Love Me, Love Me Not Read online

  “Sorry,” he mouths.

  I give him the same response I’ve given him the last four times he’s done this—a shrug. It’s not like it’s his fault.

  We pull into the garage, and I head to the back of the SUV to get my bag while Gil unlocks the door. Slinging my backpack over my shoulder, I climb the steps inside.

  “In the car!” Gil yells, charging back into the garage and practically knocking me over.

  “What?”

  “In the car. Now!”

  He’s not making any sense, but his urgency gets me moving. Brad and Gigi do the same and then he backs the car up, tires squealing, and peels out of the driveway.

  “What’s wrong?” Gigi asks, gripping the dashboard.

  “Call 911. Someone broke into our home. It’s trashed.”

  “What?” Gig and Brad ask at the same time. They live in Pinehurst. It’s the safest city in North Carolina. Homes don’t get robbed here. They just don’t.

  Unless … criminal ex-boyfriends of foster kids show up.

  No, no, no. It can’t be Chase. He wouldn’t do this, would he? I mean, it’s one thing to steal a TV, but to trash an entire house? He’s never done anything so horrible before. I have to believe it wasn’t him. It couldn’t have been him.

  Gil says, “I don’t know if they’re still in there, but we’re going to a neighbor’s until the police check it out.”

  “Trashed?” Gigi asks, her voice cracking. “The artwork?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t get that far.”

  “Please not the Meier,” she cries, her hands trembling as she dials her phone. The Meier is a family heirloom. Brad said it’s been passed down generation to generation within her family for more than one hundred years. If it’s gone, she’ll be devastated.

  I swallow against the lump in my throat and stare out the window. It can’t be Chase.

  “You okay?” Brad whispers.

  I nod but don’t say anything as my eyes well up. If Chase did this, I’ll never be able to forgive myself for bringing him to them. Two tears fall down my cheek and land on the windowsill.

  “It’s going to be okay,” he says, patting my knee.

  The next four hours are awful. The cops come to make sure it’s safe. Then it’s our turn to inspect the damage while they further investigate what happened. The detective walks through the house with Gil and Brad, writing down everything of value that’s been stolen, including the Meier.

  Gigi crumpled to the floor once she saw her gallery. Most of the paintings are either destroyed or gone.

  “DeRubeis original, valued at forty-five hundred earlier this year,” Gil says, taking charge.

  I sit next to Gigi and chew on my nails. I haven’t seen any broken windows, which gives me a sliver of hope Chase might not be involved. He’s definitely not smart enough to get through their security system, so he’d have had to muscle his way in some other way.

  The detective makes a note as Gil continues. “Warhol original,” he says with a sigh.

  “Value?” the detective asks.

  “Five hundred two years ago.”

  “Five hundred dollars?”

  Gil looks at him like he’s crazy. “Five hundred thousand dollars.”

  The detective drops his pen. I slump against the wall and stifle a cry. Please, please don’t be Chase, I silently beg.

  “Fuck,” Brad says, kicking a closet door.

  “We have insurance on it,” Gil says to no one in particular. “The most important piece is the Meier. If you can only get one piece back, please make sure it’s that one.”

  The detective blows out a long breath, and then shakes his head before picking up his pen. “We’ll do our best.”

  “Mr. Campbell,” one of the policemen says, joining us upstairs.

  “Yes.”

  “There’s no sign of forced entry anywhere. Whoever did this knew how to get in.”

  I raise my head at his words. It was a professional. It couldn’t be Chase.

  “That’s impossible,” Gil says. “No one has the security codes but us.”

  “Can you call your security company? Get the records of when people entered and exited over the weekend?”

  Gil agrees and then rushes downstairs to his office. The detective stands awkwardly in the hallway until Brad offers to take him to his room.

  I continue gnawing on my nails.

  After a few minutes, they exit, Brad’s jaw clenched and the veins in his neck throbbing. Then they go into my room. I stand to join them but run into Brad as he’s leaving. “Don’t go in there,” he says.

  I push through anyway.

  The dresser’s overturned, the bed’s been flipped upside down, and my clothes are strewn everywhere. The worst part, though, is the words Fucking bitch in red spray paint in at least twenty places, including the carpet and ceiling.

  I close my eyes as the tears start to fall. It was Chase. Who else would call me that? I don’t know how he did it, but he did. I hate him. No, hate’s not strong enough. I hate my mom. Chase … Chase, I loathe with every fiber of my being, with every ounce of me I ever gave to him.

  Brad wraps his arms around me, but it does nothing to soothe the river of contempt coursing through me. How will I ever make it up to the Campbells? I sniff and wipe at my face. I won’t be able to. There’s no way. I’ll never be able to fix what Chase has done.

  My shoulders shake, and Brad squeezes me tighter.

  The detective excuses himself, and Brad leads me back to the landing, where Gigi is. We sit down next to her, and Brad puts an arm around each of us as we sob.

  Just then, Gil turns the corner and starts up the stairs. He sees us and stops. His jaw is tight and pulsating as he clenches his teeth. “They broke in at three a.m. this morning and then again about an hour before we got home.”

  “How?” Brad asks.

  Gil’s nostrils flare. “They used Hailey’s security code.”

  “What?” I ask, my sobs ending as my head snaps up. “That’s impossible. I’ve never told anyone my code. I swear!”

  “The detective also found this note by the front door,” he says, waving a piece of notebook paper enclosed in a plastic bag.

  “What’s it say?” Brad asks, standing.

  Gil holds it in front of his face and reads the words. “‘Thanks, Hailey. I’ll find you once things calm down, Chase.’”

  I bolt up and sprint down the stairs. “No!” I yell. “I never gave the code to him. I’m not lying. I swear!”

  I pull the paper from Gil’s hands and study the words. It’s not from Chase. The writing is way too nice. What in the world is going on?

  “I’m calling DSS,” Gil says, before turning around.

  “No!” I shout. “There’s got to be some other explanation. I never gave anyone my code.”

  He looks over his shoulder. “We don’t have a choice.” He stalks away, and I realize my entire life is about to crumble.

  “I didn’t give him my code,” I whimper. I turn around and see Brad staring at me. “I didn’t do it. I promise. You have to believe me.”

  “I—I,” he whispers, falling back to the step and hanging his head. “I don’t understand.” He shakes his head.

  My mouth trembles, and my eyes well up again. “You promised you’d never let them kick me out,” I say, smearing tears over my cheek as I try to wipe them away. How many times did he tell me that?

  He meets my eyes, and I see something I’ve never seen in him before. Defeat. He’s given up on me. The one person I trusted more than anyone has given up on me.

  Suddenly, all the anger I’ve harbored against Chase and my mom seems minor.

  “I believed you,” I say with shaking shoulders. “I believed you, Brad! You’re no better than anyone else!” I yell as I shove him in the chest and then escape outside into the cold, dark night.

  I sit on the steps, wrapping my arms around myself as I wait for the white sedan with the yellow license plate.

&nbs
p; This—cold, dark, and alone—was always my future. I let them convince me I could have more, be more, but it was never going to happen. This is it.

  This is my life.

  CHAPTER 28

  I hug Brittany tighter. After the last week, I needed to see her. Out of everyone I know, she’s the most likely to understand what I’m going through.

  We’re sitting on the sofa in the commons area of my group home. I don’t know if Sherry couldn’t find another foster family for me or thought this would be better, but I’m now living with twenty other sixteen-and seventeen-year-olds who have no family and are just waiting until we’re adults and on our own. It’s not horrible. Between here and my new school, we get three meals a day, and I have a warm bed to sleep in, but it’s not like being with a family.

  Brittany hugs me again, then holds me at arm’s length. “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I mean, it must have been Chase. It had to be. I … I just want to kill him. You should have seen their house. It was…” I take a deep breath and fight back the tears that threaten to fall. I’m surprised my cheeks aren’t raw from all the crying I’ve been doing lately.

  “It’s not your fault,” Brittany says, putting her arm around me.

  “It wasn’t. It really wasn’t. My mom wanted me to help Chase. To get him inside. But I refused. I never gave them the security code. I swear. I would never do anything to hurt the Campbells.”

  “I believe you.”

  “And that note wasn’t from him. The handwriting was way too nice. Plus, he calls me Hales, not Hailey.”

  Brittany’s quiet for a moment. “Did you give the security code to anyone? Maybe he was working with someone else.”

  “No. I wouldn’t do that. I would never do that.”

  “Then how’d they get it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did you have it written down anywhere?”

  “No.”

  She falls against the back of the sofa and sighs. “This doesn’t make any sense.”

  “I know.”

  “Who gave you the code?”

  “Gigi.”

  “Any chance she had it written down somewhere?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Have you talked to Brad?”

  “No, I can’t. He looked so … disappointed.” He keeps emailing me, saying he wants to talk, that he blames Chase, not me, but I don’t respond. I don’t know what to say. Unless Chase and all their stuff are found, he’ll always think I played a role, even if I didn’t. That’s what hurts the most. He honestly thinks I’d do something like this to them.

  “Bummer,” Brittany says.

  I fall back next to her. “I know this is what my life should be like,” I say, motioning to the cinder-block walls around me and the tiny Christmas tree. “It’s just I got a taste of something better and … it was addictive. Loving parents. Loving … whatever Brad was to me. Once you have it, it’s hard to lose, you know?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “I almost wish I had never met them. If I had come straight here, I wouldn’t know any better. And they’d still have all their stuff.”

  “Don’t say that.”

  “It’s true.”

  “Have you talked to your mom or Chase?”

  “I tried calling them, but both numbers have been disconnected.”

  Brittany hugs me again. “This sucks.”

  I nod and then sigh. It really does.

  *

  Two weeks later, I’m sitting on my bed, tapping a pencil on my geometry book as I stare out the window at the cold, gray afternoon that looks just like I feel. Without Brad’s help, I’m really struggling with geometry at my new school. It doesn’t help that they’re ahead of where I was at Pinecrest, so I’ve had to learn a month’s worth of stuff in only a couple of weeks. And to really top things off, we have a test tomorrow. It’s our last day before Christmas vacation, and the teacher is giving us a test. Who does that?

  I sigh and then decide to take a break.

  “Want a snack?” I ask one of my roommates, who’s reading in the bunk above me.

  She replies, “I’m good. Thanks, though.”

  I slide off my bed and head for the kitchen, where I find an apple. I start to wander back to my room when the door to the computer room catches my eye.

  I shouldn’t go in there.

  I walk past it but slow down. It’s like my feet have a mind of their own. I pause, biting my lip before glancing at the clock on the wall. It’s been a whole thirty minutes since I last checked. Not that long. Still … maybe our geometry teacher decided to cancel the test and I can stop killing myself trying to cram all the information into my brain between now and tomorrow. Yeah. That’s the only reason I want to check my e-mail.

  If I keep telling myself that, maybe I’ll believe it.

  I turn and rush into the tiny room, happy to find one of the three computers empty. The two other guys in the room barely glance at me as I slide into the chair. I sign in to my e-mail and bite my nail as I wait for my messages to load.

  I have like fifty messages from Brad, ten in the last day. They’re all kind of the same—apologizing for the way he acted the night of the robbery and asking me to call him. Never in any of them does he say he believes it wasn’t me.

  Just then, a new message appears. From Brad.

  My fingers snap to the mouse to open it.

  Are you even getting these? Where are you? I’m worried, okay? Sherry says you’re fine, but it’d be nice to have a little confirmation. Would it kill you to send a few words letting me know you’re not lying dead in a ditch somewhere?

  I automatically hit reply and type I’m fine. I can’t persuade myself to hit the send button, though. I tap my finger on the mouse and stare at the two words. I haven’t said anything to him since Gil kicked me out. But despite feeling like a stray dog they kicked to the curb, I’m still holding on to the messages. I check my stupid e-mail every chance I get, and my heart skips a beat the moment I see a new message from Brad or Gigi. Gil doesn’t write, not that I’m surprised.

  What is wrong with me? I walked away from my mom and Chase without ever looking back, but I hold on to these messages like they’re a big ol’ glass of sweet tea in the Sahara. It’s ridiculous. I should just block both of them. They kicked me out of their home; I should kick them out of my in-box and my life.

  I move the mouse until the cursor is over the block-sender button. I lightly tap the button, but, again, can’t push it all the way down.

  “Are any of you almost done?” Tom, another foster kid, asks, sticking his head into the computer room. “I’ve got to finish something for school.”

  “Yeah, I’m logging off right now,” I reply quickly before clicking send. I guess Brad deserves to at least know I’m okay.

  *

  Four days later, Christmas music fills the hall outside my room.

  “What time is it?” Christina, one of my roommates, groans. “Like five a.m.?”

  I glance at the clock. “Nine,” I say, pulling my blanket up to my chin and rolling to face the wall. One of the nice things about the three girls I share this room with is we’re all late risers. The same can’t be said for the girls across the hall. They remind me of the Campbells—up at the crack of dawn and getting more done before I wake up than I get done the entire day.

  Christina jumps out of bed, throws open the door, and yells, “Turn that shit down! Some of us are still sleeping!”

  I hear parts of a snide comment but can’t make out the whole thing. The music does quiet, though, and my roommate crawls back into bed.

  I spend the next twenty minutes dreading having to get up, but I’m on dish duty this morning, which means I need to be in the kitchen by nine thirty. Plus my stomach is growling, so I should get there a little early in order to snag some breakfast.

  I tiptoe out of the room and then join a bunch of others in the kitchen for bacon and eggs. Afterward, two g
uys and I clean all the dishes and then head out to the commons area, where more and more people are starting to gather. I’m surprised to see our small tree with gifts underneath.

  “Where’d all that come from?” I ask the guy next to me.

  “Generous strangers. Ever seen those trees at the mall with little tags filled with names?”

  “Yeah,” I respond.

  “Well, this is the result,” he says, spreading his hands to where it looks like Santa just dumped his entire sleigh.

  Eventually, everyone gathers in the room and the director, Kathryn, starts to hand out presents. I end up with five boxes with the same wrapping paper and a card in front of me, and I wonder who my very generous stranger was.

  I start with the biggest box and am stunned when I push the tissue paper aside and find it stuffed with a bunch of things—pajamas, three Tshirts, and a new backpack, which I desperately need. It’s kind of a weird feeling to get such a nice gift from someone you don’t even know. It almost feels like acing a test by cheating. You’re happy but feel guilty at the same time.

  “Oooh, nice,” says Sara, the girl sitting next to me. “Look what I got!” She holds up what looks like a toolbox, but it’s filled with every kind of makeup imaginable. It’s way more than I’d ever want or need, but she won’t leave her room without looking flawless, so it’s the perfect gift for her.

  I move on to another box, slipping my finger under the tape, when the tag catches my eye. This one isn’t from a stranger. It’s from Gil and Gigi. How in the world did they get this here? Sherry told me they don’t know where I am. Plus, why would they get me something after kicking me out?

  “Um, Kathryn?” I ask, holding up the box. “Where’d this come from?”

  She smiles. “One of the social workers brought some things by yesterday.”

  Oh. I guess that makes sense. I continue opening the box, but more slowly now. I’m not sure how I feel about them getting me something after everything that happened. It’s nice of them, of course, but I’m trying to put distance between us, not accept gifts from them.

  Inside is a really cute outfit—dark jeans and a bright pink shirt with sparkles.