Double Digit by Annabel Monaghan

now I hated her again.
    We didn’t stop to eat until after nine p.m. at an old diner outside of Morgantown, West Virginia. At first glance it looked like one of those diners that was built inside an abandoned train car. But upon closer examination, I could see that it was really an old Greyhound bus remodeled to look like an old train. All this deception was getting to me.
    We sat down and ordered. John got a cheeseburger, I got a Mexican omelet, Danny got the Lumberjack Special, and Spencer got a scoop of chicken salad. On a bed of lettuce but not iceberg. Did they have a darker lettuce, maybe arugula they could use? Dressing? Of course not.
    “What, are you like a rabbit?” Danny asked.
    “Rabbits don’t eat chicken,” Spencer explained.
    “Right. You know who can eat chicken? Digit! Dude, have you ever seen her attack a rotisserie chicken? It’s like something from the Nature Channel!”
    John choked on a bit of water, laughing. “Yeah, I’ve seen it. But what about a chili cheeseburger? It’s like a week’s worth of food, and she can put it away in three bites.”
    Spencer’s eyebrows were high. Mortified for me, it seemed. What’s wrong with having an appetite? “Yes, I eat. Sue me. I’m going to the bathroom.”
    John snapped back to attention and stood up, wiping his mouth with his napkin. “Hey, I’ll take you.”
    Spencer nudged him. “God, John, she’ll be fine. They haven’t followed us; they have no clue where we are. It’s a diner. She’ll be fine.” And then John took the most awkward pause. Looking back and forth between us, choosing, and then finally sitting down and nodding.
    I stood there for a moment not knowing what to do. Was I disappointed that he wasn’t going to follow me to the bathroom? Or because she made light of my predicament and he agreed with her?
    I walked down past the bar to the ladies’ room sign that was really a personalized license plate from Hawaii: LADEEZ . A train, a bus, and now a Hawaiian car? This place could make me nuts. I pushed in the door to the restroom and had all of the air knocked out of me. It was a quick jolt to my gut as a strong arm pulled me inside and then a firm handkerchief to the mouth with the other arm. I could feel the strength of my assailant and knew I was outmatched by a factor of six.
    “Shhh. No one hears you. Clear?” I knew the voice, but how was that possible? “Don’t move. We need to talk.” His hands released from my gut and my mouth, and he spun me around.
    “Mr. Bennett? Jeez, you hurt me.” I rubbed my belly where I’d just had the Heimlich maneuver to end all Heimlich maneuvers. Then I threw my arms around him. “Oh my God, John’s going to be so glad we found you! I did something really stupid, which of course you know about, and I’m in so much trouble: They want to arrest me for felony espionage, plus the nuts are after me again and they attacked me but they don’t want to kill me—they want to keep me because I’m some sort of national threat, and I got an interview for the job I really want but it’s tomorrow and we are so far away from school that it’s never going to happen . . .”
    “Can you calm down? I don’t have a lot of time, but I have a lot to say, and John can’t see me.”
    “Okay.” I took a deep breath and looked up at him. I swear he’s like God: big and strong and just magically there reading your mind whenever you need him to be.
    “I’ve been tracking you since last summer.”
    My heart raced in ten directions.
Tracking me? Like when? Like when I was alone with John? Like
then?
Oh my God.
    The mind reader’s smirk creeped up. “No, not like that. I mean that I’ve just kept tabs on you, through your computer activity. I know it’s a bit of an invasion of your privacy, but I didn’t know any other way to make sure that you were okay. At first I thought I could just have John do it, but he accused me of being ‘unnaturally interested’ in your relationship. And then