Ferocious

2. Half Life

"Whoa, are you OK? Brooklyn?" a voice was asking me. It was a girl from my Lit Appreciation class, her name was something-or-other. She had pushed me upright when I started to fall on her and now she was shaking my shoulder.

"Oh, my gosh," I said. "My head was spinning for a second, but I'm good now."

She looked at me askance and her friend scoffed. "You are way pale. Maybe you should go to the nurse's."

"Yeah. Maybe. Thanks." I nodded and continued my way. The guy against my locker raised his head from what he was staring at and said hi to a couple of passing seniors.

It wasn't Levi. How could I be so dumb? Why had I been so hopeful?

He turned. "Hey, Brooklyn," he said a low voice. A crooked smile brightened his face.

"Oh, hey!" I replied. I clicked my mind firmly into this life — the one I wanted. The life where I wasn't constantly aching for my missing friends, where weird things didn't appear in my closet, where today was the same as any other day except that a totally cute boy was waiting for me by my locker.

Joshua. Bass player, as in bass guitar player. Band member. New boy as of middle of last year. Light brown hair full of loose curls, dark brown eyes, golden tan lingering on past summer. Did I mention he plays bass guitar in a band? Hey, hey, hey, Joshua.

"Did Steve tell you we're going for pizza after practice tonight? You can come, if you want to," he said. He stood upright now that I was there, his backpack hanging loosely in one hand. Muse t-shirt and ragged jeans. He could really be my kind of guy. Any girl's kind of guy.

"Yeah, Steve told me, but I have something tonight after practice," I said. Joshua was still new to Allsbury. There was a lot of history he didn't know.

I threw my lunch and extra books in the locker and grabbed my Algebra things. The two of us joined the jostling flow of bodies moving up and down the hallway, heading in the same direction.

"That's cool," he said. "We usually go for something to eat after all the practices. Just wanted to make sure you knew. You're part of the band now. And I was, uh, really impressed the other day, when you came to audition. You really know what you're doing with those drumsticks, and I was, just, wow. Yeah. Looking forward to making some cool music together. During practice."

He was babbling. I paused at the doorway to my class. I couldn't believe he was going on and on like that.

"All right, so I'll see you later," I said when his words started to slow down.

"All right, see you later!" His crooked smile returned, and he walked backwards for a second before continuing down the hallway.

"Brooklyn Hadder, you skank, you," a girl whispered in my ear.

I snorted. Of course, Kaylee would assume that about me. "Right back at you," I said. Then I smiled and hooked my arm around hers. She and I had known each other since the seventh grade when we had Home Room together. She was a human equivalent of a glitter bouncy ball and was on every student organization she could fit into her peppy lifestyle. We were pretty much opposites, but maybe that was why we had always gotten along without having to be glued to each other's side.

"Looks to me like he is totally into you, Brook," she said as we went in for our daily dose of Algebra 2.

"I'm afraid it's just a business relationship. He was just filling me in on the band's plans for this evening. Guess who the new drummer is for Spit Fire?"

"What? You are? No, way!" she said, eyebrows shooting up to her hairline and her mouth open in a big 'O'. She squeezed into the desk next to mine, trying to pull her ridiculously short cheerleading skirt over her thighs. "What happened to Jeff? I mean, I heard he got busted for marijuana, but I didn't think he was out of the band."

Spit Fire was the most popular rock-slash-folk band at Central Hills High School. It was the only band, but it had screaming 7th and 8th grade fan girls galore.

"He has to go to juvie for a while and Mr. Clark won't loan the marching band room for our practices unless we are all drug free," I said.

"This is awesome! When are you guys playing somewhere?"

"Well, I have to learn the backlog of songs first, but hopefully soon."

The tardy bell rang and Mrs. Clark strode in. She was married to Mr. Clark's cousin. With a population of nearly 8,000, we had the usual small town malediction of getting to know people as the cousin of this or that other person. As our teacher was shutting the door, Alicia darted inside, giving me a vacant nod hello and slinking into her desk in the back.

She looked like she had stuck several fingers in an electric socket that morning while blow drying her hair, slathered on her eyeliner in a darkened room and then put on her clothes inside out. Typical.

"Morning, everyone," Mrs. Clark said. "Open your books to page 58, we need to get right to work." Her philosophy was that all work and no play made you just barely worthy to be alive.

We opened our books and got straight to work. The class was well into problem number three (finding distinct roots of a graph for the equation y = (x + 1)(3x - 4)(2x + 5)) when Aaron slipped his phone onto my workbook from his seat in front of me.

The screen was lit up with grade school pictures of Sean and Levi. They grinned for the camera, showing crooked teeth too big for their mouths. The title read 'Missing Children's Case to Be Reopened.'

I gasped out loud, covering the sound with a sniff and conspicuously digging a Kleenex from my backpack under Mrs. Clark's suspicious glare. When she turned back to the whiteboard, I tapped the screen.

The journalist mentioned some new evidence might have been uncovered. I glanced over my shoulder at Alicia, wishing I could pass her a note. She was three rows over and two spaces back, though. She was staring at me already. She shook her head, her face blank of emotion, as if she knew what I was reading and didn't want me to get my hopes up.

I scrolled down, skimming the article for information. Aaron twisted around and jabbed a sentence to enlarge it. 'Police have admitted that the original search for the boys had been conducted poorly and that evidence found and misplaced has now been located in storage.'

What?

Aaron leaned over. "Can you believe it?"

I shook my head.

"All right, people, focus. Turn to the top of the next page, for problem 18, please," Mrs. Clark said, turning her glare on Aaron.

I slid his phone under my workbook and turned the page.

A muddy hand print was smeared across my page. I screamed and shoved the book to the floor, half standing.

"Ms. Hadder, please!" Mrs. Clark snapped.

Several students started laughing and one asked me where the spider was. Alicia wasn't laughing-she had stood up as well and now had her eyes fixed on me. She resembled an '80's era B-movie actress who had been directed to give the camera her best performance of insane.

But even with the teacher glaring at me, Alicia shaking and most of the class talking, all I could think was that the muddy hand print in my book was wet.

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