If You're Out There(58)

“Sorry, sir,” I say. “We really don’t.”

“What about a nice omelet?” asks the wife.

I take a second to close my eyes, drawing on swiftly draining reserves of patience. “Well, see, like I was saying, this is a vegan restaurant. So we don’t have eggs. Or corned beef. Or anything else that comes from an animal.” They look to one another, mystified, and the woman lifts a finger with a question at the ready.

“Why don’t I give you two another minute?” I say, walking off before either can respond.

When I reach the kitchen, I check my phone. Priya’s posts have dried up these past couple days. The most recent was something to do with study snacks—berries and nuts laid out with notebooks. And before that, there was a shot of city lights at night with the words Stars can’t shine without darkness.

I don’t know what it is I’m looking for. The wall I’ve hit hasn’t exactly budged. But even if no else believes me, the more I think about it, the more sure I am that the Saturday Selfie with the birthday earrings could only be one of two things: somebody’s slipup or a message. And what about that email? HLEP? ZZ?

I have to admit, every post since has felt sort of like nonsense. But if I’ve gone off the deep end, I don’t think I care. I’m listening to the voice inside my head.

This morning I left for school at my usual time and sat on a stoop up the block until I saw Mom, Harrison, and Whit all climb into the Jeep and drive off. I dialed the school and excused my own absence, pretending to be Mom.

Then I dove.

One wall of my room now looks like an evidence board from Law & Order—all covered in sticky notes. The only problem is I still can’t seem to work out how to connect the clues with little tacks and strings. For a while I sat on my bed and stared at the calendar on my wall. I moved the month page back to June, where Priya had drawn a huge sad face in the box for the thirtieth—moving day.

I called Nick first. He sounded surprised to hear from me. “When was the last time you spoke to Priya?” I asked, getting right down to it. “Like really spoke to her. Not emails or texts or any of that.”

He sighed. “Still on this, are we?”

“Please, Nick. Give me the date.”

I could feel his reluctance. I could tell I was making him sad. Finally he said, “It would have been the day she moved, whenever that was. I was in London and we chatted while she packed. Must have been morning for her, late afternoon for me.” After a pause, he said, “She seemed like she really didn’t want to go.”

When we hung up, I held the phone to my chest, an unnamed fear clawing up.

I called GRETA next. Anushka answered. “Well, hello! Finally got that fund-raising proposal ready for me?”

“Oh,” I said. “Sorry. I’m a little behind on that, actually.”

“Yes, well, you and everyone else,” said Anushka. “There’s a reason we set the deadline so early. Even Priya hasn’t gotten anything to us.”

“Huh.” My heart beat faster. “Hey, when was the last time you spoke to Priya?”

Anushka paused. “God, it’s been a while. She’s emailed here and there.”

“But what about talked, like on the phone? Not since your birthday, right? When she sent bacon cupcakes?”

Anushka sounded vaguely alarmed. “You have quite the memory, Zan. Is everything all right?”

“Uh-huh,” I said quickly, digging through my backpack until I found the documents I’d scooped up from Priya’s house—sheets filled with dollar amounts and various emails about GRETA. I skimmed through until I landed on the one about the fire.

“Hey, Anushka? This is kind of random. But is Friends Elementary one of the places we’ll be volunteering this summer?”

“Well, no, actually. Sadly it burned down a few months ago. They decided to redistribute the students rather than rebuild, so we lost a school.”

“I see,” I said. “I mean . . . That’s awful.” I shuffled through the papers some more. “What about the um . . . Priti School?”

“Priti, Priti,” she said, clucking to herself. “Ah. They got a grant from a bigger charity, so they didn’t end up needing us. It’s been an unusual year. Lots of changes.”

I lingered on the email from Ben to j.karim565.

Please take my call.

I swallowed. “Hey, this is weird, but um . . . Is there anyone named Karim involved with you guys by any chance?”

“Yes . . .” she said strangely. “He worked for us for a couple years. He was our quality control liaison on the ground. He actually quit not too long ago.”

“Oh,” I said. The paper trembled in my hand. “Um, what—what was his job?”

“He was sort of our bridge to the schools in Mumbai. He would check in. Make sure everyone was complying with our requirements to continue receiving funding. Ben was supposed to hire someone new soon, but he’s been dragging his feet. At this rate, we’ll have to start taking the trips ourselves again.”

“Huh.”

Anushka clucked into the phone. “Hey, Zan. I’ve got to run. But . . . is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Everything’s great.”

When we said goodbye, I went to Anushka’s Facebook profile, hoping for a delivery date on those bacon cupcakes. Birthday: June 30.