All Kinds of Bad

by Rachel Rust

  The rock got Alex behind the ear. But it wasn’t enough to knock him out. He tried to grab my wrist, but I swung again before he could reach me.

  This time, the rock got him right in the temple.

  He collapsed down onto me.

  I dropped the rock and pushed against his chest, rolling him away. My hand dove into his back pocket and grabbed my phone. After rising up unsteadily, I hobbled across the gravel, unable to put much weight onto my left leg.

  The night air was cold, piercing my skin, and I rezipped my jacket. I looked behind me before stepping into the wooded area behind the mechanic shop. Alex was still slumped onto his side, but one of his hands moved slowly to his bloodied temple.

  I slipped behind a tree, out of sight.

  The miniscule town seemed extraordinarily large and spread out as I made my way through backyards, staying close to fence lines, dashing from shadow to shadow, and avoiding street lamps as the night grew dark. Always on the lookout for a black Mustang. Slowed down by my left knee, it took me nearly a half hour to finally see the Broadway street sign.

  Hugging the brick façades of the downtown businesses, I made my way toward the police station. An officer exited the building and got into a police car. He backed out and drove away—my feet stopped, and I bit my lip to keep the scream in my throat from surfacing. Behind where the police car had been parked sat a black Mustang.

  My heart raced. The street was quiet. No businesses were open. No lights, except the yellowed street lamps across the road and two exterior fluorescent lights under the police station’s front soffit.

  I lurked in the shadows. Watching the front of the station. Waiting for movement. Waiting for Sergeant Rollins to get in his police car and go looking for me … the girl who hit poor Alex DeMarco over the head with a rock. What a demented wacko she must be.

  Several minutes went by, and still nothing.

  I took a few steps forward.

  A hand shot out and slapped across my mouth. The scream in my throat let loose, but was muffled into near-silence. An arm wrapped around my chest and pulled me into an alley. My body twisted and kicked. My back slammed up against the brick wall.

  Sam Stone’s dark eyes were barely visible in the low light, but they were unmistakable. “Shhh,” he whispered. “Don’t scream.” He pressed his hand harder against my mouth. “I’m not gonna hurt you, but you gotta stay quiet.”

  I nodded—anything to be able to breathe normally again. He relaxed his hand. My lungs gulped in a deep breath.

  “Whatever you think I did, I didn’t do,” he whispered. “I’m sorry about what happened in the park. I was scared and just didn’t know what else…” his words drifted as his jaw clenched. He looked a lot like a young Nathan in the low light.

  “Alex told me everything,” I said.

  “I tried to tell you not to get into the car with him, but you guys took off too soon and, well…” Sam rubbed his cheek. “Alex’s got a hell of a right hook.”

  “Alex’s at the police station,” I said. “He’s probably telling them everything about us … you and the gun. Me and the rock.”

  “What rock?”

  I waved his question away. “Later.”

  Sam peered around the corner at the police station. “Now what?”

  My mind raced as my fingers drummed against my phone. Old Man Mitchell’s words came front and center: Don’t be afraid to be a little bad.

  “Screw you, Alex DeMarco,” I muttered, then grabbed Sam by the elbow. “Come with me. I have a plan.”

  ****

  “Stay down,” I commanded Sam. He might have been bigger than me, but I was three years older and had no problems reminding him of that.

  Sam folded his body as compactly as he could behind the bushes in front of Lance’s house. With as much grace as my rattled body could muster, I stood on the front steps and knocked on the door.

  Relief washed over me when Lance himself answered. I was in no mood to deal with parents.

  “Lydia? What’re you doing here?”

  Car tires on asphalt sent me flying off the front steps and into the bushes next to Sam. The pain in my knee made me bite my tongue until I tasted metal. Lance stared at us in silence, mouth open, eyebrows up.

  “Don’t look at us!” I yelled in a whisper. “Pretend we’re not here!”

  Through the branches of the shrub in front of me, the red paint of a Chevy truck came into view. It paused at the corner and turned left. No other cars were in sight. No police. No Mustang.

  Lance looked back down at us. “What the hell’s going on?”

  “Does your computer burn CDs?” I asked.

  “What?” Sam and Lance asked at the same time.

  Ignoring Sam, I asked Lance again, “Can you burn a CD? Like from a phone’s voice recorder?”

  Lance thought for a moment. “Yeah, I think so. Why?”

  “I have a story for the journalism award.”

  His eyes widened. “What is it?”

  “Before I tell you anything, you have to agree that it’s going to be a joint article, because I’m going to write it with you.”

  Lance’s face squished in confusion. “You’re not a journalist.”

  “Not yet, but I’ve got one hell of a story and I want it on the front page of the next newspaper. And I want it told my way.” It was high time for a pro-Nathan piece.

  “What’s the story?”

  “First you need to help us. But trust me, it’ll be worth it.”

  Lance threw open the front door. “Come on in.”

  ****

  I took the finished CD from Lance, housed safely inside a nondescript plastic casing.

  He nodded to it. “That’s some pretty intense shit you dug up. You got major balls … or, you know…”

  “Ovaries.”

  Lance’s face turned beet red. Sam laughed.

  “Seriously, though,” Lance said. “What you’ve done is pretty impressive.”

  I shrugged. “I just asked a bunch of questions and followed up on leads… Isn’t that how it’s done?”

  “Basically, but usually it’s just about school conspiracy theories like recycled coleslaw.”

  My stomach recoiled. “Eww.” I had eaten that coleslaw.

  Lance chuckled, then crossed his arms. “You know, I could use a good reporter on the paper. It’s not always exciting work, but you seem to have a knack for it.”

  I forced back a grin, not wanting to pat myself on the back too early. Nathan was still in jail. Alex was still free. Until their fates swapped, I still had work to do. “I’ll think about it, but right now”—I held up the CD—“I have to go find an ending to our story.”

  “Good, go bring that to the police.”

  I shook my head. “No police. They’ve done a shitty job so far, and I wouldn’t trust them with our one piece of evidence against Alex. Knowing how much power the DeMarcos have in this town, Alex’s confession would probably mysteriously vanish under Rollins’s watch. So, we need more than just the police’s help. We need as many people as possible to know about this, or else Chris DeMarco will just bury it.”

  “So if we’re not going to the police, then what are we gonna do with the CD?” Sam asked.

  “We are not going to do anything. You’re going home.”

  Sam’s face fell. Despite the danger, he seemed to be enjoying himself.

  “But you’re taking me with you,” I told him. “I need to get into Nathan’s bedroom.”

  “Why?”

  Condescension flew from my mouth before I could stop it. “It’s better if you don’t know.” I turned to Lance. “I may need an alibi depending on how this all turns out, so if anyone asks, you and I were together all night tonight.”

  “All night?” Lance asked. “What am I supposed to say we were doing all night?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Jesus, Lance, use your imagination.”

  His cheeks flushed red again. “Oh, yeah, okay. But what would Nathan think?” />
  “I think Nathan would forgive you for pretending to sleep with me if that’s what it takes to keep me out of jail.”

  Lance half-grinned. “Right. But, wait—what are you gonna do that could land you in jail?”

  My stomach twisted with thoughts of the night’s events that had yet to unfold. “Don’t ask. You don’t want to know.”

  He nodded a bit in understanding, despite his furrowed brow.

  Next to the front door was a freestanding coat hanger. As Lance opened the door, my hands snagged a pair of black gloves sticking out of his mother’s jacket. I shoved them into my own pocket as we exited.

  Lance gave us a ride to Sam and Nathan’s house. His Chevy Impala smelled like Axe body spray and the Italian bread from Subway—which wasn’t surprising given the sea of Subway wrappers floating around my feet on the passenger side.

  “Eat much?” I asked.

  Lance shrugged. “I drive around a lot for stories. And a guy’s gotta eat.”

  The cup holders in the center console were filled with crumpled Subway receipts. I uncurled a few. Something weird about the receipts caught my attention. I inspected a few more receipts and saw the same thing.

  “Are you dating someone?” I asked Lance.

  He shot me a quick glance. “No. Why?”

  “Most of these receipts are for two footlong sub sandwiches.” I scanned his skinny frame. “You eat two at a time? That’s two feet of food.”

  He chuckled nervously. “I usually buy two, but only eat one.”

  “Who’s the other one for?”

  Lance didn’t answer as he turned into the Stone driveway and then parked near the side of the house. He glanced back at Sam, who quickly took the hint and exited the car, leaving Lance and me alone.

  Lance nodded to the receipts in my hand. “Let’s just say Officer Benson likes Subway.”

  “Officer Benson?” My eyes widened. “Holy shit, is he your source?”

  Lance just smiled.

  “You bribed a cop for information?” I asked. “I’m pretty sure that’s highly illegal and your ass is going to end up in jail.”

  He shrugged with a laugh. “I just bought some food to show my appreciation for a public servant. Nothing wrong with that, and I can’t help that Benson’s a moron. He gets chatty while he eats. He’s willing to spill the beans on pretty much anything while munching on meat and cheese. And chips. He likes the barbeque kind.”

  I covered my mouth as I giggled, picturing Benson with his receding hairline, chomping away on his chips, gabbing about things he’s not supposed to talk about. “He told you about Nathan’s jersey at Shadville? And the bullets matching?”

  “Yep.”

  “What an idiot.”

  Lance grinned. “But a useful idiot.” He glanced over at me. “And you didn’t hear me say any of this.”

  “Hear what?” I asked, with a mock salute. I hooked my finger into the door latch. “I’ll be back in five minutes. Wait for me.”

  I followed Sam inside. Heather was in the kitchen, reading a book at the table. She did a double take at the sight of me. “Lydia, what are you doing here? Is everything okay?”

  “Yeah, it’s fine,” I said in my fakest pleasant voice. The one I usually reserved for bitchy teachers. “But I think I left my gloves in Nathan’s room a while back, so…”

  “Oh, by all means, go on up and look for them.”

  I turned on my heel. “Thanks.”

  Once in Nathan’s room, I made a beeline for the footlocker. My hands dug around, under some old jerseys, ignoring the white envelope with Nathan’s parents inside. The cool of the metal greeted my fingers before my eyes saw them.

  The ring of keys.

  I shoved them into my pocket. Before shutting the footlocker, something else caught my eye. At the bottom, peeking out from under a tattered old book about Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, was a small, flimsy box. I pulled it out.

  Condoms.

  I dropped the box back into the footlocker and stared at it for a while before picking it up again. I sneaked a peek at the boxes of condoms at Walgreens whenever I went down the tampon aisle, but was always too embarrassed to actually investigate the prophylactics.

  I plucked one from the box. My thumb traced along the protruding circular bulge under the silver wrapper. Thoughts of Nathan intruded, pushing past the pertinent thoughts of the evening’s events and the undertakings I had to endure in the night to come.

  I had many more important things to concentrate on. Serious matters. Life or death. Freedom or jail.

  But staring at the condom, my mind went only one place.

  I shook my head in an attempt to fling the naked thoughts as far as they would go. They didn’t go far. In fact, they didn’t leave at all. Which was why instead of putting the condom back into the box I shoved it into my back pocket.

  I placed the condom box back under the Jabbar book and shut the footlocker. Sex with Nathan—being with Nathan, period—was the kind of motivation I needed to get done what needed to get done.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  She Does

  Lance and I parked a half a block from the baseball diamond where I had left my car. Headlights off, we waited. We waited for nearly twenty minutes. There was no movement. No one in the parking lot. No one on the streets. No cars. No blond mohawk. Lance drove his car up next to mine, lights still off. I thanked him for his help and then got into my car. Lance followed me home, which wasn’t originally part of the plan, but I was glad he had thought of it. The streets were dark and shadowed, a perfect place for a black Mustang to hide.

  But there weren’t any Mustang sightings.

  It was nearly ten-thirty by the time I schlepped my broken body into my house. The constant throb inside my knee grated me down to my core.

  I stripped myself of my clothing and redressed in all black. Including a pair of all-black canvas shoes that my mother had bought for me a year ago, thinking somehow that they were cool. They weren’t. But they were perfect for the moment.

  The only black jacket I had was a windbreaker. Not enough for the cooling air outside, but it would have to do. After putting it on, I shoved the CD and ring of keys into the pockets. Then I put on the gloves from Lance’s house.

  If there was one thing that binge-watching crime shows on Netflix had taught me, it was to always wear gloves.

  The school grounds were dark when I arrived ten minutes later wishing I had taken ibuprofen before leaving my house.

  Pain or not, there was no other option but to push on.

  The school’s front entrance was illuminated by two lamps, so the dark gym door was my best bet. I knelt in front of it, eye level to the lock. The shadowed space made it difficult to see the keys, so it was only by touch that I went through each of them, until one finally went in and turned the lock.

  Fear paralyzed me for a moment. Unlocking a door was one thing. Stepping inside was a whole other thing.

  I forced my hands to push on the door. It opened. The threshold of illegality had long ago been crossed, so I figured I might as well go all the way.

  The inside of the school was dark and quiet, the hallways endless and obscured by shadows. My feet tip-toed toward the main hall, guided by sheer memory as the space was too dark to see. I stopped. Silent, listening. There was no sound. No movement of any kind. Straight ahead, on the other end of the dark corridor, a dusky gray light shone in the main foyer. I took a deep breath and forced my feet forward. One after another. The blackness around me squeezed my chest, but I kept going. Left foot. Right foot. Left foot. Right foot. With my nerves on fire, a scream of terror and anxiety threatened to screech out of my clamped-shut mouth at any moment.

  I stopped short of the foyer’s gray light. The creepiness of the blackened hallway was nothing compared to the anxiety-inducing light of the foyer. Anyone walking or driving by the front of the school would see movement.

  My eyes closed and I took a deep breath.

  Go!

 
Under the power of sheer will, I raced forward and went into the office. I looked around the desk. Nothing. I pushed the button to open the CD-ROM tray on the computer’s tower. It popped open. Staring back was a CD with school song in black sharpie. I whipped around to the counter behind me. The light from the foyer was barely enough for me to make out a cup of pens. I fingered through them. No sharpie. I opened a drawer. It was full of post-its and staples. I opened another drawer. More pens and pencils—and one sharpie. I grabbed it and, as carefully as I could in the low light, scribbled school song in a hopefully somewhat similar handwriting. I swapped the real deal out for my CD with Alex’s confession.

  I stepped back into the foyer and went down the hallway. A minute later, my feet landed back on the concrete outside the gym doors. After locking the door, I sat slumped against the brick façade, heart ready to explode. I was either brilliant or a complete idiot.

  After arriving back home, I slipped into the kitchen. And then waited, listening to the house around me. Waiting for the sound of Alex lurking in the darkened shadows somewhere, waiting to finish what he had started.

  I creeped from room to room and turned on every light in the house.

  In the shower, thoughts of the evening flashed erratically like a strobe light, beating my skull from the inside out. I turned the knob closer to the H and let the hot water pound my raging nerves into submission until I was sure my dad was going to lecture me on water conservation upon opening the next water bill. My mind drifted to Nathan. His smile. His voice. His arms around me. My fingertips could still feel his abs and pecs. My breasts tingled at the mere memory of him.

  The rational part of my brain eventually shut down the thoughts—and the water.

  I stepped out, hair soaking wet and dripping onto the floor mat.

  The cool air of the house tingled my damp, warm skin under my robe as I walked out of the bathroom. I wrapped my knee in a bandage before putting on pajamas. I then downed three ibuprofen with a gulp of lukewarm tap water.

  My body ached, ready to sleep. But I sat on the corner of my bed. Listening for any rustle of noise out my window. Or outside my door.