Snitch (The Bea Catcher Chronicles) (11 page)

Knock. Knock.
“Bea? Can I come in?”

My dream whooshes out the window, washes into the gutter, and down onto the wet lawn, forming a fantasy puddle that will evaporate, I’m sure, by morning.

Mom enters and hands me my astronomy book. “You left this on the kitchen counter. Thought you might need it.”

“Oh, thanks.” I take it from her and shut the window.

“How was the meeting?”

“It was okay.”

She scrunches up her forehead. “What happened to the one after school? The same thing that happened to the one before school?”

Crap.
“Um . . . like I said to Dad, Eva Marie needed my help—you know, with her portfolio.”

She sits on the edge of my bed. “Bea, is there anything we need to worry about?”

I laugh. “All you do is worry. You need more?”

Her eyes narrow.

“Mom, I’ve just got a lot going on, with school, AA, Wendell . . .”
A murder case.

“Uh-huh.” Eye contact still zeroing in.

I sit at my desk, open my astronomy book, and fake a yawn. She stays seated on my bed—not picking up the cue that it’s time to leave. “I’d better get some more studying done before I hit the sack.”

She doesn’t move.

“Is there something you need, Mom?”

“Are you going to keep your hair in twists?”

“What? I was thinking about it, yeah. Why?”

“Well, I was tossing around ideas about your birthday present and thought maybe you’d like to have your hair
relaxed . . . while you’re growing it out. We could do a mother/daughter day at the salon. How does that sound?”

I pull at a coil. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I like my hair like this. It feels good. True to me.”

She shrugs. “It’s a little . . . ethnic-looking.”

I whip around and face her. “Ethnic? You mean black?”

She fluffs a pillow that doesn’t need fluffing. “You’re not
just
—”

“I know. I get it, Mom. I’m African American
and
Italian American. But, honestly, when people look at me . . . what they see is that I’m black.”

The fluff of the pillow morphs into a punch. “Well, that hairstyle doesn’t help.”

She blinks a couple times, telling me she knows she went too far.

“Are you kidding me?” I cross to my closet and grab a sweatshirt. It’s suddenly very chilly in here. “Wow. I’m sorry I’m so disappointing. I’m sorry if I resemble Dad more than you.”

“Oh, Bea. You’re beautiful. You know I think that.”

“You used to. You had no problem back in the day with my
ethnicity
as you put it. You’re the one who bought me my first black Barbie doll, remember?”

She stands, smoothing my bedspread where she was sitting because there’s no way she can smooth the kink out of my hair. “I’m sorry I brought it up. I thought it would be fun to go to the salon with you. It seems like we haven’t been connecting lately.”

“That’s for sure,” I mumble.

And then she basically remakes my bed. Pillows thrown, quilt on the ground. She shoots the sheet up high into the air, and it parachutes down, the same place it friggin’ was.

“Mom. Stop making the bed.”

She does. Her eyes are unusually sad. And I think I know why: guilt. The only obvious gene that Mom’s passed down to me (besides the faint moustache that I have to wax every two weeks or so—oh yeah, and my short-fuse temper) is the addict gene. Yup. Mom’s been sober for more than ten years now. I don’t know the whole story—don’t know if I want to know—what her screwups were. I sort of remember some messes when I was a little girl—deep down, pushed away memories. But she obviously fucked up enough to quit drinking. Just like her little girl.

“It’s late. I have to get up early for work.” She walks to the door. “Mr. Connelly is expecting me at eight.”

“Mr. Connelly? You have to call your boss Mr.?”

“Well, it’s Mike, Michael, but yeah, I like to keep it professional. Good night, Bea. Sweet dreams.” She closes the door.

Sweet dreams?
Not happening. I rip out the page of the moon-and-stars tattoo—crumble it up. Open and then throw it out the window, hoping it drowns in the puddle with the fantasy.

I plop down on my bed and put a pillow over my face.
What am I doing? Dreaming? Fantasizing. I’m only setting myself up for disappointment. . . . Everything is already mapped out. Just let it be.

Let it be.

Let it Bea . . .

I jump up—sit upright on my bed.
Mike Connelly . . . MC. Oh my god, her client, Mike Connelly—that’s who she was thinking of, who she was texting.

4 days
12 hours
45 minutes

“O
kay, class.” Mr. Pogen hands out tests. “This is our last quiz before the final exam next month. Take your time, use your notes, ask your fellow classmates. This will serve as your study sheet for the final. I promise you, no surprises. It’s all here.”

I love Mr. Pogen, as does every other senior. Astronomy, specifically the Sea of Tranquility, is the most popular class last semester—rarely skipped, even though senioritis runs through the halls like rabid rats. The class is jam-packed with over fifty students, sitting everywhere from the floor to windowsills—partly because the class is an easy A, but mostly because Mr. Pogen is the coolest dude on the whole planet, probably the whole solar system.

I choose to sit on the floor in the corner of the room. Knowing I’ll have to put a pen to paper, I face away from the
other students and toward the bookcase. Chris gets it, of course, and joins me—so it doesn’t seem too weird.

My stupid
skill
is a real hassle at school. I found out the hard way and know some stuff about the teachers that I really don’t want to know. So I try to never hold a pen in my classes. I explained that I’m an auditory learner and record lectures on my phone. I thought it was pretty clever of me, and most of the teachers were fine with it. I mean, there’s a lot more crap happening in their classrooms that they should be worrying about rather than a student recording what they’re saying. But somebody complained to Principal Chump Nathanson. He tried to stop me, threatened to take my phone, but I’m acing every class, so he didn’t have much ground to stand on and had to drop it.

Pencils scratching, whispering, pages turning—everyone’s engaged. I’m drawing, labeling the fire constellations—the stars in the sword, flame, and the snake—when the door slams open, and in walks another snake: Zac.

“You’re late.” Mr. Pogen calmly states the obvious.

“Like I really need this class.” Zac snickers, looks around as if seeking validation. Nobody pays attention to him. He tries again. “You know, like, ’cause I got into Cornell.”

What an ass.

“Congratulations!” Mr. Pogen responds with genuine enthusiasm. “You’re very lucky. I’m sure the stars were aligned accordingly when you took the SAT.”

“Whatta you mean by that?” Zac’s face gets all splotchy red.
And then the twitch thing happens—big time. His head jerks to the left, and he spots me sitting on the floor. Our eyes lock, and (
oh, no, no, no, no, please no
) . . . pencil to paper, something starts crawling in, scraggly lines, strands of hair, forming a triangle on a chin—what looks like a beard or a goatee.

“Mr. Posen?” Billy Weisman jumps off the windowsill with an unlit cigarette in his mouth. “I gotta take a leak.”

“Go right ahead, Billy.”

Billy passes Zac on the way out of the room, shoves his shoulder into him, and mimes a zipper closing on his mouth—does it superfast.

No. It can’t be.
I look back down at the scratches on the paper.
Billy’s soul patch? Holy crap, I drew his goatee! Did he take the test for Zac? No way. He wouldn’t have, couldn’t have. . . . Could he have?

My phone buzzes with a text from Daniels:

DANIELS: usual place. 4.

4 days
8 hours
48 minutes

I
make my way down the gully. The rain has stopped for the time being, but my red Converse high-tops and the bottom of my long, tie-dyed jersey maxi skirt gets soaked. (Chris and I had spent one lazy Saturday afternoon tie-dyeing clothes—we were so proud of ourselves until my mom threw a hissy fit because the indigo-blue dye also tie-dyed the dryer. The drum is still blue to this day.)

I crawl through the window—not easy with the skirt, but I wasn’t planning on coming here. He’s standing, waiting for me, wearing a green-checked button-down shirt, kind of nerdy-looking, but it makes the irises of his eyes stand out like two lime-flavored lollipops, and yes, I have the urge to lick them.

“What’s up? Everything okay?”

“We made a major bust at Skyline High yesterday afternoon.”

“Really? Wow. What happened?”

“In the middle of the night it popped into my head—”

“Nice to hear someone else has things popping in his head.” I walk past him and plop my bag down on the bench.

“I kept thinking about the tennis balls you drew out of that kid.”

I whip around. “What? No, no . . . I told you that sketch meant nothing.”
Shit. I didn’t have time to check it out yet.

“But they did, Bea—you nailed it again. I looked into it a little more—brought in the narcs again, but this time with the help of a drug-sniffing dog. Searched the whole school. The scent lead them to an old shed behind the gym, filled with discarded sports equipment. And in the corner, a netted bag with dozens of tennis balls slit and stuffed, packed with drugs—cocaine, acid, pot. Can you believe it? It was a major bust, Bea. Someone was literally rolling the goods.” He chuckles.

I don’t.
Oh my god. They’re going to think Junior snitched. Act cool, breathe.
I sit on the bench. “Okay, so now you have more evidence? To keep him locked away for a long time, right?”
That will keep him off the streets—keep him safe.
“I knew he was guilty; I told you that.”

“Yeah, that bust would’ve been enough to hold him, but . . .” Daniels looks down. “There’s something else.” He crouches in front of me, puts his hands on my knees. “There was an incident.”

My stomach jolts. “What? What happened?”

“Junior—he was shot.”

“What?”

“He’s in surgery at St. Joseph’s. They don’t know if he’ll make it.”

I jump up, pace the dusty room, squeezing my head between my hands.
No, no, no. This can’t be happening.
My eyes burn; my breath is held tightly inside my chest. “But, but . . . how did it happen? He was in custody.” My voice sounds like it’s outside of my body—coming from somewhere, somebody else.

“I couldn’t keep him. The sentencing hearing for the pot was scheduled for next week. . . . He was free to go.”

“What? You let him walk out? No protection?”

“I had to. There was nothing we could do. He was targeted, ambushed right outside his house last night after he was dropped off—someone wanted him dead, Bea.”

“So it was after the bust at Skyline?”

“Yeah. A few hours later.”

Fuck!
“Who picked him up?”

“His coach—they call him Credos. He’s a good man, cares about the kids on his team—keeps them out of trouble, off the streets.”

I think of the gruff face on the YouTube video.

“This hit him hard, the coach. He’s a mess. Says he took Junior to his house, didn’t even get halfway down the block when he heard a gunshot. He was already down—hit in the temple. No one saw anything, it happened so fast.”

I grab my purse off the bench. “I’ve got to get out of here.” I rush to the window.

“Bea.” He puts his hands on my shoulder. “What’s wrong? I thought you’d be pleased about what you drew—what we found.”

I push his hands off. “Pleased about someone getting shot?”

“I hate to say it, but it was inevitable. His whole family has been involved with gangs. I think you were right. Junior could have been dealing, could have killed Jamal. I have to admit maybe I was wrong about him.”

I throw my sketchbook on the floor. “I’m not doing this anymore . . . this drawing shit. No more.” I push at the plywood and climb out the window.

Daniels is fast after me. “Bea, stop. What’s going on?”

I forge ahead, run down the hill, slip in my sneakers, and fall on my butt on the wet grass. The homeless man is hanging his wet socks on the branches of a scraggly sapling at the bank of the river, his box standing upended, soaked. He walks toward me, holds out his hand.

I wipe my eyes, pull out my wallet, and hand him a couple bucks. “It’s all I have.”

He waves it off. “No. No. I just wanted to help you up.”

I take his hand, and he pulls me off the wet ground. “Are you okay?” he asks.

“No, I’m not okay.” I take off running—cross the bridge—tears flowing.
He knew he’d be hurt, and I’m the one who ratted on him. It was because of me that he was hit. I’m the snitch.

4 days
7 hours
50 minutes

I
drive straight over to Skyline High, to the Kodiak Kidz team practice, and immediately take note of a couple police cars in the parking lot. Damn. They’re keeping an eye on the place, and one of them is Detective Cole, leaning against his car, laughing his stupid cackle.

I for sure don’t want him to recognize me and figure I’d better get my gangsta-look going. So I tug Billy’s baseball cap over my twists, tuck them in, and even though it’s warm—a humid sixty-something degrees—I pull on the heavy, baggy sweatpants under my skirt, slip the skirt off, and throw on Chris’s red, loose pullover hoodie.

I look at myself in the rearview mirror. My allergies are jacked up—my eyes have been tearing since meeting with Daniels, so my eye makeup is nonexistent. The inside of my nostrils feels inflamed as hell, like the little hairs are pinpricks—scratching, tickling, and stirring up a massive amount of gunk.
Sweat beads above my lip. I wipe my face with a red bandana and then tuck it in my sweatpants pocket.

It’s a little after four, and the athletic field below is bustling with activity. Various teams are working out, practicing—cheerleaders perfect a pyramid, pole-vaulters vault, runners sprint on the track.
Jocks.
Never understood them, never will. I stink at sports, was humiliated in fourth grade when I couldn’t do a headstand in PE. It seems really lame right now, thinking back on it, but when you’re nine years old and every other girl around you can pop her long legs up in the air like
what’s the big deal?
and you can’t, it sucks.