The Karma Club

by Jessica Brody

  Jade shakes her head, and I can see beads of sweat appearing across her forehead. “No. I don’t know what’s happening. I started feeling sick during seventh period. So I grabbed the pass, ran to the bathroom, and started throwing up. I’ve been here ever since.”

  I glance down at the floor and see Mr. McCauley’s infamous hall pass made out of an actual toilet seat. Whoever decided to give the teachers creative freedom when choosing their hall passes needs to be severely punished.

  “Was it something you ate?” I ask, crouching down next to her and pushing her damp hair away from her forehead.

  She considers this. “I guess it could be. I can’t remember ever feeling this sick.”

  “Maybe it was sabotage. Maybe one of the other girls auditioning for the lead poisoned you!” My mind races with thoughts of conspiracy.

  Jade shakes her head. “I don’t think so. I mean, no one gave me anything to eat. I just ordered my usual turkey chili in the cafeteria.”

  And then, upon hearing her own voice say the words turkey chili, Jade’s eyes grow really big, she covers her mouth with her hand, and turns back to the toilet. I look away. Less out of wanting to give her privacy and more just wanting to keep myself from joining her puke fest in the next stall.

  I had food poisoning once in the tenth grade, and I know from experience that the thought of whatever it was that made you sick will trigger another wave of nausea. This means Jade’s turkey chili was definitely the culprit. But why would anyone poison the chili? Or maybe it wasn’t poisoned. Maybe it was made with bad meat today. I wouldn’t be surprised with the suspicious stuff that goes on in that kitchen. In fact, I’m surprised Jade takes her chances with cafeteria food at all.

  Jade pulls her knees back up to her chest and rests her forehead against them. She looks like she’s ready to collapse at any minute, and I wonder if I should call an ambulance or something. “Do you remember anything unusual today about the . . . um . . . the . . . you know what?” I ask, avoiding any mention of the c-word.

  Jade shakes her head. “No, it looked fine. But it’s not like I inspect my food before I eat it.”

  I rack my brain for another possible answer.

  “There was a new woman working in the cafeteria,” Jade says. “But I doubt that had anything to do with it.”

  “I guess you never know. If she was new, it’s possible she didn’t know what she was doing. Maybe she messed it up.”

  I see tears well up in Jade’s eyes. And I know she’s not crying about the chili.

  “Can you still audition?” I ask hopefully. “I’m sure if you sneak in there right now, Mr. Kent will hardly even notice.”

  Jade sniffles and wipes her nose against her jeans. “No. There’s no way. I’ve thrown up every three minutes for the past hour. And my audition monologue is four minutes long.”

  Soon after, I make a decision to call Jade’s mom, and she comes to pick us up. Jade is diagnosed by her mother as having just an everyday case of food poisoning, and the only thing you can do about it is allow your body to purge all remnants of the poison from your system. Sometimes that takes a few hours, sometimes as much as a few days.

  Jade doesn’t talk the whole ride home. She sits in the front seat, holding the plastic shopping bag that her mom brought for her in case she gets sick in the car, and stares out the window. I can tell she’s thinking about UCLA and how one stupid bowl of chili has probably blown her chances of going.

  Jade’s mom drops me off at home, and I promise Jade I’ll call her later tonight to check up on her. When I get inside the house, I find it eerily empty. I check my watch. It’s four o’clock. At this time, someone is almost always home. Emily, my mom, the housekeeper even. But it’s totally quiet. Like an emergency evacuation has been ordered and no one told me.

  I search everywhere for something that might clue me in to my family’s whereabouts, but there’s nothing. Not even a note taped to the fridge.

  I pour myself a bowl of cereal and take a seat on the couch. I prop my feet up on the coffee table and turn on the TV. It’s not every day that I have this place to myself, so I guess I might as well make the most of it.

  I’m barely two bites into my cereal when the phone rings. For a minute, I consider not answering it because it’s never for me anyway. My friends always call me on my cell phone. But given the unusual absence of people around here, I decide to pick it up.

  “Hello?” I say, swallowing a mouthful of Lucky Charms.

  “Maddy? It’s Dad.”

  “Hi, Dad,” I say, relaxing back against the couch. “If you’re calling for Mom, she’s not here. No one is. It’s really weird actually.”

  “Maddy,” he says again, and this time there’s an urgency in his tone that makes my heart beat faster.

  “Yeah,” I say cautiously.

  “Listen,” he begins, his voice on edge. “I need you to come down to the hospital.”

  Oh, no. Not another one of these phone calls. What on earth could have happened this time? First Angie calls me from the police station, and now my dad is calling me from the hospital?

  “Why?” I jump up to my feet, almost spilling my cereal. “What happened? Is it Mom? Is she okay?”

  “Your mom’s fine,” my dad assures me.

  I sigh loudly. Thank God. But then I ask, “Who is it?”

  The answer nearly knocks me off my feet.

  “Your sister’s been in an accident.”

  MY OWN TV CRIME DRAMA

  Okay, all of this just doesn’t happen to one group of people in the same week. A mathematician would say that it’s not statistically possible. First, Angie gets held up by a bunch of guys in ski masks, then Jade gets food poisoning and misses her audition, and now my little sister is in the hospital with a broken leg.

  Fortunately, that’s all it is. She was hit by some punk kid on a bicycle after she got off the school bus. Afterward, the guy took off. He didn’t even stop. How ridiculous is that? I mean, really? A bicycle hit-and-run?

  What are the odds that these things would happen within mere days of each other? Not very high, I can tell you that. It’s like things are spiraling out of control and I have no idea what or who is next. Is it me? Will I suddenly burst into flames for no apparent reason? Or will the ground suddenly split wide open in front of me and I’ll fall into the hot, fiery center of the earth?

  First thing Tuesday morning, I decide to investigate. I need to figure out why all of this is happening to us. Because the only logical explanation is that someone has found out about the Karma Club and has sought out his or her own revenge in return.

  My first step is to interview the new cafeteria employee. The one Jade remembers serving the chili that made her sick yesterday. As I head down the hallway to the cafeteria at lunchtime, I make a mental list of our suspects and their possible motives.

  SUSPECT #1: Heather Campbell—Somehow she figured out her acne medication had been swapped out for Crisco, linked the crime to us, and has decided to initiate some harmful revenge schemes of her own.

  SUSPECT #2: Mason Brooks—After doing research on the name Catherine Linton, he learned that she is a character from one of my favorite books and then traced the entire scandal, including the whole revelation of the SAT cheating thing, back to me.

  SUSPECT #3: Ryan Feldman—While visiting a hypnotherapist, he remembered seeing me out of the corner of his eye darting suspiciously around the racks of bras at Eve’s Closet, thus linking the shoplifting charge to his ex-girlfriend Angie and me.

  SUSPECT #4: Seth Taylor—After tracking down one of the women that so desperately wanted to sleep with him, he tied her to a chair and used torture devices to get her to admit that she met him on an Internet dating site. Then he hired one of those computer geniuses who work for the CIA to track down the e-mail address used on the profile and link it back to Jade’s father’s high-speed Internet account.

  Clearly some of those scenarios are a little more plausible than others, but I am determined t
o get to the bottom of this. If someone has discovered us, they have to be stopped. Not that I’ll strap concrete blocks to their feet and drop them into the San Francisco Bay or anything. More like I’ll speak to them rationally and try to talk them into stopping.

  When I get to the cafeteria, I don’t notice anything unusual. The same lunch ladies seem to be going about their business of serving up hamburgers, mac and cheese, and very suspicious-looking taco meat. I pull a tray off the stack and make my way down the line. I attempt to blend in and pretend that I’m just another hungry customer, trying to decide which delicious delicacy I’ll order today. All the while, I’m scanning the kitchen for someone who looks new. But really, how the heck am I supposed to know who’s new? It’s not like I’m a regular here. I always bring my lunch. And after getting a whiff of that mac and cheese in front of me, I’m reminded why.

  I decide to take a more direct approach. “Hello,” I say to the woman who’s waiting impatiently for me to make a decision. “What happened to that new girl who was in here yesterday?”

  The woman stares at me with this blank expression, and for a minute I think that she’s not going to even answer, but then she goes, “Fired her.”

  I blink my eyes in disbelief. “What?”

  “She screwed up one of the batches of chili on her first day. A couple of kids got sick, so we had to let her go.”

  Well, there you go. Culprit found. But the information is not terribly helpful, as it doesn’t link the food poisoning back to any of my suspects. I try to think about what a detective on one of those popular TV crime dramas would do at this point. He would definitely ask more questions. So I do.

  “Hmmm,” I say curiously, surveying my lunch options. “Everything looks so good, it’s hard to decide.”

  The woman is clearly not amused by my antics. “Well, do it fast. You’re holding up the line.”

  I nod. “The mac and cheese looks promising. Do you happen to remember anything about the woman who was fired yesterday?”

  The lunch lady shoots me a very strange look, like I might be one of those special ed kids that she has been trained to deal with in a patient and understanding manner. I guess this ends up working in my favor because she goes, “Her name was Leanne something or other. She only wanted to work here once a week because she already had another job. A flight attendant, I think.”

  I squint at her. “Leanne, you say?”

  “Yeah, now are you gonna order or just stand there and ask more questions?”

  I’m too lost in thought to decide about food right now. So I mumble something that sounds like no and exit the line, abandoning my empty tray on the metal slider.

  There’s something very familiar about the name Leanne, but I’m not really sure why. It’s not like I know any flight attendants.

  I push it to the back of my mind and hope that the subsequent stops on my investigative path will prove more fruitful. The next place I go is Mason’s house. I know, I know, it’s pretty much a suicidal thing to do. But I have to talk to his mom and ask her if she remembers anything about the night she went to Miller’s Drug Store. I mean, according to Angie, those guys in the ski masks walked in the door mere seconds after she left. Maybe Mrs. Brooks can tell me something that will apply to my case that didn’t necessarily make a difference in the police investigation.

  Plus, I purposely choose a time when I know Mason will be at soccer practice. Since he’s one of my prime suspects, it’s important that I interview his mother when he’s not around.

  After school, I ride the bus home and get my bike out of the garage. It’s absolutely humiliating that I have to resort to this, but I still have one week left of my driving probation. Jade is still home sick, and Angie’s parents have been dropping her off and picking her up from school every day since the robbery. And it’s not like I can ask Spencer to take me. I already had to lie to him earlier today to get out of going home with him.

  As I pedal my way down the hill toward Mason’s house, I can’t help thinking about the fact that, for the past couple weeks, all I seem to be doing is lying to the people that I care about. I’ve been lying to Jade and Angie ever since I kissed Spencer. And now I’m lying to him too. But it’s for the best, right? If Angie and Jade found out about Spencer, they would be crushed. And if Spencer found out about the Karma Club, he’d most definitely break up with me. So really, what choice do I have?

  Once at Mason’s house, I take a deep, motivating breath and then reach out to ring the doorbell. As I stand on that welcome mat, a place I’ve stood hundreds of times over the past two years, I realize that being here is going to be harder than I thought. Just looking at Mason’s door is bringing back so many memories that I would have rather kept packed away in boxes in the back of my mind. I close my eyes and will myself to be strong. This goes much deeper than just me and my pride. I have to find out why these terrible things are happening to my friends and my family.

  Mrs. Brooks answers the door, and she breaks into a warm and inviting smile, immediately putting me at ease. “Oh, Maddy. It’s so good to see you again. Please come in.” She holds the door open for me, but I hesitate on the front steps. I don’t think I can go in there. Not after everything that’s happened. Facing Mason’s front door was hard enough. The thought of facing his couch, his TV, his dining room table, and everything else is too much to think about.

  “Actually, I’ll just stay out here, if you don’t mind,” I tell her.

  She seems to understand and nods cordially.

  “I wanted to ask you a few questions about the night that Mr. Miller’s store was robbed.”

  Mrs. Brooks instantly looks pained. “So terrible, wasn’t it? How’s Angela holding up? Is she very upset?”

  “She’s doing better. A bit shaken up.”

  “I couldn’t believe it when the police came and told me what happened. It was such a shock to me because I didn’t see anyone in the parking lot when I left,” Mrs. Brooks tells me.

  My heart sinks upon hearing this, but I force myself to ask, “So you didn’t see anyone?”

  She shakes her head again. “No. I wish I had. I wish I could have been more help. But I hurried back to my car and drove away. I was anxious to get home so I could bring Mason the bandages I bought. He was bleeding pretty badly.”

  As soon as she says this, my ears perk up and my eyes open a little wider. “You were buying those for Mason?” I’m not sure why I didn’t know that before. Had anyone even mentioned it? Did Angie know?

  “Yes, he cut his hand open while cleaning out the toolshed. We were out of bandages, so I ran out to get some,” Mrs. Brooks tells me.

  I’m totally confused now. “Why was Mason cleaning out the toolshed on a Saturday night? Wasn’t he at the Loft par . . .” My voice trails off as a sinking realization hits me. Of course he was home on Saturday night. Heather dumped him, so he would have never been able to get into the Loft party after that. She would have made sure of it.

  “Maddy, are you all right?” Mrs. Brooks asks, putting a hand on my shoulder.

  She is obviously referring to the fact that I’m standing here with my mouth wide open, looking like I’m about to get hit by a bus.

  I blink rapidly. “Yes, I’m fine. I just remembered I have to go do something. Thank you for your time, Mrs. Brooks.” With that, I turn around, race back down the steps, hop on my bike, and pedal furiously toward the Pine Valley Memorial Hospital.

  My mind is racing the entire way. I have a million thoughts, and I’m having a hard time sorting through them.

  When I get to the hospital, I chain my bike to a telephone pole, speed through the front doors, and dash into the elevator. I arrive in Emily’s room two minutes later, completely panting and out of breath.

  “Maddy?” My mom leaps to her feet when she sees me. “Are you okay?”

  I don’t answer her. Instead, I turn to Emily and say, “You have to remember who hit you. Who was it? What did they look like? You have to remember something
about them!”

  Emily looks at me like I’ve completely lost it, and maybe I have.

  “I already told everyone I don’t know,” she says, confused. “Including you when you were here last night. I was hit from behind. I couldn’t see anything.”

  “You have to have seen a shoe, an arm, something!” I’m quite aware of the desperation in my voice, but I don’t care.

  “Madison,” my mom says in a warning voice. “Don’t upset your sister. Besides, it doesn’t matter what she saw or didn’t see. We already know who did it.”

  I struggle to catch my breath. “You do?”

  “Yes,” my mom says. “He turned himself in and confessed about an hour ago. It was a terrible accident, and he feels awful about what happened. His family has already promised to pay the hospital bills.”

  “Well, who is it?” I say, even though I’m afraid of what her answer might be.

  “You know him, actually,” my mom replies. “He’s that guy Angie used to date. Ryan Feldman.”

  THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT

  I stagger back until my legs hit a chair and I collapse into it.

  Ryan Feldman. Ryan Feldman hit my sister on his bike. Ryan Feldman wouldn’t have been riding a bike if his parents hadn’t taken away his car. And I know exactly why that happened.

  The Karma Club.

  And what about Mason Brooks? He was home on a Saturday night. He cut his hand while cleaning out the toolshed. His mom begged Angie to open the pharmacy door that she had already locked in order to buy bandages. And once that door was opened, three men entered with guns and forced Angie to empty the register. But Mason Brooks was only home on a Saturday night because of one thing.

  The Karma Club.