At lunch on Wednesday, Addy and I are talking about nail polish. She’s a font of information on the subject. “With short nails like yours, you want something pale, almost nude,” she says, examining my hands with a professional air. “But, like, super glossy.”
“I don’t really wear nail polish,” I tell her.
“Well, you’re getting fancier, aren’t you? For whatever reason.” She arches a brow at my careful blow-dry, and my cheeks heat as Maeve laughs. “You might want to give it a try.”
It’s a mundane, innocuous conversation compared to yesterday’s lunch, when we caught up on my police visit, Nate’s mother, and the fact that Addy got called to the station separately to answer questions about the missing EpiPens again. Yesterday we were murder suspects with complicated personal lives, but today we’re just being girls.
Until a shrill voice from a few tables over pierces the conversation. “It’s like I told them,” Vanessa Merriman says. “Which person’s rumor is definitely true? And which person’s totally fallen apart since Simon died? That’s your murderer.”
“What’s she on about now?” Addy mutters, nibbling like a squirrel at an oversized crouton.
Janae, who doesn’t talk much when she sits with us, darts a look at Addy and says, “You haven’t heard? Mikhail Powers’s crew is out front. A bunch of kids are giving interviews.”
My stomach drops, and Addy shoves her tray away. “Oh, great. That’s all I need, Vanessa on TV yakking about how guilty I am.”
“Nobody really thinks it was you,” Janae says. She nods toward me. “Or you. Or …” She watches as Cooper heads for Vanessa’s table with a tray balanced in one hand, then spots us and changes course, seating himself at the edge of ours. He does that sometimes; sits with Addy for a few minutes at the beginning of lunch. Long enough to signal he’s not abandoning her like the rest of her friends, but not so long that Jake gets pissed. I can’t decide whether it’s sweet or cowardly.
“What’s up, guys?” he asks, starting to peel an orange. He’s dressed in a sage button-down that brightens his hazel eyes, and he’s got a baseball-cap tan from the sun hitting his cheeks more than anything else. Somehow, instead of making him look uneven, it only adds to the Cooper Clay glow.
I used to think Cooper was the handsomest guy at school. He still might be, but lately there’s something almost Ken doll-like about him—a little plastic and conventional. Or maybe my tastes have changed. “Have you given your Mikhail Powers interview yet?” I joke.
Before he can answer, a voice speaks over my shoulder. “You should. Go ahead and be the murder club everybody thinks you guys are. Ridding Bayview High of its asshats.” Leah Jackson perches on the table next to Cooper. She doesn’t notice Janae, who turns brick red and stiffens in her chair.
“Hello, Leah,” Cooper says patiently. As though he’s heard it before. Which I guess he did, at Simon’s memorial service.
Leah scans the table, her eyes landing on me. “You ever gonna admit you cheated?” Her tone’s conversational and her expression is almost friendly, but I still freeze.
“Hypocritical, Leah.” Maeve’s voice rings out, surprising me. When I turn, her eyes are blazing. “You can’t complain about Simon in one breath and repeat his rumor in the next.”
Leah gives Maeve a small salute. “Touché, Rojas the younger.”
But Maeve’s just getting warmed up. “I’m sick of the conversation never changing. Why doesn’t anybody talk about how awful About That made this school sometimes?” She looks directly at Leah, her eyes challenging. “Why don’t you? They’re right outside, you know. Dying for a new angle. You could give it to them.”
Leah recoils. “I’m not talking to the media about that.”
“Why not?” Maeve asks. I’ve never seen her like this; she’s almost fierce as she stares Leah down. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Simon did. He did it for years, and now everybody’s sainting him for it. Don’t you have a problem with that?”
Leah stares right back, and I can’t make out the expression that crosses her face. It’s almost … triumphant? “Obviously I do.”
“So do something about it,” Maeve says.
Leah stands abruptly, pushing her hair over her shoulder. The movement lifts her sleeve and exposes a crescent-shaped scar on her wrist. “Maybe I will.” She stalks out the door with long strides.
Cooper blinks after her. “Dang, Maeve. Remind me not to get on your bad side.” Maeve wrinkles her nose, and I remember the file with Cooper’s name on it she still hasn’t managed to decrypt.
“Leah’s not on my bad side,” she mutters, tapping furiously on her phone.
I’m almost afraid to ask. “What are you doing?”
“Sending Simon’s 4chan threads to Mikhail Powers Investigates,” she says. “They’re journalists, right? They should look into it.”
“What?” Janae bursts out. “What are you talking about?”
“Simon was all over these discussion threads full of creepy people cheering on school shootings and stuff like that,” Maeve says. “I’ve been reading them for days. Other people started them, but he jumped right in and said all kinds of awful things. He didn’t even care when that boy killed all those people in Orange County.” She’s still tapping away when Janae’s hand shoots out and locks around her wrist, almost knocking her phone from her hand.
“How would you know that?” she hisses, and Maeve finally snaps out of the zone to realize she might’ve said too much.
“Let her go,” I say. When Janae doesn’t, I reach out and pry her fingers off Maeve’s wrist. They’re icy cold. Janae pushes her chair back with a loud scrape, and when she gets to her feet she’s shaking all over.
“None of you knew anything about him,” she says in a choked voice, and stomps away just like Leah did. Except she’s probably not about to give Mikhail Powers a sound bite. Maeve and I exchange glances as I drum my fingers on the table. I can’t figure Janae out. Most days, I’m not sure why she sits with us when we must be a constant reminder of Simon.
Unless it’s to hear conversations like the one we just had.
“I gotta go,” Cooper says abruptly, as though he’s used up his allotted non-Jake time. He lifts his tray, where the bulk of his lunch lies untouched, and smoothly makes his way to his usual table.
So our crew is back to being all girls, and stays that way for the rest of lunch. The only other guy who’d sit with us never bothers making an appearance in the cafeteria. But I pass Nate in the hallway afterward, and all the questions bubbling in my brain about Simon, Leah, and Janae disappear when he gives me a fleeting grin.
Because God, it’s beautiful when that boy smiles.
Addy
Friday, October 19, 11:12 a.m.
It’s hot on the track, and I shouldn’t feel like running very hard. It’s only gym class, after all. But my arms and legs pump with unexpected energy as my lungs fill and expand, as if all my recent bike riding has given me reserves that need a release. Sweat beads my forehead and pastes my T-shirt to my back.
I feel a jolt of pride as I pass Luis—who, granted, is barely trying—and Olivia, who’s on the track team. Jake’s ahead of me and the idea of catching him seems ridiculous because obviously Jake is much faster than me, and bigger and stronger too, and there’s no way I can gain on him except I am. He’s not a speck anymore; he’s close, and if I shift lanes and keep this pace going I can almost, probably, definitely—
My legs fly out from under me. The coppery taste of blood fills my mouth as I bite into my lip and my palms slam hard against the ground. Tiny stones shred my skin, embedding in raw flesh and exploding into dozens of tiny cuts. My knees are in agony and I know before I see thick red dots on the ground that my skin’s burst open on both of them.