Whistleblower ✓

13 | suits and stds

I'd always been warned that Garland was a dry place, and that just one ember was enough to spark a wildfire capable of mass destruction.

By Tuesday night, I realized that our article was less of an ember and more of a gasoline-doused bonfire. My dad had been right; the local radio station in my hometown had gotten hold of the story. As had just about every other major news outlet in Southern California, including the Los Angeles Times.

Hanna tracked down a physical copy of their Wednesday paper, cut out the article on Vaughn, and tacked it to our fridge like a proud parent.

When she and I dropped by Pepito's for dinner that night, we found Oscar plastering JUSTICIA PARA JOSEFINA posters on every available surface of the stand's exterior. He paused this endeavor to call Pedro and Joaquin to the order window, so they could all thank me—in Spanish so heavy with emotion that even I had a hard time following along—for putting Josefina Rodriguez's name in my article.

I plastered on a smile and told them all, "No, no hay qué agradecer."

Oscar insisted our food was on the house, but when he wasn't looking, I slipped a crumpled twenty dollar bill in the tip jar.

❖ ❖ ❖

On Thursday morning, I convinced myself that I needed to skip Human Sexuality. The carpet in the bedroom was a hair-magnet. The fridge smelled a little funky. The bathroom mirror was splattered with water droplet stains. It was therefore justifiable—nay, imperative—that I stay home and, in the pursuit of cleanliness, address these very urgent matters.

It totally had nothing to do with the fact that I'd heard the entire football team was fuming about our article, and that somehow, my name had gotten tossed around in the locker room enough that even Andre heard it.

"I can just take notes for you," he'd told me the night before. "You don't gotta come to class if you're scared, but I really don't think they're gonna do anything, you know? It's all talk."

I wasn't scared.

I just needed to clean the apartment.

That was the plan, at least, until Andre texted me fifteen minutes before class: Okay so Fogarty says Nick warned St. James there's a pop quiz on the reading today.

I spat out an expletive and tore off my rubber gloves. There was no time to change into something more flattering than the stretched-out leggings and my dad's old XL shirt that I'd thrown on that morning. I grabbed my backpack and booked it to campus, wishing the whole way that I was one of those kids who didn't care about making good grades or keeping scholarships or disappointing their parents.

The stairs in the biological sciences building still reeked of paint, even though there were no more signs or ribbons of caution tape warning me not to brush up against the walls.

I figured I could hold my breath for thirty second if it meant avoiding the elevator.

In fact, if I could just keep my head down, take the pop quiz, and then make a quick escape before the lecture started, I'd be alright.

The auditorium was crowded when I slipped through the double doors behind a pair of blonde girls who were bitching loudly about a biochem midterm with a bad curve. I scuttled straight to my usual seat—the third row from the back, second in from the aisle—and slapped my notebook and a mechanical pencil onto my desk, then scanned the auditorium for signs of trouble.

Nick stood up at the front, shuffling stacks of papers at his podium. Fogarty and a couple of the other starters were sitting in the middle of the room, their voices lowered and significantly less rowdy than I'd grown accustomed too. There was no sign of Bodie.