“That’s just how it is when you get to be Grandma Esme’s age,” Mom said. “Especially when it gets late in the day, and the sun goes down. Something chemical happens in your brain.”
“Like a zombie?” Rafi said.
“No, zombies eat brains,” Maria said, rolling her eyes. “Plus, the sun was still out when I was there. Mom, can you please just check on her?”
Maria’s mom scrunched her eyebrows together like she did when Maria tried to explain the plot of one of her books. It was the same look she got when she was paying the bills. Finally, she said, “Of course I will, mija. I’ll swing by her house before I pick you guys up tomorrow.”
Rafi was quick to protest. “But, Mom, Rob asked if I could come over tomorrow. They’re getting a new waterslide put in this weekend, and it’s supposed to be finished by the time school’s out.”
“Isn’t it a little cold to be swimming?”
“Nah. We were in the pool last weekend and it was fine.”
“Maybe I’d better call Rob’s father and make sure it’s okay that you keep coming over.”
“He already said it was,” Rafi whined. “He said I was welcome anytime.”
“I’ll call him after dinner,” Mom said firmly.
Maria didn’t understand how Rafi could think about waterslides when she’d just said their grandmother wasn’t doing well. Not even Derek was that carefree.
On the way back to her room, Maria discovered another large, abandoned spiderweb, this one strung up between the ceiling and the wall of the hallway. She shivered.
“Rafi!” she called. “Rafi, come look at this.”
“What is it now?”
“Have you been leaving the back door open when you go outside? This is the second spiderweb I’ve found today.”
“Well, it’s not my fault. I didn’t leave the door open. Maybe the spiders at Grandma Esme’s house rode here inside your book bag. Did you think of that?”
“Fine, be that way,” Maria said, leaving him in the hall and all but slamming the door behind her. She knew she wasn’t really that mad at her brother, but it was like her anger was getting wrapped up inside her fear, and the two were becoming a tangled black knot that filled her head. If it was a coincidence that these webs were appearing now, after what Grandma Esme had said about the spiders returning, it was the worst coincidence in the history of coincidences.
Still, Maria hoped that it was a coincidence. The spiders had no reason to be here.
Right?
When Maria got to her seat in English, Claire was already at her desk smiling brightly, as if it weren’t first thing on a Monday morning. Maria got nervous when Claire McCormick smiled. Her smile showed too many teeth, like a lion’s.
“Hey, Maria. How was your weekend?” Claire asked through that smile.
“Fine,” Maria said carefully.
“I’m so glad to hear that.” It was almost convincing.
Was it possible Claire had been the one behind the cobwebs in her house? Maybe she’d planted spiders on Rob, counting on Rob to pass them accidentally to Rafi, who had brought them into the house without realizing it. But that was ridiculous. Maria was starting to sound as paranoid as Grandma Esme. Claire wasn’t some villain in a fairy tale. She was just a girl in Maria’s English class.
As soon as the bell rang, Ms. Wainscott began passing back their vocab quizzes from Friday. When Maria got hers, she was relieved to see that she had gotten all ten of the words right. She’d almost blanked on the definition of disputatious, until finally she’d realized it looked a lot like dispute.
“Wow, Maria, you’re so smart. I wish I was as smart as you,” Claire said, looking over Maria’s shoulder. The sarcasm in Claire’s voice was slick and dark, like oil. Everyone laughed as if Claire had said something clever. Maria’s hand went self-consciously to the purple star on her sleeve, like maybe she could hide it before Claire noticed that, too.
“I told you not to mess with her,” Derek said at lunch. He’d already finished his peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich, and now he passed a big silver dollar back and forth between his hands. At times, it vanished from sight completely.
“She started it,” Maria said, shrugging. She stared down into the beefaroni and orange slices that lay untouched on her tray. It was kind of sickening how they were almost the same color. “I keep thinking I just need to be mean right back. Let her see how it feels.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s a fantastic idea.” Somehow Derek managed to sound kind even when he was teasing her — the opposite of Claire, who sounded mean even when she gave Maria a compliment. “Just talk to Ms. What’s-Her-Name about it. I’m sure if she knew, she’d at least put Claire in a different seat.”
For Derek, every problem in the world could be solved by talking it out. But Maria wasn’t Derek. As she’d tried to explain, if she told on Claire, Claire would just get back at her in other ways, likely much worse than her usual teasing.
“So how is your aunt?” Maria asked, very much wanting to change the subject.
“Great-aunt. And fine,” Derek said. “I mean, you can tell she’s from New York. She’s very fancy and she never, ever laughs, not even when my dad did that thing where he acts like he’s going to shake your hand and then pulls a coin out of your ear. But she’s nice enough. She liked it when I showed her the shop.”
“Oh, I almost forgot — Grandma Esme says hello.”
“Hello, Grandma Esme,” Derek replied, which was exactly the right response.
“I found this old poster that proves all her circus stories are true. It showed her and the lion, just like she always says.”
“Wow, really? I bet my dad would love to have that for the shop.”
“Well, he can’t have it — it’s Grandma Esme’s.” This came out more forceful than Maria meant it to. Derek’s eyes widened, and he stopped passing the coin, but the thing about Derek was that he never took anything personally.
“My bad. You know I just meant it sounds cool, right?”
“Yeah, I know. I’m sorry,” Maria said. “Grandma Esme was just a little out of it on Friday, so I’ve been a little out of it since. This thing with Claire definitely isn’t helping.”
“Does this help?” Derek asked, cupping his hands as if he were holding them over a fire. Maria didn’t understand what he was doing at first, until suddenly she realized the silver dollar was in her hands, impossibly.
“How did you do that?” Maria asked, amazed.
Derek grinned.
“You really want to know how I did it?”
“Yes.”
“It’s easy,” Derek said. He leaned in like he was going to whisper the answer in her ear. Always the performer, just like his dad.
“The secret,” he told her, “is practice.”
When Maria went to get her books at the end of the day, there was a terrible surprise waiting for her at her locker. She didn’t see it at first because there was a crowd of people in the way. She figured they must be waiting for that eighth-grade girl Kim Thomas, who seemed to have even more fans than Claire. But no, she realized. They were staring at her locker, on which duct tape, stickers, and even a few cloth patches had been plastered so thick she couldn’t see an inch of the gray metal beneath.