Verwandte Artikel zu Freefall

Freefall - Softcover

Scott, Mindi

 
9781442402782: Freefall
Softcover
ISBN 10: 1442402784 ISBN 13: 9781442402782
Verlag: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2010

Inhaltsangabe

How do you come back from the point of no return?

Seth McCoy was the last person to see his best friend, Isaac, alive, and the first to find him dead. It was just another night, just another party, just another time when Isaac drank too much and passed out on the lawn. Only this time, Isaac didn't wake up.

Convinced that his own actions led to his friend's death, Seth is torn between turning his life around . . . or losing himself completely.

Then he meets Rosetta: so beautiful and so different from everything and everyone he's ever known. But Rosetta has secrets of her own, and Seth soon realizes he isn't the only one who needs saving . . .

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Mindi Scott is the author of Freefall and Live Through This. She lives near Seattle, Washington, with her drummer husband in a house with a non-soundproof basement. Visit her at MindiScott.com.

Auszug. © Genehmigter Nachdruck. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 4

8:19 P.M.

This was Daniel’s deal. He’d taken the order, contacted a supplier, and set it all up. I was just the sucker he’d roped into driving him for the actual delivery. Which meant, technically, I was also the guy who had the police cruiser riding his ass through town.

Just like always.

“You know, Dick,” Daniel said, “I’m pretty sure you bring this cop bullshit on yourself.”

“Oh yeah?” I kept the steering wheel as steady as I could and stole another glance in the rearview. All I could make out in the dusky darkness were bright headlights and the outline of the light bar on the cruiser’s roof, which—so far—wasn’t flashing. “How do I bring it on myself? By hauling you around everywhere in my brother’s unlucky car?”

“No,” Daniel said. “By driving like a paranoid old lady. You’ve got to blend in better on the road. And go faster. You might not realize this, but cops pay close attention when people are under the speed limit too.”

“I know that.”

What I didn’t know was why Daniel thought he was some kind of speed-estimating expert; the Mustang’s speedometer was always stuck at zero whether I was at a dead stop or cruising the highway.

I looked in my side-view mirror. From what I could tell, the cop had no plans to stop tailgating me anytime soon. The experience was not doing wonders for my hangover headache or crazy-nervous heartbeat.

“You’ve got to quit looking at him,” Daniel said between swigs of his Jack and Coke. “And take some deep breaths or something. The street you want is coming up next left.”

The moment of truth. I flipped on my blinker, and then eased into a pretty smooth turn, even with all the weight Daniel had piled in the back. I peeked in the rearview again, trying to be casual about it.

To my relief the cruiser hadn’t followed. We were in the clear for now.

A minute later we hit the crest of Ray Fitch Hill—“Rich Bitch Hill” to those of us unlucky enough to live by the river—where huge houses sat on square, perfect lawns with clipped hedges and lit-up flower beds. Amazing, really, the ritziness of this part of town. Most of the cars alone were worth three, maybe even four, times as much as the single-wide mobile homes Daniel and I called home.

Daniel directed me to the place, and as I backed into the driveway, Pete Zimmer, the Kenburn High football god himself, was waiting on the sidewalk with two other jocks. They all looked alike with their buzz-cut hair and T-shirts that said, I AM COLLEGE, I’D DO ME, and SEXY NEVER LEFT.

“Just let me handle this,” Daniel said to me.

“I always do.”

We climbed out of the car. I fidgeted with Isaac’s miniature Magic 8 Ball while Daniel clasped I-Am-College Pete’s hand all secret-handshake-style. This crap had been going on for over a year, so I should have been used to it, but Daniel acting buddy-buddy with guys we’d always hated still weirded me out.

Pete nodded toward me. “Hey, Seth.” Then he got down to business. “Danny, I have all these people showing up. Last big party of the summer and you’re late with the beer. What’s up with that?”

“Hey, these things take time,” Daniel said.

The fact that he didn’t correct Pete over the Danny thing bugged me too. Everyone got a nickname from Daniel—he’d been calling me Dick instead of Seth for years—but he usually didn’t let people get away with calling him anything but Daniel.

I popped the trunk, which was packed tight with cases of beer and a whole mess of Jack Daniel’s and vodka. Then I went around, leaned into the car, and pulled out the blankets from the backseat that had been covering up more stacks of the same.

Pete stood at the back of the car, staring down. “What’s all this single-serving shit? I ordered a keg.”

“That didn’t work out,” Daniel said, playing it cool. “But I got you a good price and threw in a bunch of hard stuff, too. You and your pals can stay sloppy drunk all night with this.”

Pete frowned. “What are you trying to pull, Jackson?”

If I hadn’t known better, the expression on Daniel’s face would have made me believe he was actually sorry. He clamped his hand on Pete’s shoulder and hunched down so they were at eye level. “Look, Zimm. I have it on good authority that the police are looking for some underage parties in your neighborhood to raid this weekend. If you have a keg, there’ll be no way to hide it. You’ll be screwed, I’ll be screwed, we’ll all be screwed. It’s safer this way.”

I’d-Do-Me Eric raised his eyebrows and looked down the street like he expected to spot police cars staking out the place.

“Where’d you hear that?” Pete asked. “About the cops?”

“I have people everywhere,” Daniel said, waving toward the Valley.

Pete looked like he wanted to ask more questions or possibly kick Daniel’s ass, but Sexy-Never-Left Garrison cut in. “Dude, beer’s beer. Let’s do this.”

“Yes, let’s,” Daniel said. “Dick and I will haul everything in for you, no extra charge. Sound cool?”

Pete shrugged. “Go for it.” Then he headed back to his mansion with his friends trailing behind.

When they were gone, I couldn’t help laughing. “You have people? Every where?”

“Hell yeah, I do,” Daniel said, grinning. “And these people of mine predicted that beer will be served in huge quantities right here tonight. Which is exactly why you and me are going to stick around.”

I shook my head. “No way.”

It was more of a reflex than anything. Saying no to Rich Bitch Hill parties was as automatic to me as saying yes had become to Daniel.

“Come on, Dick,” he argued. “It isn’t like you have anyplace better to be.”

He was right. And, well, the truth was, I actually did need to do something to get my mind off all the crap from the night before.

Daniel could always pick up on it if I was wavering, so he told me his usual lie to seal the deal: “Just give me twenty minutes here and we can take off, okay?”

“Fine,” I said, pretending to believe him. “Twenty minutes.”

10:44 P.M.

I’d been to enough house parties to know when everything was about to fall apart. After two hours, this one was definitely on the way to disintegration. Forty or fifty rowdy drunk kids were there, all laughing and yelling their heads off while the suck-ass dance music vibrated children out of their beds the next block over.

I was ready to leave—I’d been ready since we’d walked in, to be honest—but Daniel had disappeared with some chick, so I headed back to the kitchen on my own, even though the booze was in there and I kind of wanted to steer clear. Being around these rich assholes was messing up my head worse than ever. The room I was trying not to go into was exactly where I kept ending up; the stuff I was trying not to drink was exactly what I’d been chugging all night.

Vicki Lancaster and Carr Goodwin were standing in front of the marble-y counter with a few of their friends, sipping from cans. Carr watched my every move like salespeople always did when Daniel and I walked into a store. The rest ignored...

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Verlag
Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Erscheinungsdatum
2010
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
1442402784
ISBN 13 
9781442402782
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
336
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