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“Did she ever say anything about her home life or her parents?”
“Said she had a brother. I remember her wishing he’d get hit by a car. I thought it strange at the time because she hadn’t been kidding… it showed in her voice. Gave me the willies.”
“No doubt. Anything else you noticed?”
“Yeah, maybe it has no meaning, but she couldn’t seem to sit comfortably. First she leaned forward and winced and then tried leaning back and eventually, twisted to be on her side. I remember asking her if she’d hurt herself.”
“What happened then?”
“She became teary, you know, kind of sad looking, got up without saying a word and walked out the door. I asked my parents that night what they thought but no one had any answers. Dad said to be kind to her. And Mom said to stay away, she could be trouble.”
“Okay. Now, I want to know whatyouthought.”
Chrissie, being a nice-looking girl, not above average but with a happy smile, took the question seriously. “I thought she was damaged. And no matter how hard I tried, she’d never be my friend. So I gave up. Now I’m glad I did.”
Lori wondered if this judgement occurred because of what Jessica had done two days ago or if this would have been the same answer Chrissie would have given anyway. Hard to tell.
“Got it. Thanks for your time.” Lori pretended to move away but stopped and turned back as if with an afterthought. “Do you know anyone else who Jessica did hang around with?”
“Yeah, kind of. There was one guy who put up with her, but I don’t know his name.”
“Do you know if he went to school here?”
“Couldn’t say. I was new and didn’t know many of the kids. Plus, it’s a huge school.”
“Would you recognize him from school photos?”
“Doubt it. I only saw him a few times, and he always wore his hood up around his face. One thing I do remember, he walking ahead of her. Like in Pakistan. I saw a video about their customs and that one bothered me a lot. No way I’d let some guy make me follow behind. It’s disrespectful.”
“And, yet, in those countries, it could be a custom where the male protects his female. There’s always two ways of looking at something, right?”
Lori watched the other girl consider what she’d said and nod. “I never thought about it like that.”
“Thanks for your help, Chrissie. Is there anyone here at the school who might have more information about Jessica?”
“I’m sorry, I really don’t know. What about her parents?”
“They’re unavailable at the moment.”
Chapter Seventeen
Beau headed into the office after breaking off his conversation at Starbucks with Miss Flashy-smile and no brains to speak of.
Chrissakes, when did these gaga whackos start multiplying? Second time in a month he’d been told that some girl went by a different pronoun. How the hell was a guy to keep up with that nonsense? Not that they didn’t have the right to their choice of title…yawn, he just couldn’t be bothered.
Cranky from his day starting off badly, he became worse when he found that Lori hadn’t yet appeared. Yanking out his phone, he texted her and waited. ‘What’s up?’ Nothing came back to him and after a few minutes, he stuck his phone in his pocket and began to plan his itinerary for the day.
Still at his desk, shuffling more paper files than he liked to see, too many he hadn’t gotten around to dealing with, he nodded at some of the other workers passing by and opened his computer.
Turning to the Intelligence Analyst who worked with his section, he asked, “Hey, Larry, anything on Jessica Boland’s parents or brother yet?”
“Nah. Craziest thing. They just disappeared. I’m wondering if we should be looking for their corpses? Let’s face it, if that kid could shoot up a school, it stands to reason, she could off her family.”
“I agree. So where are the bodies?”
When the bottle-cap bifocals he’d recently started wearing pinched his nose, Larry pulled them off angrily, rubbed at the welts and grimaced. “Hell if I know. Jessica doesn’t have a driver’s license.”
“And that matters… why?”
