Chapters (47)
- Cover
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- 2 Months Later
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Books by Kasie West
- Back Ad
- About the Publisher
“He still does sometimes, but he helped me escape school when I needed it and he was really nice about it. That kind of turned things around for us.”
“I can see that.” She looked at my still-lingering smile. “He seems to lighten you up a bit.”
“What’s that mean?”
“You know what it means.”
She was right. I did know. And I did feel light. As light as air.
Twenty-Five
My renewed motivation in trying to figure out Heath Hall’s identity was a nice distraction from the realization I’d had about my brother. The one I wasn’t sure how I was going to fix. How could I get over feeling like he was my enemy when he wasn’t even alive for me to confront? When he’d done nothing wrong.
I plopped myself in front of my computer that night, ready to set some traps for Heath Hall where he would slip into admitting something. I may have been even more motivated to figure out who Heath Hall was because of the possibility that he could be Jackson.
Did this mean . . . ? Was Amelia right? Was I crushing on him?
Our chats online had been fun and meant something to me. And our interactions in person had been . . . great.
Before I even signed into my private messages, I saw Heath Hall had announced another event for this weekend. He didn’t say exactly what would be happening, just an address and time range. That was new.
I moved on to my messages. I had no new ones. That did not disappoint me, I told myself. I analyzed each of the suspects in my mind, trying to decide which trap to lay first before I typed. A thought occurred to me.
Have any fun mental conversations with your dog lately?
Robert had a dog. How had I not thought about that until now? He didn’t respond right away. It was only six o’clock. Had Robert’s track meet gone late? Jackson. Where would he be at six o’clock at night? Eating dinner with his family, maybe.
I began scrolling back through Heath Hall’s wall. The feed went on and on. How long had he been doing this anyway? I clicked on his profile where it showed me when the account was created. I stared at that date for a long time, then subtracted the number in my head three times from the current date to make sure it was right. Five years. This Heath Hall account had existed for five years? How had I not noticed that before? I just assumed it had only been happening for a couple years because that’s when I remembered learning about it. But I was in elementary school five years ago. So were Robert and Jackson, for that matter. There was no way either of them would’ve thought of something this elaborate five years ago.
My computer dinged with a new message.