Center of Gravity Read online

  “I told you it’s nothing.”

  Oscar pulls his own milk carton in front of him and turns it around, so the kid faces me. I moan softly. I had to turn over twenty milk cartons to get one that was new to me—but both Petey and Oscar managed to find kids I didn’t already have without even trying.

  Life is colossally unfair.

  Oscar sees it in my face, and he tilts his head. “So, if it’s no big deal, you won’t mind if I just…”

  He takes his carton in both hands and slowly starts to squish its sides.

  I last until the little boy’s face starts to collapse and then I lean forward and grab the carton out of his hand.

  What if I never find this kid again?

  It isn’t rational to believe that if I memorize the boy’s stats, whisper his name every night before I go to bed, look at his picture until I know it like I know the faces in my sixth-grade yearbook—if I do all that, he’ll be safe.

  He’ll be found and returned to his family that must be frantic with fear and worry for him. It’s happened before.

  “They found one of these kids,” I say. “In Colorado, a few months ago. It was on the news.”

  “That’s great. I mean, good for him, and all,” Jay Jay says. “But what does that have to do with anything?”

  “Not him. Her.” Amanda Lansing was the first kid I collected. I saw her on my milk carton at lunch on a random Tuesday, and I don’t know why, but I couldn’t throw her away. I just couldn’t. The idea of dumping her into the huge black trash bin near the door to the school’s courtyard made me feel sick.

  So I kept the carton. I took it into the bathroom by the gym, and I opened the top and used powdered hand soap to clean it out.

  Hillary MacLean walked in and said, Hey, Cinderella, you don’t actually have to wash the trash before you take it out.

  I felt sick to my stomach that day. But I still carried that milk carton home and used Mom’s dish soap and her little bird scissors to wash and trim it.

  And I looked at Amanda Lansing for three days.

  Then I went to Gran’s for dinner on Saturday. She eats early and watches the news at six every night of her life.

  We have breaking news at this hour. Amanda Lansing, missing since November, was found in Boulder last night after police followed a tip from a resident who saw the eleven-year-old girl at a local grocery store. The sighting was reported on Friday afternoon, and police located the girl in a hotel room with her abductor.

  “I didn’t throw away her milk carton, and they found her.”

  Oscar leans back away from me.

  “But come on,” Petey says. “They didn’t find her because you had her milk-carton picture. I mean, unless you’re the one who saw her and called the cops.”

  “I know that.” And I do. I know it. But it doesn’t matter. I still can’t throw those kids away. And now I have no idea how I’m going to ride a bike with three milk cartons.

  “So what?” Jay Jay asks. “You really believe that if you collect those kids, they’ll be found?”

  Even Megan never asked me that. I told her about Amanda Lansing, and she never asked me about the milk cartons. I’m so off balance that it actually feels like the world is tilting. “I know it’s stupid.”

  Jay Jay lifts his eyebrows and gives Petey a look I don’t understand. “I’ve heard of stupider stuff.”

  Petey leans over the table and shoves Jay Jay’s shoulder. “It’s not stupid.”

  They’re not talking about my milk cartons anymore. “What?”

  “Nothing,” Oscar says. “It’s just … nothing.”

  He nearly crushes his milk carton for real, but Marvel stops him. The little boy snatches it out of his hand and gives it to me.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “I’ll carry them in my backpack if you want.”

  Everyone is staring at me. I’m grateful to Marvel, but the unbalance is almost unbearable. I say Thanks under my breath.

  “Marv—” Petey starts to say something.

  “It could happen,” Marvel says. “Maybe it really could.”

  He takes all three cartons and goes back into the building. My heart lurches a little, but I’m able to let him go.

  “We have to win the tournament,” Oscar finally says. “We truly do.”

  I sense the opportunity to restore balance and can’t help myself. “Why?”

  “There’s a thousand-dollar prize,” he says.

  I take the flyer out of my back pocket and spread it open on the table. “So how does it work?”

  “We play on Friday,” Jay Jay says. “The top-ten teams play elimination rounds in the finals the next Friday. If we win one in the finals, we move on to the next until there are just two teams left. And then just one winner.”

  “Wait. You mean this Friday?”

  “Yep,” Jay Jay says. “Starts at ten a.m. at the Boys and Girls Club.”

  The tournament starts two days after tomorrow, and I wonder how we could possibly practice enough to even make it to the second day of competition. Maybe we could do well next year, but this weekend? “How far did you get last year?”

  “We didn’t play last year.”

  Jay Jay looks at me, and I find my eyes shifting from his blue eye to his green one. I don’t even know what to say. “Okay.”

  “Anyway,” Petey interrupts before I can ask anything else. “That’s two-fifty each. Who wouldn’t want to win that?”

  Oscar lifts his shoulders. “It’s a frickin’ fortune.”

  But he gives the other boys a look. There’s more to the story, and even if they aren’t going to tell me now, it restores some balance just knowing that it’s there.

  “Awww…” The voice comes from behind me, and I look over my shoulder at a boy with hair the color of carrots. “It’s the Losers table.”

  Jay Jay rolls his different-colored eyes.

  Oscar says, “That’s right. So go away, Ricky.”

  “Go away, Ricky,” the boy mimics.

  Petey stands up. “Marv already slapped the table. Let’s do this.”

  Ricky reaches over me and snaps up the flyer. “I don’t know why you losers are bothering to even try. We’re going to win this. Everyone knows we’re going to win this. You won’t make it to the finals.”

  Another boy, this one taller and heavier, shoves Ricky’s shoulder and sends him crashing into me. “Take a chill pill, Rick.”

  The only way for Ricky to right himself is to put his hand on my arm and push himself up. He starts to, but the new kid grabs him by his striped T-shirt and hauls him away from me before he can.

  “Sorry,” Ricky says to me.

  “This is Aaron.” Jay Jay lifts his chin toward the other kid. “Ex-Loser.”

  Aaron puts a hand over his heart, like it’s been wounded. He has dishwater-blond hair and green eyes that are magnified behind a pair of thick glasses. “Marvel’s holding the table for you. Move it or lose it, current Losers.”

  “Cute,” Jay Jay says under his breath. He starts toward the building, and Oscar and Petey follow. So do I.

  “What’s an ex-Loser?” I ask Petey.

  “He used to be part of our crew,” he answers without looking at me. “He’s not anymore.”

  “Why not?”

  “God, you ask a lot of questions,” Oscar says. Then he raises his voice, just as he starts into the building. “Because he’s greedy and selfish, that’s why!”

  I look over my shoulder. Ricky is cracking up, laughing so hard he has to lean against the table to stay on his feet. Aaron watches us without even a smile.

  * * *

  A group of girls is playing on the one foosball table everyone plays at. Marvel bounces on his toes nearby, waiting for one side or the other to get to five.

  “You guys are too slow,” he whines. “We lost our turn. But I slapped it again.”

  I go to the other table and give one of the bars a spin. The little men rotate, just like they’re supposed to. I reach m
y fingers into the pocket, but there’s no ball.

  “We never use this table,” Jay Jay says, standing on the opposite side, his fingers gripping two of the bars.

  “Why not?”

  He looks surprised for a second. “Just no one ever does.”

  “Used to be for the staff,” a kid who’s maybe a year or two older than us says. “Remember? Stupid Ellis never let us play on it.”

  There’s some murmuring of memory.

  I’m not sure where it comes from, but I feel a burst of bravery. “So is there a ball?”

  Jay Jay feels in the pocket on his side, then shakes his head. “Jessica probably has one.”

  “I’ll go ask!” Marvel darts out of the room before anyone can stop him.

  “Truly, no one plays on this table,” Oscar says.

  “So…” I tilt my head, looking at him. “It’s the Losers table, then?”

  He dips his chin and raises his eyebrows at my bad joke. “Even the Losers don’t use it.”

  I toy with the keeper on my side. “Seems like a waste.”

  Oscar looks at Jay Jay, who raises both shoulders. “Would it be cheating?”

  Marvel comes barreling back in, holding a small white ball up in one fist. “Got it!”

  Petey and Oscar look at each other for a second, but then they take their spots and Jay Jay comes around next to me. The other kids in the room are watching now. The girls have even stopped playing.

  The surge of nerve I felt earlier leaves when I hear Ricky say, “Now what are you losers doing?”

  “They’re playing on the other table,” one of the girls says.

  Aaron comes from behind him and walks up to the good table. He slaps his hand down on it and says, “Next game.”

  “Go ahead,” Marvel says. “We don’t need that table anymore anyway.”

  I expect someone to slap the Losers’ table, to take the game after ours, but no one does.

  Jay Jay says, “Drop the ball, Marv.”

  * * *

  The Losers have a rival crew: Ricky and Aaron, and two others—identical twin brothers with dark hair and eyes. While they wait for the girls at the good table to finish their game, one of them snorts and says, “They replaced the baby with a girl. Losers.”

  Marvel slaps our table with the palm of his hand and says, “You know what? I get next game.”

  I’m about to say that I’ll be the mascot for the next round, but Petey puts his hand on his brother’s shoulder and bends to whisper something in the little boy’s ear.

  Marvel’s small face darkens.

  “If Marvel wants his spot back, it’s okay with me,” I say. “Really. Or we could share it.”

  Marvel’s blue eyes narrow when he looks at me. “No, it’s fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Let’s play,” Oscar says.

  There’s no time to argue. Jay Jay passes the ball up to my defense, and I shoot it, hard, down the line to the other goal.

  I have to admit, we play like a well-oiled machine. Petey and Oscar win this time, but it’s close. Even the boys waiting their turn stop heckling and watch.

  “If we’re playing against other teams in the tournament,” I ask, “don’t we only need two players?”

  “We take turns. There are six rounds on Friday. Three for O and Petey. Three for me and you,” Jay Jay answers. “Everyone gets six games, even if they lose.”

  “We won’t lose.” Petey looks at Ricky and Aaron still leaning against the wall. “We can’t.”

  SEVEN

  On the ride home, I try to pay attention so I can remember the route. It’s hopeless, though. I’ll never make it back to the community center without the boys. Not after just one trip there and back.

  When we finally get to our neighborhood, the boys all stop on the sidewalk between Jay Jay’s house and mine.

  “Why don’t you guys come to my house?” Jay Jay says to Petey. “You can stay over. My grandma won’t care.”

  “We gotta get home.” Petey doesn’t sound happy about that.

  Marvel has deflated completely. He looks half the size he’s been all day. “Are you sure?”

  Petey puts a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “Mom said we have to.”

  Marvel shrugs his brother’s hand off.

  “Wait.” Everyone looks at me, like I popped out of the sewer drain or something.

  “What?” Oscar says.

  I rub my hand on my shorts, trying to dry my palm. “Sorry. Marvel has my…”

  My voice trails off, but Marvel swings his backpack off his shoulders and unzips it. He pulls out one of the cartons and hands it to me, then another, and another.

  “Thanks,” I say.

  Marvel nods and looks at his brother. The two of them ride off.

  I still need to get Oscar’s sister’s bike to his house, but I’ll climb up the stairs and leave the cartons on the balcony, I think. I’m definitely bringing my backpack tomorrow, if they want me to go with them again.

  “Hang on,” Oscar says just as I’m about to say that I’ll be right back. “Just wait here.”

  He parks his bike on Jay Jay’s driveway and walks in the front door like he owns the place. I’ve got my fingers in the drinking spouts of the milk cartons and that Neo-Maxi-Zoom-Dweebie feeling is back. Huge.

  Jay Jay stands on the sidewalk with me and looks out toward the beach across the street. “You killed it today, by the way.”

  I shrug one shoulder. “I had fun.”

  “Are you going to come with us again tomorrow?”

  I feel something let go in the center of my chest that I didn’t realize was tight. “Yeah. I mean, if you want me to.”

  “We have to win that tournament,” he says.

  “Foosball?” As soon as the word is out of my mouth, I feel like an idiot. What other tournament? “Oh, right.”

  “It’s a thousand bucks,” Jay Jay says.

  “Yeah. I know.” I still have the flyer in my pocket, and we had a whole discussion about it at snack time and another during the lunch break.

  He finally turns to me, and he looks fierce. Like a warrior. I take a half step back. “We have to win it.”

  “But why is it so important?”

  Before he can answer, Oscar comes back out with a woman who, I think, must be his mother. She’s very small, with black hair pulled back into a twist behind her head. She wears a light-blue dress and white sneakers. Oscar says something to her, then comes to us.

  “Mom says we can leave Olivia’s bike here, so you can use it again.” He gives me a look that lets me know that he expects me to arrange my own ride. Soon. “If you have to.”

  “So, tomorrow?” Jay Jay asks me.

  Both boys look at me and I say, “Yeah. Tomorrow.”

  * * *

  The streetlights pop on practically the second I step foot on the front stoop of Lila’s house. The timing is super satisfying and I smile. Before I can make a decision between knocking and just walking inside, the door opens.

  “Oh God, Tessa.” Lila takes a step back and covers her mouth with her hand.

  She’s been crying. Like, really crying, the way I had been in my sleep the night before. For a split second, I think Dad’s dead. He’s been in an accident or something. It’s like the oxygen has been sucked from the universe and I can’t draw a breath.

  But then, her face melts in relief. She grabs me by my shoulders and shakes me once, hard enough to make my head snap back and the cartons on my fingertips rattle together. “Where have you been? Where were you?”

  “I—” I yank away from her. “You said I could go out.”

  “That was ten hours ago!”

  I step back from her. “I got home before the streetlights came on.”

  “Streetlights?” She looks at me like I’ve lost my mind.

  Be home before the streetlights come on has been my rule since the third grade. It literally did not occur to me until that moment, with Lila standing in front of me tryi
ng to pull herself together, that it wasn’t my rule in Los Angeles.

  No. No, it is my rule in Los Angeles. I’m sure of it. She just doesn’t know the rules. “Where’s Dad?”

  She wraps her arms around her huge, pregnant belly. “He went to orientation at the high school. For his new job.”

  “He got the job?” She nods. It bothers me to get that news from her. “When is he coming home?”

  “Soon,” she says, but she’s still looking at me like I’ve kidnapped her puppy or something. “Why are you doing this to me?”

  Doing this to her? I push past her and stomp toward the stairs. The words come tumbling out of me, though. “It’s not my fault you don’t know the rules. My mom would have known that I wasn’t late until the streetlights came on.”

  She looks younger when she feels sorry for me—this little half orphan she’s somehow gotten herself put in charge of. Like she wishes, maybe, that her own mom was there to help her deal with me. “I’m doing the best I can.”

  Meanness brews in me, like the coffee that bubbles in the top of Dad’s coffee maker every morning. I don’t want it to, but it comes spilling out of me. “You are not doing the best you can! You could have stayed away from my dad. You could have left us alone. We were happy in Denver.”

  “Tessa.” We both turn to the front door. Dad is standing there holding a folder full of papers. I actually take a step forward before he closes the gap between himself and Lila and folds her up against him. “What’s going on?”

  Before Lila can answer, I run up the stairs and close myself in the bedroom that isn’t even mine.

  I have time to pace the length of the room twice before I hear footsteps and there’s a knock on the door. I go to it, expecting to see Dad there. I expect him to hug me and tell me that we’ll figure things out. Everything will be okay. Just give Lila some time.

  And I’ll tell him to forget it. I hate her. I don’t want to give her some time. I want to go home. Right now.

  I’m so sure I know what’s going to happen, that when I open the door and it’s Lila standing there, the breath goes out of me.

  God. She’s even pretty when her face is all red and puffy.