The Stranger Game

“My name is Nico, what’s yours?” I followed the script, Marcia nodding as I spoke. The caller’s name and number came up on the screen. She was on a cell phone outside Denver. She wasn’t lying about her name, like lots of callers did; the phone was registered to her. I listened closely as she talked, about the girls at her school and how they were treating her, about how she had started cutting and wanted to stop but didn’t know how. “Sometimes I think about just running away, like, just starting over somewhere. You know? Just disappearing,” the girl said.

A shiver ran down my spine. “I know, I totally understand. We all feel that way sometimes. . . .” I gave the advice I was supposed to, clicked the resource link next to her location, and gave her the names and numbers of the places closest to her where she could get help. But the whole time, my mind was not really on this crying girl. I was thinking of Sarah. Would I know her if she called? That couldn’t happen—would never happen. Coincidences like that were for the movies, not real life. Still, part of me had to admit the truth about why I had chosen to volunteer at the help line to meet the school community service requirement.

I could have been at the animal hospital, nursing a baby rabbit back to health.

Or at Mapleview Home for Seniors, reading to some nice old blind lady.

But here I was, answering calls from teens who wanted to disappear—and then sometimes did.

By the time I ended the call, the Denver girl had stopped crying. Marcia looked over and gave me a smile and a thumbs-up, even though I could tell she was already listening to another call. I noticed with a start that it was 9:02. I dug my community service form out of my backpack and put it on her desk on my way out.

“Nico,” Marcia called to me as I was almost at the elevators. “Great work tonight, really,” she said. Her eyes were on the form I’d left on her desk. “Where am I supposed to sign this?”

I walked back to her desk and showed her. “But you also have to fill out the evaluation section,” I reminded her. “So I’ll pick it up from you later.”

“Give me a minute and I’ll do it right now.”

I glanced at the backlit clock on the wall. Now it was 9:05. “I can’t, I have to go,” I said.

“Really, it’ll just take a sec,” she insisted.

I stood next to her desk for a moment while she wrote something on the lines. Her black pen moved so slowly. Halfway done. 9:07. I could feel my heart thumping in my chest.

“I’ll get it from you next week,” I said, running out the door. I didn’t give her a chance to answer. I pressed the elevator button hard, over and over, until the doors opened. I did the math in my head. By the time I got to the lobby and out the doors, it would be 9:10. I felt my phone vibrating in my bag before I even made it outside.

There was Mom, her car idling by the curb where she always parked. I could see the bluish light of her cell phone reflected on her face, the lines on her forehead deep and worried. I moved fast over the sidewalk and across the grass, where bits of slushy spring snow soaked my sneakers. I tapped the passenger side window. She looked up at me and for a moment I could see the shock on her face. In the dark, with my long blond hair down under my hood, she thought I was someone else. I knew who.

I pushed the hood back, showing her my face. She smiled and rolled the window down.

“You scared me! Come on, get in, it’s freezing.”

I got into the warm car, smelling leather and Mom’s perfume.

“You’re late, and I tried to call you. Nico—”

“Not my fault. You know we aren’t allowed to even take our phones out in the center. And Marcia was filling out my school forms and taking her time.”

Mom didn’t say anything, just looked into the mirror as she pulled out of the spot. She didn’t have to say anything. I knew how she worried, how unacceptable it was to make her feel like that. Our agreement about always being in touch, no matter what. But sometimes, it was impossible. Impossible to be perfect, to always be on time, to never, ever make Mom and Dad worry about me the way they had about her.

“What’s the homework situation?” Mom finally spoke in a normal tone of voice as she turned left onto the street that led to our neighborhood.

“Almost done. I have a chapter to read for chemistry.”

“And you ate already?” she asked.

“I ate, Mom,” I answered with a sigh. Always the same questions. Always the same answers.

She pulled into our driveway, brightly lit by two floodlights over the double garage doors and lanterns on either side of the front door. As we waited for a garage door to open, Mom turned to me. “You know that I’m so proud of you for working at the help line, don’t you? Your dad is too. I want you to know that.”

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