“They’re at 18 Ninth Avenue,” Willa said, and my heart started hammering.
My parents were in New York? They were here, in the city? What if I ran into them? Then I wouldn’t just be able to not be in Lear. I might find myself going to Stanwich College in the fall, still living at home.
“There is an uptown D train arriving,” the loudspeaker voice intoned. “Stand clear of the closing doors.”
“Where are you?” Willa asked curiously.
“Um—nowhere,” I babbled. “Just—don’t tell them I called. And good luck with the casting, and—what’s that, Teri? Gotta go!”
I hung up the phone like it was hot and stepped back from it, trying to think.
I still had a hundred dollars. I would be able to find someone who could break it for me. Yes, I was still alone in Manhattan. But Mr. Campbell’s play was still happening.
What was I supposed to do—not see this play? Not try and do everything I could to get this part? The more I thought about it, the angrier at Stevie I got. Yes, we’d had a fight. I hadn’t thought it was a fight that was worth abandoning me over, but apparently it was.
So fine.
Fine.
If Stevie wanted to go back home and leave me to figure out the city on my own, that was her choice. I had wanted to help her, since going to Mr. Campbell’s play was going to be good for both of us. But since she was apparently giving up on theater forever, it was no longer my problem.
And if she didn’t care what happened to me, I didn’t care what happened to her. She could go back home, but I was going to do what I came in for and go see Mr. Campbell’s play. I was pretty sure that I could walk there from this subway station—that this train wouldn’t help me get any closer. Manhattan was a grid, right? That was what everyone said. I’d be able to find the Echo Theater.
Armed with my plan, I turned toward the exit just as the phone rang again. I hesitated, then crossed back to it. What if it was Willa calling again? Because the number of the pay phone would have shown up on our caller ID when I’d called. Maybe she’d heard from my parents—either way, I needed to make sure she didn’t report anything suspicious to them. I walked back and picked up on the third ring.
It was then that I noticed two people, dressed excessively cool, who looked like they were in their mid-twenties, walking up to stand behind me. Were they waiting to use the phone? That didn’t make sense—they were both holding phones.
“Hello?”
“Hello,” a voice said—a voice that was not Willa’s. It was a woman, her timbre low. “Tonight. At eleven. The night to end all nights.” The voice was speaking carefully, like every one of her words was italicized, like she was sharing some fabulous secret with me. “See you in the elephant’s house. Alaska. Pilgrim. One thirteen. Password is Daedalus. Good luck… and good night.” The dial tone sounded in my ear, and I set the phone down in the cradle. I had no idea what that was about—maybe a prank or a clue for some escape room.
I walked a few steps away, and the couple swept past me to the phone. “Look how cute,” the girl cooed. She posed against it and turned to the guy. “Take a picture first.”
“We don’t have much time,” he said, even as he started to frame the shot.
I headed up the stairs, then walked back through the turnstile again. It was something that would have been unimaginable half an hour ago—me, leaving without Stevie. But here we were. I zipped up my coat and buttoned the toggles before I started on the last set of stairs that would take me back out onto the street. I paused for one more moment in the station. When I left, it would really, truly mean admitting that Stevie and I had had a fight so big that she’d left to go home and I was now on my own. The second I stepped out into the cold night, this would be real.
And as much as I might have wanted it to be otherwise… there was nothing left to do but go.
I took a deep breath and started climbing.
CHAPTER 11
Stevie
What?” I asked. Suddenly, a thousand openings to a thousand Law & Orders were flashing through my head—and I was the person it was never good to be. I stared at the blade in the guy’s hand, the one catching the flickering overhead fluorescent light. Was I being mugged? Like, for real? I glanced around, my heart pounding, but somehow the only other people around were the ones across the platform. And even if I yelled for help, what were they going to do about it?
“Your phone,” the guy said, taking another step toward me.
“Um,” I said. I took a stumbling step back but didn’t get any farther than that, because that was when Brad started to growl.
I was still holding him, so the dog was pretty close to eye level with the guy. I looked down in shock at the tiny, fluffy dog, who no longer looked so cute and helpless. His eyes were narrowed and locked on the guy’s, his top lip was drawn back, and he was baring tiny teeth that suddenly looked very sharp. And there was a low, steady, menacing growl coming from his throat. This dog may have weighed less than ten pounds, but he wasn’t messing around.
“Call off your dog,” the guy said, frowning at Brad, but I noticed he took a step back.
“He’s not my dog,” I said, rubbing Brad’s fur with the hand that was holding him.
“Look, I don’t want to hurt you,” the guy said, flashing the blade again but keeping his eyes on Brad. “Just give me your phone!”
“I don’t have a phone,” I blurted.
“Everyone has a phone. Give it to me and I’ll be out of here.”
“I don’t,” I said, and my voice broke on the last word. It was maybe not surprising, considering that I was actively being mugged at the moment, but a second later, I burst into tears. It was suddenly all too much, all at once. “I—don’t—have—a—phone,” I sobbed. “I had one but then my best friend and I—had—had a fi-fi-fight,” I managed to get out, feeling hot tears hit my cheeks. I hated that I was crying, but that was only making me cry harder, because it’s embarrassing to cry in front of strangers. Even if they are trying to rob you. “And my phone f-fell on the tracks and then we got separated and I don’t know where she is and I have to find her or I’m just… just…” I wiped my non-Pomeranian hand across my face and remembered my eye makeup a second later, which made me cry harder. “And now you’re here and you don’t believe me and I don’t even have my wallet and you have a knife.…”
“Um,” the guy said, looking exceedingly freaked out. “Look, it’s okay, all right? See?” He pressed the blade down onto his hand and I gasped—and then saw that the blade had disappeared. He pulled it away and the blade popped out again. “It’s fake, okay? I got it at Tannen’s. This way, if I get caught, I can’t get in trouble, because it’s not a real knife.” He raised an eyebrow proudly.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. The surprise of the fake knife had given me a moment to pull myself together, and I wasn’t actively crying anymore. I took a sniffly breath. “That’s not—you’ll still get in trouble. Like when people rob banks pretending their fingers in their pockets are guns—they still get arrested.”