The Fourth Stall - Chris Rylander [53]
“Wouldn’t you have known about this sooner than now? I mean, her birthday is the same day every year, right?”
“Yeah, I just forgot. I don’t have a good enough excuse to miss for my mom not to get suspicious, you know?”
“Well, I guess there’s nothing you can do, then.” Something didn’t seem right about this.
“I’m so sorry, Mac. I begged, I pleaded . . . but my mom said stuff like, ‘This’ll probably be the last birthday you will ever get to celebrate with her!’ Believe me, I’d much rather be there to see the look on Justin’s face than to be at my grandma’s place, which smells like cat pee, while she hits me over the head with her cane and tells me to ‘sit up and speak louder’ and says a bunch of crazy things that don’t make sense.”
I could tell that he felt pretty bad. But I also knew that he secretly wanted to go to his grandma’s. He likes going over there.
“I already said it was fine. You don’t really need to be there anyway,” I said.
I looked at Vince and he glanced at my shoes. Was that guilt for having to bail or something else? I used to be able to read his face as easy as a picture book, but lately, it had been more like trying to read an organic chemistry book written in Russian.
Then the morning bell rang and ended our conversation.
It was in the middle of class that I realized my guts suddenly felt like quicksand, and I was melting into myself until I’d eventually implode and cease to exist. Something was off about Vince, I knew it. This story about his grandma’s birthday just didn’t feel right. Now I needed to know about the money thing as well. My Books were right. I’d been lying to myself when I kept assuming it was just a numbers error I’d made. If Vince’s Books were supposedly “right” and he was the only other person with a key to the Tom Petty cashbox, then . . .
I raised my hand. “Mr. Skari, I need to use the restroom.”
My teacher scribbled a hall pass, and I was out the door and speed-walking toward my office before I’d even blinked once.
I gathered up Vince’s Books as quickly as I could and started going through the most recent transactions. I guess Vince must have thought that I would never take an interest in keeping track of our money, because it didn’t take long to notice why everything was off.
Vince had been padding the numbers. According to his Books, we’d paid the bullies slightly more than we actually did. In fact, most all of the recent payments were slightly higher in his Books than they’d actually been. Also, some of the money-received transactions were listed as slightly lower than what we’d taken in.
I was too stunned to breathe. I’m surprised I didn’t pass out right there in the office. There had to be some sort of misunderstanding. Vince had always been the money guy. How could this happen? There was only one answer; I just didn’t want to admit it. Vince had been padding the numbers so he could steal money undetected. But that didn’t make any sense either. Why would Vince do that? This was his business, too, and if he needed extra cash for something, he would come to me and we’d find a way to get it. I couldn’t understand why he would possibly be sneaking money like this. I wondered if it had something to do with how weird he’d been acting lately. One thing was for sure—I was going to find out before the day was over.
I slammed his Books shut, surprised at how pissed off I actually was. I put them away and then dug our Tom Petty cashbox out of the garbage can. I hid it inside the empty toilet tank in the second stall. I wasn’t just going to sit back and let Vince keep stealing cash until I found out what was going on.
The first thing Vince said when I walked into the office at morning recess was “Mac! Our Tom Petty cash is missing!”
And my first thought was: Why exactly did he look for it first thing when he got here? Answer: He was going to take more money.
“It’s not missing,” I said.
“What?” Vince asked.
I held out my hand. Vince just looked at it. Joe and Fred walked in, saw us, and instantly stopped talking. I didn’t flinch.
“Your Tom Petty key,