Truly Devious (Truly Devious #1) - Maureen Johnson Page 0,66
some poles. “Hayes is never around to do the dishes.”
Maris shifted around, and for the first time, Stevie saw a first year like herself, someone who’d fallen for someone fast and was rapidly realizing things were not equal on both sides.
On their return home that evening, Nate went right to his room. Stevie decided to sit in the hammock chair in the common room and wait for Hayes to return. She could not fully explain why she did this. Maybe it was irritation. Maybe it had something to do with the tunnel. Had Hayes gone back there? Why had he turned like that and gone off on his own so deliberately?
Whatever the case, the hammock chair was a good place to sit and watch some episodes of Stormy Weather. She had earned them. The hours passed. Nine became ten, which was when Janelle returned, her face flushed.
“Hey,” she said, dropping to the floor by Stevie’s feet with a wide grin. “I was just doing some work with Vi. I saw you brought my poles back.”
“I’ll always have your pole,” Stevie said. “And working with Vi?”
“Studying,” said Janelle. “In the yurt.”
“Yurt studying?”
Janelle smacked Stevie’s shins playfully with the cord of her headphones.
“I’ll get my stuff,” Janelle said. “I’ll sit with you.”
Ten became ten thirty. Curfew was eleven, and there was no Hayes yet. Stevie began to think more about the tunnel. Hayes had clearly been in it before. Was it stable? It had been packed with dirt for many decades. It had been through all kinds of weather. It was locked. There were cracks. What if he’d gone down alone? What if it had gone down on his head?
No. Hayes was just being Hayes.
He wasn’t with Maris, though. Maybe he was with Gretchen?
It didn’t matter where he was. So why was she so anxious?
Because she had anxiety.
Pix also moved into the common room wearing a flowing pair of cotton pants and a black tank top showing off her muscular arms as she knitted away and watched a documentary on her computer. Ellie and David floated in at just before eleven, both grinning. They dropped onto the sofa together.
“So,” David said to Stevie, “exciting Saturday night?”
“What’s the matter?” Ellie said. “You look kind of freaked out.”
Before Stevie could reply, Pix pulled off her headphones and looked at the group.
“Anyone know where Hayes is?” she asked. “He’s about to be late.”
Everyone else replied in the negative. Stevie decided to look blank and ignore the question.
Pix pulled out her phone and started texting.
Stevie felt the electric zing of anxiety shoot down her arms. He would come in at any second. He was just being stupid. Don’t mention the tunnel. It would get everyone into trouble, probably, for no reason.
Eleven became eleven thirty.
“I hate calling Larry because people are late,” she said. “He’s not answering my texts. He didn’t tell anyone where he was?”
Stevie felt a vein beating in her forehead.
“Look,” Stevie said, “I don’t know where Hayes went—I don’t—but a couple nights ago? We went in the tunnel.”
David and Ellie jerked their heads up at this. Janelle had headphones on and did not hear.
“You need to be more specific,” Pix said. “There are a lot of tunnels.”
“The one under the sunken garden.”
“That one is filled in,” Pix said.
“Not anymore,” Stevie said. “It was fine, but . . . I don’t know. Maybe he went back there?”
“Are you kidding me?” Pix said. “Oh God.”
Ten minutes later, Larry was at the door of Minerva.
“Mark is already on his way to the tunnel,” he said to Pix. “Stevie, coat on. Come with me.”
A few minutes later, Stevie was out in the cold alongside Larry, their breath puffing out in front of them, their flashlights making long, dancing dots on the ground.
“I knew someone would try to get in there,” Larry said, gesturing for Stevie to get into the waiting golf cart. “I knew we should have welded it shut.”
Stevie wrapped her arms tight around herself as the cart rumbled down the path.
“At least you had the sense to tell us,” Larry said. “Jesus.”
“It was fine,” Stevie said, though her voice sounded small. “It seemed okay.”
“That thing isn’t sound,” Larry said. “It probably wasn’t sound when it was built and eighty years of burial couldn’t have helped. I told them to seal it. If he’s not in there, we’re going to go around to everywhere else you’ve been working, because I am going to find him and talk to him. Jesus, that tunnel . . .”