The Graduation by Christopher Pike

her back didn’t surprise her. She’d heard the motorcycle approaching from far off.
    “So she really is dead,” Clark said.
    Polly turned. Clark was all in black. She couldn’t remember when she had last seen him in the sunlight. It could have been the day they had met. It didn’t make much difference, the time of day; he brought the night with him. He was the only guy she knew who stood in his own shadow. She had not seen him since the night her aunt had died.
    “Hi,” she said.
    “Hello.”
    “Did you think I lied to you about her?” she asked.
    “You lie to me all the time.”
    She turned back to the tombstone, annoyed. Alice Ann McCoy. Polly could have sworn Ann was her own middle name. “Go away.”
    “You’re not happy to see me?”
    “No,” Polly said.
    “Then why did you call?”
    “I didn’t call.”
    “Then why am I here?” Clark asked.
    “I don’t know.”
    Clark stepped onto the neighboring grave, her aunt’s. He grinned as he looked down, and she thought that he might spit. A green canvas bag hung by a strap over his shoulder. “She finally choked to death, I see.” he said.
    “The doctor said she went peacefully in her sleep.”
    “But doctors lie.”
    “Did you smother her?” she asked angrily.
    Clark shrugged. “She was old and ugly.”
    “I hate you.”
    He chuckled. “You hated her. You hated taking care of her.”
    “That’s not true! Get out of here and leave me alone!”
    Clark circled Alice’s grave. He did so carefully, almost as if he feared the spot. He moved to Philip Bart’s grave. A rock from a dynamite blast had put him in the ground. Polly had donated the plot to his family. It was supposed to have been her own plot.
    Clark slipped the bag from his shoulder and set the strap over Philip’s tombstone. His middle name had been Michael. Her father’s name had been Michael. But neither her father nor mother was buried in this cemetery. There hadn’t been enough of them left to fill a coffin. Their car had burned forever. Ashes and smoke. If she closed her eyes. Polly could still smell it. and hear her father shouting at her to behave in the backseat right before he had driven off the road.
    Polly liked the name Michael. It brought back warm memories. But she still hoped Michael Olson didn’t come to the party. Clark knelt beside his bag and began to unzip it.
    “I’m not leaving,” he said. “Today’s your last day of school. It’s our last chance.”
    “For what?”
    “To even the score.”
    “You’re not doing anything. They won’t let you on the boat.”
    “You can get me on board.”
    “Why should I?” she asked.
    He let go of the bag. Anger filled his face. “You’re sitting on your why.”
    “They didn’t kill her! She killed herself!”
    “That’s a lie. You’re lying to me again.”
    “Then you killed her.”
    His anger left suddenly. He grinned. He had ugly lips, like a fish. It made her sick to remember all the times they had kissed. “Closer to the truth, Polly. But not close enough. Go on.”
    “What?”
    “Tell me how I killed Alice.”
    She stared down at her roses. They’d scraped away the thorns at the florist; nevertheless, she felt a sharp prick—a band of thorns wrapped around her head like the crown of thorns Jesus wore. Bloody red roses. Funeral flowers. A waste of money. Her vision wavered at Clark’s question. “I was outside in the backyard,” she said.
    “All right.” He appeared to sigh. He’d wanted her to say something else. He went back to his bag, pulling out a tiny metal clock, black and red wires, and a lump of what could have been orange Play-Doh. “We’ll say the party killed her. If there hadn’t been a party, there would still be an Alice.”
    Polly nodded wearily. “Yeah.”
    “Most of the kids who were at the party will be on the boat.”
    “What is that stuff?”
    Clark tapped the tombstone at his back. “Mr. Bart could tell you.”
    “You’re not going to blow up the