It was pretty heavy-handed matchmaking. The kind of meddling that an actual grandmother might do on behalf of her grandson.
Is Chase a “lovely boy”? Would Mrs. Murphy bake him cookies if she knew his past? And yet, he’s made an old lady happy.
Sighing, I resumed staring at the street, this time more alert and watching, with mixed emotions, for a tall, athletic guy who still, in my eyes, wore an imaginary question mark, even though I’d kissed him and nearly blurted out three words that I couldn’t seem to say to anybody else in the entire world.
But he didn’t show up, maybe because we were showing Hitchcock, and I knew he wasn’t a fan. Or maybe he didn’t want to see me after I’d literally fenced him out.
And when it became apparent that nobody else was coming to buy tickets, I went into my post at the snack bar, retrieving my backpack from where I’d stashed it under the candy counter. As usual, I pulled out a book. But that evening, I hadn’t brought one of my philosophy texts. Instead, I’d impulsively grabbed one of the Nancy Drew novels I’d read with my mother.
Studying the cover, which featured Nancy in her usual businesslike attire, I suddenly wondered if my mom had chosen to read the books with me for a reason. Not because they were both campy fun and yet compelling stories, for a nine-year-old, at least, but because she’d known I’d be motherless in my teen years—just like Nancy—and had wanted to give me a role model. Wanted to show me a half-orphan who’d grown up more than okay, and who looked out for her father, her friends, and her dorky, straight-arrow boyfriend.
I turned the book back and forth in my hands, as if it was a clue not to a murder mystery, but to . . . my whole life. My past and my future. And I found myself wondering, WWND?
What would Nancy do?
Not to solve a murder and save her dad, but if she one day discovered that dweeby Ned Nickerson wasn’t quite the “nifty,” innocent frat boy he’d led her to believe.
Would preachy, straight-laced Nancy ditch him? Or—given that she was also loyal and pragmatic—would she look at the person he was now, and forgive him?
I was pretty sure I knew the answer. She’d ditch him—kindly, but firmly.
And yet, I realized that I couldn’t do that.
Chase had done something terrible in the past, and he hadn’t been forthright with me at first, but I still liked—more than liked—him, and had to at least give him a chance to explain why he’d kept stuff from me, and what, exactly, had happened on the night he’d wrecked that car and taken a life.
Unfortunately, by the time I tried to approach him at school, he had reasons to hate me.
Or so he thought.
Chapter 80
“I was very pleased to see your latest story in my inbox this morning, Millie,” Mr. Sokowski said, joining me at my locker on Monday morning. “I really think you have a chance at another Pacemaker this year.” Then he frowned. “Although I’m sorry about your father.”
“Thanks.” I did appreciate the support, but I tried to peer around my lanky advisor.
Where was Chase, who should’ve been at his locker, too?
Was he skipping school?
“Millie? Are you listening?” Mr. Sokowski sidestepped, blocking my view. “Because—ironically—I’m trying to tell you that I’m very impressed with your focus lately.”
“Oh, I’m superfocused,” I said distractedly. I again tried to peek around him. “Like a laser.”
I need to find Chase. Need to at least know if he’ll talk to me after I shut him out, or if it’s too late. And I just . . . need him today, too. In case things go wrong for my father with the borough council . . .
I heard Mr. Sokowski sigh, and I finally forced myself to look at him just as he said, with clear annoyance, “Well, keep up the good work for the paper, Millicent. At least keep your head in the game there.”
“Sure. Will do.”
Mr. Sokowski left, and I resumed watching down the emptying corridor, just like I’d watched for Chase at the theater the night before. But once more, he was a no-show. At least, that’s what I thought until I felt a tap on my shoulder and heard a familiar voice say, “Millie?”
I wheeled around, at once excited and relieved that Chase had approached me. Then I saw his face. “What’s wrong?” I asked, without even greeting him.
He didn’t greet me, either. He just looked at me with disappointment—and anger—in his usually beautiful blue eyes, demanding, quietly, so other kids couldn’t hear, “How could you do that to me, Millie? I know you’re done with me, but how could you betray my confidence? Tell everyone my story?”
What?
“I . . . I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Chase crossed his arms. “Really? Because everyone’s talking about my time at Mason Treadwell—and you’re the only student who knows . . . or knew . . . about that. Until today.”
My heart sank to the floor. “But Chase . . . I didn’t . . .”
He didn’t believe me and rubbed the back of his neck, talking more to himself than me. “All I wanted was to be left alone. To finish out my senior year.” He addressed me again. “Then you had to interfere and . . .”
He didn’t have to finish. Two kids walked by, gave Chase funny looks, and whispered the moment they thought they were out of earshot, “He was in, like, juvie . . .”
I turned back to Chase, begging him to believe me. “I swear . . . I didn’t say a word! Not even to Laura or Ryan!”
“Yes, Millie.” His voice dripped with sarcasm. “I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that we kiss, I confess something, and you completely shut me out.” He held up a hand. “Which I get. I didn’t say I deserved understanding or forgiveness. I don’t give those to myself.” Then his eyes got even harder. “But you didn’t have to go out of your way to make me more miserable. Believe me, I punish myself, every day of my life. I don’t need anyone’s help with that.”
Before I could defend myself again, Chase walked away down the hall, his back straight, and opened his locker. I could see the picture he kept there—part of his punishment.
“But I didn’t . . .” I said softly, not understanding how word about Chase’s past had gotten out. I was seriously wracking my brain, trying to figure out if I’d somehow slipped up and said something, because it was a strange coincidence, his confiding in me and the whole story spreading. But I hadn’t mentioned Mason Treadwell, or anything Chase had done, to anyone. Heck, I wouldn’t even know how to start a rumor. I only had two friends.
It was almost like someone with better connections than me had suddenly decided to snoop into Chase’s private life, which I couldn’t imagine anybody bothering to do. Especially since nobody’d really asked questions for over a year.
Who in Honeywell High would go to great lengths to dig up dirt on Chase?
And then, all at once, I solved the riddle. Or, more accurately, someone else straight out answered my question. A witchy girl who couldn’t keep the laughter out of her voice as she noted, “I think your boyfriend’s really mad about his big secret coming out, huh, Millie?”
Chapter 81
Who had connections?
And a propensity for malicious gossip?
And the will to put her irritatingly formidable brain to work if the purpose was diabolical enough?
Viv.
I wheeled around to find her standing right behind me, her boobs looking especially overinflated since she was puffing out her chest with pride at having screwed Chase over.
“He didn’t want you, so you had to make him miserable,” I accused her. I glanced down the hall, but Chase was gone. In fact, Viv and I should’ve been in homeroom, too. I turned back to her. “You just couldn’t leave him alone. And now he thinks I sold him out!”
“Yes, watching him lay into you was an added bonus,” she said, looking extra pleased. “I take it you knew that he’s a closet delinquent.”
“You don’t understand,” I said, defending the guy I’d recently turned my back
on. “He just wants to be left alone.”
“I would, too, if I my previous school was a prison,” Viv agreed nastily. “I wouldn’t go bragging about it, either.”
“How did you even find out?”
“I always suspected there was something up with him,” she said. “I mean, who refuses to party with the cheerleaders?” She uttered that with genuine disbelief—although I was tempted to raise a hand. Not that I’d ever been invited to a “cheer” party. “And when he took you to the formal,” Viv continued with a mock shudder, “I knew he was totally off. So I sneaked into the guys’ locker room—into the office—opened a desk drawer, and read Killdare’s file on him. And there it was. Chase’s last school, and his transfer papers.” She examined her manicure and sighed with self-congratulation. “It was pretty simple, really.”
Yes, simple—if you were the kind of person who sneaked around locker rooms.
I caught myself.
Well, I was that kind of person, too. But I didn’t act maliciously.
“Look, Viv.” I tried to appeal to whatever humanity she had. “He’s sorry—”
Shark that she was, she smelled blood in the water, and bit. “For what?”
So, at least she didn’t know why Chase had been at Treadwell. Needless to say, I ignored the question, repeating, “He really just wants to be left alone. He doesn’t even expect people to understand, or want their friendship. He’s just sorry . . .”
My voice trailed off, though.
How could I explain the complex, private, tortured person who was Chase Albright in a few sentences to a girl who, let’s face it, didn’t care, anyway? And who probably still wanted him, too, even though she pretended otherwise, telling me, “Whatever, Millie. You’re lucky I saved you from one felon—although you’re stuck living with another. At least until he goes to jail, too.”
I knew that Viv was nearly crazed by jealousy. That she really was like a shark thrashing in the water, lashing out at anything that moved, in a total feeding frenzy of envy over the fact that, on top of everything else, I’d taken the guy she wanted. Clearly, that had been the last straw. Maybe I even should’ve felt sorry for her, because sometimes things did seem to fall my way. But that wasn’t happening then—in fact, my life was a shambles—and I wasn’t about to take her crap for one more second. She definitely wasn’t going to get away with calling my dad a felon. And just as the bell rang, sending everybody spilling into the halls, I raised my foot, glad that I was wearing an old pair of Doc Martens, even if they weren’t stylish—had never been stylish—because ballet flats or some other girly shoe wouldn’t have made Viv yowl like she did when my giant boot met those wussy, peep-toed suede jobs she seemed to love so much.
And I finally didn’t care that a ton of kids heard me say, with my finger right in her twisted-with-pain face, “I think you’re the felon, Viv. I swear, I think you killed Mr. Killdare, and Mike Price, too. And if you mess with my family or my friends one more time—so much as show your face near our house again—my Doc Martens are going to do more than stomp your foot. They’re going to kick your skinny ass!”
I’d always thought Viv was popular. I mean, I guessed she was, by most standards. But apparently a lot of kids secretly felt the way I did about her—believed she was nothing but a bully—because as I strode down the hall a bunch of students applauded.
Not Chase, though.
I couldn’t tell what he was thinking when I stalked right past him, so close that our shoulders brushed.
I couldn’t help but touch him. He stood in the very center of the corridor, feet planted wide, and I thought he meant to stop me. But I had other business to attend to.
First, I had to go to Mr. Woolsey’s office to accept my inevitable detention for “inciting a disruptive incident.”
Then I had to figure out how the heck I could prove that Viv had walked out of the boys’ locker room with more than a nugget of damning information about Chase. I needed to think about how, on her freakishly emaciated frame, she’d smuggled out a trophy, too, and buried it in our yard.
Chapter 82
“Dad!” I jumped off the couch when he finally came into the house, late. And right away, I knew that his day had been worse than mine. He hadn’t just gotten detention. He’d lost another job that he’d loved. First coaching. Now mayoring. I stopped in my tracks, my heart breaking to see him pull off his tie and ditch it on a chair. Something about the way he performed that familiar gesture seemed final, like he’d never do it again. And all at once, I wasn’t worried about how we’d get by. I was only sick for how unhappy he was. “Oh, Dad . . .”
“Sorry, Millie.” He dropped down onto the couch, rubbing his face with both hands, and I sat down again, too. “We . . .” His voice was muffled, and he seemed to have trouble getting out the news. “Borough council and I agreed that it’s best if I take a leave of absence.”
“A leave? That’s not so bad, right?” I ventured.
He didn’t say anything. He just exhaled with a whoosh and fell back onto the cushions, staring straight ahead—no doubt at a bleak future.
He doesn’t believe he’ll ever be mayor, or a coach, again. Maybe he even thinks he’s going to prison.
“Dad, do you have any idea who might’ve planted the trophy?” I asked. “Any idea? Because I have suspicions.”
He closed his eyes and shook his head. “No, Millie. I’m baffled. And I want you to leave it alone. A boy has been killed. Please. Don’t give me cause to worry more by nosing around.”
“Okay,” I promised. But I had my fingers crossed. “Just don’t worry, all right?”
He didn’t answer, and although it felt strange at first, I moved closer and rested my head against his shoulder, just being there with him. I swear I half expected him to edge away. But I guess one good thing was coming out of the whole mess we were in, because for the second time in a few days, my father and I were close. Not only physically, which was weird enough, but—at the risk of coming across as too gushy—emotionally. It was like we were finally the team that my mother had no doubt hoped we’d evolve into.
We sat that way for a long time. I didn’t try to tell him things would be okay, because I was afraid it would make him feel weak to be reassured by his child. And more to the point, I had no clue what was going to happen. We just hung out. Being quiet.
After about a half-hour, the door opened and Ms. Parkins slipped into the house quietly, as if she already knew the news and expected the grim mood. That was my cue to get up, and I went over to meet her at the door, since I was on my way out.
“I’m really glad you’re here,” I whispered with a glance at my dad, who was rubbing his face again. “You know. For all of this.”
“I’m glad I can be here,” she told me. “Thanks for letting me.”
I looked down at my arm, which was being squeezed by fingers laden with cocktail rings. A gesture that wouldn’t have happened if there’d been a library counter between us. She let go of me, and I reached for my jacket. “Guess nobody can stop true love, huh?” I joked. “Not even Millie Ostermeyer can stand in the way of that.”
I said that to lighten the mood a little. But as I made my way through town, headed toward Coach Killdare’s house, I wondered if I’d already proven that I did, indeed, have the power to wreck—if not true love on Chase’s part—what sure felt like love on mine.
Chapter 83
I wasn’t sure how I knew that Chase would be at Mr. Killdare’s house. Maybe I just figured that if I’d had a sucky day—and a key that would give me access to a grotesquely cute, nonjudgmental dog—that’s where I’d go.
And Chase didn’t seem incredibly surprised to see me, either, when he opened the door at my knock. He just stared at me for a long moment, then stepped to the side, saying, “Come on in, Millie. I think we have a lot to talk about.”
Chapter 84
“Viv spread the rumor about you,” I told Chase, who sat next to me on the kitchen floor, our backs resting
against Mr. Killdare’s cabinets, just like we’d once sat against the tub. At least the view was a little better this time. “The whole thing was her.”
Chase drew in one long leg to kick, lightly, at my foot. “Yeah, I figured that out when you crushed her toes with those big army boots. I heard the tail end of your tirade.”
I overlooked the dig at shoes that had served me very well that day, thank you—although I did appreciate his use of the word “tirade.” Jock geek. “She found out about Treadwell by snooping in the football office,” I explained. “Mr. Killdare had some old file with papers about your transfer. But she doesn’t know what you did . . .”
I didn’t quite finish that thought because that was still a bad topic between us.
Chase rolled a rubber ball across the linoleum floor, giving it a halfhearted toss, and Baxter gave equally unenthusiastic chase. “I guess you know all the gory details by now,” he said, accepting the slobbery ball—and Baxter’s head across his legs. It was clear the game was already over. “I’m sure you’ve read about it online.”
“Yeah. I have.”
Chase shifted to finally meet my eyes. “And . . . ?”
“I don’t know.” I was the first to turn away. I couldn’t think straight when he looked right at me like that. We were having this terrible, uncomfortable discussion, but I couldn’t control how I felt for him. No wonder Ms. Parkins and my dad hadn’t been able to stay apart. “I just wish you’d told me.”
“I do too.” Chase began stroking one of Baxter’s long ears, avoiding my eyes, too. “I just started to . . . like you so much. From the first time we really talked, on the walk from the cemetery. I didn’t want you to think I was a monster.”