Stones and Spark (30 page)

I want to sally forth from this room.

"Have you nothing to say?" he asks.

"Not really."

"You can tell me," he says.

"Tell you . . . what?"

"Where Miss Levinson is hiding."

"I don't know!"

He leans back in his hard wooden chair. Tenting his hands, he gazes over the steeple of his knuckles. “The other educators and I have noticed the influence Miss Levinson exerts over you, the detrimental friendship that has formed. You've become wise in your own eyes, Miss Harmon."

"You're wrong."

"You presume incorrectly." He gestures to the window where Socrates perches. "Why don't you tell me how you two burned that field, for instance?"

I gaze out the window, saying nothing.

"That misbehavior is expected of Miss Levinson. She's compelled to go too far. But I've received some disturbing reports recently, how you're not completing your assignments—"

Sandbag.

"And now we see you leaving campus without permission."

My voice rises. "I don't know where she's hiding. But I know she didn't run away. Something happened to her."

He sighs, dropping the tented fingers.

"I will let you in on a little secret," he says. "We've known about the move to New York City for quite some time. Her mother apprised us of the transfer weeks ago. Thoughtfully, I might add. We've been prepared for her ruse."

"Ruse?!"

"And we are fully cooperating with the Richmond police. I was, until today, considering you an incidental victim of Miss Levinson's cruelty toward her mother. But today's truancy changes that perception."

"So you're not doing anything to help find her."

"Find her? On the contrary, we've informed the police. Our school is ready and willing to aid."

I can't believe my ears. Or my eyes. Ellis looks so . . . "You're glad she's gone."

He gazes at me a long moment. "Miss Harmon, what would you propose we do?"

"Crank up the phone tree. Tell people to look for her. Create a committee—you did that for the stupid toilets in the gym."

After a moment's silence, he swivels the chair, gazing out the window at the empty field. "You may find this difficult to believe, but I am as distressed about Miss Levinson's disappearance as you are."

"Last time you started the phone tree, you called everyone."

"And learned my lesson."

I can’t help it. “So when you heard she was moving away you, what, you
threw a party
?"

He swivels toward me, his mouth so tight it's lipless. "I've been patient with your insubordination. But my patience has been wasted on you. Expect to hear from Mrs. Parsons regarding your detention. Unless . . . " His pause is long. "Unless you'd like to tell me where you went and who you saw."

Part of me would love to describe Y'landa Williams for him. But my inner attorney
warns me about how deep a grave can be dug. "I had an errand to run."

"An errand." He leans his elbows on the desk, leaning toward me. "Miss Harmon, we've bantered long enough. Tell us where Miss Levinson is hiding. We will be merciful."

"I have nothing to tell you."

"Tell the truth, and all will be forgiven. No one suspects you of being the mastermind of this ill-conceived plan."

I don't want to talk to him, but he needs to hear the truth. So he can stop believing the lie that she's hiding. So I tell him about the soil: in her tires, in the shoe found at the quarry. The soil that proves Drew went to the St. Christopher's baseball field—and I don't know why.

But just as I'm about to explain my morning errand to Southside, he says: "Soil."

I wait. His tone is strange.

"Soil," he says again. "Would this soil have to do with geology, perhaps?"

I know one thing. Ellis would savor any chance to ship Teddy back to West Virginia.

"Miss Harmon?"

When I don't answer, he reaches out and presses a button on the phone base.

“Miss Parsons, would you please send Mr. Chastain to my office?"

I stare at Socrates. There's a bitter flavor in my mouth, maybe like the taste of hemlock. "I will swear on the Bible," I tell Ellis, "I do not know where Drew is.”

"Indeed."

I begin sweating in a really bad way--that mix of fear and
adrenaline.

But when Teddy finally rolls into the room, he completely ignores Ellis.

“So how'd it go?" he asks me.

"Begging your pardon," Ellis intones, “this is my office. I'm conducting this discussion."

"Yeah, you hauled Raleigh in because she took off. But I told her to go."

"You told her." Ellis sounds like he's talking to a child. The educator at his finest. "You
told
Miss Harmon to leave campus?"

"Yerp." Teddy pours out hillbilly accent. "I needed me some tacky paper."

"Perhaps," Ellis's lip seems to curl. "Perhaps I misheard you. You requested—"

"Tacky paper. You know, what you civilized folks call fly paper? Lab's out. I sent Raleigh to git me some."

Ellis likes to quote Socrates as much as he can. He's often telling us to become "citizens of the world." He likes to go on about diversity. Maybe that's why he hired Teddy--nothing says diversity like a guy in a wheelchair. Unfortunately, Ellis's idea of diversity isn't someone who thinks differently from him.

"Miss Harmon," he says in that same educator tone, "why would you choose not to reveal this telling detail during our conversation?"

"You were asking about Drew. Where she's hiding. And she's not hiding."

"Okey dokey, that settles it," Teddy says. "Where's the tacky paper? I need it next hour." He backs up the chair, making room for my exit. When I stand, I feel a wash of relief. And gratitude for this man, rolling for the door.

"Mr. Chastain," Ellis says.

I freeze.

"Would you mind remaining for a moment?"

"Actually, I would," Teddy says. "But I've noticed my particular preferences don't hold no water 'round these parts."

When I walk out of the room, alone, a bad feeling settles in my gut.

***

At the final bell, I know there's only minutes, maybe only seconds. Because not only am I grounded, but it's also about to get much worse when I go home and face my dad.

Only I need to see Teddy first, thank him for what he did today.

He's cruising around the Earth Sciences lab, bending low to pick paper off the floor. But he's not shooting three-pointers.

"Thank you," I tell him.

"You're welcome." He rolls around the back of the room. "And enjoy it because from here on out, you're on your own."

His eyes. The green color doesn't look right. Not cold, like Tinsley’s. But . . . wounded.

"What did he do?" I ask.

"Gave me notice."

"What does that mean?"

"He's been keeping a file. And it's getting fat."

"But you're Teacher of the Year."

"Not this year."

"So?"

"He can fire me. And I want to stay here."

"When you have to deal
with
him
?!"

"I don't care about him. He's a flea at the circus."

"Then quit. Any school would take you."

"Raleigh, I'm a geologist. All the way down to the toes I can't feel. But I found out something else. Something I like more."

"Torturing Ellis?"

"Well, yeah, it
is
fun. But it ain't important. No, I found out what it’s like to get a student champing at the bit, dying to learn, begging for knowledge. And
that
is one total unmitigated blast."

"Unmitigated—did Ellis make you use that word?"

"I'm as serious as an egg-sucking dog. Every sub-moron science-hater in this school is totally worth that one great student."

I nod. “I get it. Drew."

"The girl's a genius, no doubt about it." He stares at me, the green color shifting in his eyes. "But for her, teachers probably just get in the way. But you? Lemme ask you. How'd you find that Petersburg granite?"

"I don't know; I looked at a map. At the library."

"See, there’s something inside of you. Instinct, Raleigh. You’ve got it. And it makes me swallow all my pride and refuse to let Ellis kick my crippled butt outta this place until you graduate. And then, you'll run right past me."

“Well, you're in a wheelchair."

He laughs. Throws his head back, howling.

I’m glad he's laughing. But when he looks at me again, the expression on his face makes my eyes burn.

He asks, “You get what I'm saying?"

I nod. Just like I nodded with my dad’s question this morning.

But, no, I don't get it. At all.

And I just don't care anymore.

I don't care if I'm grounded for a month, or six months, or a year. So instead of riding home, I bike to Drew's house.

More fallen leaves smother the driveway and front steps, and the back door—as always—is unlocked. Isaac Newton sits in his usual spot in the sunroom, hissing as I pass by into the kitchen, the den, then upstairs.

Inside Drew's bedroom, I stand for a long moment, listening with my eyes closed. I can hear the whispery sound of her planetary mobile, shifting above my head because I've disturbed the air molecules in here. When I open my eyes, hoping for a fresh perspective, everything looks the same.

I walk to the bookshelves. Richard P. Feynman's books take up two shelves.
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman
beside
The Pleasure of Finding Things Out
waiting next to
Perfectly Reasonable Deviations
.

Wrong.

Alphabetical order. Even textbooks inside her locker are kept in alphabetical order.

But here's Feynman, her idol, with books running
S-T-P.

Wrong.

I cross the room to her closet. Two hangers empty. I try to remember—wasn't it one hanger before? The empty space is still on the floor, where her Converse All-Stars would be. But now that blankness glares up like some nasty theorem about negative space being just as powerful as positive space.

I check all the books. But come back to Feynman. They're the only ones out of order.

S-T-P.

As in, S-T-O-P?

Downstairs I search the kitchen and find another negative space that's even more startling: the wine rack is empty.

Not one bottle.

I check the
trash. Nothing there.

Backing up, closing my eyes again, I tell myself it's Wednesday. Only Wednesday. The perfectionist alcoholic usually makes it to Friday. But with all this stress—would Jayne really not drink?

I open my eyes. Newton is mincing into the room. Expecting me to feed him.

But his dish. I stare at it. The brown mush fills the bowl.

Somebody’s already fed him.

The feeling quivers down my arms.
The back door.
It's always open. I know that. And of course Drew knows that. Drew also knows that Jayne will leave for work every day, no matter what, even if her daughter is "officially missing."

I see that last sentence written in her notebook. The sentence that's so very Drew:
"If this is true, then . . .."

Then Drew could sneak into the house during the day. Change her clothes. Grab a book, get something to eat. Feed Newton. Pour out all of Jayne's wine.

If this is true then . . .

Then she is hiding.

Somewhere.

I walk outside, crunching over the dead leaves, gazing into the trees that circle the back yard. Stripped of leaves, the trees don't offer anywhere to hide.

The river?

But this time of year people are still launching canoes and kayaks, stealing these final sunny days for paddling season. Someone would see Drew. Report it. Her disappearance has made the news now.

I close my eyes once more, willing my mind to answer another hypothesis.

First: Drew would choose to hide where no one could find her.

Second: That means some place nobody ever goes.

No one.

Except.

Maybe.

Me.

***

The litter, I never really noticed all the litter before. Empty soda cans. Crushed paper bags. Kudzu vines around every surface, greedy to obscure. I kick away a brown bottle, lean into the vines, and feel around for that one loose board.