Chapter 27

CHAPTER 27

I stalled for as long as I could, but Mom made me go back to school for lunch. Darius was sitting with three AP girls when I got to the cafeteria, and I was not going to sit there while everybody looked at them and then back at me and then back at them. So, I turned around and went to the guidance office and asked to see Mrs. Gaffney this time because I was never going to talk to Mr. Phelps again. Mrs. G was polishing off a salad in a plastic container when I went in.

"Poppy!" she said, practically choking on her lettuce.

"Don't stop, I just have a yes-or-no question," I said. "I have enough credits to graduate, right?"

She nodded, trying to swallow lettuce.

I knew I did, I'd been following Darius on his insane I-want-to-be-valedictorian quest, so we'd taken a ton of advanced classes and I had more than enough credits.

"Well, here's the thing," I told Mrs. Gaffney while she wiped her mouth. "I think I'm done with school. I don't want to come back."

"I heard about this from Mr. Phelps," she said, shoving her salad away. "You need to finish this semester. You can't just drop out."

"Okay, Thanksgiving is coming up next week, right? And nothing happens between then and Christmas. So, if I go see my teachers and ask to take my tests early?—"

"What's this about, Poppy?"

The thing about Mrs. Gaffney is that she's nobody's fool.

"I was in an accident a week ago," I told her, and her eyes got huge. "I'm okay, but it was bad." I pulled up my sleeve and showed her where some of the cuts were still healing, the bad ones. "And it kind of makes high school feel pointless now. But I'm working in my mom's shop, and I have a lot of ideas for it, and I don't want to sit in classes and think about stuff, I just want to go home and work."

She stared at me for a minute, and I waited because that's what she looks like when she's thinking. Then she picked up the phone and dialed. I was afraid she was calling my mom, but she waited until somebody answered, and then she said, "Betty, Gaff here. Got a question for you."

She listened for a second and then said, "I've got Poppy Malone in my office and she said she was in an accident last week. Is it anything I should be concerned about?"

She was watching me as she listened to, I assume, Mrs. Baumgarten. That was okay, Mrs. Baumgarten is a champ. Finally, Mrs. Gaffney nodded. "All right. Thank you so much. And Betty, I am so sorry about Melissa." She hung up and said to me, "Maybe we can get you an independent study for the last semester, something that some of your teachers would have to approve, but you could tailor it to what you wanted to do in your mom's shop. Maybe upgrade the computers in your shop for Mr. Pearson?"

I snorted at the idea of there being computers in Oddities, but it was a good idea, and thanks to Ozzie, I had the money to buy one, so I nodded. "I've got some ideas about displays, too, maybe Mrs. Stuart will like that; I'm good at art. And math, I can do something with bookkeeping with Mrs. Maxwell. My mom would be thrilled."

"One more," she said, and I thought about what I wanted to do with the shop.

"Design a website? Or write advertising stuff? I bet Mr. Goldman would go in on that; he likes my writing."

"Okay, then," Gaffney said. "Write it up: four proposals, detailed proposals, real plans, Poppy, and we'll see if it floats. And you can talk to your teachers about testing out early. I'll have a word, too." She leaned in. "This accident. It wasn't an accident, was it?"

"No," I said.

"Are you really okay?"

I took a deep breath. "No. But I'm getting there."

"Is it over?"

I thought about it, given we now had two people dead in Rocky Start. But that had nothing to do with me. "Yes."

"Okay," Mrs. Gaffney said. "You need one more independent study. A psychology one. With me. Once a week, in my office. No deal otherwise."

"You want me to talk about things?" I stood up. "No."

"Then no independent study next semester."

She picked up her fork and dug into her salad, and I knew she wouldn't budge.

"Okay, fine," I said. "Once a week."

"What really happened, Poppy?" she said.

I stared at her for a long minute because I hated saying it, but she waited, so I finally said, "I was kidnapped."

"Oh, hell." She put down her fork. "Are you seeing a therapist about this?"

"Nope," I said. "And I'm not going to, not even for the independent study."

She looked at me for a minute and then nodded. "Okay. I know Betty Baumgarten and a few other people from Rocky Start. I have an idea that it's not a normal place. But we can talk about things. Twice a week, then, in my office. Every Tuesday and Thursday. You can check in with your independent studies then. No argument. This is not negotiable."

"Okay," I said, and then I sat down, and we made plans.