Chapter 18. Reed
Reed
We travel back to June sixteenth, swapping the early-morning light of our kissing session for the darkened foyer the night of party.
Somewhere in the distance the swim team chants as they build their human pyramid.
A group of freshmen teeter through the front door in heels they look unused to wearing, giggling as they take selfies in the entranceway.
People have strung up battery-operated lights along the hallways, all pulsing to a deep bass vibrating the windows.
“Okay, we need to focus,” Tessa states. “It’s eleven thirty p.m. That means Tilly’s leaving soon and we’re about to play beer pong.”
“You’re sure the poison came from something we drank?”
“I think we ingested it, and we didn’t eat.”
I nod. “I haven’t had a chance to tell you something important because the whole time-travel thing happened. But … I’m pretty sure I know who did it.”
“What?” She gawks.
My pulse picks up. “When I went home, I overheard a threatening call between one of those factory guys and my stepdad. I think they killed us to intimidate our fathers somehow.”
Her eyes widen. “Did they mention my dad?”
“I don’t—not in the part I overheard.”
She bites her lip, her concentration habit. “That’s definitely a lead. But I’ve watched enough crime shows to know we can’t make assumptions. We need to follow the drinks. That means watching Jenny set up beer pong. She had the perfect opportunity to slip us something then.”
Not this again. “Tessa, it’s not—”
“Jenny needed the scholarship money. The motive is there, so … let’s be sure.”
It’s her pleading eyes that break me. “You win.” I cave. “Let’s watch ourselves get destroyed at beer pong.”
Even after Jenny opens fresh beers to fill the Solo cups at each end of the dining table, Tessa’s still suspicious, arguing she could have placed the caps on top to make them appear untampered with.
It’s not until Jenny swigs from one of the bottles that Tessa concedes she hasn’t poisoned them.
Still, she insists we watch the entire game, in case they sneak something in when we’re not looking.
They don’t.
“I told you this was a dead end. Jenny’s annoying, but she’s no murderer.”
Tessa scans the room for additional clues, though I suspect she knows I’m right.
I tap my foot with fake impatience. “Was there something you wanted to say?”
“Fine,” she mumbles. “She’s off the suspect list.”
“I’m sorry … what was that?” I lean in, smiling smugly.
“Oh, you heard me, Walker.” She gives me a light shove.
“So, now what?”
Tessa squeezes her eyes closed, straining to recall the events of the night. “Before beer pong you got us drinks from the kitchen, right? From things other people were making?”
I nod and she takes off down the hall, like some amped-up Sherlock Holmes.
“We’re wasting time. I already know who did it!” I race after her. “Besides, why would someone poison a drink they were making for themselves?”
We weave through the party madness, past rooms shrouded in moonlight where the drama club is attempting Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board and rooms packed with bodies dancing to rhythmic beats.
I even spy Olive Dingle making out with Jasmine Byers through an open doorway.
I hope things don’t get awkward in Model UN for them later.
At last, we arrive at the kitchen with its large hearth and majestic stone tiles.
It was probably entertainment central back in the day.
I can almost see the servants, hair pulled back in tight buns, arranging trays of hors d’oeuvres for some fancy van der Born soiree.
A long table straddles the center of the room, now chock-full of every conceivable brand of alcohol and mixers, looking like it might buckle any second under the weight.
The kitchen is so crowded it’s hard to avoid running into people. I’m dodging every direction, when suddenly a sophomore I don’t know marches straight toward us. Panicked, I try to tug Tessa aside, but it’s too late. The girl plows through her.
I’m expecting Tessa to collapse from the ice-cold disorienting impact of passing through someone. But she appears remarkably unfazed.
“What was that?” Tessa whips her head around as the girl races outside to throw up.
“You didn’t feel anything?” I ask, confused. Her teeth aren’t chattering. She doesn’t seem nauseous.
“No. Nothing.”
“Huh.” A seed of a theory takes form. I spot a couple walking in from outside and charge through them.
There’s no overwhelming onslaught of memories. No bone-deep chill from making contact with the living.
Tessa gasps while I beam at my experiment. “Yeah. Nothing.”
“Why aren’t we feeling anything here?” She wanders over.
“I don’t know, but I have a theory. Maybe we haven’t traveled back in time.”
Tessa raises an eyebrow.
“I mean, time travel might be the wrong way to think about this. It could be more like adjusting the clock back to an instant replay of the night of the party. These people, they’re not really here.
They’re more like an echo of everything that happened that night.
Like, you and I, we haven’t changed times, we can’t affect the world around us or alter anything, we’re merely … watching the show.”
She nods, taking in the room. “That sort of makes sense.”
“When you can’t have Netflix.” I shrug as the replay swirls around us.
“If your theory’s correct, then it’s like we’re the real ones and they’re the ghosts.” Tessa waves at our classmates.
“Touché.”
“And regardless, it sounds like we don’t have to worry about avoiding people, which is a relief. So, lets figure this out. When did you get us drinks?”
“A few minutes before Tilly, Brandon, and Kira left.” A strand of hair has fallen across my face from all my excitement nerding out over time-travel theories. I tuck it behind my ear.
“Then we set the clock back again to that moment but stay here this time and watch you come in,” Tessa suggests.
I pull out the phone and set the time back about twenty-five minutes.
In a blink there’s a new crowd of people around us, most of them chanting “Brett, Brett, Brett!” as Brett Whitaker—no doubt the guy behind the LONG LIVE BEER AND brOS sign from senior prank day—shotguns a Budweiser.
The crowd cheers as he finishes, crushes the can in his hand, and chucks it across the room.
“Now, who wants a Whitaker Special?” People whoop and shout as he pours a disgusting concoction of Budweiser, Mountain Dew, Red Bull, and peach schnapps into a number of empty cups.
“Wow. I didn’t know what went in that thing.” I gag as the Reed from the night of the party waltzes into the room.
When Brett spies the other Reed, he stumbles forward, pulling him into a one-armed hug. “Reed, you’ve got to try one of these. It’s my signature drink, bro, you won’t be disappointed.”
“Uh … sure.” Then-Reed takes the offered cup, peering inside skeptically.
“I can’t believe you gave me that drink.” Tessa scowls at me.
“I had no idea how to mix a cocktail and I wanted to impress you,” I admit.
“You should try one of mine, too. I used the good stuff, top shelf.” Caden Pierce, our quarterback, pours drinks at the end of the table, near a tight-knit cluster of people deep in conversation. He waves toward a handful of cups ready to go.
Brett chucks a lime at him, which Caden ducks, laughing.
“Thanks, man.” Reed nods appreciatively.
Brett drunkenly thrusts one of Caden’s cups into then-Reed’s other hand. “You can compare. Mine are better, though, bro.”
Hip cocked, Tessa turns to me. “How were you friends with those guys?”
“I was friends with everyone, Tessa. No one at school could resist my charms.”
She arches a brow.
“Almost no one,” I counter, then redirect us. “Okay, those drinks were disgusting, but were they poisoned? Look around, lots of people are drinking them. Why would only we have died from ours?”
“It’s a good question.” She purses her lips as she scans the crowd. “Wait … holy shit. Check out the cups. One of yours is a different color.” Tessa smacks me on the arm. “That wasn’t Caden’s drink Brett handed you.”
I rub my shoulder where she nailed me, then startle when I see who she’s pointing at. His back had been to us, but now that he’s turned around it’s clearly one of the factory guys who hassled us before.
I fucking knew it! “I told you it was them,” I say to Tessa.
Some of the guy’s friends enter through the rear door. “Yo, Dave, another keg arrived, get your ass out back.”
Dave exits the kitchen behind them. If his Solo cup was handed to me, he doesn’t seem to care about it now. Which, I’ll admit, is a little weird.
I’m torn between following our old selves to see how the drinks affect us or taking off after the factory workers.
This feels like a lead. “I think we should follow Dave and his friends,” I say, and Tessa nods.
We make our way down the back steps, past the swim team’s pyramid antics and the French club dancing in the empty fountain, toward the rear of the estate.
“Do you think Dave’s drink was poisoned?” I slow my pace a bit as Tessa jogs beside me, trying to keep up with my long strides.
“Why would he poison that drink? It’s a pretty elaborate scheme to leave a poisoned cocktail out on the off chance the kid whose stepdad dismantled your company stumbles upon it.”
“You’re right. That makes no sense. I mean, Dave’s no genius, but I’d like to think he could do better than that. They must come after us later.” We catch up to Dave’s crew in a rear garden gathered around a keg. “Let’s wait and watch. If they’re plotting something, we’ll overhear it.”
So, we hang around as Dave and his buddies Leo and Rob get shit-faced. We learn about T-Bone, Rob’s cousin from Schenectady who’s going to hook them up with weed. And then there’s the saga of Dave’s girlfriend Becca who dumped his sorry ass over text.