Page 21 of Possibly Texas

It’s not a club. It read.

“Then what is it?” I asked desperately. “Like, I don’t know, a missile silo or something? Are they doing strange government experiments or something?”

Jack rolled his eyes and began scribbling again. I waited, still bouncing on the balls of my feet as I waited for more written communication.

Auguste Anderson lives there.

My heart sank further. Jack held a finger up and started writing again.

Artist. But I don’t know anything about the lights. I was in bed.

Jack showed me his last message, then shrugged at me.

“Well, shit.” I kicked at the ground. “Uh, sorry.”

Jack looked amused. He scratched out another message.

Sorry.

“It’s okay,” I said after looking at the message. “It’s not your fault this town is boring. No offense.”

Jack sat the notepad down and began running his finger along the grooves in the table again. What he was checking for so thoroughly, I wasn’t sure. In fact, I didn’t even know why he’d cut up the tabletop like he had. When I looked down at it, it looked like…an ant farm? Like those plastic ant farms you fill with chunky sand, then add ants, and you can view the way they dig their tunnels through the clear glass sides? That’s what the top of the table looked like, but without the glass covering to keep anything inside.

“So,” I kicked my toe at the ground again, “what’s the school situation around here? I mean, I guess I’ve been kind of homeschooled by Mom. Is there even a high school here? Or are you going to break out a bigger notepad to teach me more about the three Rs or what?”

Jack looked up at me, a frown on his face. His hands started to move rapidly.

“Jack,” I said, “sign language? I’m rusty. Remember?”

His head fell back and he would have groaned if he was able. Instead, he reached for his notepad and started to scrawl his indistinct block letters again.

Kids around here go to The Pueblo.

“What’s that?” I asked immediately. “The high school or something? I haven’t seen it downtown, so—”

Jack was scribbling again.

It’s the building next to Starbuck’s.

I had to think about the layout of Possibly for a moment before I realized what he was talking about at first.

“The…mosque?” It suddenly dawned on me. “That’s…a school?”

Jack nodded and held his hand up to tilt back and forth.

“Uh, why’s it called The Pueblo?”

Jack shrugged.

“Okay.” I relented. “I mean, it’s a mosque. But whatever. The kids around here go to school there?”

Jack nodded.

“I guess I should go check it out.” I shrugged. “I’ll be going there in a few months.”

A thought that made my cheeks go red suddenly struck me.

“I mean,” I said, “you know, if I’m still here and everything. I mean, yeah. I didn’t mean to—”