I locked myself in my room and collapsed into my bed.
In a matter of hours, I’d probably be arrested for four murders I didn’t commit. My mother had kept secrets from me for years. Neither of my parents were who I thought they were, and this trailer—this life that had always been the best she could do for us—was a lie.
I reached under the mattress and withdrew the train ticket from the bag.
Reece was the only one left I could trust. Leave town, he’d said. Run, before everything came crashing down around me. It didn’t matter if running made me look guilty. The police thought I was guilty anyway. Get someplace safe, he’d said. Save yourself.
But that wouldn’t save him.
And if I ran, that would leave Jeremy squarely under the investigators’ microscope.
Besides, I only had the ticket, no cash. The ticket was enough to get out of town, but the only cash in my future was the scholarship I was going to lose anyway.
I shut my eyes. Kylie’s bloody face stared back at me. Emily, Marcia, Posie, Teddy, and now Kylie . . . And yet, this whole mess was far from over. Whoever was framing me wasn’t finished.
Ne + Ar + Li + B + Os.
My name was still incomplete.
Obviously, whoever was doing this was in no hurry to have me arrested, only giving the police part of the picture. Just the bodies of my students. He was holding back, biding his time, withholding the one piece of evidence that would seal my fate—the clue he’d left for me under the bleachers—but he’d put me in an inescapable box. Made it impossible for me to go to the police without incriminating myself. He was forcing me to play this through, but I was damned either way. In the end, it would be my name spelled in blood. But why? Why me?
I lay there for hours, watching the light shift in my room. By late afternoon, my head was swimming and I was no closer to understanding any of it. I should’ve been studying for my chemistry final, but there hardly seemed any point in it now.
The front door slammed and I peeked out my window. It was just before dark and Sunny View Drive took small bites of my mother until she was a tiny red speck under the traffic light. I was alone.
I opened my door and headed to the kitchen, hungry, tired, and confused. Mona had fished the trig exam out of the trash and left it for me, smoothed out on the table. Stuck to it was a yellow Post-it note addressed to me.
N— This is for you. I was saving it for your graduation. Use it if you must. Save it if you can. Please stay out of trouble. And be safe. It’s yours to waste now. —M
Mona’s note lay on the table beside a fat brown envelope that said For Nearly. The handwriting on the envelope looked familiar. Not like Mona’s. More like my own.
I picked it up, the paper crackling loud in the silence. I opened it. Turned it upside down over the table. Tight rubberbanded rolls fell out with a series of thuds.
Money.
A lot of money.
But it was the yellowing letter that I reached for first. It
peeled open, brittle like the skin of an onion. My eyes burned as I read it.
M—I need to lay low and I can’t stay. Hide this. It’s all for Nearly. For college. I know how much that means to you. It’s not much, but I’ll send more through Butch as often as I can. He’ll watch out for you. I’m sorry I let you down. I love you both. —D
I tore off the rubber bands, fanning the cash in my shaking hands, a ripple of loose bills spilling to the floor as I counted. Five thousand dollars. Not as much as the scholarship, but enough.
I scooped the rolls of money into the envelope and clamped it tight over my chest, the names of a thousand distant cities rolling like a bus departure ticker through my mind. A lightness filled me, but it didn’t last.
If I weren’t so worried about what might happen to Jeremy, I could’ve run.
40
I slipped into chemistry class at the last possible second. Whispers and stares followed me. They’d grown louder and harder to ignore since Teddy and Posie died, and the connection between the victims became undeniably obvious. Anh acknowledged me with a nervous smile.
I kept my head down, sparing a quick glance at Oleksa’s empty chair, and dropped into my own just as the bell rang. Anh sat rigid, her desk cleared of all but two number-two pencils and her calculator. By the bags under her eyes, I guessed she’d been up all night studying—an entire night more than I had. I wanted to tell her to relax. That her victory was a sure thing. Winning the scholarship was no longer an option for me. I hadn’t studied. I was short on community service hours. TJ was the one she should be worrying about, and even he was a full percentage point and a half behind her.
Rankin was silent as he passed out the final exams. Whispers spread throughout the room.