Alan doesn’t move. He’s looking at Rev, who’s shifted to lean against Rowan’s car. “You need to let him fight his own battles, Rev.”
Rev’s expression is even. He coughs, then pulls his hood up. It throws his whole face in shadow. “Maybe I think his stepfather shouldn’t be starting battles with him.”
Alan draws himself up, but he must figure it’s not worth it. He gives a humorless laugh and shakes his head, then turns away. “You kids always think you know everything.”
The street is dead silent once he’s gone.
“Wow,” whispers Rowan. Her eyes are like saucers.
Rev looks at her. “That’s nothing.”
“Thanks for stopping Declan from—” She breaks off. “From . . . whatever he was going to do.”
“I didn’t stop him. He stopped himself.”
That’s not quite what it looked like, but I don’t say anything. I like Rev’s quiet voice, and the way he stood up to Declan’s stepfather. It makes me feel bad for thinking he looked like a serial killer.
Especially when he glances at me and says, “Thanks for what you did, too. Do you think you’ll be okay to get home?”
My heart is still thudding in my chest, but I nod. I have to clear my throat. “What’s Cheltenham?”
Rev frowns. “What?”
“That Alan guy. He said Declan could try sneaking out of Cheltenham.”
Rev’s expression darkens, closing off. He coughs again, and his shoulders hunch a little. “It’s a juvenile detention facility.” He pushes away from Rowan’s car. “Make sure you get a new battery. If he says you need it, you need it.”
Then he slides into the darkness, leaving us alone.
CHAPTER NINE
I’ve started 35 notes to you, and they all start with, “I’m 17,” but then I can’t write any more. I don’t want to ruin this. I don’t want to lose it.
I sound like an idiot. I might as well be sitting here writing letters to the dark, waiting for a response.
I don’t even know you, but I feel like I understand you.
I feel like you understand me.
And that’s what I like so much about it.
She’s my age.
I had suspected she was close, but this is confirmation. I don’t know why it matters, but it does.
She likes this.
She likes this.
I’ve read the note at least sixty-seven times, and it still gives me a secret thrill. I glance around the classroom, checking to see if it’s contagious, as if the rest of the class should be able to feel the jolt this one little note gives me.
I don’t need to worry. We’re studying poetry in English, and an espresso bar couldn’t wake this room up. A girl in the front row is reading a Dylan Thomas poem out loud, but she doesn’t give a crap about raging against the dying of the light, because she sounds like she’s reading a shopping list. She twirls her hair around her finger and slumps back in her chair when she reads the final line.
I smooth my fingers along the lines of the note and read it again. I have it tucked under the edge of my textbook.
I feel like I understand you. I feel like you understand me.
A crazy, wild part of me wants to find her. To say, yes, yes, I understand.
Bored silence has overtaken the classroom. I swear you can hear three people texting. Our teacher, Mrs. Hillard, is hoping we’re all absorbing the power of the poetry. She leans back against her desk, clutching the textbook to her chest. “Who can tell me what the poem is about?”
This will probably come as a shock, but no one answers.
Mrs. Hillard straightens and walks down the rows of desks, touching her fingers lightly to each one. Her long skirt swishes with each step, and she’s wearing one of those patterned cardigans you only ever see on middle-aged high school teachers.
I slide the note farther under the book before she can get to me.
“What is Dylan Thomas raging against?” she says. “What is ‘the dying of the light’?”
“Darkness,” calls out Drew Kenney.
Mrs. Hillard nods but says, “On the surface, maybe.” Her heels click down the aisle between the desks. “What else could he be talking about?”
“Nighttime?” calls another girl, her voice lilting at the end. It’s a guess.
She sounds so dull, so uninspired. I think of my photography analysis with the cemetery girl and wonder if she’d be so bored with this class.
Wait. I wonder if she’s in this class. I look around.
I have no idea. I don’t think so, but I have no idea. It’s not like you can look at a girl and know her mother is dead. There’s no neon sign over my head flashing DEAD SISTER, either.
“Read it again to yourselves,” says Mrs. Hillard. She taps on Elijah Walker’s textbook and whispers, “Put your phone away.”
He gives a heavy sigh and shoves his phone into his bag.
“Read it again.” She stops beside my desk and barely gives me a glance, her fingers tapping the textbook absently before she moves on. Teachers never expect much from me. “Read it again and tell me what this poem is really about.”
Someone coughs. Someone shifts.
Silence.
She turns at the back of the room, and for the first time her composure cracks. “Someone must have an idea. Someone. Anyone. There are no wrong answers here.”
Says the woman who just told two people they were wrong.
“What is this poem about?” she demands.
My eyes skip to the page to see what the big deal is. Do not go gentle into that good night.
Before I know it, I’ve read the whole thing. It’s not about nighttime or darkness at all.
Mrs. Hillard is still pacing the aisles. “He says, ‘Rage, rage against the dying of the light.’ What is Dylan Thomas feeling?”
“Desperation.”
The word is out of my mouth before I can stop it. My voice is rough with misuse—I haven’t talked to anyone since I split a bagel with Rev in the cafeteria three hours ago. I’ve drawn some focus, too. Half these people have probably never heard me speak.
Mrs. Hillard comes back up the aisle and stops beside my desk.
I don’t look at her. I should have kept my mouth shut. I doodle on my notebook like someone else said it, but she’s not an idiot.