She reached up, throwing her arms around his neck and giving him a hug. He smiled down at her, then glanced over at the group by the office. “Hey, shouldn’t you be in class?”
“It’s fine,” Riley said, flipping her hand. “I have drama, they won’t even notice I’m gone.”
“Don’t waste an absence on this,” he said. “It’s not worth it.”
“I just wanted to make sure they weren’t going to pull you out. I was freaking.”
“Everything’s fine,” he said. “Don’t freak.”
Don’t freak. It was only when I heard this that it hit me. I looked at the guy again: short hair, clean-cut. Your generic High School Boy. Except he wasn’t. He was Dave Wade, neighbor and storm-cellar dweller. The clothes might have been different, the hair short, but I knew his face. It was the one thing that no matter what, you could never really change.
Riley stepped back from him. “Okay. But I’ll see you at lunch, right?”
“David? ” His mom was standing by the office door, holding it open. Just beyond, I could see his dad and the administrator disappearing down a hallway. “We’re ready to go in now.”
Dave nodded at her, then looked back at Riley. “Duty calls,” he said, and gave her a rueful smile before walking away. She watched him go, biting her lip, before turning around and starting down the stairs. A moment later, the door banged, and I saw her jogging up the walk that led to the adjacent building, her bag bouncing against her back.
I looked at my schedule again, took a breath, then walked over to the other hallway and scanned the doors until I found 215. I wasn’t exactly looking forward to interrupting just as the teacher got things under way, much less having to take a seat with all those eyes on me. But it was better than a lot of other options, especially the ones Dave had spared me from the other night. I was lucky to be here. So I reached for the knob, took a breath, and went inside.
Two periods later, I braved the cafeteria, taking a chance on a chicken burrito that didn’t look entirely inedible. I brought it outside, along with a wad of napkins and a bottled water, then settled myself on the wall that ran along the main building. Farther down, a group of guys with handhelds played games in tandem; on my other side, a very tall, broad-shouldered guy and a pretty blonde girl were sharing an iPod and a pair of earbuds, arguing—albeit good-naturedly—about what was playing as they listened.
I pulled out my phone, turned it on, then clicked open a new text message and typed in my dad’s number. MADE IT TO LUNCH, I wrote. YOU?
I hit SEND, then scanned the courtyard before me, taking in the array of typical groups and cliques. The stoners kicked around a Hacky Sack, the drama girls talked too loudly, and those who cared about the world sat at various tables lined up along the walk, collecting money and selling baked goods for various causes. I was unrolling the foil on my burrito, wondering where exactly Liz Sweet belonged among them, when I saw the blonde, busty girl I’d met at the party on Friday night. She was cutting across the grass, wearing tight jeans, high boots, and a cropped, red leather jacket that was clearly more for show than warmth. She looked irritated as she passed by, heading for a group of picnic tables on the edge of the parking lot. After taking a seat at one she crossed her legs, pulled out a cell phone, and looked up at the sky as she put it to her ear.
My phone beeped and I picked it up, scanning the screen.
JUST BARELY, my dad had replied. THE NATIVES ARE VERY RESTLESS.
My dad expected to encounter resistance when he first came into a restaurant, but apparently Luna Blu was an extreme case. There were several “lifers,” as he called them, people who had worked there for years for the original owners, an older couple who’d moved to Florida the year before. They’d thought they could manage things long-distance, but their balance sheet quickly proved otherwise, and they decided to sell to EAT INC in order to enjoy their golden years. According to what my dad had told me the day before at breakfast, Luna Blu had been running for the last year or so on little else but the goodwill of its longtime regulars, and even they weren’t showing up the way they used to. There was no point in trying to tell that to the natives—employees—however. Like so many before them, they didn’t care that my dad was only the messenger. They still wanted to shoot him.
I took a tentative bite of my burrito. By the time I’d opened my water, taken a sip, and braved another taste, I saw Riley was approaching the blonde at the table. I watched as she dd her backpack on the ground, then slid onto the bench beside her, leaning her head against the blonde’s shoulder. After a moment, her friend reached up, giving her a couple of pats on the back.
“Hi!”
I jumped, spilling some beans across my shirt, then looked up. A girl in a bright green sweater, khakis, and white sneakers, a matching green headband in her hair, was smiling down at me. “Hi,” I said, noticeably less enthusiastically.
“You’re new, right?” she asked.