Page 78 of Magical Academy for Delinquents
His pudgy hand reached out—
But the vision changed. The image on the wall swirled and suddenly there were two hands on a steering wheel. An older man’s hands with a wedding ring. His voice filled the room, excited. “Yeah, they found it! I can’t believe it. We’ve been working on this for six years. And just when I thought I’d lost all hope …” It was my dad’s voice. But … that would mean this memory was from before my dad died.
My throat caught. I leaned against the table; not sure I could handle seeing something from before Dad passed. Even if it was just his drive home from the grocery store.
There was an awkward pause in the memory—a long span of silence where the car stood still at a stop sign much longer than necessary—and Grayson looked toward me, confused. “Phone call?” he mouthed.
I shrugged. But an eerie feeling swept over me as I watched and listened and the car started to move again. Grayson must have noticed, because he walked over and stood next to me. “You okay, nemesis?”
“I dunno,” I whispered back.
On the wall, the view turned to look out at the sunset that sent orange streaks across the passenger seat. I recognized that tan leather. It was from the car my dad bought once he thought the Porsche would be a good gift for Matthew. He’d only had that car for six months … this memory had to be close to his death.
My hand slipped into Grayson’s. I started squeezing his fingers as I watched the screen. My heart wasn’t quite to full panic mode yet, but the steady thud-thud sped up when Dad’s voice spoke again. “Yeah … yeah, I guess I can wait for you. Let me just pull over here. Yeah. Um, I’m by Sixth and Marron. By the train tracks.”
My heart sprinted to the edge of the Grand Canyon and leapt off.
Dad kept talking. “Yeah. I’m gonna call Trudy, she’ll be so excited … oh. Yeah. You’re right. Better wait to tell her after.”
I realized I’d tucked myself into Grayson’s side. “Sorry,” I shook my head and tried to back away. But the tears started when Dad parked on the side of an empty street and put his favorite song on the car stereo. “Desperado” played through the speakers. Dad started to sing off-key. Grayson pulled me into his side and Zavier somehow squished in between me and the table, taking up my other hand.
“Hey, hey, what’s wrong?” Z whispered, tucking a strand of my hair back.
My eyes didn’t leave the screen. They were glued there, terrified and mesmerized at once as the sunset burned a brilliant red before it started to dip.
“I think … this might be the night my dad died,” I whispered. My hands started shaking.
“We can stop, Hales,” Z whispered in my ear. “Just ask your dad to leave Evan.”
I shook my head. “No. We can’t.”
“Yeah we can,” Grayson tried to pull away from me and step toward Evan, but I yanked him back.
“No. We can’t,” I growled. “My dad got hit by a train. There was basically nothing left … But you just heard him. Someone went to meet him that night. There could have been someone else in the car with him. Some family out there somewhere could think their loved one went missing. Got kidnapped. Somebody might have been suffering three whole years, not knowing.”
Bile rolled through my stomach as the sun set within the floating mirror and the view turned toward the clock dial. 7:52 p.m. My father had died at 8:03. I started to sway where I stood, but when each of the guys tried to convince me to at least sit, I refused.
“Shut up,” Malcolm growled at them. “This is her truth. She wants the truth.”
The sky in the floating mirror grew dark and my imagination ran wild. Until there was a rap at the glass. Grayson immediately turned toward the glass window on the side of the study room. But the tapping wasn’t from there. It was from my father’s memory.
Dad’s hand pressed the unlock button and the passenger door opened. A man’s legs were visible. Then he bent and climbed into the sports car.
Claude King sat down.
My insides snapped like whips. I was stripped raw. “Claude,” I whispered.
Claude turned to face my dad, an eerie look in his eyes. “You have it?”
Dad’s hands reached into his coat pocket.
My heart started thumping-pumping-jumping. My head started spinning, spinning, spinning, pinnings, inningsp, nningspi, ningspin …—…— …
Dad took out a glowing red vial. It looked like neon.
The world slowed down.
My existence narrowed.
