Free Tears by Francine Pascal Page A

something else.
Someone else.
Gaia felt a sinking feeling in her stomach, sensing who it was even before she saw that unmistakable brown hair and teen supermodel face.
    â€œHi, Ed.”
    Heather paused as Ed slowed to greet her. She didn’t even acknowledge Gaia’s existence. Which was fine with Gaia. She hung back a little.
She was not in the mood for a witchy Gannis greeting, not so early in the day.
Nor did she feel like witnessing a broad Heather-to-Ed beaming smile.
    â€œHi,” Ed answered. His voice was flat.
    For once Heather seemed less than composed. Her hair was kind of tousled, now that Gaia took a good look at it. And her eyes were puffy.
    â€œDid you finish the book?” Heather asked Ed.
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI nearly finished it.”
    â€œOh. Well, you should. It’s worth reading.”
    Gaia knit her brow.
What the hell?
They were talking like a couple of androids, lobbing impersonal quasi-pleasantries back and forth. Only a slight tremor at Heather’s lower lip betrayed any feeling at all. For his part, Ed was totally without emotion, unless you could call stilted awkwardness an emotion.
    Ed glanced up at Gaia. “We should get to class.”
    â€œUh. . . yeah.” Gaia nodded, waiting for Heather to strike. Whenever Ed addressed Gaia directly in Heather’s presence, it inevitably elicited some scathing insult. But there was nothing. And Gaia knew she looked like crap this morning, having slept badly and woken up late. Circles under the eyes. A threadbare pair of puke-green cords and a sweatshirt that was bravely attempting to hold itself together at the seams. Hair a mess. Overall, she knew she looked like she’d been dragged backward through a bush. An easy target for Heather.
    But in a Village School first, Heather didn’t say a word.
    And for the first time in her life Gaia
wished
Heather would insult her, thus reassuring Gaia that all was well with the universe and the logical order of things hadn’t been completely tossed out the window.
    Instead Heather just sighed.
    The three of them silently filed into MacGregor’s classroom. Ed immediately made for a space at the back, surrounded on all sides. No room for Heather. Or Gaia. Like an automaton, Heather sat down next to the FOHs. Gaia slouched into the first vacant spot she could see,
still trying to process the schizoid scenario she’d just witnessed.
She knew she wouldn’t get an answer from Ed. No, Ed had closed himself off to the world—as tightly as Gaia herself had in the very first weeks she had arrived in New York.
    â€œAnd here we have our protagonist, Meursault...,” MacGregor opened.
    Gaia stared at the blackboard, her muddled, irritable thoughts punctuated in short intervals by MacGregor’s words. Words like
disconnected
and
alienated.
    More than ever, Gaia felt she could relate.
    I SHOULD JUST GET OUT OF HERE.
    Penance
    But it wasn’t an option. Sam’s feet carried him through the forbidding metal doors of the visitors’ entrance of the Manhattan federal jail—a dank spot in the bowels of lowerManhattan, virtually hidden from the sidewalk by a long, descending staircase. As soon as the doors slammed behind him, he froze. A metal detector blocked further entry into the facility. His grip tightened around the package.
His skin was clammy with sweat, but he couldn’t tell if he was hot or cold.
Anxiety had scraped his nerves raw. He had no idea where he was going or who he was supposed to meet. The instructions hadn’t said a thing about his contact. Sam could only picture trying to walk through the metal detector and setting it off—then being apprehended for whatever horrible stuff was concealed in this box—
    A woman in a prison guard uniform suddenly appeared from behind the security station and strode toward him. Sam sucked in an extra hit of oxygen.
Her.
That woman from the park. His pulse slammed into overdrive—but