All night I think about Jeremy Brown’s words—that Emily was secretly meeting someone else in the park after hours. My mind probes this problem like a loose tooth. It hurts to go there, but I can’t seem to help it.
Could Emily have been meeting my father?
Of course not. That would imply an inappropriate relationship, and my mind refuses to accept that. There has to be an explanation for Emily’s disappearance that doesn’t involve him. At least that’s what I tell myself. Any one of the other interns, including Jeremy, could have been meeting her.
While my dad holds the morning briefing, I head for the ladies’ room. Although the police have already searched Emily’s locker and probably taken anything that might give a clue, I want to see for myself. I know her a lot better than they do.
Her lock dangles from the front of the locker, like an ugly charm on a necklace. The combination is part my birthday, part hers, and it opens on the first try. As I feared, it’s mostly empty—just her canteen and a Vera Bradley bag holding deodorant, sunscreen, a spray bottle of Victoria’s Secret body scent, and an assortment of makeup.
The air in the locker smells sour, and I spray the body scent. The odor of vanilla and lavender hangs in the air like a ghost. If you were seeing someone, why didn’t you tell me? I picture her lips curving into a slow smile. Well, Paige, I couldn’t very well blurt out that I was dating your father, could I? You were mad enough at him as it was.
I slam the locker door shut, but the conversation, like the body scent, lingers.
Remember those nights he worked late at the park? Emily’s voice asks. You don’t think he was working, do you? It was right there in front of you, Paige. Only you kept closing your eyes. The way you did in New Jersey. The truth was right there in front of you. The way we looked at each other…the photo of us on my Connections page…the way I always defended him…
Walking out of the room, I cover my ears with my hands. Shut up, I tell the Emily voice. I won’t listen to you. You’re not even Emily—you’re me making up a story, letting my imagination get out of control.
Why do you think he wanted to send you back to New Jersey? the Emily voice persists. You and I were always good at keeping secrets. Well, it turns out your father was, too.
I walk faster down the empty hallway. Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!
I’m passing Dr. Shum’s office when his deep voice booms, “Paige! Could you come here please?”
Shit. My stomach clenches. Part of me wants to keep on walking, but I know he’s seen me. A fresh wave of heat sends small beads of sweat sliding down my back. Not now, I think, struggling not to let anything show on my face.
“Paige,” another voice says, and my heart drops like a stone.
I step inside. My father is seated across the desk from Dr. Shum. For a moment our eyes meet, and then my dad shakes his head as if to warn me not to say anything.
“Have a seat,” Dr. Shum waves me toward an empty chair. Although he smiles, he doesn’t quite meet my eye. He takes his time shuffling and reshuffling the papers on his desk. “How are you doing this morning, Paige?”
How does he think I’m doing? I perch on the edge of a straight-backed chair with a long tear in the fabric seat. “Fine.” I swallow. “You?”
“Pretty good. Thanks.” His smile fades, and his brown eyes turn serious. “Paige, we need to talk.” He scratches the side of his nose and then runs his hand through his thinning blond hair in a distracted way. “It’s about Jeremy Brown.”
I close my eyes briefly. “What about him?”
“I need to decide if he’s going to return to the program or not.”
Beside me, my dad pinches the bridge of his nose as if he already knows whatever Dr. Shum says is going to be painful to hear.
“There are some discrepancies I’m hoping you can help clear up.” He leans forward, fingers laced and eyes hard. “He says that you came to his house yesterday. Is that true?”
I freeze. How much trouble am I in? I look at my father, but his gaze stays fixed on Dr. Shum. “Yes.”
“Weren’t you afraid of seeing him again?” Dr. Shum’s head cocks to one side, and his brows push together sympathetically.
“Not really.”
Now those thick blond brows lift. “That surprises me. Considering that he allegedly attacked you.”
“Allegedly?” My voice rises. “You think I lied about that?”
Dr. Shum picks up a piece of paper from the top of a pile. “In your statement to the police, you say that he sexually assaulted you. But according to Jeremy, you were the one who initiated the physical contact.” His brown eyes seem sad as he stares at me. “Now, who’s right? Whose word do we take? Can you see, Paige, why we have a problem?”
My stomach drops and inside I’m shaking, but I make myself hold his gaze. “I asked him to stop. The guy’s a creep.”
Dr. Shum sighs and sits back in his chair. Pressing his palms together, he seems to be thinking hard. “The problem,” he says, “is that, according to him, you said no several times, but you meant yes.” He holds his hand up to stop me from speaking. “If you were so afraid, why did you go to his house?”
I glance at my father for help, but he seems to want to hear the answer as much as Dr. Shum. “Because I think he has something to do with Emily’s disappearance.”
Dr. Shum steeples his long fingers and sighs. “He never left his house that night. The police have cleared him. But back to the situation at hand—as far as what happened between you and Jeremy, I’m afraid it’s always going to be a he-said, she-said thing.”
Finally my father comes to life. “Ray, you can’t ignore the bruises he put on her. I don’t want him in the program.”
“I know you’re upset,” Dr. Shum says, “but I’ve talked to the boy, and he’s genuinely sorry. I see no reason for further disciplinary action. He’s reinstated into the program effective immediately.” His brown eyes hold my father’s gaze. “In light of the circumstances, however, I’ll be supervising him. That’s my decision.”
My father’s already sunburned skin gets even redder. “Paige, go outside. I’ll talk to you later.”
I can’t get out of the office fast enough. I tear down the hallway and into the maze of museum exhibits. I race past the cases of bronze tools and then accelerate past the taxidermy display. I’m almost through when Mrs. Shum steps out from behind the curtained-off exhibit and we nearly collide.
“Goodness, Paige, you’re in a hurry.” She smiles, but the expression fades as she searches my face. “You’re upset. What’s wrong?”
For the first time I see she’s not alone. The tall, balding detective—I can’t remember his name—is with her. “I’m fine.”
Mrs. Shum smiles. A pair of oversized, wiry gold earrings swings from her earlobes. “I was just showing Detective Torres the new exhibit. He’s fascinated with the ruins and wants another look up there. Is your father still talking to my husband?”
“Yes.” Any minute he’s going to come out of the office, and my thoughts are so jumbled, I don’t know what—or who—to believe. Before Mrs. Shum can press me further, I run out the door.
My feet pound the bed of gravel lining the path in the cactus garden, and then carry me down the concrete path snaking around the sand-colored walls of the cliffs. The ruins sit in their niche, their broken walls smoothed by the distance, and black, empty windows gaze back at me as if they’ve seen every bad thing in the world.
I keep moving, even though my father is going to kill me for not waiting for him. I run until my lungs burn and my legs turn to rubber. And then I push myself farther. But what am I running from? Jeremy? My father? Myself?
The sweat streams over my body when finally I stumble to a stop. Breathing hard, I look around. I’m past Tacoma Well, basically in the middle of nowhere. Around me the barren landscape seems huge and as foreign as the surface of the moon. The posed cacti, scrubby hunched-over trees, and stubble of browned-out grass look like the sole survivors in a war the sun has long since won.
I wipe my hot, sweat-slick face and take a deep breath of burning air. I should go back; I’m going to have to eventually. But I press forward, daring whatever happened to Emily to happen to me. Stupidly, I want to prove to myself that my father wasn’t involved. Even if it means I get killed, it’s worth it. The thought is irrational, but nothing, I’m discovering, is really very simple. You can love someone and hate them at the same time. You can think you know someone and then suddenly they seem like a total stranger. You can look in the mirror and not see the truth about yourself.
I randomly follow the trail of trampled grass along an irrigation ditch. What really happened to Emily? What is it that I’m not seeing?
Close, close, a voice inside me whispers. I keep going, not understanding how far I intend to go. The heat increases. The sweat pours off me, reminding me how stupid I’ve been to run into the desert without water. I should turn around, but I don’t. I don’t know why.
I walk until I come to a corn field. The plants aren’t quite as tall as me, but they’re lush, packed together tightly, and utterly motionless. My mind flashes back to another time, another field. I hear Emily’s childhood voice in my head. There’s this special place I know…
All at once goose bumps break out on my arms, and the back of my neck prickles. I stare at the field, picturing Emily, not as a teenager, but as a ten-year-old in a frayed pair of denim shorts and an oversized pink T-shirt knotted at her waist. She smiles, the gap between her front teeth giving her a slightly mischievous, slightly sinister look. She beckons me forward.
Somewhere deep inside the corn field, a cricket begins to buzz. The single rattle quickly swells into a loud and insistent chorus as if thousands of crickets are buzzing. It’s almost like the insects are calling me, daring me to walk into the tangle of corn leaves.
“There’s a secret place I know,” Emily said, “where the grass grows taller than anywhere else. Want to see it?”
It wasn’t grass, though, where she brought me. It was a corn field with tightly packed plants and stalks as thick as my legs.
“Come on,” Emily pulled me by the hand.
“Emily, I…”
“It’ll be fun,” she said.
And it was fun, at first. The corn smelled warm and sweet. We walked deeper into the field until all we could see were the stalks. Emily giggled and then raced ahead, zigzagging through the plants.
It was hard to keep up. Leaves slapped my face, and a couple of times I almost tripped on the tangles of old, broken stalks. Suddenly Emily turned, and I couldn’t see her at all.
I stopped. Panting, I looked around. “Emily?” It was very quiet. I called a little louder. “Emily?”
Spinning slowly, I looked for her. A jungle of giant plants surrounded me, blocking my view with their long, green leaves. Had Emily fallen? Was she hurt? My father’s stories spun in my head—snakes and scorpions and iguanas big enough to carry off a child.
Something behind me brushed my arm. I whirled, but it was only a leaf. As soon as I pushed it away, another touched me, this time on the back of my neck.
“Emily!” I shouted.
The plants swayed, reaching for me. I tried to shrink, but they surrounded me. They seemed suddenly alive, capable of movement, of lashing their leathery leaves around me like ropes.
I sank to the ground, sobbing. And then suddenly Emily burst from between plants, laughing.
“Got you!” she sang out. “Now I’ll find you!”
I looked up. “You scared me!”
She studied my face and then wrinkled her nose. “Why are you crying?”
“I’m not.”
“It was just a game.”
I stood up. She was taller, but I was really angry. “I don’t want to play with you anymore.”
“I’m really sorry,” she said. “We’ll make the corn prince now.”
“I want to go back.”
“Okay,” she said, “but please don’t be mad at me. My dad says if you don’t face the things that scare you, you’ll never grow up. You’ll be a little girl forever.”
“We need to go. The corn’s alive,” I told Emily. “It moves when you’re not looking. It wants to catch you and turn you into a scarecrow.”
Emily’s eyes got bigger with excitement. “We’ll fight it together. We’ll steal the leaf from the tallest plant and destroy it.” She reached for my hand. “I won’t let the corn hurt you. I promise you that. We’re best friends now.”
I turn away from the field and its memories. And then I see him, standing less than a dozen yards from me. He’s so still he seems to blend into the scenery. His presence is dreamlike, as if he would vanish if I blinked. Only moments ago, I dared the universe to have whatever happened to Emily happen to me, and now here he is.
I square my shoulders and ignore the way my heart suddenly slams in my chest.
“Jalen,” I snap because I don’t want him to see that he’s scared me. “What are you doing here?”