by Lamar Giles
I got it. He couldn’t tell what he didn’t know. Couldn’t be made to tell.
Switching phones was key, but there was the little obstacle of sending each other the new numbers. Enter Facebook.
Step 1: With over a billion users, FB’s the perfect way to hide in public. My page is a fake, obviously. To those floating around cyberspace, my name is Stan Humphrey, Cablon High class of ’04. I enjoy sushi, massages, and Caribbean cruises. Every so often, Stan gets a wall post from a rival of his favorite sports team, the L.A. Lakers.
Kobe Bryant can eat %&^ and *#&@ die.
A casual observer would think it was just some flamer dick taking his sports too seriously . . . missing the code entirely.
The symbols correspond to numerals on a standard QWERTY keyboard. The way our system works you add one to the number that corresponds with each symbol.
The symbols %&^ convert to 687, your area code.
Decode *#&@ and you get the last four digits of the phone number.
Step #2: Twitter. No decoding. Bricks simply posts his predictions for the pick-three lottery drawing: 555, for example.
I combine the pieces and—boom!—my godfather’s latest number.
And if he hasn’t gotten around to shooting the latest code into cyberspace, I just send a private message to his Twitter account. A simple ##. Letting him know to start the process. That’s what I planned to do.
Until I saw the private message in my Facebook in-box: Call Me. Now. 856-555-8741.
Bricks bypassed our codes, our slick system. A straight phone number.
That meant something bad. Possibly life threatening.
Call me. Now.
Too bad the message was already two days old.
CHAPTER 34
PACING. I WAS AT THE EDGE of the lake, with my new disposable pressed to my ear, and a light drizzle falling. A hollow ring bleeted through the receiver while I imagined the infinite horrors that might inspire such an urgent and sloppy request from Bricks. “Come on.”
The ringing ceased abruptly.
“Is this Mama Luisa’s Pizza?” I blurted, still playing our spy game.
“No need for that,” Bricks said. “I’m alone.”
“What happened?”
“You just got my message?”
“I don’t check that account every day.” Breathing on his end, that’s all. Like some perv crank call. “Is this about Kreso? Does he know something about where we are?”
“This is about your mom.”
I stopped walking, dumbstruck. “What? Mom?”
“She’s been reaching out to old players up here, trying to call in markers and get her hands on some cash. Damn, I didn’t think she’d be so stupid.”
“Why would she—?”
I have friends. You’d be surprised how many!
Dad’s lies hadn’t fooled her, only delayed her. Got her to slow down before putting her plan in motion. What else had all her weirdness been about? The mysterious old car, the snooping on Dad, that weird conversation before Eli’s funeral. It couldn’t be a coincidence.
We were going to run.
“You still there?” Bricks asked.
“I’m here.”
“What’s she up to, Tony? Messing with the streets again is insane.”
“Does Kreso know?” I said, evading.
“I don’t think so. She’s been hitting up some low-level sharks mostly. These guys aren’t on the Big Man’s radar. Yet. But if people keep talking . . .”
It would get to Kreso eventually. Mom had to know that. Which meant whatever she was planning would happen soon.
Bricks said, “If she needed something she should’ve come to me!”
I held the phone from my ear, stunned by the outburst. He had a thing for her when they were kids, I knew that. Those “remember when” stories used to be funny, with Bricks laughing as much as Mom and Dad over his childhood crush. There was no humor in him now. Just . . . ick.
“Thanks for letting me know about Mom.”
“Tony, talk to her.” He pressed on, “Give her this number if you have to. I’ll help.”
“What? You want me to let her know that we’ve been talking on the down low, for years, then ask if she wants to play, too?”
Dad might be involved in a political conspiracy and kid murder. Mom was planning to duck WitSec. Now Bricks wanted to reveal our secret calls. Was everyone going crazy?
“Do what I say, Tony. Call me back tonight and let me know—”
“Someone’s coming, Bricks.” No one was. “I gotta go.”
I ended the call, tossed the phone in the water, and stared at my throwing hand like it was demon possessed. I couldn’t talk to Bricks anymore today, not about Mom. But I never got to ask him any of the stuff I’d intended to. About the mayor and Miguel Rios and how Dad might be connected to them.
Would any of it matter if Mom told me to pack a bag today or tomorrow?
It felt like my life was falling apart. Since it wasn’t really my life, I should’ve been okay with it. You know, cool. .But there’s a difference between being cool and feeling cold fingers walking up my spine when I considered what might be coming.
I got in bed that night with my thoughts shifting back to two dead Stepton teens. Fatigue overlaid their faces with another kid’s from long ago. A kid with a cartoon on his shirt who begged “Big Man” Kreso Maric for his life while my father held the boy’s fate in his hand.
My buzzing phone interrupted the start of a nightmare.
Reya: Lorenz died 2nite
Three dead Stepton teens. My stomach clenched at the count. Another text.
Reya: We r getting n that room 2morrow
Me: Count on it
CHAPTER 35
A HALF HOUR BEFORE FIRST BELL, I examined the J-Room padlock, a Schlage. I took a picture with my phone for reference. After school, Reya would drive us to a hardware store in Portside for materials to make and test the bump key.
I ran into a small group where the halls intersected. Three of them craning their necks the way people do in a building like the White House. Wow, the president’s lightbulbs work the same as my lightbulbs.
New kids. Army brats, I guessed. Eli told me they get a lot of them here. They were escorted by a fourth kid decked in an orange vest that actually said Student Guide. The group moved on, down the main corridor and past the grief counselors, who’d extended their stay for another week.
Classes crept by. I’d memorized the bump key tutorial on YouTube, my hands mimicking small filing motions under my desk, ready to work. My bag shook. I snatched my phone before my teacher heard.
Reya: Meet @ science hall after bell, found a better way
Ring, ring.
The bell stopped as I got close to the science hall, but the corridor remained packed and noisy. Voices. Shouting. Screaming.
Cheering?
People crowded, packed tight, which was weird this far from the caf. I wedged between classmates who stood on tiptoes or leaned sideways for a better view of . . . something.
I heard a voice I recognized and this crazy knocking sound again.
“Skanky bitch!” Reya shouted.
THONK.
“Messing with”—THONK—“my man.”
Chants of “Girl fight! Girl fight!” An anthem. I broke through the crowd.
What. A. View.
Callie, the girl who left me in the woods to be mauled by Zach and company on Saturday night, slid on her knees across the slick tile floor. Reya stood over her, two handfuls of Callie’s hair coiled in her fingers, dragging the girl from one side of the hall to the other. And at the end of each trip—THONK—Reya rammed Callie’s head into the closest locker before reversing her momentum and repeating the process on the opposite side. THONK.
I might be in love.
A linebacker in a starched white shirt and black slacks muscled me aside. Vice Principal Hardwick shouted, “Settle down!”
The crowd shushed. Except for Reya. Sh
e didn’t miss a beat. THONK.
As Hardwick closed the gap between them, Reya released Callie, and her momentum swung her directly into Hardwick’s embrace.
“Have you lost your mind, Ms. Cruz?”
“I’m sorry,” Reya said, “but she—”
“Quiet! There’s never an excuse for this.” He clamped down on Reya’s arm, then helped a wobbling Callie to her feet.
The VP walked them toward me, on his way to the office for the obligatory parental phone call. When the girls passed me, Reya bucked Mr. Hardwick’s grip, hopped up and down like a lunatic. “Anybody else want to disrespect me?”
Reya ran past me and shoved some poor kid I didn’t know. “You want some, too?”
Hardwick stepped up, snaked an arm around her waist, and lifted her off her feet. “Move,” he shouted to anyone and everyone. The crowd parted. Reya kicked and screamed the whole way.
Kids dispersed quickly, anxious to get to the cafeteria and broadcast the events to those unfortunate enough to miss what was already being billed as the fight of the year. I stayed behind. Reaching into my jacket pocket, I removed the heavy key chain Reya slipped in after she shoved that last kid. A key chain she’d lifted off Hardwick’s belt during the scuffle.
A better way indeed.
Seven keys on Hardwick’s key chain were Schlage compatible and I hit the jackpot on the fourth try. I ducked under the yellow caution tape strung diagonally across the frame.
Red, tacky blood pooled ahead of me. I blinked.
No blood, clean tiles.
“Breathe, Nick.”
Mostly, the room remained unchanged from my last visit. Someone had taken the ancient Macintosh and printers, but reference books still lined the baseboard and teetered in stacks at each corner.
I had a half hour before next bell. I went straight for Eli’s desk.
The drawers were unlocked. It saved me the time of breaking in but didn’t bode well for me finding anything useful. As I suspected, they were all empty.
I sat in Eli’s chair—nowhere near as creepy as I feared. If he’d hidden a flash drive in a locked drawer, as most rational people would, then the Eli Magical Mystery Tour was over. No clues, no evidence, no case.
The keyword: rational.
Those books along the wall drew my attention each and every time I entered the room. He could’ve hidden a flash drive in one of them. I scanned the titles, everything from automotive manuals to The Chronicles of Narnia. I grabbed the closest one and leafed through it, found nothing. Moved on to the next. There was no time to get through all of them. I’d have to figure out a way to get back in here after school, before Hardwick realized—
The third book I chose came from a bulky stack in the corner closest to Eli’s desk. When I removed it, a white plastic corner protruded from the area the book formerly concealed. I set the book aside and began to remove more volumes from that stack until I revealed the entire heavy-duty plastic beast.
A stepladder.
Above, I noticed a fiberglass ceiling panel slightly askew in the overhead grid.
Working quickly I cleared the rest of the books and climbed the ladder. I had Eli by a few inches so it was easy to reach in and snag his stash. An insulated lunch box rested in the ceiling.
It contained a single flash drive and an ancient peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I pocketed the flash drive and put everything back the way I found it. The bell rang just as I emerged into the hall.
Mission accomplished.
By the time final bell rang I felt like a rocket about to blast off. I biked to Reya’s in record time. She met me at the front door. “Did you find it?”
I glanced away and shook my head. She sighed. “It’s okay. There was no guarantee that he—”
I held up the flash drive. She punched me in the shoulder for lying.
“Hey, I’m not Callie. Please, don’t unleash your wrath.”
“That crap got me kicked out of school for two weeks.”
I’d heard. But what a genius move. I had a feeling Eli would’ve been proud. I know I was.
We plugged in the flash drive. Her machine booted and I dried my sweaty palms on my jeans.
A window appeared on the screen and my face went slack. Reya ran both hands through her hair. “No, no, no.”
We had another mystery to solve.
Eli’s password.
CHAPTER 36
A BUMP KEY WASN’T GOING TO get us past the flash drive’s security. After a couple of hundred wrong passwords, I had to keep Reya from snapping the thing in two. Even though that’s what I felt like doing.
It went like that for days.
I drifted through school, jotting down new password guesses when they came to me. Eli liked Star Wars, so I made a Star Wars list. My journalism list had things like “C0lumn$” and “1nch3s.” All of them wrong. Reya, suspended for fighting and obsessed, spent all her time trying to crack the code, filling notebooks with her failed attempts. I went to her place after school each day to take a typing shift while she soaked her hands in ice like an athlete. Hackers we weren’t.
I expected Mrs. Cruz to shut the whole thing down since Reya got in trouble over the Callie fight. All she said was, “It’s nice to have one of Eli’s friends over,” like I was visiting him.
By day four, I found Reya wearing a pair of glasses with purple frames, kid’s glasses. When I asked her about them, she said, “Contacts were irritating me.”
I looked from her to the picture of Eli on her mirror, noting a much stronger resemblance between them. I would’ve said something, but she was too into unlocking the drive.
During one super-frustrating code-cracking session, my phone lit up.
Dustin: I’m @ home now. Got my phone back (as u can tell)
Me: U ok?
Dustin: No. But I’m here. That’s more than L + C can say
Me: Remember, keep quiet. Me & Reya r workn something
thatll help
Dustin: Lik what?!?! Dont make this worst, yo!
Me: B cool. Stay low. Will b n touch
I snapped my phone shut and powered it down. I couldn’t deal with him freaking right now.
Wait, freaking. Maybe with a 3 for the e and an @ for the . . .
The password window flashed red at another bad attempt while Reya dozed behind me. Hopeless.
Late was the new early at my house. There’d been no fights, and Mom kept insisting that we “eat breakfast as a family,” but the evenings felt like I lived in a bachelor pad. Sandwiches and sodas in front of the TV, no parents to be found.
I took my dad’s spot on the couch and surfed channels. One more day of school this week, then a long weekend of staring at the password screen. Hopefully.
If Mom was planning to run, how much longer did I have in Stepton? With Reya? I could’ve asked Mom directly, put everything on the table, but I was afraid. Afraid that if I mentioned it, I’d make it happen. Like now.
I powered on my phone intending to text Reya, but I accidentally touched the voice mail icon. One saved message. From Eli.
“You’re really going to make me use my voice here, huh? Okay. Nick, um, I’m sorry about what happened today. For reals. I line crossed. From now on, I’ll keep you out of my more . . . troublesome obligations. As a peace offering, I wanted to let you know that my guild is going to quest for Urilium Gauntlet tonight, and I wanted to invite you to join our brotherhood. You can lead the war party if you want.”
Bingo. Video games.
I called Reya. When she picked up, I heard keys clacking in the background. “What?”
Ignoring the snap in her voice, I said, “I’ve got some new ones for you.”
“Hang on.” Rustling, crackling static, then, “You’re on speaker.”
“These are all video game based.” I started with Modern Battlefield because Eli was so good at it. We worked through the names of maps, guns, co-op missions. Nothing. We switched to that Finite Universe game. “Try Urilium.”
&nbs
p; “Spell it.”
I did. “If that doesn’t work, try gauntl—”
“Nick! Nick! Oh my God,” she screamed, forcing me to lower the phone. At a distance, I still heard her say, “I love you soooo much right now.”
My stomach clenched. She was happy. That’s all.
When her volume decreased, I said, “It worked. What do you see?”
“There’s a folder called ‘Whispertown,’ but there’s a ton of stuff in it. All sorts of files and subfolders. It’s going to take a while to sort through. Come by early tomorrow, I should have some answers.”
“Hey, what you said a minute ago—” The line went dead.
CHAPTER 37
THE WORST DAY OF MY LIFE began with a kiss from my mother.
Her lips pressed my forehead, warm and comforting, waking me. I felt five again. “Come on, sweetie. I need you to get up.”
The sky beyond my window was purple, gold streaks signaling the rising sun. Mom wore black, just like I imagined she would on our last day in Stepton.
No. Not now. Please not now.
I reached for the bedside lamp. The bulb flared, revealing her usual robe and slippers. “Get dressed and come downstairs for breakfast. I want us to have a bit more time together today. As a family.”
What had we been doing all week?
“Downstairs in twenty,” she said.
I stumbled into the shower and let the hot spray sting my face. Dad beat me downstairs, where a massive country breakfast waited. I sat next to him. Mom brought over biscuits from the oven.
Dad reached for the remote control on the counter. Mom slapped it from his hand so hard the cover popped off, sending two AA batteries rolling to opposite ends of the kitchen. Dad’s jaw hung slack, in midchew.
“No TV during meals,” she said.
It was scarier than if she’d spun her head 360 degrees and leaped to the ceiling like a human spider.
“We don’t know how long we get with the people we love,” she told Dad, like they were the only two people in the room. “You should know that better than anyone. Cherish the little time you’re allowed. Things won’t always be this way, Robert.”
