I went back to school today.
When I walked down the hall for the first time, everybody turned and looked at me. It was partway like what they did with Will after Sam died, and after he tried to kill himself. Only partway not like that, because not really bad. They got quiet, and they looked at me, but it didn’t feel bad.
Still, I got to my locker as fast as I could.
I picked up the lock and tried to work my combination. But it wasn’t even a combination lock. It was the kind of lock you open with a key. So I figured I must have the wrong locker. I double-checked the numbers, but it was my locker all right. It just wasn’t my lock.
For a minute I stood there with this lock in my hand, wondering.
Somebody had cut off my lock. Or broken it off. And done something inside. And then put a new lock on.
Then I noticed something that looked like a note sticking out of one of the vents in my locker. Right at the level of my nose. I pulled it out. It wasn’t a note, though. It was an envelope.
Inside was a key.
This is when I got scared.
I started thinking what would be inside there when I opened it. I thought about snakes. Stink bombs. Paint bombs. Real bombs. I almost walked away. But I had to open it sooner or later.
I stuck the key in the lock, and it fit. I turned it, and the lock dropped open. I lifted the latch and then jumped at the sound it made. Even though it made that same sound every day.
I opened the door and jumped out of the way.
Nothing jumped out at me.
When my heart had stopped pounding some, I looked in.
Hanging on a hanger in my locker was my jacket.
It wasn’t dirty anymore. The side that had been all dragged in the mud was clean. Really clean. It was on one of those hangers from the dry cleaners. Those wire hangers covered with paper, printed with an ad for the dry cleaners.
I touched it like I didn’t believe it was really there.
I put it on.
After a while I locked up my locker again and started down the hall to my first class. And you know, I did feel like something more in that jacket. In fact, I felt like something more than I had been last time I wore it. It’s one thing to have my mom give it to me. It’s another thing to have the jocks admit I deserve to have it.
It’s like I wasn’t exactly the fat boy anymore. I still weighed as much. It just didn’t matter as much.
Maybe after school I’d try to call that cop back. Because maybe he really would be interested in the answer to the question.
When you save the life of your enemy, he’s not your enemy anymore.
Just as we’d suspected.