Chapter Thirty-One
The next day I am essentially a human-sized exposed nerve.
It seems unfair, unethical even, to make me go to school in this state.
Unfortunately, last night my mother learned that I in fact did not go to school yesterday.
So I’m currently walking down the block not only with a ripped-out heart but also with a metaphorical stiletto heel jammed up my ass.
Cam’s mom is pretty lax compared to mine, but she’ll probably make Cam go to school too. I will have to do everything I can to avoid him at all costs.
It’s confusing, because I’m nearly certain I’m avoiding Cam purely out of embarrassment.
I practically fell over myself to kiss him.
I listened to him tell me—for the second time—that kissing me was a mistake.
He pulled me in and then pushed me away completely.
There is not a hole deep enough for me to burrow into to recover from that.
And yet.
Tendrils of another feeling are mixing in with the one I already know. I’m filled not only with searing embarrassment but also…a strange, cold guilt for some unknown reason. Like icy fingers wrapped around a hot mug.
“Why should I feel guilty?” I mutter to myself as I round the last corner to school.
Cam’s the one who stole my flyer and turned the treasure hunt into a race. Cam chased us down at the art museum. He forced us to add him to the group. He made me track clues across the city with him when all five of us were supposed to be taking a break.
He’s the one who stormed into my house, into my room, and pulled me to him.
If anything, I’m only culpable of being too complicit in all of Cam’s demands.
The mysterious guilt still lingers.
“Hey, Sunny,” I say as I walk down the main hallway.
I veer toward her locker, but as the door slams and Sunny looks at me, I realize I have absolutely made the wrong move.
Her face is flushed and blotchy. Her eyes are all sharp edges.
She scowls at me like I am a rat-sized cockroach that just crawled out of the gutter in front of her. I immediately take a step back.
Monday! my brain pings. Sunny told me she had feelings for me on Monday. And today is Wednesday, and I haven’t said one word to her since then. Until right now.
But Sunny doesn’t particularly look like she’s waiting on a response from me. She shifts to face the opposite direction, then begins shuffling through the books in her arms.
“God, Sunny. I’m so sorry about yesterday. I was…”
Don’t lie and say you were sick.
“Sick,” I say anyway, because it is literally the only reason my mom ever allows me to miss school. She even schedules all my medical appointments for Saturdays. Nobody should have to schlep to a freaking dental cleaning on a Saturday.
Sunny makes a weird, choked laugh. “Oh. Sick. Is that right?”
Should I cough or something? This entire conversation feels like getting trapped in a spider’s web. If I struggle, I’ll only make it worse. I decide to sidestep yesterday entirely.
“I thought a lot about what you said on Monday.”
“No you didn’t,” Sunny says dully.
“Come on, Sunny. I’m trying to talk to you about this. I…I was caught off guard after the meeting. I didn’t think you liked me that way. I thought you barely liked me at all.”
She flicks her eyes at me over her books. She’s still glaring.
“Maybe you feel the need to go through this whole song and dance,” she says. “But I really, really don’t. Just talk to yourself and pretend I’m still listening if that’s what you need to do.”
She starts walking down the hall. I follow her.
“Wait!”
She waves me off with the back of one hand. “It’s fine, Ivy. Go have your little happily-ever-after moment with Cam.”
I stop just short of her. “What are you talking about?”
“I saw you on a date,” Sunny says. “At the music concourse yesterday? You two were dancing.”
“That wasn’t a— We were just— Hang on, why were you even at the music concourse?”
“Researching!” Sunny’s voice cracks. She swallows and glances around furtively. “We all split up images on the map, right? I was looking for matches in Golden Gate Park after school. But, honestly, screw all of that. I’m over this stupid treasure hunt.”
She jabs her index finger into my chest. “You used us as placeholders, Ivy. You really had us convinced Cam was the bad guy in your story. But that was a total front. You just made him out to be the bad guy because that was easier than admitting you liked him. All this time, I bet you were wishing he would come running back to you and replace us. God, I feel like such an idiot!”
The guilt engulfs the humiliation from earlier, extinguishing it completely. Feeling hurt and betrayed is awful. But seeing yourself hurt someone else, the way I can see I’ve hurt Sunny, is excruciating. I’m not used to playing this part in the story. I don’t want to be someone else’s bad guy.
“You’re not placeholders,” I croak. Sunny rolls her eyes and takes off down the hall. I’m scrambling to keep up. “Sunny, you are not a placeholder!”
My mind races over what I could possibly say to convince her.
I definitely cannot mention the kiss—or the fight—between me and Cam.
But before that, Sunny already saw us at the music concourse.
Now is my chance to share everything we found with the others.
Yearbook crew and I can finish this thing together, just like we started it.
I can still fix this.
“Let me prove it to you,” I say.
Sunny slows down on her next stride. “How?”
“The meeting.” I’m already out of breath, mostly from desperation. “Please, come to the meeting today. I’ll bring what I have to the Bat Cave after school. Just us. No Cam.”
Sunny shakes her head. “I don’t know.”
“You do, though,” I say. “I know you care about this. And not because of me. Screw me. I’m awful—I’m not worth anyone’s time. But this hunt is, Sunny. All of you have put so much into this. You deserve to know.”
Sunny startles a little. She betrays herself and looks right at me.
“You know where the treasure is?”
I nod. “Yeah. I’m pretty sure I do.”
I’m early to the meeting but am still the last one down into the basement lab. Gabriel, Sunny, and Julia are already in their chairs, facing the projector screen, which is currently blank and dark.
Sunny nods slightly as I make the final step in. “She’s here. Okay, let’s see what you’ve got.”
Gabriel and Julia look up from their phones. I have no idea what Sunny’s told them. She might’ve spilled everything she saw regarding me and Cam. Or she might’ve kept it to herself.
I go in playing na?ve.
“I’m first to share?” I ask semicasually.
Sunny narrows her eyes at me. “None of us found anything. And you know where the treasure is, so—”
“WHAT?!” Gabriel pops out of his chair. His phone clatters onto the desk behind him. He turns and gives Sunny a look. “You didn’t say she knew where it was.”
“I said she had something to show us.” Sunny leans back and crosses her arms.
“The treasure?” Gabriel asks eagerly.
I shake my head. “Not yet. But its location, hopefully.”
Gabriel runs a hand through his hair. “Okay, this is crazy. None of us came here with a clue, even, and somehow you have the entire thing figured out?” He pulls up the drawing of the scroll on his phone. “Which part of the picture were you working on?”
I bite my lower lip. “The three women in the corner. They’re The Three Shades sculpture at the Legion of Honor museum.”
Julia cocks her head. “Another art museum? I thought we were supposed to be digging for this.”
“We are,” I say quickly. “There used to be these outdoor installations near the museum that popped up every June during the Pride celebrations. In 1983, the installation was a clockface, but without any arms to indicate a time. Look at the grandfather clock picture on the scroll. I think we’re supposed to dig where the clockface installation was, right outside the four o’clock mark. ”
No one says anything. Gabriel, Julia, and Sunny poke around the picture on their phones, squinting. I notice that Julia hasn’t written anything down in her notebook.
“That’s…interesting,” Gabriel says finally. Except he makes the word “interesting” sound exactly like the word “stupid.”
“Why not the nine o’clock mark?” Julia asks after a minute. “The clock in the picture is pointing there too.”
I pull out my laptop, then connect it to the projector. Once the machine warms up and the image flashes over the back wall, I walk directly to it.
“See this woman?” I ask. “She’s wearing the same necklace as the one we found in the box. And her arms are doing the same thing as the clock arms. They’re pointing to nine and four. But there’s nothing near the nine.”
“Well, nothing in the drawing,” Sunny clarifies.
“Which is important,” I say, exasperated.
But no one looks convinced. I rack my brain to figure out what I’m missing from earlier—why the solution felt so obvious when Cam and I first found it.
“The boundaries of Gilbert’s picture have to be there for a reason, right?
There’s nothing outside nine o’clock. But look where her four o’clock arm is pointing.
Right at The Three Shades in the Legion of Honor museum! ”
Gabriel folds his hands in his lap. He looks like a sad combination of confused and disappointed. “What about everything else? How is Harvey Milk connected?”
I throw my palms up. “I don’t know! The librarian from the history center said the installations could be related to the San Francisco Gay Pride marches. They popped up in late June from 1970 all the way to 1983. I think that’s pretty fascinating!”
Sunny lunges forward, elbows pinned on her knees. “Wait. You went back to the history center yesterday?”
Ohhhhh no.
“Is that why you weren’t at school?” Gabriel asks softly. “You…you couldn’t wait for us?”
Sunny tuts and shakes her head. She would be pulling off the distant, judgmental vibe perfectly if her eyes didn’t look so hurt. “So I guess you two lovebirds weren’t just playing hooky for a date, then.”
The room goes completely silent.
Sunny eyes me menacingly after dropping the bombshell. I can only look back at her, beyond guilt-ridden, as Gabriel and Julia put two and two together.
“Cam,” Julia says. “You were with Cam.”
I swallow. “He’s a good researcher.”
“So why are you standing in front of us right now?” Sunny asks. She motions at me with one arm. “If you and Cam wanted to sneak off and find this thing yourselves, why aren’t you out digging it up together?”
“I wanted to bring it to you—”
“Bullshit,” Sunny says. “You didn’t say a word about this on Monday or in the group chat yesterday. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re only here right now because something happened with Cam, and you’re out looking for placeholders again.”
I wince and close my eyes. I feel like I’ve just failed a lie detector test.
“You’re not placeholders,” I whisper. But even my voice refuses to prop up such slippery, spineless words.
Sunny stands and grabs her bag. She breezes by me and trots up the stairs without a word. Gabriel shakes his head as if in disbelief. Then he stands, resigned, and picks up his own backpack.
Julia studies me as the sound of Gabriel’s footsteps fades into the distance. Instead of tucking her notebook away, she holds it out to me.
“What’s going on?” I ask as I take it.
Julia tries to smile. “I…I don’t think I want these notes anymore,” she says. “It was always your magic, anyway. Not mine. Good luck, Ivy.”
She makes the fourth person to leave me in less than a day.