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We all crowded into the back four rows of the bus so we could hear each other talk. Kira made sure I didn’t get anywhere near Rick. She told “our” story about how we’d attempted to change our appearance in the alley of the café. She wanted me to look as foolish as possible for thinking we needed to. (If only she knew.) Rick nudged Alex and I felt the inevitable tingles he always gave me.
Why did he have to be so beautiful? I know people use the word beautiful to describe girls, but Alex McGinnis truly was beautiful. I’d look into his intense brown eyes and be overwhelmed. He smiled easily, showing a perfect set of teeth. His deep brown hair had just the right amount of curl and his tall, tan, muscular body made me forget what I was doing. Charisma emanated from his every pore, drawing, not only me, but everyone in. He had this contagious spark of life that lit up a room as he entered. I wanted to be a part of that life.
“Hey, come over here a minute,” Rick said to Alex, pointing to an empty row in front of us.
“Sure, whatever,” Alex said, squeezing past Kira and down the aisle.
My face flushed as he passed me. I loved to watch him talk, there was something so soothing about his voice. I thought about him having the presence of mind to take pictures of the murder. He had a cool head in scary situations. Hadn’t it affected him at all seeing that blood? I had had to really concentrate to even pretend to be calm.
Rick gave me a smile and a nod before he left. I was sure he was filling Alex in on our “visitor” at Georgetown University and the café—and telling him the whole story—the story only the three of us would now know.
I watched them, trying to see Alex’s reaction, but they were bent down low in the seat. I sort of listened to Kira and nodded or said ‘yeah’ when needed. Alex did raise his head and look my way several times, eyes wide. The butterflies in my stomach went wild. I wished I was a part of their conversation, but I knew that if I were up there too, it would attract too much attention, and others would want to know what was going on. Especially Kira.
After what seemed a long time, Alex, with his head hanging, slightly shaking side to side, took his seat with the group again, and Rick did the same. Summer had just finished her story about their uneventful taxi ride to the Mall and what the four of them had seen there.
I felt Alex staring at me and worked hard not to look at him. I had a hard time standing still. He’d never really looked at me before.
“I’m sure we’re in the clear now. No one could’ve tracked us back to the hotel,” Josh said.
Summer nodded in agreement. “I’m sure we had nothing to worry about from the start.”
“We can’t think like that,” Alex said, looking away from me and giving Rick a knowing glance. “No offense, but you didn’t see what we saw, Summer. These are really bad guys. We have to assume they could figure out who we are and are wondering if we saw anything we shouldn’t have. The good news is that they must think we didn’t see anything—otherwise, we most likely wouldn’t be alive.”
Someone took a sharp intake of air.
If only they knew.
“We need to act as normal as possible and never discuss it outside of this bus. It’s too loud in here for anyone to hear anything even if they tried to listen. We won’t give them any reason to suspect we saw what we did. Are we all in agreement?”
I got goose bumps all over.
People nodded. My body went cold. I didn’t know if I could commit to it. Maybe I needed to tell. Maybe for the dead man’s sake? Or maybe just out of common decency? I felt guilt coming over me even though I was sure I hadn’t done anything wrong.
“Guys, we can’t make that promise,” Eugene said. “We’ve got to go to the authorities. We witnessed a crime and we have to report it. It’s the law.” Leave it to Eugene to lay down the law. He pressed his glasses hard against his nose as everyone stared at him.
I let out a deep breath of relief—glad I hadn’t been the one who spoke up first.
At home, I would have been eager to debate whether to tell or not to tell, but here, I didn’t want anyone to know I was “smart” or really cared. It had become apparent to me that there were many reasons to use your smarts, but making friends was not one of them.
All my smarts at home had given me was a miserable social existence. It hadn’t bothered me to be alone with my books, projects and research until social dance class (way out of my comfort zone, by the way) had started second semester. There had been nothing more rewarding to me than perfect scores and winning competitions, but school had gotten old and frankly, easy. Social dance was my way to break free of the monotony.
The first day of class, everyone but three of us had partners. The other two without partners were boys. Instead of choosing me, a girl, the two guys decided to be partners, and I was alone. Everyone had laughed. The sting of that moment still burned when I thought of it. From that moment on, I had seen, really seen, every rejection, every mean comment, every mean action—I truly was a social outcast. Why hadn’t I seen that teachers and adults were my only friends before that day?
I was determined, however, to change people’s perceptions of me. I watched the cool kids and tried to do as they did and say the things they said. Nothing changed. If anything, I was mocked even more for trying to be someone “I wasn’t”. For the first time in my life, depressed and alone, I tried to soften the blow by telling myself that I couldn’t just decide to be someone different one day and expect everyone around me to forget what I’d said, done and been the last fifteen years and accept the new me immediately. It occurred to me that it must not be in our nature to do so—especially in a small town. I didn’t want to believe that it was impossible to escape, though, and this trip gave me hope. I had friends here. I could change things.
To my surprise, no one immediately objected to Eugene. In fact, silence hung in the air for several minutes. Heads bowed, fingers fidgeted, and the sound of bodies shifting on vinyl seats grew louder.
I had to assume everyone felt what I felt, and I couldn’t stop myself from blurting out, “I agree.” Everyone’s eyes turned to me. I was the one shifting in my seat now, the vinyl protesting loudly. Besides, if they knew, really knew we were being followed, they’d want the police involved, too.
“I didn’t see anything,” Summer said. “And Josh only peeked for a second. We don’t need to report anything. Right, Josh?”
“Right,” he said. His face had returned to the sickly white it held in the hotel bathroom after he had looked down on the bloody scene.
“We were all there,” Eugene said. “We all need to go in. I mean, some guy is dead. Let the authorities decide what to do after that.”
I could feel the tension in the group pressing down on me, and I wondered how I would make it through this, too. The fact that we were being followed was pressure enough.
“Who would we tell?” Josh raved. “The police? Ha! They’d never believe us. We have no proof. That body is long gone, and if I’m not mistaken, burning someone at a high enough temperature leaves no evidence behind.”
“We have pictures,” Eugene said, looking hopefully at Alex.
“You mean the ones on my toilet phone?” Alex asked. His stare could have sliced Eugene in half. Eugene appeared not to notice.
“Maybe someone with a high-tech machine can still get something off your phone. You know, like they do on CSI?” Summer suggested.
“That’s a stupid TV show,” Alex retorted. “It’s all fake.”
“We wouldn’t go to the police anyway,” Eugene pointed out. “It’s the FBI we need.”
“FBI?” Josh said. “Crap! Crap! Just leave me out of it. Please!”
I wondered if Josh had something to hide or if he was just too afraid.
“How do we even find an FBI office?” Rick asked.
“Every state has field offices,” Eugene said. “But the big kahuna FBI building is not far from our hotel.”
My body stiffened.
“Don’t you think they could be wa
tching for us at the FBI building?” Alex asked. “We could be walking right into their hands and proving we saw something. Let’s just forget we saw anything.”
Again, I couldn’t stop myself. “What about Jonathan?”
“Jonathan?” Rick asked, frowning.
“You know,” Eugene said, “the guy who lost his head in the ballroom.” The way he said it was so glib that everyone squinted and wrinkled their foreheads at him.
“Sick!” Summer said.
“How do you know his name?” Rick asked me, his tone softer now.
“The white guy whose head didn’t get chopped off,” Eugene answered before I could, “called out his name several times while looking at him. ‘No Jonathan, no.’ He said it several times.”
Just the facts to Eugene.
“Ughh!”
“Look guys,” I said. “I know it seems crazy to tell, but I just can’t let it go. Maybe the Feds can catch these guys.” I couldn’t stop myself from talking. “They said something about a bill passing Congress or the Senate or something and Marybeth said the guy in that ballroom, who’s still alive, is her state senator. Maybe we can find out which bill it is they’re trying to get passed and stop it. It must really be important to those creeps, and that can’t be good. It’ll probably cause something terrible to happen to this country. I couldn’t live with myself if that happened. Look at Marybeth. She needs some serious help. I could go on my own, but at least Marybeth needs to go with me.”
Everyone looked at the back of Marybeth’s head. She hadn’t moved. Despite the roar of the bus, a silence fell over us that seemed to last an eternity.
“We really should tell someone what we saw,” Rick said, quickly becoming my hero in all this. “Wouldn’t you want to know if your son or brother or friend was murdered? It would be awful to be left to wonder forever what happened to him. Christy’s right. We owe it to the people in Jonathan’s life, as well as to our own country.” Then he leaned into me and whispered, “Besides, they don’t know about Iceman.” He raised his eyebrows and then turned to listen to Alex. I wanted to tell him I saw Iceman again, but I let the chance pass.
“This is why I hate politics and politicians,” Alex said, adding a few colorful swear words. “Things like this happen all the time in politics. Behind those trustworthy looking faces are lies, death, hatred and more lies. We should tell someone just so that we can blow the lid off this thing, whatever it is. They’ll be exposed and maybe we’ll have made a tiny difference in politics in America. This trip might turn into something of value after all.”
He paused for a moment. “The real question is, how do we tell and not get caught by the bad guys?”
Several minutes more of silence passed. I wanted to yell out that we were already caught, but knew it would only create panic.
“Well, we’re on a tour,” Eugene finally offered.
“Maybe we could tour the FBI building.”
“Isn’t the FBI building already on our itinerary?” Alex asked. No one seemed to know and I wasn’t about to tell them I knew it wasn’t, so Alex stood and walked past all the other students and chaperones, to the front of the bus, where Mrs. J sat.
We watched her shake her head at Alex. Then they talked for a couple of minutes more and both started nodding. He came back, his look triumphant.
“We may have just changed our itinerary to include the FBI building tomorrow,” he said smugly.
“How did you do that?” Eugene asked. “Do you always get what you want?” A look of awe crossed his face.
“Yes,” Alex answered, his smile mischievous. “Now, there’s no guarantee that we will get to tour it, but Mrs. J is pretty resourceful, so I’m betting on her. We should probably all write down what we saw from that hotel bathroom last night. We could just hand what we write to someone in the FBI building when we go. And if we don’t get in, we could always mail it. Then this thing will be over. I don’t think we should try and figure out what’s going on though. We’ll leave it to the FBI to figure that out.”
I wanted to clap for him, the man with all the answers.
Everyone agreed to write a statement about what they had seen in the ballroom before going to bed. I usually liked to write, but what I had to write about would be painful and scary. The fact that it could impact so many lives beyond my own, made me even more afraid.
I felt a bit sick.
Arlington cemetery took on a whole new meaning. I couldn’t help but think about dying—getting my head chopped off—to be more exact, and being buried there. And yet, the graves of the soldiers also made me grateful to them for giving their lives for me and this country. It made me think of all eight of us dying a slow painful death at the hands of the bad guys. I was freaked, but hid it from everyone. With everyone’s silence, an eerie feeling wandered amid the graves. I felt totally unprotected even though it was midday. With the rows and rows of death all around us, I almost suffocated.
We all gawked at the slightly different shade of white brick on the section of newly restored Pentagon exterior as we drove to it—a stark reminder that terrorists had succeeded in causing total chaos on American soil in the not-so-distant-past. Once inside, it offered a slightly lighter feeling, but I would never look at life the same way again. The Pentagon seemed so much more important after last night. I forced myself to listen to the tour guide, but occasionally found myself back in the café looking into Iceman’s cold, blue eyes. I itched to get to a computer and research how secure we really were in America. I had never felt unsafe back home. D.C. held a different story. Did the Pentagon even have a clue about these men? I searched the archives in my brain for all information on the Pentagon. Pages of history books sorted themselves in my mind. But very little on the Pentagon showed up. The pages mentioned the building and its design as well as its general purpose, but nothing to ease my mind.
A low rumble sounded in my gut and I was almost hyper-aware of what happened around me. The eight of us hadn’t gone far from each other at Arlington Cemetery, but here at the Pentagon, more space separated us from each other. It felt good to leave.
Dinner tasted like cardboard, and I found it hard to interact with everyone. I kept to myself as much as possible, looking for an opportunity to tell Rick about Iceman. Truly, I wanted to tell Alex, but my fear, or maybe awe, prevented it.
After dinner, everyone, except Marybeth, crowded into Alex’s room to type on laptops. His single room was larger than the double room Marybeth and I shared. Luckily, four in our group had brought laptops from home because they thought they would need them the second half of the trip. Music blared, making it hard to focus. I tried to detach myself from what had happened. I kept having to stop typing while I let the vivid pictures of the murder play across my mind. After typing the last word, I’d had enough. I never wanted to re-visit the ballroom again. I would push the memory into a far corner in my mind and keep it there. I had told and that had to be enough. I slipped out the door after handing Eugene’s computer back to him.
“Hey, Christy!”
Did Alex just call me? No. Keep walking. It’s just my imagination.
“Christy!” he said, gently grabbing my arm.
I turned slowly, feeling my insides buzz.
“This guy you saw…you really did see him, right?”
“Yeah.” I could feel my cheeks burning. This was my chance to tell him I’d seen Iceman again. But I couldn’t get my mouth to tell him.
“Freaky. Let me know if you see him again. Okay?”
“Uh huh.” I grunted. I stood there staring into his deep brown eyes, unable to turn and walk away.
“Okay,” he said again, grinning.
Move, Christy. Move! I screamed at myself—but I couldn’t. If you can’t tell him about Iceman, get out of here. He chuckled, probably used to this reaction, and then turned to go back into his room. I just stood there, watching him walk away. Then he turned and looked at me when he opened the door to go in. He paused and grinned again, b
efore going inside. He probably thought I was an idiot for still standing there. I did too, especially knowing that the door had been shut behind him for several minutes before I could turn and head for my room.
He had talked to me. Really talked to me. Sure, I was totally embarrassed at my reaction to him, but at the same time, so excited that he had talked to me. Having had almost no sleep in the laundry room of that other hotel caught up to me, and I desperately wanted to get some sleep. Tomorrow was another day. A day that Alex could choose to talk to me again. And yes, I’d tell Rick about Iceman tomorrow. My neck killed me, and I could feel a horrible headache coming on. The room was pitch black, and I could hear Marybeth’s even breathing. Thankfully, sleep came quickly.
At seven, the dreaded wake-up call shocked me out of a fitful night’s sleep. I’d never had a hard time getting out of bed and always beat my alarm clock at home; but that morning, making my legs slide out of bed was hard. I was beat—like I’d been running all night long.
The curtains on the sliding glass door to our tiny balcony stood open about three inches, letting in the bright sunlight. In a flash, I covered my eyes. A headache came on full bore. I had a lot of headaches, so I always came prepared with prescription meds, but chose to take ibuprofen instead. Heading for the sink in the bathroom to get a drink, I passed Marybeth, who was still in bed sleeping. I thought about nudging her awake, but thought she could probably benefit from a few extra minutes sleep.
A lot of the tension in my neck, that I was sure triggered my headache, started to dissolve once I climbed into the warm shower. The water felt so good flowing over my head and body, I didn’t want to get out and simply stood under the delicious, hot stream of water until all the stiffness disappeared.
Coming out of the bathroom, I noticed Marybeth was gone.
Even though the curtains lit up the room a bit, I quickly turned on the lights to have a closer look. Definitely not there. I opened the door to the hallway and looked out, but couldn’t see her anywhere. I couldn’t leave the room to look for her in my towel, so I headed for my tiny closet to get some clothes. Her bed was made. Had she gone down to breakfast without me? I’d just taken too long in the shower. I’m sure she was safe. Maybe she was back to her old self! I couldn’t wait to talk to her.
Sliding into my most comfortable jeans and a light blue T-shirt, that I had spent a full four months of my allowance on, felt sweet. I hoped Marybeth would approve. I stared at myself for several minutes, wishing Marybeth stood next to me to help me and say, “Perfect”. Returning to the bathroom to brush my hair, I heard a faint voice. I stopped and totally still, focused all my attention on the voice. My heart stuttered and fear crept up my spine. Was someone in the room, watching, waiting for the right moment to grab me? Had they already taken Marybeth?
I looked toward the room. No one could be in there. I was just in there, for heaven’s sake. I tried to zero in on the sound, but the drumming beat in my ears made it difficult. Despite the fact that I had already ruled out the possibility that she hid under the bed, I scanned under it again. No Marybeth.
Still hearing the voice, I moved toward the fluttering curtains. Faint, but louder now, the voice sounded like it came from outside, so I peeked around the balcony curtains and saw her. Despite myself, I jumped slightly at the sight of her. Marybeth sat alone on the floor of the balcony, her back facing me, sobbing. My heart dropped. I reached to pull the window open and join her, when I noticed a phone in her hand. Wait. She didn’t own a phone. Did she? She hadn’t been on it twenty-four-seven, like the others—texting away. I leaned back into the room and put my ear up to the crack in the sliding door.
“Yes. Yes,” Marybeth whimpered, but the sobs made it difficult to understand her. “I-I-I will try h-h-harder. I-I-I just miss you so much. I love you, too.” She breathed in deeply and then cried all the louder.
Apparently, I wasn’t as alone as I’d thought. I wanted to reach out to her and cry with her. We were all alone in our pain, and she had found a way to release some of hers.
Guilt swept over me for making her look down into the ballroom. I caused this pain. She saw the murder because I made her. My heart ached. Friends made me feel more deeply than I’d ever felt. The horrible hurt I’d felt from the rejection of my peers in Helena was nothing compared to this.
It had been two days since a single word had come out of her mouth, and I was glad to hear her voice, even cracked up and sobbing. I reached for the window again, but hesitated at the last moment and pulled my hand back. I had to allow her to have her own private moment. To intrude seemed like the wrong thing to do. We’d been through a lot, and to keep it all bottled up, for someone like Marybeth, must have been incredibly difficult. Besides, I certainly didn’t want to send her back into silence.
I decided to wait for her. My first real friend. She didn’t want anything from me either. No answers, no help, nothing. She only wanted to help me. She wasn’t on the phone anymore, and I was sure she would come in any minute. Maybe I could give her a hug. But, fifteen minutes later, she still sobbed on the balcony. Breakfast would pass us by and Mrs. J. would freak if we didn’t get downstairs soon, so I came up with a plan.
I slammed the door to the bathroom and started talking loudly. “Marybeth? Are you already gone? That’s weird. She always waits for me,” I pretended to talk to myself. “Oh man. No wonder she left. We only have ten minutes till breakfast is over.”
I had grabbed a ponytail holder. “Sorry, Marybeth,” I mumbled, looking at the holder, wishing I felt confident using Marybeth’s flat iron by myself. I grabbed my bag and headed out, slamming the door behind me. I hoped she would hear and follow.
She did. Five minutes later, with a swollen, red face, Marybeth sat next to me, a bagel in her hand. Amazingly, she looked perfect, despite her swollen face.
“Morning Marybeth,” I said, hoping she would respond.
“Good morning,” she said, staring at my hair, raising her eyebrows.
I bit my lip and gave her a weak smile, pretending not to notice her tear stained face.
I reached back and touched my ponytail and said, “Sorry, you were gone, and I wasn’t sure if I should use your flat iron without you.”
She giggled. “You’re so funny. Of course you can. You should have. If only we had the time…” She looked at the door just as Mrs. J. walked in.
I thought about Marybeth’s call, the privacy of it. I mean, of course, it was private, in the sense that she didn’t want anyone to know, but also private in the sense that she needed a moment with people she loved and that loved her.
I wished I had someone like that in my life. Maybe Kira and Marybeth would become that way to me. I took a deep breath and genuinely smiled this time, all to myself.
I guess it could have been her parents that she called. It hadn’t even occurred to me to call my parents—which is pretty darn weird. Even in real danger I hadn’t even thought to call them. My parents didn’t pay much attention to me. They didn’t have to. I wasn’t like some of my brothers and sisters. I always did what I was told, which made me sort of invisible to them. Kira’s parents made her call each night at eight sharp to check in. My mom had simply said, “See ya in two weeks. Learn a lot.” Not speaking to me for two weeks wouldn’t be much different than what normally happened at home. I wondered how many of the others had thought about telling their parents and wished they could. How many of them had called their parents and had their own private moment? I searched all of my group’s faces.
Josh’s square face was mostly hidden behind his large hands shoveling food into his mouth. Surely, he had no intention of mentioning the murder to his parents. It would make him look like a coward.
Alex ate just like I expected someone so beautiful to eat; no shoveling or disgusting noises. I paused for a few seconds to admire his perfect nose and face. I couldn’t think of anyone who had a more handsome face. I looked a second too long, and he looked up to catch me staring at him.
Alex glanced up and our eyes met for second or so. He didn’t turn away and there was a slight smile on his face. His eyes were playful, not hard and mean. I felt my face burn and turned away again. I didn’t want him to see my lobster-red face.
“Okay you guys, listen up!” Mrs. J. barked. “We have a slight change in our plans today. My mini-group wanted to get a peek inside the FBI building. As you know, since 9/11, it has been closed to almost all tours. Fortunately, I have connections, and we have an appointment at eight-thirty this morning for a very brief tour. It may not be what you were hoping for, but it’s better than nothing. I can only take fifteen of you. That means seven of you, that aren’t in my mini-group, can join us. The rest of you will have one hour of free time at The National Mall with the other chaperones. Any questions? Okay, let’s load up.”
I heard only a few groans. As I stood up, I felt the back of my head to see if I could find what had hit me earlier. I still couldn’t find anything. I looked down at the floor and couldn’t see anything unusual around me. I felt stupid. Only social things ever made me feel like this. I hated not having control.
“We’re in business now,” I heard Alex say to Rick as he passed him. “I can’t wait for this to be over.”
I kept my head down, sure he’d hit me with something. The question was, had he done it to make fun of me or did he simply want my attention? I shook my head. How stupid was I to think Alex would like me?
CHAPTER FIVE