Greg nodded in agreement. “We wouldn’t’ve even noticed, but that dude said you were gone”—he pointed to Reyn again—“and so we were kind of watching your place for you. You know, like neighbors do.”
“How many of them were there?” Gary asked.
“Two. One of them was a short dude, in his thirties probably. The other one was younger, but there was something wrong with him. He had, like—”
“Ape arms,” Matt interjected.
“Ape arms. Exactly. He had, like, these big, long arms that hung way down. Like a monkey’s.”
“Did they say anything? Did you hear them talk? Did you notice where they went?”
Both Matt and Greg shook their heads. “No. Why? Who were they?”
“No one,” Gary said. “Thanks, guys. I appreciate it.”
His neighbors looked confused, but they took the hint. “Later,” Matt said, and the two of them headed back to their own room.
Gary closed the door behind them, turned around, and his eye was caught by the red blinking light of the answering machine on his desk. He walked over and pressed the PLAY button. His pulse was racing.
It could be Joan.
Gary! I’m—
But it wasn’t. The message was from his father, who asked him to call back right away. Gary did, and his dad answered immediately, as though he’d been waiting by the phone.
“Good news,” he told Gary. “I explained the situation to both the grant administrators and the people in charge of your scholarship, and they all agreed that these are extraordinary circumstances. So, basically, everything’s been put on hold until you’re once again officially enrolled. But the money’s still yours. So, like I said, talk to your teachers, keep attending your classes, and keep up with the assignments so that once the paperwork’s been sorted out, you’re already in place.”
“Did you call UCLA?”
“That’s a slightly bigger hurdle. Your school’s got quite a bureaucracy there, and there are some forms you have to fill out, and a couple of things you have to provide, including a copy of a police report and credit statement, before you can be reinstated. That’s why I say you need to keep up with your classwork, because this may take a few weeks.”
“I have another problem, Dad.” Gary felt embarrassed. “I have no money. All my money and identification was in my wallet—”
“You didn’t tell me you lost your wallet.”
Gary was caught short. “Uh, yeah,” he said nervously. “I mean, that’s how—”
“You said it was some hacker.”
“It was. But he had my wallet. That’s how he knew who I was.”
His father’s voice was stern and disapproving. “How did you lose it?”
“I don’t know!”
“You don’t know?”
Gary thought fast. “I was at the gym, and someone broke into my locker and took it.”
“So you do know.”
“Yeah.”
“I wasn’t aware that you belonged to a gym.”
“I don’t. It’s for a PE class.”
“I don’t remember seeing a PE class on your schedule.”
Gary was sweating. He didn’t like lying to his father, he wasn’t good at it, and his dad could ferret out falsehoods from a mile away. “Look, I was auditing a swimming class so I could swim. It’s been hot out here. I left my clothes in a locker, and someone got my wallet. Now he’s used that information to steal my identity and ruin my life. Jesus. I think you’re getting a little sidetracked here. The point is: I have no money, and I can’t draw any out of my account because I have no ID.”
His dad was silent for a moment. “Well, you should be able to get money out of your account with your Social Security number and your mother’s maiden name. That’s usually how it works. They wouldn’t let you?”
Now he felt even more embarrassed. “I don’t know. I didn’t try. I just assumed—”
“Never assume,” his dad said.
“Okay.”
“I guess that means you didn’t call the bank, close your account and open a new one.”
“No,” he said. “But I will.”
“You did call your credit card company, like I told you, and had them close your account, right?”
“Yes,” he lied.
“And the DMV?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, call your bank and get things straightened out. If there’s a problem, let me know. In an emergency, I can contact Western Union and wire you some money.” He sighed. “I’m just glad your mother’s not here right now. If she heard this, she’d have you on the first plane back.”
“I know, Dad.”
“I’m not so sure I trust you out there on your own.”
“I’ll be okay.”
“Well, sometimes you just have to learn the hard way. Now I want you to call the bank… .”
There was another five minutes of lecturing; then Gary thanked his dad again and hung up.
“Wow,” Brian said. “What was that about?”
“It’s complicated. I need my dad’s help, but I don’t want to tell him what’s really going on, so I have to kind of… finesse the truth.” He told his friends what his father had said.
“You know,” Brian mused, “this could work to your advantage. You could just take the semester off. It’s not your fault. It’s because of a crime committed against you. You’d probably have no problem. Although it would take an extra semester to graduate.”
Gary had been thinking along the same lines. He was already behind in every class, and he had no plans to resume his normal life until Joan was back here safe and sound. Taking the semester off would ensure that his personal problems didn’t completely derail his academic career.
But he could think about that later. His dad was right. He needed to get a new bank account, credit card and driver’s license. He needed to make sure that no damage was done to his credit and that no exorbitant bills were racked up under his name.
Reyn, Stacy and Brian hovered around Gary’s computer while he called his bank, credit card company and the Department of Motor Vehicles. Both his checking and savings accounts were intact, and he was given a new account number with a secret password. His old Visa card was voided, and a report was automatically filed with all of the credit monitoring agencies, alerting them to the fact that he’d been the victim of identity theft. He was told that a new credit card would be sent out to him immediately. The DMV informed him that he would have to come in to one of their offices, get his photo taken and fill out the form for a new driver’s license, at which time he would be issued a temporary license and ID card.
Gary hung up the phone. “What are you guys doing?” he asked, walking over to where the other three were clustered around his computer.
Brian looked up from the monitor. “Trying to find out what ‘Outsiders’ are.”
“Any luck?”
“Sure. There’s a rock band called the Outsiders, a young adult novel by S. E. Hinton, a line of snowboards…”
“Any luck?” he repeated.
Reyn stood straight, shaking his head. “No.”
“Whoever they are,” Stacy said, “they’re flying well below the radar.”
“I’m thinking they’re based in Texas,” Gary said. “I’m pretty sure the car I was in had Texas plates, and we were already in New Mexico and still heading east.”
“Does that help us?” Stacy asked.
“It could narrow the search.”
It narrowed the search, but it didn’t help, and when Gary asked whether someone could give him a ride to the nearest DMV office, Brian shut off the computer.
“I also need a place to stay,” Gary said. He gestured around the room. “I’m not staying here. And I can’t transfer to another room because once they look me up, they’ll find out that I’m not officially enrolled, and then they’ll kick me out completely.”