I bite my lip, wondering if any of them might be behind some of the pranks I’ve been getting, especially since they’re using a photo.
When the assembly is finally over, I dart out of the auditorium to my first block of the day, but before I can get there, Ben stops me.
“We need to talk,” he says.
“Not now,” I say, trying to move past him.
“Then when?”
“We’re done talking, remember?”
“Just give me a few minutes,” he insists.
I glance around, noting the crowd of kids going off to their classes, brushing past Ben and bumping against his backpack. Ben breathes through it all, trying to mentally shake off the sensations.
This must really be important.
Debbie stands only a few feet away, outside the computer lab, waiting for Mr. Nadeau to unlock the door so everyone can file in. She folds her arms and stares straight at us.
“How about tonight?” he suggests.
“I won’t be around. My parents are away.”
“You won’t be alone,” he says, more of a statement than a question; there’s a degree of concern in his voice.
“I’m staying at Kimmie’s.”
“How about before Kimmie’s?”
“Before Kimmie’s I have to go home and pack.”
“And before that?”
“I have plans,” I say, meeting his eyes.
Ben nods and studies my face, probably inferring the truth in my lack of details—that “plans” means I’ll be busy with Adam.
“Are you free after school, then? I could meet you.”
“Where?” I ask, finally succumbing to his persistence.
“I’ll find you.”
A second later, the final bell rings. I hurry up the stairs, two at a time, just hoping Madame Funkenwilder doesn’t give me a detention for coming in late. Luckily, we have a sub. And even luckier is that said sub— appropriately named Ms. Pecker, with her pointed nose, beady eyes, and nest of hair—grants us a free block so long as nobody looks idle, does anything illegal, or mutters a single word. A small price to pay for the time it’ll take me to finish the overdue homework I’ve yet to even start.
After school, I exit the main entrance with Wes and Kimmie at my side. Ben is already waiting for me. I spot his motorcycle parked just beyond the traffic circle.
“Like clockwork,” Kimmie says.
“More like a piece of work,” Wes corrects. “Do you want us to hang around for a bit?”
“No, thanks. I’ve already got a ride.”
Kimmie tsks-tsks. “You really do have a penchant for self-inflicted torture, don’t you?”
“I’m not going with Ben,” I clarify. “Adam is driving me home. I’ll call you when I get there.”
“You’ll do better than call me, Miss Chameleon,” she says. “You’re staying at my house, remember?”
“Right, so once I’m done with Ben, I’ll have Adam bring me home to pack and then drop me off at your house. Sound good?”
“More like mildly acceptable, but I guess I’ll take it.” She gives me a squeeze for luck, and then I make my way over to Ben.
Ben is dressed in a black leather jacket and dark-washed jeans. I try not to notice how amazingly good he looks.
“Can we go someplace private to talk?” he asks.
“I’m actually waiting for someone.” I look over my shoulder to make sure that Adam isn’t here yet.
Ben follows my gaze and gives a subtle nod, like he fully gets the picture, and like that picture disappoints him.
We end up in the lobby of the auditorium, where I can still keep an eye on the traffic circle outside, but where it’s private enough to talk.
“So, what’s going on?” he asks, his arms folded.
“With what?”
“I opened your present.”
“And?”
“And, what’s going on?” he repeats. “How did you know about that? Is this all just some way to get back at me?”
“Get back at you for what?”
“You’ve been snooping around in my past,” he says.
“Ben, I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Then how did you know about the horse?”
I shake my head, still thoroughly confused. “The horse has some significance for you?”
“Are you trying to tell me that you don’t know?”
“Why would I be snooping?”
“You were snooping last night . . . when you came to my house. My aunt told me she saw you checking out her fender.”
My face heats up, guilty as charged. I look down at my hands, feeling the pools of sweat begin to form on my palms.
“What were you looking for?” he asks, though it’s clear from his expression that he already knows. His jaw is tense.
“And what was she doing spying on me?” I volley back. “She must have been sitting in her car, waiting for me to come out of mine. I didn’t even see her inside. Was she crouched down by the wheel?”
“She was cleaning out her car. She saw you coming toward hers, and wanted to see what you were up to.”
“So then why did she shine her headlights in my face? And why did she rev her motor?”
“I already told you,” he says, “there’ve been a lot of pranks going on around my house, even more now that I’m back in school. My aunt is just being extra protective. This isn’t easy for her, you know.”
“It isn’t easy for any of us.”
“It’ll be easier if you tell me what you were looking for when you were inspecting my aunt’s car.”
“Why don’t you tell me?” I ask, suspecting he already knows the answer.
“You saw the dent, didn’t you?”
“Is there something you want to tell me about it?”
“I can’t believe we’re still talking about this. That dent’s been there for over two years. Do you honestly think the police didn’t already look into it? Do you think that when Debbie went into a coma, I wasn’t the first person they came looking for?”
“Then why does Debbie think it was you?”
“Do you really have to ask?”
I shake my head, remembering how Kimmie told me that Debbie and her family are determined to pin the accident on someone. “So what does all this have to do with my horse sculpture?”
Ben takes a moment, his eyes focused toward the wall instead of on me. “I gave Julie a pendant that looked exactly like the horse you sculpted. The stance, the legs, the head . . . everything. It hung from a chain. She wore it around her neck.”
I swallow hard, not really knowing what to say. My skin ices over, and a chill runs down my back.
“Julie was into competitive horseback riding, which is why I bought it for her,” he continues. “But on the day we broke up—that day on the cliff—she gave it back to me. She said she didn’t want it anymore.”
“Ben, I had no idea. I mean, I only did what you suggested,” I say, referring to my sculpture. “I went with my impulse, with what I was feeling.”
“Well, your impulse led you to create my exgirlfriend’s pendant.”
I bite the inside of my cheek, wondering what this all means, what it means that I obviously have this ability, and what it means that I’d sculpt something from Ben’s past . . . from the day his girlfriend died.
“I still remember hiking up that mountain with her,” he says. “She seemed distracted, like something was definitely wrong. I tried lightening the mood by pretending to trip, finally getting her to giggle a couple times, but I could tell she didn’t want to. So she just kept telling me to be careful—”
“Excuse me?” I ask, nearly dropping my books.
“She wanted me to be careful,” he explains. “She was afraid I might hurt myself. Only it wasn’t me who ended up falling.”
My heart races as I put the pieces together inside my head: the sculpture, the words, the giggling. It was Julie’s voice I heard that day in the basemen
t, playing in my mind’s ear.
“So maybe we should talk about this,” Ben says.
“Definitely,” I whisper, wondering if he senses it too, how truly alike we are.
“But there’s something I have to tell you first.”
A moment later, Adam’s car pulls into the traffic circle. Ben notices and turns to look. “I guess your ride is here,” he says.
“Just tell me,” I insist.
“Maybe I’ve wasted too much time already.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Be careful,” he whispers. “I think someone might be trying to trick you in some way.”
“Is that what you sense? Is that the real reason you’ve been keeping tabs on me?”
“You have to go,” he says. “Your boyfriend’s waiting.”
“No,” I snap, reminded of the photo left on my windshield. “You can’t just say something like that. You can’t just tell me I’m being tricked and then walk away. Maybe you’re the one who’s tricking me. Maybe you’ve been tricking me all along.”
“I guess it’s up to you to decide who you can trust,” he says.
“Tell me,” I repeat. “Just explain to me what you mean. How is someone trying to trick me? Do you mean all the stuff that’s been happening with the photos and the notes? Are they definitely just pranks?”
“I already said everything I needed to.”
And with that, Ben turns away and heads out the door.
53
There’s a numbing sensation crawling over my skin as I walk to Adam’s car. It’s sort of like I’m on autopilot, going through the motions of my day, like nothing ever happened.
Even though part of me wants to collapse.
Adam spots me coming toward him and gets out of his car. He opens the passenger-side door and gestures for me to climb inside. He’s smiling until he sees my face—my crumbled expression and how I can barely look up from my shoes.
“What’s wrong?” he asks.
I get inside and close the door, then flip the visor down to block out the sun. My reflection stares back at me in the mirror.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Adam asks, back inside the car now.
“I want to go,” I whisper, gazing down at my lap.
“Where do you want to go?”
“Away.” I turn the radio up. The blaring buzz of the music helps block out my thoughts—all the questions and all the confusion—and numb me up even more.
Adam begins down the road, taking a bunch of turns and driving us in circles, clearly at a loss for where to go, but it doesn’t matter. He raises his voice so I can hear him over the music: “Hungry?”
“Take me to Knead,” I say, checking my watch. We’ve been riding around for at least a half hour.
“What’s at Knead?”
“Nothing.” I look out the window and watch the rush of pine trees blur together into one long, green line. “No one. That’s sort of the point.” I rest my forehead against the window, remembering how Spencer said he’d be going to the city to pick up clay supplies today. “We can talk in private.”
Without another question, Adam takes us to Knead, probably relieved to finally have a destination. He unlocks the door and flicks on the overhead lights. We end up sitting at one of the tables toward the back. It’s already set up for tomorrow morning’s class, which tells me that Spencer must have come in today after all.
“So, what’s going on?” Adam asks, taking a seat across from me.
I grab a carving tool from the center of the table and twiddle it nervously in my hand. “I think I may have mentioned it before, but my life is sort of intense right now. I don’t expect you to understand. I don’t even expect you to put up with me.”
“Stop,” he says, reaching out to touch my forearm. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t want to be.”
“I know,” I say, venturing to look up at him.
Adam wipes a stray strand of hair from my eyes. “Tell me what’s going on. I want to help.”
“Why?” I ask, still able to hear Ben’s words in my mind’s ear, telling me that someone’s trying to trick me.
“Because I care about you.” He lifts my chin with his finger, forcing me to look at him again.
“You don’t think I’m nuts?”
“Actually, I think you’re pretty great . . . when you’re not being scary, that is.”
“Scary?”
He pries the carving tool out of my hand and places it out of reach. “Maybe we should keep all sharp objects at a distance,” he jokes. “At least until you’re in a more cheerful mood.”
“Very funny.”
“At least it got you laughing.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I don’t mean to be all high maintenance. Maybe you should just drop me off at Kimmie’s.”
“Does this somber mood have something to do with your ex?” he asks.
“I really don’t feel like getting into it.”
“Then how can I help you?”
“You’ve already helped,” I say. “You brought me here, didn’t you?”
“But now you want to go?”
I shrug, not really knowing what I want. I grab a ball of clay from the recycled bin by the sink and begin wedging it out on a workboard. The rhythmic slapping as clay meets wood helps ease the jangling of my nerves, the tension in my muscles. I pound the clay down, grateful for the break in conversation, to simply concentrate on the form and texture of the clay as I work to get all the air bubbles out.
“So there’s something I need to tell you,” Adam says.
“What is it?” I ask, reaching for a rolling pin to smooth out the lumps.
He hesitates, almost afraid to tell me maybe, but then he finally says it: “I like you.”
“I like you too,” I say, somewhat confused. I mean, haven’t we already been through this before?
“No, I mean I really like you.” His face is completely serious, like there’s so much more going on here than just his mere admiration. “I knew coming here . . . going to school here . . . would be all well and good. I just never imagined I’d like you this much.”
“Did you think you wouldn’t like me?” I ask, thinking back to the first time we met here, at Knead, when I nearly tore his head off at the door.
“Do you mind if I help you with that?” he asks, gesturing to my ball of clay. “I’d really like to learn the wheel.”
“Seriously?”
He nods again, and we move over to the wheel station. I sit on the stool and Adam squats down beside me. “You have to keep your hands moist,” I say, dipping a sponge into a bin of water and squeezing the liquid out over his fingers.
I throw the clay ball down with a smack, flick the switch that turns on the motor, and press my foot against the pedal, feeling an instant jolt of connectedness—me with my work.
The plate revolves counterclockwise. “Are you ready?” I ask, leaning forward to place my hands over the mound.
Adam positions his hands over mine, and I instantly lose that connected feeling. Still, I try to keep focused, working the sides of the ball upward into the shape of a cone. Adam slides his hands toward my wrists, trying to catch the rhythm as I make the cone grow taller.
“This is a lot tougher than it looks,” he says.
His fingers are dry and gritty against my skin. I wring a sponge out over them until water drips down over the plate.
“Your hands really need to become one with the clay,” I say.
Adam’s breath is at my ear, reminding me of Ben. Actually, this whole scenario reminds me of him—of that day, last September, when we sculpted that pinecone shape. Even that ended up coming true.
I remember how at first I thought it was funny, and sort of random, to be sculpting something with my crush—with Ben—and to have it turn out to be a pinecone. But then later, when Matt took me captive, I remember sitting in his car, seeing the pinecone air freshener that hung from his rearview mirror, and thinking what a
coincidence it was.
I’m not even sure I believe in coincidence anymore.
“Am I totally screwing this up?” Adam asks, probably noticing how my hands have stopped moving, and how my mound has lost its center. The bowl-in-process is warped now.
I ease up on the pedal to stop the revolution. Then I straighten the bowl out, blaming my lack of focus—my lack of connectedness—on the clay. “This is why I never use this gray stuff,” I explain. “The red clay is so much better. More tooth, better grog.”
“Grog?”
“Shoptalk.” I grin. “It basically just means that it has more grit.”
“And grit is good?”
“It’s very good. More earthy, less mealy.”
“Are you sure you’re not talking about worms?”
I smile wider and begin again, bearing my hands down over the mound to form the base.
Adam moves even closer, finally scooting in behind me on the stool. “Is this okay?” His thighs graze my hips.
I clench my teeth, trying to keep focused, trying to keep his lack of focus from making me more nervous.
Adam glides his hands up and down my arms as I press my fingers inside the mouth of the bowl to open it up.
I take a deep breath, thinking how this feels so much different from that time with Ben and the pinecone.
Adam presses against me. I can feel the heat of his chest on my back. And then he kisses me. His lips draw a line from my shoulder to the nape of my neck, completely startling me. I puncture my finger through a wall in the bowl, collapsing the sides.
“No,” I whisper, pulling away.
“What’s wrong?”
I look down at the bowl, completely broken now. “This just doesn’t feel right.”
“Oh,” he says, as if taken aback. I can hear the disappointment in his voice.
“I think maybe I just need to be alone right now.”
“Well, at least let me drive you home.”
“Actually, I think I’ll stay. I’d like to work for a while.”
Adam hesitates, but then grabs his coat.