Unspeakable Things(26)
It was a true thought, truer than any I’d ever had, and suddenly I wanted to write about it, not in a way that people would know what I was saying but like a message in a bottle, a secret code that Dad couldn’t crack. I reached for the pencil and spiral-bound notebook that I stored inside my closet. I couldn’t risk turning on a light, but the lightning came often enough that I managed to write the words burning up the space between my brain and hand.
Writing it took longer than it should have, but when I was done, I felt like I could sleep. I closed the notebook and tucked it back into the shelf along with the pencil before falling into a heavy slumber.
CHAPTER 15
Bad news still finds you on sunny days.
If that saying of Aunt Jin’s was true, then the converse must hold as well: good news could arrive during a monsoon, and man, was this a tree-bender. Usually storms finished off before morning, but this one was holding on. I wondered what Mr. Patterson, my biology teacher, would have to say about the downpour. An early summer with a lot of rain seemed like it’d be a good thing for farmers.
But of more immediate concern: today was the day.
Not the last day of seventh grade, though it was that.
Today I was going to ask Gabriel to sign my yearbook and cement our relationship.
Eeeeeeee.
The way I envisioned it, as Gabriel was leaning in to sign my Lilydale Ledger, I’d make a joke about how hard Mr. Kinchelhoe’s finals were. Then Gabriel would say that he was looking forward to seeing Cujo at the Lilydale Cinema come August, and I’d say no way me too, and before you knew it, he’d offer his phone number and our summer would be a bliss of dates with his dad driving, Seven Minutes in Heaven for that first melty love-and-rockets kiss, and him pushing me on a swing with my toes pointed toward the moon. He’d tell me my scar was beautiful but offer me his necklace just the same. He’d remove the link that would make it just the right length, drape it around my neck, and clasp it.
The air would flood with the pink-honey smell of roses.
Like that, my disfigurement would disappear.
I’d rehearsed the interaction until I knew it by heart.
Unfortunately, I couldn’t locate Gabriel.
He hadn’t ridden the morning bus. As if that weren’t bad enough, Wayne, Ricky, and Clam were more aggressive than usual. Made sense with it being the last day of school, but I wondered if it was something more, if Wayne or Ricky were the other Hollow boy who had also been abducted. Sephie and I talked about it and decided we couldn’t tell for sure.
Gabriel missed band, the only class we shared. Also, no passing him in the hallway during morning classes, though I kept my yearbook clutched to my chest just in case. I made it all the way to lunch without spotting him, which I hoped didn’t portend anything.
I started to plan and organize a million miles a minute, which is what I did when I felt nervous. If I didn’t see Gabriel for the rest of the day and he didn’t ride the bus, I’d walk to his house after school. I would. I’d do it. I needed that necklace.
If you want it, go for it. Aunt Jin.
“Free lunch!” someone yelled as I cruised into the cafeteria. I stood up straighter. Mom had woken early to pack our noon meals, which was something she hardly ever did now that she was full-time, but I suppose she wanted to send us off to our last day feeling good. Unfortunately, I could guess without looking that the brown bag held too-thick homemade bread slathered with co-op peanut butter, the kind you had to stir with a cement mixer to get the oil to blend back into the nuts, an apple (of course), and maybe some almonds.
Heather’s friend Bonnie was standing next to me wearing the prettiest rainbow shirt. For sure she knew about me and the cookie lip gloss, but I didn’t care, not in that moment. “What’s this about a free lunch?”
She stood on her tippy-toes to peek at the menu. She had to raise her voice to be heard over the rain pelting at the cafeteria’s roof and window bank. “I think they’re cleaning out the kitchens. Doesn’t matter if you have a lunch card or not,” she said, managing not to glance at my brown bag. “We get to eat until it’s gone.”
“Thank you!” I said too loudly, even considering the storm happening outside.
I wove through the crowd to dump my brown bag in the trash and then jogged all the way to the rear of the line. When I finally reached the front, there wasn’t much depth, but there was so much breadth! Green beans and fish sticks and cinnamon rolls and applesauce and white-bread-and-butter sandwiches and instant mashed potatoes. I tucked my yearbook under my arm so I could hold the tray with two hands; then I stacked the food up as high as I could before searching for a spot to sit.
The only feasible opening was across from Evie and Frank, same as before.
Oh well. Nothing was going to break my stride, not when I was holding a tray of free lunch.
“Hey, guys!”
Evie smiled at me with her sharp little teeth. “Hey, Cassie.”
“Hi, Frank,” I even said. Free cinnamon rolls made me magnanimous, a word I did not know how to pronounce but appreciated when I read it.
“Hi.” He sounded mad.
“What’s wrong with you?” I asked.
He scowled. “Your face.”
“Gawd,” I said, digging into the lump-free mashed potatoes. “What’s your prob?”