The In-Between Read online

  South Korean Department Store Collapses

  Cooper tapped the link.

  SEOUL, South Korea, Friday, June 30—Rescue workers dug for hours in the ruins of the Sampoong shopping mall today, hoping to find survivors in the rubble of the five-story building, which collapsed June 29.

  Witnesses described how the catastrophe occurred, starting from the top down, each layer crushing the floor beneath.

  Park Cho told KBS-TV he was on the ground floor Thursday before the collapse. “I felt a terrible quake, and then people began racing down from the upper floors.” The owner of a top-floor restaurant told MBC-TV that he had reported a crack in his kitchen floor to store officials earlier in the day, but states he was reassured that it was not of concern and told to remain open.

  Police now say the operators of the complex had known for hours that the top floor was failing but took no action. They were not in the mall at the time of the accident.

  When the top floor finally did give way, it took only twenty seconds for the entire building to collapse.

  “Wait. What?” Jess said. “It just fell down? That’s not even possible. How does a building fall down?”

  Cooper went back and linked to another article dated six months later. He skimmed down to a section that read:

  Investigators have found ample evidence that Sampoong Mall was constructed with substandard cement and steel, and the roof was of insufficient strength to support the heating and cooling systems placed atop it.

  Today, the owner of the mall, who had expressly ordered the building built with these specifications to maximize profit, was sentenced to ten years in prison for criminal negligence. Five civil servants have also been arrested on bribery and corruption charges for allowing the building to operate despite not meeting safety standards.

  The collapse, which occurred in June of this year, left 937 people injured and more than five hundred dead.

  “Five hundred!” Jess gasped.

  “Oh no,” Cooper whispered. He felt a trapdoor give way in his gut, that feeling of freefall at the beginning of a roller coaster’s descent. The scope of this tragedy was not the cause, however. He hit the back button of the browser multiple times, returning to the site he now suspected was written in Korean. “Look down here, at the bottom, Jess. These pictures.”

  The siblings exchanged a heavy glance.

  “These must all be items found on people who were in that building,” Cooper said. “They are all super distinctive, right?” He pointed at the Mickey Mouse watch and the unique pair of boots, not wanting to touch the crest. “I think they put these things in the newspaper because they needed the public’s help.”

  Jess’s eyebrows drew so close, they were like one woolly caterpillar. “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying the two times we’ve found this symbol so far . . . I think the wearer ended up dead.”

  “And unidentified,” Jess added softly. They both sat back and stared at each other, challenging the other to say something that made sense. Jess finally spoke. “So, what? Elena’s in danger?”

  “I . . . I don’t know about that,” Cooper said. “I mean, wherever she goes to school, there have to be dozens of other people wearing that symbol, right? Kids, teachers? And we know the symbol has been around as long as that train accident in 1928, so that’s like hundreds, maybe thousands of people who have worn it over the years.”

  “You mean the school no one can find?”

  Cooper’s mouth went dry, and he found it nearly impossible to swallow. Both of them turned their heads and peered out the window toward Elena’s darkened house.

  “Dinner!” their mother called from downstairs.

  “Okay,” Jess said quietly to Cooper. “Maybe you’re right, maybe Elena isn’t in any danger, but don’t you think we should at least go tell her about these articles? I mean, I’d want to know if I was wearing something that was tied to two tragedies like this.”

  “Guys! Did you hear me?” came another call from the kitchen.

  “Yeah, Mom! We’re coming,” Jess yelled back.

  They both rose slowly, still staring out the window. Cooper didn’t know about Jess, but he suddenly didn’t have much of an appetite.

  11

  Jess was right. They had to talk to Elena.

  They at least had to tell her what they’d found online, tell her they had reason to worry she might be in harm’s way, as crazy as that sounded. At the same time, they needed to know what she knew about the history of the crest, her school, or the past victims. She wasn’t someone who was all that into sharing, but maybe the articles they’d found would convince her. She might hold the key to deciphering what was turning into a very ominous puzzle.

  But first, dinner.

  Cooper pushed his stir-fry and rice around the plate, trying to make it look like he had eaten enough to be excused. Normally, Jess would have been chatting away with their mom, but she too was focused on her plate.

  “You two okay?” Mom asked. She probably assumed they’d been fighting, a historically solid bet.

  They looked at each other and then nodded.

  Mom chewed slowly, appraising both of them. “Okay. So what’s up?”

  “Nothing,” Cooper said. But Mom wasn’t looking at him; she was staring at his sister. Jess never kept anything from her.

  Jess shrank a little before putting a limp chunk of broccoli in her mouth and muttering, “Nothing, Mom.”

  Though she clearly wasn’t buying it, their mother at least let it go. “You both have laundry to fold after dinner. And Cooper, I want to see your planner and your finished homework before bed. And not only the stuff that’s due tomorrow—I’d like to see the progress on your essay that’s due next week. How’s that coming along?”

  Just like that, Cooper’s entire evening was gone. He hadn’t done any work on the essay, a fact his mother already seemed to know. Any chance of slipping out to talk to Elena tonight vanished before his eyes. He convinced himself that it was a good thing, that he now had more time to plan for their conversation.

  After lights-out that night, Cooper stared up at his darkened ceiling until well after midnight.

  The next day, Cooper waved at Gus from where he was sitting with Zack when Gus boarded. Though Gus didn’t sit any closer, he did give a little wave back, and smiled.

  At noon, Cooper was on his way to the cafeteria when he slowed slightly while passing by Mrs. Wishingrad’s old room. She had retired last year, and seeing her room festooned with the decor of some other teacher still bummed Cooper out. But today, even though it was lunchtime, there was someone in there. Alone.

  Cooper poked his head in the doorway. “Gus?”

  “Oh, hey, Coop,” Gus said with a start. “Sorry. Cooper.”

  “That’s okay. You can call me Coop. Are you studying or something?”

  “Um . . .” Gus looked around, as if unsure he was allowed to be in here. “Yes?” He then shook his head. “No. Not really.”

  “Want company?”

  “Sure!”

  Cooper dragged a desk closer to Gus’s and sat, unpacking his lunch. He opened a Snickers, bent it, and placed half on Gus’s desk. “So, what’s up?”

  “Just living, you know.”

  “What’d you end up doing last night?”

  “Homework. Otherwise known as hiding from my grandma. You?”

  There was no way to go into the details of what he and Jess had found out about the crest and the accidents. He would sound like a kook if he started sharing their rather fantastical conspiracy theories without more concrete information. “Pretty much the same, but my mom wouldn’t leave me alone.”

  “Why aren’t you in the cafeteria?” Gus asked. “Isn’t Zack going to wonder where you are?”

  Cooper shook off the suggestion. “Nah. Zack’s pretty used to me not showing up for things. He knows that sometimes I need to be alone.”

  “If he comes by, I’ll totally hide.” Gus pretended to see if ther
e was room in his brown paper bag.

  Cooper gave Gus a small laugh. “It’s weird. Zack and I used to be so tight. I’d go over to his house all the time, especially when my parents were fighting. But after my dad left, it was like he knew too much. It got hard to be around him. I don’t know . . . that probably doesn’t make much sense.”

  Gus took a bite of Snickers.

  Cooper weighed telling Gus about that night. About what had happened right before his dad left for good, the event that had created the horrifying memory that now stood like a ghost between Cooper and Zack every time they were together. On one hand, it was nice that Gus didn’t know exactly what had happened with his dad. On the other, it seemed like he might be one person who could understand. Who wouldn’t look away from it, or pretend it hadn’t happened.

  Because Gus knew what it was like to feel forgotten. Unseen.

  Gus stayed quiet and took another bite of his lunch. He didn’t seem to be waiting on, or pressuring, Cooper to say more. It was more like he was comfortable hanging out in whatever space Cooper needed while deciding how to proceed.

  “So this thing happened, back when Zack and I were nine. My mom was out of town for a few weeks because my grandma had fallen and broken her hip, so my dad had to do everything while she was gone. Neighbors and friends helped out with me and Jess when my dad was at work, and there was this one Friday my dad had to work late and couldn’t take care of us. I was spending the night at Zack’s, and Jess was at some friend’s house.”

  Cooper could almost feel the beautiful spring night as he remembered it. It had been one of those first warm days of the year, when parents insist their kids take a jacket to school even though the kids know they don’t need it. Zack and Cooper had rolled off the bus together and, after a short Nerf battle in the yard, had gone inside to get ready.

  “We had a baseball game that afternoon. I hit my only double ever. Zack’s dad cheered extra loud since my dad wasn’t there, which was nice of him, I guess. After the game, we celebrated at Dairy Queen and then decided to go to a movie. I really wished my dad hadn’t been stuck at work, because he used to love movies.” Cooper started to feel ill. His father always talked about how, when Cooper got older, he would share some of his favorite movies with him. He called them “films”—The Godfather, Casablanca, Citizen Kane.

  Gus shifted in his seat, but only in a way that showed he was listening, not fidgety.

  “So when the movie was over, we were walking out of the theater, Zack and I quoting our favorite lines and cracking each other up. I don’t think his dad liked the movie very much, but even he was laughing with us. I was still laughing when, down the long hallway, I saw this guy who looked exactly like my dad. My first thought, seriously, was how crazy it was that two men could look so similar.”

  Cooper didn’t need to finish the story. It was obvious how this ended. But he wanted to. Gus was still listening, not taking his eyes off Cooper, and now that he was in the middle of it, Cooper decided he needed Gus to hear it.

  “So then this guy I’m looking at puts his hand through his hair exactly the same way my dad did. And I’m thinking, Wow! What are the chances? And then he coughs, covering his mouth with a hand that has a gold wedding band that looks just like my dad’s. And then I was like, Hey! Why is this man wearing my dad’s jacket?”

  “Oh, man,” Gus sighed.

  “And Zack and his dad are both looking at me, then looking at him, then looking at me. And all these other people are walking around us. And at that point I decided my dad must be here to find me, like there’s been an emergency or something. But then I watched him throw away a popcorn bag and take a last long slurp from his soda. He’d just been there seeing a movie.”

  Cooper paused for a moment. Retelling his father’s first of so many lies still struck Cooper with a sickening force.

  Gus was now leaning forward on his desk. “Did he see you?”

  “Oh yeah. When he turned around to leave, he saw me standing there like an idiot, with my mouth gaping open. We all stood there for what felt like hours. Then he just turned and walked out the door, like he hadn’t seen me at all.”

  Gus gently shook his head.

  “So we left too. And I stayed at Zack’s for the night, exactly like we’d planned, across the street from my own bed. It was so pathetic. I was the kid whose own dad didn’t even want him around. Zack tried to cheer me up, we played video games all night and his dad made us popcorn and stuff, but . . .”

  “What happened the next time you saw your dad?”

  “The next morning, when I came home, I walked in and he was sitting at the kitchen table. He just looked at me over his coffee and said, ‘You know, taking care of you and your sister is harder than you think.’ Like, riiiiight. Got it. It’s all our fault.”

  “Dude. What did your mom say when you told her?”

  Cooper snorted. “You are the only person I’ve ever told that story to. And, like, I know he means well, but after that night, Zack’s dad appointed himself my official dad understudy, or something. He hollers for me to ‘come over to throw a ball around’ with him and Zack or asks me to go out to dinner with them. He even invited me on a fishing weekend with him and Zack and Zack’s uncle. But I barely go over there at all anymore.” Being in the Tyson home felt like Cooper was standing on the dining-room table in his underwear, exposed and on display for all to see, like some diorama in a Museum of Unnatural Family History.

  Cooper had worried he might feel like that now too, after telling Gus about what had happened. That story was a stinking pile of personal garbage, something to put down and run away from. But Gus didn’t seem to mind. He didn’t even flinch.

  As the bell rang for fifth hour, Cooper expected a wave of extreme self-consciousness and regret to crash over him, but it never arrived. Instead both he and Gus packed up their lunches in a comfortable quiet, leaving the story Cooper had told hanging in the air between them.

  And it was okay.

  Gus put a hand on Cooper’s shoulder as they walked out of the room, and together they headed off toward their next classes.

  12

  The Friday-afternoon bus was as loud and raucous as ever, but Jess and Cooper sat together silently. Unlike every other kid, they weren’t big fans of Fridays. The Stewart family tradition of Friday movie night—pizza, four people under a too-small blanket on the couch, and popcorn at the halfway point—used to be the best part of every week. It had been a regular reassurance that even as a hurricane seemed to be gaining strength all around them, there was calm at its core.

  But then the hurricane had shifted and blown it all away.

  Mom had tried to keep Friday movie night going after Dad left, but soon she had needed the job at the arts center. These days, Jess made PB&Js for the two of them (easy on the J for her) and begged Cooper to watch something with her under that same blanket, which felt huge now. Half the time he just said no, retreating to his room to journal or watch YouTube; the other half he ended up on the couch, arguing with Jess about what to watch before begrudgingly settling on Survivor reruns for the thousandth time. They certainly never watched “films.”

  Tonight, however, they had a different plan in mind: talk to Elena. A plan they were both excited about.

  However, to both Cooper and Jess’s surprise, their mother was home when they got off the bus, saying she had requested the night off from her pottery class because “There’s too much to do here at the house.”

  From the minute he and Jess got home, Mom had them working. It was as if she was trying to do some family bonding through intense manual labor. The list of fall chores she had prepared kept Jess and Cooper hustling not just that afternoon, but all weekend: raking, sweeping out the garage, clearing their drawers of clothes to give away. Shrub pruning, bulb planting, and mulch spreading.

  And Elena sat perched on her swing, watching it all.

  By Sunday evening, however, the to-do list was finally complete. And as they washed and dried
the dinner dishes, and the sun sank low toward the horizon, Cooper and Jess hatched a plan: Cooper would go over and talk to Elena while Jess stayed home to keep their mom distracted over a game of cards.

  Right as he was about to slip out the back door, his mother came back into the kitchen for a glass of water.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Um . . .” He remembered how Jess had made fun of him when she caught him looking over at Elena’s bedroom through his telescope. The last thing he needed his mom thinking was that he had a crush on the girl next door. “I’m, uh, going to go write in my journal. Out back.”

  “Wouldn’t you need your journal then?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

  “Ha! Yeah. Right.” Cooper ran to his room, giving Jess an annoyed glare where she sat guiltily holding her cards in the living room, and was back in no time flat.

  “It’s too dark out there, bud. Why don’t you work in here instead?”

  “I can still see fine, Mom.” Cooper grabbed a pencil from her desk. “The moon’s super bright.”

  “Well, come back in if you’re straining your eyes. You don’t want to give yourself a headache.”

  “Whatever, Mom,” Cooper said, and hurried outside.

  Of course, now, Elena’s swing was empty—it swayed gently back and forth in the brisk evening breeze—but Cooper had been waiting all weekend to talk to her, and he wasn’t going to miss this chance. He tossed his journal on top of the trash-can lid beside him, took a deep breath, and hurried to the edge of his backyard. He stood with his toes on his own property line, staring up at the yellow house. It seemed larger now, more imposing. Most of the lights were on inside, and woodsmoke rose from the chimney. The aroma was welcoming, like the house was inviting Cooper to come over and stay awhile.

  That was when the house flickered.

  Like a digital glitch interrupting a streaming video, so brief you aren’t sure if it even happened, the entirety of the home shifted and blinked; the yellow siding flashed the brown of old paint and dirt; the white window frames were replaced by gaping holes of darkness. Cooper’s pulse sped up as he blinked and rubbed his eyes.