Suspicious Minds (Stranger Things Novels #1)(9)

As long as it doesn’t interfere with my studies, was all she’d said. But, inside, she’d glowed like a star shone in her chest. Proud.

She’d have to keep this quiet around Becky. Her sister didn’t soak up the same lessons from their dad. When Terry would write letters about the war and send them off to their congressmen, Becky said it was better to know now that people like them had to work hard to survive, rather than be pumped full of hot air thinking they could change the world for the cost of a stamp. Maybe Becky would never have to know what Terry was doing at all.

“I just…I don’t know how we can trust the government anymore,” Andrew said. “They’re supposed to work for us.”

“Preacher to choir. I know,” Terry said. She reached over and lowered the volume on the radio. “They did the moon, too, though.”

“Science did that. JFK told them to do that,” he said. “All they do now is send more of us to die.”

Terry decided not to fill him in on who precisely was running these experiments yet. Scientists from the government. It might give him a stronger reason not to support her involvement, and she didn’t want to fight about it. Her mind was made up.

“I’m getting popcorn and a hot dog,” Terry said. “Possibly a slushie.”

Andrew shot her a wink. “Now you’re talking, big spender.”





1.


“They make me feel like I’m not going because I’m some kind of goody-two-shoes,” Terry said. “That isn’t it.”

Andrew pulled her back over to sit down on the tangle of sheets on his messy bed in the corner of his messier bedroom. “Keep your voice down. They’ll hear you. You could come along…if you weren’t being too good to skip school.”

Terry mock-pushed his shoulder. “You could always stay with me and be my kind of goody-goody.”

“But I’m not allowed in your mad science experiment,” Andrew said, grinning at her.

“There’s also class,” Terry said. “Becky already paid the tuition. Aren’t you worried about skipping out on yours?”

Intersession term was about to start and they’d both signed up for two-week classes. Terry’s was something about pedagogy techniques and Andrew’s a philosophy seminar.

“I’m worried about life passing me by,” he said.

“Uh-huh.”

Terry could never forget that screwups on her part would impact Becky, who felt responsible for her now. Andrew was more spontaneous and also a little spoiled—he’d never been in any trouble someone wouldn’t step in to get him out of. But they believed in the same things, even if they approached them differently. That counted for more than their differences.

“I do have to go back to the psych lab this week,” she said. “So I can’t.”

“Are you sure it’s a good idea to go back?”

“Yes, and that’s why I have to.”

“Babe,” he said, her hands in his, “everyone will be playing at this. You can’t miss it.”

“I barely convinced Dr. Brenner to let me in. I can’t run the risk of getting kicked out before it even starts.”

“Okay.” He touched her cheek. “I wish you were coming, though. I’ll miss you.”

From the other room, a man’s voice called, “Hurry up, we’re leaving in fifteen.”

The voice belonged to some guy named Rick, who had oily hair and made Terry’s skin crawl. He owned the van the five of them were driving to some town no one had ever heard of in upstate New York. Woodstock. It sounded made-up.

Terry rolled her eyes. “Just promise me you’ll be careful. You are going to spend days in a van with strangers from California, after those murders out there. I bet the killers had a van, too.”

Her tone might have been light, but she kept waking up at night, the details fresh in her mind. She read every story about the brutal killings. PIG and HEALTER SKELTER written in blood on the walls, and that poor actress Sharon Tate stabbed to death while eight months pregnant. What kind of monsters would hurt a pregnant woman?

“We’re going to the opposite end of the country,” he said. “You’re not really worried about murderers in vans?”

“No,” she said. Yes, she thought, and everything else that could happen. The world barely makes sense.

“And they’re not strangers. Rick and Dave grew up together.”

That didn’t account for Rick’s friends, another sketchy guy nicknamed Woog and a girl named Rosalee who stared at Terry like she was a joke in human form. Not to mention, people changed. As far as Terry was concerned, they’d only come by to invite Dave along on their way across the country from Berkeley so they could use the apartment’s shower.

“Maybe I am a little worried. I know it’s irrational,” Terry said, which was a lie. It felt perfectly rational. “I just feel like something bad’s coming. I can’t explain it.”

“That’s a given…Hopefully not to me though. Or to you.” Andrew smiled and toppled her back onto the bed, his lips beside her ear. “But just in case, maybe we should say a real goodbye.”

“I can’t believe you’re seeing Janis Joplin without me. You are a terrible boyfriend.”