The Breakers Code (2 page)

     “You’re gonna back into Hernando,” Casper said, grabbing my arm and pulling me to a stop.

     I pulled the inhaler from my pocket and took a whiff. I was out of breath. I must have been more nervous than I thought.

     The ‘Hernando’ Casper was talking about wasn’t a teacher or student. It was a statue. Hernando DeSoto was some sort of Spanish explorer. He marched through Georgia a couple hundred years ago and set up shop here for a while. That was pretty much the only interesting that ever happened in Crestview, so they named the school after him and put up the statue.

     It was probably nice when they erected it, about a thousand years ago. Now however, it was clear that, like the town itself, Hernando had seen better days.

     What was presumably once the picture of a braver pioneer; a striking man with a Spanish flag in his hand, his foot propped up on a rock, and a devilish smirk on his face, was now all but gone. The bronze was dull and dingy. The statue’s sharp lines and edges had been flattened with time, and that devilish grin was barely a grin now at all.

     “Forgive me, Hernando,” I said, stuffing my inhaler back into my pocket. “Look,” my foot started tapping against the pavement. Yep, I was nervous. “Long distance relationships never work, not even in the movies.”

     “That might be true, but it’s been working for them for about two years now,” Casper answered. The light tilt had vanished from his voice. “He has a girlfriend Cress, a girlfriend who is not you.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “I don’t want you to get hurt, and I don’t want things to get weird between you guys. Besides, if he doesn’t see how insanely awesome you are, he doesn’t deserve you.”

     Okay, that was sweet, and there might even be some truth in it. But I wasn’t looking for sweet, and I wasn’t looking for anything to slow me down. It had taken me close to two years to work up the nerve to tell Owen how I felt about him. If I let Casper talk me out of it now, good intentions or not, I might never do it. And I couldn’t deal with that.

     I ran a hand through my wavy blond hair like I always did when I was trying to collect myself. “Look, I know you wanna protect me and everything.”

     “It’s cause I’m a Southern gentleman,” he smiled. We both knew there were a couple freshman girls who might disagree with that, but I let it slide.

     “Look at my hands, Casper.” They had traveled from my hair to the inside of my pockets.

     “Hands in pockets,” he said.

     “And what do hands in pockets mean?” I asked.

     His mouth twisted crookedly. “Means there’s nothing in heaven or hell that’s gonna get through that thick head of yours.”

     Casper knew me well enough to know that once I was set on something I was set. I looped my arm through his.

     “I’ve gotta tell him. That way, either way, at least he’ll know. You know?”

     “I know,” he answered, and squeezed my hand.

     We walked together into the school. Pushing through the doors, I turned to give Hernando one last glance, and saw what looked like the tinted black Sedan from Mrs. Goolsby’s passing slowly by.

Chapter 2

He Died Laughing

     I stood by my locker, watching the only entrance Owen could come in, and waiting for him. He was usually early, which is why I made it a point to be extra early. I wanted to have time to get my thoughts in order, to sort of feel the air around me, and come up with exactly the right thing to say.

     I had been stroking these feelings for so long now, building it up in my head, that I needed to do this right. Even if he said no, even if he looked at me like some love struck idiot, I wanted to be clear.

     He wasn’t early today though. I must have run my hands through my hair a thousand times, watching the door and trying to act nonchalant as other students started to pour in.

     I had never been the most popular person in DeSoto. Hell, I’m sure if you asked them, most of the other sophomores probably couldn’t tell you my name. They’d say I was the new girl, or Casper’s friend, or the chick from Chicago whose dad died. It’s not that they didn’t like me. At least, that’s not the way I took it. I always figured they sort of saw me as an outsider; an unnecessary addition that came along once they were set in their ways.

     Everybody in Crestview seemed to have known each other since forever; like they made phone calls from the uterus or something. Their mothers knew each other. Their fathers hunted together. Sure, the fact that my mom was head of nursing (and pretty popular come flu season) might have got me a little attention, but that only lasted so long. And, if I’m being honest, I never did much to garner any affection.

     Aside from Casper and Owen, for whom I had a different sort of affection, I never made much time for the kids in Crestview. They always seemed so silly to me; so small. They were obsessed with country music, with the DeSoto Excavators Friday night football games and, worst of all, with each other.

     Every day there was a new rumor. Claire Collins dumped Randy Gentry after she caught him cheating with her sister. Wade Reynolds got suspended for sneaking peppermint schmaltz into the boys’ locker room. Susie Townser spent six months in Wyoming, but it wasn’t for a spiritual retreat. Claire Collins dumped Randy Gentry again after she found incriminating pictures of the cheerleading squad on his cellphone.

     Those two were like Chris Brown and Rihanna minus the domestic abuse.

     It was like none of them could see past the town limits; like there wasn’t a whole wide world out there full of amazing stuff. I couldn’t live that way. I had seen that world, I had lived in it. So, if I didn’t exactly fit in Middle-of-Nowhere, Georgia, well I could think of worse things.

     Owen wasn’t like that though. He was an outsider too. He was stuck just like me. He understood, and hopefully he would understand what I was about to tell him.

     If he ever bothered to show up, that is.

     “Bell’s about to ring Cress,” Casper said. He was standing next to me, his foot propped up against a locker, sucking on a bright red Tootsie Pop.

     “He’ll be here,” I insisted, scratching my face. I had snuck off to the bathroom to put some makeup on for my big moment. I mustn’t have done it right though because my face was itching like crazy. Mom had never been the sort to use a lot of makeup. I guess when you spend all your time sticking needles into sick people; there isn’t much need for it. As a result, I never really figured out how to apply the stupid stuff.

     Still, I must have done it okay, because Casper hadn’t seemed to notice. Which is good because, if he did, he’d no doubt have a field day with it.

     “Maybe he’s sick,” Casper suggested through a mouthful of the sucker.

     “Maybe,” I muttered, and ran my fingers through my hair again.

     He turned to me, pulled the sucker from his mouth, and put his chin on my shoulder. His breath was cherry and chocolate when he said, “Don’t kill yourself about it, Cress. You’ve always got me.”

     I knew what was coming next; the same thing he said since the instant he heard my last name.

     “Casper Rhodes and Cresta Karr. Karr and Rhodes,” he smiled. “See, ‘cause cars drive on roads.”

     “I get it,” I said, ruffling his red hair. “You don’t have to kill the metaphor.”

     He scrunched his nose and peered at me from over his glasses. “Is that rouge?”

     Luckily, that was when Owen finally decided to arrive.

     “I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said and pulled away from him. He clanged against the lockers, catching his balance and tried to look cool in front of the freshman girls that passed.

     “How you doing?” He waved at them. “I totally meant to do that, by the way.”

     Not that it mattered to me, but Owen was less than his spectacular self as he drudged into the hallway. His black hair was still wet, presumably from the shower, and brushed lazily to the side, making it look like sloshed mud on his head. There were huge dark circles under his eyes, and he was pulling at his jacket, suggesting that, even now, he was still getting dressed.

     I walked toward him, a super bright smile plastered across my face; the same sort of smile I imagined Merrin wore when she was picking flowers, or surfing, or whatever it is perfect California girls do in their free time.

     “Hey,” I purred, and tilted my head a little to the left. I saw Angelina Jolie do that once in a movie, and the guy completely melted. She had a pistol strapped to her thigh at the time, but I figured it was worth a shot.

     “Did you do the math homework?” he asked, looking past me.

     Angelina Jolie, I was not.

     “I-“

     “I overslept. Plus, I didn’t do the math homework. Plus, I left a red shirt in the washing machine and now all my socks and underwear are pink. Plus, I think I have an inner ear infection.”

     Okay, so he wasn’t exactly Brad Pitt today either. But I had made up my mind. I was doing this. I brushed off everything he had said and put my hand on his shoulder. He didn’t seem to notice.

     “I wanted to talk to you about something.” I stared at him, making sure my green eyes synched up with his deep blue ones perfectly. The look in them must have been telling, because this time he did notice something was up.

     “Is everything all right?” He asked, biting his lip, which he always did when he was nervous, and which I thought was just about the cutest thing ever.

     “Yeah, everything’s fine. It’s just-“

     The bell sounded, cutting into my words. I felt his shoulder tense.

     “Can we do this later?” He asked. The rest of the student body was busy filing into their respective homerooms and I could tell from the look on his face that he didn’t want to be late.

     No. This wasn’t the right time.

     “Sure,” I said, and took my hand off his shoulder. He smiled that electric smile that had been front and center in my dreams since the day I met him.

     “Thanks, Cress. Look me up at lunch or something, okay”

     “Sure thing,” I grinned.

     But then, something else happened. He leaned in close, his pool blue eyes inspecting me. I caught the scent of him on the air. I felt his breath against my cheek. For a second, I thought he was going to kiss me, and my heart started pounding in my chest like a jackhammer against the pavement.

     “You have schmutz on your face,” he said.

     Okay. Not gonna kiss me.

     “Red schmutz,” he continued.

     He put his hand on my face and started rubbing which, if it wasn’t the most embarrassing moment of my life, would have probably been nice.

     “I don’t know. Maybe you should run to the bathroom before class.” He gave me a smile and a ‘We’re such great buddies’ pat on the shoulder, and then he was off.

     I almost limped back to Casper, who wasn’t even trying to hold in his laughter.

     “Not a word,” I said, but he keeled over, holding his stomach and howling in delight.

     “That was the greatest thing I’ve ever seen in my life,” he said. “My tombstone’s gonna read: Here lies Casper Rhodes. He died laughing.”

     I had three classes with Owen before lunch; History, where I watched him struggle to stay awake through Mrs. Gilman’s forty-three minute lecture about the Cotton Tax and its effect on the Civil War, and Science, where he chewed on the end of his pencil and stared out the window. I had never wanted to be an eraser so badly in my entire life.

     I almost talked to him in Math class. I stood outside the door, waiting for him after the bell rang. When he didn’t come out, I went back in. He didn’t see me. He was standing at Mr. Jacobs’ desk, holding out a sheet of paper. I could see that the paper was blank, save for a giant smiley face he had drawn in the center in red crayon.

     “What’s this?” Mr. Jacobs asked, taking the paper.

     “It’s my math homework,” Owen answered, without cracking a smile.

     “No, it’s not. This is rubbish.”

     Owen folded his arms and leaned toward the desk a little, “Look again. It’s my homework, and I think you’ll see it’s all correct.”

     Mr. Jacobs seemed confused but, when he turned the paper back toward him he said, “My mistake. I don’t know what I was thinking. Good job on this.”

     Before Owen could come out, before I could ask him what all that was about, Margie Connor, who thought that just ‘cause she got a sash and a demerit card, she was the queen of the hall monitors, shooed me toward Language Arts.

     Lunch came with a caveat that I hadn’t considered. It was Thursday, which meant the meatheads that made up the DeSoto High Excavators would spend their entire lunch period going over plays and strategies for Friday night’s game. They’d flick fish sticks at each other and talk about how they were going to ‘completely own’ whatever poor team had the misfortune of having to come to this excuse of a town to play.