Chapter 46

So many people. As soon as Ryan stepped into the school building, he knew he’d made a mistake. A worse mistake than being alone all day at the Jennings’ house? He did his best to smile at all the friends who he hadn’t even trusted to talk to about his mother’s illness. Of course, no one expected him to smile, so that part wasn’t too bad. “I can’t believe you’re back at school,” said Alex. “You could take off a week, easy.”

“I’d rather stay busy,” Ryan said. “Not think about it.”

That was true. A little bit true. He had hoped he could just walk into school and be mostly invisible, like usual. He could pretend nothing had happened. But everyone knew.

He didn’t know where Jacky had gone. When he looked around, he saw Jacky talking to Cody Mitchell by the lockers, laughing, and then he wished he hadn’t looked. Suddenly he just wanted to go to the guidance counselor’s office and cry.

“You okay?” Monica asked.

Never had he been so grateful for Monica’s clinginess. “Um,” he said, and it was all he had to say, because his voice wobbled and Monica took charge.

“Okay, guys,” Monica announced. “Ryan needs to go down to the office to clear some stuff up.”

The crowd – there was a crowd around him – parted, but even when he’d gotten through the thick of people, he didn’t see Jacky again.

When Ryan didn’t show up to English class second period, Jacky freaked out a little. He had purposely rushed from Computer Science so he might have a chance to check in with Ryan before Mr. Dugan started class. Instead he sat at his desk tapping his feet nervously, staring at Ryan’s empty desk. When Monica sauntered in just before the bell, Jacky could have launched himself over his fellow classmates and throttled her.

The bell rang; still no sign of Ryan. So Jacky slipped his phone out of his pocket and hid it under his desk and texted Ryan.

where are you?

And then he texted Monica.

do you know where Ryan is?

Of course she wasn’t going to answer a text in the middle of class. Jacky exhaled and put his phone away before Mr. Dugan saw it and confiscated it.

It was hard to try to get Monica’s attention from the back of the room. He tried making some random noises, tapping his pen, moving the desk so it scraped across the floor. Mr. Dugan gave him a few annoyed looks but otherwise ignored him.

He could feel his heart speeding up. What if Ryan had just gone home? What if Ryan was in the bathroom, crying? Considering how Monica had been stuck up Ryan’s butt yesterday and this morning, Jacky had a feeling she knew where Ryan was. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be so freaking calm and collected right now. Was this payback for not telling her about Ryan’s mom?

He really hoped not. Ryan seemed to think Monica was such a great girl, and after everything, Jacky felt like he and Monica had come to some kind of understanding. He wanted an answer now. Not at the end of class. His heart thudded in that weird way that reminded him of the panic attacks he’d had in the car, and suddenly he started to panic that he was having a panic attack. He could even hear his breath rasping down the back of his throat.

Please God no

And then Mr. Dugan said a sentence that made Jacky want to submit his name for sainthood: “Let’s take some time to work on our group projects.”

Jacky launched out of his chair on shaking legs and shoved his way over to Monica’s desk. “Where’s Ryan?” he asked. His voice came out too high, and he heard a girl he’d basically body-checked behind him say, “Rude!”

“He’s in guidance,” she said. Then she asked, “Are you okay?”

He let his legs collapse into Ryan’s empty chair. “Yes. Yeah, I’m okay. I’m fine.”

Wally stepped between them to sit at the desk behind Jacky. “I was hoping Ryan would be here,” Wally said. “This project is due on Monday and we still haven’t seen any of the final pages yet.”

Jacky blinked at him.

“Ryan’s mom just died,” Monica told him quietly.

“Oh,” said Wally. “Oh.”

“I know he was working on them. We were working on them, together,” Jacky said in the wake of Wally’s stunned silence. “I think they’re mostly finished.”

“Mostly?” Now Wally looked alarmed. “Will he be back in school before Monday? Or can we ask for an extension? Do you have the finished pages with you?” he asked Jacky.

“Uh, no. They’re at my house, though. I can bring them in tomorrow.”

“Maybe we should ask for an extension,” Monica said. “I mean, just in case.”

“Yeah. Okay.”

Monica looked over at Mr. Dugan and got his attention, then explained the situation. Jacky honestly couldn’t remember if the pages were at his house or at Ryan’s. Everything had gotten so crazy. He was most definitely sure that the pages were not finished.

“This is why I hate group projects,” Wally was muttering to himself, or maybe to Jacky.

“I can work on them tonight,” Jacky said, maybe a little too sharply, because Mr. Dugan straightened up.

“Mr. Jennings, no one is accusing you of anything,” he said.

Jacky looked down at Ryan’s desk and ran his fingernail along a deep scratch that someone had filled in with a blue ink pen. “Sorry.”

“I understand that one of your group members is having a family emergency, but there are four of you. Three of you are not having a family emergency. I would suggest that you three try to complete this project by Monday without Ryan, and if that should prove impossible, I’ll reconsider.”

“It’s just that he’s the artist for the comic book,” Monica said, “And until he does the art, Jacky can’t do the coloring.”

“I see,” said Mr. Dugan. “In that case, remember this is English class, not art class. I’d accept incomplete artwork so long as the main ideas are included.” He looked at each of them. Jacky didn’t look up when Mr. Dugan came to look at him. “Okay?”

Jacky mumbled assent along with Monica and Wally. If at all possible, he felt even worse about the assignment. Monica had basically just told Mr. Dugan that Jacky hadn’t had anything to do with the main part of the assignment.

After Mr. Dugan moved on to the next group, Monica and Wally discussed how they thought the project would probably be okay to hand in on Monday. “Did Ryan finish the rough drawings for all the pages?” Monica asked.

“I think so,” Jacky mumbled.

“This is a nightmare,” Wally said.

“It’ll be fine,” Monica said. “Jacky will check at home, and we’ll talk to Ryan, and if the pages aren’t done, we can make some mock-up pages from our notes. It’ll be fine.”

Despite Monica’s words of reassurance, Jacky didn’t feel like it would be fine. It felt like somehow this whole project was riding on him. He was the last in the chain, after all. He couldn’t blame Ryan for not completing his part, not with everything he was going through. Through the rest of class, and his next class, all he could think about were those pages and what had happened to them. Ryan had brought all his schoolwork to Jacky’s house. The papers must be in there. Would Ryan think he was a jerk if he asked about them after school? If he tried to get Ryan to work on the project with him after school?

He struggled through an essay test in history class, another class he shared with Ryan, only Ryan didn’t show up and he had forgotten all about the test, which had been announced on Monday, while Jacky had been worrying about Ryan being dismissed from English class. At least it was an essay test, and he didn’t have to worry about the right or wrong answers of multiple choice.

“Hey, man,” said Cody, coming up behind Jacky at his locker just before lunch. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” Jacky grabbed his lunch bag out of his locker and shut it.

“You sure?”

Jacky looked at Cody. He suddenly noticed that Cody had a giant bandage on his forehead. “What happened to your head?”

“You are totally not fine.”

“I am fine!” Jacky snapped, and started walking toward the cafeteria.

“Dude, I saw you in the hallway like five times today. I’m the deaf one. You can’t pretend you didn’t hear me.”

“I didn’t see you.” It wasn’t an excuse, not really. He tried to remember seeing anyone he knew in the hallways. Or hearing anyone call his name. He couldn’t.

“Yeah, ‘cuz you got your head up your ass.”

“Can you just get off my fucking back?”

“Whoa, dude. I’m just sayin’.”

Jacky knew he should apologize. Instead he kept walking, faster than he had been before.

“Hey, man.” Cody jogged a couple of steps and tugged on Jacky’s sweatshirt to slow him down. “I’m not criticizing. I’m just asking what’s wrong, that’s all.”

Finally Jacky slowed down. He felt everything start to bubble over and he had to gulp down a few breaths to ease back from the edge. “Sorry,” he said.

“It’s that guy, isn’t it? Ryan?”

“I’m just worried about him,” Jacky said. They reached the cafeteria and walked toward their usual table. “He hasn’t been in any of the classes we have together, and Monica said he was down in guidance, and… I mean, what if he’d rather go to a group home than stay at my house?”

It wasn’t until the words left his mouth that he realized that was exactly what he was afraid of. That no matter how hard he tried, no matter how great it was to wake up in Ryan’s arms this morning, that Ryan would rather be somewhere else.

He knew it wasn’t as simple as Ryan deciding he didn’t like Jacky, after all. There were a lot of other factors. It would still feel like a rejection.

“Okay, I’m gonna put this into perspective,” said Cody.

“Big words,” Jacky said.

Cody lifted his chin. “I’m feeling insightful.” Then, more seriously, “Okay, so if I knew some chick for like a week, and I went to live at her house, it would probably be really weird. Okay?”

“I guess.” Jacky spied Nina approaching their table, striding along with her head high, as if she had no idea that Matt Welch existed or was sitting only a few feet to her right. Matt was watching her with a sad expression that almost made Jacky feel bad for him.

“And, like, if my whole family had just died, too, it would be double weird.”

“Okay, I get it,” Jacky said. He did understand, he really did. Still didn’t make it hurt any less.

“Dyusha! I am very happy to see you.” Nina came right over and hugged him. The hug went on long enough that Jacky caught a glimpse of Cody’s tortured face, which continued after Nina let go and sat down beside Jacky, leaving the seat on Cody’s other side empty and waiting for Haylee to sit in. “Are you very sick?”

“No, I wasn’t sick,” Jacky told her. “I, uh… Ryan Sullivan is staying with me. At my house.”

“Ryan! It is terrible what happened to his mother, no? He is a nice boy.” She started to bite into her sandwich, then paused. “Dyusha, you are friendly with Ryan? I did not know this.”

“Yeah.”

Cody waggled his eyebrows. “He’s real friendly with Ryan Sullivan. Ow.” That last came from Jacky’s elbow in his ribs.

Nina tilted her head. “With Ryan?”

“Don’t tell anyone,” Jacky told her. “We haven’t told anyone. Except Monica.”

With a laugh, Nina took that bite of her sandwich. There was something about the gleam in Nina’s eye that reminded Jacky of how Nina loved gossip. She never did any gossiping herself. More that she enjoyed absorbing everyone’s dirty secrets.

“I don’t get it,” piped up Haylee.

“Don’t worry about it,” Cody told her.

Jacky stared down at the container of spinach and egg whites in front of him, then at the other container of carrots and hummus. He didn’t feel very hungry.

“Are you on a diet or something?” asked Haylee.

“Nah, his mom’s just a food Nazi,” Cody said, emptying a bag of chips directly into his mouth.

Jacky watched him and gave him a look when he had finished. The look said, Real sexy, dude. Swallowing, Cody wiped his mouth and glanced at Nina, then back at Jacky. Jacky widened his eyes and raised his eyebrows. Yeah, she probably thinks you’re a pig.

Joking around with his friends made him feel a little better, but he still couldn’t eat, not with Ryan absent from lunch, too. He closed up the Tupperware containers and repacked his lunch bag. “I’m gonna go down to guidance and make sure Ryan’s okay.”

“Come on!” Cody said.

“Will you need help, Dyusha?” Nina asked.

“I’ll be okay.” Jacky slung his messenger bag over his head. “Just don’t you two gang up on Cody, okay?” Nina and Haylee looked at each other, with amazed, innocent expressions. “Yeah, he told me all about your weapons training. Don’t let him get hurt.” He patted Cody on the side of the head with the bandage.

“Come on, dude,” Cody complained, waving him off. “Get lost.”

“Text me later,” he said as he headed out of the cafeteria.

“Hold it right there,” said one of the lunch monitors. “Do you have a pass?”

“I need to go to guidance.”

“It’s an emergency?” the woman asked suspiciously, but then the other lunch monitor came up. Jacky vaguely knew her; when he’d first come back to school after his accident, he’d had to ask her to go to guidance all the time.

“You can’t ask that. If a student says they need to go to guidance, you just write them a pass.” She signed off on a pass. “Here you go, Andrew.”

“Thanks,” Jacky said. As he left, it amazed him that there was someone here at the school who hadn’t immediately noticed that he was missing an arm, who had treated him with the same suspicion he was sure students like Cody got all the time. For some reason, that made him smile.