Death, Doom and Detention

“That boy from the Clearing. He’s possessed.”

“What boy?” she asked. “That kid in the army jacket?”

I nodded and told her the whole story of what just happened.

“So, what does that mean?” she asked, as clearly disturbed by the idea as I. “Cameron?”

“It means he won’t live much longer with that thing inside him.”

I gasped.

“And it means he knows something. I’ll have to see if the sheriff can find him. Before Vincent does.”

I glanced up in surprise. “Vincent?”

“Did you see his reaction when you mentioned the descendants? There’s no love lost. Did you find an address on Vincent?” he asked Ashlee.

“I’m sorry,” she said, clearly disappointed. “I couldn’t get his file. The cabinets were locked today because Mrs. Terry is out sick.”

“Oh, crap.” I stuffed wrappers in my pockets when I saw Mr. Davis walking toward us. I had no idea why. It just seemed like the right thing to do.

I was so hoping this day would be incident-free.

He turned his big mustache-covered head toward Ashlee. “Ms. Southern, would you mind giving us a minute?”

“Oh,” she said in surprise. “Not at all. I’ll see you later,” she said to Glitch.

He eyed her a long moment. “Oh-kay.”

Maybe he was getting a clue. He turned back to us and shrugged.

“We can do this out here, or I can take you into my office one by one,” Mr. Davis said, his expression grave. “I’m fine with either, but I want to know what happened yesterday.”

Brooke said, “Didn’t the sheriff talk to you?”

His mouth formed a solemn smile, and while it wasn’t actually out of appreciation or humor, it wasn’t harsh or derisive either. It was almost sad. “You kids did a lot of damage yesterday. I don’t even know what to say to the superintendent. To the school board. But one thing I can’t tell them is that you went completely unpunished. One month of after-school detention for all of you, starting today. And that includes Kovach when he comes back.”

“Oh, man,” Glitch said, kicking up dirt.

Brooke stood, indignant. “What? That’s—that’s—”

When Mr. Davis leveled a challenging stare on her, she caved.

“That’s more than fair, Mr. Davis.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Cameron said to him. He wasn’t so much challenging Mr. Davis as—and I could hardly believe it—as confiding in him. “And I’m certain Lorelei’s grandparents won’t think so either.”

Mr. Davis stepped forward menacingly. Or at least he menaced me. “Then when you can explain to me what happened, we’ll talk about it. I’ll be in my office.” He glanced at each of us. “If any of you would like out of ASD.”

After he left, Glitch scoffed at Cameron. “You couldn’t have taken Jared outside where your little wrestling match wouldn’t have caused so much damage?”

Cameron looked down at him. “Why don’t you take some Midol, little man?”

To everyone’s utter surprise, Glitch actually took a swing at Cameron. A swing! Cameron easily sidestepped it, his brows raised as though impressed. But I was not. I ran forward and got in between them. Unfortunately, Glitch was already in the process of trying again. Noble but suicidal.

His fist struck me on the temple, and unlike Cameron, I ate dirt.

In an instant, Cameron had Glitch by the throat and pressed against the wall in a chokehold that was more choke than hold. Brooke and I both ran to him, pulling on his arms.

“Are you psychotic?” Cameron asked him.

But Glitch was just making these gurgling sounds.

“Cameron,” I said in a loud whisper, worried Mr. Davis was still around.

But he didn’t listen to me. Not really a surprise. What did surprise me was when Brooke took her turn at him. “Cameron Lusk, drop him this minute.”

He did. Glitch went down hard. He grabbed his throat and coughed a full minute.

“What are you thinking?” I asked him.

He pushed my hands away, stood, and strode off.

“What has gotten into him?” I asked.

“What has gotten into you?” Brooke asked Cameron.

“He took a swing at me. What did you want me to do?”

“Cameron, you know he can’t hurt you.”

I put a hand on Brooke’s shoulder. “I think that might be the problem.” I strolled to the trash can and started emptying my pockets of trash. “But this is just not the time for these kinds of antics. I’m worried about Glitch.”

“Me too.” She turned and watched him disappear behind the building. “Me too.”

* * *

Maybe I had been accosted one too many times lately. School was beginning to feel more and more like a prison where I didn’t know whom to trust or whom to fear. When I scanned the faces around me, I saw anger. Envy. Excitement. Despair. Jealousy. Distrust. Euphoria. Boredom. All the emotions that ran rampant every minute of every day at every high school across the country—and yet suddenly, I didn’t know anyone. Every emotion was directed at me. Every look of distrust, of anger and jealousy. And I realized I might be a tad egocentric at the moment.

“Okay, I cannot be trusted,” I said as we headed to detention after our last class.

Brooke stopped chewing the granola bar she’d saved and nodded. “Got it,” she said, her words muffled. “Don’t trust you. These things are fantastic.”