He hung his head, stared at the helmet clenched to his chest,

as if he wanted to say something, but didn't. I had that crumbling feeling again and for a minute I wished it was me he was

holding.

"Whatever." I ran home, sprinted up the stoop. The baseball bat was propped against my front door.

18.

We all fall down. The tower will point the way.

It's 68 ft. higher than three times a side of its square base. If the sum of these two is 1,380, at day's end you'll know where to find me.

I was on the chartered bus on the way to our class trip to Kings Dominion. I leaned against the bathroom sink for balance while the narrow walls rocked and rolled. The enclosed space smelled like a sewer, and the fumes weren't helping my motion sickness. I copied the numbers and tested a few equations on my palm.

Height = (3x + 68)

(3x + 68) + x = (4x + 68)

(4x + 68) = 1380

x = 328

Height of tower = 1052 ft.

Something didn't add up. These numbers were as meaningless as the one on Marcia's arm. I was tired-exhausted after the late night with Reece and three hours of fitful sleep-but there was no possible way I'd screwed up the calculation this badly. I checked the equations. Cross-checked them against the numbers in the ad.

The math was infallible, but the solution was impossible. A tower more than one thousand feet high didn't exist in the state of Virginia, or anywhere in Washington, DC, for that matter. The closest tower over a thousand feet was in fucking France.

I crumpled the page. Let it go, I'd told myself. The answer to this whole thing was so simple. Just leave the newspaper in the bathroom and walk away.

I smoothed it flat. Ran the numbers again.

Someone banged and jiggled the door handle. I tore out the crinkled ad and shoved it in my back pocket, folding away the rest of the Missed Connections for later.

Back in the seat next to Jeremy, I sniffed my sleeve, hoping I didn't smell like a hot bus bathroom.

"You feeling okay?" he asked.

"Just a little queasy." It wasn't a lie.

"What's all over your hand?" Jeremy scrunched up his face and reached for me. I pulled away.

"It's just a test problem I'm working on."

"I wasn't talking about the numbers."

He was talking about the other ink-the newsprint smudges all over my fingers.

"Were you reading the personals in there?" His voice rose in disbelief.

"No," I said defensively.

"Seriously? You were looking for him in a bus bathroom?" He looked disgusted. "That's completely unhealthy."

"If it'll make you feel better, I'll wash my hands when we get there," I said, trying for levity.

Jeremy shook his head. "It's been five years, Leigh. Are you ever going to just let it go?"

"I can't. What if he comes back?"

"He's not coming back, and you're wasting your life waiting for him. The guy's not worth it." He sounded like Mona. If I closed my eyes and touched him, he'd probably taste just like her. I scooted closer to the window and crossed my arms over my hands.

"Just because your dad's an asshole, doesn't mean everyone else's is too."

"No, yours is a deadbeat. He left you."

"I'm sure he had his reasons."

"Yeah, like two hundred forty-seven thousand of them," he muttered.

My head snapped up. "What did you say?"