Fear Me, Fear Me Not by Elodie Nowodazkij

Author:Elodie Nowodazkij [Nowodazkij, Elodie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2016-09-27T04:00:00+00:00

The coach’s house isn’t small, but when you got all the football players and their families and their girlfriends showing up, it’s hard to move around. Some of the cheerleaders are here. Shawna is crying in a corner with Mrs. Rodriguez, the cheerleading coach, comforting her.

“Dimi!” Nadia waves from the kitchen, where she and Liam are helping Mrs. Miller with the coleslaw. “Come and make yourself useful, will ya?” Her eyes are red and her voice shakes. Liam kisses her cheek and whispers in her ear.

I brush elbows with the coach, who turns to me. “Thank you for coming. Hearing about Rachel and Kim is hard. They were good girls.” His little girl barrels down the living room and he looks at her, full of worry. “They were that age once too. This is all so crazy. I thought about cancelling tonight but then I thought people could see each other, talk about them, talk about football. Forget without forgetting.” He clears his throat. “I wanted to tell you that you did good on Friday.”

“Thanks, Coach.” He nods and gathers his little girl in his arms. She smiles at me, her curly hair flying around her face. “Shawna doesn’t want to play,” she says, and Coach Miller hugs her tightly before putting her down. “Why don’t I see if I can find that drawing you started this morning? Maybe you can finish it and give it to Shawna. I’m sure she’ll love that.” He gives me a small wave before heading toward the living room.

In the kitchen, his wife is balancing plates of hamburgers and bowls of chips. “I need to get back out. You guys got the salads, right?”

Liam and Nadia nod. Nadia brings one salad to the living room and then settles in the kitchen again. She bumps her hip into mine. “How are you feeling?”

I sigh loudly. “I don’t know. How about you?”

She grabs a bowl of salad. “I don’t know. The cheer meeting was so sad and Shawna can’t stop crying. I told her she should maybe go home but she kept on saying how much cheering meant to Rachel and Kim. How much fun they had. She really wants to participate in Homecoming.”

“I’m not sure. I’m not sure we should be doing anything until we catch him. The sheriff was saying how the killer is clearly escalating, how he reached a new level and that he doesn’t think the killings will stop until he’s arrested.”

Mrs. Lowry—our quarterback’s mom—strolls our way. Her brown hair doesn’t bounce as she moves. Mom used to tell me how those meetings were important for the parents too, how it was turning more into a social event. She forces a smile out. Her fingers play with her pearls. “You’re impressing the team, Dimi. They were talking about how you’re motivating them and pushing them. They love you.”

It seems like she wants to pretend it’s a normal Sunday evening at Coach’s house and if that helps her deal with what’s going on, I should follow her lead.

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