Now I know that’s not the way things work. You can’t become the favorite child. If the favorite disappears or dies, she’s just gone, and the leftover child is still the one who will never measure up. Only now, that leftover child has a new label to add to all the baggage.
Now she’s the child who should have fallen instead.
I shudder to think of another possible label for me—one I’ve locked away. One I hope my parents never discover.
I press my fingers against the little charm dangling from my neck as we slip into the afternoon sunlight. Mr. Davis unlocks the large black athletics cabinet and starts extracting backpacks. Everyone seems to have an assigned pack. Lumberjack and Humsalot, whose actual names are Sam and Abby, grab theirs. One by one, the rest disappear, leaving only a bright red pack behind.
I pad up to it and find Piper’s name scrawled on a luggage tag.
The familiar handwriting sends a swell of sadness through me, but I find my voice as the others start lugging equipment to the empty common area. “Mr. Davis, is it okay if I use my sister’s pack today?”
He looks up from a cardboard box full of supplies. “Uh, sure. Go ahead.”
I can’t envision Piper wearing this, or even knowing how to use it. The thing has ninety-seven different pouches and snaps. I grab it by a strap and carry it over to where the others have gathered on the gum-encrusted cement and the food-smeared lunch benches. Why did my sister join this club?
Most people in Grayling’s Pass fall on a spectrum of outdoor enthusiasts. It’s kind of unavoidable if you grow up here, with all of the sights and activities at your fingertips. A lot of kids spend the scalding summers fishing or rafting on the icy Golden River, which starts up on Mount Liberty and snakes all the way down to the outskirts of town. When the weather’s more forgiving, we have our pick of dozens of day hikes.
Piper was always the exception, though. She came back sobbing from her first and last camping trip with Jacey and her dad, something about losing her magnifying glass and not having access to her microscope. Jacey and Noah used to drag her off on hikes to get her out in the sunlight. She would do anything for those two.
Is that why she joined this club? She wanted extra time with her two besties?
I plop down beside Grant, Piper’s pack between my feet as Mr. Davis begins his demonstration.
“A hiker’s backpack is only effective if it’s packed correctly. Please follow along on the gear list.” He picks up a massive orange pack, pointing at the array of mesh pouches and commenting on their various uses.
A minute into the demonstration, Grant is immersed in his phone. He already knows all this stuff. Jacey too. But Piper? She and our science professor parents are alike in every way. Complete geniuses. Completely inept when it comes to the outdoors. Maybe that’s why someone gave her that note; they realized how out of her depth she was and pranked her.
I shift the pack, noting the bulk at the base where the tent must be stored. I flip it over and unzip the first small pouch, inside which, fittingly, Piper has stuffed a pen and paper. Because those will come in super handy if you’re starving or attacked by a bear out in the wild.
I zip it shut and glance up at Mr. Davis, pretending to pay attention. As I do, I catch Alexandra watching me. Resisting the urge to stick my tongue out at her like a five-year-old, I continue working my way through the bag. It’s my sister’s stuff, and I’ll dig through it if I want to.
I shove my whole arm into the main compartment. Empty. I move on to a medium-sized pouch that runs along the front. There’s a hard object inside, so I lift the flap, reach inside, and pull out a compass. At least she has one useful item. Something else seems to be tucked into the bottom of the pocket. I dig my fingertips in deeper.
But my attention whips to the flap itself. I lift it again, and my heart pushes up into my throat.
There’s a message, rough and clumsy, written in thick white marker on the underside of the flap.
Quit Survival Club or ELSE.
Chapter 4
Grant and I exit the double doors of the school and head toward the parking lot. I showed him the threat in Piper’s pack, but we haven’t had a moment alone to discuss it. Mr. Davis wrapped up the meeting by making us play some wilderness bonding game. The pack was too massive to steal, so now it’s back in the equipment locker until I can return for it later.
This whole last month, I’ve believed my sister tried to kill herself. But maybe that’s not what happened at all. My mind returns to the note tucked away in my back pocket—the one written on school stationery, sending Piper to a fake club meeting.
And now there’s this message written in her pack.Or ELSE. Did someone not only send her to the place she fell but follow through on that threat?
It just doesn’t make sense. Everyone loved perfect Piper.
We get inside Grant’s truck, and I finally blurt the question that’s been battering my brain for the last hour. “Who the hell wrote that message in Piper’s pack?”
Grant frowns. “The packs get reused when club members graduate. Piper could’ve inherited a bag that already had that in it.”
“Who had that bag last year?”
“I think it was Eric’s.”
“Can you think of anyone who would’ve threatened Eric?” I ask, struggling to even remember a kid named Eric.