I avoid the cafeteria and my classmates' questioning stares by ducking into the library instead. Mrs. Roberson, well aware that some students need a safe place to eat, ignores the back corner table during lunch periods. I drop my lunch bag on the table, but I’ve lost my appetite. I do appreciate the sanctuary, and I’m not exactly surprised when Ozzy and Finn show up a few minutes later.
Ozzy is barely in his seat when he asks what happened during my interview. I tell them both about my car being spotted on the bridge, and how I wasn’t the one driving it. That had been Alice.
“Well that explains why they asked me if I saw you at the bonfire. They were checking your alibi.”
“Did they ask you anything else” I ask him.
“Not really. Just if I knew anything. It’s the first time in three years I’ve been one hundred percent okay with the fact I’m no longer friends with Rose Waller.” He grimaces at Finn. “Sorry.”
“I get it,” Finn says. He touches the lunch bag. “Are you going to eat this?”
I roll my eyes. “No. Go ahead.”
He’s got it unzipped and a sandwich shoved in his mouth in a matter of seconds. Before either of us can ask, he says, “All they wanted to know was about our relationship, and if we’d been getting along. Which we had—sort of.”
Ozzy raises his eyebrows in question, and Finn shakes his head, just saying, “It’s complicated.”
That’s probably the perfect way to describe any relationship with Rose Waller.
Ozzy looks back at me and asks in a low voice, “Do you think Alice would do something to her?”
“Why? Because she’s made it well known how much she hates her?”
“Yeah, there’s that.”
“There’s a lot of resentment, but I can’t see her hurting someone.” But even as I say the words, I’m not sure they sound convincing. “Alice is loyal—to a fault—but she’s definitely more bark than bite.”
“Any idea what they wanted to talk to Ezra about?” Finn asks, shifting in his seat a little.
“Nope,” I reply.
Ozzy adds. “With him, it could be anything.”
We sit in quasi-comfortable silence, and I can’t help but notice how strange it is that the four of us keep getting tossed together after years of effectively avoiding one another. In some way, I’d always thought Rose was the thing keeping us apart—that the day she betrayed me was the day a divide split us all apart, but now it seems like that’s actually true.
Except we’re not thrown together because we’re friends, more likely because we’re all suspects.
It’s not in my plans to confront Alice when I see her, but that’s exactly what happens. She’s digging through her messy locker and before I can think twice, I’m standing by her side.
“What the hell, Alice? Why didn’t you tell me you saw Rose on the bridge that night?”
She slams the locker door and faces me. “It didn’t seem relevant.”
“How could that not be relevant? Forty-five minutes later, she was gone.” I shake my head in frustration. “Why did you stop, anyway?”
“Because I wanted to talk to her, and it seemed like as good of a time as any.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“No, Ken, what doesn’t make sense is the fact you’re still hung up on a friendship with a mean, petty, rich girl who has made it perfectly clear she doesn’t care about you.”
I groan. “Not this again. What did you say to her?”
“I told her to leave you alone. That you didn’t need her toxicity in your life and that she’d done enough damage.”
“What? Why?”
Her face clouds, and she lowers her voice. “I saw the two of you talking at the pool last week. Ever since then, you’ve been hyper-focused on her. I refuse to sit by and watch you open yourself up just to get hurt, again.”