In Your Arms Read online

  Sam smiled. “Hey, handsome.” It was an old joke between them. Ever since they were in ninth grade, after they had seen a movie on a late night cable channel, whenever Sam or Alex snuck up on one another and covered their eyes, they would greet each other with the silly phrase. She laughed as the hands were quickly removed from her eyes.

  Alex stood in front of Sam, giving her a This-Is-So-Hilarious-You-Should-See-Your-Face grin as Sam began to realize it wasn’t Alex who had placed her fingers over her eyes but….Phillip.

  “Well, it was kind of sudden, but I’m starting to like it,” he said, referring to the nickname.

  “Uh, I’m sorry. I didn’t—I mean, I thought you were Alex—I didn’t mean it,” Sam stammered.

  “So, you don’t think I’m handsome?” He gave her a hurt look.

  “No—I mean, yes—I mean, no, you are—um—”

  “It’s okay, Sam. I kind of like the nickname. Fits, don’t you think?” He winked. God, he was so hot when he winked at her like that.

  “Lacking some humility?” she said, refusing to be taken in.

  “Only when you’re around,” he said.

  Sam blushed just as the bell rang.

  “See ya around, Sam,” Phillip said. “Bye, Alex.”

  “Bye, Phillip,” Sam said.

  “Wait a minute. I’m not leaving until I hear you call me by my nickname.”

  “That’s not your nickname,” Sam insisted.

  “Yes, it is. You gave it to me. Alex was there, she witnessed.”

  “I didn’t think it was you.”

  “It still counts. Now let me hear you say it,” he urged.

  “We’re going to be late,” Sam stated.

  “I only need to hear you say it, and then you can go. Besides, we’re friends and that’s what friends do.”

  “What? Make each other late to class?”

  “No, give each other nicknames. Yours just happens to be Sam, and mine just happens to be…”

  “ Fine , goodbye, handsome,” Sam said.

  Phillip smiled. “Bye Sam. Bye Alex.”

  * * *

  “All right, guys, homework for tonight is problem set 65. This covers what we went over in class so if you were paying attention, you shouldn’t have a problem. Now for those of you who were not paying attention, and there were a few of you, read through the chapter or call one of your fellow classmates for help,” Mr. Stevens said to the class just before the bell rang.

  Sam and Alex stood up and headed out the classroom door.

  “Did you hear him?” Alex asked. “‘ For those of you who weren’t paying attention.’ ”

  Sam just smiled at her friend. They both knew Mr. Stevens was referring to them. They had been passing notes during class, again.

  “It shouldn’t be that hard,” Sam said. “It’s not like we were completely ignoring him. I mean I was listening, some of the time.”

  Both Alex and Sam began to laugh as they reached their lockers.

  “Oh, hey, I forgot to turn in my homework to Mr. Stevens,” Sam said. “I’ll meet you in English.” Sam grabbed her English book and headed back to Mr. Stevens room. “Mr. Stevens,” Sam said as she walked into his classroom. “I forgot to turn in my homework.”

  “Thank you, Sam. Oh, and next class, try and pay a little more attention to the lecture. You are my brightest student, but I would like a little acknowledgement once in a while.”

  Sam smiled. “Sure thing, Mr. Stevens, see you tomorrow.”

  Before Sam made her way down the corridor to English to join Alex and Michael, she stopped at a nearby water fountain in the East wing of the school. As Sam bent down and pushed down on the lever, she nearly choked when she heard several loud pops. Just like…gunshots.

  Sam’s heart was pounding in her chest even before she heard the screams and saw students running down the stairs.

  Chapter Five

  Sam was paralyzed with fear. What was going on? Students were running down the stairs, passing her as they made their way outside the building. All Sam could do was stand there and watch as the whole thing unraveled. Teachers had come out of their classrooms and began escorting students and yelling directions. It was a mad house as everyone rushed to get out of the school.

  Yet for some reason, Sam remained locked into place, too terrified to move. She thought of all the times she’d seen this on the news and couldn’t believe it was happening here. The gunshots weren’t far away, just up the stairs. Several more shots rang through the nearly empty hallway. Everyone had evacuated the upper level immediately after the guns first began firing. As Sam stood in an empty hallway, void of all activity, she heard echoing footsteps.

  As the footsteps and voices grew louder, Sam quickly backed up against the wall near the water fountain and crouched behind it. She closed her eyes and prayed that the shooters wouldn’t see her or walk toward the water fountain. Sam maneuvered her body so she could see down the hallway.

  As she did so, she saw two guys, both wearing ski masks. The only thing she could make out was their bulky shapes. Both wore jeans and black T-shirts

  “Check and make sure the coast is clear,” one said, and Sam flinched back, trying to place where she’d heard that voice before.

  “Don’t worry, man,” the other replied. “I checked twice and no one is here. It’s empty.”

  “That’s good to hear. We have to move fast, the police will be here any minute.”

  “Can we take these masks off now? They’re making it hard to breathe.”

  “Yeah, I guess. Come on, we have to find those pills and hide them before the police show up.”

  “I’m pretty sure they’re in the councilor’s office. I mean, that’s where Mr. Sheppard put them when he confiscated them.”

  So these were students, Sam thought as the two made their way down to Mr. Sheppard’s office, a few rooms away from where Sam crouched. She began to put the pieces together, realizing that these were students she knew. Josh and Billy. She’d actually heard them planning this by their lockers that day, she just hadn’t known how far they were prepared to go.

  “Come on. Hurry up and help me look for them,” Josh told Billy. “And try not to disturb anything.”

  It didn’t take them long before they emerged with the pills. Josh took the pills along with the masks and put them up in his locker. Sam continued to hide by the water fountain, not sure what might happen if Josh or Billy found her.

  Just about that time, Chris Hendricks peered out of the teacher’s lounge. Chris had been the school nerd ever since elementary school. He always studied, always hung out at the library, and was the epitome of a social reject.

  Josh and Billy were putting the pills away, and Chris obviously thought he could make it out of the building while their backs were turned. However, as Chris slipped out of the lounge the door shut, creating an echoing noise throughout the corridor.

  Chris didn’t have enough time to get back in the lounge undetected. Billy spotted him just as he was trying to get back in the room.

  “Hold it, Hendricks,” Billy called. “Look, Josh! Look who’s here.”

  “Well, what do we have here?” Josh said as he advanced menacingly toward Chris. “Looks like Hendricks was trying to escape.”

  “What do we do?” Billy asked, panicked. “He knows. He’s seen us.”

  “What do you think, Chris? Should we let you go free, so you can tell the cops out there it was us, or should we just kill you now?” Josh asked casually, lifting his gun and pointing it at Chris’ head.

  “Jo—Josh,” Chris stammered. “I won’t tell, I promise. I—I won’t. Please don’t kill me.”

  “Well, I don’t know, you do make a tempting offer. You promise you wouldn’t tell anyone?” Josh asked mockingly.

  “Ye—ye—yeah.”

  “Billy, what do you think?”

  “We can’t seriously kill him, Josh. We’d go to jail.”

  “Billy, if we let him go, we’ll get sent to jail for
sure, but if we don’t let him go, we have a scapegoat.”

  Sam didn’t want to know what Josh was planning. Never had she felt so helpless. Chris should have just stayed in the lounge. Why did he come out?

  Sirens sounded loudly outside the school, and Josh’s eyes grew dark with fear. He cast one wild look toward the front doors, then looked back at Chris and pulled the trigger.

  Chris fell to the floor, and Sam shut her eyes and clamped her hand over her mouth to keep from screaming. Chris was a good kid, only seventeen. He was in some of Sam’s classes and well on his way to being the next Albert Einstein.

  She couldn’t believe Josh had shot him. If she made a single sound, she knew they’d see her, and then they’d kill her too.

  “Oh my god, Josh. What do we do? You killed him!” Billy was hysterical.

  “Calm down. I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’ll plant the gun on him and pretend it was Chris who went all psycho, trying to kill us because of all the times we made fun of him. He was a loser. He knew it, and so did everyone else. We tell the cops that he was going to kill us but then realized that killing us wouldn’t change the problem so he shot himself.”

  “Josh, maybe we should just turn ourselves in. I mean we’ll be in more trouble if we cover this up.” Billy was obviously scared and Sam could tell that he’d never meant for things to go this far.

  “Billy, stop it! We are not going to turn ourselves in. And if you even think about doing it, then you’re going to end up just like Chris,” Josh threatened.

  Billy gulped and nodded, watching as Josh bent down and wrapped Chris’ lifeless hand around the gun. They were wearing gloves, and she wondered if they would get away with it.

  A moment later, they sprinted off down the hall.

  Sam found herself alone with Chris’ body. She peered out from around the fountain, holding her hand to her mouth as she saw the huge pool of blood spreading out from where Chris lay. She couldn’t believe he was dead, or that she’d seen it happen. If she told the cops what she’d seen, Josh and Billy would deny it. They’d stick to their story, that Chris had been the one who’d had the gun. In fact, the cops might even think she had helped him. Who would they believe, the popular kids, or the social freaks?

  What should she do? She couldn’t walk out the front door. The cops were out there.

  She remembered the utility room Phillip had shown her the other day. If she went out that door, no one would see her. Then she could just join the crowd outside and pretend she’d been there all along. One thing was certain, she couldn’t tell anybody what she’d seen, or Josh would kill her next. The look in his eyes as he’d pulled the trigger had been so cold. He hadn’t felt anything when he’d taken Chris’ life.

  She pushed herself to her feet and ran down the hall, hearing the police sirens grow louder and louder as more and more units arrived. Red and blue strobe lights flickered throughout the halls from outside, making her feel as though she were running in a kaleidoscope.

  At last she reached the utility closet, and she pushed her way through, stumbling several times and cringing at the loud noises she was making. She had no idea where Josh and Billy had gone and could only hope they weren’t still lurking around where they could hear her.

  When she got to the exterior door, she cracked it open and looked outside. There was no one on this side of the school. With a sigh of relief, she slipped out and headed around to the parking lot, where everyone seemed to be congregated in a chaotic bubble of sound and movement.

  She joined the fringes of the crowd, keeping her head down until she finally spotted Alex and Michael. Relieved, she made her way toward them, trying to control her racing heart. She couldn’t let them know anything was wrong. This was her problem, and the last thing she wanted to do was drag her best friend into it. If Alex knew what had happened, she’d be in danger too, because Sam had no doubt Josh would do whatever it took to keep himself out of jail.

  He’d already killed one person. He wouldn’t hesitate to kill again to cover it up.

  “There you are!” Alex cried, throwing her arms around Sam and hugging her tight. “I was so worried about you. I couldn’t find you anywhere.”

  Sam hugged her friend back, taking comfort in her embrace, trying to control her trembling. She couldn’t believe she’d made it out of there alive, and the sight of Chris’ lifeless body would be forever imprinted in her mind.

  “Are you ok?” Alex asked, pulling back to look at her. “You’re shaking.”

  “I’m all right,” Sam said, hugging her arms to her chest. “It was just scary. I heard the shots, and I couldn’t find you either.”

  Michael shook his head. “This is crazy. I guess this is one thing you don’t have to worry about when you’re home schooled.”

  Alex gave him a worried look. “Hopefully your parents won’t pull you out of school when they hear what happened.”

  “We still don’t know what did happen,” Michael said, casting a worried look at the school. “This could all just be a false alarm.”

  Sam remained silent, staring blindly toward the school, knowing her life would never be the same.

  “Hey, Sam,” said a voice behind her, and when she turned around, Phillip was there, staring at her in concern. “Are you all right? I’ve been looking for you.”

  Sam looked at him, all too aware that Josh was his best friend. Had he known what they were planning to do? Had he been a part of it? As much as she wanted to throw herself in his arms and let him hold her until she wasn’t afraid anymore, she knew that would be the stupidest thing she could do. For all she knew, Josh had sent him over here to find out if she knew anything.

  “I’m fine,” she said shortly. “I’m just shocked that something like this could happen in our school.”

  Phillip nodded grimly, staring at the school as a SWAT team began advancing toward the door. “Things like this aren’t supposed to happen here.”

  “Look,” Sam said, pointing at Tracy, who was advancing on them with a determined look on her face. “There’s you girlfriend. You better go see if she’s all right.” Then she turned her back on him and rejoined her friends.

  The rest of the afternoon passed in a blur. The teachers finally managed to take a head count, and frantic parents began arriving to pick their children up. Word began to circle through the crowd that someone had died, but no one was sure who.

  Sam was relieved when she saw her mom and dad making their way toward her. “Sam, honey,” her dad said, pulling her into a fierce embrace. “I’m so glad you’re all right.”

  Sam nodded against his chest. “I was so scared, Dad.”

  “Of course you were,” her mother fussed. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. The police want to ask everyone a few questions before you can leave, but once you’re done, we’ll be taking you home, and everything will be all right.”

  “I’m sure you’re right,” Sam told her mother, but deep down, she was pretty sure nothing would ever be all right again.

  When it was Sam’s turn to talk to the police, she just told them she hadn’t seen or heard anything. Then her parents took her home and she immediately went to her room and cocooned herself in her blankets, determined to block everything that had happened out of her mind.

  * * *

  Sam woke up and looked up at her clock. She had been sleeping for a few hours. Why hadn’t anyone woken her up? She slowly got out of bed and forced herself not to relive the trauma from earlier that day. Looking in the mirror, she groaned at her bed head and began brushing her hair. She frowned when Ben started talking and then laughed hysterically. His imaginary friends were getting out of control.

  She walked over to her brother’s bedroom door, opened it, and saw Ben sitting at his table coloring.

  “Benjamin, does Mom know you’re up here alone?” she asked from the doorway.

  “I’m not alone. Phillip is here with me,” he said.

  “What? Who’s here?” She walked further into the room
and found Phillip sitting on one of Benjamin’s beanbags, his dark hair falling across his forehead. He looked up at her with his concerned blue eyes.

  “Phillip,” Benny reiterated.

  “Yes, I can see that,” Sam said, shocked.

  “Hey, I hope this is all right. Your mother said I could wait until you woke up, but then I met Benjamin and he asked me to play, so I came up here with him.”

  “No, no. It’s okay. I’m just surprised, is all. I wasn’t expecting to see you here at my house.”

  “Sorry, I just wanted to make sure you were all right. You are all right, right?” He stood up and walked toward her, looking her up and down. “You seemed so upset earlier.”

  “Yeah, I’m fine, thanks,” Sam said quickly, trying not to recall what had happened. Why was he the only one who’d noticed how shook up she was?

  “Are you okay, Sammy?” Benjamin asked, squinting up at her.

  “I’m fine, Benny. What are you guys doing?” she said, changing the subject.

  “We were drawing. Phillip drew you a picture. Here,” he said, handing her a piece of paper.

  “Thank you,” Sam said as she took the drawing. “Flowers. Wow.”

  “Don’t mock my poor artistic skills. I know I may not be the best artist, but I’m not the worst either,” Phillip said with a grin.

  “I’m not mocking your artistic abilities,” Sam said, examining the strange, stick-like drawings, glad for the distraction. “I can tell they are flowers.” She started laughing.

  “I drew flowers for Mommy, too,” Benjamin said, holding up his finished art work, which, in her opinion, was slightly better than Phillip’s.

  “Wow, Benny, this is so good. Mommy’s going to like it a lot. You may even get to put it on the fridge,” Sam said.

  Benjamin grinned widely.

  “How come you’re more enthusiastic about his picture than mine?” Phillip asked, feigning hurt.

  “He’s my little brother, and what do you expect? I mean your picture is good, but not art gallery good. Besides, I just thought Ben’s picture was better,” Sam said, smiling.