I don’t know how long I sat there. Long enough for Mom to look panicked when I came in. She started to talk, but I passed her without a word. She was a stranger to me. I went to my room and punched in the number I realized I’d been dialing in my head for more than a week. Not Dad’s number. Never Dad’s number again.
When Charlie answered, I said, “I’ll do it.”
“Good man,” came his reply.
And I smiled. It felt great to be back on Charlie’s good side.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Finding Mom’s key was the easy part. I’d scoped it out before I’d even agreed to Charlie’s plan, because maybe I’d always known I’d do it. It was on her key chain, between her car key and keys to our three front-door locks. Taking it without her noticing was another matter.
As usual, Charlie had the answer. “Get it Friday, when she won’t need it all weekend. Then, copy it before she notices it’s gone.”
We’d been screwing around on the computer in Charlie’s room. First, we were playing Quake III Arena. Then, Charlie said he’d heard of a website with secrets on how to get to the next level, so we looked for that. But it had nothing we didn’t already know. I’d been at Charlie’s house every day that week—not doing his work, either. We’d just been hanging, like friends. Like best friends.
“She notices everything.” I rolled my eyes. “Besides, it’s one of those keys you can’t copy.”
“Ah. School security measures.” Charlie started down to the kitchen. I followed him. He rummaged through a drawer. I tried not to watch over his shoulder. I mean, it was a junk drawer, nothing special. Like our junk drawer at home. He found what he wanted. “Like this?” Holding up a Medeco key. When I nodded, he handed it to me. “Okay. Switch it for the one on her key chain. We’ll do the deed Saturday, and switch them back before she needs hers.”
It would work, I realized. Yet, I felt something in my stomach. A twinge. Like someone had tickled my insides with barbed wire.
Binky was mad at me. Ever since I’d told Charlie I’d do what he wanted, he’d been including me in his group at lunch. So now, I had all these friends, even girls. Binky ate alone. I felt bad about that. But was that my responsibility?
Thursday, I found her in the second-floor breezeway. Lunch was nearly over, and people were hanging by lockers, pretending they might cut afternoon classes or it didn’t matter whether they went or not. Except Binky. She had a book propped inside her locker, reading. I glanced at it. Sartre. Not assigned reading, either.
“Hey,” I said. “Good book?”
“It’s a play, No Exit. I’ve read it a bunch of times.” She closed the book, then the locker and twisted the combination-lock dial. “The thesis is, Hell is other people.”
“Oh.”
“Missed you at lunch.”
It was an accusation. I squirmed, glanced down the hall. A bunch of jocks were screwing around by the water fountain. One waved. I nodded at him. Binky smirked. “What’s wrong?” I asked her.
“Oh—nothing.”
She was mad all right. And suddenly, I was mad at her for being mad. Why should she be? She’d do the same, in my situation. “Can’t I have lunch with someone else once?”
“Who said you couldn’t?” She started to walk away.
“Would you stop? Please.”
“I have to go to class.”
But she stopped. Down the hall, the jock who’d waved was looking at me like, Why’s he talking to her? But I knew why. Because she’d been my friend when I’d had no others. Because of guilt. So, I said, “Look. We’re still friends.”
“Were we ever really?”
“Of course we are.” Over her shoulder, I saw Charlie. He stood with Amanda Colbert, gesturing at me. I pretended not to see and walked all the way to class with Binky. The next day, I had lunch with her. It was the least I could do.
Friday, after school, I waited until Mom was half-hypnotized by Rosie O’Donnell, so she wasn’t watching her purse. It was on the kitchen counter, behind her. I opened the refrigerator, using the door as a shield so she wouldn’t see me rifling through it.
“Paul, you drinking soda again?”
Nabbed. “No, I was just…” I glanced around, finding something easy. “… getting some grapes.”
She glanced back at me, and I struggled to make eye contact. Lying to her was easier than I’d thought. I was so tired of being good. Behind the door, my fingers searched. Could she see the movement? No. Found them. My hand closed around them, so they’d make no sound. I shoved her key chain into my pocket.
“Sounds good. I’d like some, too.” Her voice reproached me. Normally, I’d have offered. She turned back to Rosie, who was talking to some woman from Saturday Night Live.
I fumbled with the purse, almost dropped it, caught it by its strap. I stuck the purse on the counter, then arranged it like it had been in case maybe she’d memorized its position. Not paranoid at all, Charlie would have said.
I found the grapes and washed them, not noticing the water was hot until it burned me, then still letting it run over my hands, long after the grapes were clean. I brought them to her.
She patted the sofa. “Sit with me.”
I had no choice, so I sat. I held the bowl in my lap, and we ate grapes for ten mind-numbing minutes. Finally, I stood, holding the grape bowl. “I’ll put these in the fridge. I’m going to do homework before dinner.”
She seemed satisfied. At least, she kept watching her show.
Then I was working on the key chain. With a knife, I separated the metal rings, switched the keys. The medallion caught my eye. Gate’s emblem, a cross. I flipped it over, like Christ wouldn’t see if I turned the cross over. But then, I didn’t really believe in God anyway. I slipped the key chain back into the purse and rearranged it on the counter.
Charlie answered on the first ring.
“Got it,” I said.
“Good man.”
“You’re sure it will work?”
“Of course it will. You’re magic.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Gate at night was a different place. By day, oaks and pines shaded its paths. At night, they blacked the moon, surrounding me like storm troopers. It was black. Hundreds of scurrying feet, none human, filled the parking lot. Fireflies, mosquitoes, nameless night creatures flew in my path. I stepped forward. One step. Two. Getting less cautious. Suddenly, the parking lot was bathed in light. I stopped. Who was there? My head jerked. My pupils dilated. I froze, remembering Dad’s long-ago words: Movement is most of camouflage, Paul. Remember that.
Bastard. I waited to be caught. Nothing. The lights went out.
I looked up. They blazed on again. I laughed. The floodlights were on a motion sensor. No one there. Still, I flew past the administration building and to the classroom building like something was chasing me.
Charlie was outside. We hadn’t taken his car. “Too recognizable,” he’d said. Instead, he’d borrowed the housekeeper’s Civic. It had been past midnight when we reached the school’s iron gates.
“I don’t have the gate key,” I’d said.
“That’s okay. You can squeeze through the hedge.”
I could squeeze. And where will you be? Charlie was smaller, after all, more able to get between the gate and the hedge-covered chain-link fence. But I hadn’t said it. Now, creeping down the cement walkway, into faceless dark, I could be bold and think it. But Charlie had answered my question anyway. As usual, Charlie had all the answers.
“Sorry, Einstein. Can’t do it.” He rested fingers to brow, tired of the whole thing. “I have a tournament tomorrow.”
“What’s that got to do with this?”
“Can you see Big Chuck’s face if I broke my arm or something squeezing through?” He got a faraway look on his face, like he was actually picturing it. He smiled.
“Charlie?”
The grin vanished. “One time, I got tennis elbow. No practice for weeks. Man, was he mad.” He clapped a hand on my
shoulder. “Can’t have that, can we? Besides, I can barely turn on a computer. I’ll be the lookout.”
And if I broke my arm? Another question I hadn’t asked. Hadn’t needed to. I knew the answer: He’d drive away.
I understood that. This was my job. I was the one with something to prove.
“Relax, Paul.” Again, he’d read my thoughts. “Nothing will happen.”
And I’d believed him, sliding between gate and fence, shuffling through dark gravel to the black parking lot with the storm-trooper trees and, now, to Mom’s office alone.
Mom worked in the attendance office, in the classroom building. It was breezeway style, open, so I didn’t need the key to enter the building, just her office. “No flashlights,” Charlie had dictated. “The neighbors might see you. Or Old Carlos.” But the janitor’s cottage was in back, separated from this building by cities of ficus trees, each with three or four trunks and curtains of hanging moss. A murderer could hide there, unseen. Besides, anyone in his right mind would be asleep now. It was dark, but not as dark as the parking lot. Drops of moonlight seeped through tree limbs like water through a washcloth. I strained to make out room numbers in the dim light. Behind me, footsteps. I turned. Nothing. I fumbled for the key, heard it hit ground and bounce. I searched, sightless, on the ground, finally finding it amid tracked-in gravel and discarded gum. Screw Charlie. Easy for him to say no flashlights. He was in the damn car. I slid the key up to the wall and let it drop into my hand.
No. Charlie was my friend. He wasn’t slacking off. He was the lookout. He had to be. And his dad would kill him if he hurt himself. Not like me, with no dad to worry about.
Besides, I was part of Charlie’s group now, part of his plans. He’d even been taking me with them to lunch. With Amanda, hair like falling leaves. I couldn’t think about her now, but I liked to, at strange times of day, or at night, when I squirmed in bed, unable to sleep.
I found the doorknob, inserted the key.
I didn’t need lights in the office. Mom’s desk was near the window, and the seeping moonlight would illuminate my work. But could you see the monitor’s glow through the window? I removed my black Carolina Panthers sweatshirt and hung it so it blocked the light. I threw the switch.
The old system started with a jolt. It ran through its setup, slow. When would it be ready? Finally, a prompt for my name. I typed LAURA. Error. I tried LAURAR. Right.
The password for Mom’s computer wasn’t hard. “Everyone uses pets’ names,” I’d told Charlie. That was something I’d learned in chat rooms. I tried it. We’d had a cat, Verdi, in North Carolina.
I typed VERDI.
Access denied.
I tried my own name, first, then middle, then both. Then Mom’s maiden name. Finally, I remembered a page from a photo album, a cat my parents had when I was too little even to remember. His name was Macoco, from some old movie.
Macoco was the password.
I needed another password to enter the student-record databases. A school password. That took longer, running it through different combinations, thanking God or whoever for all the time I’d had on my hands those years, to learn everything computers could do. Finally, I found it. Wait ’til I told Charlie the password was PiratePrde. Maybe this wasn’t a big deal.
STUDENT NAME: the program prompted.
I hesitated, then typed, CHARLES GOOD JR. Enter.
Charlie’s name, address, and reference number flashed on-screen. I exited the window, repeating the number, “1091, 1091, 1091.” I typed it in.
Charlie’s entire record came up. Near-flawless academics. National Honor Society. Tennis team, captain, honor awards in English, math, social studies, P.E. Perfect attendance six years running. Citizenship award.
The D in biology stuck out among all those A’s. I moved Mom’s mouse onto it, hit delete, and typed another A, completing the monotonous pattern. Then, I remembered Charlie’s caution. “Give me a B. Zaller’d remember an A.” I changed it again.
I felt less careful leaving. The deed done, it was simple. Why had I worried? I slammed doors, jumped to hit the red-lit EXIT sign so hard my hand hurt and the sound reverberated through the silent breezeways. I ran through the halls to the parking lot to commune with the moon. I’d done it. I’d cast aside everything Mom or Binky had ever thought about me. I wasn’t a good kid, a good, boring kid. I wasn’t some good sucker who’d live slow and die old. I was wild. I was like Dad—Dad who didn’t care about, didn’t love, anyone.
I scaled the gates this time and free-fell eight feet to the ground like stepping across a mud puddle. Charlie’s lights were off. But even in the darkness, I saw him seeing me, seeing me whooping and leaping in the dew-drenched grass. He let me go on. Then, his motor sprang to life. He beckoned to me. I got in, and we roared into the night.
“You did it?” he asked, about a block away.
“You bet, baby!” My voice, my words, like someone else’s.
“No one saw?” For once, Charlie looked scared.
“No one to see.”
“Maybe this was a bad idea.” Charlie’s eyes never left the road, but his hands clenched white on the steering wheel. “Maybe we should—”
“Bad idea? Bullshit. You’re not going chicken on me now, are you, Charlie?”
“No, it’s just…” We were blocks away, and Charlie hit his lights. “We may have to do other stuff now, things to cover our tracks.”
But I was too euphoric to ask what things. I threw my head back and kicked my legs onto the dashboard. “Whatever it takes, man! Whatever it takes!”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Monday, at school, I waited. For what? I didn’t know. But that day, I sat in chapel and in class, expecting to hear about the person who’d freaked out their computer system. And when someone from the office came to my class, third period, I figured he was coming for me. It was only a message from some guy’s mother. That’s when I realized: They weren’t coming for me. I’d gotten away with it. Binky had been right. I was smarter than they were. It felt good. It felt really good.
Everyone seemed to know I was Charlie’s friend now, and that changed everything. When I walked into history, a girl called my name. I recognized her as one of Charlie’s group, Kirby, who had blond hair and looked cool even with glasses. A cheerleader. She gestured toward the seat beside her. I sat, cautious, in case she was screwing with me. But no. She leaned on my desk and started describing the concert they’d gone to over the weekend. “You should come with us next time,” she said. And later, when Mr. Roundtree had us choose lab partners in chemistry, I didn’t have to wait around to see who was left. People wanted me.
I changed in those next weeks. I picked up things from Charlie’s crowd. Like St. John’s way of walking, thumbs hitched in pockets so his elbows stuck out. And Meat’s talk, using words like gel and jacked, saying later instead of goodbye.
Now I had lunch at McDonald’s with Charlie’s group. For months, I’d been less than a peon, pushing a tray in the cafeteria. Now, I’d arrived.
I’d learned to call it Mickey D’s as Charlie’s friends did. The Monday after Charlie and I broke into school, we arrived at ten after, three carloads, including Amanda, Kirby, and Emily. We took St. John’s Bronco, him eyeing Amanda pulling into the space beside us. I tried not to. St. John still liked her, which about killed my chances. Not that I had much chance anyway. Still, I held the swinging door while all three girls stepped through. Charlie, St. John, and Meat walked ahead of me to the counter.
“We’ll sit outside,” Charlie announced when we’d gotten our trays.
“There’s only one table left out there.” St. John gestured toward the play area. “And all those kids.” He pretended to shudder. I was busy getting ketchup. I pressed the dispenser top, and ketchup dribbled out, like blood from a paper cut.
“Well, I’m sitting outside.” Charlie turned. Meat and I followed him.
Outside was crawling with kids, like St. John said. And moms, arms dripping w
ith babies and Happy Meal toys. Ball-pit balls sailed through the air. Kids screeched. One woman breast-fed, hunched over, trying and failing to cover her nipple with her kid’s head. Meat gave her a long look until she turned away. The others glared at us. Still, I followed Charlie. When we reached the lone table, one of those round concrete ones I’d only seen in Miami, Charlie sat.
“Sit here, Einstein.” Charlie motioned to the seat beside him.
I took it, sliding Big Mac and fries off my tray to take up less room, trying not to grin.
“Now you.” With his hand, he beckoned to Amanda, whose auburn hair and plastic-encased salad both shimmered in the noonday sun. “Sit by Paul.”
Amanda obeyed, thigh brushing mine on the narrow bench. My hand jerked. Fries skittered across the table. Be cool. I stared into white-hot sun, not daring to look at St. John. After all, I was just following orders.
Charlie continued that way. Meat, he assigned the seat on Amanda’s other side, then Kirby, Pierre, Emily, and Ryan, squeezing seven onto benches meant for four. When no one else would fit, Charlie smiled. “The rest will have to sit on the ground.”
The others shuffled a little but obliged. All but St. John. He glared at Charlie, eyes like cold marbles. Charlie looked back.
“Sorry,” Charlie said. “Hadn’t realized you were still with us, buddy.”
“Maybe I’m not.” St. John walked to the overflowing garbage pail, shoved his lunch, tray and all, inside, then stalked from the restaurant. Seconds later, his motor roared.
Then, silence.
Charlie broke it. “Oops.” He smiled, like a kid who’s spilled milk but knows he won’t get in trouble. Everyone laughed.
Amanda tipped her head, eyes meeting mine, then Charlie’s. “He can be so … you all can squeeze into my car.”
That’s when I noticed it for the first time. Her retainer. It rested against her top teeth, challenging anyone to think she wasn’t perfect. I couldn’t speak. Charlie took over. “Great.” He blessed Amanda with a smile. “And Paul here will repay the favor. You said you were having trouble in computer-science class.”