It’s just a strange thing to do.

SIXTY-FOUR

Step 3: Learn to Live in Your New Home

Nico is acting weird.

He’s been going over to the Lowells’ house after school because he broke their window playing baseball in the backyard so he has to work it off doing chores. Anyway, it seems like he goes there every day, and then he doesn’t get home until just before Mom gets back. I asked him what kind of chores they have him doing and he said just cleaning. But then when I asked him what he was cleaning, he got quiet about it.

Whatever they’re making him do, it’s making him grumpy. They don’t even have an animal to clean up after. Are they making him take out the garbage? Wash dishes? Are they making him push a boulder up a hill and as soon as he gets to the top, the boulder rolls back down to the bottom again?

If this were back in the old days, when we shared a room, I would have just waited until bedtime and then asked him about it. But now, Nico shuts himself in his room at night and doesn’t talk to me much.

Tonight, during dinner, he was hardly eating at all. Mom made mashed potatoes with lots of butter and salt, just how he likes it, but he just kept making it into a big pile and then sculpting it into different things. So after dinner is over, I go to his room. I knock on the door, which still feels weird after sharing a room for so long.

“I’m busy!” he calls out.

“It’s Ada!” I call through the door.

“Still busy!”

Then I try the doorknob, and it’s locked. Why does a nine-year-old even have a lock on their door? It doesn’t feel like that’s safe.

Oh no, I really do sound like Mom. Great, I take after the boring parent. Just my luck.

I decide the best thing to do is ask him about it while we’re walking to the bus stop the next morning. The few minutes when we walk to the stop and then later back home are the only times of the day when the two of us are alone together. But then we get to the stop and mean Mrs. Archer is standing there, glowering at the two of us—especially Nico. But lately, Nico hasn’t even been waiting for me to walk to the bus stop. He just dashes out the door in the morning and barely looks at me while we wait for the bus to arrive.

So this morning, I wake up extra early to make sure he doesn’t leave before I do. When I get downstairs, there’s no sign of Nico. I figure I have just enough time for a quick bowl of cereal for breakfast, although when I get in the kitchen, Martha is cleaning, and I don’t want to get in her way. It’s so weird having a woman who comes to our house to clean. Back in the Bronx, only our rich friends had cleaning people, and I’m pretty sure we’re not rich.

“Do you want breakfast?” Martha asks me.

I nod. “Can you pass me the box of corn flakes?”

Martha’s eyes widen. “Corn flakes for breakfast?”

I don’t understand why she looks so horrified by that. What’s so wrong with having cereal for breakfast? I mean, isn’t that what cereal is for?

But then again, Martha is strange. She hardly talks at all, she keeps her hair back in a bun so tight that it looks painful, and also, she’s always staring at my mom. Like, always. I have no idea why.

“I can make you an omelet and sausage,” she tells me. “That’s a proper breakfast.”

Before I can tell her no, that I don’t have time, she opens the fridge and reaches for the carton of eggs. When she’s reaching, the sleeve of her shirt rides up and I notice she’s got a ring of dark purple bruises around her wrist. Like she was wearing a bracelet that was much too tight.

“Did you hurt yourself?” I ask her.

She freezes, the carton of eggs clutched in her hands. Her gaze drops to her wrist, and she tugs at her sleeve to cover the bruise. “I… No.”

“Then why do you have bruises?” I ask, even though I know it’s none of my business.

She blinks a few times. “I… I just…”

She seems so upset all of a sudden. I wonder if Martha is in some kind of trouble, and maybe I should try to help her. But what can I do? I’m only eleven years old. I can’t even solve my own problems.

Speaking of my own problems, while I’m trying to figure out what to say to Martha, I hear the front door slam. Nico! Shoot, I knew I shouldn’t have tried to get stupid breakfast! Now he’ll be at the bus stop before we even have a second to talk.

“I have to go,” I tell Martha. And she looks so relieved that I’m glad I didn’t say anything else. It’s not like she’d want to tell her problems to some kid anyway.

SIXTY-FIVE

Today, Dad is picking me up at school to take me out for ice cream.

He used to do this back at our old apartment. Nico eats up a lot of attention, so Dad said we should get to hang out just the two of us. I was worried that he wouldn’t want to do it anymore after we moved, especially because he’s building up his business in our new town, but then yesterday he told me he was picking me up tomorrow in his truck. And now I’m waiting for him outside the school.

I’ve never been picked up before, only taken the school bus, so I’m not entirely sure where to wait. I end up behind the school, because there is a place for cars to pull over there. But then everybody leaves and it gets real quiet, and I can’t help but start thinking about that kid, Braden Lundie. The one who disappeared.

The thought of that really scares me. Because when you disappear, what happens to you? I mean, it’s not like he just vanished off the face of the earth. He didn’t disintegrate. Somebody took him.

“Ada?”

At first, I am grateful to hear a kid’s voice from behind me. Until I turn around and realize it’s Gabe. Pretty much the last person I want to see.

Ever since my first day of school a few weeks ago, Gabe won’t leave me alone. I found some girls to sit with during lunch, and he knows better than to try to join us, but he always gets in line behind me in the cafeteria, and then he follows me to recess. I hardly ever talk to him, so I don’t understand why he keeps bugging me.

“What are you doing here?” he asks me. “I thought you take the school bus.”

“I’m getting picked up,” I say. “Except I don’t know where my dad is.”

And now that I am looking around, I realize there’s no way to get onto this street from the main road. It’s all blocked off. So there’s no way Dad can find me here. I’ve got to walk around and see if I can find him. And then tell him I need a cell phone, because I really do.

“Listen, Ada,” Gabe says, “I wanted to ask you a question.”

I don’t want him to ask me a question. “Sorry, I need to find my dad.”

“Right, but I just have to ask you this.” Gabe is really bad at taking no for an answer. It’s annoying. “Do you think you might want to go on a date with me sometime?”

“I’m not allowed to date.”

That’s not an official rule, but I have a feeling that it would be if I asked. But I’m not going to ask, because I don’t want to go out on a date with Gabe or anybody.

“Well, would it be okay if I held your hand?”

I don’t even have a chance to say no this time before Gabe reaches out to grab my hand. His is sweaty and hot. It’s pretty gross to touch. I pull away, but instead of backing off, he grabs my wrist instead.

“I don’t want to hold hands,” I say. Even though he’s not holding my hand anymore—he’s grabbing my wrist.

Gabe still isn’t getting it. His long fingers encircle my wrist as he tightens his grip. “Just for, like, two minutes, Ada. Please?”

“You’re hurting me,” I say through my teeth.