Endangered (9 page)

None of the danger of Rooftopping. Nothing to top
View from Heaven
.

Nothing to admire.

All I say is “Didn't get the chance.”

The elevator stops, doors open with a gust of wind that makes me feel like I'm back in that beach storm. Ahead of me, I see open air bordered by city lights and stars. This, from right here, is an awesome shot. The way the floor stretches toward the drop-off, a tunnel of exposed girders framing the sky, giving eerie depth. My camera's in my hand like I summoned it, and I twist on a fisheye lens for panoramic shooting.

Ocie says, “Panda, it's hard to hear you. You're breaking up.”

The wind is loud, amplified by my Bluetooth. It's hard to hear her, too.

I shout, “I'm fine. Give me a few minutes.”

The pictures I'm getting from the relative safety of the elevator would kill on many of the sites I frequent. Definitely could earn a few bucks selling these shots as stock online. But I need more.

The camera strap nestles into my shoulder with the feel of a safety belt. It's the only thing that feels safe in this moment. I remove a length of rope from my bag, and leave my backpack in the elevator so it wedges between the doors when they try to close. Venturing out, I break right, and cover half the distance—about twenty yards—to the view I want, Patriot Trust.

The wind's coming in at random directions, like a gang of ghost bullies taking turns shoving me then retreating to their spirit world. Within the last ten yards before the drop, I coil one end of my rope around the closest girder, securing it with a carabiner, like a rock climber. The other end locks onto the harness I'm wearing under my pants. Admiration is one thing, stupidity another.

The precaution is comforting, because the closer I get to the edge, the
stronger the wind. Ten feet from the open air, I'm crouched, my center of gravity low. At the edge, the break between floor and sky, I forget to breathe. Still, I'm shooting.

The Patriot Trust sign. The gravel-topped roof. The shorter, less regal, surrounding buildings. What I have is nearly enough, but I need one more picture to make sure.

With my pulse pounding hard, louder than the wind now, I push onto my knees, rock back onto my butt. Extending my legs before me, I scooch until my feet slide beyond the solid plane, keep going until my legs can bend at the knee and my boots dangle hundreds of feet over the ground they walked not fifteen minutes before. Quickly, while I still have the nerve, I get a panoramic shot of Patriot Trust and the Portside skyline with my feet in the frame, toes pointed like a ballerina.

He's going to love this
.

I'm done. Sliding backward, getting far away from the edge before the surrounding girders snap like a mousetrap, ensnaring me forever. Gasping, ecstatic, I undo my rope, moving back toward the elevator; I could cheer.

I
do
cheer, screaming into the wind while it screams back. Inside the car, going down, the ambient noise is gone, yet I still hear screams.

Ocie.

“Panda, Panda. Code red! The cops are here!”

I don't feel much like cheering anymore.

The elevator sails down.
Clank-clank-clank
. I watch the numbers on the floor indicator like a countdown. When it hits “1,” I expect the doors to
part, revealing cops, and SWAT, and Special Forces on the other side, peppering my dark clothing with red laser polka dots like in the movies.

The doors open, there is only darkness. Total, consuming. I don't dare turn on my flashlight app.

“Where, Ocie?” I hiss.

“They're, like, patrolling, shining their spotlight at the closed storefronts and alleys. They don't see me, but they're getting close to the fence you went in.”

If they find that hole I cut . . .

I can't sit still, but I'm scared to move, to make a sound. An engine revs. My engine. I recognize the sound of my car coming through my earpiece, then my squealing brakes, followed by Ocie saying, “Officers, excuse me, I need help.”

What is she doing?

Deep voices rumble in the background, too low for me to hear.

Ocie says, “I saw a couple of guys pushing each other around over by that club on Barnaby. It looked like it could get serious. I think one of them had a knife.”

Oh my God, Ocie. You genius!

More deep, low voices. Quicker now. Slamming car doors and sirens sound simultaneously through my earpiece and in the air around as the cops peel out to stop the bloodbath Ocie fabricated.

“Panda,” Ocie says, “if you're coming, it better be now.”

I turn on my flashlight app and
move
, cautious of lethal construction site debris, but walking quicker than what's truly safe. The police might find something strange about the civic-minded Asian-ish girl when they find no weapons or hostility in the club district.

Once through the fence, I use plastic zip ties to resecure the cut links.
If I'm lucky, it will be days before anyone notices the damage, if they ever notice.

My car's waiting at the curb. I jog to it, carrying my gear like a bag lady. The passenger door pops open, and I see Ocie reposition herself with both hands on the wheel, a born wheelman. I dive in, and we're in motion.

I expect admonishments, a repeat of her storm rage. Instead, she's grinning, the excitement radiating off her. She busts a U-turn and peels out like the cops, but in the opposite direction, toward the highway.

“That. Was. Awesome!” she screams, and bangs one fist into the roof.

“I didn't expect that reaction.”

She laughs, and hoots, and is in a better mood than I've seen all week. “That's our black, Panda!”

I agree quietly, “So not other.”

We hit the on-ramp, and I feel closer to her than I have in a while. It's accompanied by a blast of guilt nausea—I've regained our bond with lies.

Shake it off, Panda Bear
.

What's done is done. The question: Was the lie worth it? I won't know for sure until I get home and take a look at my photos on my MacBook. I'm feeling good, though. Confident. My shots are winners.

Ocie says, “Now that we just pulled off a caper, will I get to meet this guy?”

“Soon, I hope.” This time, I'm not lying.

It's dark in my house when I arrive. The only light is blue and ghostly, flickering in the living room where my parents are watching a movie. From the sounds of punches and gunfire I know it's something Dad
picked, yet Mom's hugging him like it's
The Notebook
.

I stop in the doorway to say hello. “Hey, guys.”

Dad pauses the chaos. “You wanna watch the new Bruce Willis with us? You haven't missed much.”

Mom offers their bowl of popcorn. “Extra butter.”

Waving it off, I make my way upstairs. “Movie night is all you, guys.” I like Bruce Willis, but since I just lived a PG version of
Die Hard
, I've reached my adrenaline quota.

In my room I import my pictures to my machine and I'm pleased with the results. I spend an hour on touch-ups before I click SEND and prepare myself for a long wait. I'm sure he'll want to battle again, but I'm not budging until Marcos admits who he is.

That's my plan, this bright and sunny fantasy about what me and my Admirer would be together.

How quickly it unravels.

The next night, Sunday, I'm fresh from the shower and pulling on my pajamas. My mail program sounds with an incoming message. The subject:
A New Game
.

Grinning—yes, my photos are game changers—I open the email. There's no message, only an attachment. I click it, expecting something amazing.

It's a plain, unflattering photo. Like a mug shot. Of Keachin Myer.

I don't get it. I respond and say so.

Less than a minute passes before I see the
SecretAdm1r3r wants to chat
request.

Um, no. It doesn't.

For an hour after I send multiple emails with no response. Irritating, but I don't think much about it—he's flaky, that much I know.

I doze off thinking about his “new game” and what it might entail. What's it got to do with Keachin? What else does karma have to teach her?

Whatever it is, I'm sure it's better than she deserves.

THERE ARE NO NEWS CREWS TODAY
when Ocie and I pull into the student parking lot. I guess bigger and better stories have drawn the flies to new honey.

Last night's weirdness from my Admirer—and the abrupt end to last night's weirdness—has me uneasy, and I mistake the palpable tension I feel when I step into the school as something internal, my personal anxiety. It's not. There's something in the air.

Voices are lower, and while the usual cliques are in their usual spots, there's hugging and hand-holding. A lot of PDA where there's usually none. Someone's sobbing, deep and throaty like a dog's bark. It's a football player.

Ocie's eyebrows bunch high, grazing her hairline. Her
What-huh?
look.

“What's happening here?” I say.

She spots some of her bandmates. “Hang on, Panda.”

As she confers with them, I move to my locker, wishing, once again, I had someone to talk to other than Ocie.

Then he's there. Again. Taylor Durham. I so have to be careful what I wish for.

“Lauren, are you all right?” There's something weird about his voice. It's too soft.

And why wouldn't I be all right?

I say, “I was until you showed up. Are you, like, stalking me?”

He looks taken aback. When he speaks again, the sorrow has worn away. “Stalking
you
? You're . . . you're unbelievable.”

Enough. “What's with you, lately? We haven't spoken this much in years. Am I radiating openness? Do you feel the warmth of springtime sun when I'm near? If so, please understand that sensation is actually my fiery disdain.”

The muscles in his jaw clench, like he's biting back rogue words. A deep breath later, he says, “The way things have been going, I thought you could use a friend.”

“Do you have a head injury that might explain the nonsense that's coming out of your mouth?”

His chest swells, like he's gearing up to blast me. But Ocie's suddenly between us, her hand pressed to her mouth. She looks to Taylor, and he says, “Mei, I tried. Okay. Can't do it anymore. You deal with her.”

He goes and I'm so confused about his parting words—
you deal with her
—that I don't notice Ocie welling up. A tear falls from each eye and rolls down her cheeks.

“She's dead, Panda. She died last night.”

I want to ask “Who?” But I can't quite manage. I remember the odd chat with my Admirer from the night before.

This had to happen
.

Who else could it be?

“Panda? Where are you—?”

I'm down the hall and around the corner. Moving. Running. Bumping classmates aside.

Keachin's our new subject
.

It's just a coincidence. It has to be a coincidence. Or I've made the wrong assumption. Ocie never said a name. The dead “she” could be someone else.

My mind's divided between flashes of last night's Admirer chat, backward twisted hope that I've guessed wrong on which of my classmates will never age beyond her yearbook photo, and the wholly pragmatic understanding that the nearest bathroom is not near enough.

Veering toward the closest set of doors, I barrel through into the auditorium, make it to a trash can just inside, and retch.

I'd skipped breakfast so nothing comes up, and I'm left dry-heaving into the can. A rending
whroa-oar
noise escapes my throat. Makes my ears hurt. So much so, it takes a second for the teeth sucking and disgusted groans to register.

Raising my head from the trash receptacle, I see a loose group of guys and girls—sophomores and freshmen; kids maybe too young, too out of the loop, or too disinterested to be affected by the morning's developments. They're twisted around in their auditorium seats, watching me. People have all sorts of hangout spots before class. The gym. The cafeteria. Here.

My stumbling nausea interrupts their Red Bull and earbud meditation. They are none too pleased.

A girl in a rainbow-colored knit hat with bulky designer headphones clamped around her neck like a collar says, “Damn, bee-yotch. Use birth control next time.”

Her comrades cackle. I feel my complexion redden as I back out of
the auditorium, considering if morning sickness and its causal condition might be better than everything swirling in me right now.

The warning bell sounds, and someone's moist wail ramps up in competition.

There is still a watery sensation in my empty stomach, and my knees feel only slightly less liquid. Somehow I make it to homeroom, my mouth sour. I don't remember walking, or sitting down, or the gradual filling of the seats around me. In the preclass murmurs I hear, for the first time, Keachin's name from somewhere other than my own head. She is the one.

Now her face, still and unremarkable on my computer screen, is all I can see.

I want to leave. And faint. And scream. At the same time.

No tears, though.

Can't bring myself to cry. I haven't done that in so long, not since the days when I was afraid to face the daily torment from my classmates. When I got strong, and became Gray, I promised I'd never shed another tear over anybody in Portside High. Promise kept. I hate myself for it.

I could've figured a way to go home, something that didn't have to do with the death of Keachin Myer, but I'm compelled to stay as the rumors grow in volume and scope. How she died. Where. Everyone's saying different things. With so many versions—which had to mostly be wrong—maybe the rumor itself is a lie.

I cling to that.

Maybe she's not really dead, just hurt in some mundane way that has nothing to do with any of the things I put in motion.

Those hopes are dashed when Principal Carlin appears on the closed-circuit TV with a suit and voice like a mortician, confirming that a student has passed away, but never mentioning Keachin's name. While
more classmates break down, I feel a sudden rush of anger and the need to understand why he won't say her name. Is it a legal thing? A stupid law if it is.

Two of the girls in Keachin's clique are bawling in an unsettling register at the back of the room, creating a contagion. At least three people in adjacent desks start leaking tears. Mr. Graham ushers them all into the hall and down to guidance before the infection spreads. An unsuccessful quarantine.

It's a sullen seven hours from the announcement to last bell. I move among the afflicted, immune to the teary outward displays, though I suffer from different ailments. Shame and guilt.

The grief is heaviest in the cafeteria where chatter is hushed, like we're in church. Even Ocie dials down her usual gossip rant, mentioning only she heard it was some sort of car accident.

People die in car accidents all the time. If there's anything to hope for when it comes to an eighteen-year-old's death, I hope this bit of information is true. I hope for this, but I don't waste a wish on it. Wishes aren't real.

My Admirer is.

DP class offers only cold comfort. My routine is familiar, but looking at the class photos I've taken reminds me of
other
photos I've taken, and that line of thought makes the world tilt.

“Hey!” It's Alyssa Burrell, her tone high and chipper as always. It's unsettling today. A perky voice doesn't seem proper.

“Yeah?”

“You okay, Panda? You seem, I don't know, off.”

I glance around, worried the whole class is as perceptive as Alyssa, who, on a day when “off” is the norm, sees me as more so. No one else is paying attention.

“I'm fine.” Go away.

She doesn't.

“What, Alyssa?”

She reveals the camera she'd been holding behind her back, a loaner from the supply cage. “Do you mind if I take your picture? It's for my next class project. On grief.”

Slap her
.

The urge is so strong, my palm itches. Instead I nod, let her shoot—no flash—then she buzzes away, asking others for inappropriate poses.

Alone, I close my portfolio and lay my head on my desk. Ms. Marcella doesn't seem to mind. No one else—with the exception of Alyssa's ghoulish ass—is very productive today either. All here in body, but not spirit.

Except for Marcos Dahmer. Neither his body nor spirit showed.

I can't
assume
my Admirer did something to her. That's stupid, right? Doesn't that reek of self-importance on my part? Only
I
know the
real
killer, I'm
still
a step ahead of my classmates and the world?

That photo from last night wasn't coincidental, no. My Admirer somehow knew about Keachin before anyone else in school, and decided to be a creep about it. That's all. He's guilty of advanced knowledge.

When I get home, there's a chat request waiting for me. I see a version of myself slamming my MacBook shut and throwing it against the wall. Really dramatic, but not practical. The simplest thing I can do is tell him I'm done. No more Photographer Tag and late-night chats. I intend to break this off—whatever THIS is.

It's not fun anymore.

Was it ever?

My chest tightens and my hands shake as an elephant dose of adrenaline saturates my blood. I type quickly, a flick of fingers.

I'm giving him an out. His next words should explain it away. Last night's picture was mean, yes, but not . . .
evidence
.

What I—? No. No, no, no.

An email comes through. No subject. Nothing clever or playful, and I don't want to open the attached photo because this feels like the first night he contacted me (
How do you get the color GRAY?)
, the first time he showed me something I didn't want to see.

But how can I ignore this?

I open the image, and my legs kick involuntarily until my chair bumps my bed.

It's Keachin. Again. Not plain like last night's photo. It's brighter. More color. Particularly the snarling red gash along her hairline. The sheet of blood draped over the left side of her face. The bright-yellow candy wrapper tangled in her hair as the gutter water soaks the collar of her letter jacket.

The worst part, those
blue
blue eyes. Open and staring at things people in this world can't see.

Whatever tears I couldn't produce before come fast and hot now. I close my MacBook gently, unable to summon the strength to be forceful, or dramatic, or anything other than sorry.

Keachin was supposed to be a monster. One I hunt and slay. Not like this, never like this.

There
are
worse monsters out there. As Petra Dobrev says, “Once the beast's breath fogs your lens, it's too late to run!”