He walks away.
I’m outside the doors, and I’m shaking, and it’s partly embarrassment but partly anger, too. I didn’t linger. Didn’t pester him or, God forbid, ask him to go grab a soda. I said exactly the right things, and he was a jerk about it.
Now I’m outside catching my breath and remembering where Jesse was when I crashed into him. Standing in a hall that ultimately led nowhere… except to me.
I head back inside. When I hear footfalls, I duck around a corner, but it’s just Owen. I circle around, and then I hear more footfalls. Not the deliberate slaps of Owen’s work boots but the scuffling walk of someone not going anywhere in a hurry.
I peek around the corner to see Jesse. He’s moving at a stroll. Keeping my distance, I follow as he heads down one hall, then another… and eventually ends up back where he started. There he glances at his phone, as if checking the time. He nods, satisfied, and makes a quick left, toward the rear exit.
Here for a meeting, you said?
He’s been killing time. I could take offense at that, presume the “meeting” was a lie to get rid of me, and that he then wandered around to ensure he didn’t bump into me again. But that raises the question of what he was doing here in the first place, hanging around where the only thing nearby was me.
I keep thinking about that anonymous email. Jesse’s interest in school has obviously dropped, but I remember him as the math whiz who planned a career in software engineering. A kid who was a genius with a keyboard.
I hear my voice, from a distant memory. “Hey, Jesse, question for you. Purely hypothetical.”
We’re sitting on a wall outside the playground. Sun setting, children playing, parents shouting “One last time” before they herd their kids home to dinner. Jesse and me, on the wall, our heels kicking it, impatiently waiting for the moment when the park will be ours.
The parents and kids will leave, and the sun will set, and I’ll jump from the wall and hop onto a swing. Jesse will smile and shake his head, but he’ll follow eventually, and we’ll swing and talk, and later – if it’s dark enough – I can even coax him onto the twisting slide, hear him laugh as he forgets he’s thirteen, supposed to be past all this.
“Hey, Jesse, question for you. Purely hypothetical.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Let’s say one wanted to access the school computers. Maybe… fix a few things.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Not grades. That’d be wrong. But, you know, erase some comments on a student record. Where a student might have done some things that got totally blown out of proportion but could look bad on a college application.”
He slants a look at me. “No one’s going to check a middle school record for college.”
“I was thinking of high school. Could you hack those records?”
“You don’t have a high school record yet, Skye.”
“I’m planning ahead.”
He laughs, startling a babysitter, who squints over, as if thinking that laugh couldn’t possibly have come from the somber boy at my side.
“You could just stop getting in trouble,” he says.
“Yeah… so, hacking the school system?”
He smiles and shakes his head. “Theoretically, yes. But ethically, no. Sorry. Not even for you.”
But you could, right, Jesse? You could crack my school account and send an email to Mr. Vaughn.
And those voices I was chasing – you could do that, too, couldn’t you?
Another kind of technology. Throw prerecorded voices, and when I don’t find the source, I’ll think I’m losing my mind.
What about the other day, when I got locked in the office? You knew I was in detention. You’re the only kid who did.
According to Owen, I’m not the first student Mr. Vaughn has forgotten there.
Did you know that, Jesse? Did you find a way to distract Mr. Vaughn, help him to forget about me?
And then there’s the video clip.
My shoulders tense, as if throwing off the very thought. That wasn’t Jesse. Could not be Jesse.
Am I sure?
Earlier, I searched the phone number and discovered it was fake. Spoofed. Something a guy with tech skills could do.
I remember the opening shot on the clip. The kitten. Like real videos Jesse used to send me. A way to guarantee I would hit Play.
No. I don’t care how much he’s changed. I cannot believe the boy I know would compile that video, much less send it to me.
What about the voices I heard Monday? The ones replaying that conversation from the girls’ bathroom. I was alone in that bathroom. So how could anyone have recorded them?
That should suggest it’s not Jesse.
It should also suggest it wasn’t anyone. That none of this is happening.
Isn’t there a better answer? A more obvious one?
That I am losing it.
Just like Mom.
Just like Luka.
Skye
The next day, Jesse is back in math class. He sits in front of me again. He says nothing. Does not acknowledge me when he walks in or out. There are other empty seats, but he takes that one.
I said it was awkward for him, having me at RivCol. Does he know it’s the same for me having him here? Is that why he makes a point of taking that seat? Forcing me to stare at his back for an hour?
I spoke to Tiffany in physics and confirmed that the newspaper meeting is after school. When I arrive, three others are there. Tiffany introduces me, and it’s only then that I discover she’s the editor in chief.
I don’t know any of the other three kids. Two know me… by rep, at least. The guy – Alberto – tenses when I walk in. The girl – Melanie – offers a too-bright welcome. I’m not sure which is worse.
No, what’s worse is the other staff member trying to figure out what all the fuss is about, until Melanie “discreetly” texts him, and then I have to watch his eyes widen, his gaze turn on me, that moment of silence where everyone knows exactly what’s happened and they’re all pretending they don’t.
“So first order of business —” Tiffany begins.
“What exactly does she do?” Alberto says. “Is she looking to write or what?”
“She is sitting right there,” Tiffany says.
“I think we should have discussed this before she came.”
“Why?” Melanie says. “Doesn’t our sign say anyone can join?”
“I just think —”
“Did we discuss you before you arrived?” Tiffany says. “Did anyone discuss me?”
Alberto shifts on his chair. “I just think we should have.”
“I’m happy to take on whatever you need done,” I say.
“Normally the newcomers are put on the leads box,” Tiffany says with a smile. “But I won’t do that to you.”
“Why not?” Alberto says. “Does she get special treatment?”
“I know you can’t mean lead stories,” I say. “Oh, wait. I saw something on the sign about ‘leads welcome.’”
“Leads not welcome,” the other guy says. “Really, really not welcome.”
“It’s a joke,” Tiffany says. “Years ago, the newspaper team decided to solicit anonymous leads from students. They got crap. But when they tried to say they didn’t want anonymous leads anymore, the school stepped in and said they had to take them, that it was proper investigative journalism.”
“Like any of us are going to be investigative journalists,” Alberto says. “Or journalists at all. Well, unless we’ve got a trust fund, and can work for an online media site and not bother with that whole getting-paid nonsense.”
“We’re here because it looks good on a college application,” Melanie says. “But the point is that no one wants to handle the leads box. If Tiff says you can skip it, take her up on that. Trust me.”
I shake my head. “The newest person should take the crap job. Just show me what to do.”