The Headmaster's List Read online

  “Good, I mean—not good-good. But it’s a start.”

  Spencer flipped to a new page in her notebook and drew a rough line down the middle of the page and started jotting down all the memories she could in her notebook, giving ample space to fill in the gaps. Her notes consisted of the following in her right-handed scrawl:

  9:30PM–Brain Freeze shift ends

  10PM–arrive at Highwood Estates

  10:30ish–I buy a Diet Coke from the bar

  10:45ish–I find Ethan and Hailey together

  TIME?–Ethan and I break up

  TIME?–we leave the party (me, Ethan, Tabby, Chris) in Ethan’s car

  TIME?–crash

  Her pen stayed pressed on the paper after she finished the h. To think, if Spencer had just stayed home like she had originally wanted to, maybe everything could have turned out differently.

  “Have you ever blacked out before?” she asked. “Not been able to remember a whole night?”

  Jackson shook his head. “I bet it’s scary, though.”

  “It is.”

  Jackson watched her thoughtfully. “Are you okay?”

  “Just seeing it all laid out like this, it’s surreal.”

  Jackson worried at a hangnail on his thumb with his index finger. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

  “You being here is doing a lot more than you think.” She smiled at him, and he smiled back, color brightening his cheeks. Her stomach swooped delightfully but she felt guilty. She shouldn’t flirt with him. He was Ethan’s best friend. It still felt off-limits, like she was somehow just as bad as Ethan—a cheater. Besides, Jackson was nice to everyone. Did she really think there was anything else there? She refocused by pushing stray hairs from her braid off her forehead and looked down at the page. “This is helping, though. It’s bringing some memories back. Like, when I got to the party, I got a drink. They had a station on a tree stump with cups and snacks and everything, and I paid five dollars to get a cup.”

  “Five dollars, wow. Harrison must have made a killing that night. Remember when he used to charge five dollars just to get in the door and drinks were free?”

  “No, I didn’t go to parties freshman year,” she told him.

  “Oh,” said Jackson.

  “Anyway, we’d have to ask him, but yeah, everyone was pretty drunk and it was relatively early in the night.” She massaged her temples, trying to remember. “People were playing corn hole, and there was a game of beer pong in a half-finished garage, and a few people were vaping on the lawn. I remember smelling cotton candy, from all the vapor. The details start to get a little hazy here … But I think I heard music.” She flipped back to her notebook page about what she remembered. She still didn’t know if it was live or a playlist on speakers.

  Jackson already had an answer for her. “The Misstakes. They’re tagged in this one video here. See?” He pointed to a recording of the band in front of a dozen people jumping to the beat. But Spencer didn’t see anyone she recognized, including herself, in the video.

  He typed The Misstakes into Google and pulled up their website. All the members went to Armstrong, like everyone else at the party. They did a lot of pop-punk covers that were a hit at those kinds of parties. Unfortunately, their website didn’t have any footage of that night so Jackson went to their personal Facebook pages to find anything that might help.

  As expected, there wasn’t much to go on. The band had probably been too busy performing to take photos or videos during the party. Jackson let out a sigh that ruffled the bangs on his forehead. There was a lot of work ahead.

  Spencer had an idea. “Do you want a snack? How about some popcorn?”

  “That’s … yeah, if it’s no trouble.”

  “No problem! Be right back.” He looked like he could use some calories after his practice. So Spencer went to the kitchen to grab a bag of popcorn from the pantry. Hope was still planted on the couch playing Jackson’s Switch.

  “Is he your new boyfriend?” Hope teased, without looking up from the screen. No need to elaborate.

  “No.” Spencer started the popcorn in the microwave and leaned on the countertop. While she was there, she spotted a fruit bowl with some grapes and nectarines, which she washed and put on a plate. “He’s a friend.”

  “Yuh-huh,” Hope said sarcastically. “Tell yourself that.”

  “You’re twelve. What do you even know?”

  “More than you.”

  Spencer scoffed and threw a grape from the fruit bowl at her sister’s head. It landed somewhere on the couch and Hope retrieved it.

  “Thanks!” Hope said, popping the grape in her mouth.

  Honestly, little sisters.

  Spencer returned to her bedroom and handed Jackson the fruit and popcorn, which he took with a smile. They shared the snack, quietly working side by side, and Spencer was satisfied knowing that this was exactly what friends did. There was nothing bigger happening between the two of them, both content with the ease with which they worked together as partners. Nothing more, she told herself.

  * * *

  “Spencer…”

  The edge in Jackson’s voice made her look up from her laptop. She’d joined in his efforts to do some more research, recording anything that might look like people were acting more drunk than usual.

  Jackson pointed at his own laptop’s screen of a paused video from Facebook, uploaded by Nea Varkaus, a junior at Armstrong. Nea was on the debate team, so Spencer didn’t really know her that well, but she was a regular at Brain Freeze, and apparently had enough social standing with the kids on the Headmaster’s List to be at the party.

  It was hard to totally make out in the dark, and they weren’t the focus of the video—Nea had been recording herself and her friends doing some sort of rehearsed dance for TikTok with the firepit in the background—but Spencer recognized her old bright white T-shirt, tossed in the trash long since the crash, and the back of Ethan’s head. They were paused, both of them with their hands in the air, gesticulating wildly. It was hard to make out the details of her expression, but she remembered this moment clearly.

  “Is this when…?” Jackson started.

  “Yeah, this was us breaking up.”

  Jackson didn’t say anything, just awkwardly pinched his lips together. He took a moment but said, trying to lighten the mood, “It’s lucky that someone caught it on camera, though.”

  “What are the chances, right? It’s at least something. What’s the time stamp?”

  “1:45 A.M.”

  Spencer jotted that down, adding the time on the timeline. There were still so many gaps. “Is there any way we can track where we went from there?”

  Jackson played the video, but the phone was too far away to pick up any audio of what was being said. Past-Spencer and Past-Ethan moved out of frame, Spencer throwing her arms up and stomping off and Ethan chasing, but the camera didn’t follow.

  “Maybe there’s another angle?” Jackson suggested.

  “Maybe…” She stared at her notebook, miles away in thought.

  Jackson must have sensed the edge in her voice because he said softly, “Listen, if it’s too hard to revisit all this, we can stop. We’ve been at it a while.”

  “No…” Spencer hated the idea of asking people about one of the most humiliating experiences of her life, but it was outweighed by her need to know everything. At least Jackson didn’t seem to judge her.

  “For what it’s worth,” he said, “Ethan’s an idiot. Pretty sure I can certifiably confirm that fact. He doesn’t even think Reese’s is the superior candy.”

  Spencer’s lips spread into an appreciative smile, and she glanced at him. She hadn’t realized how close they had been sitting to each other as the hour slipped by.

  Their heads were tipped so close together, nearly touching, she noticed that his eyes were a beautiful dark brown, with golden flecks toward the middle. She’d never noticed before how pretty they were, behind his glasses.

  She cleared her throat and ordered herself to get it together. “We’ve got a pretty good start so far. But I still need to check my hospital records. I’ll know for sure then if there was something in my system that messed with my memory.”

  “Okay,” Jackson said, nodding, though he looked worried for her sake. “I guess it’d be one less mystery.”

  * * *

  From: [email protected]

  Subject: Patient Login Request

  Thank you for using the Northshore General Hospital Patient Portal. Your login name or password has been successfully updated. Please click the link below to log in with your new credentials.

  * * *

  Patient Details

  Patient Name: Spencer Sandoval

  Date of Birth: 09/02/2003

  Patient ID: SAN0982311-B

  Status: Completed

  Blood: B+

  Most recent visit: 09/03/2021

  Allergies: None

  Quick-Click Documentation

  Operative Report: SAN0982311-B-oprep.pdf

  Drug/Alcohol Test Results: Pending

  Upcoming Appointments

  Cast removal–10/24–Send Email Reminder

  Requesting prescription refill? Click here.

  SEVENTEEN

  SINCE ACCESSING HER MEDICAL RECORDS, Spencer had asked when any of her blood tests would come back, and the hospital explained it might take a few more days. She was still unnerved by the possibility that someone might have slipped something in her drink that caused her memory loss. The next day at school, Spencer and Jackson, with Ripley bounding along at her side, left the east wing of Armstrong when the lunch bell rang.

  As expected, they found Brent Lang leading a yoga session near Chris’s memorial garden. A couple of freshman girls moved through their poses on brightly colored vinyl mats. They were in the midst of doing an elaborate stretch that involved arms and legs wrapping around each other in a way that did not look entirely comfortable when Jackson and Spencer approached. Brent was wearing harem pants and his usual beanie, his legs wrapped around the back of his head like a human pretzel.

  “Deep breaths, everyone,” he said, with his eyes closed. “Release the worries of today. Exhale the bad, inhale the good.”

  He must have sensed the shadow passing across his face as Spencer stepped in front of the sun, looking down on him.

  Brent opened one eye and looked at Spencer. “Can you not bring that dog over here? It’s going to disrupt my aura’s energy.” Brent waved his hands through the air like he was scrubbing a window.

  “Uh, sure,” Spencer said, keeping Ripley at her side. “Listen, Brent? Do you have a second?”

  “Can’t you see I’m a little tied up at the moment?”

  Jackson chuckled. “Good one.”

  Brent didn’t look like he was trying to make a joke, though. Jackson’s smile died quickly.

  Spencer said, “We just wanted to ask you some questions about that night at the party.”

  Brent sighed when he realized that Spencer and Jackson were not going to go away anytime soon. He told his yoga students, “Move into Savasana and work on finding your breath. I’ll be right back.”

  The students moved to lie on their backs, spread-eagle on the lawn, while Brent followed Spencer and Jackson so they could talk more in private. Brent always had a sleepy-eyed look, like he might curl up and take a nap under a desk at any moment at school. People at school were convinced he was on drugs, but Spencer had a sneaking suspicion that was just how he looked, perpetually calm and at ease with his place in the world.

  Before Spencer or Jackson could say anything, Brent clapped his hands twice, closed his eyes, and breathed deeply. “I’m just clearing the air between us. Give me a moment.”

  Spencer and Jackson glanced at each other, and Jackson shrugged a shoulder. They waited until he was ready to speak.

  “The spirits around you are very loud,” he said. “It’s distracting being around all that noise. Your aura is an oil spill, one big mess, and could really use a cleaning, you know.”

  Spencer wasn’t sure what to say to that. “Uh, okay. Thanks?”

  Jackson was trying not to laugh. Clearly, he didn’t buy into the New Age lingo, either. The best course of attack, Spencer decided, was to just get straight into it. “We were wondering if we could ask you some questions about your, uh”—Spencer glanced at Jackson. “Side hustle. Selling some weed. The night of the end-of-summer party.”

  “God, it’s crazy. Just remembering that night, what happened to Chris. Can’t believe it.”

  “Do you remember much of the party? Anything unusual?”

  Brent jutted out his lower lip. “Not really. Pretty run of the mill as far as Ressler’s parties go. Ressler’s definitely lost his touch, though; his parties used to be a lot more fun then. I think he’s trying too hard. Charging too much.”

  “Do you remember seeing me at the party?” Spencer asked.

  “Besides you freaking out on Ethan? Making a huge scene and all? Your aura was all spiky and red, such a buzzkill. But not really. Why?”

  Jackson jumped in. “What about anything else that might have been weird? Anyone who stood out to you? Something that didn’t feel right?”

  “Just the usual private school circuit. Kids from Armstrong, Westwood Prep, Oakhill. Can’t say it was any different than you’d expect. It’s just weird to think back on it now and realize it was Chris’s last night … Hope he was happy.” Brent’s gaze drifted up as he thought about it. “Now that I mention it, I saw Chris over by the cars, actually.”

  That surprised Spencer. “You did? What was he doing?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t think anything of it until the crash. I think that was the last time I ever saw him alive … He looked like he was trying to find something. Like maybe he’d dropped something. He kept walking up and down where the cars were parked. I wasn’t paying too much attention, though. Didn’t seem like something to pay much attention to, you know? Why bother.”

  “Did anyone else see him at that time?”

  “Yeah, my girlfriend Alison was there with me. She’ll tell you the same thing. We were … ahem, occupied in the bushes.”

  “Right…,” Spencer said, catching the hint.

  Jackson was furiously taking notes in his notebook. She saw him write down Alison’s name. Spencer had the same thought about asking her about that night too, just to make sure it was accurate. But Brent seemed like he was sure he’d seen Chris before the accident.

  “Do you know around what time specifically?” she asked.

  Brent shrugged a shoulder and shook his head. “Nah, I wasn’t really keeping an eye on the clock, you see. It’d be kind of rude. Besides, time is a construct invented to further capitalist agenda.”

  “Listen, dude, did you hook up Ethan that night?” Jackson asked. “Edibles, pre-rolls?”

  “Ethan?” Brent asked. “No, man, you know he’s been sober for a year now. If he was high that night he didn’t get it from me.” Then his face shifted and a shadow passed over his eyes. “But people keep saying he was high the night he crashed. Is that true?”

  “We don’t know.” Spencer faced Brent directly. “Were you selling other stuff at the party?”

  “What are you looking for?” Brent asked, suddenly shifting into business mode. “I don’t have any on me right now, but I can get it to you later. You want to get a body high or are you trying to get more in touch with your ancestors and see God?”

  “No, this isn’t for us, no,” Spencer said hurriedly. “We wanted to figure out who was selling drugs at the party that might have made me forget stuff.”

  “Marijuana is not a drug, she’s a plant of the earth. Nature is all around us. Making a plant illegal is just another extension of the Man. They just want to keep us oppressed. We’re all slaves to the patriarchy.”

  Spencer stopped him before the inevitable rant she could sense coming. “I get that, but did you happen to know about any other drugs being passed around at the party that night? Anything a little more … mind altering?”

  “I only sell weed and shrooms. I don’t do the harder stuff. Won’t touch anything that’s been in a lab. But yeah. There was probably some Molly being passed around.”

  “From who?”

  “Junior. I think the name is Tabby Hill? Tammy maybe?”

  Spencer looked at Jackson. “It’s Tabby. You were right the first time.”

  Jackson’s eyebrows were raised sky-high. “Tabby’s a plug?”

  Brent went on. “Yeah, man. Sells a lot of ’scrip. You should ask them. Say, what’s with the pat down? You guys snitches? Working for the cops or something?” Brent asked, looking back and forth between the two of them.

  “Brent, we’ve been in school together since sixth grade,” Jackson said with a small smile.

  “Oh right.” He blinked lazily.

  Jackson glanced at Spencer, as if to say, Can you believe this guy?

  Spencer asked, “What does Tabby sell?”

  Brent’s smile slipped wider. “Ooh, does Little Miss Four-Point-Oh Spencer Sandoval use some performance-enhancing drugs to ace all her tests?”

  Spencer’s face felt hot. “No, of course not.” And by the way, I have a 4.9, she wanted to add. Brent had probably never calculated a weighted GPA in his life.

  Brent held up his hands, defensively. “Just saying! I wouldn’t be the first to think it.”

  Spencer didn’t want to argue with him; she didn’t come here for him to start anything. She just needed answers. “You said Tabby sells ’scrips.”

  “Adderall, Ritalin, Xanax, Percocet … Don’t tell anyone I told you, because it skeeves me out, but I heard they’d gotten their hands on some dark shit. Like, stuff that could land a person in jail, no doubt. Plus, there’s a lot of dummy Xannys and Addys laced with fentanyl on the market right now. It’s Russian roulette out there. But lots of their clients are people who want to focus up during the day and then decompress at night. So yeah, there were probably pills floating around. I mean, it’s LA, man.”