Derailed by Jon Ripslinger

Author:Jon Ripslinger
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: YA, young, adult, young adult, fiction, teen
Publisher: Llewellyn Worldwide, LTD.
Published: 2011-09-13T00:00:00+00:00

fourteen

After football practice that night, I ventured into

McDonald’s to have a few—final—in-your-face words with Mindy Hillman. She needed to know that if she ever wrote on a restroom wall about me, or someone I knew, I’d think seriously about wringing her neck.

But I didn’t spot her behind the counter, in the kitchen, or at the drive-thru window.

“May I help you?” A counter girl I didn’t recognize smiled at me.

The place was warm inside and smelled of French fries. My stomach was rumbling.

“Two double cheeseburgers, big fries, and a large Coke.”

“For here or to go?”

“Here.” I released my special get-acquainted smile for the new counter girl. “Mindy Hillman’s not working? I’m a friend of hers.”

“Uh-uh. She didn’t show this afternoon. I got called in for her.” The girl smiled back. Nice white teeth. “Will that be all, sir?”

“That’s all.” I thanked her, paid her, waited a minute or two for my food, then sat down and ate.

Something was wrong here. Mindy might skip school a lot, and she hated her job, but she never took off work. She needed the money. Her mom gave her nothing.

Something was definitely wrong.

• • •

On the way home, I stopped by Brian’s house, a new brick home surrounded by oak trees on a hill, just on the edge of Hickory Ridge. The name of the street was Grandview Lane. Nice.

His mom let me in, said she was glad to see me, and ushered me to his bedroom. I plunked down in the chair in front of his computer desk. Posters of his old-time heroes hung everywhere on the walls: John Elway, Bart Starr, Terry Bradshaw, and lots more.

Trophies for baseball and football sat on every shelf and every other available flat space, like on his dresser and on top of the TV.

Dressed in jeans and T-shirt, he lay on his bed watching ESPN, remote in hand.

I said, “How you doin’, dumbshit?”

For a moment, he didn’t look at me. Then he said, “You ratted on me, didn’t you?”

“They had it figured out, man. They’re not stupid.”

“I never figured you’d do that.”

He sat up and jammed his pillow behind his back.

“You had to tell them your arm hurt,” I said. “The sooner the better.”

“Maybe at the end of the season.”

“What? When you had stats? Or when your arm turned into a dishrag?”

He didn’t look at me and started flipping through channels.

I said, “What happened exactly?”

He dropped the remote beside himself on the bed. “After practice the other night when I got home, I felt weak. Light-headed, I guess. I’d passed some blood. I didn’t tell anyone.”

“That was smart.”

“I went to bed early. Got up during the night, and my mom heard me stumbling around in the bathroom. I finally told her I didn’t feel very well.”

“Jesus! I can’t believe you waited so long.”

“She took my temp—I didn’t have a fever. But she couldn’t find my pulse. Then I passed out. My folks called nine-one-one. They hauled me over to Genesis.”

“Man, that was close. What’s with the arm?”

As

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