Expelled(52)

I hear the kitchen door open, and when I look up, I see Sasha tiptoeing into the room. She smiles at me, then wrinkles her nose. “Who were you talking to and why does it smell like baboon farts in here?”

“I was talking to the camera, and I think it’s my burrito.”

“Disgusting,” she says.

I put my hand over it. “Don’t listen to her, you’re perfect.”

She laughs as she sits down next to me. “A little cinema verité with your microwaved dinner, huh?”

“Whatever that means,” I say.

Sasha tucks a stray dark wave of hair behind her tiny ear. “It’s a French philosophy of filmmaking. We’ve basically been doing it this whole time, in a way. Handheld cameras, natural light, synchronous sound—”

“You lost me at French philosophy.”

“Don’t play dumb,” Sasha says sharply.

“I’m not dumb,” I say, “I’m demoralized.”

“Why?” She looks surprised. “You found the guilty party. You proved yourself innocent. That’s all you’ve been talking about for weeks! You should be ecstatic.”

“It turned out to be sort of complicated,” I say.

Sasha rolls her eyes. “You wanted it all wrapped up in a neat little bow? Life’s complicated, Foster.”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

“You’re calling me Sherlock? I never claimed to be the detective.”

“You didn’t have to,” I counter. “You knew you were guilty.”

“Touché,” Sasha says.

“Palmieri isn’t on our side,” I say. “And Parker might deny everything anyway.”

She sighs. “All right, turn off the camera. Let’s get out of here.”

“Why?”

“For one thing, because of the baboon fart smell. But also because I’m calling a cast and crew meeting.”

“How come?”

She claps me on the shoulder. “The show must go on, Theo.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re going to write your own ending,” she says. “Just like you wanted.”

And then she won’t say anything more.





50


It’s the golden hour at the Property, when the May light slants across the landscape and everything looks so soft and beautiful it hurts. We’re sitting in a circle on the sun-warmed deck: Jude in a paint-splattered T-shirt, Jere7my looking zombie-ish from pulling an AP calc all-nighter, and Sasha, barefoot and wearing huge movie-star shades, as if the setting sun’s still too bright for her.

Felix clips a small video camera to the railing on a gooseneck mount and looks into the viewfinder to make sure we’re all in frame. “You’re one motley-ass crew,” he says, coming down to join us in the circle.

“‘A brain, a beauty, a jock, a rebel, and a recluse,’” Jude says.

Jere7my sniffs. “I resent your stereotyping.”

“It’s the tagline from The Breakfast Club, dork,” Jude says. “Also, don’t talk to me right now, because I’m seriously pissed at you.” He looks around. “It sort of fits, actually. Sasha’s the brain, I’m the beauty—” He yelps and rubs his arm where Sasha’s just swatted it. “Ow, girl, that hurt.”

“We’re not here for witty banter,” Sasha says. “We have something to discuss.”

“Like how we’re going to band together to kick Parker Harris’s ass?” Jude asks. “Where is the jock anyway? Too chicken to show his face?”

“I’m right here, gonad,” Parker says, coming up the deck stairs from the woods. “Had to take a whiz.”

Jude shoots me a look, like Do we try to take him? I shake my head. This is Sasha’s meeting. Let her decide what happens next.

She glances around at all of us. “In a way, we’ve come to the end of our story,” she says. “We know who did what, and why he did it.”

“Or she,” I add. Okay, I don’t really know the why Sasha took the money, but I’m not sure she does, either.

“We’ve got our answers,” she goes on. “But sometimes the answer isn’t the end of things. Sometimes you need to push on a little further because there’s more to discover. A different finale.”

“Cut the motivational speech. Define the optimal outcome,” Jere7my says nasally.

I can see Sasha biting her tongue; I admire her for not tearing him a new one. She turns to me. “Theo, do you want to tell everyone what happened this afternoon?”

“Yeah. I went to Palmieri and I told him everything.” I glance over at Parker, who jerks forward like he’s going to go after me, but Sasha stops him with a single finger on his arm.

“It’s not like he can expel you again,” she reminds him.

“Goddamn snitch,” Parker grunts.

“So what did Palmieri say?” Jude asks.

“He wanted to know if Parker had figured out what a cravat was,” Jere7my says. “Everyone heard he was having trouble with that.”

Sasha turns on him. “Shut up, you fungus-pale, squeaky-voiced, tube-sock-wearing deviant,” she says. “You’re a big part of why we’re in this mess. So let Theo talk.”