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“Just to look around. Get a feel. Emery and John-Henry can’t go back; they’re already too well known, and Jem and Tean have gotten made.” Gotten made. A part of him heard those words and knew they were back, the bad old days, and a part of Theo was awake again, a part with glittering eyes and a savage restlessness that he realized, now, had never fully gone to sleep. “North and Shaw are back in St. Louis. There’s nobody else. I’m going to look around, that’s all. But I’m not going to do it if you tell me not to, and while I’d like you to stay with Lana—”
“I’ll go.”
The worst part, Theo knew, was not knowing if he had done it on purpose, if that final combination of words had been him pulling the trigger, or if they had been the truth, or a slip. Or some combination of all three. Pulling the trigger, he thought. God, please not that.
“I’ll find someone to stay with Lana,” Auggie was saying. “Is that ok?”
“Perfect,” Theo said. But that wasn’t right either, so he said, “Thank you.” He hesitated, and the classroom door opened, a noise and bodies spilled into the room. “I’ve got to go.”
He wasn’t sure what he heard in Auggie’s silence. Maybe he heard an echo in the darkness. The bad old days.
5
“Augs,” Orlando said as he flipped Lana upside down, “tell him to quit worrying.”
Lana giggled helplessly as Orlando gave her a gentle shake.
“That’s not good for her spine,” Theo said.
Auggie put a hand on Theo’s arm, and he stopped, but Orlando must have gotten the message because he set Lana upright again.
She immediately started tugging on his hand. “Come see my room, come see my room, ’Lando, come see my room.”
Orlando had been Auggie’s roommate, and then, after a weird—and failed—attempt at romance, his friend. He had heavy brows, dark scruff, and a lantern jaw. In college, he’d been ripped with muscle, and now, in his young adulthood, he’d thickened a little, in a way that looked comfortable and good on him. Part of that, Auggie knew, had to do with having a chef for one of your romantic partners. He was grinning at Lana now, pretending she was jerking him off his feet.
Theo rolled his eyes.
“Thank you for doing this,” Auggie said. “I thought Drake was coming with you.”
“Nah, somebody called in sick, so he’s back at work, and Nat’s out of town.” Lana gave another vigorous yank, and Orlando laughed and stumbled with her. “You guys go. We’re good here, right Lana?”
“We’re good!” She broke out in giggles again as Orlando scooped her up and spun her.
“Orlando—” Theo started, but Auggie squeezed his arm, and he stopped again.
“Call us if you need anything,” Auggie said and towed Theo out of the house.
The drive took them almost an hour and a half, and after a few weak attempts at conversation, they passed the time in silence. When they arrived, Auggie slowed and did a loop of the half-full parking lot. Loose stone crunched under the Ford’s tires. Theo’s Focus was less conspicuous than the Audi, and, since they had removed the license plates, it had even less of a chance of leading people back to them. Auggie guided the car into a stall and parked.
At night, under a yellowing streetlight, the Cottonmouth Club could have been any other building on any other stretch of country road. It was low and rambling, a pole-frame structure with corrugated steel panels for walls and roof. The paint was a quiltwork of different colors, jobs begun and never completed, colors discontinued, everything faded in the sun. Where an illuminated sign should have hung over the street, the holder was empty, but the name was spelled out on the side of the building. Some of the letters were missing, but you could fill them in where, over the years, they’d discolored the galvanized steel.
Auggie had picked a Wrangler t-shirt and the jeans he wore when they visited Theo’s family—over the years, as the Stratfords had become more familiar with him (if not more accepting), Auggie had learned that family time could consist of anything from extended family prayers to shoveling shit, literally, in the barn. It paid to dress accordingly. He’d added a trucker hat with the words FRESH MILK across the front, a gift from an influencer bro after Auggie had helped him salvage a tanking account. Theo’s eyes had crinkled at that, and it had been the first time in two days that something had seemed normal.
In the passenger seat, Theo wore jeans and a raglan tee and boots. His beard and hair were the same as always, but something looked different about him. A hardness to his face, maybe. Maybe more. The way he carried himself. Auggie remembered it, kind of. There was a part of Theo’s life he had only glimpsed, a place and a time behind a swinging door. This Theo was still Auggie’s Theo. But also not. Not entirely.
“Do you want to wait in the car?” Theo asked. “Or do you want to go inside?”
Because Theo was a teacher, it was both a genuine question and, at the same time, a trap. Teachers knew how to do shady shit like that. Auggie took his time answering.
“I think it makes more sense for me to go inside.” When Theo glanced at him, Auggie continued, “Two sets of eyes are better than one. We can split up. Cover each other.”
Theo made a noise that could have meant a million different things.
“Also,” Auggie said, the word a slow exhale, “I think we need to be realistic about, uh, who they might be interested in.”
This time, Theo’s gaze stayed on him.
“Jem told us he saw them forcing a drunk girl through a back door. And, I mean, it’s a strip club. And if Shaniyah was right, a boy disappeared, and now Shaniyah is missing.”
