But on the stage, Concertina was playing a song called “Kill All Cowards,” and no one had saved Kellan Caury. It didn’t matter that county justice was just murder with a different name or that he was harmless. You couldn’t go around associating with strangers. If you did, you might wind up swinging.
I put my hand on the man’s wrist and twisted away.
His eyes were just dark pockets of shadow, but suddenly they burned ferocious and hot under the brim of his hat.
I turned around fast, before he could grab me again, and went back the way I’d come.
My heart beat hard and panicky as I shoved my way through the crowd, back to where Roswell laughed too loud and waved his hands around when he talked and could almost always make me feel normal.
But I knew that this time, it was going to take more than pretending everything was fine. I could still hear the guitar player’s voice. It reverberated in my head like a tinny echo, You’re dying.
When I came up to the pool tables, Drew was terrorizing Roswell at nine ball, sinking numbers one after another, then starting another round and doing it all over again.
“So, what was going on over there?” Danny asked, jerking his head in the direction of the floor and leaning on his cue.
“Nothing,” I said, clearing my throat. “Just a misunderstanding.”
Danny gave me a hard look. When a situation started to get too weird or too bad, he could generally be counted on to turn it into some kind of joke, but he wasn’t smiling now, not even close. “Kind of a strange place to have a misunderstanding, though. What did he want?”
You’re dying. You’re dying.
I glanced in the direction of the fire door without meaning to. The doorway was empty and the green exit sign still glowed over it, flickering a little.
Danny was watching me with a blank expression.
What did the guy want? He wanted to take me somewhere, or to tell me something or give me something. He said that he wanted to save me, and I wanted that too, only not in the middle of the Starlight where everyone could see, and not by someone with black, flashing eyes and yellow teeth. I couldn’t shake the way Danny was looking at me, like he was waiting for me to show myself.
I was saved from answering by Tate. She came back to the tables breathing hard. Her face was shiny with sweat and there was a rip down the shoulder of her T-shirt where someone in the pit must have grabbed her by the collar.
She pushed herself up to sit on the half wall just as Alice came down the steps behind her. I figured they must be hanging out together, even though I never saw them talk in class, but Alice walked right past Tate and came over to me. “Hey, Mackie! I was looking for you. You seemed kind of rough yesterday. Roswell said you went home. Are you feeling better?”
