The Edge of Nowhere (20 page)

Then she understood at least part of the whispers. Derric’s father was wondering what sort of mess he’d created in bringing a black son to a place where he would probably never fit in.
Raisin on Wonder Bread
was what his whisper actually seemed to call it.

Becca wanted to stand up in the audience, then. She wanted to tell Derric’s father that he
was wrong. She wanted him to know that that wasn’t even what people were thinking, that the only whisper in the theater declaring
black black black
was coming from Mathieson himself.

He began to speak. He said that Derric’s mom was with him at the hospital and he was getting very good care but he sure could use everyone’s good thoughts and prayers. Then he went on in a different tone, one that was firm with a meaning that he didn’t need to make explicit. He said that there were things that had happened in Saratoga Woods while Derric had been there, things that needed to be looked into. He said he was hoping that
anyone
who had been there that day would be willing to come forward at the end of the assembly and sign a sheet so that they could be talked to individually.

“No one’s in trouble.” Mathieson peered over the lectern into the audience. “
No
one’s in trouble.” But his whispers said
only you and when I know who you are I swear to God
while he concluded by telling them that the sheet would also be available in Ms. Primavera’s office for anyone wishing to sign it privately. Then he shifted his weight with a shift in his topic. He said, “I know a lot of you also want to do something to help Derric. Here’s what it is.”

Then he nodded to someone sitting in the front row in the audience. Jenn McDaniels rose and walked up the steps and onto the stage.

JENN WAS CARRYING
a clipboard. She strutted to the lectern. She seemed to be enjoying her moment of importance. To Becca, she was exactly like a high-tension wire, filled with energy but lethal if you got too close.

Jenn said into the microphone, “Okay, here’s the deal,” as if they were talking about a business transaction. “We need people up in Coupeville with Derric as much as possible because, like, the doctors are saying that one of the ways to bring him back is going to be to talk to him and to read to him and to play him music and whatever else. And this is where this comes in.”
This
was her clipboard, which she held up for the other students to see. “I’m organizing our part of the deal to bring him back, and here’s how it’ll work.”

A little buzz went around the theater as students spoke quietly to one another. Jenn kept talking. Up there, Becca figured she wouldn’t be able to hear them. What she also definitely wouldn’t be able to hear was the louder buzz that accompanied the students’ murmurs. This was their whispers, and they were mostly about what Derric’s father had said versus what he probably meant. These whispers began to fight with their murmurs, which made a whirlpool out of the air. Everything seemed to switch, to be about Derric and Jenn and Jenn and Derric and what it meant that Jenn was up there on the stage ordering everyone around because
who’s she think . . . what’s the story . . . geez you can only tell . . . so obvious . . .
The very atmosphere in the auditorium became hot and swirling for Becca as the real murmurs and the accompanying whispers were joined by questions from the audience, which then were joined by
sue the whole place . . . on my watch . . . Dave Dave please . . . job on the line . . . you made this happen . . .
And then one of them came through so loud that it might have been shouted on a megaphone and this was
know when we trace that cell phone to whoever used it . . .

Which was the last whisper that Becca heard before she fainted.

THE NURSE’S OFFICE
turned out to be just down the hall from the registrar. Two senior boys carried Becca there, which was more embarrassing for her than having fainted in the first place.

The nurse had seriously bad coffee breath, but at least she was nice. She told the boys to set Becca down on the narrow bed and she put her hand on Becca’s forehead. She said, “You’re burning. We’ll need to call your mom. I don’t think I know you. What’s your name?”

“Becca King. But I’m okay. I’ve got a test this morning and—”

“Nervous about that?” The nurse plopped a digital thermometer into her mouth.

Becca didn’t want her temperature taken. She didn’t feel hot. On the contrary, she was so freezing cold that her teeth were chattering. She said, “I’ll be okay in a minute. I freaked out because of the stupid test.”

The nurse tucked a blanket around her and said, “Sit tight. Keep that in your mouth. I need to get your information.” Then she left the room and went in the direction of the registrar’s desk.

Becca felt panic on its way. There was
no
information to be gotten from the registrar. Beyond that little problem, she’d been meant to keep her head below the radar on Whidbey Island, and so far she was failing at this. First making that cell phone call from Saratoga Woods, then running away from the woods when the cops were on their way, and now this. Feeling light-headed was one thing. Fainting in the presence of the entire student body of South Whidbey High School was another.

She wanted to leave the nurse’s office, but she knew that could make things worse. She decided she had no choice but to wait, see what would happen next, and plan how to bluff her way out of trouble. What happened next surprised her, however.

The nurse returned. Shaking her head, she said, “Ms. Ward says she’s got the lock stuck on her K filing cabinet, if you can believe it. She should have filled out a card for you, but she’s behind in her work. Well, aren’t we all?” She went to a desk. She took out the slim volume that was the island phone directory and said, “You’re lucky you happened to faint today. I get shared with the middle school, so if you’d fainted tomorrow you’d be flat out of luck.” She flipped the phone book open. “You’re Debbie Grieder’s niece, I understand from Ms. Ward. I know Debbie. You belong to her brother?”

“Sister,” Becca said, recalling Debbie’s words to Ms. Ward.

“Oh!” said the nurse and knotted her eyebrows thoughtfully.

“Anyway,” Becca said quickly, “I’m feeling okay now. I c’n go to class.” She took the thermometer from her mouth. The nurse came over, took it from her, carried it back to the light. She studied it and said, “Uh-huh. Looks like you’re fine. You were awful hot, though.”

“Yeah. I didn’t eat breakfast this morning. I think it was that, the test, and the heat in the theater.”

“You
need
to eat breakfast. You girls. Always trying to lose weight.” The nurse’s face got altered to an assessing look. “Is that what you’re doing? Are you avoiding breakfast because you’re losing some weight?”

Becca only wished. She said, “As if.”

“What d’you mean?”

“Look at me. I know that I’m fat.”

The nurse set the thermometer down on her desk.
What the heck
was in her movements even if it hadn’t burst between them. She came back to the bed and told Becca to stand. She eyed her, held her wrist, circled her fingers around it, delicately pinched the flesh of her arm. She said, “Where on earth did you get the idea that you’re fat? You’ve just got a big frame. It’s called being full bodied. Believe it or not, it’s the way women were
intended
to look at one time. All you need to do with what you’ve got is to distribute things. You exercising, dear?”

“Riding a bike every day.”

“So give that a month. You’ll be in fine shape. Meantime, here. Take this.” She brought an energy bar out of her pocket and handed it over. “And don’t skip breakfast again, okay? Hang on a second. You’ll need a pass back to class.”

The pass in hand, Becca headed out. The way took her past the school’s main reception desk, where Hayley was once again seeing to phones. Jenn was there, too, with her clipboard in hand, and she was giving the sign-up list to Hayley. This prompted Becca to pause and to say, “I’d like to sign up to visit Derric, too.”

Hayley looked up. She smiled and said, “You’re Becca. I remember from your first day. That’s real nice of you to want to help out. Because you’re new here, and everything.”

“Derric showed me around. I have Eastern Civilization with him. And Yearbook.”

“
And
she’s totally hot for him,” Jenn added with a roll of her eyes. “As
if
.”

Hayley handed the list to Becca and Becca signed beneath Hayley’s name. She avoided looking at Hayley, recalling what Seth had said about her and Derric. All the time, she tried to ignore the gutter whispers that were coming from Jenn. It was difficult to do. They were stronger than ever.

She handed the list back. Jenn snatched it like someone who’s having their kidnapped baby returned. She stalked off while Hayley said quietly to Becca, “He’s a nice guy. I can understand why you like him.”

It was a kind thing to say, and Becca could tell that Hayley was sincere in saying it. The words made her wonder, though. Was Hayley hooked up with Derric or was she not? Becca wanted to talk to the older girl, even though, like before, a strange form of sadness came off her like the scent of fading violets. But she had to get to class because the teacher was Mr. Powder, who was going to look at her pass from the nurse and do the math on how long it would have taken her to walk from the nurse to his classroom.

Jenn waylaid her just outside the administration office. She said, “Let’s walk together to class, okay,
Beck-
kuh
?” She accompanied this with more gutter whispers about Becca’s size and the clothes she was wearing.

On top of everything else that morning, this was finally too much for Becca. She fumbled in her pocket for the earphone to the AUD box, and she shoved it into her ear. The AUD box was where it always was, on the waistband of her jeans, and she felt for the volume nob and turned it up full blast. The static obscured what Jenn was thinking, but it did nothing to hide what she wanted to say.

“Thought I’d fill you in on something before you buy your wedding dress, Beck-
kuh
. I hope that’s okay with you ’cause I hate to destroy your dreams.”

“Whatever,” Becca said.

“Good. Smart, too. ’Cause one of the cheerleaders—a chick called Courtney—is after Derric and everyone knows it. And between her and you, who do
you
think he’d choose?”

SEVENTEEN

J
enn McDaniels or no Jenn McDaniels, Hayley Cartwright or a cheerleader called Courtney, Becca was determined to get to Coupeville in order to see Derric.

School wasn’t the same without him. She missed the safety she felt when he was near. She missed the warmth coming off him and the scent that seemed to hang in the air around him. She missed the way that he was special to her in a manner that other boys had never been special.

The intense interest in Derric’s condition faded after a few days at the high school. Other things rose to take the place of what had happened in Saratoga Woods. Football games and pep rallies distracted the other students. Homecoming was hanging out there in the near future as well. But these things didn’t concern Becca. She didn’t expect to be asked to homecoming, not with how she looked. She wasn’t exactly dating material these days.

She hadn’t seen Seth Darrow since the night that Debbie had come upon them in room 444. Ever since then, Becca had done what she could to soothe Debbie’s concerns about her hanging around with Seth. She’d gone to school, come home to the motel, done her homework, played with Chloe, tried to reassure Josh about his Big Brother’s condition, and cleaned the rooms of departing guests. But having committed herself to helping Derric in his recovery, she had to get to Coupeville where the hospital was, and she figured Seth was her best way to do that.

She remembered what he’d told her about the place called South Whidbey Commons: It was where kids from Langley tended to hang out.

Some days after Derric’s father had spoken to the assembly, Becca went in search of Seth. She’d finished her work cleaning the rooms of departed guests, and she popped into the motel office to tell Debbie what she was off to do. Debbie wasn’t there, so she left a note. She was careful to tell her the full truth of the matter: She was finding Seth Darrow to see if he could take her up to Coupeville and show her where the hospital was. He could also show her where to catch the bus so that when it was time for her to sit with Derric during his recovery, she’d be able to get up there to do so. Then she left the motel.