The Truth of the Matter by Andrew Klavan Read Free Book Online Page A

feeling to be trading messages with her. Even standing there on the outside of the scene, watching the younger me at my desk, I could feel that happiness inside me. I could feel how in love with her I was and how good it felt to know that she was in love with me. And I was so glad that I could finally remember, that it was all coming back, all of it.
    I remembered how everything—even Alex’s murder— faded into the background of our lives as Beth and I discovered the depths of our feelings for one another. We were together every moment we could find, walking, talking, laughing, feeling like we had stumbled on the whole point of our lives and that that point was for the two of us to be together, to find each other, like two halves of a single person that were created to snap into place.
    As I stood there, watching my younger self—wishing I could be back in his body, in his world, in that past, happy life—I looked over his shoulder and saw a new message appear on the monitor.
    Beth: i don’t think it’s fair, that’s all.
    My younger self tapped back at the keyboard: y not talk to her?
    Beth: and say what? “Hey, I’m a much better writer than that grade you gave me?”
    I tapped back: sure, y not? you want me to?
    Beth: no!!!!!!
    And me: why so many !!!?
    Beth: cuz I no what yer like, CW. no karate chopping my eng teacher!
    My younger self and I both laughed.
    Then my younger self and I both stopped laughing. Just as we were about to tap an answer to Beth into the keyboard, the monitor went completely black.
    My younger self blinked, startled. “Oh, no,” he said aloud. He slapped the side of the monitor. “Come on!”
    He—I—was beginning to jiggle the On/Off switch at the base of the monitor when the screen crackled in a strange way and a message rolled across the bottom of it. The message was in white letters on the dark background.
    It said: Open your cell phone, Charlie .
    With that, the monitor flashed back on again. There was the Schoolyard home page with the last message from Beth still there, just as before.
    Puzzled, I—the younger me—looked around and saw my cell phone lying on the desk, at the opposite end of the keyboard from my calculator. I picked it up. It wasn’t ringing or anything. There didn’t seem to be anyone there. All the same, I shrugged and opened it as the message directed.
    Instantly, a man’s voice said: “If you want to know who killed Alex Hauser, come to the Morgan Reservoir in half an hour.”
    “What?” I said. “Who is this?”
    “Come alone. Don’t tell anyone.”
    “How do you know who killed Alex? Who am I talking to?”
    “If you tell anyone, I’ll know. Do you understand me? I’ll know and I won’t show up.”
    “Wait, listen . . . ,” I began.
    “Do you understand me?”
    The younger me looked around the room as if searching for help. Finally, I raised my hand in a gesture of surrender. “Yeah. Yeah, I understand you, sure.”
    “Do you want to know who killed Alex or not?”
    “Yes, of course I do, but . . .”
    There was no click, but the silence at the other end of the line became somehow suddenly more complete.
    “Hello?” I said. “Hello?”
    No answer. The mysterious man was gone.
    The present me stood at the edge of the scene, at the edge of my old room at home, watching the past me as he sat there wondering what to do. I didn’t know what was going to happen next, but I wanted to call out to myself, to warn myself, to say: Don’t do it. Don’t go. Stay where you are. Answer Beth’s message, stay with Beth, love Beth, have your life .
    But at the same time, I thought that I could feel what was going through the heart and mind of the past me; I could feel his curiosity, his desire to find Alex’s murderer and clear himself of any possible suspicion . . . and I could feel something else too. I could feel his sense of adventure. His need for excitement. His burning ambition to get out of his small-town life and do something important