Free Final Exam by Maggie Barbieri Page A

Sister Catherine Marie LaGrange. The bottle shattered, shards of it landing in my and Trixie’s hair. Trixie let out a yelp of surprise and bolted, dragging me after her. I flew into the gravestone directly in front of me, the top of the stone hitting me squarely in the diaphragm. I sucked in one last gasp of air before the wind went completely out of me. I hit the ground, landing on my back, staring up at the last remaining slants of daylight in the clouds.
    The rustling got louder and I heard the sound of footsteps. In between gasping for air and wondering if you could die from having the wind knocked out of you, I sat up and saw a figure running through the gravestones. I couldn’t see the front, but from the back, the figure was tall, male, and thin.
    And if I could have guessed, I would say slack-jawed.
    I tried to speak but couldn’t. Trixie was in hot pursuit, having freed herself from my hold on her leash, jumping over gravestones and weaving in and out of the rows of dead nuns. I finally took in some air and screamed his name.
    “Wayne! Wayne Brookwell!”
    But Wayne, or whoever it was, ran up the hill and out of sight. Trixie wasn’t chasing him anymore, so when I was able to breathe again, I got up to find her.
    She was crouched on the grave of Sister Mary Lawrence Cassidy, born 1893, died 1995. I got closer and saw that Trixie was eating the remains of a ham and swiss on rye. She looked up at me guiltily.
    “You almost killed me, Trix,” I said, clutching my midsection. The pain was intense and I realized I had tears streaming down my face. I wiped my cheeks with the arm of my sweater and pushed my hair back, looking around. Still not a soul in sight, the bottle thrower long gone. I grabbed Trixie’s leash and hobbled back to the dorm.

Nine
    I was still breathless from nearly being impaled on a gravestone. “I think I saw him,” I said. I was back in my room, sitting on my twin bed, talking on my cell phone. Crawford was at his desk in the squad.
    “You’ll have to be more specific,” Crawford said.
    “Wayne. Wayne Brookwell.”
    That got his attention. “Where? When?”
    “A few minutes ago.” I explained how I had been walking Trixie in the cemetery and how I was about 99 percent positive that Wayne was only a few rows of graves away.
    “So, he’s alive.”
    “I think so,” I said. “But not for long if I get my hands on him. Between having to live in this dump, and getting a beer bottle thrown at my head . . . and, oh, yeah . . . getting pulled over the top of a gravestone, I’m getting more and more ticked off by the minute at this guy.” I took in another deep breath. Yep, still hurt. “Even if he has the loveliest parents in the world.”
    Crawford asked me to hold on; I could hear his muffled voice as he talked to someone in the precinct. “Radio car is on its way over.”
    I groaned. “Why?”
    “Because anyone who throws a beer bottle at your head deserves a tune-up.”
    “A what?”
    “A talking-to.”
    I didn’t think that that’s what it really meant, but I let it go. “How are you going to find him?”
    “I told them to start with the cemetery and take it from there.” He paused again. “Now I’m pissed.”
    “It’s okay, Crawford,” I said, knowing that him being angry at Wayne would not help the situation. “I’m fine.”
    “Are you really okay? Or are you just telling me that so I won’t make a big deal out of this? Because if we find Wayne, he’ll have bigger problems than a brick of heroin in his toilet.”
    I touched my midsection, and while it was sore, it wasn’t excruciating. “I don’t think I broke anything but I could be bleeding internally,” I said, only half joking.
    “Do you want me to come over?” he asked.
    “Under normal circumstances, I would say ‘yes,’ but I have a meeting tonight with my resident assistants.”
    “That sounds like fun.”
    “And with the internal bleeding and all, I don’t think you’d enjoy being