2.

"Alright Class, settle down. Settle down! You know the drill. That was the bell." Hayes watched Mr. Simmons pace back and forth in front of the classroom. "Happy Friday everyone! First things, first, phones in your backpack and backpacks in the front of the room please. It's time to get this party started!" Cue the jazz hands. That was his normal behavior, but this time he held in his hand the test papers. They shimmered with the gesture.

Having dropped her bag in the front when she walked into the classroom, Hayes was ready to start.

"Good luck." Margot whispered from where she sat at the desk beside Hayes.

Hayes turned her head to the side and shot her a grin and pounded Margot's outstretched fist. "May the odds be ever in our favor." It has been their pre-test ritual since they first became friends in elementary school. Margot was her only friend.

Margot winked before turning forward in her seat. Mr. Simmons began handing out the test papers.

Hayes took the papers from the classmate in front of her, muttering a thank you. She took the top sheet before passing along the rest to the person sat behind her.

"Does everyone have a test?" Mr. Simmons looked around the room. Seeing no complaints, he smiled. "You may begin."

Deep breath in and out. Let's do this.

———

Now she knew why Glen had gotten aggravated last night. Hayes couldn't focus on anything but the tapping of the pencil. She glared at the back of the head of the kid sitting in front of her. Tap. Tap. Tap. Stupid Brendon. If she was impulsive, she would totally kick the back of his chair. But alas, impulsivity was not in her nature so she settled with the glare. A total killer, she was.

Hayes let out a little sigh and looked back at her test. Focus Hayes. She was so close to being done. The test wasn't so hard and she had been able to confidently fly through it.

Flipping to the last page of the test, she expertly filled in the scantron bubbles with no hesitation. She double checked all her answers before letting herself relax. If she had to guess, out of 50 questions, 2 or 3 questions max wrong. Glen would just have to live with that.

She handed her test in to Mr. Simmons and sat back down. With 10 minutes left until lunch time, she rested her head on her arms thinking about the food she was about to consume. She had skipped breakfast that morning only managing to eat a browning banana because her stomach was a bundle of nerves and she was suffering the consequences now.

-------

"Pencils down! Turn in your test on your way out if you haven't done so yet." Mr. Simmons stood up at his desk. "And I hope you all have a good weekend. See you on Monday."

Hayes grabbed her backpack and walked out into the hallway waiting for Margot to catch up with her. They sat together in the cafeteria along with Glen and his buddies. The girls didn't really mingle with the boys, but Glen made it obvious that Hayes was a package deal and so his friends didn't mind the company. Plus, she'd been tagging along to all their playdates and hangouts since Glen met them that she was basically one of the guys.

"Woah, did you see this?" Hayes glanced at Margot to see her looking at her phone. Unlike Hayes, Margot always had her phone and was probably too attached to it.

"See what?"

"There was a dead body found this morning. But they haven't released the name yet." Margot scrolled down reading the news, "That's sad."

Hayes tightened her grip on her backpack straps as they followed the crowd to the cafeteria. She thought about the news report from this morning that her grandfather was watching. She really wished she had heard the report.

"Sad but also so exciting! Oh my gosh." Margot caught the open door, allowing Hayes to walk in first.

"Exciting?" Hayes could think of a million other words to describe this and exciting was not one of them.

"Yeah! I mean, like, nothing ever happens in Live Oak. This is huge!"

"If you say so." Hayes took her seat at the table and pulled out her sad excuse for a lunch, a ziplocked bag of Apple Jacks.

"What's up Sis?" Glen slid onto the bench shoving Hayes playfully, his friends joining them at the table. "Hey Margot."

Margot waved, mouth already full of food. Mint Oreos, to be precise. The girl was addicted to them.

"How'd your test go?" Glen asked Hayes, pulling out a similar bag of cereal.

"Fine." Hayes shrugged despondently. Right now all she could think about was food. She wished she had some chicken tenders right about now.

"Here you go." A chocolate cookie dangled in front of her face. She quickly snatched it, sending a grateful smile to Lewis, Glen's best friend.

"You rock, Lewis." His mom always made the best cookies.

"Oooookay," Glen watched her as she ate the cookie, sensing something was off but couldn't tell what it was. "you gucci?"

"Peachy."

"You sure?"

"Yes." She pushed Glen's shoulder trying to create some personal space. "Now move over."

He searched her face for any signs of distress before nodding, dropping the subject. He'd wait until they got home to figure it out. He scooted back over giving some space between them.

"Yo, Glen, check this out!" He let his attention be swept away by his friends.

———

"Thanks Mr. William," Hayes chirped, stepping off the bus.

"You're very welcome Miss Hayes, you have yourself a good weekend!" Mr. William was the city bus driver for their route home from school. "You too, Mr. Glen."

"Yes, sir. See you Monday." Glen hopped off the bus behind Hayes easily catching up to her for their 15 minute walk home. "Hey," He knocked into her with his backpack.

The impact forced her to stumble a couple steps away from him. "you're such a brute."

"What's running through your head?" Glen questioned, "you've been off since lunch."

"Nothing," She muttered

"It's obviously not nothing because nothing is something so just tell me what that something is."

"Huh?"

"Hayes," he sighed, grabbing her backpack strap to make her stop walking. She couldn't avoid him forever.

"What?" Hayes put her hands on her hips.

"Talk to me, Hay Hay."

"Don't call me that." Hayes scowled at the stupid nickname. "Glennard."

"That's not my name." He rolled his eyes. "Come on, why can't you just tell me?"

"Because."

"Because why?"

"Because it's driving you crazy not knowing." She mocked him with a grin.

He punched her arm, unamused.

"Because I'm not thinking anything!" She flung her hands into the air. "I'm not thinking about anything. I just have this stupid feeling in my stomach that something is going on and I don't know why and I don't know what. Okay? Happy now?"

Glen was startled by her outburst.

At his silence, Hayes huffed and started walking again. The sound of feet hitting the pavement trailed after her as Glen jogged to catch up to her again.

"Me too." Hayes glanced at Glen waiting for him to elaborate. "I can't shake this feeling that something happened." Like Margot, Glen's buddies had obsessed over the dead body during lunch. Margot wasn't kidding when she said it was the biggest news their hometown had seen in a while.

"Is it about the dead body?"

"Yeah," he muttered.

"What do you think it means?"

"I dunno." He did know. He had major fears about what it meant.

They finally reached the entrance of their neighborhood. Seizing the much needed distraction, he broke into a sprint. "Last one home does dishes!" Glen yelled back to her.

"You do this every time!" Hayes complained, chasing after him. Their backpacks smacked against their backs as they ran.

"Keep up, slow poke!" Glen had to admit that Hayes was getting faster. She was already extremely fast for a tiny girl, but his long legs were his advantage. He figured one of these days she'd actually beat him. But until then, he'd continue to gloat as the winner. "Victory is mine!" Glen raised his fisted hands up in victory as he crossed the imaginary line onto their driveway.

"Loser." Hayes pushed him causing him to stumble a couple steps like he did to her.

His grin slowly dropped, stopping in the middle of the driveway. "That's weird."

"What's weird?" she took a look around the yard, not seeing anything strange.

"The Bear's car isn't here."

"Maybe he's food shopping." Hayes shrugged, walking past Glen to the front door. She jingled the door knob, hinting at Glen to hurry up. She didn't have her own house key.

"Yeah, maybe." Glen wasn't as easily persuaded. One thing he knew was that their grandfather stuck to his routine religiously. He would flip his lid if there was a unforeseen change to his day. So it was very weird that his car wasn't currently parked in the driveway, right where Glen was standing now.

Hayes took the key out of his hand, unlocking the door for them before letting herself in, leaving the door wide open for Glen to follow. She took the first turn off the hallway into the small kitchen, hoping to find some tasty food. To her pleasant surprise, the fridge was full. Meaning that their grandfather had already been food shopping. Meaning that their grandfather had broken routine and they had no idea where he was.

"Uh, Glen," trying her luck, she closed the fridge and opened the pantry instead, finding it also full with snacks again. Having spotted popcorn, she was momentarily distracted. She stood on her tippy toes trying to reach the box. "Glen!" she called out again.

"What?" he stuck his head out from their bedroom, in the middle of changing out of his school uniform.

She shook the popcorn box in his line of vision.

"Well," Glen's eyes narrowed in on the box, "Guess he's not food shopping."

"Guess not. Want some popcorn?" she already had the box open and was removing the plastic wrapping. Nothing was going to stop her from eating this bag of popcorn.

"Yeah sure." he replied, His mind became filled with possible scenarios on where their grandfather could be. It certainly wasn't helping the pit he felt in his stomach. The sound of the television playing caused him to peek back out of room. "Hey, homework first."

"But it's Friday, and the Bear isn't home." Hayes complained, but did as she was told anyways, turning the television off.

"You do know he could walk in at any moment. And then what? You gonna cry when he starts yelling at you? You know his rules." Glen questioned as he finished changing into some comfortable clothes.

"That's mean," Hayes frowned though she couldn't dispute what he said. She didn't like when the Bear yelled at them, especially when the yelling turned to something more physical.

"Sorry. Come on, the quicker you do your homework, the quicker we can go to Patrick's." He swiftly changed the topic.

"For some pizza," Hayes sang, sliding along the floor in her socks to their bedroom. She chucked her shoes carelessly into the room to put away later. Walking around in socks silenced her footsteps, a tidbit she picked up to not wake up the Bear. The microwave beeped, indicating it was done. The smell of the freshly popped popcorn filled the air.

"Yeah, for some pizza." Glen took over the popcorn operation, hissing as he burned his thumb while pouring the bag into two bowls.

She joined Glen at the kitchen table, dropping her backpack on the table and swapping it for one of the bowls of popcorn in Glen's hands.

"First one to finish their homework gets an extra mozzarella stick." Food was a good motivator to getting Hayes to do homework on a Friday. Well, food that Hayes liked, which wasn't much options. Some friendly competition, on the other hand, was what motivated Glen, in addition to food, of course.

"You're on." Hayes tossed some popcorn into her mouth before settling down. They grinned at each other before focusing on their work.

--------

Several loud knocks on the front door pulled the kids' attention from their books. Neither kid said anything nor made a move to answer the door. Nobody ever knocked on their door unless they wanted to fear the wrath of the Bear. Nor did they invite anyone over to their home, so they had no idea who would be knocking on their door.

Knuckles rapped against the door again, interrupting the kids' panicked staring contest.

"Live Oak Police!" More knocking. "Open up!"

Hayes was petrified, glancing from the door and back to Glen again looking to her brother for guidance.

"Vincent Merling, Police!"

"Glen," Hayes whimpered. He blinked, the sound of Hayes' distress bringing him back to focus.

"Stay here." Glen slowly stood up from his chair where he'd been sitting for the past hour. He quietly approached the front door. He could see two police cars with flashing lights in the street from the kitchen window along with shadows of people standing outside. He peeked thru the peep hole to see a man standing there. He could hear them talking to someone before turning to knock on the door once more.

He took a breath in and out, the pit in his stomach growing. With no other choice, he unlocked the door and pulled it open. Staring back at him were two police officers, guns drawn by their side.

Glen froze, wide-eyed. He'd never been in this position before. He didn't know what to do.

At the sight of the boy, the officers put their guns in their holster. They were not aware that children lived at the house.

"Hey Bud, I'm Officer Manning, this is Officer Taylor. Are you home alone?" Officer Manning took lead.

"No."

"Is Vincent Merling here?"

"No." His grip tightened on the door. What did his grandfather do?

"What's your name?"

"Glen."

"Glen, buddy, can we come inside?"

"Um, sure okay. What, what happened?" He moved to the side allowing the two officers to walk by. Without them in the way, he was able to see several more people loitering in their yard and walking around their house.

"Glen?" Unable to help herself, Hayes peered from behind the kitchen wall, catching the attention of the two officers.

Hi Sweetie, what's your name?" Officer Taylor asked while Officer Manning cleared the house.

Hayes kept quiet, watching Officer Manning check the bedrooms before he returned to the group in the hallway.

"House is clear. He's not here" He muttered to his partner.

Nodding, she smiled at the kids, wanting to appear friendly. "Come on, let's go sit on the couch and talk." She led them into the family room, letting Glen and Hayes sit on the couch. As they sat, more officers entered the home, doing searches of the rooms.

"Are we in trouble?" Glen asked. Hayes sat by his side wringing her hands.

"No, not at all." Officer Taylor replied. "We're just looking for Vincent Merling. Do you know him?"

"Sure." Glen answered. "Why are you looking for him? Is he in trouble? Did something happen?"

"We just need to ask him some questions." Officer Manning took over. "How do you know him, Glen?"

Glen debated on if he should answer or not, not knowing what kind of trouble he was in. He eventually sighed, deciding to answer. As he went to open his mouth, another person came running into the house. But this time, he knew the man, Sergeant Stephen Rayon.

"Glen, Hayes. You guys okay?" He spotted them on the couch, immediately coming over to them. "Manning, Taylor." He acknowledged the officers before turning his attention back to the kids.

"Stephen," Glen breathed out. He had never been happier to see the man.

"I'm here, bud." he patted Glen's knee, taking a seat next to him.

"What is happening? Why are they asking about the Bear? What did he do?" Glen rushed out question after question.

"Easy, slow down." Sergeant Rayon looked at the officers. "If Vincent's not here, then he may be in the wind. He never breaks routine. I got the kids from here."

"Yes sir." The officers nodded, and backed off, giving him some space.

"Stephen?" Glen looked to him for answers. "Why are they looking for our grandfather?"

"They just want to ask him some questions."

"What kind of questions? For what? What did he do?"

"Just some questions." He couldn't tell them anymore than that.

"Is it about the dead body?" Hayes finally spoke up. This is what she had been worried about the whole time. It was the feeling she couldn't shake since Margot told her at lunch.

Stephen looked at her and Glen, seeing the fear in their eyes, the uncertainty. But he couldn't lie to them.

"Yes," he responded, "Yes, it is."