Come Find Me(42)

“Kennedy?” I whisper.

She jumps anyway before spinning around. Sorry, she mouths.

I ease the door shut behind us. “It’s okay. The guy downstairs works for my parents. He’s got headphones on, so he’s not going to hear us. But more people will be showing up soon.”

“Is this it?” she asks, frowning.

It. My brother’s room. The source of the signal, of everything.

“Yep, this is it.” She’s staring at the room the way I did, like she’s looking for something that isn’t there. I’m too embarrassed to mention that I actually whispered his name, looking for him.

    I clear my throat. “I told Mike I was on my way out, back to school, so…”

She raises an eyebrow, and it turns her more carefree, like I can picture the girl inside, underneath everything that’s happened: the signal, the house, her devastating history. “Is this why you questioned my stealth mode?” she asks, and I laugh.



* * *



—

In the end, I have her sneak out the back door, behind the kitchen. Mike was right—the interns arrived right after him. Dave and Clara (or Sara). Clara/Sara looks at me when I come downstairs, notebook in hand. Her face pinches into both recognition and pity, and I can’t stand it. She smiles warmly. She reminds me of Abby: pretty, friendly.

“Hey there,” she says. “Nolan, right?” Dave runs a hand through his red hair, looks from her to me, and lowers his eyes again.

I half-wave and walk by the table. I can’t stand that still, two years later, I am something to be seen in relation to an event. It’s the only reason she’s looking at me like that. Head tipped to the side, mouth pursed, so tragic.

Like Kennedy said, the spectators do come out, drawn to the scene. Like there’s something alluring about our tragedy.

“Sara, right?” I say, pressing my fingers into the surface of the table, waiting for Mike to look up.

“Clara,” she corrects.

Dave has inched closer, but he’s fidgeting with the papers, like he’s hoping I won’t notice he’s totally eavesdropping. “I remember you,” I say, and he flinches.

    Dave nods slowly. “I was at your school when…” When it happened. When Liam disappeared. He looks back down again. “I didn’t really know him. But he was always friendly.”

“Uh-huh,” I say. As if I didn’t know this about my brother.

Mike’s talking on the phone and barely notices the exchange. He probably wouldn’t have noticed if Kennedy had walked right by him, either.

“Well,” I say, channeling my parents, “thanks for your help.”

Clara leans across the table, just as I’m backing away. “You know, Abby is a friend of mine,” she says, and I feel my cheeks start to heat. I wonder what Abby told her, about Liam, about me. I wonder if she knows about the email. Dave looks up again. Maybe everyone knows. Abby’s friends, the police, Dave, who thinks he knows us.

“Late for next period,” I say, turning away.

I’m out the door before anyone can call me back.

I wait for Kennedy in the driveway, weaving past either Clara’s or Dave’s black SUV and Mike’s blue car, which is much nicer than my own. It only makes it more obvious that mine is in desperate need of a cleaning. They’ve both got a decal of my parents’ organization in their back windows, whereas I’ve always refused. I felt like a walking billboard as it was—no need to add a sticker for people to know.

I like to avoid the attention magnets as much as possible.

Kennedy slips into the passenger seat, and she’s looking at me in a way I can already interpret: she wants to boss me around. “Okay, Kennedy,” I say. “Where to?”

“Well, I sort of need my bike back. Maybe you can drop me at my house and I can take it to Joe’s? As you can see, I’m pretty stealthy. I’ll sneak around back when the buyers aren’t looking.”

    “That’s kind of a long bike ride.”

She shrugs. “I do it every couple of nights.”

“Wait, when do you sleep?”

“Naps, Nolan. Give them a shot. I’m big on the after-school nap before Joe gets home for dinner. At this point, I think I have him convinced it’s just a normal part of female adolescence.”

“You know, I can just drive you instead.”

She twists in the seat, not responding.

I repeat the offer, only this time I make it a statement instead of an offer, so she will just accept it already. “Stop biking. I’ll drive you over there tonight to get your things. And then whenever you need a ride. At least until we figure this out. Okay?”

“Are you going to try the nap?” she asks, and I think that means she’s agreed.

She asked me if I believed the universe could talk to us, and the truth is, I do think it’s something. The fact that we both received the signal and it linked us together; the fact that she came to my house and recognized a photo. All of it means this was not chance, but purpose.

I think it’s this: The signal isn’t the message. It’s the sign. A clue, from my brother maybe, trapped somewhere beyond this world, telling me where to go. And right now, it’s telling me to follow Kennedy Jones on her mission, and somewhere along the way, it’s going to lead me to the next sign, or the next, and we will find him.