Kendall rolls her eyes and pulls the milk jug from the refrigerator. Its label reads fresh as heck from hector farms. How could anybody not adore Hector Morales? She pours an impossibly large tumbler full and drinks it all. Slams it on the counter, empty. “Any mail?”

“Nothing from Juilliard.”

Kendall screws up her nose, disappointed. “Okay. Well, what needs to get done before I start practicing?”

“Dad’s checking the southwest field today to see how close we’re getting to harvest. He wants you out there to show you how he does that. Then dinner. Then homework. Then you can practice.”

“Big sigh, Mummy,” Kendall says. “I am so sick of potatoes, I could scream.”

“Another six weeks and it’ll all be pretty near over.”

Kendall starts jogging to the field, but the milk sloshes in her stomach and her thighs burn from the soccer scrimmage, so she slows down to a walk. Even out here, on her home turf, Kendall feels uneasy walking alone. She heads for the southwest field, looking nervously over her shoulder every thirty paces or so.

After a few minutes she hears her father’s familiar yell and catches up to him. “Hey, Daddy!”

“How’s my girl?” Mr. Fletcher air-hugs Kendall. His hands are filthy.

“Good, now that I’m with you,” she says, demure. “Whatcha got?”

“This here is what we call a potato,” Mr. Fletcher says. “Fascinating.”

They walk the field together a few rows apart, stopping now and then to check for ripeness, rot, and bugs. Kendall’s mind wanders, remembering earlier in the day, picking up random thoughts to obsess over.

“Machines are good,” Mr. Fletcher says, taking on a teaching tone, “but they don’t compare to the human eye, or the touch of a hand. That’s the real way to keep crops, to be one with them, to create potatoes that love you back.”

“Yeppers,” Kendall says, but she’s not paying attention. She’s picturing Jacián sneaking off to kidnap, murder, and chop poor innocent girls into pieces.

By the time she gets her homework done, it’s nine thirty p.m. and her legs ache, but she’s not done. She slips a DVD into the player and sits down on her bedroom floor to stretch and warm up. By nine forty-five she’s running through ballet positions, and then she works into her routine, the one she choreographed herself for the Juilliard application video. It feels good. But she’s exhausted.

By the time Nico calls her phone line at eleven to say goodnight, she’s already asleep. But it’s a good sleep. Being busy and exhausted is about the best thing for Kendall’s brain.

She even forgot to check her window lock six times.

In the morning Kendall rises at six. She gets online and looks up the youth theatre in Bozeman, wondering what productions they’re doing this fall and if there would possibly be time to squeeze in a play on top of soccer and life. Last spring she got the part of Miss Dorothy in Thoroughly Modern Millie. It was the most fun Kendall has had in her entire life. The director called her a natural, and she even got nominated for a local youth theatre award. Not bad for her first musical.

But Kendall has always known she wants to sing, dance, act. She’s been doing it on her own since she was a little kid, always doing productions in the barn, using cats as her other actors if she couldn’t talk Nico, Eli, Travis, or even stupid Brandon into participating.

Nico usually played along. He is the closest neighbor, and their mothers have been friends since before Kendall and Nico were born. Nico was agreeable to doing almost anything Kendall requested, except when it came to singing or dancing, which Kendall thought was probably good, since he’s terrible at both.

Kendall pulls up the theatre’s website and sees they are auditioning for Grease. She scans the rehearsal schedule but knows it’s impossible. She can’t drive all the way out to Bozeman multiple times a week during harvest and soccer season. Too far away. Too many conflicts.

Too many stupid potatoes.

She checks her e-mail and then closes her laptop and gets ready for school.

At school things are pretty much just as they were yesterday. Kendall turns the wastebasket, straightens the markers, opens the curtains, tugs to check the windows, and runs her fingers over each window lock. “All checked and good,” she whispers. Then she makes minor adjustments to the desks.

She watches the students arrive, many of them walking, some driving cars or pickup trucks. Kendall tries to see Cryer’s Cross through the eyes of a newcomer like Marlena. Some of the students wear cowboy hats and boots, others wear Gap or Levi’s or Target or home sewn. It’s not that strange, she guesses.

When Nico comes walking up to the school, Kendall smiles. She’s really proud of him wanting to be a nurse. He’s been bandaging cats and farm animals since the two of them were little. The other guys aren’t jerks about it like Brandon.

The school day progresses. Ms. Hinkler assigns the upper-classmen various things to read and work on, and then she spends the most time with the freshmen, which she’ll do for this first week, until they get used to her and how things work.

In the senior section Brandon and Travis sleep. Eli Greenwood reads for a while, then jiggles his leg and doodles in the margins of his English book. Jacián does trigonometry problems on scratch paper until his work is done, and then he slumps in his seat and traces his finger over the desk graffiti. Nico props his head up with one arm and rests the other on the desk next to his open physics textbook. His eyes close. Kendall pretends to read, but she’s daydreaming about Broadway.

There is something about performing that soothes Kendall’s overactive brain. It’s like the concentration necessary for acting takes the attention away from the never-ending circle of thoughts that drives her sometimes irrational behavior. And she wants it—she wants that relief. That control over her list of obsessions and compulsions. Maybe this winter she can do another show once soccer and potatoes are done. Maybe.

In the sophomore section Marlena glances over her shoulder, catches Kendall’s eye, and smiles.

At noon everybody heads outside to eat lunch or hit the locker rooms for a bathroom break. Some go home for lunch if they live close to town. Nico and Kendall live just a little too far away to make that worthwhile.

“Bored yet?” Kendall lies down on her back in the grass next to Nico. It’s a beautiful day, a few clouds, maybe seventy-five degrees.

Nico is quiet. Kendall pokes him.

“Hmm?”

“I asked if you were bored yet. With school.”

With visible effort he pulls himself from his thoughts. “Oh. No. I think I’m going to like physics.”

“I wish we had more options. You know. Ceramics. Drama.”

Nico rolls to his side and looks at Kendall. Touches her cheek. “Me too, for you. No mail?”

“Nope.”

“Good.” Nico falls back again. “I don’t want you to go.”

Kendall laughs and punches him in the shoulder. “Stop! You’ll jinx Juilliard.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I just wish you weren’t going to be way out in New York . . . I haven’t gone a whole week in my entire life without seeing you—since before you were born.”

“Well, maybe you should consider coming out that way too. Why do I have to be the one to stay around here?”

Nico winces. “You’re right.”

“Of course I am.” She sits up. Closes her eyes and sighs. “But the truth is, I’m not going to get into Juilliard, and we both know it. So. Saturday I’m checking out State with you.”

Nico grins. “Awesome.”

Back in the classroom, though, Nico acts distracted. He rests his head on his desk, eyes half closed.

Kendall pokes him when Ms. Hinkler is working with the sophomores. “Are you okay?”

Nico turns slowly to look at Kendall, a faraway look in his eyes. “Fine,” he says. He faces forward once again, his fingers sliding across the edge of his desk.

“You’re acting really strange.”

“Shh,” Nico says, distracted. He shakes his head slightly and doesn’t answer further. Then he puts his head back down and closes his eyes.

At soccer practice Coach works the team hard. They run drills and suicide competitions. It’s hard work, but Kendall savors it. It keeps her mind busy. But as she runs, something Jacián said yesterday keeps repeating in her mind, a syllable with every step. Stay out of my way, then, if you don’t want to get hurt.

Did Jacián say that to Tiffany Quinn, too, before he killed her? Kendall shakes her head, admonishing herself in jagged whispers as she runs the suicide drills. She glances at him. Stop it. Stop it. Stop it. Just run.

She beats everybody. It’s never happened before, but Kendall’s in her groove today. Jacián comes in second. Eli is third, with Marlena grabbing his shirt trying to pass him, but she ends up fourth. Nico’s off his game, coming in seventh out of the eight. Jacián walks away, gasping for breath.

Kendall smiles triumphantly before half the team shoves her onto the ground and piles on top. She gasps and laughs, trying to shield her face from kicking legs and waving arms. Briefly catches Jacián’s eye as he stands a few feet away, watching the congratulatory pileup. His eyes burn holes into hers. She flails and turns, and sees Nico, but he’s staring off at nothing.

In a minute she wriggles out from under the pile as Coach yells for everybody to get back to work.

At 11:05 p.m. Kendall calls Nico. “What’s up with you?”

“Huh?”

“You missed the call. You almost never miss the call.”

“Oh. Uh . . . I lost track of time, I guess. Got a lot on my mind.”

“You want to talk about it? Please? You’re starting to worry me.”

“No. No, thanks. I have to go.”

“Okaaay. . . .”

“Good night, Kendall.”

Kendall pulls the phone from her ear and stares at it for a second, and then puts it back up to her ear again. “Are you kidding me?”

But all she hears is a dial tone. Her stomach twists. Nico hung up on her. “Damn, boy,” she says. “This college thing must be huge for you, that’s all I can say.” She calls his private line again. Five times.

All she gets is a busy signal.

She checks her lock six times and then stares through the window, out over the front fields. Toward Nico’s house.

All is dark.

Kendall shivers.

The first week of school nears an end. The unspeakable absence of Tiffany Quinn is mostly forgotten, replaced by new assignments, new students, and a need for life to be normal. Kendall performs her morning routines—the wastebasket, the markers, the windows, the desks—and things are good. Mostly.

Jacián still doesn’t speak in class unless Ms. Hinkler asks him a question.

And Nico is completely lost in his own world, oblivious to Kendall.

He won’t discuss it.

Her brain goes into overdrive.

“Nico,” she says at lunch, outside on the grass. “Is it me? Is it something I did?”

He stares at the sky. His lips move, but no words come out.

“Nico?”

He turns to look at Kendall. “What?”

Kendall bites her lip, and tears spring to her eyes. “What’s wrong with you? Monday you were normal, and now everything’s really weird.”

He just shakes his head. “Nothing.”

“Are we still going to Bozeman tomorrow?”

“Bozeman. . . . Oh, yeah. Yeah, sure.”

“Are you mad at me or something?”

He stares for a minute as if he’s trying to comprehend the question, and then he takes her hand. “No, baby. I love you. Like always.” He looks into her eyes and brings her hand to his lips. But his look is vacant. He kisses her knuckles, drops her hand, gets to his feet, and walks back into the school.

There’s no soccer practice on Fridays—not until games actually begin. Nico starts home after school without Kendall. She watches him, incredulous, and then she turns and walks up the street into town.

The town portion of Cryer’s Cross consists of one four-way-stop intersection with a handful of stores, a restaurant, and a big indoor farmers’ market that doubles for whatever else might require a large organized space throughout the year. Kendall climbs the steps to the drugstore, in desperate need of tampons.

Outside the building is a porch with an awning, and under the awning, sitting in aged wooden chairs, are old Mr. Greenwood and Hector Morales. Kendall grins and waves. The two men often sit together in the early evenings during good weather, not talking, just sitting. Old Mr. Greenwood is grouchy, but Hector brightens up when he sees Kendall.

“Miss Kendall,” Hector says. “Come here, please.”

Kendall goes over to the men. “Yes, sir?”

“You are a good friend to Marlena at school. Thank you for that. You hear me?”

Kendall smiles. Hector is such a sensitive man, so kind. She wonders how his offspring could have produced somebody so awful as Jacián. “Marlena’s a great girl,” Kendall says. “Really good at soccer.”

“And Jacián, he is our soccer champion,” Hector says with a proud chuckle.

“Yes,” Kendall says, trying to sound enthusiastic. “Yes, he’s really talented.”

“He needs the friends too,” Hector says, a little softer, but somehow with more punch. “People need friends.” He glances at Mr. Greenwood, who shifts uncomfortably. “You’re a good girl. You give him a chance, okay?”

“Okay,” Kendall says. What else can she say? “I’ll try.” And before she can help it, she adds, “And he should give everybody else a chance too.”

Hector looks thoughtfully at Kendall, his finger on his lips as he thinks. “I agree, Miss Kendall. You are wise for someone so young, and I thank you.”

Kendall can’t help smiling. She reaches and takes his hand, holds it for a minute. “Good to see you again.”

She goes inside the shop and wanders around, looking at things. Thinking about Nico, and wondering what’s really going on with him.

Then she pays and walks the mile home, looking over her shoulder every thirty paces. Walking alone always reminds her of Tiffany Quinn.

Kendall does her chores and homework, mopes about Nico but is glad they’ll have a chance to talk things out tomorrow on the way to Bozeman. Her parents say good night and turn in. By ten thirty Kendall falls asleep on the couch watching music videos.

Kendall wakes up to the doorbell ringing. Once, twice. Bright sunshine streams in through the living room curtains—she slept on the couch all night. Crap, she thinks. Overslept. Bozeman today. She goes to the door in her pajamas.

It’s not Nico.

It’s Jacián. With a side of beef.

“Delivery,” he says. He’s wearing dark sunglasses, and Kendall can’t see his eyes. She grips the placket of her pajama top in residual fifth-grade fear.

“Oh.” She moves out of the way as he brings a box inside. She wonders briefly if she has morning breath. If it were anyone else at the door, she might actually care.

“Freezer?” He shifts his weight from one foot to the other.

“Downstairs. . . . Here.” Kendall runs her fingers through her tangled bed-head and leads him to the basement door, down the steps. It’s cool down here. Smells like rain and dirt. She opens the freezer door and hurriedly rearranges the containers of sweet corn she and her mother prepared and froze last month. She puts them into neat rows, stacking them just right.

“This is heavy,” Jacián says.

Kendall stops arranging. “Just . . . set it on the floor. I’ll pack the freezer.”

He sets the box down and heads up the stairs two at a time. “There’s another box,” he calls over his shoulder.

“I should hope so,” Kendall says. “Or else it’s a really small cow. One of them mini cows.” Nobody hears her.

A moment later Jacián is back. He flips his sunglasses to rest on top of his head, and he starts unpacking the box. Kendall blocks him from putting anything away. “It’s okay, really. I got it.”

“My grandfather said I’m supposed to do this,” he says. “It’s part of the Hector Farms’ service.” His voice turns sarcastic at the end, and Kendall remembers her conversation with Hector.

“It’s really not necessary.” Kendall is in the organizing groove, and she wants it done just right.

“You’re doing it wrong, anyway. Put all the steaks together, hamburger together, roasts together. Not by size and shape but by category, or you’ll never know how much of one item you have left.”

Kendall stops cold, stands up straight, and glares at him. She puts one hand on her hip and holds a two-pound package of frozen hamburger in the other. “Go force your condescending man-logic on the next house. You can go now.”

He glares back and doesn’t leave. He works his jaw, like he wants to say something.

Kendall’s mind flashes to Tiffany Quinn. She glances at the freezer, picturing it full of chopped-up abducted girls, and then looks back at Jacián, whose black eyes are on fire now. A wave of irrational fear moves through her chest, and she tries not to show it on her face. She’s down in the cellar with a kidnapper, nobody else home. “Go away. Please.”

Jacián’s eyes narrow, then soften. “Fine.” He steps back, turns sharply, and walks up the stairs. Kendall hears his feet and the click of the front door closing.

She glances over her shoulder nervously as she packs the beef in the freezer. By size and shape. It’s the only way she can stand to do it.

She rushes through her shower and gets ready. Waits until almost noon for him to show up. And then she calls Nico’s house. Nico’s line is busy. Kendall hangs up and calls the home line instead. Mrs. Cruz answers.

“Hey, Mrs. Cruz. Nico there?”

“Kendall! No, haven’t seen him up yet this morning. Leave a message?”

“Hmm.” Kendall thinks. “We’re supposed to go to Bozeman today. Maybe you should wake him up.”

“Sure thing. I’ll have him call you in a minute.”

“Thanks!”

“Bye, hon.”

“Bye, Mrs. Cruz.”

Kendall hangs up and flips on the TV. The news anchor talks about that sixteen-year-old serial killer in Brazil again—the girl who killed twelve people. Wow. Just wait until she tells Nico. Makes Jacián the teenage kidnapper look just a little bit lame.

Twenty minutes pass, and Kendall grows concerned that Nico hasn’t called. Just when she’s about to call him again, the phone rings.

It’s Nico’s mother.

“Kendall,” she says, her voice distressed, “Nico’s not home. His bed is made. There’s no note.”

Kendall’s stomach jumps into her throat before she can think rationally. “Is his car gone?”

“Yes.”

“Okay. Well, that’s good, then, right? He’s probably just out somewhere.” Kendall’s tongue is thick. She swallows hard. Breathes.

“Yes, that’s probably it,” Mrs. Cruz says, and then she laughs anxiously.

Kendall whispers, “Maybe he went to Bozeman without me.”

They find the car. It’s not in Bozeman. It’s parked at the school.

And Nico’s not there.

After a cursory search through the town and all around the school grounds, Nico’s parents start contacting everybody they can think of, asking if they’ve seen him.

There is no sign of Nico Cruz.

Nico’s car engine is cold, and according to Sheriff Greenwood, there are no clues inside. Not in the car, or in the school. Still, they tape off everything as a precaution. After what happened with Tiffany Quinn, it’s never too soon to suspect a missing person. Everybody’s on edge.

When Kendall hears the news about the car, she runs the mile from her house to the school. The car looks so lonely sitting there, surrounded by onlookers. Air crushes her chest. She sinks to her knees, can’t catch her breath. People start crowding around her to see the car, the school . . . as if there is something to see. But there’s nothing. Just a car, a building. Yellow tape.

“He could be fine,” someone says. “Maybe we’re all overreacting. He’s practically a grown man. Maybe he’s out for a hike.”

“Maybe he’s hunting back in the woods.”

“Maybe his car ran out of gas and he pulled in here.”

“Yes, let’s not jump to conclusions.”

But the other whispers are there too, growing louder. “Another one. What’s happening to our safe little town? All the children are disappearing.”

Kendall tries, fails to tune them all out.

It’s all she can do to just breathe. And count.

Count breaths: thirty-six. Count stones in the dirt: more than fifty. Count people saying stupid things: all of them.

Count all the days she’s known him: infinity.

Maybe he’ll be back before she’s done counting.

Maybe not.

The buzzing noise of the people grows louder and louder, and Kendall can’t think. She can’t count with so much distraction. She stands up and shoves through the crowd, screaming, “Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! All of you just shut up!” Tears blur everything.

Someone grabs her sleeve. Blindly she whips her arm away and runs, runs like hell. Runs almost all the way home, until her feet can’t keep up with her and she plunges forward, down onto the gravel, shredding her palms and knees. And then she just lies there as a huge splash of hurt rips through her body, and she’s so grateful for the pain, because she can feel it. It lets something else loose. She sobs. There in the gravel on the side of the road in front of Nico’s farm, she sobs, under the old rusty mailbox where she used to put notes for him, grasshoppers and bees fly and buzz around her in a panic.

It’s not long before she hears feet crunching on the gravel. When the sound stops next to her, she lifts her head and looks up, squinting into the sun. Her lip starts quivering again. “Mom,” she says.

“I couldn’t run quite as fast as you,” she says, “but at least you ran in the right direction.”

Kendall slowly pushes herself up to her feet. Tries to wipe the gravel out of her hands and knees, but some of it’s stuck hard. She starts crying again and gives up as Mrs. Fletcher wraps her arms around the girl.

“Come on inside,” Kendall’s mom says. “Let’s get you cleaned up. Sheriff Greenwood is coming over in a few minutes. He wants to talk to you.”

Kendall jerks her head up. “Why?”

“Just to get an idea of who saw him last. Nobody thinks you did anything. They think he left the house late last night.”

“Why would he do that?” Kendall limps up the long driveway to their farmhouse. “I think my brain is going to burst,” she says. “My OCD is going crazy.”

“I know, honey. This is hard. But we’ve got to stay hopeful, okay? He’s a big strong guy. He can take care of himself. We just need to figure out what happened. Find out where he is.”

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