She holds up three fingers, scout’s honor style, in all her extra glory.
I pause. Riley’s the last person I’d spill my wax to, but the pressure’s been building so much that I have to let some of it seep before I explode. I step closer to her in case anyone overhears. “My sister’s been missing since Thursday night. I have no idea where she is.”
Riley covers her mouth with both hands. “Jay,” she says in between her fingers. “Jay, I didn’t know. Why are you and Ms. Murphy even here today?”
“MiMi doesn’t know anything.” I ram my fists into my hoodie’s pockets. “Don’t want to scare her for no reason.” My hands tremble at the thought of having a reason to scare her.
“No reason?” Riley’s hands drop to her sides. “Jay, your sister could be missing missing. She has a right to know.”
“I don’t know if she’s missing missing.”
“You just said she was.”
“Look, you don’t know Nic. She does this . . . thing. She tries to break free, but then shows back up at our doorstep like a stray, remorseful kitten. I can’t freak out MiMi over one of her dizzy adventures.”
“This time is different, though. I can see it on your face.”
I step back. Riley’s been studying my face enough to see a difference?
“If you’re not going to tell your grandma, you at least have to go to the cops.”
I’d laugh in Riley’s face if my throat wasn’t so tight. “Cops don’t listen to guys like me—and they damn sure don’t care about girls like Nic.”
“Not all cops are like that, Jay.” Riley blinks at me with all the sincerity in the world. Her eyes are open to possibilities, not muddied from seeing cops laughing at blissheads like Pooch instead of lending a helping hand.
I’ve said too much. I move away from Riley before I say any more. She calls after me one more time. I pause, glance at her over my shoulder.
Riley squeezes and pulls at her fingers. “I’m . . . I’m sorry.”
This time, I do let out a laugh. A small one just under my breath. “You and me both.” But not as sorry as Nic will be after we exchange a few words when she gets home.
If she gets home.
That tiny word haunts me all throughout Reverend Palmer’s sermon. If, if, if. Over and over like the chorus of a hymn. I need to reach Sterling, get some answers, to make this somber song end.
Six
I PLAYED A GAME OF HIDE AND SEEK DURING SUNDAY DINNER: hiding the truth about Nic’s whereabouts from MiMi and seeking answers about the truth on my phone. Nic still wasn’t returning my calls, and Sterling’s so-called followers were nothing more than that. Just a few wannabes who comment on Sterling’s posts for clout, with no tea to spill. So I hit up the queen bee herself on Monday morning before heading to my locker. Sterling quickstepped off Snapchat and remained MIA the whole weekend. She had to know something about Nic. Hell, Nic was probably sitting right next to Sterling while we chatted, feeding her lines. Hopefully.
I know just where to find Sterling. In the girls’ bathroom across from the gym, touching up her face to take on the role as the baddest chick at Youngs Mill High. I text Bowie while I wait—mostly so I won’t look like some creeper waiting by the girls’ bathroom. My phone vibrates in my hand and a number I don’t recognize pops up on my screen. I suck in a breath and the phone almost slips through my fingers as I fumble to answer it.
“Nic?” I ask. I plead.
There’s a brief pause on the other line. “Uhh . . . this is Joshua Kim from Taco Bell. Looking for Jayson Murphy.”
All hope seeps out of my nostrils. Taco Bell? I thought I bombed that interview so bad that they sent a crime scene cleanup crew to mop up after me. “Yeah, this is me. Jay. I mean, Jayson. Me being Jayson.” The hell, Jay? You want this guy to think you’re even more of a dope?
“Alrighty then. Well, I reviewed your application with the other shift manager. And he and I both agree—you got what it takes to join our crew.”
I stifle a laugh. What it takes probably means that I was the only applicant who didn’t come to the interview smelling of booze or bliss. Guess they’ll take someone on the losing end of a street fight over a blisshead. “That’s amazing. Thank you so much, Mr. Kim,” I say in my Whiteboy Jay voice.
“We’d love to see if you could come in to meet Maurice, the other manager. And then we could talk about . . .” Joshua goes on and on about background checks and uniforms and W-2 forms, oh my. But his words pour in one ear and leak out the other because Sterling finally slinks out of the bathroom door, heels almost as long as her legs, and reminds me I’m on a mission.
“Excellent. I’ll get back with you,” I say to Joshua right before hanging up. He’s probably regretting the decision to hire me even more, but I’ll have to kiss his ass later. Right now, I have bigger fish to fry.
I nod at Sterling and she doesn’t even flinch when she sees me. Just nods back as if she was used to having dudes wait for her. “Hey.” She runs her fingers through her blonde locks, all wavy and tousled like she just strutted off the beach, then walks past me.
What the fick?
“Wait,” I say, catching up to her. “Didn’t you want to talk to me today?” I spread my arms and present her the floor. Inside my heart is doing cartwheels. I’m doing the whole duck thing—cool and calm on the surface, but everything flailing where nobody can see.
“Oh, right. Chung asked me to edit the Run of the Mill and convince you to do it with me. I mean, nobody really reads print anymore but I figured . . .”
Sterling’s words get eaten up by static. The lit mag? The fickin’ lit mag? No. No. There has to be more. Sterling’s my window to Nic. My last gasp of hope before I let the fear of what could be strangle me.
“And don’t look at me like that,” Sterling continues. “I know how to read, Jay. I can run a lit mag.”
“I don’t give a damn about the lit mag!” The words explode out of me. Sterling jumps from the blow. “I thought we were connecting about Nic.”
“Nic?” Sterling frowns at me. “Why?”
“I asked if you’ve seen her. You told me you’d talk to me on Monday then got all sketchy and disappeared all weekend.”
“I didn’t get sketchy. My parents took away my phone because I got a stupid D on my calculus test.”
The window to Nic gets smaller and smaller. I still try to squeeze through. “Be real with me. She hasn’t reached out to you at all?”
“Jay, the last time I heard from her was on Thursday.”
Thursday? The last time I heard from Nic was Thursday night, too. “What she say to you?”
Sterling’s face shifts from day to night. Like someone came and turned off the lights behind her eyes. “I don’t remember.”
Her response sends my eyebrows flying. “Sterling, was she upset? What she say?”
Sterling rummages through her purse, searching for something. Probably a way out of this conversation. “I said I don’t remember.”
The hell. “You don’t remember anything? Did you see her in person, or was it just a text?”