“Not that she let us ask much!” Chip snorted. “I still need to know if she’s adopted, and if she got the same kind of letters we got, and if she knows what we all ‘survived,’ and…” Chip seemed to be working from some sort of mental checklist.
“Chip, don’t you get it? Those questions don’t matter right now.” Jonah eased the survivors list out of Chip’s hand and held it up. “I got this list three days ago, with Daniella McCarthy’s address on Robin’s Egg Lane. Her parents didn’t even see the house until yesterday. They haven’t made an offer on it yet, but they’re going to today. So”—he shook the list in Chip’s face—“how did the FBI know the future?”
“They couldn’t have,” Chip said.
Seconds passed while both of them stared hard at the list, the three-day-old list from the FBI that contained information no one should have been able to know until today. Jonah knew that they were almost at school, that the bus around them was filled with kids laughing and flirting and teasing and griping and even—here and there—singing. But Jonah couldn’t focus on anything except the survivors list. That and Chip’s voice, saying slowly, “Unless…”
“Unless what?” Jonah asked.
“Unless they’re the ones making her move.”
SIXTEEN
“That’s ridiculous,” Jonah said. “Impossible.”
“Why?” Chip asked.
Jonah barely stopped himself from giving an answer that would have sounded like his dad: “Because the government is set up to serve the people. Not to ruin kids’ lives by making them move.” Instead he mumbled, “Why would they care where Daniella McCarthy lives? How could it matter to them? And to direct her family to that exact house—”
“Maybe one of Daniella’s parents is a top-secret scientist,” Chip said, “and some enemy is about to drop a bomb on their house, and so the FBI is moving them for their own safety….”
Jonah frowned at Chip and rolled his eyes.
“It’s Daniella’s name on the list,” Jonah said. “Not her parents’.”
“Maybe that’s just some sort of code,” Chip argued.
“What about all the other thirteen-year-olds on the list? Are all of our names some kind of code?” Jonah asked. “ My parents aren’t top-secret scientists, I can tell you that. And nobody’s ever tried to make us move.” Still, Jonah felt a knot of anxiety in his stomach at the thought of moving. He’d lived his whole life in the same house—well, his whole life since he’d been adopted. “My mom would never agree to leave our house, not even if the president himself begged her to,” he said. “She’s spent too much time babying that rhododendron bush in our backyard. And her roses and her grapevines and everything else…”
Jonah had never cared that much about the rhododendron bush; he’d always thought Mom made way too much of a fuss about “those gorgeous blooms” and “Do you think they’re a little smaller than usual? Should I test the soil acidity again?” But now he pictured Mom clutching the trunk of the bush while some official-looking government types tried to pull her away: them arguing, “But you have to go!” while she countered, “I’ll never leave! Never!”
The image was strangely comforting.
“Hey!”
Jonah looked up to see the bus driver in the aisle in front of them. He was glowering.
“Let me explain something to you two,” he growled. “I pull up to your bus stop, you get on the bus. I pull up to your school, you get off. It’s not that complicated.”
Jonah realized that they were at school now; he and Chip were the only kids still on the bus.
“Oh, sorry!” he said, jumping up, grabbing his backpack.
“Maybe you want to go to the elementary school instead?” the bus driver asked. He seemed amused now. “That’s my next run. This is the day when all the little kids stay on the bus extra-long, to learn bus safety. Maybe you need that, just to learn to get on and off?”
“No, no, that’s okay,” Chip mumbled, scrambling up behind Jonah.
The bus driver stepped back between two of the seats to let them past him in the aisle. He was laughing at them.
“What a jerk,” Jonah muttered, as soon as they were out on the sidewalk. Other kids from other buses streamed past them, into the school. He tried to blend into the crowd. At least no one else had been on the bus to hear the driver making fun of them.
Chip grabbed Jonah’s arm.
“After school I’m going to call Daniella back,” Chip said. “Maybe she’ll have calmed down by then. And I want to call back the other kids on the list, to ask why they moved. You’ll help now, won’t you? Remember what you promised me? ‘I’ll do everything I can to help you.’”
Chip’s imitation of Jonah’s voice was frighteningly accurate.
I didn’t know what I was promising, Jonah wanted to argue. That was last week. I thought I’d just have to quote from What to Tell Your Adopted and Foster Children. Not solve mysteries. Not see ghosts. Not call strangers. Not figure out the FBI. Not…worry about my own past.
Chip’s blue eyes were pleading and desperate.
“Katherine’s all right and everything, but she’s too…cheerful about all of this,” Chip said. “She’s thinks it’s fun.”
What’s wrong with fun? Jonah wanted to ask. But he knew exactly what Chip meant.
“All right,” Jonah said reluctantly. “After school.”
The day dragged. Jonah couldn’t concentrate on any of his classes. More than once, his teachers noticed and said, “Jonah? Are you with us?” or “Jonah? Didn’t you hear me the first five times I asked everyone to open their books?”
On the bus ride home, Jonah made sure he and Chip didn’t get too distracted. They were the first ones off the bus when it reached their stop.
Katherine bounced up eagerly behind them.
“How many names do you want to call today?” she asked. “I don’t have gymnastics tonight, and I did all my homework in study center, so I am ready to start dialing!”
Chip and Jonah exchanged glances.
“Well, see, I’ve got to get the mail first,” Chip said weakly. “And then…”