video again, he pocketed his phone.
“A friend?” Theo asked.
“Yeah.” Too casual. Too cool.
So, Theo figured, that was the guy. The upperclassman. Blond curls. Muscular—a big guy without any fat on him. And a sense of humor. Theo wondered if the upperclassman would think getting hit in the side of the head with a wrench was funny.
“Is your leg hurting you?” Auggie asked. “You’re making a face.”
“Not my leg,” Theo said.
“What?”
“I said I’m fine.”
They found Orlando in his room. His roommate, who had dark brown skin and huge eyes, was lying on his bed, listening to something on a pair of Beats. He waved once at Auggie and then turned his attention back to his phone. Orlando followed them over to Auggie’s. While Auggie unlocked the door, a pair of guys staggered past them. They reeked of weed and booze, and one of them was shouting that they were the pussy patrol.
“Nice crew,” Theo said as Auggie opened the door.
Auggie flushed and shrugged.
“You like it here?” Theo said, looking up and down the hall. “I forgot these places always smell like feet. Jesus, is that a communal bathroom?”
“It’s an experience, ok?” Auggie said. “Not everybody starts college when they’re thirty.”
“Wow. I was just asking.”
“Yeah, I like it.”
“Ok.”
“Ok.”
“Ok.”
“Ok!” Auggie snapped.
“Ok,” Orlando said. “Maybe we should go in the room?”
“That’s what I wanted to do, but Auggie had to throw a temper tantrum.”
Auggie threw the door open hard enough that it bounced back from the wall. He caught it and threw it open again as he marched into the room. Orlando sighed, catching the door on its second rebound, and Theo followed him into the room.
“I don’t have a roommate,” Auggie said when the door shut. “Is that ok with you?”
“Ok, I’ll keep my mouth shut.”
“And I haven’t washed my sheets this week. I know that’s a problem, so I’ll wash them tomorrow.”
Theo shook his head and stared out the window.
“Anything else I missed? Oh, I didn’t pick up my shoes. Sorry, Dad.”
“Augs, just chill,” Orlando said.
“I am chill,” Auggie said. “I’m perfectly fucking chill.”
“Let’s do this and get it over with before I catch a fungal infection,” Theo said. The room looked out on the south edge of Wroxall’s campus, and he was watching a guy with a hula hoop try to impress a girl. That’s how it was supposed to be. You did stupid, dumb shit, and somebody else found it cute, and that was the end of it. You weren’t supposed to innocently ask one question and get your head chewed off.
“Do you hear that?” Auggie said to Orlando.
“Oh my God,” Orlando said. “Look, what do you guys want?”
“We’re taking the case,” Auggie said.
“You are? That’s amazing. Ok, I’ll tell my parents.”
Auggie explained the information that Cart had relayed, and he managed to leave Cart’s name out of it. When he’d finished, he said, “Does anything come to mind? Anything about Cal? Anything about who he might have been waiting for, what he might have been doing that night?”
“I knew he was murdered,” Orlando said. He was crying, wiping his cheeks without seeming to realize it. “I knew it. Nobody else thought he was in trouble, but I knew.”
“The next step is to find who did it, Orlando. Come on, think.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. I mean, sometimes he was barefoot. I can imagine him running to the mailbox barefoot, especially on a warm day. Or if he was waiting outside but he wasn’t planning on going anywhere, sure.”
“Who would he have been waiting for?” Auggie said.
“I don’t know. His guy. Like, his dealer.”
“But who else could it have been?” Auggie said.
“You’re running him into the ground,” Theo said. “Ask the right question.”
Theo went back to looking out the window, watching hula-hoop guy, but he didn’t miss the way Auggie flushed, and he didn’t miss the way Auggie had to pull himself together the instant before he lost control.
“I don’t know what the right question is,” Auggie said. “If I knew, I’d ask.”
“The right question is who had a reason to want Cal dead.”
In the silence that followed, Theo could hear the pussy patrol making their rounds again. It sounded like they’d gotten some new recruits. Somebody was laughing uncontrollably. Acid, maybe. Tripping.
“Nobody,” Orlando said.
“You know that can’t be true,” Auggie said. “Theo’s right, even though he’s being a dick about it. That’s what we have to think about: who would have wanted him dead?”
“But honestly, nobody. Cal was the sweetest. He was—” Orlando’s face threatened to crumple.