All Wounds (2 page)

It could have been a week’s worth, or mopping the cafeteria floor, or—Rebecca? Are you even listening to me?”

“What?” Rebecca asked, distracted. “Sorry I thought I...”

“Thought what?”

She could have sworn she’d seen some little brown dude in rags—like one of those goblin things from
Labyrinth
—peeking into the girl’s bathroom.

She’d been seeing a lot of weird stuff lately and was starting to wonder if she wasn’t starting to lose her mind like her nana. As far as she knew, what Nana suffered from wasn’t catching, but the doctors weren’t even really certain what form of mental disorder Nana had, so maybe it was or ran in the family or something. It would explain a whole lot if it did.

Rebecca shook her head. “Never mind. It’s nothing. I’m just tired.

Algebra is getting to me.”

“Obviously,” Robin said, rolling her eyes. “You’ve got to find a way to get more sleep. Maybe you should call—”

“No!” Rebecca interrupted, almost shouting before she remembered to keep her voice down. “I mean...sorry. No. I’m not going to call anyone for anything. It’s okay, really. Just...just a bad patch.”

“But what if it isn’t?” Robin asked. She put a hand on her friend’s shoulder. “What if...what if this is what it’s going to be like, from now on?”

“Well.” Rebecca’s voice cracked over the word. She swallowed hard.

“Well, then I guess I’ll be getting to know Ryan Dugan pretty well.”

“Everything in the universe forbid,” Robin muttered. “That’s the last thing you need.”

“Thanks for being there, Ro,” Rebecca said, changing the subject. “You didn’t have to stick up for me in Wilson’s class this morning. If you’d treat me like everyone else has the sense to, you wouldn’t have gotten into trouble with me. First grade was a long time ago.”

“And I’ll never stop being your friend, so forget about it.” Robin gave Rebecca a big smile and a hug. “You were there for me when I needed you.

I’m just glad I can return the favor...sort of. Dad’s going to have a fit, and let’s not even talk about Mom.”

“Just blame me,” Rebecca said as she gave a little shrug. “They’ll pity me enough to hopefully spare you the lecture.”

“As if.” Robin sighed. “They’ll probably be grateful they finally have something to actually lecture me about that they don’t have to make up.” Rebecca laughed as she knew Robin wanted her to, said goodbye to her only sort-of friend, and went down the hall to her history class, already dreading the stares of her classmates as she interrupted the lecture she was seriously late for.

In addition to Rebecca’s own detention, Mr. Harris had made her promise to apologize to Mrs. Wilson first thing tomorrow morning for mouthing off. Rebecca blushed again at the memory of snapping at her Spanish teacher.

Maybe she really was crazy. Nana would have been mortified if she knew—

Rebecca stopped her thoughts cold. There was no way Nana was going to know about this. Ever, if Rebecca could help it. The one saving grace about Nana losing her mind was that she rarely noticed anything anymore, and didn’t care about what she did.

Rebecca pushed the door open to her classroom, ignoring the stares of her classmates. She murmured an apology to Mrs. Iverson for her tardiness, handed the teacher her hall pass and took her seat, keeping her gaze focused on the floor as she tried hard not to hear the whispers around the room.

Mrs. Iverson called for everyone’s attention. “Welcome back, Rebecca.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Iverson,” Rebecca replied without looking up from her desk.

“We’re on page 212.”

Rebecca took her history book out of her backpack and opened it.

“You’re such a loser, Spot,” a girl whispered behind her.

No need to look around or even guess who said that. Marla Thompson hadn’t come up with a different insulting nickname for her since she thought of “Spot” back in fifth grade.

As usual, Rebecca ignored her and pretended to pay attention to the lecture she’d obviously interrupted as Mrs. Iverson continued.

w x

With a powdery crunch, the tip of the pencil lead snapped and slid out of the wood beneath her fingertips. It rolled across Rebecca’s paper, leaving a gray smudge across the question she’d been attempting to answer.

She threw down her pencil in disgust.

“Now what?” Robin asked in a hushed whisper. She glanced around, looking for Mr. Nairhoft.

“My pencil is being stupid again. Besides that, I really don’t think writing an essay about the Inquisition is going to help Nana remember where her bedroom is, or not to turn on the stove.” Rebecca sighed, glaring at the offending question on her assignment. “I need to get home.”

“Well, you should have thought of that before you went and mouthed off to Mrs. Wilson. At least make it look like you’re working,” Robin replied with another fast glance around for the detention room monitor.

“Shh!”

“Is there a problem here, ladies?” Mr. Nairhoft said in a smooth, ar-rogant voice. “Rebecca MacDonnell?”

“Sorry, Mr. Nairhoft,” Rebecca apologized with a sweet smile. She really, really hated it when people used her name as though she’d done something wrong—to single her out. She had enough singling-out by her classmates every day. She didn’t need teachers doing it.

“This is the third time today my pencil’s broken,” she went on. “And I got frustrated with it. I’m sorry to have caused a disruption. May I go sharpen it again? That might help it, at least through the end of detention, anyway.” Rebecca gazed up at the tall, rail-thin Mr. Nairhoft, hoping her repen-tant smile would earn her his permission. She had to fight not to giggle as she noticed the toupee he wore was listing to the left, threatening to slide off. She was already in enough trouble as it was without being disrespectful to another teacher.

“Does anyone have an extra pencil Miss MacDonnell can borrow?” Mr.

Nairhoft asked loudly, turning around to view the detention hall, which was really just the cafeteria with the tables moved around. He’d glanced around so fast that he couldn’t have even bothered to see if anyone had an answer to his question. “No?”

Mr. Nairhoft turned back to Rebecca with that stupid fake smile he always had plastered on his face.

A surprising flicker of anger surged through Rebecca and she had the overwhelming desire to slap that smarmy grin right off the detention monitor’s face and send his cheap hairpiece flying. The thought was quickly followed by a sharp stab of hot pain from her middle, gone almost as quickly as it had come.

“Well—” Nairhoft began.

“Here,” said a voice from the far table in the corner.

Rebecca turned around to see who had spoken, as did Robin and Mr.

Nairhoft. Actually, everyone in detention swiveled their heads to see who was denying Mr. Nairhoft the occasion to be his usual unpleasant self.

Alone at a table in the corner, a boy wearing a familiar black leather jacket, faded jeans that were more gray than black and a t-shirt in the same condition waved a yellow pencil in the air.

“She can use this one.” He said it almost defiantly, like he was daring Mr. Nairhoft to come over and take it himself.

“Mr. Dugan, surely you haven’t completed
all
of your
long overdue
assignments,” Mr. Nairhoft said, folding his arms.

“I’ve completed all I’m going to,” Ryan replied, matching Mr. Nairhoft’s tone exactly. He looked at Rebecca. “Want this?” Rebecca nodded and stood up, her frustration with her own pencil, assignment, Mr. Nairhoft and detention forgotten as all the attention shifted from her onto Ryan.

“Rebecca, no,” Robin hissed.

The boy’s eyes went back to Mr. Nairhoft’s as he held the pencil out for Rebecca to take.

Ryan Dugan wasn’t just a bad boy, he was
the
bad boy. Everyone knew it. Always in trouble, always getting sent to the principal’s office, always in detention. There was even a rumor that last summer he wasn’t in summer school like he usually was, but in Mariposa Juvenile Detention Center three towns over for all sorts of different crimes.

The school rumor mill might not be right about much, but it was about the fact that Ryan never, ever gave anyone anything without expecting something in return.

Rebecca wondered why she was doing this. Why Ryan was even offering to help her. Whatever the reason, it felt good doing something Mr.

Nairhoft couldn’t really complain about, even though she was technically breaking the “don’t leave your seat without permission” rule. Really she just wanted to see the look on Mr. Nairhoft’s face as she took the pencil from Ryan with a quiet “thank you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ryan said with a big grin. He winked—actually
winked
—at Mr. Nairhoft as he held onto the pencil before letting Rebecca take it. “Wouldn’t want you to get in any more trouble, now would we?” Rebecca shook her head, stunned, and hurried back to her seat where she sat down and bent her head over her assignment. She wondered if he knew what had landed her in detention. He
sounded
like he knew. Like he knew, and approved.

Her hair hid her eyes enough that it kept Mr. Nairhoft from seeing that she was secretly glancing at Ryan while she pretended to work. She felt immensely better. Ryan hadn’t really been winking at her in the principal’s office. Not
at
her, not like that. It was just one of his...
things
he did. To mess with people. He’d just winked at Mr. Nairhoft. It didn’t mean anything.

The last thing in the world she wanted was the rumor going around that she had anything to do with Ryan Dugan. She had enough to deal with.

Rebecca’s eyes went to the clock on the wall. Twenty minutes of detention left, then she could get home to Nana.

Ryan sat back, clasping his hands behind his head as he leaned against the wall while Mr. Nairhoft berated the boy. The detention monitor railed until he was blue in the face, said something about “another week’s worth of detention!” and stalked away to harass another student he didn’t think looked busy enough.

Ryan just grinned and caught Rebecca looking at him. He winked at her again.

She blushed and bent her head back over her paper, trying not to think about how much time she had left to sit there.

Or that Nana might be setting the house on fire.

w x

Everyone else had someone to pick them up when detention was finally over. Even Robin, whose dad looked unhappy as she got in the car, even though he smiled at Rebecca.

Although Rebecca would have been perfectly happy taking the bus, Nana used to drive her to school and pick her up afterward, when Nana could still be trusted to drive. She hadn’t driven in about three years. They’d taken away her license when Rebecca was thirteen. Not that Nana was old.

There were plenty of drivers on the road older than her, but they could remember which house was theirs and which gear made the car reverse, and
where
they were going.

Nana couldn’t.

The doctors called it “early onset senile dementia,” but everyone knew that was just a polite way of saying that Nana was really too young to have Alzheimer’s, even though it was obvious she did.

The school busses only ran before detention, not after, so that meant someone had to pick you up, or you had to walk home. Rebecca offered Robin and Mr. Turnbull a little wave of apology—after all, Robin wouldn’t have gotten into trouble if it hadn’t been for her—then shouldered her backpack and turned away to begin the long walk home before Mr. Turnbull could offer her a ride. There was just no way she wanted to be in the car with that much tension, or face any questions Mr. Turnbull was sure to ask, and she really needed to clear her head before getting to her house. Who knew what disaster would be waiting for her today. Whatever it was, it could wait just another few minutes. She needed to think, to get her head on straight so she would have the brains and strength to deal with the evening ahead.

The last thing Rebecca wanted was for Nana to catch on that she’d been in detention, and if she saw Mr. Turnbull dropping her off, Nana would possibly notice how late Rebecca was getting home.

That is, if Nana even noticed.

Rebecca didn’t see any smoke coming from the general vicinity of her—well,
Nana’s
—house, or hear fire engines, so it seemed safe to take a little time to breathe on the way home. With any luck, Nana was sitting in front of the television, brushing that evil white furball she called a cat.

Rebecca lost herself in her thoughts as she walked, remembering all the little “funny” things she and her nana used to laugh about, like Nana putting her keys in the fridge, or putting toilet paper on the paper towel rack.

Then things had started to get scarier, like Nana leaving the gas stove on, or forgetting to turn off the water she was running in the stoppered sink for the dishes and flooding the kitchen.

I don’t suppose I should complain too much to Robin about how much I have to do
for Nana
, Rebecca thought as she pulled her jacket tighter around her.
Because
she could have given me up for adoption or something after mom and dad died, and she
didn’t.
Rebecca took a deep breath and let it out in a long sigh.
She looked after
me all these years, so it’s only fair I look after her now.

A gust of wind swirled brittle leaves around her ankles, and Rebecca picked up her pace. October was cold, and it wasn’t even Halloween yet. It was getting dark earlier and earlier these days, and when it got dark, it got colder. It was getting close to dinnertime and Nana needed to eat, and if Nana got hungry when Rebecca wasn’t there, she’d try to cook for herself.

Rebecca really didn’t want to spend another night in the emergency room explaining to the doctors how Nana burned herself again.

“First time, huh?”

Rebecca stopped in her tracks. She knew that voice. It was the same one she’d heard earlier, in the principal’s office and detention. So much for not being noticed.

Ryan Dugan stepped out from behind a tree that bordered the sidewalk she was on. He leaned against the trunk, brought a little box out of the pocket of his leather jacket and flipped open a small, silver—