Secrets

*Disclaimer: This is an excerpt from a longer story not yet published.*

“So, what’s the catch?” I asked.

His eyes twinkled in excitement, his fingers twirling my pen. My hand hung in the air, feeling empty and hopeless. Deep down, I knew I shouldn’t even be talking to Kage right now. He was a dangerous guy. I was a weak and fearful girl playing brave soldier for the first time in my life.

He thought for a moment. “I need you to get your friend to stay away from me.”

I snorted. “That’s impossible.”

He tucked the pen in his pocket. “I would hope not.”

My chest clenched tight. I had to get that pen back. My arm snaked out, a mind of its own, my hand grabbing Kage’s arm. He froze, my hand gripping his bicep. Slowly, he turned to face me, a wide grin on his face.

“Do you need something?”

I fought the urge to punch him. Even if I did, he was the strongest kid in school and the only one without a heart. He’d see no problem with knocking a girl to the floor. Especially the friend of his worst enemy. I’d already made a mistake just by touching him. Luckily, the hallways were empty so there were no witnesses or spectators to cheer us on.

“I can’t control Finn,” I told him, dropping my arm back to my side.

The muscles in Kage’s jaw tightened as though he was trying to hold back a laugh. “So threaten him. Let him know that his lover's life is on the line if he doesn’t stand down.”

I took a step back and glared at Kage. “We’re just friends. Everyone knows that.”

He rolled his eyes. “Oh Amory. It’s amazing what all you can be oblivious to.”

I shook my head. Obvious to what? Finn and I had been best friends since kindergarten. Our houses were right next to each other so it made summer hangouts easier. There wasn’t a single secret we would keep from each other. But maybe it’d just be easier to play along with Kage’s crazy idea.

“Whatever. I guess Finn and I are in love,” I said, shuddering at the idea. “Now give it back.”

Kage hesitated, like he was going to oblige and hand it over. In two seconds, his face went from contemplating to grinning wickedly. He turned on his heel and sprinted down the hall.

It took every ounce of willpower within me to not chase after him. No way was I going to sprint past a teacher’s classroom and risk them recognizing me. Getting in trouble wasn’t an option for me. Not a single teacher dared to touch Kage, but any other student was free game.

Quickly, I snuck back to the cafeteria and slumped in my seat next to Finn. He slid my lunch to me, not saying a word, knowing that I’d lost the battle. We didn’t speak of the pen for the rest of the school day.

When school let out, Finn and I biked to my house and flopped down in front of the TV. We believed heavily in scanning the news for anything that might be useful in our daily lives. It never hurts to stay updated on the workings of this world.

Finn ended up staying for dinner, his lively humor bringing joy to my depressed family. However, when the table had been cleared, Finn escaped to my bedroom, clearly disturbed by something. Mom raised her eyebrows as if asking the suppressed question, was Finn okay? He was one of the most expressive people I knew, never knowing how to hide emotions. Because Mom was basically Finn’s second mother, he sat right beside me in her heart and her concerns for him were equal to those of her own children.

“What’s wrong?” I asked Finn once we were in my bedroom, door closed, window open to let the spring air in.

He was spinning on the chair at my desk, head thrown back so he was staring at the ceiling. “We need to get into Maci’s bedroom.”

I froze. We’d gone there once, climbed through the window the night she disappeared. That was enough fear to last a week. No way was I going back there.

Finn continued. “We need to search the floorboards like Lane in Gilmore Girls. Or maybe we missed something else. A trapdoor in the ceiling? A hidden compartment under her bed? Maybe it’s something as simple as a notebook or journal.”

“We need the pen.”

Finn stopped spinning and turned the chair so he was looking me straight in the eye. “The pen is gone.”

“Well then I guess we’re back to square one.”

“We can’t be. We have to find her.”

“Why does this matter so much!” I yelled. “If you’re in love with her, just tell me. And if that’s not the case, then maybe you’ve lost your mind.”

How had love between friends manage to be brought up twice in one day? Luckily, Finn just stared at me like I was crazy. “In love? Maybe you’re the one who’s lost their mind.”

I rolled my eyes. “I feel like we should be taking our time, studying the details. All you want to do is go, go, go. We need to slow down, reassess the situation.”

He started spinning again, head thrown back once more. How was he not dizzy? I went to my closet, lifted a pile of old sweatshirts on the top shelf, and pulled out the cardboard box. Taking the notebook from inside and a pencil from my nightstand, I sat down on my bed and wrote the date carefully at the top of the first blank page.

I started brainstorming ideas, writing down anything that came to mind, any topic related to Maci’s disappearance. I put the word “PEN” in all caps in the center of the page. Why had Kage taken it? Was it because Finn and I were so obsessed with it and Kage was eager to deprive us of our happiness? Or did Kage know something about the pen that we didn’t? After all, it had come from the top of Mrs. Hanson’s desk.

Finn joined me, flopping onto his back in the middle of the bed.

“I’m dizzy,” he announced. I ignored him. He hoisted himself up and sat criss cross beside me, back against the mountain of pillows piled at the head of my bed. “What’re you doing?”

I tilted the notebook so he could see my work. I’d written down that the pen contained no ink, it only appeared on Mrs. Hanson’s desk the day after Maci disappeared, and it matched the picture of the pen we found in Maci’s basement two months ago. Finn read my notes, somehow seeing the words through my sloppy handwriting, and nodded.

“That’s a good start,” he said, pulling my favorite blanket over his legs. I grabbed it from him and struggled to fold it from a sitting position. He glared at me and reached for a different blanket.

We sat in silence for nearly ten minutes, the only sound being pencil on paper as we passed the notebook back and forth.

Quietly, after minutes of doing nothing but staring at the wall, I turned to Finn who happened to already be looking in my direction. “Why do we need to rush through this? Clearly her parents have everything under control. They’re the ones who supposedly sent her away.”

Finn looked away, his face kinda red. “What if this whole situation involves us?”

“What do you mean?”

He hesitated. “They sent her away, likely for something she did or something they found that would put her in danger. Isn’t it possible that we’re the ones they don’t want her to be around? Or what if the same thing endangering her is also endangering us and we just don’t know it yet?”

Okay, Finn had a point there. Nothing we found was adding up. And the deeper we dug, the uglier it would get. Once we hit a certain point, we’d have to work twice as hard and fast just to keep our heads above the water. Once we hit a certain point, there’d be no turning back. All this had been hinted at from the very beginning, and was being made clearer as we continued our research.

“Everything good here?” Mom asked, opening the door and poking her head in.

“I’m dizzy,” Finn said.

Mom frowned concernedly. “Are you feeling alright?”

He shrugged. “School’s been tough. Amory and I got bullied today.”

I elbowed Finn in the side, and it wasn’t soft either. Too late. Mom’s eyebrows jumped to the ceiling. Stumbling over the threshold, she closed the door behind her and pulled my swivel chair to the side of the bed. “Spill.”

I sighed and discreetly tucked the notebook behind me. I knew enough to not draw attention to it or the cardboard box laying open on the floor of my closet. Mom wouldn’t notice either of them if I acted completely chill about everything. However, what I wasn’t chill about was Finn calling attention to today’s fiasco. I really wanted to slap him across the face, tell Mom he’s been hallucinating all day, and then talk some sense into this boy.

“Well,” Finn started, “I have this really cool old century pen, and I was showing it to Amory today in class when this kid came up and took it right from my hand. Amory tried to get it back but it was no use.”

Mom nodded as if she had this exact scenario happen to her before. “Did you tell a teacher?”

I tried not to laugh. Finn bit his lip. I waited for him to take the lead once more.

“No, we did not go to a teacher,” Finn said. “This kid isn’t exactly one you would go to the teacher about.”

That, and it was a teacher’s pen Kage was in possession of. Again, why had Finn dragged my mom into this?

Mom nodded again. “You said you confronted the kid, right?”

“Yes.”

“Could we help you find another pen somewhere?”

Finn shook his head. “It was one-of-a-kind.”

Mom laid her hand on Finn’s arm. “I’m sorry, but I really don’t have any other suggestions. If the pen means that much to you, I would suggest going to the principal. But it doesn’t seem like that’ll work in your case.”

She gave Finn’s arm a light squeeze, sympathy clouding her eyes. With that, she left the room, shutting the door behind her.

I turned to give Finn a piece of my mind. “What in the world were you thinking?!”

He lost it. Literally falling off the bed, Finn rolled with laughter, each hysterical jab wracking his body till tears were flowing from his eyes. Dragging himself back onto the bed, he whipped his eyes on a blanket and settled back into the mountain of pillows.

“Oh,” Finn started. “I needed that more than I thought I did.”

I punched him. It wasn’t that hard of a punch and it was only to his arm. Still, he yelped like an injured pup.

“You should go home,” I said. I’d had enough for one day. Finn was going to start getting on my nerves even worse than now if he didn’t leave soon.

“Hey,” Finn said quietly. “I didn’t mean to scare you with your mom and all. I just a) needed a laugh, and b) thought we could use a little distraction. It also never hurts to feed the adults something so they don’t suspect the larger problem.”

He had me there. The way Mom had responded was kind of funny. All her words and facial expressions looked like they came straight from a movie. I bet my reaction was also a little hilarious, not that I was going to admit that though.

The distraction was also nice. But it hadn’t diverted my thoughts enough to give me a fresh view of the whole situation. Honestly, my overthinking, highly imaginative brain had come up with a hundred possibilities, half of which I probably shouldn’t speak aloud.

“Fine,” I said. “Then we better have a plan.”

Finn shrugged. “We could always corner him, force him to give the pen back.”

I shook my head. “He said the only way he’d give it back was if you stopped bugging him.”

Finn shot upright. “Why did you not mention that earlier!”

I stared at him like he was crazy. “Because I know you’ll never stop annoying him and I know he won’t give the pen back even if you did.”

He sighed and slumped back down. “Yeah, you’re right. That guy gets on my nerves way too much. We could still corner him though.”

I thought for a moment. Slowly, a random idea began to take shape. Then it hit me all at once. “Finn! You’re a genius!”

“I am?”

I grabbed the notebook from the pillows and began furiously writing down everything. Finn leaned over my shoulder, studying the plan as it came to life. By the time I was done, we were both grinning ear to ear. Tomorrow, we’d be making a special trip to Maci’s house. And Kage would be getting a special visitor any day now.