Dangerous Days of Daniel X

Chapter 32

PHOEBE AND I SAT on a couple of footstools in a far corner of the library stacks. Our knees were almost touching, and mine were knocking a little. No one else was anywhere around.

For about a minute, she stayed there staring at me while she gnawed on her lower lip. Then her eyes welled up with tears.

“What is it?” I whispered.

“I can’t fake it anymore,” Phoebe said in a shaky voice. “I lied to you about my dad moving us because of his job. We relocated because something awful, really awful, happened to our family.

“Last July, my little sister, Allison, went out to chalk on the driveway after swimming lessons and… she never came back. She was abducted. Somebody took her, Daniel. She was six years old. She’d be seven now.”

I sat there stunned into silence. I hadn’t known what Phoebe was going to say, but I definitely wasn’t expecting this kind of revelation.

Phoebe started to sob. She balled her fists in my shirt, and I could feel her shuddering against my chest.

“I’m sorry,” I finally managed. “I’m so sorry, Phoebe.”

As I wiped away her tears, I felt the worst kind of sadness inside myself. This was what was so different about Phoebe, I realized. It was our connection. We’d both lost people, people we’d loved.

“I know what you’re feeling,” I said. “I lost a sister too.”

Her name was Pork Chop.