Amanda’s office phone rang. She startled, but made no move to answer it, even when it rang a second time.
“Um, you are aware we don’t have a receptionist yet?” Sarah asked. “That phone isn’t going to answer itself.”
“Oh, right.” Reluctantly, Amanda moved to her feet on the third ring and headed for her desk. She picked up the phone. “Amanda Grayson.”
There was no response.
“Hello?”
No answer. In an instant, dread all but overwhelmed her.
“Hello?” Amanda asked one more time. Still, there was nothing except that familiar sound in the background. Heavy, horrible breathing. Her gut twisted.
“Who is it?” Sarah asked from the couch.
There was only a series of zeroes on the caller ID. Amanda slammed down the phone.
“Whoa, killer!” Sarah called out. “What did they say?”
“No. Nothing. Sorry, I don’t even know why I hung up like that. There was no one there.” Amanda smiled, but it was not a good smile. She needed to change the subject. “It’s just—Case being so far away, it’s putting me on edge. I even had this ridiculously awful dream last night. I was running through the woods, barefoot, sticks cutting my feet. I think I was trying to save Case from something. God knows what.” When Amanda looked at Sarah, her eyes were already wide, and Amanda hadn’t even mentioned the most disturbing parts—the blood that had been all over her, and she’d been wearing something, a fancy dress, a wedding dress even; and then Norma’s Diner, from her hometown, appearing out of nowhere like some haunted house in the middle of the woods. Who dreamed such strange, awful things? Certainly not Sarah. “Obviously, it was just a nightmare. But every time the phone rings, I am worried it’s Case’s camp.”
Amanda knew that Case was safe at camp. She just felt unmoored without him. The only time he’d ever been away this long was when he’d been hospitalized with food poisoning as a toddler, and even then Amanda had slept in the hospital with him.
Sarah’s face softened. “Well, that I do understand.” She came over to lean against the desk beside Amanda. “I always chew off all my fingernails when camp starts. Until I get that first letter, actually. And you’re dealing with a new camp. My boys usually go every summer to the same place.”
“You worry, too?” Amanda asked.
Sarah’s youngest son, Henry, was in Case’s class, which was how she and Amanda had met. Sarah was one of those blasé mothers who always had everything so under control no matter what new disaster her sons careened into. And there were a lot of disasters.
“Don’t let this tough exterior fool you!” Sarah exclaimed. “It’s just easier for me if I don’t let myself think about it—out of sight, out of mind. It’s like the ‘come in and see us’ message from Country Day I got about Henry right before the school year ended. You wanna know what I did?”
“What?” Amanda asked, on the edge of her seat. What she wouldn’t have done for one ounce of Sarah’s bravado.
“I ignored it. Did not even respond. Can you imagine?” Sarah shook her head as though she was disgusted with herself, but really she seemed a little pleased. “Honestly? I couldn’t deal. I needed a break from everything kid-related. Of course, now we have this emergency PTA meeting tonight. So I guess the joke’s on me.”
“What emergency meeting?” Amanda asked.
“Come on, I told you. Remember? The contact list has been compromised!” She pressed her flattened palms to her cheeks and widened her eyes for a second, then smirked. “I know that Brooklyn Country Day isn’t one of those loosey-goosey progressive schools. We all love rigor and discipline and structure. That’s why we send our kids there. But honestly, you’d think the Country Day parents were all in witness protection or the CIA or something. They are losing it.”
Oh yes, Sarah had told her about that and Amanda had deliberately pushed it straight out of her mind. Zach would lose it, too, if he found out about some hacking situation. He was obsessive about their privacy. If their information got into the wrong hands, he would definitely hold it against the school, which he had picked specifically because of its attention to every last detail. He might even want Case pulled out and that could not happen. Despite its demanding academics, Brooklyn Country Day was the only bright spot for Case in an otherwise rough transition.
Amanda had hoped to wait until the end of the school year to move ten-year-old Case east, but in the end that hadn’t been possible. At least Case made friends easily. It helped that he fit in many different places socially. On the one hand, Case was an outgoing, athletic baseball fanatic, and on the other he was an introspective artist who could happily sit alone, sketching his favorite animal—jaguars—for hours. But a new school with only a few months left in fifth grade was a lot to ask of any child, even a flexible one.
There had been tears and some nightmares. Once Case had even wet the bed. Having often been plagued by terrifying dreams herself, Amanda had always taken her son’s sound sleep as a sign she was doing something right. Now even that was gone. At least Case had perked up once Amanda agreed to sleepaway camp: eight weeks all the way back in California with his best Palo Alto friend, Ashe. But what if her son’s sadness returned after camp ended and he came back to Park Slope? Amanda didn’t want to think about it. She’d always made whatever compromises necessary for Zach’s career, but never at Case’s expense. Her most important job was to protect her son, but in balancing Zach and Case, there were no easy answers.
“Oh, now don’t you get all freaked out, too,” Sarah said. “I see that look on your face.”
“I’m not freaked out,” Amanda lied.
“Anyway, the school is pulling out all the stops to investigate,” Sarah said, but she sounded a little like she was trying to convince herself. “Hired some fancy cybersecurity firm. You know Brooklyn Country Day. They take no prisoners.”
“I just—I had no idea,” Amanda said.
“That’s because the administration is being too close-lipped. I keep telling them that,” Sarah said. “It makes it look like they’re hiding something. So you’ll come to the meeting then?”
Amanda had been to one Brooklyn Country Day PTA meeting thus far and had found it extremely intimidating.
“Oh, I don’t know if I can—”
“Sure you can. Anyway, I need your moral support. These parents are looking for someone to turn on,” Sarah said, as though she wasn’t far more likely to cut them all down to size. “Eight p.m. My place. I won’t take no for an answer.”
Sarah didn’t need Amanda there, but she wanted her to be. And that was enough.
“I’ll be there,” Amanda said to her friend. “Of course I will.”
Lizzie
JULY 6, MONDAY
Rikers looked worse than I remembered, even in the dark.
The larger prison buildings seemed deliberately designed to clash, and the smaller buildings and assorted trailers—administrative offices, maybe, or guard barracks or weapons storage—were unlabeled and sagging. A massive concrete prison barge floated impossibly on the water, housing another few hundred inmates who—I’d read—had recently managed to cut the barge loose and almost escape by slowly floating away.