Fair Coin Read Online Free PDF Page A

be the same without you. Third time's the charm, right?”
    “Hey,” Ephraim said to Michael. “Leave him alone.” Some habits were hard to break. He wasn't afraid of Michael, but he knew he couldn't beat him, either. His protests were just for show. But Nathan would never forgive him if he didn't even try to defend him.
    “You wanna be next? There's plenty to go around.” Michael flashed him a feral grin.
    “Actually, some people are waiting for me outside…” Ephraim said.
    “I've got this, Ephraim,” Nathan said.
    “I can't leave you.”
    “I can't leave you,” Michael mocked.
    “Go on,” Nathan said. “You don't want to miss that ride. Tell Madeline I said I hope she gets better soon.”
    “Okay. Are you sure? Call me later if…if you can still dial,” Ephraim said.
    “That's right, run!” Michael said.
    Ephraim pushed the double doors open and stepped outside. Far from the fresh air of freedom, he sucked in the hot summer air and immediately began to sweat.
    Ephraim scanned the parking lot, but there was no sign of Mrs. Morales's beat-up Volkswagen. Or the twins. Or Jena.
    Or the school buses.
    He checked his pockets, but aside from the quarter, he was broke; he'd already used the last of his mom's money to catch a bus to school from the hospital that morning. It was a long way back on foot.
    There were a handful of cars in the lot, including Michael's black BMW sports car and Nathan's secondhand blue Chevy. Maybe he should wait for Nathan to drive him after all; his friend might need a trip to the hospital anyway after being tenderized by Michael's meat hands. Then again, Ephraim didn't want to miss visiting hours, so it would probably be faster to walk—unless he went inside to extricate Nathan from Michael sooner, in which case Ephraim risked an injury of his own. Better to go with the lesser of two evils.
    Ephraim started walking.

 
    Ephraim's mother wasn't in her hospital room. Her belongings were gone, too, along with the plastic bag containing the wallet, keys, and broken watch from his unfortunate look-alike. He stood frozen in panic, staring at the carefully made bed. Had they moved her to the psych ward after talking to her?
    Ephraim found Mrs. Morales at the nurses’ station.
    “Mrs. Morales! Sorry about before, I got sidetracked on my way out of school. Um. Do you know where my mother is?”
    She looked up from her seat behind the counter. “Excuse me?”
    “She was in room 302 this morning.”
    She glanced down at a clipboard. “There's no one assigned to that room. What's her name?”
    Ephraim frowned. “Madeline Scott. Don't you remember me? Mary and Shelley just offered me a ride here after school.”
    “You know my daughters?” She sounded both surprised and disapproving.
    “I'm Ephraim.” He spoke slowly. “I was here last night in the ICU waiting room. You came to tell me how she was doing…”
    “I was on shift last night, but I don't remember seeing you.”
    He raised his voice. “We had a whole conversation.”
    “Okay, calm down, sweetie. I'm sure I'd remember you and your mother.”
    “I would think so.” Ephraim wondered if Mrs. Morales had a twin sister who also worked at the hospital. Didn't that kind of thing run in families? But her nametag said Julia Morales, definitely the same woman he'd spoken to before.
    He took a deep breath. “Listen, could you just check? I know she's here. Maybe she was moved to…another room.” She could be in a mental hospital by now if she had kept going on about him being dead.
    Mrs. Morales slid a black keyboard toward her and typed, her fingers pecking the keys one by one delicately, with inch-long nails painted a bright green.
    “I'm sorry, she was never here,” she said. “Are you sure you have the right hospital? People make that mistake all the—”
    “The computer must be wrong. An ambulance brought her in last night.”
    “There would be some record in the system,” she said. “What was she admitted