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“Hey! What the hell is wrong with you?” Morgan shouts as she stumbles backward.
“I’m sorry!” I say. “I’m so sorry. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, are you?”
“What’s happening?” I ask her. “Why are the police here?”
“I don’t know. Do you think it has something to do with Darci?”
I shrug.
“Let’s go,” she says. Morgan places her hand on my arm again, and this time, I let her guide me inside the building.
Upon entering, I find the walls covered in photocopied papers. Students linger in the hallway with cell phones out, trying to get pictures and videos of it all while a couple of teachers move up and down the hall, yelling at them to put their phones away while ripping the papers from the walls.
“What the hell is going on here?” Morgan asks.
I narrow my eyes and push my way through the crowd to try to get a better look. Transcripts of text messages and emails cover the walls.
“I guess all that stuff they say about Parks is true,” Trevor says, walking up behind me.
The collective volume lowers, and I turn to see police marching Mr. Parks down the hall and out the side doors.
“Sorry, Ally,” Devon says from beside me. “I guess you’ll have to get a real job.”
I turn to face him but say nothing.
“See you later,” he says, then walks away.
“Oh my god,” Morgan says. “Do you think they’ll send us all home? This seems like something we should all go home for.”
I’m about to agree, but then a voice comes over the intercom and proves us both wrong.
“Attention, students,” the voice says. “You have one minute to clear the hallways and report to your first period class. Anyone still in the hallway will spend the evening in detention.”
“Fuck that,” Trevor says. “Let’s go.”
“Oh, I brought a couple of costumes for you to wear to the party this weekend,” Morgan shouts after me as she speed-walks in the other direction. “I’ll bring them to you at lunch!”
“At lunch?” I ask. I’ve been avoiding our table and the cafeteria in general as much as possible after my fight with Audrey, not wanting to see her or Devon. We have math class together, and usually, we sit together, but after that day at lunch, she moved to the other side of the room—and made a huge scene about it, too. “But—”
“Don’t worry about Audrey,” she says. “She hasn’t been sitting with us anyway. I’m going to tell you the same thing I told her, though.”
“What’s that?” I ask.
“Apologize and get over it. I already lost one best friend, and you’re both making it so muchworse.”
I know on some level that she’s right. I also know that if anyone is going to apologize, that burden will fall on me, but that doesn’t mean I’ll do it.
“That was awesome,” Trevor laughs as we make our way toward the gym. “I wonder who’s going to be teaching class today. Not Parks, obviously.”
“Yeah, obviously not,” I reply. I wonder if I should feel bad about that, too.
It turned out the principal was the one who taught gym class, and Morgan was right that I didn’t have to worry about Audrey. She split her lunch hour between sitting with the other cheerleaders and on Devon’s lap. I tried on the costumes she brought for me after school and settled on a black cat costume that at least had a leather skirt long enough to cover the tops of my legs.
I stuff it into my locker, then prepare for our first volleyball game since the memorial. I head onto the court to warm up with my team until the buzzer sounds for the match to begin. I take my place on the sidelines while they introduce the players, then step into the outside hitter position alongside Morgan.
The other team serves first, and the ball goes deep into the back row. It’s bumped up to Morgan, who sets me up for an easy point.
