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"Excellent, see that you do," Dad said

"He’s a vaguely disturbing boy, Kyle," Moh the doorways that exited the hospital, a per her forehead

Yeah

I looked at Dad, seeing the ghost of a sriression of political incorrectness in corammar slurs and sords it was doubtful she’d make a full recovery

Gramps and Sophie came out of Jade’s rooh the door I saw the nuhtly crooked on the front

Thirteen

I swung the door open and walked inside with my heart in my throat I needed to be with her, talk to her, lend whatever comfort I could

Except for me, she was truly alone now I couldn’t even be happy that the coone I wouldn’t have wished that death on est ene of responsibility stole overin a cup, the events tied together too tightly for coest one hy had Brett planned to murder LeClerc?

Sout feeling

CHAPTER 22

We loaded up on the gutbouys plowed through whatever the girls couldn’t eat

Not a cru area I hadn’t realized what kind of stupor I was in Must’ve been running on pure adrenaline The guys all gave each other the food coer had been satiated and now the carb load had slid down the pipe and clogged the drains We had our eyes at half s splayed when the cops came back into the room

I wanted to be alert, really I did But I was part of the colob of teen sloth

I sat there

Gale took in the array of brightly colored gold wrappers, cardboard shake containers and the parents’ total lack of fluster and grinned

"Lunch break guys?" she asked

"It’s a trough thing, actually," Tiff said, wiping a napkin against her um in her craw

Nice

"What?" Garcia asked her, brows to his hairline

"Ya know, pigs use troughs to eat froet it

He nodded slowly, knowing she would elaborate without proh thirty cheeseburgers So yeah Swine" She popped a bubble, looking interested in their response

"What did you have?" Gale asked her, looking like maybe she shouldn’t have

"Whatever they’d leave us, the hogs"

Tiff definitely had some kind of animal fetish That made me think about all of Alex’s hed out loud

Tiff looked at me "Share your weirdness Hart"

I couldn’t But that didn’t hway I was gonna stabilize anytiet the crooked onna ihed as I started to howl The ies were si with Chen?"

King of Hysteria Yup, that’s ?" Garcia said, ," Alex said, interested about ould htmare under the full scrutiny of the cops

Me too

I didn’t stop until Archer ca, Caleb?"

Jonesy glared at him "Can it, Archer, don’t even try for sensitive Better to just let hi fit, then soain it’s a" Jonesy paused, thinking about it

"Coping mechanism," John finished

"Don’t psychoanalyzemy eyes

Gramps walked in "What’s your trouble, Caleb?"

"Tiff started talking about what pigs we are with our food and it put Caleb into a laughing fit," Alex said, clearly puzzled

Gramps palmed his chin "Seems to me the Weller family is awfully focused on ani, "Aren’t your parents always having a turnip or turtle or whatever?"

They gave hihter

Gramps clapped me on my back "Listen pal, man up Jade wants to see you She probably won’t understand why you’re in here putting on the Caleb Coht up

Mo to calm down in a ti his head "I don’t knohere he gets that laughing problerunted and he s up

As I left I watched a bunch of the parents swarm in to flock around the kids

The cops would have their hands full Good, I’d get the full Brett report later Right now, all thatabout aher body outside of the thin hospital sheet I couldn’t putIt’d still be about three days before she was good enough to be released