“I’m all dusty and spiderwebby. I look like the Crypt Keeper.”
“You look, like, amazing,” she says while studying her own reflection, which is pretty close to perfect in her awesome yellow jacket, black skinny cords, and tan Bebe heels with gold tips. After a few strokes of a pocket comb, her hair flows across her shoulders in an unrumpled sheet. One coat of Baby Lips pink-tinted lip balm, and it’s easy to see why she’s never needed her own car, or even a license. A girl like Jessa rides in boys’ cars, and they think she’s doing them a favor.
Because my outfit was meant to be functional for thievery and inspire sympathy in Dr. Van Tassel, the overall look is Mission: Pathetic. From black (but really gray) tennis shoes to old black jeans loose in all the wrong places to a shapeless black puffy coat Dad bought me last year (Lindy, mouth twisted in sympathy, offered to return it and buy me something more fashionable, after which I wanted nothing more than to keep it), I’m not dressed for success. I am wearing one of my favorite shirts, at least, a long-sleeve tee with the entire text of Dad’s latest book, A Shriek in the Dark, printed on it in very, very small type. He bought this one at a mystery writers’ conference in New Jersey, and I wore it to school the next day: senior picture day, to Lindy’s dismay. Lindy would prefer I wear blouses instead of Tshirts. I genuinely wish I knew what separates a blouse from a T-shirt. Fancier fabric? Ruffles?
And though I swear my mousy hair was in a neat ponytail this morning—the better not to be mistaken for a rogue mental patient in the halls of Good Shepherd—hours of climbing the stacks in a dirty basement have mussed it every which way. Jessa does what she can with tap water to smooth it back and offers me her mini can of hairspray wordlessly.
I frown into the mirror. “This is useless. Just leave me.”
“Never. Come on, Jeremy will be there. It’s important.”
“Finding my dad is important. Eating hash browns while you sit on Jeremy White’s lap? I’m thinking less so. I just want to go home and be alone and read the file.”
“With Lindy kicking down your bedroom door? Come eat. Have fun, you know? Experience, like, joy? And Chad will drive us home and you can spend the night reading in peace. I’ll help you. Or okay, I won’t bug you. Whatevs.”
I accept the mini hairspray.
“Fab!” She beams. “Just one more thing . . .” Jessa digs Mrs. Masciarelli’s keys out of her coat pocket, pulls open one of the stall doors, and hangs the key ring on the purse hook mounted inside. “HIS is just down the hall. She’ll find them on her next bathroom run.”
I admit, Jessa has a mind for detective work. She knows how to get what she wants, and get away clean. As far as accomplices go, I could do worse than Jessa Price.
To meet Chad and Jeremy we walk down to Boston Common, a little ways from Good Shepherd, toward the Park Street station. Road salt, foot traffic, and a few warm days have whipped the sidewalk snow into gray foam. It isn’t warm tonight, not even for February, and it’s dark outside already. But there are people everywhere. Mostly couples. A pale boy and girl in matching lavender skinny jeans hold hands on the platform at Park. On the red line to Kendall Square, a curvy girl in a pink Sox sweatshirt sits on her boyfriend’s lap, her hair a slick purple-black curtain around their faces, and though the seat next to them is perfectly good, no one wants to sit in it, thank you very much.
Jessa’s watching them, her face a mask of vague horror. All I really care about is the file weighing down my bag, but if there’s anything you should read only in a special place and not in a T car smelling of Chinese food and wet clothing, it’s this. To stop myself from pulling it out, I read a poster warning riders to report “mysterious packages” four times before departing the train in Cambridge.
The Friendly Toast is a short, cold walk from the Kendall stop. It’s one of Dad’s favorite places in Boston. We used to go after sessions, and now we stop by after a movie or music on the Common. The walls are lime green, decorated with old movie posters and cuckoo clocks, tin signs for funny-sounding beers, and life-size ratty-haired Barbies. I’m not dumb or desperate enough to think I’ll find Dad with a drink at the bright pink bar, but I can’t help looking while we stomp the slush off our shoes. No dice.
Across the restaurant, Chad and Jeremy wave at us from one of the big laminated tables under a giant, mustachioed plastic cheeseburger wearing a sombrero.