We reached her car and I dug out of my backpack the notebook we had been using the day before. I drew a line through Robert. “Okay, seventy-one more people to go.”
She started the car. “What do you think Robert meant by ‘figure that out on your own’?”
“I don’t know.” We both watched as his car backed out of the space and drove through the parking lot, like it would somehow answer our question. It didn’t . . . obviously. She took the list from me, ran her finger down the page and then ripped it in half. “Well, we’re going to figure it out together. We’ll divide and conquer.”
I took a deep breath and shoved my half of the list back into my backpack.
The next day, I stared at the names on my Who Is Heath Hall? list. I didn’t have to do this. What were the odds that he’d show up at my swim meet again this Friday? The image of him jumping into the pool made my shoulders go tense immediately. I growled. Apparently, I did need to do this.
I scanned the list. I’d start with the people I semi-knew, like Brady Thompson. Then I’d move on to the total strangers. Brady sat two seats to the left of me in math.
Five minutes before class ended, I packed my book away and readied myself to cut him off on his way out the door. I felt like I was planning some sort of attack. I wiped my hands on my jeans. The bell rang right in the middle of Mr. Kingston telling us our homework assignment. I stood, my movement making the chair scrape the floor.
“I haven’t dismissed you yet,” Mr. Kingston said.
I sat back down. He held us an extra minute, then finally let us leave. I caught up to Brady at the door and followed him several steps out of it before I said, “Brady, hi. Um . . .”
He looked around, then right at me. “Hadley Moore. Are you talking to me?” If it weren’t for the smile on his face, I might’ve thought he was being rude.
Even with the smile, I hesitated. “Yes. Can I ask you a quick question?”
“If I can ask you one?”
“Okay.”
“Where is your music today?” He pointed to my ears that were free of the headphones I normally wore between classes.
I patted my pocket where they were stashed.
“I see. Okay, go ahead.”
I cleared my throat. “I noticed that you follow Heath Hall online.”
“Not the real one.”
Was everyone going to point that out? “I know. But I was wondering if you know who he really is. Like, who wears the mask? He goes to our school, right?”
He laughed at this like he thought I was making some inside joke with him.
I waited until he was done to say, “So you don’t know who he is?”
“If you don’t, I’m not going to be the one to tell you.”
I curled my lip. Was this some kind of pact? First Robert, now Brady.
“I knew it wouldn’t last long,” he said.
“What?” I gave him a sideways glance.
He pointed at my hand that was clutching an earbud and getting ready to put it in my ear. “I guess we’re done.”
“Oh. Right. Thanks.” I pushed Play with my opposite hand and let the music drown out my thoughts.
“Do people think I’m a jerk?” I asked Amelia when I joined her at our usual table in the middle of the outdoor courtyard for lunch.
“Someone called you a jerk? Who?” She put her hands on the metal table like she was ready to stand up and fight whomever I named.
“No. Nobody did. Just something Brady said today.”
“Brady Thompson? What did he say?” She moved her hands to under her chin, then let out a dreamy sigh. “And how did he say it?”
I smiled and opened my bag of carrot sticks. “He was surprised I was talking to him. Acted like I never had before.”
“Have you?”
“Well, not outside of class or anything . . . but that’s not the point. I don’t purposefully ignore him. I’m not rude or anything. Am I?”
“No . . . You just have your music on most of the time and walk down the hall like you know exactly where you’re going.”
“I do know exactly where I’m going. Doesn’t everybody?”
She pointed a potato chip at me. “But other people take their time getting there. You know, by talking to other students like they actually like them.”
“I like people.” I circled a carrot stick in the air. “I did that whole swim race thing with Jackson.”
“That had nothing to do with liking him and everything to do with the fact that you lost your race that night and you needed to win at something.”
I narrowed my eyes and bit into my carrot. “Fine, you’re right. But Robert! What about him? I dated him. And Miguel before him.”
“True. They were both confident enough to date someone as independent as you. Well, until Robert wasn’t, apparently. Have I mentioned yet today how stupid he is?”
I smiled, but these arguments weren’t proving my case at all. “DJ!” I exclaimed. “I talk to DJ.”
“Because you know he is unavailable.”
“So you’re saying that Brady is right? That people think I’m closed off?”
She sighed. “No. I mean, sort of. You’re just private. You like to keep most things to yourself. But you can be friendly, nice, when you want to be. We’re best friends, after all.”
Exactly. We were best friends. . . . Granted, I’d known her since second grade. I wondered if she would’ve given me a chance if we had met now, in high school. She was much more open than I was. Willing to let people in. Willing to give people the chance to have control over her emotions. It took a lot of trust for me to get there.
“You’re like the big swim star at the school, Hadley,” Amelia added. “You can be intimidating.”
“I am not intimidating.”
“You are. I thought that’s what you were counting on when you finally get to confront the masked man.”
“You’re right, it is.” She was right, why was I getting hung up on this? I liked my life. I liked my emotions safe. Who cared what Brady or anyone else thought, for that matter? They had no idea how I really was.
I glanced around the courtyard. “So were you able to check anyone off your list?”
She shook her head. “They aren’t talking. They won’t give him up. It’s frustrating. I even talked to some girls not on our list. A few said they’ve seen his posts but couldn’t care less who he is. One person swore it was Thomas Freeman and another said it was Liam Baker.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Did you add them to the list?”
“I did.”
“You talked to a lot of people,” I said.
“How many have you talked to?”
“Just the one.”
She bit her lip, pulled out a pen, and crossed off several people. “I really only talked to three from our list and then added the two, so I’m only one down too.”
“We need to figure this out before Friday.”
“What’s Friday?” she asked.
“Our next swim meet.”
She pursed her lips. “We studied his pattern online yesterday and he usually doesn’t show up to the same place twice.”