Secret Circles yrj-2 Page 9

  But halfway to the entrance she appeared beside him.

  “I saw what you did,” she said.

  He glanced at her. She was grinning.

  “And what would that be?”

  “Hit the end of the board. Nerds know levers.”

  Jack resented that. “Nerd, huh? I guess I left my taped glasses and pocket

  protector home.”

  “Maybe nerd"s not the right word. How about misfit? You"re into things most kids

  wouldn"t understand. Your mind works differently. I should know. I"m the same. But

  you know how to hide it.”

  “I don"t hide anything.”

  Well … maybe a few things.

  “Yeah, you do. You don"t even know you do. Kids just think of you as kind of a

  loner. Me … they think I"m weird. But I"m learning how to hide it.”

  “Why?”

  She glanced back at the kids she"d left behind. “Because sometimes I wish …” “Wish you were like them?”

  “Not like them, exactly. It"s just that … sometimes I get tired of being on the outside looking in, and I start thinking it might be nice to be on the inside looking out.” “Better view?”

  She shrugged. “Maybe. I"d like the chance to compare. You ever feel that way?” Jack thought about that. It took only a second.

  “No.”

  “Never?”

  He shook his head. “Never even occurred to me. And I"m surprised to hear you

  talking like this. It"s not you. You always seemed so … happy with who you are.” “Happy?”

  She looked away. “I don"t know if I"ve ever been happy.” “Sure you have.”

  “Okay. Yes. I was happiest when I had the pyramid. And I was happy just now

  to see you ring that bell.” She gave him a gentle punch on the shoulder. “Brain beats brawn every time, right?”

  “Not every time, but it"s got a good win-loss record.”

  She heaved a theatrical sigh and slipped her arm through his as they walked. “My hero.”

  He had to laugh at her unpredictability. Her warm skin tingled against his and

  made for a nice end to a mostly crappy day.

  I was happiest when I had the pyramid.

  Really? Then Jack was going to get it back for her, one way or another.

  MONDAY

  1

  Jack"s father slammed on the brakes in their driveway.

  “What the hell?”

  He"d been leaving for work the same time as Jack this morning and offered him a

  ride down to the bus stop. He worked as an accountant for Price Water house in Cherry Hill and sometimes their departures coincided.

  Now he gaped at their lawn where the VIVINO

  FOR FREEHOLDER sign lay in tatters.

  He stared a few heartbeats longer, then looked at Jack. “Was that like that when you came home last night?”

  Jack shook his head. “Looked just fine when I rolled past.”

  Very true. Jack didn"t mention that after he"d parked his bike in the garage he"d walked back and torn the sign to shreds.

  He noticed something and used it to change the subject.

  “Hey, where"s the Frisbee?”

  They"d left it in the oak that grew curbside and spread over the street and the front yard. But the spot where it had lodged was empty.

  “Must have fallen out during the night.”

  Jack scanned the front lawn. The disk was bright yellow. If there it would have been easily visible.

  “Yeah, but it"s not there.”

  His father made a sour face. “Maybe whoever tore up the sign took it.” He shook his head as he gave the car some gas. “People … I"ll never understand them. Who on earth would stop and go to the trouble to tear up Al"s sign?”

  Jack shrugged. “Someone who doesn"t like him, I guess.”

  2

  Jack"s father accelerated away toward Cherry Hill, leaving him alone at the high school bus stop. Nobody else even in sight yet.

  Southern Burlington County Regional High School—known as SBC Regional or just plain SBR

  for short—lay only three miles south of Johnson. Jack had wanted to ride his bike to school when the weather was decent but his folks put the kibosh on that.

  His mother worried about him riding on the rutted, two-lane blacktop of Route 206. Jack had explained that he knew back roads and paths that would keep him off the highway most of the way. She hadn"t bought it.

  Dad"s objection was that he needed the “socialization” the bus provided. Jack got the impression Dad thought he was too much of a loner and that the bus would force him to meet new kids. In other words, “socialize.”

  He didn"t know the Connells" reasons for not wanting their kids to bike to school, but Weezy and Eddie wound up at the bus stop every morning just like Jack.

  He knew of ten kids from Johnson who went to SBR. Steve Brussard, who"d been a good friend until the crazy events of last month, would have made eleven, but his mother had placed him in some private school for kids with problems. Of the ten, four of them either had cars—like Carson Toliver—or knew someone who did. The less fortunate remaining half dozen gathered by the vacant lot near the blinker light at the intersection of Quakerton Road and 206, in front of Sumter"s used car lot. The cars were still there, the little red-and-yellow pennants still fluttered on their wires, but the place had been closed since Mr. Sumter"s sudden death last month. He too had been a Lodge member.

  For the previous eight years Jack had waited by the vacant lot across the street for one of the grade-school buses, heading north.

  The other two corners were occupied by Joe Burdett"s Esso station and a Krauszer"s

  convenience store. Jack figured the Krauszer"s would come in handy for a pre-bus coffee or hot chocolate when the weather turned cold.

  The lot and the shoulder were puddled from yesterday"s rain. Cody Bockman posters clung to the poles supporting the blinker light over the intersection.

  Gone almost forty-eight hours and still no sign of him. Jack had heard somewhere that if a crime wasn"t solved in the first forty-eight hours, chances were it would never be.

  So where on Earth was Cody?

  Jack couldn"t dodge the suspicion that the circus was somehow involved. In another day or two they"d strike their tents and be on their way to the next stop. Cody might never be found.

  He glanced at the sky. Clear and sunny. No rain since yesterday afternoon. If this held up, maybe he could cut the Lodge"s lawn today.

  He lowered his gaze to the elementary school bus stop across the highway and saw Sally Vivino standing with her mother. Lots of mothers there this morning. Usually they took turns driving groups of the little ones down to the stop, but this morning it seemed a lot more had decided to personally see their kids off.

  Trying his best to look casual, Jack crossed the road. He wanted to see how Sally was doing.

  “Hi, Mrs. V,” he said when he reached them. “Hi, Sally.”

  She stood with a Cabbage Patch Kid clutched against her chest—Jack couldn"t understand the craze around those homely dolls—and looked up at him with big brown eyes.

  “Hi.”

  No smile. Well, what could he expect?

  “Hello, Jack,” Mrs. Vivino said. “We haven"t spoken for a long time.”

  Something in her voice … Jack couldn"t read her expression because of the oversized

  sunglasses she wore. After seeing her bruised arms yesterday, he knew why she wore long sleeves even in warm weather like this. Was she hiding a black eye as well?

  “Yeah, well …” The way she was staring at him made him uncomfortable. “I"ve wanted to stop by but …”

  She nodded. “I understand. We missed you. Sally especially. She kept asking where you were.”

  Now he felt really bad.

  “I"ve seen you waiting here and—”

  “I"ve seen you too,” she said. “And not just here.”

  What did that mean
? She seemed to be trying to make a point.

  “Oh?”

  “I saw you last night, riding your bike away from Mr. Rosen"s place.”

  Uh-oh.

  “Yes, I, um, work for him.”

  She nodded, still staring at him through those dark lenses. “I know. We had a visitor yesterday.

  He came because of a call from a boy.”

  Oh, crap.

  He felt himself reddening. She knew! Had she mentioned it to her husband? Play dumb, play dumb.

  “Um, a call about what?”

  “About something he probably didn"t understand. About something that"s not his business, something he should leave alone and not get involved in.”

  “Oh.”

  He knew he was red. Had to be.

  The school bus pulled up then— in the nick of time, as the saying went—and Jack backed away.

  “Yeah, well, nice talking to you. Bye, Sally.”

  With a quick glance at him, Sally said, “Bye,” then handed her doll to her mother and climbed on the bus.

  Jack spotted Eddie and Weezy approaching the corner and hightailed it over to join them. He could feel Mrs. Vivino"s gaze on his back.

  3

  The big yellow school bus lumbered into view and groaned to a stop. Jack was the last to board, right behind Weezy. Since Johnson was one of the later stops on the route, the bus tended to be near full by the time it reached them. Today was no exception. As usual, the older kids—the seniors without cars and the more popular juniors—had commandeered the back rows.

  Only single seats remained at this point, so Weezy took one next to a girl Jack didn"t know; he got waves and smiles from Karina and Cristin as he passed and wound up in a window seat next to Darren Willmon, a fellow freshman he"d met on previous trips.

  Ten minutes later their bus pulled into the parking lot and stopped in line with its brothers. As he waited to get out of his seat, Jack noticed a rusty pickup pull into a far corner of the lot. Half a dozen kids of various ages jumped out of the rear bed, all wearing odd, mismatched, ill-fitting clothes.

  Piney kids. He wondered if any of them were related to the trapper by the spong. Probably.

  Pineys were related in all sorts of ways. Some people said they were too closely related, like brothers and sisters getting together and having kids. Jack didn"t know if any of that stuff was true. People liked to talk, and some people just naturally exaggerated as they went along. Like a game of telephone where what comes out at the end is nothing like what started it.

  On the other hand, pineys weren"t all that plentiful, so a piney-piney marriage could pretty much count on some sharing of family blood. The result was some kids who didn"t look quite right.

  He watched them troop into SBR"s main building, a sprawling one-story, flat-roofed

  square encased in beige brick with an open central quadrangle. Whoever had designed it must have been given blueprints of Alcatraz for inspiration. All it needed was a gun tower or two to make it look like an official prison.

  Inside wasn"t much better: A tiled, echoey central hallway ran all around the square with classrooms left and right. A hallway branched off the southeast corner to another flat square that housed the caf. A second hall came off the southwest corner to connect to the two-story gym.

  The athletic field lay beyond all that.

  Jack had been edgy about finding his way around when he"d started here, but he"d been a frosh for two weeks now and felt like the place was his.

  4

  “Next year at this time,” Mr. Kressy said, pacing back and forth across the front of the classroom, “we"ll be in the heat of a presidential election.”

  He was gray haired and overweight—not fat all over, just his belly. He looked pregnant. He always wore suspenders and a bow tie.

  Jack had already chosen Mr. Kressy as his favorite teacher. He"d expected civics would be deadly dull, but Mr. Kressy made it interesting. Jack wasn"t sure how he did it, but it worked.

  Maybe it was because he made them think rather than simply memorize.

  “President Reagan will most certainly run for a second term on the Republican side. Word is that Jesse Jackson will announce that he"s running for the Democratic nomination. Did anyone see the Miss America pageant on Saturday night?”

  A few hands went up.

  “If you did, you witnessed history of sorts: the first black woman ever to win. A black woman as Miss America, a black man running for the presidency. Times have changed, and I say it"s about time. But Jesse Jackson is up against John Glenn, Walter Mondale, and a relative unknown named Gary Hart.”

  John Glenn—an astronaut, running for president. He"d get Jack"s vote.

  Smiling, Mr. Kressy paused and scanned the classroom.

  “How many of you just thought, Ooh, an astronaut! I’ll vote for him?”

  A number of hands shot up, but Jack kept his down. Almost as if Mr. Kressy could read minds.

  And his tone hinted that John Glenn might not be such a good idea.

  “Why?” Mr. Kressy said. “Because some scientists built a rocket and shot him into space? So what? The Russians did that with a monkey. Would you vote for a monkey?”

  This got a laugh.

  “Really: How does being an astronaut qualify him for president?”

  Kelly Solt, a cute, heavyset blonde, raised her hand.

  “It means he"s brave.”

  Mr. Kressy waved an arm. “No argument there, Kelly. The monkey had no choice, but John Glenn chose to do it, and that takes courage.”

  Matt Follette grinned laconically from his perpetual slouch and said, “Maybe it just takes dumb.”

  This got a laugh. Matt had already established himself as the class cynic.

  Mr. Kressy didn"t seem amused. “I think we can assume he"s not dumb. But the country is full of brave men—lots of ex-soldiers who risked their lives so that I could stand here and lead you in a free discussion of ideas. But that doesn"t mean every one of those brave men would make a good president.”

  He looked around. “Anyone else?” He pointed toward the rear of the class. “Mr. Neolin … you look like you have something to say.”

  Jack turned and saw Elvin Neolin, one of the piney kids. He was small, with ruddy skin, high cheekbones, and black hair. He looked shocked that he"d been picked.

  “Uuuh, no.”

  Bulky Jake Shuett, seated to Jack"s right, leaned over and whispered, “How about that? The dumb-ass piney can talk.”

  Jack knew what he meant—this was the first time he"d heard the boy utter a word, but …

  “Doesn"t mean he"s dumb.”

  Shuett made a face. “All those inbreds are retards.”

  Jack felt that was a pretty retarded thing to say, but let it drop. Mr. Kressy"s class wasn"t the place to get into it. Instead he looked at Elvin and wondered if he and his fellow pineys knew about the big pyramid on Old Man Foster"s land. Maybe, maybe not. Nobody knew everything about the Barrens.

  Mr. Kressy walked to the center of the room and stood a few feet from Jack.

  “Okay, another show of hands. How many still want to vote for John Glenn solely because he was an astronaut?”

  No hands went up this time.

  “I see. I take it that means we must find other reasons to vote or not vote for him. Since the winner will be leader of the most powerful nation on Earth, maybe we should learn what the man stands for.”

  Karina raised her hand and said, “Don"t you like what he stands for?”

  “I have no idea what he stands for. At least not yet.” He wandered back to the front of the room.

  “But he and all the others will be taking positions on certain issues. We"ll hear a lot of political palaver between now and the election. I want you to listen. We have a civics book we have to study, but this is civics in action. Listen and think.”

  But Jack was thinking about this afternoon … how he was going to earn sixty bucks for mowing the Lodge"s lawn while he figured out a way to get ins
ide.

  5

  “You look so hot.”

  Jack glanced up and saw Weezy straddling her bike, shaking her head. “As hot as Carson Toliver?”

  She gave him a puzzled look, then laughed. “In your dreams.” He didn"t know why he"d asked, but that wasn"t an answer he liked. She shrugged. “You know what I mean.”

  Yeah, he knew. And truth was, he felt very hot.

  The grass around the Lodge was even thicker than he"d anticipated. The mower

  kept clogging, and the sun kept hammering away at him. After school he"d changed to a T-shirt and cut-offs before coming over, but that hadn"t helped much. He was drenched.

  But worth it for sixty bucks. He"d more than earn it this week, but have a much easier time next.

  “Have you been able to look inside yet?”

  The mower clogged and stalled again. Jack would have to unclog it, then start yanking on the cord to restart the motor. He felt his mood heading south. He gave Weezy a look.

  “Boy, do you have a one-track mind. No. As you can see, I"ve been a little busy.”

  “Yeah, I guess. Still … every day our pyramid sits in there is like … a beehive buzzing in my head.”

  There she went again, rewriting what he"d told her. “I said I might have seen a pyramid.”

  “Only one way to find out.” She shifted her gaze and stared over Jack"s shoulder. “Is anybody home?”

  Jack turned and realized she was looking at the Lodge.

  “Whoa, Weez. We can"t go snooping around here now.”

  “Looks empty,” she said. “I wonder if the door"s locked.”

  He could sense her getting carried away. Didn"t she have any brakes on that brain of hers?

  “Don"t even think about it.”

  “Can we at least look in the windows?”

  His voice rose as he felt his patience thinning. “Look, you need a little patience and I need to finish here before midnight.”

  “Okay, okay. When you do finish, Eddie"s waiting on you to help him reach the final round of

  Death Star.”

  Yeah, he"d rather be handling an Atari 5200 joystick than soggy grass, rather be piloting the

  Millennium Falcon toward the Death Star"s power core than pushing a mower.