Hoisting my backpack on again, I head out the front door where, according to Adam, no one cares much about the camera that will catch me ditching.
The camera crews outside, however, are a different story. I make it all of two steps when someone calls my name. I turn around, pulse pounding in my ears.
“Hey! Where are you going?” Sage scurries after me.
“Nowhere.” My shoe draws a circle over the sidewalk. “I just can’t be here today.”
“Yes, you can,” Sage says, hooking her arm through mine and attempting to guide me back toward the building. “Today is our student council meeting at lunch, and I’m not going to sit there all by myself and listen to Lydia Costas lead it.”
“You’re not going to be all by yourself, Sage,” I say, holding my ground. “The rest of the student council will be there.”
“You know what I mean,” she says with an eye roll. “You and I are the OGs. No one else will back me up if I need to start a coup to take over the presidency or at the very least, get the homecoming theme changed. Did you hear she wants to make it an underwatertheme? What the hell are we supposed to do? Dress as mermaids?”
I cringe. “That does sound horrific.”
“See? That’s why you can’t leave.”
I frown and tug my arm away. I’m not looking for an argument, but half of this mess is Sage’s doing. “So you want me to helpyou, when you completely ignored the favor I asked you?” If it weren’t for her, that video of setting off the fire alarm would’ve been for the cops’ eyes only. Now everyone in town is convinced that they were right about Bram Abbott, “the Girlfriend Killer,” all along.
She sighs. “Look, I’m sorry about Bram. I know you’re close with the Abbotts. And even though I don’t understandwhyyou’re friends with them, I’m sorry that you’re hurting. I guess I’m trying to find a way to make it up to you.”
“By forcing me back in there, where everyone is talking about my friend? Who isn’t even here to defend himself?”
“I’ll tell them to shut up, okay? I may not agree with you on Bram’s innocence, but I am a believer in our justice system. Bram deserves his day in court.”
How noble of her. “Unfortunately,” I say, crossing my arms, “the court of public opinion doesn’t tend to weigh evidence. You’ve always been so sure it was an Abbott. Why?”
“There’s just something off about them,” she says, picking at a pink fingernail. “And Bram was dating my cousin. Sometimes, the simplest answer is right in front of you. It’s always the boyfriend.”
“So much for innocent until proven guilty.”
“The videoisproof,” she says.
My chest tightens. “Okay, Sage, I tried. But I want to go.”
“I’ll come with you,” she says, already following me through the parking lot.
“You’regoing to ditch school?” I ask, keeping my pace and calling her bluff. Sage doesn’t get Bs, and she certainly doesn’t ditch school.
“I can tell you need a friend right now.”
I wouldn’t call Sage afriend, not anymore. But seeing as how the Abbotts probably won’t be back in school again, she may be the closest thing I have to one at Silver Creek High. She admitted something to me at the coffee shop on Saturday—that she’s held a grudge against me, because after Mariana’s death, I chose the Abbotts over her. Maybe she thinks we can be friends again, now that they’re not here.
I’m not sure I can forgive her, especially if Bram gets convicted for a crime he never committed. Not that it matters how I feel or what I think, since she’s still following me. The forested area behind the athletic fields is still a crime scene, so I take the street in front of the school for a while, entering the residential district. Sage follows. She stays silent, and I’m glad for it, though I get the feeling she’s antsy to say something, or maybe just antsy about ditching.
When a car slows beside us, the driver no doubt eyeing the two of us out on the street during school hours, I duck between two houses and head down the path that winds through the woods.
“So I heard you were defending Bram out there with the reporters,” Sage says, putting an end to the blessed silence. “Pretty wild.”
“I don’t believe he killed Kennedy,” I answer truthfully. I wish I could lay out all the evidence I’ve collected, just to get one person on my side. To convince her that it couldn’t have been Bram. Except I know that the very information that could vindicate Bram could also give him a clear motive.
And it could also point the cops directly to Henry. Instead, I add, “I know Bram can be withdrawn when you don’t know him. But off the football field, he’s not violent. He’s caring and—”
“Oh my god, Hayden,” she says, stopping momentarily to curse when her dress catches on a bramble. “Tell me you’re not in love with that lunatic.”
I start to correct her about thein lovepart, but my tongue fails me. Because the second her words echo back through my head, I realize they’re true. Somehow, in trying to fight off my feelings for Bram, I only fell harder for him.
“You’ve fallen straight into the Girlfriend Killer’s trap,” Sage says as we press deeper into the woods. “And here I thought you were obsessed with Henry. You’re always making eyes at each other in class. Which is also so, completely wrong. Sure, he might look harmless. Not like Bram, who looks like he’d be happy to slit your throat and drink the blood. But he—”
