agree with this,” Kyle said and looked across at me. “This is a terrible idea.”
I didn’t respond. It wasn’t like I had much choice, and I did see the logic behind Deon’s reasoning. If Cherri was already this bad from losing Deon once, I was terrified of how she would be after losing him twice. “Hey, here’s a question for you,” I said. “You know my friend Brayden?”
“That mini-me jackass?” Deon said.
Kyle immediately opened his mouth as if he was going to yell at Deon, but I got my hand up just in time to stop him. “Yeah.” Kyle glared at me. I’d have to chisel out some time to ask him what his newfound protectiveness was all about. “Have you seen him by any chance?”
“Seen him?” Deon said. “No. Why?”
“We haven’t seen him all week. I don’t know that his absence has anything to do with Dad, but I just wanted to make sure. Can you keep an eye out? Let me know if you do happen to see him.”
“Yeah, of course.”
“Thanks.” I crossed my arms and leaned back in my seat, leaning my head against the rest. It was pounding, but I wanted to make sure I got all my questions for Deon out since I didn’t know when I’d hear from him again. “Uh, any leads on Dad, by the way?”
“I think I’m getting closer ever since you sent me that information, but—”
The call dropped.
“What happened?” Kyle asked.
I shook my head. “I don’t know. He’s never done that before.”
“Call him back.”
“I can’t. He calls from an unknown number so that he can’t be traced.” I picked up my phone from where I’d put it on the dashboard and stared at the screen, waiting for it to ring again, but nothing happened. “Shit.”
“Do you think something happened to him?” Kyle asked.
The truth was, I had no idea. “Maybe he just thought the guys tailing him were getting close or something, so he had to go.”
“Is that really what you think happened?” he asked.
My stomach was already twisting into knots considering the alternative. “I have to hope so.”
18
Nathan
It could have been that after staying up all night, Deon never called back, or it could have been that after hoping all weekend, Nikita never called, but when I woke up Monday morning, I felt like deep-fried garbage. My brain was slamming in my skull, my sinuses felt congested, I had chills all over, and my stomach was queasy. If that weren’t bad enough, when I walked into school at the beginning of the day, I saw a huge crowd of people all gathered around the front office. At first, I was terrified that maybe Cherri had gotten into another fight or something worse, but then I saw that everyone was huddled around a long piece of paper hanging on the wall, and it hit me like a collapsing building—final track grades.
Whether Postings Proper believed in peer pressure to make students perform well or liked humiliating the bottom of the pack, I wasn’t sure, but every year, they posted a huge list of all the senior students’ current grades and GPAs, dubbing these grades the final track. They were posted about a month before finals and gave all the seniors an idea of if they and their peers were on track to graduate from high school in a month’s time. Not surprisingly, I didn’t see any members of The Royal Court looking at the paper. Typically, they were in good standing with their grades, but because the last couple of months had brought us each our fair share of challenges, they were probably as afraid as I was about how that may have affected their grades.
Still, if anyone was going to be the brave one, it was going to be me, but not because I was the brave one. I was the one who most deserved to have to suck it up. I excused my way through the crowds of students until I was facing the paper, and naturally, my eyes skimmed the sheet for my own name first.
“How is it you have a GPA above 4.0?” one kid asked me just as my eyes landed on my 4.12 GPA.
Though I was certain many people thought I bought the extra points, nothing could be further from the truth. Not only did I always do all of my homework, score perfect or near-perfect on all of my tests, and actively participate in all of my classes, but I was also the kid