Sticks and Stones by Angèle Gougeon Read Free Book Online

and less, her belongings slowly disappearing into the Sloan house. And if they did, they didn’t care.
    Her dad never talked to Lem again.
    And Lem didn’t talk to him.
    And Sandra’s bruises faded. She didn’t grow any taller, but those boys helped her grow up, and then the whole year had gone by, school was over, summer had come hot and damp, and had gone cool and windy, school had started up again, and Sandra Daron was fifteen years old.
    Then girls started going missing.

Chapter Four
    “I can’t believe it about Nikki Trite.”
    Amanda blew across her newly polished nails, a shining, searing pink. The bottle sat on the corner of her desk.
    “What?” Sandra frowned at her, pretending to listen as Mr. Murray turned to the class, voice such a steady drone that she’d nearly fallen asleep three times in the past fifteen minutes.
    “Nikki Trite? How can you not know? What, do you live under a rock or something?”
    Sandra sent her a look and Amanda at least had the grace to blush. “Oh, right. Sorry.” Former gossip-mongrel of the school’s now head-honcho Lucy Myers, Amanda finished spinning the cap back onto the bottle of polish. “Didn’t you notice how she hasn’t shown up for class in over a week?”
    Sandra glanced around the room, shrugged, and Amanda rolled her eyes.
    Amanda wasn’t so bad to hang out with, even if she was only a class friend, and even if she still gossiped like she was back at Lucy Myers’ side. Sandra supposed someone couldn’t change all that fast and all at once. And it was better than having no one now that Jack was across the street with his brother.
    Heaving a massive sigh, Amanda said, “Apparently she and Dun Brackerly had some fight and she said she was going to leave town. And now she’s gone. I mean, everyone was just waiting for her to show back up at school, licking her wounds – she’d been caught making out with over half of the volleyball team; I don’t know what she thought would happen. But they said she really did it. She ran away. Can you imagine?” Amanda snapped her mouth shut as Mr. Murray turned again, frowning as all the whispers immediately morphed into dead silence. He turned back around. “I give her another week before the cops bring her back.”
    “Huh.”
    Amanda rolled her eyes again, so hard they were about to fall out of her head. “You’re hopeless.”
    Sandra’s whole page was doodled full of names. Two names in particular. She turned it quickly and ripped it clean. “I guess I am.”
    Amanda sighed again. “You’re no fun.”
    Sandra shrugged again, opened her mouth to speak, but closed it immediately when Mr. Murray’s dark eyes landed on her. She kept her eyes wide and held her pen as though she was studiously taking notes. Amanda snickered.
    “I hate Social Studies,” she said.
    “I’m not even sure what Social Studies are.”
    Amanda grinned again. By then Mr. Murray finally had it and spun around, catching Edmund Rasui and Zachariah Inger throwing spit balls at Dale Brackerly (Dun’s twin brother) and booted them both out into the hall. The rest of the class was spent in silence, saliva gathering at the corner of Sandra’s mouth when she accidentally fell asleep for the last five minutes of class.
    She was sure Mr. Murray glared her all the way out the door.
    After school, she climbed into the truck between Jack and Daniel – both who, she swore, had gotten even bigger and bulkier over the summer (she hadn’t).
    “Fuck, Dad, we need a bigger truck!”
    “Watch your mouth!”
    Sandra smiled all the way home.
    ~
    On November twentieth, fourteen-year-old Lydia Barsowich went missing.
    This time, no one could say she ran away. She didn’t fight with her parents, she didn’t have a boyfriend, and she seemed happy with her quiet, normal life.
    That was when Sandra became worried.
    Because maybe Nikki Trite hadn’t run away either.
    Maybe everything she had seen last year was coming true.
    Maybe there was just nothing