Interim(21)

Jeremy moved swiftly through the room, shoving clothes into a huge duffel bag. Shoving all the books, binders, and notebooks he could find into his book bag. Shoving the . . . He took a quick inventory. Well, there was nothing else. His few collectibles and important personal items were at Roy’s garage, locked safely away in a corner cabinet.

He hesitated a moment, eyes moving quickly over the room, trying to recall one good memory to take with him. It’d be a shame to leave with nothing. He shut up his eyes tightly and conjured the image of his mother. But then his father stood in her way, taking up all the space in the room, in Jeremy’s brain. He had a brand new video game in one hand and a bowl of soup in the other. He brought them into Jeremy’s room and placed them on the nightstand. Then he sank into the mattress beside his son, his weight forcing Jeremy to roll into him.

“Hey, guy,” he said gently.

Jeremy smiled.

“You look awful,” his dad noted.

“Flu.”

“I know. I got some pretty good medicine here,” his dad replied. “What do you want first? Soup or game?”

“You’ll play with me?”

“Of course.”

“Game first.”

There. That would do. His heart constricted in slow, painful pulses. A drawn-out, emotional heart attack.

“Don’t cry, you *,” he muttered.

His father groaned, and he knew it was time to leave. He tiptoed past the sleeping giant and hurried to the bathroom. He swept the counter, dumping all his toiletries into his open duffel bag. And that was that. He was packed. He was gone.

***

“Get to class!” Mr. Armstrong roared.

Regan arrived late for school. It was completely out of character. She was one of those punctual people. But she slept through her alarm—“Mom, why didn’t you wake me?!”—and arrived ten minutes into first period. She noticed Jeremy, and watched him try unsuccessfully to shove a large duffel bag into his locker. He cursed and threw it on top instead, emptying his book bag as fast as he could to the sound of the assistant principal’s threats.

“Detention slips are coming!”

Jeremy slammed his locker door, but the latch didn’t catch, and the door swung wide, a red notebook spilling onto the floor. He was already far down the hallway, and Regan hesitated, unsure if she should retrieve it. She watched a student kick the notebook in his haste to avoid detention. It spun toward her, catching the toe of her shoe, and stopped cold. It stared up at her. Waiting.

“Regan, you’re one of the good students,” Mr. Armstrong said behind her.

She jumped. “I don’t want detention!”

She heard him chuckle. “Then please go to class.”

“Yes, sir,” she replied, bending over and grabbing the notebook.

She rushed down the hallway, closing Jeremy’s locker in the process, and slipped into first period Journalism. Yes, she could have replaced the book, but she didn’t want to. She wanted an excuse to talk to him. This was her one chance to get his story, and she wouldn’t squander it by doing the right thing.

What could be written inside, she thought? She hoped for something good. It felt like a journal, and she bent over to thumb the corners of the pages, glimpsing words words words! Of course she wouldn’t open it! She had a moral compass that worked . . . most of the time. But the longer she thought about the journal tucked securely inside her messenger bag, the more her desire grew to open it. Just once. Read one sentence and that’s it. Cover closed. No more. Not another glance. If she could just get a taste of that one sentence, move it around in her mouth, get a feel for its texture, she could satiate her hunger. Just a bit of knowledge would do. One bite. What’s the harm in one bite?

***

There was nothing ethical about what she planned to do. The fact that she hid in the far corner bathroom stall was proof enough. She hated herself for it, but at the same time, she couldn’t hand the notebook over without getting a glimpse into his thoughts. It may be the only opportunity she’d have to know something about him. And she needed only a little . . . Oh, who was she kidding? She planned to read the whole damn thing.

She pulled a seat protector out of the dispenser on the back wall, lined the toilet, and got comfortable.

“I’m a wretched person,” she said aloud, hoping the confession would ease her conscience some. It didn’t.

She stared at the red cover—worn at the edges with the layers of thin cardstock peeling apart to mirror little paper fans. The color was faded near the middle where he wrote something but then erased it. Maybe he labeled his journal and then decided that was stupid. She pulled the notebook closer to her face, squinting her eyes in concentration. “My thoughts,” it had read, and she smiled at its simplicity.