Thread of Hope

FORTY-ONE

Derek Weathers was in Room 246, studying AP English with a teacher named Mr. Ridley. The room was at the end of a long, wide hallway lined with classrooms and blue and red lockers. Painted signs hung on the walls in between the classrooms, exhorting various sports teams. The carpeting that lined the floor appeared to have just been vacuumed. It was quiet.

We reached the end of the hallway and stood across from the classroom door. I was expecting a bell to signal the end of class, but instead it was a series of chimes that sent the students streaming out into the hallway, turning the quiet into an eruption of voices and laughter.

Derek was one of the last students out of Room 246. A blue baseball cap sat backward on his head and a pencil was stuck behind his left ear. He wore a black Rolling Stones T-shirt that showed off the muscles in his chest, tattered cargo shorts and flip flops. A textbook hung from his right hand.

He saw us immediately and froze in the doorway. His buddy Matt nearly ran up his back.

“The hell are you doing, dude?” Matt asked, annoyed, chucking him in the back of the shoulder.

Derek didn’t answer and Matt followed his gaze to us.

“Got a minute?” I said to Derek.

Derek’s face settled into the same cocky sneer I’d witnessed at the hotel. “Not really, bro. Got history now.”

I held up the papers in my hand. “We got you a pass. Bro.”

He shrugged.

I motioned for the door at the end of the hallway and he started that way. Matt followed behind him.

“I didn’t get you one,” I said to Matt. “Take off.”

Matt’s face reddened. He pivoted and headed down the hallway, glancing back at us once before he disappeared around a corner.

Gina, Derek and I walked through the glass door at the end of the hallway and stepped outside. The air was still cool, a slight breeze blowing across the athletic fields toward us. Moisture on the grass glistened in the sunlight.

“Make it quick, alright?” Derek said, frowning at us. “I don’t wanna miss-”

Before I could say anything, Gina grabbed his left arm and swung him hard into the building. His back thudded against the brick facade, the book flew from his hand and he grunted.

“Don’t be an asshole, Derek,” Gina said, right in his face, a hand pressing against his chest. “I know it’s a challenge for you. But do your best.”

He tried to put the sneer back on his face, but he was missing the arrogance he needed to make it work.

“You know where Meredith Jordan is?” I asked. “And before you answer, think about this. If you lie to me, I’ll find out.” I stepped in right behind Gina. “Then I will break both of your arms. That isn’t an idle threat just meant to scare you, to make me seem tough. If you lie to me, I will find you and I will fracture your forearms.” I took his left arm in my hand and pressed my thumb into his ulna. “Right there is where I’ll do it. I’ve done it to guys a lot bigger than you. It will hurt like hell and you’ll cry and you’ll have trouble jerking off for six to eight weeks.” I stared at him. “So think before you answer.”

He yanked his arm out of my grasp and pushed Gina’s hand off his chest. He looked back and forth between us several times. Indecision and fear lined his face.

“I don’t know where she is,” he finally said.

Neither Gina nor I spoke, waiting to see if he had anything else to add.

He kept his mouth shut.

“Who would know where she is?” I asked him.

He licked his lips, trying to regain some composure. “Megan’s her best friend. If anyone would know, it’d be here.”

“She doesn’t know.”

He shrugged. “Then I don’t know, dude.”

“Tell me about the time you saw her father hit her.”

He couldn’t hide his surprise. “How’d you know about that?”

“Doesn’t matter.”

He blinked several times. “Fuckin Matt, right?” He waved a hand. “Doesn’t matter. Yeah, I saw it.”

“What happened?”

“Matt and I had gone over to pick her up,” he said, shifting his weight from his left foot to his right. “We were going camping for the weekend, out near Julian. Nobody answered the front door, so we went in. We went out back and her dad was yelling at her in their pool house. We didn’t know what to do, so we just waited. Couple of minutes later her dad comes storming out, doesn’t say shit and goes right by us into the house.” He looked at Gina, then back to me. “I went into the pool house to get her.” He pointed to the left side of his face. “He nailed her. Entire cheek looked like a tomato.”

I took a deep breath. “What were they fighting about?”

“She wouldn’t tell me right then,” he said. “Just wanted to grab her stuff and get out of there for the weekend. So we got her stuff and the three of us bailed.” He shook his head. “She told me later that he was pissed off about a grade on a test or some shit like that.”

I thought about what Megan had told me, about the bruises she’d attributed to basketball. “Had he done it before?”

He hesitated, then nodded. “I think so. She’s never said anything, but…I’ve seen other stuff.”

I glanced at Gina. Her face was blank, fixed on Derek.

“If you don’t know where she is, who would?” I asked.

He started to say something, then stopped. “I’m done.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’re not a cop,” he said. He looked at Gina. “And neither are you. I don’t have to say shit to you.”

“You don’t care that your girlfriend is missing?” Gina asked.

“My dad’s an attorney,” he said, the surliness I’d seen before returning in full effect. He produced a cell phone and held it up like a trophy. “You wanna talk to me anymore, you run it by him.”

He stared at me for a long moment, then looked at Gina. Satisfied that he’d stymied us, he chuckled and slipped the phone back into the pocket of his shorts. “That’s what I thought.” He picked up his book and gave each of us one last look. “Later.”

He walked back through the door and into the high school.