“Rowan!” a voice calls after I swipe my ORCA card. Savannah Bell waves at me from the middle of the bus, and at first I hesitate, worried she has my name. But she holds up her hands to indicate she doesn’t, and I wave back to confirm the same while groaning inwardly. Bus law dictates that if you run into someone you know on public transit, you are obligated to sit by them.
“Hey, Savannah,” I say as I slide into the seat across from her.
She pushes her black hair behind one ear, revealing chandelier earrings made entirely from recycled materials. Last year she opened an Etsy shop to sell them. I don’t have strong feelings about Savannah Bell, though I know I’m not her favorite person. In every class ranking, she comes in at number three, right behind McNair and me. Though she joked about it sometimes—“Guess I’ll never catch up to you guys!”—I could sense there was some hostility there.
I attempt some small talk. “Good last day?”
“Not bad.” When she laughs, it sounds forced. “I never really stood a chance against you and Neil, did I?”
“It’s possible we were a little intense.”
Savannah reaches into her pocket and flashes a familiar slip of paper. Her Howl target. “I can be content with some revenge.”
Neil McNair, it says.
My stomach drops, which might be the bus’s sudden lurch forward. We’ve only been playing an hour, and the look in Savannah’s eyes is raw determination. Maybe it was arrogant to assume Howl would end with McNair and me, but it’s not enough to simply survive longer than he does. I want to be the one ripping off his bandanna.
If Savannah kills him, I won’t see him until Sunday, his fiery hair sticking out from beneath a graduation cap.
“Good luck,” I offer, though my voice sounds scratchy.
Savannah looks down at her phone, the universal sign for it being okay for you to look down at your own phone, so I do the same.
I’m typing out the message before I have a chance to give it a second thought.
savannah bell has your name, and she’s out for blood
If he ends up dead before I have a chance to take him down, then I don’t know what I’m playing for. I’d have no way to accomplish number ten.
His reply is almost immediate.
McNIGHTMARE
Why should I believe you?
because you want to win this as badly as I do
I suppose you have a point there.
she’s across the aisle from me on a bus right now, heading south from cinerama
“I worked my ass off, you know?” Savannah says. “I can’t remember the last time I went to sleep before midnight. But I never got the kind of attention you and Neil did. All our teachers thought you two were so cute with your little rivalry.”
“Believe me, it wasn’t cute.”
A muscle in her jaw twitches. “Oh, I believe you. It’s just—I could have gotten into Stanford… but I was wait-listed.”
“I’m sorry,” I tell her. “Seattle U is a great school.” And I mean it, but Savannah scoffs.
“Pike Street!” the driver calls, and Savannah beats me to pulling the cord.
Reluctantly, I follow her off the bus and down another hill.
There’s the light-up sign that says PUBLIC MARKET CENTER. The streets here are rougher, bricked, which is common in the older parts of the city. Inside the market, vendors hawk local produce, flowers, and crafts. Down the street is the first Starbucks, which always has a line out the door despite having literally the same menu as every other Starbucks. And up ahead are the world-famous fishmongers who toss halibut and salmon around all day. I’m a vegetarian, and every year in elementary school, we took field trips here, and every time, I hid my face in my coat, mildly disturbed by the fish-throwing.
“See you,” I say to Savannah, who’s already started toward the first Starbucks. Not a bad idea for the cliché tourist photo, but I had something else in mind.
I turn left, following a cobbled path lined with street art down into Post Alley and my reason for coming here: the gum wall.
Thousands of tourists stick their gum here every day. Gum drips from windows and doorways, strung from brick to brick, holding up brochures and business cards. It’s only been cleaned a few times in its more-than-thirty-year history, and every time, Seattleites put up a fuss about it, as though the chewed-up hunks of Bubblicious are as much a part of the city as the Space Needle or a Mariners’ losing streak.
It’s weird and it’s gross and I absolutely love it.
“Will you take our photo?” asks a man with a heavy accent I can’t place. His family, including a trio of small children, are posing in front of the wall.
“Oh—sure,” I say, holding in a laugh because this happens every time I go here. They squeeze together, blowing bubbles as I snap a few photos.
They add their gum to the sticky mosaic, and I take a photo on my own phone. A tourist doing something a local would be ashamed of doing. Another green check mark from the juniors.
Two down, thirteen more to go.
I’m examining the clues again, assuming I can grab something local, organic, and sustainable at any number of produce vendors in the market, when someone bolts past me, startling me so much that I nearly drop my phone. I turn just in time to catch a reddish blur.
“Neil?” I call out, jogging after him.
He skids to a stop halfway down the alley. “Savannah,” he pants, bending over to place his hands on his knees. “She spotted me. I only narrowly escaped. I have to—” He gestures vaguely toward the opposite end of the alley.
“Savannah ran track.”
The glare he gives me could melt a glacier. “Yeah. I know.”
Panic twists through me. We don’t have a lot of time. Savannah could be headed down the bricked path right now.
“So you can’t outrun her. But you could hide from her.” I point at the Market Theater, tucked away inside Post Alley. Ghost Alley, some call it, a nod to the rumors that Pike Place is haunted. They even offer ghost tours.
For the most part, the tourists ignore us, too focused on taking the perfect gum wall photo. I cross the alley and try the theater door. Unlocked.
McNair lifts his eyebrows, as though wondering whether it’s safe to trust me. His chest is still rapidly rising and falling, and the wind has tossed his hair out of place. It would be fun to see him so frazzled if I weren’t so distraught about his potentially impending death.
“In here,” I say, waving him over, and after a few seconds of deliberation, he follows.
“If you lock me in here just so you can give the valedictorian speech, please tell everyone I died exactly as I lived—”
“A giant pain in the ass? Got it.”
He disappears into darkness, and I shut the door behind him only a few seconds before Savannah comes barreling down the alley. Tourists clutch their belongings and jump out of her way.
“Did you see him?” she asks, barely breaking a sweat. “Neil?”
I point down the alley. “He ran right by.”
She flashes me a smile that I return easily, though my heart is banging against my rib cage. It doesn’t slow down until she’s out of sight.
I wait another minute before opening the door. “Come on,” I tell McNair, and he follows without protest.