Revealed (14 page)

Except for the parts where I'd had to listen to Heidi, I'd actually gotten kind of into the play with its crazy plot and its star-crossed lovers and girls dressed as boys and noblemen dressed as shepherds. But the actors might as well have been speaking Japanese—their words barely managed to penetrate my current mood. All I could think about was Callie and Nia working backstage because I'd come up with this brilliant plan to give us the chance to study Amanda's box. Amanda's box that I'd promptly lost. I imagined them thinking of and hating me a little more with each costume change they had to orchestrate. The thought made me literally squirm in my seat, and halfway through the first act, my mom put her hand on my arm and leaned toward me. “Are you okay, honey?” Her voice was a whisper, but the message was loud and clear:
Sit still, Hal.

“Sorry,” I mumbled. As we'd left the house, I'd shoved Amanda's watch in the front pocket of my jeans. Now it dug into my leg, but I knew if I shifted positions one more time my mom would have my head, so I just sat there, glad the pain in my thigh gave me something to focus on besides the pain in my chest.

“I might not sit with you for the second half.”

It was the end of intermission, and my mom and Cornelia were headed back into the auditorium. I'd spent the past fifteen minutes looking around the lobby for Callie and Nia before realizing that, of course, they were probably backstage.

Not that it would have mattered if they were standing next to me in the lobby. When people are ignoring you, distance isn't what's keeping you apart.

My mom reached forward and brushed the hair out of my eyes. “You want to sit with your friends, hon?”

“Yeah.” As I spoke the word, I realized it wasn't even a lie. I did want to sit with my friends. The problem was, they didn't want to sit with me.

Because they were no longer my friends.

Like she knew there was more to my answer than I was saying, my mom leaned forward and gave me a brief hug. “See you after the show,” she said, before she and Cornelia were swallowed up by the crowd.

I thought about leaving the building, but that would have meant either coming back before the play's end or explaining to my paranoid mother why I'd headed out into the night to hoof it home alone rather than just waiting for her to give me a ride. Instead, I headed down the B corridor toward the one place I couldn't imagine feeling lonely no matter how alone I was: the art room.

Normally I'm not one to get the jitters, but as I walked farther and farther from the brightly lit lobby, I found myself wishing the studio were a little closer to the theater. The halls were dark, and though it was a clear night, the moonlight only worked its way so far into the building. By the time I pushed open the unlocked door to the studio, I was feeling more than a little creeped out. The room was lit with a red glow from the bulb that indicates the dark room is in use. Even though I knew nobody could be in there, I didn't bother to hit the light switch—just headed over to the ancient, paint-splattered sofa and threw myself down on it.

Lying on the sofa, I felt the watch jamming into my leg again, and this time I dug into my pocket and pulled it out. In the red light, the metal took on a lurid glow, and I traced my finger over the inscription I'd looked at so many times before.
“I know you (x2) know me.”

I felt like throwing the watch across the room. Dipping it into paint thinner. Crushing it with the paper cutter.

Smashing and torturing and squeezing it until it was forced to relinquish its meaning.

T
he Saint Catherine's carnival to raise funds for needy children, taking place on the town green, was definitely an event I could stand to miss, but there was no convincing Amanda of that.

“It'll be fun, Hal. Don't you want to have fun?” She was standing at my front door wearing a pair of black leather pants, a black leather motorcycle jacket, and black motorcycle boots. It was very don't-mess-with-me attire, and hers was a very don't-mess-with-me voice.

“Carnivals aren't fun,” I corrected her. “They're depressing.”

“No, actually, sitting inside on a beautiful fall day is depressing. Carnivals are fun.”

In the end, it was easier to get on my bike and follow her to the green than to try and convince her I didn't want to spend my afternoon eating cotton candy and trying to win tacky stuffed animals by hitting things with hammers or throwing quarters at chickens or whatever it is you do to win stuff at carnivals.

To my surprise, the carnival wasn't nearly as awful as I'd imagined. There were a million little kids there laughing and running around and getting their faces painted and generally having a total blast, and the people running the games and rides were regular people, not the circus freaks I'd been picturing in my mind. By the time we got to the game where you shoot water at a duck to win a huge, stuffed bear, I was actually kind of into it.

I watched as Amanda wrapped her hands around the handle of the water gun and slipped her index finger against the trigger. She squinted at the smiling plastic ducks as they floated past us on their plastic river, and the intensity of her stare made me glad I wasn't one of them. Out of nowhere, without turning to look at me, she announced, “I want to talk to you about your art.”

And suddenly I felt like I had a whole lot more in common with those ducks than I'd thought. “Let's not and say we did,” I suggested, trying to keep my voice light. I reached into the bag I was holding and offered some caramel-covered popcorn in her direction. “Cracker Jack, anyone?”

“We're not talking snack options, Hal, we're talking about your art.” She squeezed the trigger and a duck flipped onto its back as a bell rang, signaling her success.

“No, you're talking about my art. I'm just trying to enjoy this beautiful fall day.” I breathed deeply and made a show of looking around me. “Smell that crisp air?”

Amanda ignored my meteorologistic commentary. “It's time for you to put yourself out there, Bennett.” Bam! Another duck bit the dust.

Watching Amanda kill helpless plastic waterfowl while she put the screws to me about my art was more than I could take. I turned and leaned my back against the counter, staring off into some vague near distance. “Yeah, about that. I'm thinking I'd like to be discovered posthumously. Like—hey, look at this! We thought he was just, you know, an amazing auto mechanic, but it turns out he was the artistic genius of the twenty-first century.”

Bam! The click of the plastic flipping over and the ding of the bell ringing let me know what had happened even if I couldn't see it.

“Hal, what you know about cars would fit on a three-by-five index card. And as far as posthumous discovery, you know what you get to be when you're dead?”

“Famous?” I offered.

“Dead,” she corrected me. To emphasize her point (as if it needed emphasis), she shot and killed another innocent plastic duck.

“Isn't there some kind of limit on this game?” I asked, gesturing at the booth we stood in front of. “Haven't you maxed out or something?”

“Don't change the subject, Hal.” There was more than a whisper of annoyance in her voice. “It's time for you to let people see your work.”

“I am changing the subject, Amanda.” She wasn't the only one with the right to get pissed off. “And I'll show people my work when I'm good and ready.”

Still holding the gun, she turned to glare at me. “Which will be when, never?”

“Not that it's any of your business, but yeah, maybe. If I want to die with a studio full of canvases and a storage space full of sketchbooks that nobody has ever seen, that's my right.”

“No, Hal, it isn't!” Was it my imagination or was she jonesing to spin the water gun in my direction and blast me as thoroughly as she had the ducks? “When you have talent, you have to put yourself out in the world. ‘To whom much is given, much is expected.'”

Now we were both glaring at each other. “And who, exactly, are you to decide to whom much has been given?”

“Oh, don't give me the whole, ‘Little old me, what could I possibly have to offer anyone' routine.”

“It's not a routine!” I was so mad I chucked my Cracker Jack to the ground. “My art is private! I'll put it out in the world when I'm ready to put it out in the world, and if that's never, so be it.”

Amanda stepped around the gun and thrust her finger into my chest. Hard. “Too late, Hal. I already showed your sketches to Mr. Harper. He's entering you in the National Art Society's high school competition.”

“What the—” I stared at her, too shocked to finish my sentence.

Amanda took her finger away from my chest. “It's time to be a part of the world, Hal. Time to step up. ‘You're either on the bus or you're off it.'” She walked backward a few paces, then lifted her hands up as if asking a question.

“But—”

“And I'm not just talking about your art,” she finished.

Before I could say a thing (and what would I have said? Thank you? To hell with you?) she'd turned around and headed to where we'd left our bikes.

By the time I got my head clear enough to follow her, she was long gone.

“I still have no idea what you meant!” I shouted to the empty art room.

And to my amazement, out of the darkness, a voice answered. “Of course you don't. I haven't said anything yet.”

I shot off the couch and spun around faster than if Mr. Richards had been standing over me with a stopwatch.

Amanda!

But the person who was standing in the open doorway wasn't Amanda. It was Callie.

My heart was pounding, and I could barely swallow my mouth was so dry. Despite how psyched I was to see her, fear made my voice sharp. “You scared the crap out of me.”

“Who were you talking to?”

“I . . .” How could I answer that?
The past. I was talking to the past.
“No one.”

“Oh.”

I half sat, half fell down on the couch, still breathing hard from my shock at hearing an answer to the question I'd been asking of a person inside my head. A second later Callie came over and sat beside me.

She took a deep breath, then spoke quickly, almost as if she'd planned what she wanted to say. I steeled myself for the attack I feared was coming.

“So I owe you an enormous apology and I'm really sorry I was so mean and I hope you can forgive me.”

“I . . . wait a second, what?” About to launch into a major apology myself, I was so totally unprepared for what she said that it took a minute before the meaning of her words sank in.

This time she turned to me, her skin pale in the red light of the bulb. “I said I'm sorry.”

“You're sorry,” I repeated. There was a brief silence. “Okay, I'm confused. What do you have to be sorry
for
exactly?”

Callie bit her lip for a second. As though she hadn't rehearsed
this
part of what she wanted to say, her words came slowly now. “I am so totally the last person in the world to judge someone who falls under the spell of Heidi Bragg.”

“You . . .” I couldn't decide which was more incredible—that Callie sounded as if she might be considering forgiving me or that she'd described so perfectly Heidi's power. The spell of Heidi Bragg. That was exactly what it felt like—as if I'd fallen under a spell.

Which didn't make what I'd done any less heinous.

“Callie, I am so, so sorry. I—”

“Shh.” She touched her finger to her lips. “Stop, okay? It could have happened to anyone. Heidi's smart. Scary smart. She finds people's weak spots and she exploits them.”

I saw Heidi's sorrowful expression, heard her fake remorse about the way she'd treated Callie. She hadn't tried to flirt with me or flatter me. She'd known doing either of those things would have had zero effect. Somehow she'd realized there was only one way to get me to listen her—to distract me—and it was to pretend to regret what she'd done to Callie.

She'd found my weak spot and she'd exploited it.

“Thanks.” It was all I could think of to say, but I had the feeling it was enough.

Callie had shut the door to the art room behind her, and now it flew open, slamming against the wall. “We have exactly eight and a half minutes.”

Nia.

“I'll take that as hello,” I said. Callie's forgiveness gave me the confidence to smile at Nia.

“You'll take it all right,” said Nia, but she was sort of smiling, too. “So this
is
where you came to wallow. Callie was right.”

“Hey, I resent that. I was not
wallowing
.”

“Whatever.” Nia waved away my protest. “The point is, we now have”—she glanced at her phone— “less than eight and a half minutes to figure out how we're going to get that box back from Heidi Bragg and her I-Goonies. I's for
idiot
, right?” Nia addressed her question to Callie.

“I think it's for
I will be underestimated at your own risk
,” Callie corrected.

“I think you're right,” Nia said, and from her voice, I could tell that even she was daunted by the impossibility of our getting Amanda's box back from Heidi.

“Hal, will you
stop doing that
?! It's driving me
crazy
.” Nia spoke in a growl.

“Stop doing
what
?” I'd just been sitting there thinking about how we were never going to see Amanda's box again, but unless Nia had suddenly developed ESP, the odds were she wasn't railing against my negative thoughts.

“
That
.” She mimed flicking something with her finger, and I realized I must have been opening and shutting the watch without realizing it. “You do it all the time.”

“I do? Sorry,” I said, and I started to shove the watch back into my pocket.

“Yeah, I've been meaning to ask—what is that?” asked Callie, reaching for the watch.

“It's a pocket watch,” said Nia.

As Nia came over to where Callie and I were sitting, I suddenly remembered Frieda's warning. This was bad. This was very bad.

Taking it from me, Callie held the watch up to her face and squinted at the inscription in the dim light. “I know you,” she read.

“Guys,” I announced, “we need to separate.”

Callie was too focused on what she was reading to pay attention to what I'd just said, but Nia heard me.

“What are you talking about? We just got back
together
, you idiot.”

“No,” I insisted. “I mean, yes. But we shouldn't have. It's dangerous for us to be together.”

I was about to explain everything that Frieda had told me when Callie said, “‘I know you. You know me.' I don't get it.”

My head snapped around to look at her. “What did you just say?”

“I don't get it,” Callie repeated.

“Before that.”

“Um, ‘I know you. You know me.'”

“That's not what it says,” I told her. “It says, ‘I know you,' then ‘x2' in parentheses, then ‘know me.'”

Callie shook her head and showed me the all-too-familiar inscription. “The ‘x2' in parentheses means multiply the item immediately proceeding it by two, in this case, the ‘you.' It's algebraic notation.”

“Oh my god,” I said.

Because suddenly I knew where the inscription came from.

Callie laughed, misunderstanding my amazement. “It's not that big a deal. You just—”

“No, you don't understand! I know what it means now. ‘I know you. You know me.'”

The girls stared at me blankly.

“This watch.” I pointed at it. “It's from Amanda. And the inscription—it's a song.” I threw my head back, unsure about whether I wanted to laugh or cry. “It's a Beatles song. ‘I know you. You know me.' Those are the lyrics.”

“Amanda,” Callie whispered.

“Um, okay,” said Nia. “Not exactly the most exciting but, you know, who am I to criticize the Beatles? I mean, ‘Michelle' might be fairly mundane, but ‘Day in the Life—'”

“The message.” I held out my hand in the universal signal for stop. I needed time, literally, for all the gears in my own head to spin. “The message is
come together
. She's telling us to work together to find her.” The song played in my head and I almost shouted the chorus at Nia and Callie. “‘Come together, right now, over me!' It's not
dangerous
for us to work together. It's
crucial
!”

“What are you talking about?” Nia asked.

“Why would it be dangerous?” Callie added.

“Frieda said—” But they didn't know about my trip to see Frieda. They didn't know because I hadn't told them. And I hadn't told them because I'd been so eager to be the one to find Amanda that I'd missed the most important tool for finding her.

Us. The three of us. Together.

A small buzz began, growing louder over the next few seconds.

“We have less than a minute to get backstage,” Nia observed, pushing a button on her phone and standing up.

Callie jumped up. “Wait! We didn't figure out how to get the box back.”

“Oh, but we did,” Nia said, moving toward the door.

“We did?” I asked.

“Together,” Nia prompted, and Callie and I looked at each other and then back at her, neither of us getting it.

Nia shook her head, clearly amazed by how dense we were. “Where are we all going to be
together
in less than an hour?”

“Um, nowhere?” Callie offered.

“Um, cast party?” Nia corrected her. “But I like the sarcasm. I must be rubbing off on you.” She gestured with her hand for Callie to join her at the door, and Callie did.

Suddenly I remembered. “The cast party's at Heidi's.”

“Oh, no! No way!” Callie wagged her index finger at Nia. “I don't mean to be a drama queen or anything, but I promised myself I'd never set foot in that house again.”

Close enough that she could reach out and grab Callie's hand, Nia did just that, pulling Callie through the door. “Yes, objection duly noted, okay?”

As she and Callie disappeared into the corridor, Nia called to me over her shoulder. “Get your mom to drop you at Heidi's after the play.”

The door closed behind them, leaving me alone in the art room, so amazed at everything that had just happened I fell against the back of the sofa. Here I was, right where I'd been when Callie surprised me, yet I felt so completely different I might as well have traveled halfway around the world. I touched my forearm where the tattoo of a cougar was fading a little every day.

One man in his time plays many parts.

You're on the bus or you're off the bus.

The time for me to be the loner had come to an end.

Now it was time for me to be a friend.