The horrible boy must be Kieren, I realized. Was Kieren dead too? I didn’t dare ask.
We sat in silence for a moment. I wondered if I’d ever leave that table. I started bargaining with God—just let this moment be over. Just end this moment, and let my body disappear.
I stared at the table, at that stupid little plate of chocolate cake. My tears pooled around its rim, carrying away the little black crumbs, like inner tubes floating down a river.
CHAPTER 4
Piper McMahon. That was her name. And she had been missing for over a week. It was all over the local news. Flyers displaying her beautiful face, her flowing brown hair, had sprung up on every bare wall in the school. In the picture, she was wearing the same tan suede jacket she had been wearing when I saw her with Brady in the hallway.
Her parents were devastated, naturally. A mob of reporters camped out in front of their house. They appeared on TV at night, begging viewers for any information. Her mother’s eyeliner formed black tears that streamed all the way down to her chin.
And then the principal called an assembly. It started like all assemblies—long trains of kids lining up in their classrooms and shuffling down the hall like human tributaries converging into a reluctant river.
But there were no cheerleaders. No pom-poms. Only the school principal, a slight woman of Middle Eastern descent with bouncy black hair named Miss Farghasian. She looked somber. She looked like she had been crying.
Piper McMahon was last seen on a Tuesday.
And the rest of the words came out of the principal’s slight mouth, booming from her little body with a shocking amount of volume. Piper McMahon. She was seventeen. She was on the homecoming court. She loved The Smiths. She was missing.
I looked over at the part of the bleachers where upperclassmen sat. The rest of the homecoming court looked destroyed. The girls caught their breath. Some of their boyfriends comforted them. Some just sat and stared at the floor.
Piper McMahon was a straight-A student.
Outside the tall window, the bare branches of the trees seemed to shiver, defenseless against the descending chill. My fingers clenched my jeans at the knees. I thought of my mother. I thought of our kitchen. The seat at our table that had been my brother’s.
And then I saw Brady.
Has anyone seen Piper McMahon?
Brady’s eyes pleaded with me, his lips curled into an almost painful circle, like he was about to speak. And I could hear the words he was saying to me, floating soundlessly from his eyes to mine: Please don’t say anything. I can explain. Just wait.
My body felt ready to explode, my heartbeat battering my rib cage. What was I supposed to do? Brady’s eyes continued to plead, and all I could think of was Piper McMahon, alone on a train headed west. Piper McMahon without so much as a toothbrush. What was she running from? Did Piper want to be found? Would she want me to speak up?
The shuffling of feet around me made me realize we had been dismissed. I sprang from my seat and ran as fast as I could out of the room. I’m sure I attracted more than a couple strange looks, and I’m pretty sure I could hear my homeroom teacher telling me to come back, but I couldn’t stop my feet.
I ran from the packed auditorium towards the temporarily empty school, and I quickly found myself completely lost in the labyrinthine hallways. This was a part of the building I didn’t know, and like the rest of the school, it made no sense whatsoever. Doors leading to half-finished hallways, windowless rooms that all looked completely identical. I ran farther until something looked familiar: blue lockers. I knew the blue section. And I knew what I would find there.
The door to the darkroom was in front of me. I ran up the stairs and into the blissful, quiet red light. The photographs were gone, and the room was empty and still. I quickly looked in the shadows for Kieren, who was not there. It struck me as funny that once you’ve seen a person in a certain place, you expect to see them there every time.
I needed a moment to think. Well, my decision was clear, wasn’t it? I mean, I had to tell Piper’s parents. They were terrified. They didn’t know where their daughter was, or if she was even alive. I knew all too well that fear, that moment between knowing something is wrong and knowing just how wrong it is. That endless gulf of pain before the words confirm your worst fear—gone forever. He is gone forever.
What was I thinking about?
Piper McMahon.
I was going to tell Piper McMahon’s parents that she got on a train. I was going to betray Brady, and he would hate me for it. But so what? What allegiance did I have to Brady, anyway? Did I owe him loyalty? Friendship? No, it was the hope of more than that which had made me feel a devotion to him. A silly little crush on an older boy who would graduate in a few months and be gone forever.
Gone forever.
Could I sacrifice Piper McMahon for a crush?
I suddenly hated Piper McMahon. I hated her for getting on that stupid train. I hated her suede jacket. I hated her parents, crying on the news, and the cheerleaders who missed her so much.
Why did she get on the train?
I shuffled over to the tables that held the various baths for the photographic negatives. They all sat empty, their slightly tinted liquids reflecting my image in the red light that hung above them. Without warning, the pools started to undulate, ever so slightly, and the obscure girl reflected in their waters lost all form, her outline blurring into nothing. Swallowed by the dark
