All’s quiet now, so she resumes her speech, filling a whole thirty seconds with rambling before the door flies open, slamming against the gym’s cinder block wall, drawing the attention of every single person in the vast room.
Ryan steps onto the gleaming hardwood.Ryan, followed by Xavier. I do a double take, my mouth dropping open.
He scans oodles of teenaged faces, clearly, frantically searching, until I make sense of his arrival—he’s got to be here for me, right?—and rise from my seat.
He spots me and shouts, “Elise!”
My name echoes like thunder through the silent gymnasium. I stumble down the crowded row in which I’ve been sitting. Befuddled stares track me as I hurry down the stairs, my heart pounding because something’s wrong. Ryan wouldn’t be here otherwise.
I sprint across the gym, my flip-flops slapping the glossy floor. Distantly, I hear Mrs. Cruz call, “Excuse me!” and I’m not sure if she’s questioning me or admonishing me, but I ignore her, my ponytail swinging behind me as I run. I meet Ryan and Xavier at the door, grabbing their arms, pulling them into the corridor, where a man—a teacher or a security guard, I think—ushers us away from the gym.
“You’re not authorized to be in the building,” he says to my intruder friends.
“Yeah,” Xavier says. “It’s an emergency. We’re leaving now.”
My stomach drops out.An emergency.I knew it.
Xavier leads Ryan and me down the hall, away from the man and the gym and the orientation I knew I shouldn’t have come to. With every footfall, I thinkMom? Audrey? Janie? Mom? Audrey? Janie?But I can’t bring myself to ask.
This can’t be happening again. I can’t lose someone else.
Despite my escalating alarm, I hustle to keep up with the boys’ long strides and, finally, push my panic away long enough to speak. “What happened?”
We’ve reached the lobby. Ryan grabs my hand as we push through the doors and into the sunlight. He’s towing me along, toward where Xavier’s Jeep waits, parked crookedly in the fire lane. “It’s Mati,” he says.
“Mati?!”
Ryan squeezes my hand. “We’ve got to go.”
I yank free of him, planting my feet on the concrete. I’m shocked and I’m confused and I’m tired of being dragged along, clueless.
“Elise,” Ryan says, gently now. “We need to go to the hospital.”
“Why?”
Xavier drops a hand onto my shoulder. “Because he’s hurt. He needs you.”
We scramble into the Jeep. Xavier drives, swift but sure. Ryan sits shotgun, fiddling with the radio. I’m in the backseat, gusts of wind riling my hair. I’m trying not to throw up.
I think:Mati is strong and steady, smart and sweet. Bad things don’t happen to good people—he’s practically invincible.
And yet…
Cypress Beach isn’t big enough for a hospital of its own, so we’re on our way to San Jose. I borrow Ryan’s phone to text my mom. I tell her that orientation’s done and that I’m spending the rest of the day with my friends. Then I dial Mati because I can’tnot. The line rings unceasingly, leaving me full of apprehension and fear, buzzing with the need to get to him, get to him,get to him.
“What happened?” I ask Ryan over the wind whistling through the Jeep’s soft-top.
“He was jumped,” he says. His words sound garbled, as if they’re painful to speak. “It was pretty bad.”
My imagination conjures a slide show of horrific snapshots: Mati attacked, Mati hurt, Mati bleeding. I blink it all away to keep from bursting into tears. “Jumpedwhere?”
“Cypress Beach. Early this morning. In an alley close to Van Dough’s.”
“Oh God. Ryan!”
He reaches back to touch my knee. “He’s gonna be okay. He called me, so he’s conscious. He’s gotta be well enough to operate a phone, you know?”
No, I don’t know. Because I didn’t get to speak to him. I couldn’t, because my phone is sitting in my mom’s bedroom, useless.
