Panic

by Sharon M. Draper

  “Gotcha.”

  Just then Layla saw her own mom hurrying over. She carried no bouquet. She looked tired and smelled of fried chicken. But Layla was happy to be drawn into her embrace. “Glad you came, Mom.”

  “I’m sorry, honey,” she said. “Cook wouldn’t let me go—we had a busload of teenagers stop in.”

  Layla made a face. “Oh, that’s the worst!”

  “Loud, rude, and hungry—fifty of them!”

  “I’m sorry you had put up with that, Mom. But you didn’t miss anything.”

  “But I did! Your solo! I felt so bad.”

  “I didn’t do so good tonight anyway,” Layla admitted.

  “Nonsense. You’re always amazing, even when you think you mess up.”

  “I fell, Mom.”

  Her mother’s eyes grew wide. “Oh, no! Did you hurt yourself?”

  “No, just my pride. I made an ass of myself. And I knew that dance, inside and out.” Layla sighed. “Mom, can we maybe talk about some stuff tonight? I’ll send Donny on his way, and I can ride with you.”

  “Tonight? Oh, sweetie, can we talk about it in the morning? You’ll see things differently then anyway.” Layla’s mother dug in her purse and pulled out her cell phone.

  Layla’s heart sank. “Are you going out?” she asked, even though she knew the answer.

  “I’ve got a date,” her mom said, a distracted smile lighting her face as she scrolled through her text messages.

  A too-familiar pressure tightened in Layla’s chest. She lowered her voice and said angrily, “You and Daddy are not divorced! He’s coming back!” She and her mother had had this conversation far too many times.

  “Layla, I’m not going to marry the guy—we’ve been over this! I just deserve a little fun in my life,” her mother replied in exasperation.

  “Well, I hope you take a shower before you go out,” Layla lashed back. “You stink of chicken grease!”

  “And I bothered to hurry over and see you!” Mrs. Ridgewood fumed. “Tell Donovan to have you home at a decent hour.”

  Her eyes stinging with tears, Layla looked around and hoped no one had heard their conversation. The lobby was almost empty. Justin was leaning against a table, waiting for his dad, but he wasn’t looking her way.

  Layla’s mother hurried out without saying good-bye. How did that go downhill so fast? Layla wondered dejectedly. As she headed toward Donovan’s car, Layla thought about Diamond and the devastation her parents must be feeling. Would her own mother worry and fret all night if she were missing?

  14

  LAYLA, Saturday, April 13 9:45 p.m.

  “His iron claw made a circle of dead water round him,

  from which they fled like affrighted fishes.”

  —from Peter Pan

  The spinning hubcaps of Donovan’s truck sparkled with raindrops.

  “So, why you always gotta be the last one out?” Donovan said as he roared out of the parking lot.

  Layla barely had time to buckle her seat belt. Her head bumped back into the padded headrest as the SUV swung into the street.

  Layla exploded into tears.

  “Dang, girl. What’s up with you? Why you cryin’?”

  “My mother is stupid, and my friend Diamond is missing,” Layla choked out, gulping down a sob. She chose to leave her issues with him out of it.

  “Diamond? The fine one?”

  “Yeah.” She paused. “Is that how you see her?”

  “I’m not blind.” He stopped at a red light, and Layla tried to pull herself together. Donovan nudged her with his shoulder. “Well, you can’t fix stupid, and I’m sure Diamond will show up.”

  “You’re no help,” Layla muttered.

  “Okay, okay. Calm down. Explain what you mean by missing,” Donovan said.

  Layla took a deep breath. “Diamond dipped out on the performance tonight. She said she had a chance to be in a movie, so she left with some dude she didn’t even know.”

  “Huh. She came across to me as somebody with some sense.”

  “I just wanted to talk to her,” Layla said, still sniffing.

  “Who? Diamond?”

  “No. My mother. She blew me off. She’s got a date.”

  “Get back, Moms. Momma’s gonna kick it tonight.”

  Layla glared at him. “I hate when she goes out. And she always picks some total lowlife.”

  “I guess even mothers have needs.”

  “She’s got a husband.”

  “Who is locked up.”

  “But just for two more years!”

  “You living in dreamland, girl. Your mom won’t want your daddy when he gets out.” He turned the windshield wipers up to a faster speed. They swished back and forth almost frenetically.

  Layla sighed. “Maybe not. But it’s possible they could work things out.”

  “Seems like your mother’s got a thing for losers.”

  “Look, I can talk about my mother, but you can’t.”

  Donovan held up one hand in apology. “My bad.”

  “Sometimes she brings her dates home,” Layla admitted. “I hate that even more. Plus, we never talk anymore, me and my mom.”

  “You got me. You wanna talk to me?”

  “You’re sweet to offer, Donny. But this is complicated.”

  “Try me. I’m complicated too!”

  Layla laughed, then studied him for a moment. “You won’t like some of it,” she warned.

  “I promise I’ll be cool.”

  “Promise?”

  “Didn’t I just say that? Now, go on, spit it out.” Donovan was starting to sound annoyed, so Layla hurried to tell him what was on her mind.

  “Well, okay, so I was a little shaky about going onstage because Diamond wasn’t there,” she began. “She’s, like, my rock. She makes me feel like I can do anything just because she says so. And she’s, like, seriously missing. Nobody has heard from her for hours.”

  “Yeah, and?”

  “And I’m standing in the wings, trying to visualize my dance, and you come backstage and start yelling at me!”

  “Don’t make me the bad guy!”

  Layla turned away from him. “I knew I couldn’t talk to you about this.”

  “I’m cool. I’m cool. Go on.”

  She waited a moment, then said, “I needed you on my side tonight. Not hassling me. You’ve got me, body and soul, and you don’t need to growl at me like I’m your dog on a leash.”

  “Okay. Okay. I guess I went a little overboard. But you looked so good in that costume, and I didn’t want to share that with an auditorium full of people.”

  “I looked good?”

  “Good enough to lick the plate.”

  “Then why did you say I was getting fat?”

  “Can’t you take a joke?”

  “It wasn’t funny to me. I think I messed up my dance because I was worried about you.”

  “You messed up?”

  “Didn’t you see me wipe out?”

  “I went outside after your teacher chased me away. All those dances look the same to me anyway. Girls jumpin’ all over the stage. I had to get some air.”

  “You’re kidding, right? You missed my dance?” Layla asked incredulously.

  “Turns out I didn’t miss much, to hear you tell it.”

  “I thought you came to see me perform—to support me.”

  “I did. But by the time I got back to my seat, you were just leaving the stage. People were clapping, so I figured you did fine. You always do.”

  “So not one person I care about saw me dance.” Layla slumped back into the seat.

  “Get over yourself. I told you—I sat through most of that boring stuff for you. Anyway, wasn’t that you in the back row in the second half of the show?”

  “Yeah, probably.”

  “So cheer up. I did my part. You owe me.”

  “Owe you? What?”

  “You know.”

  “Not tonight, Donny. I gotta get home.”

  �
��Why? Your mom is out. We’ve got all night.”

  “Don’t you have to get to work?”

  “I’ll call in sick.”

  “I’m wiped, Donny. I just want to get some sleep.”

  “I thought you loved me.”

  “You know I love you.”

  “Soooooo . . . ”

  “Donny, don’t be like this.”

  “I saw you checkin’ out Justin backstage.”

  “Huh? What are you talkin’ about?”

  “You savin’ it for him?”

  “What? You trippin’! Justin means nothing to me. Why you always gotta go there?”

  “I’m just sayin’ . . . ”

  “Take me home, Donny. Please. Don’t make me prove anything tonight. I need to be alone to think and rest. Please.”

  He stopped at another red light, reached over, and grabbed her left arm. Hard. His fingernails clawed into her skin.

  Layla cried out. “You’re hurting me,” she whispered.

  “Love hurts,” he said sharply. He released her arm when the light changed. But his face was stone.

  “I want to go home,” she pleaded, rubbing her arm.

  “Okay, you win,” he said finally. “But remember, you owe me.”

  15

  JUSTIN, Saturday, April 13 10 p.m.

  “ . . . he had dreams and they were more painful than the dreams of other boys.”

  —from Peter Pan

  “You hungry, Jus?” Justin’s dad asked, peeking into his son’s room. “You’ve been moping around since you got home.”

  “I had a sandwich earlier. I just feel kinda maxed out.”

  “You did great tonight—I got some good stuff to edit down for these college applications.”

  “Thanks, Dad.” Justin picked at the blue plaid comforter he’d had on his bed since he was about six.

  “Something bothering you?” His dad came in and sank into Justin’s desk chair.

  “It’s just that—well, I was really missing Mom tonight,” Justin admitted. “I remember telling her dudes don’t get bouquets of roses . . . ”

  “ . . . and she’d bring them every time anyway!” his dad finished with a small laugh. “She really got into your performances.”

  “And the practices. And the costumes. And the pictures. I think she had that camera surgically implanted in her hand!” Justin smiled, remembering.

  “She’s at your shows in spirit,” his dad reminded him.

  “Now you sound like those old ladies at church,” Justin groaned. “I feel her spirit, but I’d rather have her here.” He played with his braids. “And her flowers!”

  “Me too, Justin. Me too.”

  The silence between them was accentuated by the relentless rain outside. It was still so hard to talk about her, especially to his dad. It was like if he talked to his father about his mom, he made his dad even sadder. It’d been an entire year since that damn phone call, a year since the police had told them there’d been an accident. A stormy night. A drunk driver. And his mom was gone. So completely not fair.

  “Can I ask you something, Dad?” Justin asked after a few minutes.

  “Sure.”

  “Girls are so complicated.”

  “That’s the question? Sounds like you’ve got that one figured out already.”

  “Nah, I don’t understand them at all.”

  “Can you give me a for-instance?”

  “Well, one of the girls at the studio—you know Diamond, right?”

  “Yes, the one with the pretty hair and smile. You’ve done duets with her a couple of times, haven’t you?”

  “Yeah, she’s fine, but that’s not why I mention her. She, like, ran away or got kidnapped or something.”

  His father sat up straight. “Oh my God! How did that happen?”

  “We’re not sure. You know how girls gather in groups and gossip. They were huddling all evening. I stay around the edges and try to keep up.”

  His father nodded. “I feel you there.”

  “But the bottom line is, Diamond didn’t show up for the performance tonight. She sent her friend a text that said she was trying out for a part in some movie, and she went off with some strange guy. Nobody has heard anything from her since.”

  “Is this a girl you have feelings for, Justin?”

  “No. I mean, I like her all right, but she’s not special like that. I just don’t get how girls can be so dumb.”

  “Ah. Let me go dig out my book called Why Women Do Stuff.”

  “You need to write it, Dad. Guys my age could use it.”

  “The whole thing would be two hundred blank pages, kiddo. The real answer is, nobody knows!”

  “Yeah, like Layla . . . ”

  “Poor kid, she had a rough night,” his father commented.

  “You saw her mess up?”

  “She covered it quickly—very professionally, I thought.”

  “She’s such a good dancer, but she doesn’t think so.” Justin sat up and let his long legs hang over the edge of the bed.

  “How do you know?” his dad asked.

  “No matter what compliment somebody gives her, she always talks down about herself.”

  “Confidence problem?”

  “It’s more than that, Dad. She’s, like, really, really beautiful, but I don’t think she sees that when she looks in the mirror.”

  “What does she see?”

  “Somebody overweight and not good enough.”

  “Not good enough for what?”

  “For dancing. For being. I think she sees herself as ugly.”

  “And what do you see?” He straightened a pile of books on Justin’s desk.

  Justin paused and pulled a sheet of notebook paper from the top drawer of his bedside table. He read slowly, giving each word its due. “She is beauty. She is grace. She moves like fluttering leaves.”

  “Wow. A girl who brings out the poetry in you.”

  “She is poetry to me.”

  “So why don’t you tell her?”

  Justin let the paper drift to the floor. “I can’t.”

  His dad raised his eyebrows. “Why not?”

  “She’s all hooked up with somebody else.”

  “So what?”

  “It’s complicated, Dad.”

  “There’s a girl you care about and you won’t even let her know?”

  “You remember Donovan, the kid I used to hang out with in elementary school? We used to be best friends. Not that you could tell now,” Justin added.

  Mr. Braddock shifted in his chair. “Yeah, cute little fellow. Smart. Loved cars, if I remember. What happened to you two, by the way?”

  “He’s not so little anymore. He’s into some shady stuff, and he’s got, like, these chains around Layla. She looks at him like he’s the last player on the planet.”

  “That may be, but I’ve never known you to back away from a challenge.”

  Justin sighed. “It’s like he controls her, like she’s his toy that he winds up, and she does what he wants. She deserves so much better than that.”

  His father gave him a sidelong glance. “How do you know she’s not happy being his toy?”

  “How can anybody feel good about being used like that?”

  His dad nodded. “You’ve got a point there.”

  “That’s another chapter in your book, I guess.” Justin stood up and scratched his head. “But really, Dad. Why would she stay with a dude like him? What’s up with that?”

  “Well, I suppose she has to want more for her life; she has to want to escape from a guy like Donovan.”

  “So how do I make that happen, Dad?”

  “Just be yourself. Reach out to her if you can. Read my book.”

  Justin laughed. “Yeah, maybe I can add a chapter to it one day.”

  “Follow your heart, Justin. She’ll figure out how much you care.”

  Justin began pacing around the bedroom. “Yeah, right. Easy for you to say.”

  “I’ve been around
the block a couple of times.”

  “It’s weird. Me and Donny used to be friends. But now he treats me like the enemy.”

  “My army buddies used to say, ‘All’s fair in love and war.’ You willing to fight for the young lady?”

  “I hope it doesn’t come to that. But I sure wish she knew how I felt.”

  “She’ll never know unless you tell her,” his dad said, picking Justin’s poem up off the floor, holding it out.

  “Yeah, I know, I know. I’ll think about it,” Justin said, taking the paper.

  “Good. Now get some sleep. I hope it works out for you.” His father closed the door quietly behind him.

  Justin sat on the edge of his bed, trying to make sense of his jumbled thoughts. Finally he turned off his lamp and slid under the covers. But it took a long, long time for him to fall asleep.

  16

  LAYLA, Saturday, April 13 11 p.m.

  “Tink was not all bad: or, rather, she was all bad just now,

  but, on the other hand, sometimes she was all good.”

  —from Peter Pan

  Layla showered slowly, letting the warm water massage her sore arm. She could already tell that she’d have to wear long sleeves tomorrow. She toweled off carefully, put on her pajamas, and picked up her phone. Scrolling through her list, she tapped Mercedes’ picture. Seconds later Mercedes picked up.

  “What’s up, girl? Any news?” Layla asked, stretching out on her bed.

  “Nothing. And it’s driving me bananas. My dad said the police think Diamond might have run away,” Mercedes told her.

  “No way. No way. Diamond would never do that. Now if you hear of me running away from my crazy mother, you better check the homeless shelters and parks. I might be under a bench!”

  Mercedes laughed, then asked, “Are you hanging with Donovan tonight?”

  “No, I sent him home. Too much drama for one night.”

  “Yeah, that dude does seem to bring it with him.”

  “Aw, girl, you just never get to see his sweet side. When we’re alone, he’s like a cuddly puppy.” Layla wouldn’t let herself think about the marks on her arm.

  “He seems more like a pit bull to me.”

  “See what I mean? You gotta see it from my point of view. Donny is there for me when nobody else is around. He makes my heart beat fast when I just look at him. Plus, his ride is so tight. He let me drive it the other night. Whoa, that engine’s got power!” Layla wanted her friend to understand, but she found it hard to put it all into words.