Recognition slides over her face in a smile. “Oh yeeaah. What is it?”
“I can’t tell you right now. It’s a long story and I have to finish the last of the journals for Kinney. Come with me to the library.”
She raises an eyebrow. “Look at you taking charge. It’s too bad you didn’t yesterday.”
“What are you talking about?”
She ignores the question. “Never mind. Let’s go. I haven’t been to first period for the last four days. No need to break the streak now.”
After a quick stop at Mr. Kinney’s room to grab the box of journals, Kat and I find a seat at a table in the farthest corner of the library. She slaps another preprinted postage label on a manila envelope and tosses it in the box at our feet. “Okay. Let me repeat back to you what you just said so you can, you know, hear how insane you sound.” I nod, pretty sure that this is part of the process of her agreeing to go with me.
“You, Parker Frost, stumbled across and stole Julianna Farnetti’s journal from this stack here.” She pats it and I nod. “Then you read it, found out she was in love with some other guy who wasn’t Shane Cruz, but who you’ve decided is Josh from Kismet, and because of a tattoo and an anonymous painting in his café, you think Julianna Farnetti is still alive and it’s your duty to reunite the two people who were actually meant to be together, by taking our unofficial senior trip to some art town instead of to San Francisco and the beach?” She stops to take a breath just in time for Ms. Moore to give her “the look,” which Kat pointedly ignores. “It doesn’t sound crazy at all, right?”
I don’t answer right away. Instead I peel another postage label from the sheet to give Ms. Moore a chance to turn her attention back to her computer. Then I look at Kat. “Well, when you say it all dramatic like that . . .”
“You’re insane.” Kat peels and sticks another label. “And you’ve obviously read too much Nicholas Sparks.”
“Ha. You have too. And you love this, I know it.” She tries to hide a smile as she tosses another envelope into the box. “Kat, come on. It’s exactly the type of thing you’re always trying to get me to do.”
“Go chasing after a dead girl? What about Shane? Where does he figure into this whole thing? Is he alive too?” She leans in close and lowers her voice to a sinister whisper. “Or did she kill him and run off?”
“Kat—” I stop. I haven’t actually thought about where Shane fits into the puzzle. What the rest of his story is. “I don’t know. But I’m taking this trip, and the only other person in the world I’d want to take it with is you. So you’re coming. Right?” I try for the kind of confidence she usually throws at me, but it comes out as a question and a pathetic attempt at puppy dog eyes.
She rolls hers. “Of course I’ll come, you dork. I just had to torture you a little. Make sure you’re really committed to doing this thing.”
“You will?” I jump out of my seat in a rush of relief and excitement and hope, and wrap my arms around Kat, not caring if Ms. Moore shoots another look our way.
“But you know you’re gonna have to let me read the journal,” she says. “Just in case you missed something important.” She reaches around me for my backpack.
I grab it first. “Um . . . I—”
“Girls,” Ms. Moore says with another pointed look, “I think it’s time you get back to your classes. The period’s almost finished, and it seems your work is too.”
“Sorry,” I say, slipping back into my normal, authority-fearing self. “You’re right. We’ll pack up right now.” I lean across the table to gather up the various stacks of envelopes, and all in one motion Kat slides her hand into my open backpack, snatches out Julianna’s journal, and slips it into her purse. I kick her under the table.
“Calm down,” she smiles. “I’ll give it back to you by the end of the day, and I won’t show anyone. Promise.”
Before I can answer her the bell rings and she spins on her heel and makes for the door, leaving me with the box to return to Mr. Kinney’s and the hope beyond hope that she keeps her promise.
17.
“So all who hide too well away
Must speak and tell us where they are.”
—“REVELATION,” 1913
I’m waiting at Kat’s locker after seventh period when I get her text: Almost done w/journal. Holy. Shit. Meet me @ Kismet in an hour.
This freaks me out for multiple reasons. First off, I know she’s going to want to talk about it. At great length, and at a volume better suited for my house or hers than the place where the topic of conversation might actually be working. I’d trust her with my life, but I don’t trust her not to interrogate Josh in a completely inappropriate manner.
I also know she won’t change her mind or even answer if I text her back with a different place to meet. It’s how she gets her way a lot of the time. By not giving people any other choice. The other thing that worries me when I walk outside is that her car is still in the parking lot.
I text her back: Where are you??? Why an hour?
I don’t expect an answer, but I linger in front of the school just in case, watching the cars stream out of the parking lot and off into the warmth of the spring afternoon. Only when it’s mostly emptied out do I really notice the other cars that are still there. With graduation only a few weeks away, most seniors are gone from campus after lunch, taking full advantage of their free period. Trevor always is. Not that I keep tabs on him, but I never see him at his locker after fifth period, so I’m pretty sure he leaves. Except he didn’t today.