Midnight on Strange Street, page 6
A troubled look passed over Mrs. Gil’s face. “What on earth do they have you doing here? Does it have to do with that new Citizen Force law they passed last week?”
Nando’s work was classified, but their mother never missed a chance to try to trick out an answer from her son. Usually, Nando laughed the questions off, but tonight he stiffened, a hardness entering his brown eyes.
“I’m not at liberty to discuss,” he said in a clipped tone.
Lola looked worriedly between Nando and her mother. “Well,” she said, “that doesn’t matter. What matters is you’re here. I got new sliders, and Bastian and I have learned lots of skating tricks since last time. We’ll have to show you tomorrow, okay?”
“I’d like that, Lols,” said Nando, whose expression had turned kind again. “I might be tied up tomorrow, but I promise I’ll watch before I go, okay?”
Lola nodded, still shiny-eyed. Bastian felt shiny-eyed, too. Maybe pink lemonade wouldn’t make things right, but Nando? He could do anything.
A tinny beeping sound filled the room, and Nando looked at his digiwatch. Then he got to his feet, saying, “I’ve got a work call in half an hour. I should probably head upstairs and set up my things.”
Bastian had been quiet this whole time, but now he saw his chance to really talk to Nando. He followed him upstairs, and when Nando reached the second-floor landing, he motioned for Bastian to sit. The brothers settled side by side on the top step, Nando resting his green briefcase against the banister.
“So,” said Nando, “how’re you holding up?”
Instantly, Bastian thought of the cafeteria, chaotic and covered in food. He thought of Dani falling from the oak tree, terror in her eyes. With effort, he shook the memories out.
“Great,” he said. “I’m great.”
“Still remember what I told you?”
Bastian nodded. “‘The door is always open.’”
Only after he’d spoken the words did their meaning sink in. If the door really was open, was Bastian walking through it? He was worried. He was confused. He was different. But Nando didn’t seem to see the guilt inside of him.
“That’s my man,” he said, clapping Bastian on the back.
So much for open doors.
There was, at least, one thing Bastian could still be honest about.
“I know you’re busy,” he said to Nando, “but maybe you could look at my art projects? I’m trying some new approaches, and…well, I don’t know if they’re any good.”
Nando’s digiwatch let out another round of insistent beeps. He looked down, reading a message that scrolled across the watch face, and then gave Bastian a distracted smile. “Sure thing, Bash. Not tonight, but sometime soon, okay?”
Nando got to his feet, picked up his briefcase, and was off, heading down the hallway.
The door is always open.
Bastian repeated the words to himself that night, as he lay awake in bed. The trouble, he thought, was that even though the door was open, he wasn’t sure he wanted to walk through it. He wasn’t sure he could be honest with Nando anymore.
These days, he had too many secrets to keep.
At Avery’s. Back by dinner.
Dani left the note for her parents on the refrigerator digipad.
It was a lie, of course.
Dani had stood in Avery’s backyard, same as she had the Gils’, and waved the Sardines’ emergency flag. Then, figuring that this situation was exactly what her newfound powers were good for, she added a telepathic shout for Avery’s attention. But there had been no response. Maybe that was because the other Sardines had parents at home—parents who were keeping them locked away. Not Dr. and Mr. Hirsch, though.
It was funny, Dani thought. Her parents cared a whole lot about what she did, from the food she ate to the sports she played. But when it came to the mysterious cafeteria explosion, Dr. Hirsch had treated it like any other school event. She’d picked up Dani at Taft Middle and sped to Cedar Lane, talking all the while about how she simply had to make it back to her office for her two-thirty appointment. Then she’d dropped off Dani without so much as a “Stay safe,” and screeched down the cul-de-sac, leaving her only daughter all alone in an empty house.
“It’s fine, though,” Dani said aloud as she washed her face free of a chocolate stain and then plucked a mysterious bit of meat from her hair. “It’s better this way. Even if the others can’t come, that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t go.”
Because Dani Hirsch had a plan.
She left her house, glowboard in hand, by way of the back door. Then she paused on the porch and looked around, making sure no one was watching.
The first time Dani had done it, the day of her twelfth birthday, she hadn’t even been thinking. She’d run outside, and the door had slammed after her. She’d explained it away as a gust of wind, but then it kept happening. Doors continued to shut behind Dani, without her so much as touching them.
It had taken Dani time to realize and believe. It had taken practice, too. But now she could do it on purpose. Now she could focus the bright blue flame inside toward the back door.
Shut, she commanded.
And slam.
The door closed and locked itself tight.
Dani crossed through the backyards of her other neighbors—the Arnolds, Lopezes, and Clarks. Only once she’d reached their end did she emerge onto Birch Street and click on her board. It sputtered, coughing out orange glow, then powered down. It had been doing a lot of that lately.
“Come on,” Dani said coaxingly, running her hands down its sides. “You can’t die on me now. Not until after the big race. Got it?”
She flipped the power switch again. The board rumbled, coughing out still more glow, but this time it maintained a gentle hum. Dani dropped it to the ground, where it hovered inches above the asphalt road.
“Thanks, pal,” she said, mounting.
Then she was off, swishing around corners, hovering at intersections, and, above all, trying to stay inconspicuous—her beanie tugged low over her eyes, no showy glowstream behind her.
“It was me,” Lola had whispered as they’d been shuffled out of the cafeteria by teacher aides. “I don’t know how, I didn’t mean it.”
And then the adults had shouted for everyone to stop talking and file out silently.
Lola had caused the explosion; that’s all Dani knew. Now she was determined to find out more.
Dani was going back to school.
The fire trucks were gone from Taft Middle, but some cop cars remained. Their silent lights whirled, flashing bright blue and red against the school’s brick facade. Dani slowed and then cut off her board, hiding herself behind a thick-trunked tree across the road. There was yellow tape strung in front of the school’s entrance, and two men in suits were talking by the front doors.
Then Dani noticed them.
There were a half-dozen figures on the school lawn, dressed in sleek silver jumpsuits that zipped up to the chin. Their faces were obscured by the dark visors of their metal helmets, and their hands were fitted with gloves. Not a single inch of skin was visible; in fact, the figures looked more like machines—heartless, faceless machines—than humans. They were gathered on the lawn in a precise formation of parallel rows, treading the ground with heavy boots and carrying long metal objects shaped like batons.
Dani recognized them; they looked like the figures she’d seen in textbook photographs of Callaway from fifty years ago, when Mitchell Jensen’s grandfather had first discovered the glow and the government had sent inspectors to investigate.
The inspectors from those photographs—that’s who these figures reminded Dani of now. They gave her the creeps. Their uniforms were slightly different, updated, but the metal instruments they were using, sweeping back and forth in slow arcs over the lawn—Dani knew what they were: glow detectors.
Is that what these suits were trying to detect? Glow, on Taft Middle property? Or were they searching for something else? Someone else?
Dani shoved her glowboard into her backpack. Then, noting one deserted corner of the school lawn, she emerged from behind the tree. She crossed the street as nonchalantly as she could and edged along the lawn. Then, in one go, she sprinted up the hill and hid herself in the juniper bushes by the school’s front entrance, near the two men standing there, dressed in regular business suits. They were talking to each other. She crept closer, but then felt resistance. Her backpack strap had caught on a branch. Quietly, quietly, Dani freed the strap and crept closer.
“…reinforcements,” said one of the men. “The local force isn’t trained for this.”
“They’ll be here soon enough,” said the other. “O’Brien says they’re flying a team in tonight to handle the survey data. It’ll be in federal hands from here on out. Well, and his hands, of course.”
The first man put a cigarette to his mouth and lit it. Dani made a face and covered her nose.
“Think it’s possible?” the man said around his smoke. “That we’ve got what they’ve got?”
“Wishful thinking, maybe. But if so, couldn’t have come a moment too soon. No doubt they’re already training theirs for combat. Wouldn’t surprise me if—”
The school doors flew open. Dani ducked as a woman’s voice boomed out, “Get in, both of you. He needs your signatures.”
Dani sucked in a breath and heard a rapid series of sounds: the stamping out of a cigarette, footsteps into the school, and the slam of doors behind the government workers. Even after the sounds had faded, she remained where she was, crouched and unbreathing. At last, she exhaled and cautiously stood. There was no one left at the entrance guarding the taped-off doors. She could risk it, try to sneak in. But she had to be sure the area was completely clear. Dani turned to survey the yard…
…and found herself face-to-face with Mitchell Jensen.
“AAAH!” she shrieked, and ducked for cover once more.
Mitchell stood over her, venom in his blue eyes. There was someone by his side: Zander Poxleitner. Dani cast them both the dirtiest look she kept in her dirty look arsenal.
“What’re you doing here, freak?”
Freak. It was Mitchell’s usual put-down, but today it pained a tender spot inside Dani.
“Could ask you the same thing,” she said, rising to Mitchell’s eye level—though actually, above it. How had Dani not noticed before? She was taller than Mitchell Jensen. The revelation filled her with confidence, and she shoved her fists on her hips, staring him down.
“Don’t play all innocent, Hirsch.” Mitchell stepped so close that Dani could see the spittle on his lips. “I was there, in the caf. I know one of you freaks did it. I know it.”
“Wow.” Dani snorted. “That’s some imagination you got. Didn’t you hear? It was probably an enemy sympathizer.”
“That’s crap, and you know it.” Then Mitchell’s hands were on her shoulders, shoving Dani with force. She stumbled and fell, sprawling back into the juniper bushes.
“Hey, man, lay off!” a voice said. “Save it for the track.”
Mitchell turned on Zander, red in the face. “Excuse me?”
“I said, save it for the track,” Zander repeated. “This isn’t the place to fight.”
Dani struggled in the bushes, watching Mitchell elbow past Zander and walk off toward the street. Then Zander was kneeling beside her, offering his hand.
Was he crazy? Dani glared, righting herself awkwardly on her own.
“You’re not the good guy, you know,” she spat when she was back on her feet, her blue flame burning stronger than ever.
Zander backed away. “I didn’t say I was.”
“And I don’t need you to fight for me. I’m fine on my own.”
“Yeah, I know that. I…” Zander’s voice turned to little more than a whisper. “I know you, Dani. Even if you won’t, like, look at me in school.”
There was another sensation in Dani’s gut, strange and unwanted, that had nothing to do with the usual flame.
“You’re the one who’s a traitor!” She folded her arms like she could hide behind them. “You moved away from Cedar Lane, and you never gave us an explanation. Why? Because you wanted to live in a cooler part of town? Probably Mitchell’s neighborhood, right? We were a team, and then you left us for that…that jerk.”
“Oh, like you weren’t being a jerk before?”
“Excuse me?”
“C’mon, Dani. Things were great for a while. But then the races started up and you got so…competitive.”
Dani bristled. “Are you saying girls can’t be competitive?”
“Of course not!” Zander’s dark eyes turned indignant. “You know, just because I skate with Mitchell doesn’t mean I am Mitchell.”
“But you skate with him. Even though he’s awful to us. You stand there and let him say all those horrible things. You told him that private stuff about Bastian, too. Stuff he never even told the rest of the Sardines.”
“I…” Why was Zander turning red? “Fine, you’re right. I do stand there. And I did tell some secrets. That’s not cool, I shouldn’t…Look, I’m trying to figure things out. There’s been a lot of stuff going on lately, and—”
“That’s not an excuse!”
“Okay, okay, it’s not.” Zander scratched at his ear, looking down. “But you have to admit, back when you started getting so serious about racing? You made things really hard. You sucked all the fun out of glowboarding. And I wasn’t the only one who thought that. I needed a break, to go back to having fun again. That’s why I got into glowboarding in the first place. That’s why I taught you to skate. I thought…it was a cool way to hang out.”
The anger growing in Dani faltered, sent off-kilter by that weird other feeling. “So what?” she asked. “You teamed up with Mitchell to have fun? The Grackles are the most competitive team out there.”
“Well, sure, but we still free skate a bunch, and there are parties, and we get new equipment—”
“Because Mitchell’s dad owns glowboarding!” Dani shouted. Then she remembered where she was. Panicked, she looked around, sure someone had heard her. She had to get out of there, away from stupid traitor Zander. In a growling whisper, she said, “Just stay out of my way, you sellout.”
With that, she freed her backpack, which had once again caught in the bushes, and stomped past Zander, ignoring the sad look on his mole-marked face. She also ignored his stupid green jacket and floppy black hair, and the way he kind of smelled like a freshly opened can of Coca-Cola.
So what if she’d had a teeny tiny crush on Zander, back when they’d been friends? He’d joined Mitchell’s pack. And he’d just called her a jerk.
Even now, his words blared in Dani’s head: I wasn’t the only one who thought that.
Who else had Zander meant? Who else thought that Dani sucked the fun out of glowboarding? Lola had never been as into races as the others, Dani knew. But Lola didn’t think Dani was a jerk, did she? Did the others think that, too?
“Hey! You there!”
Shock zapped through Dani’s bones.
They’d spotted her. One of the silver suits was running toward her, glow detector raised in a sinister hold.
Dani ran, flying across the grass, her sneakers pounding into the sidewalk, flinging her over the street until, back in the cover of her hiding tree, she pulled out her glowboard. This time, to her relief, it started up on the first go, and Dani skated off fast, into a bloodred sunset.
“A full-blown explosion. Who knew it would escalate this quickly?”
The man in the navy suit was sitting across a table from a young woman. As she spoke, she adjusted a bobby pin that held her high ponytail in place.
“It’s no surprise to me,” the man said. “I was raised here. I remember the incident as though it were yesterday. I knew from that day on there was something special about Callaway.” Here, the man smiled. “More special than glow.”
The woman took a long sip of her Earl Grey tea. “You were right,” she said. “Now the entire DGE knows it.”
“And the contract?” The man in the navy suit tapped a stack of papers that lay between them. Most prominent on the page was the word “Gloworks.”
After swallowing more tea, the woman said, “It would seem it’s our best bet. The DGE has a history of making deals with private businesses. Hopefully this deal, like all those that have come before, will be mutually beneficial.”
The man in the navy suit nodded. “I feel confident of that. With the DGE’s knowledge and Gloworks’ resources combined? We’ll track them down no matter what it takes.”
The man in the navy suit meant every word.
When Lola woke, it was not to the buzz of her alarm clock, but a faint brushing against her cheek. She swatted away the sensation, yawning, and held her pillow close. But the brushing returned, trailing along the curve of her ear. She sat up, blinking into the dark. The clock by her bedside read 12:00 a.m. exactly. Midnight. She still had plenty of sleep ahead of her. Lola rearranged her pillows and ducked back under her quilt. That’s when she saw them: her paper birds.
They were gliding through the air—seven of them, in varying shades of violet and yellow and green. But no, not gliding, flying. They were flapping their paper wings. Lola sat up once more, wide-awake. She watched as the birds swooped in a circle, bathed in moonlight. How had they found their way here from the kitchen? How could they be alive?
A violet bird broke off from the circle and flapped up to Lola, skimming the edge of one wing across her forehead.
Come. She heard a voice in her head, twinkling and sharp, like a wind chime. Follow us.
Lola told herself to wake up. She rubbed her eyes and pinched her arms, but nothing roused her from sleep. So maybe she was awake after all. And why shouldn’t she follow where her paper birds led?
She slipped out of bed, and the violet bird rejoined its mates. The birds’ circle fanned out, then turned to a single straight line that shot out her bedroom door.
Lola followed.
Bastian woke to the sound of rustling paper. There was light streaming in beneath his door, from the hallway.
