The Disappearance of Emily H. Read online

  I sit there for a minute, in a staring contest with her. Emily wins, of course.

  On Tuesday morning, I wake up early. Even though I’ve changed schools more times than I’ve had birthday parties, I’m always angsty on the first day. Plus, I didn’t sleep great. It takes a while to get used to the night sounds at a new place, but this house is particularly creaky and groany. Around three o’clock, I jerked awake, thinking for a minute I’d actually heard the back door open and close. Creepy.

  At seven-thirty, I hoist my backpack over my shoulder and call to my mom that I’m leaving.

  “Have a great day!” comes her muffled voice from behind the bathroom door.

  I find my math class and slip into a seat in the back. Between the knots in my stomach and the tingling in my fingers, I find it hard to concentrate on what the teacher is saying.

  Walking down the hall between classes is more of the same. I want to be like everyone else and ignore the glinting memories. But I can’t. Reaching for sparkles is like breathing. It just kind of happens. Sparkles help me figure out people, help me figure out how to fit in.

  I manage to grab a couple, careful that no one’s paying attention. I don’t get any memories off them, though. That’s annoying.

  At lunch I eat alone in the noisy cafeteria. Nearby, a few girls from cross-country are sitting together. They nod but don’t motion for me to join them. A few rows in front of me, Hugh’s at a table with a bunch of guys. The redheaded guy, the one Hugh has the ongoing photo competition with, tries to start a food fight. Avalon shows up and squeezes in next to Hugh, so close you couldn’t slip a piece of paper between them.

  “Hi, Raine.” Shirlee slides onto the bench opposite me. A sheen of sweat shines on her forehead. “This place is such a zoo. It’s taken me almost all of lunch to find you.”

  “Yeah, I’m surprised they don’t have more than one lunch period.” I pop a potato chip into my mouth.

  She swings her lunch bag onto the table.

  It’s easily the largest lunch bag I’ve ever seen. Every school has their own rules. But I doubt it’s ever cool to bring a lunch bag with a zipper as long as my arm.

  Shirlee unzips the bag and pulls out a rectangular plastic container, snaps it open and lifts out a sandwich thick with sprouts and deli meat. “I wasn’t prepared for how invisible I’d be here.”

  “It’s only the first day,” I say, understanding what she means.

  With her baby finger, Shirlee nudges runaway sprouts back between the slices of bread, then opens her mouth wide. “When’s your birthday, Raine?” she asks after she finishes chewing.

  “May thirtieth.”

  “Place? Time? Year?”

  “I don’t do horoscopes,” I say, clicking into why she’s asking.

  “Put the newspaper horoscopes out of your mind,” she says, waving her sandwich. “It’s not like that at all. It’s subtle, all in the interpretation. Personally, I pick and choose my reading from several sources. I’m good at horoscoping.”

  “Uh-huh.” I’m still not convinced.

  “You’d be surprised what talents people have.”

  I think of how crazy Shirlee’d go if she knew I can pull memories off objects. How under the table, my fingers are dancing on my thighs, wanting to grab the sparkle I see on her dress.

  Halfway through her sandwich, Shirlee sets it down and pulls another container from her lunch bag. She flips up the lid and spoons out a weird-looking grainy thing.

  “What is that?” I ask.

  “Quinoa and mint salad.” She tips the container in my direction. “Want some?”

  “Maybe another time.” Like when the world runs out of real food. I look at Shirlee with her food containers and dense whole-wheat bread and strange salad. She’s wearing a dress with elastic under her boobs and around her arms. It might take Shirlee longer than the average girl to fit in here.

  She reaches back into her lunch bag, this time pulling out oatmeal-and-raisin cookies.

  A buzzer signals the end of lunch.

  “Tell me,” Shirlee pleads before we separate in the hall. “I’ll just keep bugging you otherwise.”

  I sigh and tell her.

  I spend the afternoon finding classrooms, finding seats, listening to welcome-to-my-class-here-are-the-rules speeches, sensing sparkles, seeing sparkles, jamming my hands in my pockets so they don’t reach for sparkles. New schools are exhausting.

  My last two periods of the day, science and film, are at opposite ends of the building, which means I have a major hike. As a result, I arrive late to film and end up standing at the front of the room, looking for an empty seat. Awkward.

  The room is packed. Film is probably the most popular course at Yielding Middle. Everyone’s taking it: Shirlee, Jennifer, Alyssa, Danielle, Hugh, Garrett, Avalon, Willow, Torie, Sydney, and some students I recognize from my other classes.

  Shirlee motions to a desk a few over from hers.

  “Seattle Ska,” Hugh says as I walk past him. His hair is still messy. Does he ever comb it? Would he look as cute with neat hair?

  “Oily Artichokes,” I reply.

  Avalon scowls.

  I slide into my seat. My backpack thuds to the floor.

  The teacher looks up from where he’s talking to a girl at his desk.

  A couple of seats to the right of me, Jennifer leans forward. She’s wearing this amazing necklace with an oversize teardrop stone that has the hugest sparkle hanging from it. “Alyssa,” she whispers loud enough for everyone in a three-desk radius to hear.

  Alyssa shifts toward Jennifer. “Yeah?”

  “I think Shirlee got dressed in the dark this morning and put on her mother’s dress.”

  As if someone flicked a switch, Shirlee turns bright red.

  “Is that what happened?” Alyssa whispers at the same volume. “I thought it was a Goodwill special.”

  Danielle giggles.

  Shirlee closes her eyes.

  The teacher stands and claps his hands. “People. May I have your attention? We have a lot to get through in the next fifty minutes.”

  “You could just do half and let us out early,” Garrett suggests.

  Several students laugh.

  “I’ve been warned about you, Mr. Lyons.” The teacher frowns at Garrett.

  Garrett smiles like this is some kind of honor.

  “For those of you who don’t know, I’m Mr. Magee.” The teacher looks around. “You, in the blue shirt.”

  “Me?” I ask.

  “Yes; would you get the papers from the counter at the back and pass them out?”

  There’s a sparkle sitting right in the middle of the stack. Just plopped there, waiting for me to scoop it up. I close my fist around it and shut my eyes.

  It’s a quick memory of my film teacher kissing my English teacher. Apparently, there’s old-people romance at Yielding Middle. Gross.

  After film, I head to the locker room to get dressed for cross-country. A bunch of us are almost finished changing when Torie marches in from outside. “Hurry up, girls. Chop-chop.”

  “Who died and put you in charge?” Jennifer says. The sparkle swings from her necklace.

  Torie frowns. “Coach sent me. He said to remind you all how bad we want to get to state again this year. And that it’s not gonna happen sitting around in here.”

  Girls start filing out. Only Jennifer and Alyssa take their sweet time, chatting and hanging up clothes in their lockers.

  I’m minding my own business, pulling on my shorts and T-shirt.

  “So, you’re friends with Shirlee?” Jennifer asks me. “Why?”

  The best strategy with mean girls is to keep the conversation short and have as little to do with them as possible. That’s one rule that doesn’t change from school to school. “Shirlee’s okay,” I say.

  “Okay if you like losers.” Jennifer unclasps her necklace and drops it over a hook in her locker. The sparkle glints off the metal walls, lighting up the space like the North Star. />
  Alyssa laughs.

  I grab my water bottle. Pushing open the door to the outside, I see the team stretching on the grass. They’re in a big circle, with Torie in the middle, leading the warm-up. A man wearing a Cougars tank and a stopwatch around his neck stands behind her. He beckons to me.

  “Raine, right? I’m Coach Jackson. Glad to have you on the team.”

  He asks about my running experience, then does what every coach does and sticks me with his slow group. I know I can keep up with the fast runners, but I have to prove it. Again. This gets old.

  Willow scoots over to make room for me in the warm-up circle.

  Jennifer and Alyssa arrive. Without a word, Torie vacates her position, and Jennifer takes over leading the exercises.

  The coach surveys us as we stretch, discusses today’s speed interval training, and pulls out players for private chats about goals and skills. It’s your typical beginning-of-the-season practice.

  Eventually, he blows his whistle. “Let’s get started on the track. We’ll keep it easy today. Two hundreds at a no-talking pace.”

  I can handle this. In my sleep.

  He pulls stopwatches from a gym bag and tosses one to Jennifer, who leads the fast group, including Alyssa, Torie, and Sydney, to the track.

  Still working on my hamstrings, I watch their sets. Jennifer stays easily in the lead. She’s a natural, one of those runners who drives coaches crazy. She lands on the ball of her foot and has a short arm swing, but she’s quick. And because she’s quick, she won’t change what she’s doing wrong.

  I’m in Willow’s group.

  I run out in front. With each bouncy step on the cushioned track, I concentrate on getting a rhythm with my legs, my arms, my lungs. I’m reaching for that place where my mind is clear. Where all I do is run. I don’t stress about being the new kid on the block. I don’t stress about my mother falling for another deadbeat. I don’t stress about moving again.

  Willow and I end up running an extra two hundred together. I’m sure she’s vying for a spot on the fast team, too. The coach’s eyes are on us, and I keep my back straight and my stride long.

  “Make your face blank,” I say to her out of the side of my mouth. “So you don’t look tired.”

  She gives a quick nod and adjusts her expression.

  When we’re done, I veer off the track to where my bottle of water lies in the grass.

  “Good job, Raine,” Coach calls out.

  “Good job, Raine. We’re so happy to have you on the team,” Jennifer says sarcastically, then jogs past me.

  Back in the locker room, Jennifer and Alyssa unpack towels and shampoo and set them on the bench. Then they walk to the drinking fountain around the corner.

  Jennifer’s locker door is open, and the necklace swings gently from the hook. Its sparkle shines at me, practically poking out my eyes with its sharp brightness. What kind of memory does it hold?

  I take a step toward it. Could I grab the sparkle without anyone noticing? What if I pretend to trip and fall against the bank of lockers? Could I quickly reach in? There are a lot of girls around who might notice I have a hand in Jennifer’s stuff.

  I take another step. I would love to get something big on her. Something so embarrassing it would make her shut up and swallow her meanness if I shared it. Maybe that something is on the incredibly bright sparkle. The sparkle from her purse was about an older guy telling her to get lost. Could the memory on the necklace be even more personal than that?

  Willow taps my shoulder, and I jump.

  “Thanks for the tip, Raine.” She smiles. “I really appreciate it.”

  “No big deal,” I say.

  Jennifer and Alyssa return from the drinking fountain and pick up their things from the bench.

  “Wait. I need conditioner.” Jennifer seizes a pink bottle from inside her locker. Then she slams the door and clicks on the lock, shutting away the necklace.

  At least for now.

  After about a week at Yielding Middle, I’m already in a groove. Go to school. Go to practice. Do homework. Eat dinner. Walk the dog. Do more homework.

  I slam my math textbook shut. “Come on, Levi. My brain needs a break.”

  Outside, I swat the first mosquito of the evening off my forearm. As we walk, words like variable, coefficient, and factor swarm in my head. Yielding’s ahead of my Detroit school in math. There’s no way I’ll be ready for tomorrow’s quiz.

  I’m so lost in the world of math misery that I only vaguely hear someone calling, “Buttons. Buttons!” before I finally look up to see Hugh.

  The second I spot him, everything polynomial flees from my mind, and I smile. A dog the size of a toaster is dragging Hugh along the sidewalk.

  Levi and I stop to watch the show.

  “Buttons, slow down!” At the end of a taut leash, Hugh’s zigzagging all over the sidewalk.

  Buttons stops short when he spots Levi.

  “How do you get your dog to just sit there?” Hugh asks. “She’s not even on a leash.”

  “It’s all about who’s boss in the relationship.”

  “Wow. Thanks,” Hugh says, looking fake hurt.

  “I may have had a little help from a place called Doggy Discipline,” I admit.

  We begin walking side by side, following Buttons’s lead. I’m not always good at joking around with a guy, especially a cute guy. But maybe knowing about him and Avalon takes off all the pressure, and I’m pretty at ease. There’s a sparkle on his back pocket. I don’t make any attempt to grab it. I’m curious to see what I think of Hugh without reading one of his memories. I want to see how we get along the normal way.

  At the corner of Maple and Birch, Hugh puts on the brakes, his footsteps turning slow and heavy like he has bricks for feet. For the first time, Buttons isn’t straining at the leash.

  “You know about Emily Huvar?” Hugh asks.

  “Yeah,” I say. “I live in her old house.”

  “I didn’t realize that.” He looks surprised. “I saw her that last night.” He points to the sidewalk. “Right about here.”

  So Hugh was the student who saw Emily on her way to the sleepover.

  “I was out being dragged by Buttons, and suddenly Emily was off her bike and wheeling it next to me, talking a mile a minute about the sleepover and the other girls and a science project and the pizza they were ordering. Then she petted Buttons and started telling me the tricks her dog could do and that Buttons would be lucky if he learned to sit.”

  “That’s harsh,” I say.

  “Yeah.” He shrugs. “I didn’t mention that Buttons got his name because of eating a buttload of buttons. And that we basically can’t train him to do anything. He’s years away from sitting on command.”

  I laugh. “I don’t think I would’ve mentioned that, either.”

  We start walking again.

  “It’s kind of weird living in the same house,” I say. “Is it weird being the last person who saw her?”

  He nods. “People asked me a lot of crazy questions when it first happened.” With his free hand, he pushes his hair off his forehead. It immediately flops back. “But mostly, I just feel bad because normally I walk the way Emily headed when she turned on Birch. That’s the route I always take, always. But I wanted to get away from her, so I kept going straight on Maple.

  “If I’d walked her to Jennifer’s house, I could’ve made a difference.”

  “Jennifer’s house?”

  “Yeah. Jennifer Swearingon.”

  “Is that the same Jennifer who hangs out with Alyssa and Danielle?” I ask incredulously.

  Hugh nods like this is nothing strange.

  Seriously, guys are so clueless when it comes to social stuff. The Emilys of middle school do not get invited to sleepovers by the Jennifers. That’s like saying I’ll wake up fluent in Spanish. Or my mother will marry a stable guy with a full-time job and a bank account and live happily ever after in the same house until she dies. Willow even said Alyssa and her frien
ds picked on Emily.

  “Where’s Jennifer’s house?” I ask.

  “It’s the last two-story on Birch.”

  Maybe Jennifer’s mom forced her to include Emily? Or maybe the girls never planned to answer the door when Emily arrived. Or maybe they were going to make her play a humiliating game of Truth or Dare. I don’t get it. It’s all too weird.

  We walk a couple more blocks together.

  “I live up this way.” Hugh inclines his head toward a cul-de-sac. “See you at school.”

  Buttons’s yips fade as he and Hugh get farther away.

  What if I found a memory of Emily’s from that night? Levi and I double back to Birch. I hold out my arms, tuning into my fingers and any sparkles they might sense, and think Emily thoughts.

  Levi slows to my pace, occasionally bumping against my knee.

  My fingers begin to tingle at a house that’s lit up both inside and out. There’s a large living room window with a couple sitting on a couch watching TV.

  I squint, looking for a sparkle. Nothing. “Levi, stay here,” I whisper, pointing to the sidewalk.

  She whines, not wanting me to leave her.

  “Shhh.” I put a finger to my lips. Then I creep up the side of the driveway, staying as close to the hedge as possible. The tingling in my fingers gets stronger. My palms go sweaty. Where is a sparkle? I blink and open my eyes wide.

  There it is. Glinting weakly, a small sparkle hangs from the garage door handle. I dash from the hedge to the middle of the garage, crouching down and flattening myself against the door. I reach out to trap the sparkle.

  A motion light blasts on.

  I stifle a scream.

  The front door doesn’t open. No one appears at the living room window. I tell my thudding heart to cut it out. The motion light’s probably activated a million times each night by small animals and cars.

  I close my eyes to see the memory.

  It’s a man talking with another man about weed killer. Earth-shattering. Not.

  Birch is a long street, and I actually find several memories on it. There’s a woman who dashes out in pajamas to steal her neighbor’s newspaper. A man who doesn’t pick up after his dog. A group of high school kids toilet-papering a house. A couple making out. But I don’t find anything to do with Emily.