The Game Master of Somerville

Excerpt

The Game Master of Somerville
A.J. Raven © 2024
All Rights Reserved

Chapter One

“Jerry, when are you going to start doing it again?”

I tried not to roll my eyes for the umpteenth time. “Stop making me repeat myself,” I answered, trying to keep my voice calm as we walked through the school corridor to the chemistry lab. “What did you think I would continue doing?”

I already knew the response I was going to get. Ugh!

“I don’t know,” said my tall friend Justin, faking a shrug. “I thought you were going to continue solving cases, you know?”

Now I couldn’t help rolling my eyes at him. Enough was enough! Leave it to Justin to continue annoying me to do something that would get him attention. “Yes, you’re right, Justin!” I made sure he took in the irritated tone of my voice. “There’s a whole pool of unsolved cases out there just waiting for me to dive in!”

“Maaaaybe,” Justin sang. I shot him a look. He answered with a smile, brushing away a strand of his brown hair from his forehead. “Who knows? You can’t be sure unless you try.”

“You do realize it’s only been a couple of weeks since we solved the Devona case, right?”

I tried not to remember an incredibly weak Devona all tied up in a chair. Her blood being drawn by her captor with a syringe. If only I had figured it out a bit sooner. She would have lived—

“I know, I know.” Justin’s voice snaps me back to reality. We were outside the lab.

“Sure you do,” I said sarcastically, pushing my glasses back up my nose. Even though Justin had been annoying me for the past few weeks about solving more cases, in a way, I kind of appreciated his annoyance keeping me busy and stopping me from continuously remembering Devona’s face.

Justin took a deep breath. “Fine, I’ll give it a rest.”

“Thank you.” I faked a smile and mentally started to count down the time until Justin would bring up the same topic again. I entered the lab. The rest of the class was already there. I saw my childhood friend Ashley Burro-way, Ash for short, near one of the working stations. Her brown hair was tied up in a tight knot.

“Justin still wanting you to take on another case, Sherlock?” she asked with a smile, handing me a lab coat as I came closer.

I nodded, taking the coat from her. It took me a second to get accustomed to the smell of the chemicals all around me. I thought I was going to sneeze. But didn’t. Ash put on her safety goggles and opened her textbook. “If you ask me—” She looked straight at me. “—I don’t ever want to go through all of that again.”

“I hear you,” I said. Not knowing what else to say to her, I looked around. Justin was talking to some boys in our class. I knew the only reason Justin wanted me to take on another case was because he missed the attention it gave him. The moment the Somerville High newspaper published my story about solving the Devona case, the entire high school basically went wild. It was the first time the paper was read by the entire student body. The police did a good job when it came to keeping the local media away from me and my friends, but it was tough avoiding the sea of students and the faculty while at school.

Justin took the opportunity to break the ice with his crush, Lucy Broadway. My other friend, Nick Perez, enjoyed the attention, too, but not as much as his best friend, Justin, did. Ash had addressed the attention targeted at her by putting up a defensive air and simply avoided answering any of the questions she was asked about the case at school. The last member of our little group, Kate Williams, who already had an I-don’t-care attitude going on, did just that…just didn’t care. Due to the reputation she had already cemented, the students knew not to approach her unless she directly gave them permission to ask her a question.

The bombardment of questions I faced the day the paper was released was a lot to handle. “How did you figure it out? Did the police help you crack the case? What’s next?”

I answered the questions I could. And fortunately, like everything else in this world, interest dwindled and people started to talk about other stuff after a couple of days. Apparently the mystery-of-the-week plots occurring on the current famous TV shows were better than the real thing. None of us were affected by the dying attention except for Justin. On the fourth day, Justin shared his fear. According to him, Lucy was losing interest in him even though I told him it was just him being presumptuous, and he needed to work on his confidence. And frankly, let’s assume, if Lucy was indeed the kind of girl who only liked Justin because of the attention he was getting from the rest of the school, then she wasn’t the type of person he should be wasting his time with anyway.

Of course, Justin didn’t listen.

“Jerry, where are you?” Ash snapped her fingers in front of my eyes.

“Huh?” I blinked.

“Seriously, Jerry,” she said in a concerned voice. “You’re kind of spacing out more than usual. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” I saw Ash purse her lips. I knew what she was going to say. Ever since the Devona case, Ash had been bringing up therapy. She wanted me to talk to a professional after what Tom did to me. Ugh! That name!

Thankfully, our chemistry teacher, Miss Ophilia Patience, walked into the laboratory and Ash, like the rest of the class, kept quiet. Miss Patience wasn’t the kind of instructor the students wanted to cross. She looked at the class. No one said anything. After giving a quick nod, she started writing on the board behind her.

I looked around the lab again and realized someone was missing. “Where’s Nick?” I asked Ash. Her gaze was on the board, copying every single word Miss Patience was writing. I noticed Justin looking back at us from a few workspaces ahead. He averted his gaze when we made direct eye contact. I wanted to bet a hundred dollars he thought Ash and I were talking about taking up another case without telling him.

It took a few seconds for Ash to respond as she continued scribbling. “Don’t know.”

Weird, I thought. It wasn’t like Nick to miss class without telling us. Even if he did skip class, he and Justin always did it together. I tried not to think about it too much and looked at what Miss Patience was writing on the board.

Surprise! It was boring.

Time dragged on as Miss Patience talked about ways to influence chemical reactions. As far as I could tell, heating different materials up seemed to do the trick for a lot of them. Want to see something change? Try heating up the molecules!

And speaking of things heating up, I guess the same thing was going to come true for me and my friends soon enough. There was no way we could’ve avoided what was coming for us. But at that time, in the chem lab, with Ash busy writing notes next to me, none of us had the faintest idea about the domino effect that had already begun. I do sometimes wonder about what I could’ve done if I had known more back then.

Hidden myself in my house? Not talk to anyone ever? Resigned from my position as a contributor at the school’s newspaper?

But wondering about such possibilities didn’t matter anymore.

What was done was done.

*

After an agonizing hour, which felt like five, the bell rang, and everyone got ready to leave. Miss Patience wrote details about our new homework assignment on the board and the whole class, understandably, groaned. Miss Patience didn’t care one bit. She walked out of the lab without looking at the students.

“Of course, she’d give us a lengthy assignment for the weekend!” said Ash. I couldn’t tell if she was excited or annoyed. Knowing the kind of student Ash was, she would never voice her annoyance regarding a teacher even if it was eating away at her from the inside. So her statement did take me by surprise.

Contrary to Ash, the rest of the class was definitely complaining as usual. Some students even made profane gestures at the board.

Ash and I walked toward Justin. “Where’s Nick?” I asked.

“He didn’t come today,” he answered as we left the lab together. “Nick’s not feeling well,” Justin added after seeing the questioning look on my face. We began walking through the corridor. “It’s nothing serious though.”

“I hope he feels better soon,” said Ash. Taking out her phone, she checked her texts. “Kate wants to meet me in the cafeteria. You want to come with?”

“I have to go meet Alyson,” I answered. Alyson Richard, the daughter of the school’s principal, was in charge of the school’s newspaper. She kind of looked like Halle Berry, but a bit taller, with long black hair. Alyson was the one who had asked me to write something interesting in order to be part of her team. Long story short, the whole thing led me and my friends to Devona and the unexpected series of events that came along with it. Anyway, Alyson wanted me to come by her office today.

“I’ll go,” Justin told Ash. Seeing him be with us at school without Nick by his side looked weird to me.

“We’ll talk later, Jerry.” Ash smiled at me and then walked toward the cafeteria with Justin.

I turned and started to head toward Alyson’s office. I admit that Devona’s case had certainly given me a lot of attention and helped me secure a position at the paper. But there were only so many missing person cases in a small town. Also, solving one such case was enough to last me a lifetime. Now I wanted to write something normal for the newspaper. Taking a deep breath, I opened the door to Alyson’s office.

“Hi, guys,” I said entering the room. Three students were typing away on their laptops. There was the bespectacled, brown-haired Matt, the braided black-haired Sophia, and the nervously-chews-on-the-end-of-a-pencil, red-haired Melissa. All three were my seniors.

“Hi, Jerry,” they all said in unison, not averting their attention from the tasks they were busy doing. I was used to such a greeting. They were good people, but publishing a monthly physical newspaper, with weekly, and even daily, online updates, was not an easy job. There were two more boys on the team, but they mostly did their work in the computer lab. They managed the backend stuff, making sure everything ran smoothly.

“I guess Alyson’s not here,” I whispered, having noticed her empty workspace. Before I could sit on a chair, the door opened and Alyson walked in, holding a bunch of papers. “Oh! Jerry!” she exclaimed. “You’re here. Good. Follow me.”

Follow you where? The space isn’t that big.

She placed the pile of papers on her desk and sat. I took the seat in front of her, a questioning look on my face. “So, you wanted to see me?”

“Yes. I have a couple of things for you,” she said while separating the pile of papers into two stacks. I wasn’t sure what basis she was separating them on. From a quick glance, most of them looked like research articles.

“There’s a girl I want you to meet. Her name is Amy Diaz.” Alyson was still dividing the pile. “She showed interest in taking pictures for the paper.”

Amy Diaz? The name sounded familiar. I simply nodded at Alyson, not sure what she really wanted me to do.

“I asked her to come too,” Alyson added. She stopped stacking the papers and looked at me. “I want both of you to cover the school’s basketball team before the championship starts. Get some interviews, talk to the cheerleaders, you know, all that stuff.”

Finally. Something normal for me to do!

“You do know about basketball, right?” she asked.

That was a weird question to ask. “I know the basics of it,” I answered with a smile. As in you have to throw the ball through the basket kind of basic.

“That works,” she smiled back. After pausing for a second, she looked right at me again. Her smile widened. “Now, the other thing I want you to do for me.”

I noticed the change in her expression. She was excited. But she also appeared a bit hesitant about something. “You read the paper last week?” she asked, opening the top drawer of her desk.

“No,” I answered, shaking my head. I didn’t read newspapers nor did I have Google notifications turned on about what was happening in Somerville. If something big happened, it was bound to reach my ears sooner or later. Pulling out a newspaper from the drawer, Alyson placed it on the desk in front of me.

Okay?

I picked it up and read the headline:

“Pritchett, James (31), Murderer Escapes from Prison!”

My mind began to race. Oh, no! She better not!

“I mean, you already have experience with these kinds of things.” Alyson continued to smile.

What’s that supposed to mean?

“It won’t be anything like the Devona case, of course,” said Alyson, trying to read the expression on my face. Even I wasn’t sure what my face was conveying during that particular moment. She continued. “I just need you to do a bit of research on him. Create an interesting article for our readers. Give your own two cents about the whole thing.”

I let out a nervous laugh. “For a moment there, I thought you were going to ask me to find this Pritchett guy.”

Alyson laughed. “Of course, not. I’ll leave that to the police.”

Uh-huh.

The office door opened, and I turned my attention to the girl walking in, a camera hanging around her neck. The office staff continued typing away. “That’s Amy,” Alyson told me, signaling the new arrival to walk toward us. I recognized Amy. She was in my year but mostly took subjects related to media and journalism.

“Oh! You’re the guy who cracked the Devona case,” she said. “I’m Amy,” she added, holding out her hand.

“Yup. That’s me. Jerry,” I said. I smiled at her as we shook hands. She had a firm grip.

Amy sat next to me. “Thanks for this opportunity,” she told Alyson.

“No worries,” said Alyson. “I saw your portfolio. You’ve got skills as a photographer.”

Amy blushed. “Thanks.”

“Well, if you both don’t have any questions, I’ll leave you guys to do your thing,” said Alyson. Amy and I told Alyson we would send her the basketball-related content she wanted ASAP.

Amy tapped her camera as I closed the door behind me. “In case you don’t know, Alyson wants weekly pics for the digital edition and a whole bunch of pics for the physical one by the end of this month. So, let’s get to work.”

“I guess so,” I answered. Amy was an inch shorter than my five-foot-seven-inch height. Her black hair was tied into a long ponytail, and her brown eyes were wondering if I had anything else to say. I didn’t.

“I think we should start by going to the gym and see if there are any cheerleaders around. You can ask them about their choreo, and I’ll capture some shots. Sound good?”

“Sounds good,” I said. I felt my phone vibrate as we walked toward the basketball court. Taking it out of my pocket, I noticed it was a text from Ash.

“Where are you?”

“Going to the gym for some paper stuff. See you soon.”

After sending my reply, I pretended to read something on my cell. I mean, yay for smartphones! They were the perfect little devices to use while trying not to be weird about the awkward silence that existed between Amy and I as I followed her.

“Okay. Let’s do this,” said Amy. She sounded excited. Amy opened the doors to the gym and saw the basketball court, and my heart skipped a beat as I finally realized the breadth of what I had walked into.

Honey-brown-haired Diana Simmons and her always-energetic cheerleading squad were practicing in the middle of the floor.

Damn it! I scolded myself for agreeing to my current assignment. Trying to keep him out of my mind ever since solving the Devona case must have worked because my mind had clearly failed to link the word “basketball” to him and yes, by association, to Diana. Of course, she was going to be there.

“Ahem!” Amy faking a cough made me come back to my senses. “Aren’t you supposed to ask them questions?”

“I sure am,” I answered, pushing my glasses up. I had no choice but to look at Diana. She was telling one of her cheerleaders to not move her arms too much during the routine.

What should I ask her?

About her cheerleading routine. Duh, said the voice in my head.

I tried not to think about the conversation she and I had in the basketball court recently. I’m not proud of the way I came at her. I was dealing with certain emotions back then because of him. And I felt bad about the entire thing. I had decided to never talk to Diana like that again.

Fingers crossed.

Taking a deep breath, I walked toward the cheerleaders. Amy followed.

“Hi, Jerry!” Diana greeted me with a smile. “Alyson told me you’d pop by.” Her gaze took in the camera around Amy’s neck. “Oh! You’ll also be taking pics?”

I noticed the rest of the squad trying to look more presentable. It wasn’t as if they needed to do that. They all looked perfect. “Yes, just a couple,” I answered. “I guess Alyson told you I’ll be asking you some questions, right?”

“She sure did,” Diana answered as I opened my notepad. “Oh, I feel like a celebrity! Getting interviewed by the Jerry Mathews.”

I forced a smile.

I had never stood this close to Diana before. I couldn’t help but analyze her features. She definitely had one of the best smiles, in my opinion.

The same smile Kevin must’ve fallen for.

Stop it! You have work to do! Focus!

“Uh! You must’ve seen the basketball team practice here, right?” I directed my attention to my notepad. Ash had suggested I should use my smartphone to record my interviews. It’s good I didn’t follow her advice during that moment, otherwise I would have had to keep looking at Diana’s face. “Would you like to share your thoughts about the team this year?”

I should have prepared questions on my way here.

“Oh! They’re quite determined to win!” answered Diana. “The boys have been working hard. I can’t wait for our team to win!”

Her squad chattered in agreement.

“That’s good to know.” I managed a smile.

“Uh! Jerry, do you mind if we continue practicing during this?” asked Diana. “Some of the girls have to go to class soon.”

“Sure, no problem.”

“It will make for some good shots,” said Amy, camera ready in hand.

“Okay, everyone! Back to work!” Diana addressed her squad. “Formation three, please!”

“So, where was I?” Diana turned to look at me while her squad got ready to perform whatever formation three was. “Oh! Yes, the team! Their practice sessions have been very good. Coach Willow is doing a great job with them.” Turning back to look at her squad now, she continued, “Some of our new players are also showing a lot of promise.”

Good to hear. I knew the two new players joining the team this year. Justin and Nick were ready to prove themselves as basketball players. They did mention trying out a while back, but I didn’t know if they actually made the cut. They hadn’t brought it up after that. It could be because they thought I wouldn’t be interested in knowing. You would think Lucy would give Justin more attention after he decided to try out for the basketball team. But I guess she wanted a “bad boy” who lived dangerously and helped with solving cases.

“Kevin is also playing this year.”

Diana’s voice broke my stream of thought.

“Huh?”

I could hear Amy clicking away on her camera a few feet away from me as the squad talked to one of the girls about what she should do when they threw her in the air again. Or something to that effect. I wasn’t really paying attention.

“He didn’t tell you?” Diana asked. Her gaze didn’t leave her squad. I didn’t answer. “He tried out like two weeks ago. He’s really good.”

Of course, he’s good. Kevin had always liked basketball. He was also very good at soccer. But he had never played for any school team. Until now. Maybe he wanted to do something different before he graduated?

“With all the players we have, I can clearly see the trophy in our hands,” said Diana. She sure sounded confident. “Yes, that’s it!” she cheered as one of the girls did a flawless turn midair. “Is there anything else you want to ask me? Do you want some info about the strategies the team will use? I mean, you can also just talk to Kevin whenever you want.”

“Yeah. I guess I can do that.” Closing my notepad, I faked a smile. “I’ll let you know if I need anything else.”

“You do that.” Diana smiled at me.

“Thanks for your time,” said Amy.

“No big.”

Waving goodbye, Amy and I walked away from the cheerleaders.

“You only asked her like one or two questions,” said Amy as we made our way through the corridor and away from the gym.

“Hmm,” I answered. Tell me something I don’t know.

“I’m not telling you how to do your job, dude,” she said as we continued walking. “I’m just saying it could have gone a lot better.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll write up something good,” I said. Somehow. “What about you? You got the pics you wanted?”

Giving her camera a tap, Amy nodded. “I’ll send some of them to the paper today.”

“Okay. Anyway, this is me,” I said stopping outside the cafeteria. Ash and the rest of the gang were supposed to be inside.

“Yeah. See ya!” Amy waved and then walked away.

I let out a sigh. She was right. I should’ve asked Diana more questions. I made the entire thing about the basketball team even though I was interviewing the freaking captain for the cheerleading squad. Kevin was still messing with my mind. I thought I was over him when he began ignoring me after we kissed. Heck! I even wrote a song about it for Jason’s band. He didn’t even ask how I was doing after the Devona case. I nearly died and still there was nothing from him. Crickets. That alone should have kicked him out of my system. Ugh! I felt frustrated with myself.

What’s done is done. I took a deep breath. Stop thinking about him.

Walking into the cafeteria, I saw my friends sitting at a table. I was surprised to see Nick there.

“How did it go?” asked Ash as I sat between her and Nick.

“It went well,” I said taking one of her fries. “I interviewed Diana and asked some questions about the basketball team.”

“So, you are happy doing sport write-ups?” asked Justin. I knew where he was going with this. I needed to change the topic and fast.

“Why weren’t you in class today?” I asked Nick. His curly brown hair looked messier than usual.

“I had something to take care of, and I also wasn’t feeling well,” he answered unenthusiastically and returned to eating his sandwich.

Well, that didn’t work. Should I ask him about something else?

I could feel Justin still staring at me from across the table. Kate was busy doing something on her phone, totally ignoring the conversation and rolling a strand of her blonde hair around her fingertip. I turned to Ash and she had one of her familiar smiles on her face. The smile which was a clear sign she was waiting for me to answer Justin’s question.

My so-called friends were my biggest enemies, depending on the situation.

Having no other choice, I looked at Justin. “What do you want me to say?” I asked him. “That no, I don’t want to write about sports. That I want to get on another case the police can’t crack? That I’m dying to put my life in danger again?”

Justin looked taken aback from my tone.

Good!

“It’s not as if you haven’t found a case already,” said Kate before Justin could answer. We all looked at her. “Hmm. Are you going to tell them, or should I?” Kate directed the question at me, still not looking away from her phone screen as she typed away.

Surely, she couldn’t know about that! But, then again, knowing Kate it wouldn’t be a surprise if she had somehow found out. She kind of had eyes and ears everywhere. Heaven knows the amount of information she was capable of gathering through her online and offline social circles. Justin, Nick, and Ash looked at me. Waiting.

A second passed.

Then another.

The three leaned in, me being the target of their focused stares.

I had no choice but to say it.

“Alyson told me about it this morning,” I addressed the group at large. “There’s this man. I think he’s called James Pritchett or something. I didn’t read the whole thing she showed me, but I think he’s on the run after escaping prison.”

“What was he in for?” asked Justin. He was clearly excited about the whole thing.

“Murder,” I answered. What else?

“And Alyson wants you to catch him, right?”

“No, Justin,” I answered, trying my best to not sound annoyed. “She wants me to do some research on him and write something interesting for the paper. That’s it!”

“But why bother wasting all that time researching when you aren’t even going to try and catch the guy?”

“Give it a rest, Justin,” said Ash before I could speak. She gave him a stern look. I was surprised by what she said to him. Just a moment ago she was all about me answering his question about possibly taking on another mystery. Maybe she hadn’t realized how serious Justin was actually being about it.

“I’m just saying,” said Justin, holding up his arms to look nonconfrontational.

I waited for Nick to side with Justin and tell me to go find James Pritchett. But, oddly enough, he remained silent. There was definitely something wrong with Nick. He didn’t show up for chemistry class, and now he wasn’t participating in any of the conversations. The Nick I was accustomed to would have tried to tell us a bunch of jokes by now. I wanted to ask him what was wrong but decided against it. I didn’t want to come across as too pushy right now.

Thankfully, Ash changed the subject. She started to talk about basketball with Justin. It turned out to be one of the best topics to bring up if you wanted to distract him. I continued eating my lunch, trying to act interested in Justin’s enthusiasm as he told us about the tryouts and how well he had performed. Nick chimed in once or twice. But he wasn’t being his enthusiastic self.

It’s only some research, I told myself as my mind went back to thinking about James Pritchett. It’s only some research.

Of course, it ended up being more than that.