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I reach back to grab it.
Nina: Not a good time. Parents are having the mother of all fights.
Me: I’m already here. A block away. I really need to talk to you.
It’s darker than usual on Nina’s street. The lamps seem to be broken out, but maybe it’s just the rain. A dark van is parked a few houses away. I notice it because it’s so out of place with its blacked-out windows.
I’m about to walk up to the front door when I hear Nina’s mom and dad. They’re arguing. And it’s loud. Even with the windows closed, I can hear them.
“Kat,” Nina calls out from her upstairs window. Her room is dark, which is strange. I guess she was waiting for me. “Come around back.”
I nod and slip around, my Chucks getting stuck in the muddy lawn. The fighting grows louder when I open the back door, and I hear Nina’s mom asking her dad how he could be so stupid.
I take my muddy shoes off and leave them at the back door. Making as little noise as possible, I creep up the stairs to find Nina waiting with her door open. Her parents fight a lot, and she usually takes it in stride, but tonight, something’s different.
“Hey,” I say.
She puts her finger to her lips and pulls me into her room. She closes and locks the door.
When I go to flip the light switch, she stops me.
“You okay?” I ask her, suddenly worried about her. I slip off my scarf and set my purse down but don’t take my jacket off.
“You can’t be here, Kat.”
“What’s going on?”
Her face is pale, and she looks like she might throw up. She gets up and opens her desk drawer, but instead of looking inside it, she bends down to slide her hand underneath it, and when she turns to me, I see she’s holding a flash drive.
“What’s that?”
“I stole it from my dad’s study. It’s what they’re fighting about.”
“What is it?”
“Fuck, Kat. I’m going to be sick.” She hands the drive to me and rushes into her bathroom. I hear her retch, and the sound makes me nauseous, but I go in after her to at least hold her hair back.
“What’s going on, Nina?”
“My dad did something really stupid. So freaking stupid.” She’s crying, wiping the back of her hand across her mouth.
I wet a washcloth and hand it to her.
“What did he do?”
“Stole something.”
I look down at what I’m holding then back at her.
“You need to get out of here. They’re coming. If they don’t find it, maybe they’ll believe him when he tells them he doesn’t have it. I doubt it. They’ll beat the shit out of him but—”
“Who? Who’s coming?”
We both hear a vehicle then, and she runs ahead of me to her bedroom window. “Shit!” She turns to me before I make it to see outside. “You need to go. Now!”
“What—”
“Fuck. Where are your shoes, Kat?”
“They were muddy. I left them—”
“Never mind. Take mine. I’ll call you tomorrow. Don’t come back until I call you, okay?” She shoves my purse at me and takes off her boots as I hear voices downstairs.
Voices I recognize?
“Is that…?”
Nina stares at me. “Please go. Get that thing out of here.” I barely have time to pull on her boots as she shoves me toward the window along the side of the house. This is the one she uses to sneak into when she’s late. I’ve climbed the trellis with her, so I wrap my purse across my shoulder as I swing a leg out.
“Come with me!” I tell her.
“I can’t. They’ll come after me if I go. They know I’m here. Go!”
I climb out, the rain and my own anxiety making the trellis sweaty. Nina closes the window and turns away just as a light goes on in her room, and I duck out of sight. Climbing down fast, I lose my footing once and just barely catch myself. I only make it to the ground as I hear a quick, sharp pop, and although I’ve never heard a gun fired anywhere but on TV before, I know that’s what that sound is. I know it.
I back away from the house when I hear another one of those pops. Tears stream down my face as I turn to the street, thinking to run to the bus stop because where else would I go?
But then I see the Audi. It’s parked at the far end of the road, and I only see it because of another car’s headlights passing on the cross street.
And I’m grateful for not having been able to eat today. For having vomited everything I did eat back up because I feel sick. I feel sick as I run through the backyard and into the shadow of the woods that separate this property from the next.
