Deceived (6 page)

“Hey.” Davis leaned on the counter and looked me over as I passed.

“Hey.”

He nodded. I pressed a shoulder into the glass door and smiled.

On my way to the car, Brian’s motorcycle was nowhere to be seen. I wondered how he had gotten there. I couldn’t imagine him walking around campus like the rest of us pleated-skirt doppelgangers. Hadn’t he offered me a ride? I looked to the tree with the fallen firefly once more. Just a tree. A dark street. Nothing more.

The car door swung open with a loud squeak. I appreciated the ride and also the fact that Pixie didn’t ask why. Instead, she seemed glad for the call. She talked too loudly. She hated to turn the stereo down, so she just talked louder.

“Don’t go home. I’m going to the river. Come with. Please?” She planned to see some friends and her on-again, off-again boyfriend.

I didn’t necessarily want to be alone, but it didn’t interest me. “Nah. Catch me up on all the details when you get in.”

“Come on, Elle. Are you kidding? The Pier is raging. I freaked when you called because I thought we were finally going to hang. We never hang.” Her flawless face seemed so disappointed. I almost went with her just to see her smile.

The student body called the art studio near the river “The Pier” after the wooden pier wrapped around it. They partied there a lot. Local public-school kids met up there all the time, making it a good place to meet guys. Pixie loved the attention. So did everyone else. The Pier was crowded almost every night, and the girl-to-boy ratio had to be more than two-to-one. It was only my first day, but all the complaints about the lack of boys at Francine Frances made sense now. Of those available to date, only a few were in demand. A busy girl could quickly exhaust her resources.

“I need to get my assignments started. I barely did any work today. For like six hours straight, I tried to figure out how Brian ended up at Francine Frances.” Certainly she could get behind me on that.

“I know, right? You’d think he would’ve mentioned the academy.”

“Yes.” I nodded fiercely. “Do you think he thought we were older? He never asked where we went to school.”

“I guess we look too old for high school. What can we say?” She gave me one of her wild smiles. We pulled up to our place. “You know, you could meet a great guy at The Pier.”

“Let me know if you see any worth meeting. Maybe I’ll tag along next time.”

“Fine, but it’s more fun with you.”

I highly doubted that, but I smiled at her ridiculous pouty face.

She bounced on her seat. “We’re a team. We’re Pixie and Elle. Come on. I need an anchor.”

I hated letting her down. For some reason, she liked doing things with me. I didn’t get it. She was fun for me, sure, but she was fun for anyone. At the few parties I had attended, I’d felt like the furniture.
Anchor
was a good word. I doubted anyone knew I’d been there. I was more like backup than the main event. I’d probably make a good designated driver in college.

“Tell me everything the minute you get home, and I promise to tether you to Earth on another night.”

Pixie was as much of a loner on the inside as I was. I suspected the makeup and dramatics were mostly show. At home we wore yoga pants and herbal facemasks and watched reality television. Our apartment was a quiet, girls’ drama−free zone.

I jogged from the car to our door, hoping to make it inside before she barreled away. I kicked the pile of cigarette butts aside and looked around. There were two more since the morning. I slid my key into the lock and prayed it was locked. The soft click assured me it was, but the eerie sensation I’d struggled with all day returned. One last look at the soiled welcome mat and I hustled inside to lock the door behind me. My stomach coiled inward at the smell. Deep in my mind, a memory rushed by too quickly to capture.

Chapter Five

I took a heavy breath, focusing on one thing at a time. First, the ribbon. The whole Brian fiasco had taken center stage in my mind for most of the day. I needed to think about the ribbon. I dug through my backpack. Who had lockers near mine? Who would’ve shoved a ribbon in through a vent instead of opening the door? Someone who had borrowed it and wanted to return it? Unlikely. Someone in a hurry? Possible. Maybe someone had found it and tried to return it to the one they thought it belonged to and got my locker instead. I pictured my dowdy, portly homeroom teacher with her frizzy hair and orthopedic sneakers. She didn’t look like someone who got everything right.

At ten, I started a new pot of coffee. The phone rang.

“Well, Gabriella, how was your first day of school? Do you feel like a senior yet?” Dad sounded stoic as always. Relief washed over me.

“Yes,” I tried to match his tone. “I feel one step closer to college in Fiji.”

“So close? I thought you wanted to see the world.”

“Well, NYU hasn’t exactly come to claim me, but it’s still early.” I’d applied exclusively to colleges in cities without annual watermelon or apple-cider festivals: Boston, Chicago, New York, L.A. Whoever would have me.

“Anything unusual happen today?”

Could he somehow know about my day?

“Fall on the stairs? Drop your lunch? Something to make you appreciate the fact that dear old Dad sent you to a small school where your friends will feel like family?”

Of course, I was wrong. My eyes rolled in their sockets. Paranoia was so lame. “No, well, yeah. No, nothing like that, but yeah, something strange.”

His voice changed. His disposition immediately tempered. I could practically see him shifting in his chair. He’d always been protective of me, of my happiness, especially after losing Mom. “What happened?”

“Well, my locker was jammed after first period. I was late because it took so long to get in.” I considered ending it there. I hated to worry him unnecessarily while he was on the road, and he definitely sounded worried. I teetered.

“What else?” His voice thickened with insistence, like a television interrogator examining a criminal in custody.

I stiffened, afraid not to answer. “There was a black satin ribbon inside … like the ones Mom used to wear.” The last part slipped out. He never talked about Mom. Ever. My voice had caught, and I was sure he’d heard it. Matter of fact, telling the story aloud made it seem sad and pathetic. What did it matter? No one had broken into my locker, I didn’t think. The vent seemed the most likely way for the ribbon to have entered, though the locker did jam. It would have taken a long time to feed the ribbon in. I tapped a well-chewed nail against the phone. Black matched the uniform. Plenty of girls wore khaki pants and white polo tops. A black ribbon might look cute. I ignored the voice telling me to mention that our apartment door had been unlocked and that I thought I’d been followed. Pixie had been on the phone. Lots of people walked around the little town. I wasn’t convinced, so I kept it to myself.
Liar.

Dad didn’t speak for a long beat.

“The ribbons.” His voice lightened by a fraction.

Would he prefer to hear I’d been caught in an unscrupulous activity, rather than what I was about to say? I rarely connected with my emotionally detached father, but at that moment, I practically heard his thoughts. At the mention of Mom and her ribbons, his thoughts probably ran to his darker days like mine had. He remembered her with her ribbons. When they came out, we moved. Outrunning a ghost was impossible, but Dad never stopped trying.

“I almost hate to give it back. It makes me think I need to pack.”

Silence.

“Dad?”

Silence.

I pulled the phone away from my face to examine it. Had he hung up on me or had a stroke or something? Tension zinged through the phone. The hairs on my arms stood on end. If he wasn’t on business in Tokyo, he might’ve been en route to get me.

“Why?”

“Seriously? You must know we move every time you miss her too much. First, you drag out her ribbons, and then you’re in a frenzy to move.” Finally I’d said what I’d wanted to for years. “I know your work isn’t the only reason we move so often. I know you feel chased.” Dad wore his heartbreak like a neon sign. He had never gotten over losing Mom either. Her loss bonded us in complicated and permanent ways.

“Gabriella.” He cleared his throat. “What?”

“I know you miss Mom. Your grief haunts you. I’m haunted, too.”

“Honey, you’re not hunted. I don’t want you to worry about anything.”

“Haunted.” I enunciated. “Not hunted, Dad. Are you feeling okay? We’re not moving again, are we?”

When he hesitated, I worried I’d gone too far. I blamed nerves and nightmares and gorgeous boys with magical green eyes.

“At what time did you receive your locker today?” His flattened tone frightened me. The interrogation voice was back.

“I don’t know, maybe eight or a few minutes after … ”

“When were you there?”

“Until the bell at eight-ten and then again after that class.”

“When was that?” His questions came one upon another. It was as if I was in trouble again.

“What?”

“What time did you return to your locker, following your first class?” He spoke slowly, clearly. He wanted answers, facts, now.

“Ah, class is forty-five minutes long, so it was almost nine. It took a minute to get back there after the bell.”

“That’s when the locker was jammed? When you discovered the ribbon?”

“Yes.”

“Could it have been there before your first period and you overlooked it?”

“No. The locker was empty the first time.”

“Who else has access? Do you have a locker partner?”

“No. They don’t do that here. Everyone has their own.”

“Tell me more about the ribbon.”

I described it as completely as I could. He insisted I photograph it and send the picture to his inbox while he waited. He wouldn’t get off the phone until he had it in front of him. Then, after he nearly scared me to death with his questions and odd behavior, he went back to making small talk. Jekyll and Hyde much? His keyboard clicked as his fingers flew over the keys. He’d moved on. The ribbon wouldn’t kill me. I rolled my eyes.

“Maybe I can come for a visit. See how things are going. I can check your apartment for safety again. Talk to the school.”

“Dad, no. I’m good. Everything’s good.”

“We can have lunch. I can make pancakes.”

The thought tempted me. I had a million memories of Dad in the kitchen tossing pancakes in the air. Of all the changes in my life, the cabin was a constant I could count on. And I did. The cabin had been in Dad’s family for generations, and we all loved it. We stayed off the grid and enjoyed the peacefulness of nature. Mom had loved it. They’d always made breakfast together. She’d sliced berries and scrambled eggs. They’d sung duets and danced for me. They’d loved doing things together. I’d loved watching. After she died, he still made pancakes, but the singing ended. Her absence gonged in the silence.

I considered telling him I had been afraid to walk home from the coffee shop. I considered playing the frightened-daughter role, maybe even mention the rumor going around. I’d already spent the better part of the day telling myself I was an adult, so I skipped confessing my fears. We said goodbye after a few more feeble exchanges.

The caffeine rush ended, and I crashed. My eyes pulled shut almost before I could get my earbuds in. I set my playlist to start on my favorite song and dragged the light comforter over my body until I smelled the fabric softener. As I inhaled muted scents of powder and lavender, sleep rushed in to meet me.

The dream began immediately. This time I was at my locker. I had a strange conversation with Brian. I asked him about his age when he was about to ask me something else. He wanted to talk to me, and I knew why. He wanted me to promise silence about our previous meeting. Sun glinted off his crisp white shirt. The smell of fresh-cut grass tickled my nose. I smiled.

I wanted to reach for him, but the dream morphed in an eerie way until he was in an alley with me. He seemed at ease, though my heart raced as the scene changed. I knew to be afraid. He didn’t look concerned. He didn’t know we were in danger. I turned to run and ran right into him. He smiled and handed me coffee. I scanned his face for an explanation. How could he not understand that we needed to go? Something bad was near. A low noise sounded from behind me and chills rose up my spine. Frozen in place, I stifled a scream before hearing a familiar sound, the front door.

Pixie tossed her keys onto the counter.

My eyes pulled wide open. I’d slept for two hours.

“Hey, how was The Pier?” I ran a hand through messy hair and leaned into her bedroom doorjamb.

“Do you ever sleep?”

I bit my lip. Sleep and I didn’t get along. “Do you?” I folded my arms over my chest.

“Not enough. I’m going to look like the bride of Frankenstein in the morning.”

“As if. So, did you find me a man?”

“No one you’d look at.” She gave me a sharp look and stripped out of her clothes. I turned away. “Michael stopped by and asked where I’ve been, like I’ve been avoiding him or something.”

Michael, her on-again, off-again boyfriend, gave me the creeps. He dressed like her and listened to the same music, but he gave me a serious poser vibe. Hopefully Pixie knew who he was under the garb, because I recognized an act when I saw one. They told people they had met at a rave, but really it was a book signing. I knew better. I was there, and we all had matching autographed copies to prove it.

“I told him, ‘give me a break. It’s the first day of school.’ He was all ‘excuse me for caring.’ I said ‘yeah sure,’ and he was all ‘whatever.’ The whole Pier saw it. I have witnesses.”

“Are you going to see him again?” I wanted her to be happy, for sure, but single Pixie meant more time for her to fill, and I didn’t want to become her pet project. She already looked at me like her personal social-science experiment.

“Nah. We’re cool, but I hope he learned his lesson.”

Sure. That lesson sounded clear as mud. Why wouldn’t he have learned?

“Do you think Brian acted strange today?” Unfriendly, elusive, douchey.