone staring at me. I went along with it, relieved.

  “Maybe we should go in together,” my dad says.

  “We talked about this.” Mostly I had done the talking. “I’m going alone.”

  Before my dad can say another word, I walk away from the curb, across the wide interlocking-brick patio, past the row of garbage bins and toward the entrance. My hand is still trembling when I reach out to push open the center door. My stomach heaves when I step into the empty foyer lined with glassfronted displays of athletic trophies and team photographs. I hold my breath when I get close to the school office.

  The entire outer wall of the office is glass. I could look in if I wanted to, but I tell myself I don’t want to. Still, my head turns automatically, and I spot Ms. LaPointe, one of the viceprincipals, standing behind the counter. She sees me and nods. Then she turns to look at Mr. Michaud, the principal, who has just come out of his office. He follows her gaze to me. He seems surprised, even though he was told I would be here today. Maybe he thought I wouldn’t show. Maybe he thought I wouldn’t have the nerve. Who can blame him? I wasn’t sure myself until a couple of minutes ago.

  I walk up the stairs to the second floor, trying to ignore the shakiness in my knees and the churning in my stomach. The hall is deserted. Classroom doors on both sides are shut. Everyone is already inside.

  I don’t go to my locker. I have everything I need in my backpack. The classroom I’m headed for is at the end of the hall. As I walk toward it, the hall seems to get longer and longer, as if I’m in a nightmare and no matter how far I walk, I’ll never get where I’m going.

  My head spins.

  I am in a nightmare. I’ve been dreading this for months. I’ve been praying this day would never come. But that’s not the way it works. It’s the day you wish for that never comes, not the one that terrifies you. That day rushes at you like a runaway locomotive.

  Chapter Two

  Mr. Grayson’s head swivels around when I open the door to his classroom. My mother calls Mr. Grayson a fussy man. Mostly, the male teachers at this school dress in chinos or jeans. Mr. Grayson doesn’t. He always wears a suit and tie, and nine times out of ten he has a vest on under his suit jacket. He carries his lesson plans and test papers in a leather briefcase. No backpacks for him. He is a real stickler for propriety. And for the rules, most of which he made up and apply only to his classroom.

  Rule number one is always be on time. Be in your seat on time. Hand in your assignments on time. Get your permission slips and your report cards signed on time.

  Rule number two is always knock.

  I don’t knock, which is why his eyes are squinty behind the windows of his glasses. At first I’m sure he’s going to say something sarcastic, the way he always does when someone is late or misbehaving. He does this because he knows that if there’s one thing every teenager on the planet is afraid of, it’s being made fun of. Being made to look and feel ridiculous. Having people laugh at him—or her.

  But today he doesn’t whip off a sarcastic remark. Instead, his eyes register the same surprise as Mr. Michaud’s.

  “Oh,” he says. “It’s you, Addie.” He recovers enough to add, “It’s good to have you back.” I can’t tell if he means it.

  I take a seat—my seat, which is empty, as if it has been waiting for me all this time. The rasping sound as I pull out the chair fills the deep silence of the classroom.

  I sit.

  Mr. Grayson clears his throat and points to the board, where he has written some notes. I stare at them, but I don’t copy them down. I don’t volunteer any answers either. I don’t even pretend to listen. It doesn’t matter. Mr. Grayson goes on as if I’m not there.

  I know without looking that kids are stealing glances at me. I know that one of those people is Neely. She’s sitting where she has been since the beginning of the school year, over by the window. I turn and catch her sneaking a look at me. Her pale face turns crimson, and she ducks her head.

  I glance at the person beside her. It’s Kayla. She looks me in the eye, as if daring me to do anything to her. I meet her gaze and hold it, unblinking, until she finally looks
away. When she does, I feel myself expand, as if I’ve devoured her. This is why I’m here. This is exactly the feeling I have been imagining.

  Emboldened, I turn my attention to my next victim. John. His head is down, but I see him trying to peek at me out of the corner of his eye. It turns out he’s a bigger coward than either of the girls. He doesn’t look up, even though I can tell by the redness of his ears that he knows I’m watching him. He can’t—or won’t—acknowledge me.

  Finally the bell rings. My heart begins to race. My neck tenses, then my shoulders, in what Dr. Zorbas calls preparation for fight or flight. My breath quickens. I try to slow it down by counting as I breathe—in, two, three, out, two, three. Meanwhile, all around me, kids are flooding out of the classroom. Neely almost knocks some of them over in her dash for the door. John isn’t far behind her.

  I take my time.

  I walk slowly out of the classroom and down the hall. I know exactly where I am going to find her.

  I don’t want to talk to her, but I have to. At least, I think I do, right up until I catch sight of her at her locker. Her locker door is open, and she is half-hidden by it. I see flashes of her hair, not as blond now as it was two months ago. I see some girls looking at her—Shayna and Kayla and Jen. They’re the girls Neely ogled all last year. They’re the ones she was determined to get to know. The ones she was so desperate to hang out with. They’re looking at her now, but they’re not standing with her or clustered around her for support. Jen spots me and says something, her mouth half-hidden behind her hand. The other two nod. But they don’t say anything to Neely. I wonder why.

  I wait. Neely scurried out of class like a mouse desperate to get to its hole before the cat could trap her. She’s doing her best to make herself invisible. Does she know I’m standing here? Are the hairs on the back of her neck standing up? Does she have that prickly feeling you get when you think someone is staring at you? Will she close her locker door and meet my eyes?

  If she does, then what?

  I wait. I ask myself, What did you expect?

  Chapter Three

  This is what I remember.

  I am holding the note in my hand and thinking, No way, this can’t be true. Then I think, But it has to be. I know that handwriting. I know that signature. It is true. Now all I have to do is forget how nervous I am and follow what it says. I tell myself that Cinderella was probably nervous about going to that ball. But she went anyway. Her heart probably fluttered when the prince saw her and made his way over to her to ask her to dance. But she danced anyway.

  I’m no Cinderella, and John is no prince. He’s just John, the guy I’ve been crazy about ever since I can remember. The guy who just got cuter and more popular year after year and who never once seemed to notice that I was anything but the daughter of his mom’s curling partner until, well, until he looked at me from across the room and smiled.

  At me.

  Later, he asked if he could borrow my notes after he’d missed class for a dentist’s appointment. My notes, not Kayla’s or Jen’s or Shayna’s. All of this happened after he and Kayla broke up.

  And then…I couldn’t believe it was happening, but it was. The doorbell rang, and I opened it, and it was John. He had a measuring cup in his hand. When he saw it was me, not my mother, he smiled again and said, Addie, as if he were surprised—pleasantly surprised. His mom had sent him over to borrow a cup of milk, but it took him forever to get around to telling me that. Instead he asked me if I had any plans for spring break and said he had been planning to go away for a week, but that was before he broke up with Kayla and now he wasn’t sure what he was going to do. It wasn’t until his mother shouted from his house across the street to ask what was taking so long that he seemed to remember what he had come for. His face turned red, and he spluttered a little. I gave him the milk and he hurried home.

  The next thing I knew, there was a note on my locker.

  It was from him.

  From John.

  It asked me to meet him.

  So, feeling like Cinderella and with butterflies in my stomach, there I am, clutching the note and walking away from school. I glance around, wondering if anyone is watching. For once, I want someone to be watching. But no one is. And even if they were, even if the whole school were staring at me, no one would have any idea what I was doing or where I was going, because I haven’t told anyone. I wish I could. I want everyone to know that Addie Murch is on her way to meet John Branksome, at his request. I especially want Jen and Shayna to know. And double especially, Kayla.

  But there is no one around.

  That doesn’t stop me from strutting like one of those boys who wants everyone to know how cool he is. I strut across the schoolyard. I strut through the gap in the fence. I strut along the rocky little path that leads through the woods, past the new subdivision and out into the conservation area. I keep right on strutting as I follow the path to where it forks and goes deeper into the bush, taking you, if you follow it far enough, to where kids hang out for parties. I strut past the party zone and the big blackened circle with burned wood in the center, and cinder blocks and tree stumps all around it, where kids sit and drink or make out or whatever they do at their parties. I keep going, glancing at the note to make sure I haven’t taken a wrong turn.

  I find myself in the smallest clearing I have ever seen. It’s as if someone planted a ring of trees in a tiny circle, and I’m standing in the middle of them, listening, waiting, breathing hard from all the strutting.

  That’s when it happens.

  Twigs snap. Something rushes at me.

  Something is pulled down over my head, covering my eyes, my nose, my mouth, my ears. When I open my mouth to scream, whatever is blanketing my head gets sucked into my mouth. I panic and fight for breath. The material closes around my nostrils too. I am suffocating. When I start to raise my arms to rip the bag or material from my head, someone clamps my arms to my sides. I try to break free, but I’m being held too tightly.

  I flash back on the rumors swirling around school the past few days. Kids have been saying that a weird guy is lurking out here. I overheard two girls talking about it in the washroom. One of them said a man had followed her and creeped her out, and that she’s lucky he didn’t catch her. She said she was never going to come out here again, it didn’t matter who was having a party. The other one said she’d heard the police were searching for the guy because there had been so many reports, but that so far they hadn’t found anything.

  I am cold all over, and not from the temperature.

  Someone is holding me. Someone is smothering me. Someone is stopping me from screaming.

  And the whole way out here, I haven’t seen another soul.

  Not one single person.

  I am alone in the middle of nowhere.

  With a stranger.

  I keep struggling, but it doesn’t do me any good.

  I thrash around, trying to find some way to tell whoever is there that I am going to suffocate. But I can’t speak. I can’t move. I can’t breathe.

  I feel as if I’m going to black out.

  My knees buckle.

  I try to stop myself from falling.

  I tell myself that if I fall, whoever is out there will have won. He will be able to do whatever he wants with me.

  I wonder if anyone will find me.

  Of course someone will—eventually. Because eventually someone will come out here to party. Or to walk in the woods. Or to hunt. Or something. And they will stumble on something. A shallow grave. My grave.

  I try again to break free.

  Instead I feel myself being lifted off the ground.

  Whoever he is, he is strong. I imagine him—a hulking man, bearded, filthy clothes, boots, maybe a bush jacket, jeans, flannel shirt, hunting hat. Maybe with a hunting knife. Maybe with a gun. The girl in the bathroom, the one who said she was followed, also said she never saw him clearly. She just saw flashes of red flannel every now and then, and that’s how she knew
he was trailing her.

  I kick. I try to scream, but when I breathe in, material—I think it’s burlap— fills my mouth and everything goes black.

  The next thing I remember, I am still being carried. I hear a murmur. A voice. More than one voice. Two? Three? I can’t tell.

  But I am definitely being carried. I am being carried down something— maybe down some stairs. Or down a hill.

  Suddenly it’s colder than it was before.

  I hear a creaking sound.

  Then I am dropped.

  I hit the ground. I hear the creaking sound again. Then a bang.

  It takes me a few moments to realize that my hands are not tied. I lift them to my head, and I pull off whatever is covering my head and face. I still can’t see. I panic. Am I blind?

  I reach out, gingerly. I have no idea where I am or what I might touch in this blackness.

  I touch rock.

  I touch wood.

  I walk my hand up the wood and touch a latch.

  A door latch. I try it. It doesn’t give.

  I’m inside a room. From what I remember and from the dankness I feel, I guess it’s a cellar. But what cellar? The last I remember, I was out in the bush. I don’t know of any houses out here. I don’t even know of any abandoned cabins or shacks. But I don’t spend as much time in the bush as most of the kids I know. I don’t come out here on weekends to party. I’ve never been out here with a boy. It’s never been my thing.

  I think again about the creepy guy who’s supposedly lurking out here, the one I overhead that girl talking about. Maybe this is his place. Or maybe he’s been squatting here and has been waiting patiently for someone to stumble into his territory. Someone like me. Now he’s caught me and I am in this cellar—and nobody knows where I am.

  Nobody except John.

  Is he out there somewhere waiting for me? Is he looking for me? Did he see or hear something? Is he close by?

  Is he too close?

  What if the guy who grabbed me has seen him? What if he managed to sneak up on John and used his hunting knife to…to get rid of John?