All We Can Do Is Wait(22)

A tension settled over the table and then, surprising everyone, Skyler said, “I hate Harry Potter.”

Scott laughed, bigger and louder than he expected. “How can you hate Harry Potter? Who hates Harry Potter?”

Jason raised his hand. Asshole.

Skyler thought for a second. “I don’t know. It’s just, like, I hate those stories where a kid has some shitty life but then he finds out he’s special and his life gets really cool and exciting. Like he’s saved. What about the kids with shitty lives who aren’t special, who don’t find out they’re magic or whatever? Shouldn’t there be books about those kids? Why does the story have to be about, like, wizard Jesus?”

“Totally,” Jason muttered.

Alexa pursed her lips. She had nice lips. “I guess I hadn’t really thought about it that way.”

“Me neither,” Scott said, wondering which one he was, the special kid or the nobody, but also sort of already knowing. He wasn’t going to be whisked away to anywhere magical, probably not. The only good thing, like really good thing, in his life might be dead or dying as they spoke. Crushed in her car, with Taissa and Cara.

“She was driving to Salem,” Scott said. The group turned to look at him. “Aimee, my girlfriend. She and two of her friends, Taissa and Cara. They’re in The Crucible? The play? So the cast was driving up there to, like, I dunno, do research about witches or something.”

Scott swore he heard Jason snicker a little. He looked up, gave him a hard stare, but Jason didn’t even seem to notice.

“Anyway, that’s why they were there. On the bridge, I mean.”

There was a silence. People shifted in their chairs.

“My sister was just driving back from work,” Skyler offered after a moment. “She drives that way, like, every day, I think, each way. I was . . . I was on the phone with her when . . .”

“Jesus . . .” Alexa muttered. “My parents—our parents—they were . . .” She trailed off. The others waited for her to continue, but all she said was “I don’t know. They were just there.” The group fell quiet again.

Scott sat back in his chair. It was so bizarre to think about. That they could all be gone. To think of how scary it must have been to be on the bridge. I should have been with Aimee, Scott thought. Maybe he would have skipped class and he and Aimee would have driven up together, stopping at Aimee’s house for a quickie or something, and then they would have missed it, they wouldn’t have been on the bridge when it happened. There were so many things that could have been different, that could have prevented it all from happening. To Aimee, at least.

Skyler’s phone started buzzing in her pocket, snapping Scott out of his fantasy, the hazy vision of an entirely different November afternoon disappearing. Suddenly the Mary Oakes doors swung open and there she was, striding through alongside a girl with streaks of purple in her hair, wearing a black hoodie stuck through with safety pins. The girl’s eyes were sunken and red from crying, and she was wiping her nose with her sleeve. Mary Oakes had a tentative hand on her shoulder and murmured something to her before turning away and walking back through the doors.

The girl, tall and tough looking, collected herself and then, standing there alone in the middle of the room, seemed not sure what to do next. She stood there, fiddling with her safety pins, shifting her weight from one boot to another. Scott, feeling some wave of charity, or just wanting even more distraction from the realities of the moment, called over to her.

“Hey!”

The girl turned, eyeing him a little suspiciously. “Yeah?”

“Did she tell you anything? Mary Oakes?”

Something flashed across the girl’s face, then disappeared. She nodded. “Yeah. Uh. My dad. I was finding out about my dad.”

Alexa frowned. “Is he O.K.?”

The girl shook her head. “Um . . . I don’t know? I don’t know. He’s just . . .”

Scott was confused. “He was at the accident? They already brought him in? I thought none of the, uh, the victims were here yet.”

The girl walked closer to the table, her messenger bag making a jangling sound—keys or something. “Yeah, no, he’s still there, I guess. My mom used to work here, at the hospital, so I know Mary a little. She just wanted to make sure I was O.K. or whatever.”

“Oh,” Scott said, wondering what else Mary Oakes might have told this girl. He gestured toward the table. “Well, want to sit with us? While you wait for your dad?”

The girl pulled her sleeves over her hands, crossed her arms. “Uh, yeah. Sure. Cool, thanks.”

She walked the rest of the way to the table and sat in the remaining chair, the five of them introducing themselves. “I’m Morgan,” the girl said, giving everyone a wave.

“I like your pins,” Jason said, leaning forward and giving one a little yank. To Scott’s surprise, the compliment sounded sincere.

Morgan looked down at her sweatshirt, as if she’d forgotten the safety pins were there. “Oh, thanks. I put them on in, like, eighth grade. They’re dumb.”

“They’re cool,” Jason said, nodding with certainty, before turning his attention back to the surface of the table.

“You come here often?” Scott said to Morgan, for no other reason than to fill the silence.