Of All the Stupid Things (2 page)

“It’s probably nothing,” Whitney Blaire goes on. “But I swear, I’ll find out for sure. I bet he and Chris Sanchez were goofing off and Andre’s dirty mind took over. You know how boys are. They’re always making sick jokes like that. Besides, Brent’s not the type to go off with a guy—he likes girls too much. He wouldn’t do that to you.”

She waves her arms as she tries to convince me it’s some crazy rumor, but I don’t really see her. I just stay blank. She kicks my water bottle against the wall by accident. It rolls back to me unbroken. I hold it in my hand and squeeze it. Squeeze, release. Squeeze, release. It’s the only part of me capable of moving. And I certainly can’t speak.

Pinkie comes out of the stall smelling very minty. She sits down next to me and puts her arm around me. She rambles on about something random. Maybe she’s talking about Brent. I don’t know. I can make out words, but I can’t put them together to understand what she is saying. She hands me a candy bar, something with loads of chocolate, caramel, nuts, and 273 calories in two ounces. I eat it all.

By then a teacher finds us and tells us off for not being in class. The girls help me up and gather our bags.

Pinkie says something and then looks at me for a response.

I don’t know what she said. I shake my head. “I’ve got to run.”

I take off down the hall, away from my friends, away from school, away from Brent and what he might have done. I don’t care that I haven’t stretched and warmed up. I don’t care about overexerting myself with two runs in one day. I don’t care that the candy bar is doing somersaults in my stomach. I just keep running.

Whitney Blaire

“TARA,” PINK SHOUTS, BUT HER VOICE DOESN’T COME OUT louder than a whisper. “Tara, come back.”

“Pink,” I say to her. “She’s gone.”

“We have to find her. She could get hurt. She might not look both ways while crossing the street. She could trip and fall and the cars might not see her. What if—?”

She jumps when my phone starts ringing. “Answer it quick,” she says, darting glances across the empty hall.

“Yeah?” I say while Pink scolds me for having the phone on during school. But at the same time she’s staring at me with huge brown eyes, dying to know who’s calling.

“Hey, it’s Andre. You know that thing I mentioned to you earlier? Well, just forget it, ’kay? ’Cause it never happened. You didn’t tell anyone, did you?”

“Tell anyone what?” I ask innocently.

He breathes a sigh of relief on the other side of the phone. “Great. That’s awesome. Thanks, man.” And he hangs up before I can say anything else.

I twirl the phone in my hand for a few seconds before throwing it in my bag. I run my fingers through my hair a couple times. Pink is twitching, almost ready to burst. I decide not to string her along, though it would have been fun any other time. “Turns out it was a mix-up. There wasn’t anything with Brent after all.”

“Well, that’s good,” Pink breathes, and then pales again. “But what about Tara? You shouldn’t have said anything without—”

“I know,” I snap, and then sigh. Crap.

I shake my head. I can’t deal with this right now. I look around for a distraction.

Behind the doors teachers are doing their thing. And we’re out here in the hall where they can’t get to us. Even the teacher that caught us in the bathroom can’t get us; by the sounds she’s making, she’ll be in there a long time. I grin. We can do anything. Go anywhere. And no one can stop us.

I start walking. “Well, come on, Pink. Let’s get out of here. Let’s go find Tara!”

We start heading for the door when Pink suddenly stops. “But wait, we can’t. We have classes. I have homework to hand in.”

I take her hand and keep walking. “It’s for Tara. Don’t tell me that a couple math problems are more important than her safety. Tara’s freaked—she might end up doing something stupid.”

That gets Pink moving faster. “You’re right. We have to find her. But for goodness sake, Whitney Blaire, do your shoes have to make so much noise?”

Pinkie

I DON’T SEE TARA ANYWHERE. THERE ARE TWO WAYS SHE could have gone: to the right, toward the highway, or to the left, toward town. I still don’t know if the idea to go look for her is a good one. The bell goes off, marking the end of first period. I’ve never missed school before. I should be heading to physics. I haven’t been doing very well in that class; I only got 89% on the last quiz.

Whitney Blaire is half pulling, half dragging me through the parking lot. I’m out of breath. I think there’s something in my shoe. And I’m carrying my forty-ton schoolbag, and Tara’s bag as well.

“Hurry up, we have to get her,” Whitney Blaire urges me.

“I can’t,” I gasp. “We have to go back. I’ll just give her a call.”

Whitney Blaire keeps pulling me. “She won’t be home for ages. It takes forever to get to her house, no matter how fast she runs.”

Of course she’s right. Tara’s house is eleven miles from school driving on the highway, and nine miles going through town. She only left ten minutes ago. And we don’t even know if she’s running home. I glance over at the school, hoping that no one sees me playing hooky. That would not look good on the college applications.

We get to my car. She starts up with a moan but then quiets down as I drive her out of the parking lot. “Which way?”

Whitney Blaire waves her manicured hand. “Highway, it’s faster.”

I can see the cars speeding down the highway in the distance. “But Tara’s not going to run on the highway. It’s too dangerous.”

“Right.”

“But then again, Tara’s not thinking straight. She might have gone for the highway instead.”

“Then we’ll go that way.”

“But.” I stop. I have no idea which way Tara would have gone.

Whitney Blaire suddenly points. “Over there, I think I see her.”

The car sways a bit from turning so sharply. Breathe, Pinkie, breathe. “Where? Where did she go? I don’t see her.”

“Faster. Up there—turn right and then right again.”

I clench the wheel and follow her instructions. Eventually we get on the highway, but going the opposite direction from Tara’s house. “Are you sure this is the right way?”

Whitney Blaire shifts her long legs so her knees are up against the dashboard. I don’t know if she’s paying attention to where we’re going. She seems a bit distracted, but then again she always looks that way when her blue eyes are covered by her huge movie-star sunglasses. “Trust me. You just don’t have a good sense of direction.”

She’s right of course; I’ve been known to get lost going home on dark nights. I shift into fifth gear. I hand her my phone and have her try Tara’s house. Whitney Blaire keeps telling me where to go, but with every minute that we don’t see Tara, my heart beats faster.

I can’t help it. I’ve been worrying about the girls since I met them back in first grade. Whitney Blaire was stuck in a tree and Tara went up to rescue her. Even though I didn’t know them, I was certain they were both going to die. They came down with nothing more than a few scratches, and yet it was enough for me to realize that I never wanted to lose either one. But now Tara’s gone off, and I don’t know if she’s okay. Please be okay, please.

Whitney Blaire suddenly sits up and lowers her glasses. “Oh wait, I think we were supposed to take that last turn.”

“Are you really sure?” I wipe the sweat from my forehead. “I mean, we’re in a car. We should have caught up with Tara by now. Do you even know where we are?”

She pushes her glasses back up. “Course I do. You shouldn’t worry so much.”

I grumble and grip the steering wheel tighter.

“No, really.” Whitney Blaire turns to look at me. “Do you know how pretty you could be if you’d lay off the worrying? You look like a thirty-five-year-old housewife.”

I ignore her and glance at the clock. An hour and twenty-three minutes have gone by since we left school. And still no Tara. Whitney Blaire tells me to turn a couple more times and we end up in front of a roller coaster in some unknown town.

“Awesome!” Whitney Blaire suddenly perks up. “Have I got an amazing sense of direction or what?”

“Great, Whitney Blaire, except that you were supposed to lead us to Tara!” I grab my phone and quickly call Tara’s house again. If she’s not there by now, I don’t know who I’ll never forgive: Whitney Blaire for getting us lost, or myself for letting us get lost.

Tara answers on the fourth ring.

“Oh my God, Tara. Are you all right, are you okay? We’ve been looking all over for you. Did you get Whitney Blaire’s messages? It was all a mix-up with Brent. We’re so sorry. We didn’t mean to upset you. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

I switch the phone to my other ear. “Oh, Tara, you sound horrible. This is all so horrible. Is there anything we can do? Do you want us to come over? We’ll be there, don’t worry. It might take a while, but we’ll be there. We’ll be right there.”

“I’m fine.”

I motion to Whitney Blaire. “Pull out that map in the glove compartment and find out where we are. Tara, you just hold on, we’ll be there soon. You’re going to be okay.”

“I’m fine, really.”

“Tara, you’re—”

“Pinkie, look. I’m fine. But I just ran about twenty miles today. I am very tired. You don’t need to come. I need to rest for a few hours. Really, that’s all.”

I frown, not sure what she means. “So you don’t want us to come over?”

“I’m fine. I just want to get some sleep.”

“Okay, Tara.” I sigh. “If you say so. But please, please, please call me when you get up.”

“Fine.” And she hangs up.

I sigh again. Now that I know Tara’s okay, I start thinking about school again. We’re getting our Spanish papers back today and I know that I used
ser
instead of
estar
at least twice. Then in English lit, Ms. Jamison is handing out the next Shakespeare play we have to read (or in my case reread), and Nash said we might meet at lunch for a special talk about college applications for next year. I could be missing out on some very important classes that will affect the rest of my life, but I’ll never know because I’ve ended up on some wild-goose chase.

I look at Whitney Blaire to scold her. The sunglasses are off, the distracted look is gone, and she’s grinning. “So she’s okay, right?”

I shake my head. “That’s what she says, but—” I notice her grin is bigger and more mischievous than ever. “What?”

“David just sent a text wondering where we are,” she says, but I know that’s not why she’s grinning. Nonetheless, I check the phone still in my hand and sure enough I also have a message from him.

Unable to hold the suspense any longer, Whitney Blaire finally lets me in on her plot. “I figured since Tara’s okay and, knowing her, probably wants to be alone anyway, and since we’re already here…well, I told David we’re checking out a roller coaster!”

My stomach turns just thinking about it, but Whitney Blaire is already out of the car and walking across the parking lot. I can’t just leave her here. I don’t know where we are.