Wallace squinted at Donny. I could tell he didn’t believe him any more than he had me. “Yeah,” he said, drawing out the word. “She’s psychic.”
I opened my mouth but looked at Donny first. He was glaring at Wallace, so I took a chance and said, “I told you before, I’m not psychic. I see dates. That’s all. I don’t have visions, and I can’t predict the future, and I don’t see dead people. All I see is a date, and that’s what I tell people. I tell them the day they’re going to die.”
Wallace shook his head a little. He clearly didn’t buy it. “Really?” he asked. “What day am I going to die?”
He said it so flippantly that I opened my mouth to tell him if only to shock him, but Donny put his hand on my arm and gave it a firm squeeze. “We’re not playing that game, Agent Wallace,” he said.
“Is this a game?” Faraday asked.
“Only to you guys,” Donny replied. I totally agreed. Clearly, these two were playing their own game of mean cop/meaner cop.
Faraday snorted and looked back at the file. “I’m curious about the alibi Madelyn has given us for the day Tevon went missing.”
“She was with her best friend, Arnold Schroder, studying for a chemistry test,” Donny said, his hand still on my arm. “Both she and her best friend have told you that already.”
“About Arnold,” Faraday said, turning a page in his file. “What’s the deal, Madelyn? Are you two an item?”
I didn’t know what he was getting at so I looked at Donny, and after a moment he nodded at me to answer. “No,” I said. “We’re just friends.”
“Best friends,” Faraday corrected. “Right?”
My palms were sweating. I was so afraid of giving them an answer that might make them suspect me more that I didn’t want to confirm or deny anything. But Donny was nodding at me again, so I said, “Yes. We’re best friends.”
“Would Arnold lie for you if you asked him to?” Faraday asked next.
I knew exactly what he was getting at, and Donny did, too. “He’s not lying about her alibi, Agent Faraday. Move on.”
“What’d you get on the chemistry test?” Faraday asked almost too casually.
I breathed a tiny bit easier. “A ninety-eight,” I said. They could check that if they wanted, and I had no doubt they would.
Donny sat back with a smug grin. He liked my answer, too. “Hardly the score of a young lady who’s gone and murdered a thirteen year-old the day before,” he said, his tone as mocking as Wallace’s had been.
“Did you text or call anyone during that time?” Wallace asked me. He was still fishing.
“No, sir. I was too busy studying for my chem test.”
Wallace and Faraday exchanged another look. I saw that they knew they weren’t going to poke any more holes in my alibi, which was good. For a minute I had hopes that they’d lay off, but then Wallace leaned over toward the file on Faraday’s desk and pulled something out from the back. He slapped it down in front of me. I stared at it, and it took my brain a few seconds to catch up to what my eyes were seeing, and by the time I understood that I was staring at a picture of Tevon Tibbolt, lying dead and bloody in pile of leaves and mud, it was too late to shut my eyes against it. Donny reacted by leaping to his feet and snatching the photo off the desk. I could feel my eyes water, the shock of what I’d seen had caught me totally off guard. “What the hell?” Donny roared, throwing the photo back at Agent Wallace.
I bit my lip and dropped my gaze to the ground. I’d heard the news reporter say that Tevon had many wounds and that he’d been tortured. But seeing it in the photograph was so, so much worse than anything I could’ve imagined. The kid’s face, torso, and arms were a mass of cuts, burns, and open wounds, and his throat had been slashed wide open. It was the most gruesome thing I’d ever seen, and it was playing over and over in my head, blocking out everything else, even the room I was in and the men who were in it.
I tried to hold it back, but a wave of emotion overcame me, and I bent at the waist and let out a gut-wrenching sob. Tears fell down my cheeks and I shut my eyes, fighting to forget what I’d seen. But the image kept on playing in my head. Tevon’s lifeless eyes staring fixedly up, his mouth curled down in a death mask of pain, his fists balled up over his head, and his hair matted with blood. And most of all, I couldn’t forget the dark black numbers hovering above his ghostly pale skin. 10-29-2014.
I got to my feet and swayed, feeling my stomach lurch while Donny yelled. Then I bolted out of the office, running along the corridor, trying to keep down the urge to retch before I could find a restroom. I spotted a ladies’ room on my right and I pushed my way inside, barely making it into the stall before losing my breakfast.
I hacked and heaved and clutched the bowl for several minutes, sobbing the whole time. “I didn’t know!” I whispered over and over. “I didn’t know!”
If I had known that that was going to happen to Tevon, I never, ever would’ve let his mother leave my house without convincing her that I was for real.
Finally, I sat back and grabbed some toilet paper, wiping my mouth and cheeks. It was that cheap, scratchy kind, but it was a relief to feel something other than nausea and regret.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the stall door and I jerked, knocking my water bottle on its side, where it rolled out under the stall door. I sat still for a couple of seconds. I hadn’t heard anyone come in. I then saw a shadow on the floor, and peeking out from under the stall door, I spotted a hand grabbing the water bottle. I managed to get up and open the door. There was a lady (8-14-2058) standing there, wearing a gold badge clipped to her waistband. “You okay?” she asked me.
I took a shuddering breath. “Yeah.”
She stared back doubtfully.
I moved to the sink, washed my hands, and splashed cool water onto my face. The whole time I was there, she watched me with a mixture of suspicion and sympathy. Still, something about her presence there felt off.
I wiped my face and hands with a paper towel and then turned back to her. She handed me a fresh bottle of water. “I brought you a new one,” she said. But there was something about the exchange that again felt off. “No thanks,” I muttered, hurrying out of the restroom. She followed me, and as I got back into the corridor, I saw Donny standing with his arms crossed and a furious look on his face. Next to him were Faraday and Wallace; only Faraday looked like he had an ounce of compassion for me.
Donny put his arm across my shoulders. “You all right?” he asked. I managed to nod, and he turned to the agents. “We’re done here.”
I was never more grateful in my life, and I leaned against him as we walked away. He didn’t let me go until we were next to his car, and he opened the door for me and shut it once I’d gotten seated.
“They pulled that stunt to gauge your reaction,” Donny said when he got in. He seemed to be beating himself up pretty good over it. “I’m sorry, Maddie. I should’ve expected they’d do something like that.’
“It’s okay,” I told him, wiping my cheeks because the tears wouldn’t stop.
Donny glanced out his window toward the building. “Those bastards,” he muttered. “If they ever try anything like that again I’ll file a complaint with the bureau director.”
I didn’t say anything. I simply wanted Donny to start the car and take me home. But he sat there a few more minutes, staring hard at the building. “Hey,” he said at last.
“Yeah?”
“Great job on that chem test.”
That got me to smile. “Thanks,” I said. If Donny was joking with me, then the interview with the feds couldn’t have been as bad as it felt.
He laid a hand on my head. “Do me a favor, though, okay?”
“What?”
“No more readings.” I gulped and dropped my gaze to my hands. “I mean it, Maddie. Even if the president of the United States calls and says it’s a matter of national security, you don’t give anybody their date.”
All I could think was, what was Ma was going to s
ay? Donny was asking us to give up a lot of extra cash, and no matter how many times he’d offered, Ma had never once accepted money from Donny. I didn’t know how we were going to make it without the readings.
When I hesitated, Donny added, “Listen, kiddo, if you happen to read someone new who’s about to die, and the feds get wind of it…Sweetheart, I don’t even want to think about how bad that’s gonna make you look. You can’t do any more readings or tell anybody their date. Not a soul. Do you hear?”
I finally nodded reluctantly. “Okay.”
“Good girl.”
And then I couldn’t help adding, “The president doesn’t need to worry though. His deathdate isn’t for, like, forty more years.”
Donny ruffled my hair. “Smartass.” He chuckled. But then he nudged me in the shoulder, and when I looked up, he pointed to the cup holder between us. “Where’s your water bottle?”
I blinked. “The FBI lady who came into the restroom took it.”
Donny let his head fall forward to the steering wheel. “Well, I guess giving them your fingerprints and a DNA sample was inevitable.”
“Wait…what?”
“They found cigarette butts at the crime scene. They’ll test your saliva from the bottle against the cigarette butts and keep searching the scene for anything that might give them a usable print to compare to yours.” Donny shook his head as if he was ticked off at himself. “I didn’t think to tell you to bring the bottle with you, but it’s not a bad thing. When the DNA comes back as not a match, I can use it in court if they decide charge you.”
Donny started the car, and I felt a cold shiver snake up my spine. His words, if they decide to charge you, replayed over and over in my mind.
Before we reached home I checked my phone. There were a dozen texts from Stubby. He’d heard about Tevon and he seemed really freaked out. I didn’t want to call him from the car, so I waited until we got home when Donny was busy answering all of Ma’s questions and telling her that I wasn’t allowed to do readings anymore.
Slipping away upstairs I called Stubs. “Ohmigod!” he said the minute he answered the phone. “He’s been murdered, Mads! Murdered!”
“I know,” I told him.
“Oh, man, oh, man, oh, man!” Stubs said, and I could imagine him pacing back and forth, running a nervous hand through his hair. “It’s all our fault, Maddie. We should’ve done something.”
I dropped my head and felt my shoulders slump. Stubs had said aloud exactly what I’d felt since hearing they’d discovered Tevon’s body. “It gets worse,” I whispered.
I heard Stubby’s sharp intake of breath, then, “What? What else?”
I filled him in on all that’d happened that morning. Stubby reacted by freaking out a whole lot more. “But you had nothing to do with it!” he practically shouted. “Mads, you have to tell them! You were trying to help Mrs. Tibbolt keep Tevon alive!”
“I don’t think they believe me, Stubs.”
Stubby was silent for a long time. “I should’ve talked to her at the diner,” he said. “Or you and I should’ve gone over to her house that night. We should’ve tried harder to get her to listen.”
“I know,” I agreed, sick with regret about not having done more to prevent Tevon’s death. “I didn’t know it would end like this. I didn’t know he’d be tortured and murdered. I thought he’d die from some freak medical thing that nobody could’ve detected.”
Again Stubby was silent for a long time. Then he said, “I’m sorry, Mads. I didn’t mean it when I said it was our fault. You tried to warn Mrs. Tibbolt, but she wouldn’t listen. None of this is your fault. I should’ve been the one to vouch for you.”
I sighed. “It’s not your fault, either, Stubs. If you’d gotten on the phone, or gone over there, she might’ve called the cops on both of us.”
“Or she might’ve listened,” Stubby countered, his voice heavy with regret. We were both quiet for a minute and then Stubs said, “What’d Donny say?”
I curled my knees up onto the chair and hugged them tight. “He says they don’t have a case, but…”
“But what?”
“I can tell he’s worried,” I whispered, more afraid of sensing that from Donny than anything else that’d happened to me that day. “He doesn’t even want me to do readings anymore. He told me flat out that I’m not allowed to tell anybody their deathdate until this thing blows over. If it blows over.”
I heard Stubby sigh. “Well, if he says there’s no case, then I’d believe him. And don’t worry, they’ll find out who really did this. And then those agents will owe you a big apology.”
I squeezed the phone and closed my eyes. It was so typical of Stubby to think positively. I thought it must be in his DNA or something, because he always found the good in everybody and in every situation. But he hadn’t seen the photograph of Tevon’s body. He hadn’t seen the hard, accusing eyes of Agent Wallace.
I could feel myself starting to get really upset again, so I tried to end the call. “Yeah, okay. Listen, I think Donny’s calling me. I gotta go.”
Stubby seemed to know I was rushing him off the phone. “You gonna be okay?”
“Sure.”
“Meet you at the diner tomorrow night?”
“Yeah. Listen, I really gotta go.”
“Okay,” he said. “Text me later.”
I nodded, but my throat had filled with emotion and I couldn’t get any more words out. After I hung up, I cried in my room for the rest of the day.
BY THE FOLLOWING TUESDAY AFTERNOON I knew it wasn’t my imagination. It started with Mrs. LeBaron (11-18-2060), my homeroom teacher. She kept glancing in my direction during the twenty minutes before classes started. And it wasn’t a nice look. It said, I know what you did, and I think you’re terrible.
I tried to shrug it off. Tevon’s murder was all over the news and it was all anybody could talk about at school, but I didn’t think anyone knew that I’d been called in by the FBI. Well, except for Stubs, and he’d never tell anyone.
But then my chemistry teacher, Mr. Pierce (3-12-2029), called me over as class was letting out and he said, “Hang in there, Maddie. In this country you’re innocent until proven guilty.” And I understood then that all the teachers knew.
Worse yet, Mr. Pierce seemed to be the only teacher who was on my side. In French class Mrs. Johanson (2-2-2031) snapped at me for using the wrong preposition while Mike Dougherty (5-6-2067) had done the very same thing right before and she hadn’t even blinked. Stubs leaned forward from behind me and whispered, “Why’re they all acting so weird around you?”
I didn’t answer him, because out in the hallway I heard Harris call to a student caught out of class after the bell. It suddenly dawned on me that maybe nobody knew I’d been called into the FBI offices over the weekend, but they could know about the meeting in Principal Harris’s office. The faculty’s reaction was too intense for them to have just learned that I’d met with the agents. They seemed to know the details of the conversation in Harris’s office, which meant it could only have come from Harris himself.
I didn’t know if he was allowed to tell the other teachers about what was said, but it was pretty obvious that he had, and it really upset me. I started to wonder who else he’d told. The news reporters covering the story were saying what a monster Tevon’s murderer was, and after seeing the photo of his dead body, I knew that firsthand. It was bad enough to think that Agents Wallace and Faraday thought me capable of doing something like that to a young kid, but it was a whole different kind of nightmare to think that all my teachers believed I was capable of that, too.
As if to have my worst fears confirmed, a little later as I was leaving Precalc, Mr. Chavez said, “Did you really kill that kid, Fynn?”
He’d spoken so low I almost hadn’t heard him, but when I glanced up he was looking at me the way Wallace had, like he simply knew I was guilty. Immediately, I dropped my gaze and bolted out of there. Stubs had to run to catch up. “Hey!” he called, followi
ng me to a barely used stairwell. “Mads! What’s going on?”
“It’s nothing,” I said, trying to hide my face from him. I didn’t want to make a bigger deal out of it than it already was, and I was terrified everyone else at school was going to find out.
Stubby frowned and caught my arm to stop me from walking away. “Will you talk to me, please? Seriously, what’s up?”
I took a deep breath. “I’m pretty sure Mr. Harris told the other teachers about the meeting with the feds in his office.”
“Whoa,” he whispered. “Can he do that?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know, but it doesn’t matter now because obviously the word’s out, and pretty soon, the whole school will know and everybody’s gonna think I’m a murderer.”
Stubs eyed me with a bit of humor. He always knew when I was being melodramatic, but this time I wasn’t playing. I was actually crazy scared. “Hey,” he said. “Don’t think like that, okay? None of the kids know yet, right? And maybe the teachers will keep it on the down low until the feds actually catch the guy who did this.”
A sudden and terrible thought occurred to me. “But what if they don’t, Stubs? What if they never catch the killer and this hangs over me forever?”
Stubby turned me forward to walk with him and nudged me with his shoulder. “You can’t let yourself go there. You have to believe that the feds just need a little time to do their thing and figure it out, and then everybody’s gonna look totally stupid for thinking it could’ve been you.”
The warning bell rang, and Stubby quickened his steps, hooking his arm through mine. “Come on,” he said. “Try not to think about it, okay?”
I let him pull me along to our next class, but for the rest of the day I avoided looking at anything besides the textbook in front of me.
After school I hurried to meet Stubs out by the bike rack. I found him standing next to my bike with a wad of paper towels again. There were even more eggs this time. “I hate those two,” I spat as he and I worked to get the gunk off. From nearby we could see Eric and Mario laughing and poking each other.