Soon-to-be Dead Boys by Kylee Awiech

Author:Kylee Awiech [Awiech, Kylee]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kylee Gomez

TWENTY-TWO

Monday September 12th 6:00 PM

Everyone is on time for once. Everyone but Officer Ken. He’d been here for a moment when I came to set up chairs, but disappeared with a coughing fit. That was ten minutes ago.

I glance back at my team. Topher and DJ have their heads pressed together, laughing at a video on DJ’s phone. Shelby, Anika, and Ben are sitting on top of a table in the corner, swinging their legs while they talk. I pretend to get busy with fixing a stack of chairs near them.

“I don’t want to go with him, but I’m scared to say no,” Shelby says, twirling her hair around her finger.

“Just tell him you have a date already,” Ben says.

“But I don’t and he’ll see that.”

“I could go with you,” Ben says nonchalantly. I get the feeling he would absolutely love that.

Shelby snorts. “You’re in middle school. They won’t let you in.”

Ben blushes and slides the tiniest bit away from her.

“You shouldn’t have to have a date to say no to someone,” Anika says.

Shelby sighs. “That’s what people say, but it never actually works.”

“It’s the truth though.”

Shelby says something so quietly, I don’t catch it. I do see the way her face hardens though. All three of them stop swinging their legs. Whatever Shelby just said, it was serious.

“What’s his name?” Anika growls.

“Don’t worry about it,” Shelby says quickly.

“That’s not okay. I’m going to talk to him.”

“No. You can’t. Forget I said anything.” Shelby’s eyes are huge.

Anika is about to say something, but the door opens and Officer Ken walks in. I go over to him. His face is pale and his eyes are watering. He takes a swig from a new reusable water bottle.

“Ellie, I’m going to let you lead tonight.”

“Sounds great.” I grab my backpack and reach for my notebook filled with Pathfinder lesson plans. I’d worked on them during COVID while I’d been dreaming of this day. It’s not in my bag. Why isn’t it in my bag? Instead, I have my notebook filled with theories about the River Boys. It’s not like I don’t have room for another notebook. How could I forget my Pathfinders one?

I’m drawing a blank on what else we need to practice for the competition. We’ve already covered the SWAT scenario. What else is there? I run through the previous competitions in my head. As soon as we arrive and settle into our hotels, everyone meets on the field for––

“We need to do a proper uniform inspection,” I say. I can’t believe I’ve forgotten to work on this, the very first event. I’m slipping up, again, as team leader.

Officer Ken nods. “You’ll have to run it, my voice is shot.”

Great. It’ll be nice to have an excuse to yell at people. Especially Anika. I turn to the group. “Uniform inspection. Line up.”

Topher, Shelby, and DJ fly to the little cupboard in the corner of the room where we keep the plastic guns. Ben follows after them, looking confused. This will be his first inspection, so I’ll go easier on him.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.