“I’m so glad you called,” I say, closing my eyes as relief washes over me.
“I’m n-not sure I should have. But you seem pretty freaked out. Though I’m not sure what you think I’m going to d-do about it.”
“I am freaked out. And I’m not expecting—”
I cut myself off, taking a deep breath and leaning back in my chair. The piece of paper I found in the book stares up at me.
Maggie was right.
“You were right,” I tell her.
“It’s known to happen.”
I grin at that, wishing things were still easy between us. Losing Mags feels like losing a sister. Or maybe a limb.
“Maggie, I have to tell you something, and I know it’s going to sound crazy.”
“I doubt you can t-top the last four months of crap you’ve spit out.”
“The last four months feel like a blur,” I say softly. “A really bad blur that I can barely remember. Or remember at all. And I know this is going to sound completely paranoid, but I think there was something really weird about that SAT study group I was in.”
“Gee, you think?” she asks, and there’s no missing the sarcasm in her tone. I can even picture her face, pale brows arched in mock surprise. “How many times did I t-tell you that, Chlo? A d-dozen? A hundred? And every t-time you threw your New Age crap back in my face, yammering on about your perfect boyfriend and eating healthy and your meditation horseshit—”
“Meditation?”
“Why d-did you call me, Chloe?” she asks, sounding irritable.
“Because I want to know what happened to Julien Miller. And I think you might have an idea.”
It’s a hunch but not a crazy one. That note in my book and the things she’s saying—it means something. I hear her sigh on the other end of the line, and I know she doesn’t want to tell me anything. Maggie doesn’t trust me anymore. It’s impossible but true.
“Why don’t you j-just ask Blake?”
“I don’t want to ask Blake. I’m asking you, Mags. Not him. You.”
She waits awhile, and I can hear her adjust her phone. Switching ears or something. When she speaks again, her voice is very soft. “I don’t know if I want t-to talk to you about any of that. I don’t know if I want t-to talk to you at all.”
“I know. And I know I probably deserve that,” I say, because the truth is, Maggie is damn near impossible to piss off. I don’t know what I’ve done, but the hatred she’s spewing at me has to be warranted in some way.
“There’s no probably about it,” she says.
“Will you think about it? About talking to me? I know there’s something going on with this group, but the details are all fuzzy now. I can’t explain it, but it’s almost like the whole summer was a bad dream.”
She’s quiet again. I know I should stop myself from getting too hopeful, but I don’t. I go on, careful to keep my voice light. “I want to pick up the pieces, but I don’t know where to start.”
“I already t-told you where to start,” she says. “Dr. Kirkpatrick.”
The world screeches to a halt, my body’s rhythm’s hitting an awkward pause. I want to say something, but nothing comes out. Maggie doesn’t wait long thankfully.
“Look, Chloe, I know she called it monitoring, b-but there was something way creepy about that. Is it normal to have a psychologist sit in on a study group? I mean, it wasn’t a study group for the mentally disturbed, so what g-gives?”
“I don’t know,” I say, swallowing thickly, feeling the hot fingers of adrenaline needling up my spine. I think about Dr. Kirkpatrick’s comments about how hard I’d worked over the summer. She wasn’t blowing sunshine—she knew because she was there.
“It’s a place t-to start,” she says with another sigh. “Look, I gotta go, but, Chloe…”
“Yeah?”
“Get some help. Someone you trust.”
“I trust you,” I half whisper.
“I c-can’t get involved,” she says, but I can hear a little bit of regret in her words. Or maybe I’m making it up, but either way, I’ll take it. Anything is better than the silence she gave me before.
“I’m glad you called, Maggie. It means a lot.”
She doesn’t say anything else, but I still smile when she hangs up.
***
Adam doesn’t look thrilled to see me at his house. Again. He wedges his shoulder in the door and glances at his shoes.
“I’m sorry to come over, but I need to talk to you,” I say.
“You couldn’t talk to me at school?”
“I wasn’t in school today.”
His eyes shoot up then, a concerned look softening his face. “I figured you just skipped our classes together. Are you sick?”
“No, I’m—”
How the heck am I going to finish that? No, Adam, I’m not sick. I’m dodging my boyfriend because he gives me the creeps. And also because I’m completely infatuated with you.
Yeah, I don’t think so.
“I just had a lot going on,” I say, “but I really need to talk to you. Can I come in?”
He gives me that hard look again, and suddenly it isn’t so unreadable. He’s embarrassed. He doesn’t want me to see his house.
The stranger inside chokes out that same rattling cough, and I force myself not to flinch.
“Look, I get it,” I say. “I can tell that you don’t really want me checking out your space, but I don’t care about that. Unless you’ve got a goat-sacrificing ritual going on in the living room or something, it’s cool, okay?”
He doesn’t answer that, just cuts his eyes sideways. It’s hard not to stare at him, even now. It’s hard to imagine anyone this perfect-looking living in such an ugly space.
“I don’t have anywhere else to go,” I say, and then I drop my voice low. “Not with this.”
It’s completely quiet for a second. Then he pushes open the door, and I force the surprise off my face as I follow him inside.
It’s not dirty. I mean, it’s not lick-the-floors clean, but the tiny dinette right inside the door isn’t sporting piles of dirty plates, and the kitchen counters seem freshly wiped. It is tiny though. Just this little kitchen and dinette and a set of stairs across from a door I’m guessing leads to the bathroom. And another room I can’t see well in the back.
A pale blue light spills out from that back area. A television, I guess. I hear the coughing again, coming from the unseen room. It’s the kind of noise I imagine when people say “death rattle.”
Adam stays right in front of me on our way to the stairs. We are so close I can smell him. Six inches and we’d have full body contact. I feel hot and cold at once, and then he stops abruptly, one foot on the stairs.
He stares me down, eyes glittering. It’s like he’s daring me to say something. Or maybe to chicken out. He’s going to have to stand there a long time if he thinks a little icky coughing is going to scare me out of here. I’m actually not sure an army of opera-singing roaches would change my mind. I’m beyond desperate.
“Adam?” someone calls. A woman. I’d guess grandmother by the sound of her voice. But somehow the row of liquor bottles I saw on the back of the counter tells me she’s not the type to bake cookies and start college funds.
“Adam!”
“I’m here!” he shouts back, and then arches a brow at me, dropping his voice low.
“I need a drink,” she says, slurring each word.
His face grows even darker as he smiles at me. “Do you want one too, Chloe?”
Test. I can see it in the half sneer in his eyes. He’s testing me. I’d bet a thousand dollars right now that he never touches those liquor bottles. The disgust in his eyes is a little too obvious.
Inside the living room, the woman begins to snore.
I reach forward, spanning the distance between us to take his hand. “Thank you for letting me in.”