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“Your bag!” she screeches. “I left a note for you in your bag.”
How the hell did she get near my bag? I shake my head and climb inside the car, refusing to listen to one more second of her bullshit.
“Take me to the airport.”
The driver nods and does as I request with an efficiency I can appreciate for once in my life. The only problem is, I have no idea where the hell I’m going to go.24Kailani“Are you comfortable, honey?” My mom frets over the pillow propped beneath my ankle. “What can I get you? A cold drink? A snack?”
“I’m fine, Mama.” I offer her a weak smile.
She sits down beside me with a sigh. I’ve never seen her so worn down, and I can’t help feeling guilty about that even though it’s not my fault. The past four weeks since the incident have been a blur. For me, it was surgery. Pain management. Appointments with various specialists. Sessions with a therapist. Homework by correspondence. My mom did her best to make everything peaceful and calm, but I know behind the scenes, it’s been nothing but chaos.
The school has launched a full investigation, and Theo hired a private investigator too. The entire football team, cheer squad, and dance team were questioned with no results. Everyone except for Landon.
He never showed up at school after the headlines broke, and he’s been MIA ever since. My mom hasn’t said much about him, but I can see the worry in her eyes. When the police questioned me, all I could tell them was that it was a large male. It wasn’t much to go on, but I never even caught a glimpse of what he was wearing because it happened so fast.
They asked me a lot of questions about the guys at school, and particularly, Landon. I could see how they might think it was suspicious that he disappeared right after it happened, but there’s no way it could have been him. He would never do something like that. Just because I know it doesn’t mean everyone else is on the same page, though. The cops want to talk to him. And Courtney told me the rumors have been flying like crazy at BMA.
Nobody knows where Landon went, and nobody has spoken to him. At least not that the students are aware of, and if the faculty knows differently, they aren’t saying so. After the articles broke, he just… vanished. When I first saw that someone leaked a story about that night, my shriveled-up heart nearly fell out of my chest. Whoever it was claimed to be me, and I couldn’t help wondering if this was somehow connected to my missing tablet. Someone broke into the pool house. I know that now with certainty. When I was finally able to check it out after I got home from the hospital, I realized it wasn’t just the tablet missing. Someone had stolen my spy cam too.
I don’t know what’s more unnerving. The fact that they found the camera or the idea that they could gain access to my tablet and all the journal entries I’d kept since that first summer with Landon. All my obsessions were written in there. The creepy things I used to do, like sniffing Landon’s hoodie when he wasn’t looking, or smearing his deodorant on my skin. There are confessions of times I’d drink from his water glass when he went to the bathroom, just so my lips could touch the same place his had been. Long, meandering descriptions of his face and eyes and moody personality I could never quite decode. Embarrassing dreams I’d had about him that first summer. And then, eventually, the details of that night. If someone accessed my journal app, they’d have all that information. There’s no telling what they might do with it, and every morning, I find myself frantically googling to check that they haven’t shared that as well.
My mother waited until I was home from the hospital before she started interrogating me too. I couldn’t deny it now. As soon as she read the word tutor, she knew the unidentified girl at the party was me. She’s asked me multiple times if that’s why I left, but I haven’t been able to answer her. When she asked me if there was something she should know about Landon, I was emphatic that there wasn’t. I don’t want her to get the wrong idea. Not after I screwed things up so bad in the first place.
She asked me once if I leaked the story, and it horrified me that anyone might think that. I told her about the tablet and camera situation, and she made an appointment the next afternoon to have security installed. None of us can believe it’s come to this. Black Mountain is supposed to be safe. My mom isn’t the sort of person to lock up her house, but now, I guess she has to be.
