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Jake leaned back against the door, pursing her lips as she flicked a glance round the cramped room. The clothes she and Will had washed with hand soap were still dripping into puddles around the basin. A bathroom festooned with soggy smalls wasn't her first choice of private places, but for one thing, at least they were alone, and for another, she was planning to yell at Hamilton.
"We need to talk."
Hamilton took a step back. "What?"
"All right. What's going on? Do you want to break my cover?"
"What? You're an FBI agent as well as everything else?" he cracked defensively.
"I should never have trusted you" she said, losing hope. - face the facts - she told herself. - I should have stayed with friendship. One sketchy moment and now I'm in girlfriend territory. And I've had a front seat view of how Ham treats them -
"Of course you can trust me. We're best friends. We'll always be best friends."
"Always" she said flatly. "Ham, when have you stayed with anyone longer than a weekend?"
"I've stayed with you." He moved up close to nuzzle her temple.
Jake tried to be tough and unaffected. "Well you're stuck with me for now. Unless Will or Scout are open to suggestions, and I don't think-"
"Stop it. Shut up Jake." She was hurting him.
She moved past him to test the dampness of the laundry with a fingertip. - I've got to stay in touch with reality. The crash will hurt less if I don't get my hopes -
Hamilton stared at her back. "You think this is some prison bitch cliche?" he said incredulously. "I'm not into you as a substitute for a real girl-"
"I AM a real girl" Jake snarled.
"HUngH?" in a tone worthy of Scooby Doo - or Scout.
She was replaying what they'd said in her head. "I told you I'm a girl."
"Yes. And I accept that. Am I the first person you've told?" Because, he couldn't help noticing how Jake was repeating himself on the subject.
They stared at each other for a good minute, both reaching out, each aware that they were failing to connect. Still speechless, Jake began wrenching her top off.
"Jake you don't have to - Jake." Hamilton shoved his fringe out of his eyes.. "Jake ..you've got a chest."
"I'm a girl" said Jake, as if the point needed reinforcing. She reminded herself that her bra was as good a cover up as a bikini top. It was an effort to keep her hands from screening her breasts, especially with Hamilton staring so intently. She expected his eyes to burn through the fabric.
He dragged his attention back to her face. "Why?"
Jake sucked in a deep breath. "Remember how I told you I kept changing schools to get my mom's attention?" She paused, and when he nodded, said wryly "Coming to Rawley Boys was kind of an extension of that."
"She never noticed, did she."
- I don't want your pity - "Nope. But I settled anyway." She forced a smile. It touched Hamilton.
"Because of me."
"Because of me" she said sharply. "Because I love crew, and tag football, and decent science teaching. And, yeah, friendships. Scout, Will, Bella ..you."
"Can you call us friends? You've been lying to us all this time."
"Not about the important stuff. My name's Jacqueline, not Jake. But I believe the same things, I enjoy the same things, I'm the same person you knew."
"I don't think I ever knew you." He sounded cold, maybe angry.
Jake stooped to pick up her sweatshirt and made a big performance of pulling the sleeves right side out. "You know me better than anyone else ever did," she mumbled.
"Why didn't you trust me?" This wasn't anger (Jake was still desperately reading his tone of voice). It might be bewilderment. Jake darted a look to try and read his face.
"I was afraid." She blinked rapidly. "You'd think I was a freak or weird or creepy or something."
He turned and left the room.
"Don't tell-" she blurted. Hastily pulling her top back on, she followed.
Jake and Hamilton emerged from the bathroom at the same time but not exactly together. She walked off by herself and started doing press-ups fast. Hamilton raised his eyebrows, shrugged, and went over to Will and Scout.
"How's it going?" Scout wondered what all that had been about with Jake and Hamilton.
"Life is weird."
Will smiled faintly. "That's my line." He was sitting by the hole in the window. If he held his face just so he could feel the cool breeze, and maybe catch some rain splatters on his face. He looked outside again, feeling claustrophobic. "Opalescent grey" he said.
Hamilton studied the sky in his turn. It reminded him of a pigeon's plumage, grey, yes, but with flushes of rose and lilac.
Scout cut through the meteorology talk. "So, uh, what's up with you and Jake?"
"Nothing. Why would anything be up? We're in a locked room, nothing's happening."
"Oh, ok." Scout threw Will a "weird, huh" look.
"When I was a little kid" said Will "I used to sneak out of my room during my folks' fights, and go sit in the yard. Feel the night breeze on my face, believe there was a place for me somewhere." He caught the look on Hamilton's face. "Not as John Boy Walton as you thought? My dad isn't a Walton."
A police siren wailed past them underneath. They eyed the car sourly, and Will went to make yet another attempt on the lock.
"Jake's a girl?" Finn couldn't get past that point.
"Yes" said the Dean, his teeth gritted. Finn had repeated himself three times now.
Finn looked at the Dean curiously. "You don't seem very angry." He'd always thought the man was bloodless.
"Angry?" said the Dean as if it was a new concept. "I'm furious."
"Do you suppose Munchie knew?" Kate wondered.
"Why should he?"
"He's close friends with Jake."
"Is he? But he doesn't know" Steven said confidently. "If he'd found out he'd have come straight to us. That's how we taught him."
"Uh, yeah" said Finn, but he permitted himself a dubious expression. Steven would never notice.
"I feel sorry for those rich brats sometimes" Steven said expansively "shipped off out of their parent's hair. You know, I think parents should need a licence to practice-"
Kate and Finn did know. They'd heard this speech before.
"- but our Hamilton, we've kept him close and he's never been deprived of love and attention."
"Shouldn't we be talking about Jake now?" suggested Finn.
"I've sent for his - her - school records" said Steven. "What are your impressions?"
"Very bright, especially in the sciences. In IT-"
Steven nodded. "Mr Rosen spoke to me about her talent."
Now that Finn thought about Jake, he found her more elusive than Will or Scout. "Hates speaking up in class. Kind of standoffish. I'd say she's been hurt."
"Hurt?" The Dean latched onto the word.
"Emotionally."
"Oh, emotionally." The Dean dismissed it. "She's a liar. Of course she'll have trust issues."
"We don't know why she did this" said Kate. "Maybe we'll find out when you meet Monica Pratt."
Steven met up at the theatre with a quieter, tenser Sopwith. "Ms Pratt knows we're coming?" he confirmed.
"Yes, but we give the bad news in person." Sopwith looked glum. "Really, this is stupidly late to be contacting a parent, but we had trouble tracing her, and then her agent is very protective-"
Steven nodded feelingly at that last.
"-I don't understand why Ms Pratt hasn't been onto you though. Hasn't she noticed an absence of communications from her daughter?"
"She might not know Jake's at Rawley."
"It's not hard to work out. Her money's going in your account. Excuse me-" (aside to a grumpy looking woman on the stage door) "-We're here to see Monica Pratt."
"Good luck to you" said the woman.
"Er, it's about her daughter" said Steven, anxious to make it clear that he was not a show business person.
Sopwith showed his id, which got the woman off her bottom and leading them through a maze of cramped and grimy corridors. "She has a child? It's hard to imagine. No, wait, I can imagine it. She ate most of the litter at birth to refresh herself but this one crawled away." The woman indicated a dressing room door and left them to it.
"I'm not a superstitious man" said Steven before they knocked.
"-but?"
"This isn't generally how a constructive parent/teacher meeting opens."
Sopwith was surprised into a laugh. "We just stepped in some office politics. Don't worry about it."
Ms Pratt greeted them smoothly. Sopwith detected a slight edge of confusion as to what they were here about.
"I'm with the metropolitan police" he explained. "I'm afraid I have bad news."
"Is it about those parking tickets? Because, you know, there was a really good reason-"
"I'm a detective inspector with the metropolitan police."
Monica stepped back from Sopwith and leaned on her dressing table in a graceful, elegant gesture. This made a packet of rizlas and a brown herbal lump sweep over the edge to the floor. Troubled, Steven said "It's about your daughter."
"Who are you?" she wanted to know.
"I'm the dean of her school."
"She's not still in that convent?" she said.
"You sent Jake to a convent?"
"It was a very classy convent. I thought it would-" Monica hesitated "-sort her out. She's a really awkward, emotionally grasping, girl. I haven't the time for it. You know, boarding school, peer group, professional supervision.."
"It didn't sort her out" Sopwith said frankly.
"Wait a minute." Monica wasn't listening. "I think my accountant said she'd relocated."
"She relocated to my school" Steven said.
"Who are you again?"
"The dean of Rawley boys academy."
After a startled moment, Monica burst out laughing. "Oh, I keep telling her to find herself a boy. Is that where she is now?"
"Well, no. Do you read the papers?"
"I read the arts section." Monica lit a cigarette.
"On Thursday night, the son of Senator Calhoun was snatched for ransom, along with three of his classmates."
Monica dropped her cigarette in a glass of water. "And?" she said harshly. She was going to drag it out of him word by word.
"One of the classmates was Jake Pratt." Steven spoke as gently as he could. He hated this.
"Back up. Are you saying my daughter's locked in a room someplace with three horny teenage guys?"
"In their defence, they think she's a horny teenage guy" said Steven, caught off guard. He added "None of them are going to pounce on her."
Monica fiddled compulsively with the makeup on the table. She was staring into space. "Do the - what was it, Callahans? - need help with the ransom? (god, the amount that girl's cost me, first and last)"
Sopwith cut this off. "No. We're confident of locating them via computer traces and good, solid police work. We could even do it without the help of the nice men the Embassy insisted on sending."
Steven started a sidelong look, then masked it.
"This is fraud" said Monica, thinking it through. "How much trouble is Jacqueline in?"
"Apparently the dean can sue her" said Sopwith with the awful candour Steven associated with him.
"My Stupid little bitch" Monica muttered.
Jake staked a claim to the bathroom for the next hour to wash up before bed. Hamilton followed. She was staring mindlessly at a discoloured stain on the ceiling when he tapped on the door and followed her. "Oh, feel free to barge right in."
"We need to talk."
"I was about to -" she looked at him sidelong. "Are you still mad at me?"
He backed her against the basin and kissed her. "Of course I'm mad at you."
"I dunno; I'm getting mixed signals here."
He pushed her away enough for her to get the benefit of an exasperated look.
"You were so angry" she said.
"I was embarrassed. How did I not know? You're good, you fooled everybody. But it's not like I wasn't paying attention. God, I was paying attention." His eyes swept over her. Their blueness and intensity of expression made her gut twist.
She slid her arms around him and kissed the lips she'd been staring at for weeks. "You're all stubbly." She moved away from his raspy chin.
"You're not." Ham cupped her neck to pull her back, his fingertips stroking the nape. Her skin was soft, warm, and damp. He brushed his lips along the perfectly smooth sleek line of her jaw.
"Oh, hell. Facial hair, I haven't got any. Even Will is getting bristles now. (Will the guys notice?)"
"I don't get why you're still stressing over this. When we get out, everyone'll know."
"Because you'll tell them" she panicked.
"Because they'll know. Our parents, police, teachers. It's out of our hands. By the time they come and get us-"
"By the time they come to get us. I wish I was gone. Just run. I could hire a bike. I could go for months. I speak French, Spanish. I could go-"
"Where would that leave me?" He felt left out of her dreams.
Her most dazzling smile flashed out. "On the bitchpad."
"Camere baby ..You've got to face them all sometime."
"They're not going to let me come back to Rawley."
"Maybe Dad can be persuaded" he said.
Jake looked doubtful. She'd heard him vent a ton about how the Dean was never interested in what he said.
"My mom can persuade him."
Jake wasn't so sure; she thought Mrs Fleming would be angry too.
"I can talk my mom into anything." Hamilton was confident.