LITMIR.BIZ

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up early.

      “Hey.” I had no third period class, so I usually spent the hour there, knowing that if Tod had a break at work, that’s where he’d look for me.

      Chelsea pulled a notebook from her bag. “Do you mind if I ask you a few things about Emma? I’m working on a memorial article for the school paper.”

      Oh, yeah. Journalism was also third period. Just my luck.

      “Sure.”

      She frowned, studying my expression. “If this is a bad time, I can…?”

      “No, go ahead. I don’t mind talking about Em. Feels like I’m keeping her memory alive.” How’s that for quotable?

      “Great. Em was a junior, right?” Chelsea said, and I nodded. “And she had two sisters?” Another nod, and I noticed that though her notebook was open, she wasn’t taking notes. Whatever she really wanted to ask obviously required courage she hadn’t yet worked up.

      “And…was she a good student?”

      I turned to face her directly, looking right into her eyes. “Chelsea, just ask whatever you really want to know. Otherwise, this sounds like it’ll take all day.”

      She blinked, surprised, then nodded. “Okay.” She sat straighter and actually picked up her pen, ready to write. “Do you really think it’s a coincidence that Emma Marshall and her boyfriend died on the same day? Just one day after Brant Williams died in his car, here on campus?”

      I swallowed, trying to hide my own surprise. Obviously our classmates were just as suspicious as the police had been, but I hadn’t expected anyone to actually ask that question. And I certainly hadn’t expected anyone to expect me to have an answer.

      “Do I think it’s a coincidence?” I bought time to think by repeating the question. “I don’t know what it is. I don’t see how it could be more than that. They died at different times, in different places, in different ways.” Sort of. Neither Brant nor Jayson had any obvious cause of death, so the coroner had labeled them both with the generic “heart failure.” Which wasn’t exactly common in teenagers.

      “Were you there when Emma died?” Chelsea asked, her gaze glued to me. Watching closely for my reaction.

      “Yeah. A bunch of us were. We took the day off for my birthday.” The tears in my eyes were real—I was lying, but the truth was no less traumatic. “We were just goofing off on the swings. At the lake. But Em went too high.” I sniffled. “She was showing off. Then she let go and just…She just fell out of the swing. She landed on her back, but she must have hit her head first, and…”

      I stopped there, with another sob. A real one. Picturing Em’s actual death helped. Seeing Belphegore’s hand on her neck. Hearing the gruesome crack. Seeing Emma crumple to the ground.

      In my memory, it all happened in some kind of horrible slow motion. That was the only way I’d gotten through the police interview, and I’d seen no sign that they doubted any of my story.

      Their suspicion had come later, when they started calculating the death toll.

      “It must have been horrible,” Chelsea said, and I realized that my tears were like a shield between us. A line of defense she wouldn’t cross. At least, not now. Not at sixteen. Though I had no doubt she’d someday dial up the pressure on some poor lying politician, unfazed by tears.

      “It was.”

      “Okay. Thanks.” She stood, stuffing her notebook and pen into the front pocket of her scuffed denim backpack. “Kaylee, I just want you to know that…we stopped the presses on the yearbooks. They’d already started printing them, but when we told them about Brant, and Jayson, and Emma, they agreed to reprint at no additional charge. So…the yearbooks will be late, but she’ll have a memorial page. They all will.”

      “Thank you. That means a lot.” I hadn’t even known Chelsea was on the yearbook staff.

      The lunch bell rang as she walked away, looking more frustrated and confused than she had before she sat down. I knew exactly how that felt.

      Two minutes later, Sophie appeared in front of me and slapped a newspaper down on the picnic table. “Have you seen the headline? I would have missed it if my dad didn’t still read the news in print.”

      Luca set his tray down and sat across from me, but Sophie was obviously too riled up to relax. She hadn’t bought a lunch, either.

      “Headline?” I glanced at the paper and had to read it upside down. “‘Eastlake High Named Most Dangerous School of Its Size in the Country.’”

      Sophie nodded, eyes wide, brows furrowed.

      “Wow.”

      “Look at the picture,” Luca said, his burger halfway to his mouth. So I looked.

      Beneath the headline was a black-and-white shot of…us. Me, Nash, Sabine, and Emma, in Lydia’s body. It was taken at her funeral. The caption read, “Teens Mourn Yet another Lost Classmate.”

      I mentally crossed my fingers and hoped that Lydia’s parents wouldn’t see that photo.

      “Do you see that?” Sophie demanded, like I was refusing to look. “We’re the most dangerous school in the country.”

      “Of our size,” Luca added, looking up at her. “Don’t you want something to eat?”

      “How could I possibly digest anything with that staring back at me?” She waved one hand at the paper still lying on the table.

      “What’s wrong?” Nash asked as he and Sabine settled onto the bench next to Luca.

      “What’s wrong? We’ve just surpassed inner-city alternative schools all over the country as the most dangerous school in the U.S.”

      “Of our size,” Luca added again. “I’m sure there are way more dangerous schools out there with several thousand students.”

      Nash laughed, and Sophie turned on him. “This isn’t funny! All the other schools on this list are plagued by gang violence and organized crime.” She lowered her voice and leaned over the table. “We’re the only one overrun with demons.”

      “How do you know?” Sabine plucked a fry from Nash’s tray.

      “What?” My cousin finally sank onto the bench.

      “How do you know those other schools aren’t also infested by hellions? I mean, the paper doesn’t say that’s what’s wrong with our school, does it?” she asked, and Sophie shook her head reluctantly. “Then it may not say what’s really wrong with those schools, either. For all we know, their ‘gang violence’ could really be roving bands of gremlins, shaking down students for their lunch money and handheld technology.”

      “When something’s funny, you should let yourself laugh,” Nash added. “Otherwise, you’ll just stay mad or scared, and those little frown lines in your forehead will become permanent.”

      Sophie’s eyes widened, and Sabine laughed out loud.

      “Hey, Sophie!” Someone called from across the quad, and we all looked up to see Jennifer Lamb crossing the grass toward us, holding a chemistry textbook. “Can you give this to your cousin? She left it in class.”

      “My cousin?” Sophie stood to take the book and glanced at me in confusion, but before I could tell her it wasn’t my book, Jennifer elaborated.

      “Emily, right? She’s my new lab partner. Is she always so…grumpy?”

      Sophie’s hand clenched around the thick textbook. “She’s Kaylee’s cousin. On a completely different side of the family.”

      Jennifer frowned. “But her last name is Cavanaugh.”

      Sophie turned to glare at me. “Great. You made her my cousin, too.”

      I

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