Bang by Lisa McMann

back?”
    “I’ll be back Friday before dinner service. You’re welcome.”
I laugh. Sometimes Rowan just leaves me speechless.
    “Okay,” I say. “What do you want me to, like, say to Mom
    and Dad when they get home from mass to find their
    youngest child missing? I mean, can I tell them the truth?
    Are you going to give me all the information about where
    you’ll be and stuff?”
“I’ll have my cell phone with me. That’s all they need
    to know. But yeah, I’ll give you the address and stuff too
    in case Charlie is secretly an ax murderer. But don’t give
    it to them. Please.” She licks her pinkie and smoothes her
    eyebrows, then deposits the tweezers back into her bag
    as I turn down the alley behind our home and park a few
    buildings away so nobody sees me—I don’t want my dad to
    force me to come inside. “Maybe we can talk tonight.” She
    gets out and waves, then saunters down the alley toward
    the restaurant like she owns the world.
And I totally want to be her.
    I meet Trey and Sawyer at the library. They’re up in the
    loft on the corner couches where you can see everyone
    approaching but still have a private conversation. I plop
    down next to Sawyer, kick off my shoes, and curl up into
    him, and he slips an arm around my shoulders and kisses
    the top of my head. And I feel like this exact moment right
    here, this feeling of warmth and love, is what I have been
    waiting for my entire life.
    Trey watches us. He smiles a small smile and doesn’t
    look away. And then he sighs and leans forward, elbows on
    his knees, and says, “All right. Number one: nobody here
    gets hurt.” At first I think he must have new information
    from Sawyer that I haven’t heard yet, but then I realize it’s
    a command.
    Sawyer nods. “I hear you, bro. We hear you. No crazy
    stunts. No matter what.”
“Of course,” I agree.
While I was gone, Sawyer filled Trey in on a few of the
    minor but important details—the tree, the grass, the tiny
    stop sign, the old building with ivy on it.
I pull the note Sawyer gave me this morning out of
    my pocket and hold it out. “We need to destroy this or
    something,” I say. “Yours, too.”
Sawyer pulls his note out and takes mine. “We have
    a shredder in the office. I’ll take care of it. From now on,
    only verbal communication, and we don’t talk about g-un-s in school. Does Trey know about your secret phone?”
Trey raises an eyebrow.
“It’s just a temporary throwaway,” Sawyer says. “Don’t
    bother trying to text her.”
I give Trey my new cell number and watch him enter it
    into his phone. “Sawyer, can you get away from the proprietors long enough to drive by some schools? The list is in your hand—can you memorize them before you shred that?”
“Yeah,” Sawyer says. “I’ll drive around tonight and
    tomorrow morning before school.” He looks at the
    addresses. “Some of these are way out there.”
“Are you safe to drive?”
“So far.” Sawyer squinches his eyelids shut and rubs
    them. “The vision keeps playing in the windows down
    there, though, and it’s giving me a headache.” He points
    to the wall of glass on the main floor below us. “And in the
    face of that clock.” There’s an old school clock on the wall
    opposite our couch.
“What about your windshield and mirrors?” I ask,
    worried, knowing how distracting that is, and how much
    worse it could be for Sawyer going out into city traffic.
“Not bad,” he says lightly. “But . . . things are getting
    worse. The noise is driving me insane. I think—I feel like
    it’s happening very soon.”
Trey lifts his head. “I’ll go with you to look at schools,”
    he says. “I’ll drive.”
I bite my lip. I want to go, but I haven’t been pulling
    my weight at the restaurant. “That’s a great idea,” I say.
    I glance outside and then at the clock. “Maybe you guys
    should go now before it gets dark. Do the close ones. It’s
    rush hour.”
Trey gets up and blows out a sigh.