Page 99 of Hand Picked
I’d barely gotten my behind back in the seat when Katey hit the target with her second beanbag and I got doused again—with evencolderwater. And then she immediately landed her third shot.
By that point, I was coughing and spluttering water. I was soaked all the way to my shoes, and the back of my legs was the only dry spot on my body.
“Okay, then! Fun is fun, but now it’s done,” I said, standing up and clapping my hands like the entire crowd was my first grade class… since many of themwere. “I’m getting cold, so you guys will have to wait for the next volunteer!”
Fortunately—for me, anyway—one of the volunteer dads ran up at exactly that moment, all apologies, and took the splash seat… wearing shorts, flip-flops, and a heavy waterproof rain poncho like the prepared person he was.
I snicker-snorted at my own soaked state. If I was going to continue living in Little Pippin Hollow—which I was—I was going to start carrying a change of clothes and a raincoat in my car.
I squelched my way through the crowd, receiving several back pats of support, and ended up back at my booth—which was nearly deserted for the first time all day.
“What happened to you?” Principal Oliver asked.
“What do youthink?” I shot back. I glanced around the empty booth. “Where’s Aiden? I need to go home and get changed, so I’m going to drop him off with Webb.”
“Aiden?” She blinked in confusion. “Oh! Umm.” She darted a guilty glance around also, even looking under the folding table and behind a pile of boxes. “He… he must’ve wandered off!Tsk.”
Was she kidding?
“He’sseven.” I narrowed my eyes. “Seven-year-olds wander, which is why they need adult supervision. What happened to ‘I’m the principal, you can entrust him to my care’?”
I stood on my tiptoes, trying to see above the crowd, and when that didn’t work, I stood on the chair the boys had been using.
“Well, Iwaswatching him. But then someone came in and asked a question about donations… and Maryanne and Olin Kopra were here talking about hamburgers, and Aiden said he was hungry also…” She set her chin. “And I could hardly do two things at once.”
“So he went with the Kopras, then?”
“I… yes. Yes, he did.”
I rolled my eyes, mildly relieved and still wildly annoyed. It amazed me that she’d actually been a teacher at one point. She liked the bureaucracy so much more than the kids.
I stopped myself from screaming at her, barely, by scouring the crowd. Fortunately, Maryanne was a redhead just like Murray, and I spotted her pretty easily just a few booths down.
Without saying another word to Principal Oliver, I jostled my way through the crowd to where I’d spotted Maryanne. But when I found her and Olin eating burgers at one of the high-top tables someone had set up, there was no one with them.
“Hey. Where’s Aiden?” I asked, a little breathless and extremely wet.
“Aiden?” Maryanne blinked at the state of me but quickly shook her head. “He’s not at the Pick-a-Book? He was there when we left. I figured he’d be chatting with Amanda.”
“A-Amanda,” I repeated. “She’s here for real?”
“I think so? I saw someone who looked just like her heading toward the Pick-a-Book when we were in the burger line.” Her eyes narrowed. “Problem?”
“Maybe? I don’t know. Amanda wasn’t supposed to be here at all. I mean, shewas, but then she said she had to work, so Webb wasn’t expecting her. But I thought I saw her earlier, too. And now Aiden’s gone, and I really don’t think he would have randomlystrolledoff all by himself, which means—” I couldn’t make myself complete the sentence.
I didn’t notice I was close to hyperventilating until Maryanne laid her hand on my arm. “Don’t panic. Even if he’s with her, they probably just ran to grab some food,” she said soothingly. “He was complaining that he was starving.”
“Right. You’re right. I’m jumping to conclusions.” I reminded myself that I trusted Amanda. That I had no reason not to. “I’m going to go look—”
God, where should I even begin? He—they?—could be literally anywhere. I ran both hands through my hair.
“We’ll look, too,” Maryanne said. “Come on.”
But ten minutes later, though I would have sworn we’d covered most of the stalls, we hadn’t found him, nor any sign of Amanda. This was starting to feel horribly familiar.
“Where could he be?” I demanded, close to panic.
My brain was spiraling, imagining the worst, because it was literally impossible to stay positive when a child you loved could be in danger. I remembered Webb telling me time and time again that he’d known her better and longer than me, and me encouraging him to trust her, giving her the benefit of every doubt.
