He groaned and shouted, “Jones! Spaulding! Escort Miss Sweeney to Midtown High and deliver her to Sergeant Baker.”
The sound of combat boots slapping the frozen ground approached, but her escorts stayed back, giving her a good ten yards of privacy as they all marched on. A good thing, because she wasn’t exactly pleasant company this morning.
The sun rose through dark, heavy clouds, casting a pitiful glow across the forest. Her fingers felt so empty without Aelyx’s linked among them, but as much as she ached for his warmth and laughter, she couldn’t take another minute of charged silence or empty small talk. She glanced behind her to make sure he wasn’t following.
When had she grown so dependent on Aelyx? She couldn’t identify any given moment that it had happened. It reminded her of a blizzard from years before, when a surprise cold front had dumped four feet of snow on the town. She’d gone to bed completely unaware of the storm and awoken the next morning to an impenetrable wall of snow surrounding the house.
Or maybe a blanket was a better comparison—the way it gathers warmth so gradually that you don’t feel the chill until removing the cover. Yeah, that was just like Aelyx. She’d fallen for him so slowly she hadn’t realized the depth of her feelings until he pulled away. But why would he pull away? He was the one who’d initiated the whole let-me-touch-you-all-over-and-take-your-pulse thing. The jerk.
“Miss Sweeney?”
Cara turned to find one of the soldiers, a fair redhead with so many freckles they almost blended together into a tan, pointing his gun toward the end of the trail. “Don’t get too far ahead. They told us the crowd’s a little wild.”
“Wait,” she said, “they’re here?” HALO had announced a march on City Hall, not on the school. This wouldn’t be anything like the usual demonstrations. An icy chill snaked up the length of her spine and settled near her heart when she imagined what a crowd of thousands could do to her—Cara Sweeney: L’eihr Lover Extraordinaire. Suddenly, she felt like an idiot for not letting the military play chauffeur. An armored Hum-V sounded pretty good right about now.
The other soldier, a vertically challenged brunet, must’ve smelled her fear. “The National Guard’s handling it. We’ve got troops up the wazoo, so don’t worry.”
“Sure,” she whispered with a nod. Why didn’t that make her feel better?
As they approached the end of the trail, a blazing chorus of sirens began to drown out the crunch of twigs and dried leaves beneath their boots. Red and blue lights flashed through the trees as if the school had caught fire, and then the din of ten thousand voices roared in her ears like a cross between ocean waves and radio static. And what a scene.
The National Guard had blocked off the street with concrete barricades, corralling the chaos at least fifty yards to the left of the school, but rows of armed soldiers couldn’t keep protesters from fighting among themselves or throwing rocks and beer bottles. In all her life, she’d never seen a crowd that large assembled in one place, not even at the Women’s Health March she’d attended in DC a couple years ago. After a gentle nudge from the redhead, she clenched her teeth and strode forward, sandwiched between her guardians.
Two crimson Midtown Fire and EMS trucks idled near the school’s front entrance, and she recognized Dad’s strawberry head bent over a long, portly man on a stretcher. The closer she advanced, the more that patient looked like Principal Ferguson . . . because it was.
“Hey,” she said, tugging on the redhead’s sleeve and pointing ahead, “that’s my dad.”
“Barry will go with you.” That must’ve been the short brunet. “I need to find Sergeant Baker.”
She jogged over, watching Dad bandage a cut above the principal’s left eyebrow. When he turned to grab the scissors, she noticed a smudge of blood on the breast of his starched white shirt. When Dad glanced up and spotted her, his eyes widened. “What’re you doing here? I left a message for you to stay home.”
“I left early.” She turned to Mr. Ferguson. “What happened?”
“He caught a beer bottle with his head,” Dad answered. “Where’s Aelyx?”
“Home.” Where he’d probably stay if he got Dad’s message. The prospect of an entire day without him at school both excited and depressed her. Mostly the latter.
“I need a word, Cara.” Mr. Ferguson sat up and swung his legs over the side of the stretcher, then patted a newly vacated spot on the cushion in an invitation to join him. She settled on the edge and gazed at the crowd, wiping her sweaty palms on her jeans. “I’ve already talked to your dad,” he said, “and he agrees it’s for the best.”
“What’s for the best?”
“If you and Aelyx finish out the school year at home.”
“What?” Now he had her attention. “As in homeschooled?”
“Just this morning, I lost twenty-six kids to Scott High. Their parents don’t think it’s safe here anymore with all the fights and protests.” He shook his head and apologized with his eyes. “It’s nothing against either of you, but I can’t disrupt the education of the whole school for one student. I hope you understand.”
Hell no, she didn’t understand!
“This is crap!” she said, her voice rising above the shouts of the protesters.
“Cara ...” Dad warned from behind.
Ignoring him, she drew in a breath. “You didn’t expel Ronnie McPhail after his eleventy-billionth suspension, but you’re giving me the boot? I’m the valedictorian!” She’d busted tail to hold up her end of the exchange, and this was the thanks she got? “It’s true what they say. No good deed goes unpunished.”
“This isn’t a punishment,” Mr. Ferguson insisted. “I even put together an independent study plan, so you won’t have to worry about this hurting your transcript.”
“This isn’t about my transcript. It’s the principle. You’re required by law to provide me with a free and public—”
“Cara!” Dad barked. “Just go home. I don’t want you anywhere near those people,” he said, nodding toward the protest. “We’ll talk later.”
Cara folded her arms. “Fine. I’ll clean out my locker, but this isn’t over.” She turned to Mr. Ferguson and stressed, “This is temporary.”
“Sure.” The flatness of his tone did little to reassure her. “I’ll e-mail the study plan later.”
“Uh, Miss Sweeney?” Soldier Barry tapped her shoulder. “We’re supposed to hand you off to the sergeant first.”
Of course. Because control of her own life was an illusion right now.
Cara sucked it up and waited patiently while her escorts tracked down Sergeant Baker. They seemed like sweet guys, and if she got them in trouble with their commanding officer, they might have to do a thousand push-ups or scrub toilets with their toothbrushes.
Finally, ten minutes after the tardy bell rang, their contact showed up and signed off on the transfer of goods—her—with instructions to meet Blake at her locker. Then the military finally let her go while they assumed their posts outside the front entrance.
With homeroom already in session, the only sound in the foyer was the slow, careful tread of her boots against the tile. She’d never seen it so placid in here—there wasn’t a person in sight. Maybe the classes were on lockdown. It made sense with all the violence going on outside. Each of her squeaky footsteps seemed amplified in the silence, and twice she paused because she thought she heard steps in sync with her own.