1
We learn from failure, not from success!
That’s what Mrs. Lieu has written in red at the top of my English paper, above the C-plus.
She’s quoting some book, no doubt. She likes to weave literary quotations into even the most mundane conversation.
One time, a couple of girls in the front row were talking about their homecoming dresses, and Mrs. Lieu interrupted to inform them, “All that glisters is not gold.” We all spent the rest of the day trying to misuse glisters in a sentence.
I resist the urge to crumple up the paper and tell my teacher that actually, a C-plus isn’t a failing grade. But I know what she means; it feels like failing. Especially since I worked hard on this assignment.
The room is in a state of grumbling dissent, and I look around to find everyone with their heads bent over their papers.
I make eye contact with Henry Abbott across the room, who puts on a silly expression and pantomimes death by choking.
My cheeks heat, and I pretend to collapse as though my grade has ended me too.
Even Sage Wheeler, who’s on the path to valedictorian, has folded her paper in half to hide her grade.
“You okay?” I ask, leaning closer to her desk.
“This is bull,” she says, rolling her eyes. “I’ll have my dad call her. I’m not going to lose a spot in the Ivies just because Mrs. Lieu can’t read.”
“Um…” I frown, not really sure what to say to that.
“I’ve never gotten a B in my life.” Sage flicks a strand of short blond hair out of her eye and, as if to emphasize how together she has everything, examines her acrylic nails, painted an autumnal brick-orange shade that perfectly matches her tank top.
“Right.” If we were at a bigger school in a bigger town, Sage and Henry would be in a separate class for the ultra-advanced. At Silver Creek High, they have to sit among us mere honors students and do separate assignments here and there.
Up front, Mrs. Lieu, either failing to read the room or thoroughly enjoying our collective anguish, flashes a broad smile. “Okay, everyone. I don’t usually do this, but since you all struggled so much with your papers, I’m going to give you the chance to rewrite them.”
“Yeah, you are,” Sage mutters smugly under her breath while the rest of us cheer.
I glance over at Henry again, who runs a hand through his brown hair in a gesture of relief.
He looks at me, glasses skewed and hair a mess.
He’s adorable, and still, I wish I could walk over there and straighten his glasses, smooth his hair.
Maybe rough it up even more. At his smile, my heartbeat kicks up.
But Henry’s just my friend. Always has been, as much as I sometimes wish he’d see me as something else.
A snap sounds, right in front of my face. I jerk back to find Sage reaching over. “Hello? Hayden, eww. Stop looking at that creep.”
“You know he’s my best friend,” I say.
Sage looks momentarily hurt, and I regret the slip of tongue. Not that she’s ever been my best friend; still, we were close. Her expression returns to disapproval. “Then why are you looking at him like he’s an ice cream cone?”
“That’s gross, Sage.”
“Okay, whatever. The point is you could do so much better than a murderer. Even a really hot one.”
“Thanks,” I droll. “But he’s not—”
“A murderer’s brother, then, sorry.” She lifts her hands, absolving herself of any misgivings.
My jaw clenches. This is the reason she and I aren’t close anymore. Mariana Sanchez was her cousin, and despite the fact that the police ruled Mariana’s death an accident last October, Sage and the rest of this town refuse to accept it. They’re all convinced that the Abbott triplets were involved.
Class is almost over. Mrs. Lieu tugs on the collar of her blue and white pinstripe button-down as she explains the rewrite assignment. “You’ll choose a new prompt from the list. You have two weeks.”
This is met with groans. At the back of the room, Todd Ellison, quarterback of the football team, asks, “Can we make it three?” The sentiment is echoed by a couple of his teammates.
“If you have a problem with my magnanimous offer,” Mrs. Lieu says, throwing in a vocab word as she wanders over to her desk, “we can call the whole thing off.”
“Two weeks is great,” Todd says, stuffing his paper into his backpack.
At her desk, Mrs. Lieu shakes her head and mutters to the ceiling, “‘Lord, what fools these mortals be.’”
The bell rings, and after everyone packs up for lunch, Sage sidles up next to me on my way out. “Hayden, I didn’t see your name on the list for the student council retreat. You’re coming, right?”
I pull my long sand-colored hair over one shoulder and twirl it around a finger.
“Oh, we might have auditions that weekend for The Wizard of Oz,” I say, even though there’s no way we’ll pull together the numbers to put on an actual production.
At our small school, I’m one of five members of the drama club.
Whenever we attempt a performance, each of us plays at least two parts—sometimes we go triple or even quadruple duty.
Then there’s student council. Sage and I joined together freshman year as something to do once a week at lunchtime.
We never planned on moving up in the ranks the way Mariana did—she was a junior class secretary with sights on becoming student body president.
When Mariana passed away, Sage decided it was her new mission to take her cousin’s place as well as guilt me into joining her.
Mariana would’ve wanted us to do our part to help the school, Hayden.
But Sage never quite got the numbers to win the schoolwide presidential race over popular cheer captain Kennedy Russo and had to be content with senior class president.
I, on the other hand, ran unopposed for my position as school treasurer.
The annual retreat is the best part of being on student council. But things are still a little tense with Sage, so I’ve been on the fence about attending.
“You have to come,” she says, linking her arm through mine. “Please, don’t leave me alone with the Abbotts.”
“The Abbotts?” I scan the hall, spotting Henry waiting for me at the lockers.
“Apparently, they’re really interested in student government all of a sudden. It’s so obvious they’re just trying to pad their high school résumés after everything last year. And Mr. Fuller is the only club advisor stupid enough to fall for it.”
“He’s stupid for letting high school students…join a club?”
“Yeah,” she says, like it’s obvious. “For letting murderers join a club.”
“Bye, Sage,” I say, tugging my arm out of hers.
“Alleged murderers, then,” she calls as I stride ahead of her. “You’ll come though, right?”
“Maybe,” I call back. If Henry’s going on the retreat, that changes things.
I make my way through the crammed hallway to him.
“I guess congratulations are in order.” When he arches a brow, I add, “On your student government appointment. What, uh, is your title exactly? Vice Keeper of the Striped Polos?” Henry rarely veers from his uniform of jeans and a striped polo shirt, though he’s changed up the top half today.
“Nice sweatshirt, by the way.” It’s the navy-blue zip-up hoodie I gave all three triplets last Christmas when no one else—not even their parents—gave them a present.
Embroidered on the back of each hoodie is a large white A for Abbott.
“It’s my favorite, though I think this one might actually be Bram’s,” he says, tugging at the pouch pocket.
“I thought it smelled a little like rain and gloom.”
“And my position is Keeper of the Striped Polos, Second-in-Command to No One.”
“Atta boy.” I knock my fist against his arm. “So this is for real? And you’re going on the retreat?”
“Well, yeah. I thought you’d be going,” he says, causing my insides to melt.
“I am,” I say. “But you never actually said what the three of you would be doing on student council.”
“Mr. Fuller said we could be senior class reps. I guess he had to fire a couple of them for misuse of power—a.k.a. stealing snacks from the teacher’s lounge when they were supposed to be making copies.”
“You and Bram could easily get back on the football team,” I suggest. “I mean, they obviously need you. They haven’t won a—”
“Not without Adam,” he says, shutting the idea down.
I get it. Football has never truly been Henry or Bram’s thing.
They only played for the sake of their brother, Adam, who’d been the team’s star wide receiver and hero of both the school and the town—at least until last year.
The accident that killed Mariana left him physically incapable of playing again, as well as the town’s number one murder suspect.
I guess student government is the only thing all three brothers can do together. And considering how their schoolmates have treated them since they returned to Silver Creek High last month, they need each other. Strength in numbers.
The brothers—fraternal triplets actually, who look nothing alike—have been working in their family’s auto repair shop since they were old enough to hold tools.
The shop is located at the base of their massive property, just down a winding dirt road from their nineteenth-century hilltop mansion.
Back in the 1950s, the boys’ great-grandfather Peter J.
Abbott worked as a private auto mechanic for the reclusive elderly mansion owner.
The wealthy man who’d first built the place had collected some of the earliest automobiles, including a Ford Model B that’s still displayed in a special showroom in the house.
Cars back then were luxury items that needed constant work, so the mansion had its own dedicated repair shop.
The wealthy family’s enthusiasm for cars continued to the next generation: the man who hired Peter.
Over the years the old man came to consider Peter a son more than a hired hand, and when he passed away, he left the entire property and the shop to Peter.