Kristy and the Last Run

"Thanks for dropping me off, Charlie!" I all but screamed out as I sprinted from the car, holding a hand on my head to keep my cap from flying off.

I think he replied, but I was going to fast to hear. Or care.

It was Wednesday. Nearly five thirty. And I was nearly late.

For what, you ask? Well, ill tell you. I was late for a meeting of the babysitters club.

What is the babysitters club, you ask? Again, I will tell you. The babysitters club, was my idea.

And I was late.

"Wooo, Kristy!" Claudia said gleefully as I collapsed in my traditional seat, the director's chair. I didn't have to look up to know that she was pointing at the clock, which read 5:32 in the unforgiving red numerals.

"Sorry everybody!" I gasped. I leaned over in the chair, trying to catch my breath. Mary Anne rubbed my back comfortingly. "Charlie was—" I took a deep breath. "Charlie was listening to the radio two minutes too much."

"Suuuure Kristy," Claudia teased. Stacy laughed, and Mary Anne gave them each a Look. I was grateful.

I sat up, having started to breath normally again. Quickly, I swapped my collie baseball cap with my green visor. "This meeting will now come to order!"

"Any club business?" I asked the room at large.

Silence. Then there was a rustle, and I turned to see Claudia slowly produce a bag of Cheezies from under a pillow.

I sighed. This, to her, was club business.

Of course, that didn't prevent me from taking a handful, myself.

"Any other club business?" I said pointedly. They giggled.

"Well, I have something." Mallory said. She had raised her hand while she spoke. I think that no matter how many times I tell her that this wasn't school, that I wasn't a teacher, and she wasn't going to get sent out to the hall for not putting her hand up, she would do it until her dying day.

"Yes Mallory?" I said, while pointing at her, like I was calling on her. We giggled again, and she blushed slightly when she noticed what she had done, again.

"Well," she said, still a little pink. "This is just a future reference for anyone who sits at my house. Nicky's grounded. Indefinitely."

"Why?" We asked at once.

I was more then surprised, I was shocked. If anything, I would have suspected the triplets. And even then, I wouldn't have thought indefinitely.

She sighed. "It's not a big thing, per se. Its not one big incident. It's just the way he'sbeen acting lately."

"How has he been acting?" Jessi asked.

She shrugged, her eyes showing bewilderment. "Just…bad." She shook her head. "Every thing we say seems to set him off. And by setting him off, boy, does he ever."

"Are we talking, oh, Claire, after striking out, setting off?" Dawn asked, smiling.

Mallory didn't smile back. "No…more like Boo Boo mixed with Lou McNally on a bad day."

There was silence again.

"Like…" Mallory continued, "The other day, Mom asked him to go have a bath. And he absolutely screamed, not said loudly, but bellowed, 'Why the—'" she paused. "Um…the…something…." She winced. Then she continued, "'should I take a bath? Why?' Then Mom started to say something, and he cut her off; 'I'd rather stay dirty!' or something like that, and he charged upstairs and slammed the door." She shrugged again.

"Wow." Mary Anne whispered. "That doesn't sound like Nicky."

"Tell me about it!" Mallory said. "Just before I left this morning I asked him for my jacket that was next to him, and he picked it up and threw it, as hard as he could, at my face." She tilted her head and pointed to a spot on her cheek. I leaned forwards, along with everyone else, and saw a small red dot, covered in a new scab. She poked at it, and winced. "That's where the zipper hit my face. I was lucky it didn't crack my glasses."

I felt stunned. Why was Nicky acting so badly? Their family wasn't the most peaceful in the world, but it certainly didn't warrant this type of behavior. "You should write this up in the notebook, Mal. I know it's not a sitting job, but it is club business. I think we should discuss this." She nodded, and grabbed the book from Claudia's desk.

"Is he being bullied at school?" Stacy asked.

"No" Mal answered, scribbling. "I asked the triplets. They said he didn't do much at recess, just sit on the swings mostly."

"He doesn't have anyone to play with?" I asked. Loneliness could be the catalyzing factor. I knew I would feel terribly depressed if I had no friends.

She finished writing, and thoughtfully tapped the pencil on her thigh. "You know, that's what you would think. But from what I heard, all of his friends still talk to him, and ask him to play all the time. He just keeps saying no."

"Is he doing badly at school? How are his grades?" Dawn asked.

Mallory's brow furrowed. "That's the most confusing thing. Lately his grades have been…"

"Oh, he's failing?" I interrupted. I received a personal Look from everyone for butting in. I shut my mouth.

"No." She continued with a frown. "Lately, his grades have been…perfect. Flawless."

Forgetting about being shut, my mouth dropped open. So did everyone else's.

"I'm serious! We got an invoice from his teacher, and everything he hasn't got nineties on, he's gotten a hundred. It's incredible. His teacher even keeps him after class sometimes for extra tutoring, saying that at this rate he can skip into the fourth grade after Christmas."

"Wow." Jessi whispered. "When did this happen?"

"It the grades were up about three weeks ago. The attitude was only last week. Just suddenly. Although he was unusually quiet before then."

"Maybe he's feeling pressure," Mary Anne said, looking worried. "Everyone's now expecting him to do great in school. Maybe that's not what he wants."

"All the school pressure in the world wouldn't make me act that way towards my family," Stacy said darkly.

Mallory clearly wasn't feeling any better. "Look, Mal," I said, "we'll monitor the situation. We'll even try and talk to him for you, okay? Maybe he'll open up more to a stranger." The words sounded stupid even to my ears.

She looked pained. "It's not right. I should be able to talk to him, find out what's going on. I keep meaning to, but I chicken out." She pulled her legs in and hugged her knees. "It's not like I have much time to see him now, anyways. Anytime he's not grounded in his room he's either eating, or having a tutor session at school."

"That would be enough to drive anyone mad." Claudia mumbled, biting a Cheetoe. "Extra school. Yeesh."

"How long is he tutored for?" Jessi asked.

Mal laughed. "Anywhere from ten minutes to ten at night. It's almost like he's an apprentice, and Mr. Cleaver is the high master." We laughed.

Stacy was thoughtful. "I had a tutor once. It never lasted till ten at night, but it sure seemed like it did sometimes."

"What's he being taught?" Mary Anne asked.

"Everything, I suppose." Mal replied. She sighed. "It's not like he'll tell me, though. Every time I ask how the tutoring's going he just doesn't answer. Or he screams at me. Depending on his mood."

"Man." Dawn said, sounding concerned. "It sounds like things are going tough for him."

"Maybe he should see a psychiatrist." Stacy suggested.

Mal snorted. "Just suggesting that would earn me a lifetime of pain." We laughed uneasily.

The phone rang. Dawn reached for it before anyone else.

"Baby sitters club," she said professionally.

There was a moment of silence, and her forehead furrowed into a frown. "Hello?" She said into the receiver. "Who's this?"

My friends and I exchanged a glance. I held my hand out for the phone, intending to wring out anyone who was prank calling. Dawn just flapped her hand at me, and kept the phone pressed to her ear.

"I can't really understand you, can you speak up?" She listened. "What was that? Mr…." she stopped talking, and her frown deepened. "Can you say that a little louder?"

Suddenly, she gave a little yelp and held the receiver far away from her ear. From where I sat, I could clearly hear the person on the phone.

All I could hear were screams.

"What's going on?" Claudia asked, alarmed.

"I don't know!" Dawn gasped. Her eyes were wide as she stared at the phone, which was still emitting horrible screams. "What's wrong? Can you hear me?" She cried.

The phone suddenly stopped making noise. The person had hung up.

No one said anything. We were all just looking at the phone, expecting it to continue. Only when the phone started emitting beeps did Dawn finally hang up.

"What…was that…" Mary Anne asked shakily.

"I have no idea." Dawn said, shuddering.

"It was probably a prank caller." Stacy said soothingly. "Some people just have bad senses of humor."

"Extremely bad." Jessi said darkly.

I opened my mouth to say something about Sam's prank calls, but just at that moment, the phone rang again.

All of our heads snapped towards the phone. It rang shrilly, but no one dared to answer.

On its third ring I said, "This is silly. It's probably just a client." I reached for it, at the same time as Dawn.

Our eyes met, and I withdrew my hand. She deserved to pick it up, after what just happened. Wash the taste out.

"Baby sitters club, how may I help you?" She said, her voice shaking ever so slightly.

After a second, she relaxed, and everyone sighed in relief. "Hi, Ms. Pike. How are you?"

She listened for a bit. Then her smile disappeared.

"Um…yeah, she's right here…are…are you okay, Ms. Pike?" Mallory sat up straight, her eyes showing alarm. "Okay, okay, here she is." Dawn held the phone out for Mal.

She snatched the phone. "Mom, what is it?"

She listened for a long time. Her face became more confused after every second. "I don't understand, Mom, you called the school?"

We all exchanged mystified glances. "Mom, he did have one today." She listened. "Well, he's just probably staying for longer, it's not such a big deal." More silence. "Wait, what?" Her face changed to alarm. "He never…they didn't do it at the school? Then where…" She changed ears rapidly. I had never seen her this agitated. "If he hasn't been teaching him, then what…" She cut off abruptly. "So you don't know where Nicky is?"

We all gasped.

"Yes…yeah. Okay, Mom. Yeah, I'll be home soon. Yup. Okay. Don't worry, he's probably just at a friends or something. Okay. Okay. Bye." She leaned forward and dropped the phone on its cradle, shaking her head.

"What was that about?" I asked immediately.

"Nicky was supposed to be home by five from a tutor session. He isn't yet."

I checked the clock. It was only five forty five.

"Mal, kids are always late. Forty five minutes isn't much, when you go by my family's standards."

"Yeah, I know that." She paused, and ran a hand through her curly hair. "But the thing is…Mom called the school. He wasn't there."

"Well, maybe he is at a friend's house."

"That's not all. The secretary was really surprised. Apparently, there wasn't any tutoring going on in his class. She had never heard about it. She said that anything like that would have been in the records, even for special cases. She said that Nicky and his teacher had never been in the school after hours, let alone 'til evening. At all."

We all stopped talking.

"What could that mean?" Jessi said.

Mallory fiddled with the hem of her shirt. "I have no idea."

"Hey!" Stacy said, snapping. "Do you think Nicky forged that invoice so he could go out when he was grounded?"

Mallory shook her head. "No..." she said doubtfully. "That's what I first thought. But for one thing, his teacher called and said it—"

"But couldn't he have gotten some other guy, like and older brother of a friend…"

"Another thing," Mal said. "The invoice thing came before he started acting up."

We had no answer for that.

For awhile we didn't say anything more on the subject. I think we were all running it over in our heads, trying to find an answer. We scheduled some jobs; one at the Johansson's for Mary Anne, another at the Marshal's for me. Claudia told us a story about Pete Black during her English class; he had somehow managed to drop his homework through the air vent on the floor. The teacher had come in when he was trying to pry the cover off with a ruler. He managed to get marks for the work by shining a penlight down the vent and verifying that he had finished it. The sheet was still there.

We all laughed at that. But it wasn't a comfortable laugh. We could still sense that Mallory was more then worried.

"Whew." I said, as I hung up the phone at 6:00. "This meeting is adjourned."

We all got up and started heading out. Mallory looked hurried; I was sure she was anxious to get home.

I was heading down the hall when I heard Mary Anne in the room, "Dawn? Let's go. What are you doing?"

I backstepped until I was in the doorway again. Mal and Jessi, who were ahead, followed me.

Mary Anne put her hand on Dawns shoulder. "Dawn?" She asked uneasily. Dawn didn't answer; she just continued to stare at the phone.

Without turning around, Dawn spoke. "Mal," she whispered. "What was the name of Nicky's teacher again?"

"Mr. Cleaver." Mal said, surprised. "Why?"

Dawn finally turned towards us.

The look on her face was undeniable terror.

"That…that call…" she choked out. "That call…"

"What? What call?" Mal demanded.

"The call before…the voice, it was young…it was quiet…all I could here was heavy breathing, the word Cleaver...and no. Then…the screaming…"

It took a second.

Then it all fell into place.

"No…" I whispered.

Mal didn't say anything. She just fell against the wall behind her, her face frozen in a mask of horror.

It wasn't tutoring.

Aftermath.

It was a beautiful day. The air was crisp; a telltale sign of winter was in the breeze. It flowed through the willow branches next to us. It fluttered through my hair, done up in a bun with a black hairband.

It ruffled the pedals of the roses that were scattered on the small coffin, which was laid on the fresh dug ground.

The minister's words were monotonous, generic. He read from a special bible; its cover showed a picture of an angel child, soaring to the heavens.

The crowd was sizable. Every one of our clients was there, along with everyone from Nicky's school.

Everyone except one.

There were police flanking the service. Their eyes were watchful, observing the procession. Every now and then I could see them write something in their notebooks.

They had traced the call from Claudia's to a small motel on the outskirts of Stonybrook. About an hour after the call, police were pounding down the door to the room that was registered indefinitely to a one Mr. Nicky Cleaver. It was void of all life.

It was not void of all people.

I had not heard the whole story. I don't think I will ever want to. The police had arrived at the Pikes with the news at 10:35 PM that night, after the paramedics had done all they could. I heard the news from Stacy at 11:01. She had heard the family's reaction from her house.

That was a month ago. The Pikes had not been able to have Nicky back until the forensics team from Stamford had collected all the evidence they could. They had gathered enough of it to convict. The trouble was, there was no one to arrest.

That was the reason of the police at the funeral. Besides reminding everyone why the event was even happening, the cops wanted to be there if the man, who's name was still a mystery, returned to the scene of the crime.

The minister had stopped speaking. My mind, which was a galaxy away, snapped back to earth. I saw him nod to someone behind him. Then two men, that was all it took, picked up the coffin and started lowering it into the hole with ropes.

I think the only reason I survived that part was I kept thinking he's not in there. There wasn't a little boy in there. One that wore glasses, before his eyes started to shrivel in the freezer he was kept in for a month. One that had four sisters, three brothers, two parents. One that loved softball, who could pitch better then any other boy his age in the neighborhood. One who's heart was just beginning to beat, before it was crushed by the icy fist of cruelty. One who's innocence was pure and whole. Before.

I didn't mean to look. But my eyes moved before I could stop them. I glanced at Mallory.

She was staring at the ropes that were slowly disappearing into the ground. She didn't seem to be actually seeing. She was probably using the same tactic I had.

Her parents were behind her. They didn't make any movements. It didn't even look like they were breathing.

All of the Pike kids except Claire were crying in some way. Vanessa had tears making a constant streak down her face. Margo was sobbing openly. The triplets were trying hard to mask their grief, but it was pointless; they were crying just as hard as their sisters.

Claire wasn't crying. Nor did she look particularly interested in the service. She was bewildered by the actions of her siblings, and turned to the only one not acting strange.

"Mallory-silly-billy-goo-goo, can we go? I'm tired of standing."

Mallory didn't make a move to answer her sister.

The rest of the service was dirt being filled in the hole. Every shovelful seemed to grind the message in deeper. I felt every cut of the blade; it was if the shovels were digging another hole in my heart, one that could never be filled again.

People started filtering away once the last bit of ground was covered. Many people threw flowers on the fresh dirt as they passed; a mound of color started piling up.

After awhile it was only Mal's family and us, the rest of the club. We wanted to pay our respects without an audience, because our hurt ran so much deeper. Most of them didn't know the details. We did.

We all had a different color rose. Mine was yellow, like the sun. I kissed it softly before dropping it near the marble stone in the ground last. The writing was plain, a simple verse.

Do not think of me as gone. I am with you still-at each new dawn. Nicholas Daniel Pike: 1985-1993.

We stood there for quite a while. Just thinking, and gazing at the text. I was brought back by a small voice.

"Kristy?"

I started, and turned to see Claire's big blue eyes watching me.

"Kristy, what's going on? No one will tell me." She looked back at the rest of her family, who were also gone, staring at the stone as if it would go away if wished enough.

Claire took a closer look at the words on the slab. "Kristy?" She said, confused. "Why is Nicky's name on here? Why haven't I seen him for a long time, but his name's here? When is he coming back?"

I bit my lip and took a breath. It was all I could do not to break down then and there.

"Claire." My voice was rough from non use. Among other things. "Nicky…isn't coming back."

"But…why? I miss him." Her eyes were huge.

I bent down, not caring that my new black dress was grinding into the dirt. I took her hands. "Nicky will always be with you, Claire. Even when you grow up, he'll be there."

"But I want to see him. I wanna play with him, he promised we could play softball the next time the sun was out." She looked up at the light shining through the branches of the willow tree. Her breath was coming in hitches now. "He promised he would teach me to pitch." She sniffed, and her voice wavered. "Why can't I see him anymore? He's my brother…I thought he'd always be here…I thought we were too young to go…"

She went on her knees near the stone. "Nicky?" She whispered. "Nicky, I know you can hear me. Come back. Come back…"

The official cause of death had been suffocation. The medics had found a pair of racecar decaled boxers near him, balled up. Forensic testing had confirmed the saliva, along with blood, on the cloth.

The testing had also confirmed that the time of death was around 5:45, PM.

The rest of the club left the Pikes at the gravesite. We all walked together, not speaking. We were all thinking.

Yes, our hurt ran deeper. People who saw the grave saw in their head the cheerful boy with the crooked glasses and striped shirt, sliding to home. Some other, more unfortunate, ones saw the moody boy that was there weeks before he left us.

We saw the grave, and we heard his last words ever spoken, his last plea of help. We heard a boy in the very last minutes of his life, and who knew the fact. We heard a boy that was taking his last swing. And he struck out.