When she reached the place his tent had been, she found that he was gone.
23
SPIDERS HAD IT MADE. THIS ONE, FOR INSTANCE. ALL DAY NOW, SHE (Stevie was sure she was a she even though she was a daddy longlegs) had been chilling in this corner under the window bench, watching over a loose weave of webbing, waiting for a snack to show up. It looked like a good life under there, shooting your own house out of your butt, food flying over to you, everybody basically leaving you alone.
“You have to stop that,” Nate said.
“Stop what?”
Stevie’s voice was flattened by her position on the floor, her face tilted toward the wall.
“Whatever it is you’re doing. You look like a Blair Witch remake.”
She had been here for almost an hour. Maybe more. Maybe even a lot more. Who even knew? She was on Spider Time now.
When she’d left David’s campsite, she walked around the lake for a while, her thoughts unmoored. She must have arrived back at camp sometime after lunch, then come right up here to the treehouse, where Nate had been on his laptop, alone and content. Then she got down on the floor and started thinking about the spiders. That had been her day so far.
Nate poked her with the toe of his sneaker.
“This is a David thing,” he said. “Obviously.”
She did not reply.
“Romance seems fun,” he added.
“Don’t.”
“I’m not. I don’t know what happened. I don’t even want to know. But I know you can’t do whatever the hell this is. Don’t you have things to do?”
“Janelle’s got it. She doesn’t need me.”
“I don’t mean Janelle.” He crossed around and sat on the bare window seat and looked down at her.
“I screwed everything up. I ruined everything.”
Nate banged his head against the screen behind him, then jerked forward when it proved to be looser than he imagined.
“Stevie.” He sounded annoyed enough that she pulled her chin off the floor, then gradually pulled herself up. She was dizzy from the extended period of time she’d spent staring at nothing. She looked down at herself, at the white T-shirt that had been so pristine the day before. The shirt was still as rectangular, but it was no longer clean or stiff; it had melted into a bag of damp wrinkles, slashed all over with grime. The marks from Arrowhead Point were really pronounced, almost black. She tried to rub them away, but they didn’t budge. Whatever was on it wasn’t dirt—it was something more inky and permanent. The shirt was ruined.
This seemed like a bad omen, a dark mark. A message. Her focus was shot. David was gone. The summer split apart like a wet paper bag.
“Stevie.”
Stevie blinked and looked up.
“I got some weird shit on my shirt,” she explained.
“Why don’t we get out of here?” he said. “I have nothing to do up here now, which is great. You’ve abandoned your post. Let’s get out of here and go to town.”
“For what?”
“For something to do. There’s a diner, right? Let’s go there.”
She was about to refuse, but when Nate looked annoyed, it truly startled her. His pale brows furrowed into a point.
“Fine,” she said.
She pushed off the floor. As she did so, she snuck a glance at her texts.
Nothing. Not that that surprised her. Her phone had been sitting by her head the whole time and had never made a peep.
She and Nate got bikes out of the rack, took their locks and keys, and headed down the path, out of Sunny Pines and back onto the now-familiar stretch of tree-lined road. This activity shook off the top layer of her malaise, which was unfortunate, because that layer had been keeping the other, more painful layers in soft focus. David had probably just driven off down this road. Or maybe he would drive by now. She should stop and call him. Or not. Maybe when she got to town. Call him before he got too far away, onto the highway, out of Massachusetts, out of her life, forever.
England. He was going to England?
Why was her life over when she was only seventeen? She’d peaked. It was done.
Also, screw him. Screw him for sneaking up on her with this information when she was trying to figure out what had happened to Allison Abbott. He could have told her about this on any one of their phone calls. He’d had so many chances.
Also, also? Free college? Poor little rich boy. She had no idea how her family was going to afford college. She would have to get so many loans that she would be in debt until she died. Oh, so you’re sad about your dad? Here’s free everything.
She pumped the bike harder, working all her feelings out on the road, riding more on the driving lane than the side. Go ahead and hit her from behind. She dared them. Nate was struggling to keep up with her, occasionally yelling something about the fact that she was “riding in the middle of the fucking road” or whatever. The pedaling stopped the thinking, and the road belonged to her now. Let them try to take it.
They arrived in Barlow Corners in record time, Nate red-faced and looking regretful that he had ever had this idea in the first place. Stevie, though, was mildly renewed. At least, she was hungry. It was a start. They locked their bikes by the library, near Sabrina’s reading room.
“Jesus,” Nate said as they crossed the street to the Dairy Duchess. “Never again. Next time I leave you there.”
It was only when they crossed the street and Stevie saw the red, white, and blue bunting that was on some of the storefronts that she remembered that it was the Fourth of July. There would be fireworks tonight. She checked her phone and found, to her surprise, that it was almost six o’clock. If she had guessed before, she would have thought it was maybe two, three at the latest. Somehow, she had lost almost an entire day in misery. No wonder Nate had finally peeled her off the floor.
The Dairy Duchess was an old-fashioned diner, the kind you saw on TV, that never seemed to exist in real life. There was a long counter with red stools, and Formica tables. It was also air-conditioned, which was a sweet, freezing relief. The place was basically empty when Nate and Stevie came in, so they took the prime booth by the window, looking out on the street and the town green across the way. The top of John Barlow’s hat peered above the menu that was tucked behind the ketchup bottles.
They both decided on some milk shakes and burgers, because Nate and Stevie had similar views on nutrition. To Stevie’s surprise, Nate got out his laptop and immediately starting typing.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Nothing.”
“Are you writing?”
“I’m just . . . I’m doing something.”
“You’re writing, aren’t you?”
“Solve,” he said. “Solve.”
“I can’t solve.”
“Okay, then sit there. At least you’re not on the floor anymore. I’ve done my job.”
This was a bit of a betrayal.
She opened her backpack and put her things on the table. Her tablet. Her phone. A notebook. Everything she knew about this case—aside from whatever was floating around in her head—was here. All the tools she needed. Now there was time and space to think.
She looked at the items.
She looked at the ketchup.
She looked at the menu and John Barlow’s hat.