The first thing Mrs. Weaver did when she met them after school was demand that Collin show her his bruise.

The second thing Mrs. Weaver did was turn to Iris and say, "You lied to me," cold and final and so disappointed Collin almost apologized out of turn.

Iris didn't have the courtesy to feign ignorance, or pretend to be sorry. "What gave it away?" she asked.

Mrs. Weaver pursed her lips. Her eyes danced between the road and whatever she could see of Iris in the rearview mirror. Iris had opted to sit in the back with Collin instead of next to her mother. Collin now knew why. He glared at Iris as best as he could without being too obvious about it.

"Mr. Francis called," Mrs. Weaver said.

Collin winced; Mr. Francis was the principal. Of course he'd call – anything to do with Iris would be top priority for the school, what with the media hovering like jackals. And Iris'd gone and cried in public. Over Collin.

"I hate you," Collin hissed.

Iris flipped him off behind her mother's back, expression as serene as a newborn calf's.

"Collin, has this happened before?" Mrs. Weaver asked. The worry in her voice made Collin flush, out of embarrassment and guilt and probably a tiny bit of happiness to be fussed over, which only made the guilt worse.

"No," he forced out.

Mrs. Weaver was silent for a few blocks. Collin felt her eyes on him, and did his best not to fidget. He'd had less trouble lying to actual cops.

"Well, the boy's suspended, and I'll be calling his mother. I don't understand why you would lie over such a thing," Mrs. Weaver sighed at last. She looked at them both with the sort of exasperation Collin had observed of mothers supervising toddlers at the playground.

The usual crowd of reporters parted for Mrs. Weaver's car once they reached their block. Reluctantly, and with the aid of a few bored police officers, but hey, they made it to the gate, so Collin wasn't complaining. The backseat windows were tinted. Collin spied Iris playing with the buttons and slapped her arm while Mrs. Weaver wasn't looking. Iris stepped on his foot. She left the window alone, so Collin counted it a victory, numb toes notwithstanding.

"Dinner will be an hour," Mrs. Weaver said. "Collin, if you could stay? I want to take a look at your head under the light."

Collin agreed with all the enthusiasm of a wet cat. Iris blew him a kiss from the stairs. She had her phone in her hand. The case was silver, Collin noted. He could've sworn it'd been black last time he'd seen it.

"Collin? Over here, dear," Mrs. Weaver called.

The thing was, Mrs. Weaver worked for a hospital. She was in administration, as far as Collin'd understood, but took first aid with the seriousness Collin imagined of nurses or doctors. There was an entire medicine cabinet under the kitchen sink. Half of its contents were on the kitchen table at present, including a roll of bandages Collin eyed with trepidation.

"Sit, please," Mrs. Weaver bid. She had a chair pulled directly under the overhead lights. The dark circles under her eyes stood out against her skin.

Collin sat. He bent his head forward without needing to be prompted, glad for the excuse to look somewhere that was not Mrs. Weaver. He cursed Iris again, then the reporters clamoring for a shot outside. Then himself.

"Does it hurt?" Mrs. Weaver asked. Her hands were gentle, far kinder than Reed's bony fingers.

"No," Collin said, and heard Mrs. Weaver sigh. "A little," he amended, ears burning.

"Do you feel dizzy? Did you lose consciousness at any point?" Mrs. Weaver asked.

"No, to both," Collin said.

Mrs. Weaver let him go after a while, satisfied to find his skull whole and no brain leaking out of his ears. She pressed a glass of water and painkillers into Collin's hands and bid him to go and rest before dinner. Collin was only too happy to comply. He'd half-expected to leave the kitchen looking like a mummy from the neck-up.

"Thank you," Collin said.

Mrs. Weaver caught his arm before he could leave. "Collin," she began.

Collin held still. Mrs. Weaver's eyes flickered over his face, searching. He was reminded of Iris in Reed's office, though Iris' gaze had been much sharper – a scalpel to Mrs. Weaver's feather of concern.

"You can come to me with anything. You know that, don't you?" Mrs. Weaver asked.

"I know," Collin said. His voice cracked a little in the middle and he ducked his head.

Mrs. Weaver touched his arm again, a flutter of motion. "Iris is my child, but so are you," she said.

Collin glanced up, startled. Mrs. Weaver's expression was tired but firm. She smiled for him, and gently ushered him away.

"Rest," she reminded, "I will call you down when dinner's ready."

Collin took the stairs on numb legs. He hesitated in front of the door to his room, then took the two steps to Iris' and went in, not bothering to knock. Iris was at her desk. She seemed to be doing homework – she had a book open, at least, though she appeared to be in the middle of drawing in it rather than taking notes.

"Did she tell you to lock your door at night yet?" Iris asked.

Collin closed the door, remembering not to slam it shut at the last moment. "Did you have fun?" he asked. He was impressed at how level his voice came out. Words pounded in his head, and he felt like screaming.

Iris turned, straddling her chair to lean her chin against the headrest. "Mm, not bad. Speaking of fun – your buddy Michael's been trying to get you into juvie for a good while now. Hope you're not planning on complying."

Collin faltered. "What?" he said.

Iris sighed up at him. She grabbed her phone off the desk without looking and turned the screen so Collin could see. "Look familiar?" she asked.

Collin leaned closer. The picture on Iris' phone was of a 7-11, recognizable for the slice of the lit-up sign at the corner of the image. The photo was taken at an angle so the adjacent alley was visible. Collin made out Michael and a few of the guys that hung around him. Their faces were bright with the orange glow of cigarettes.

"I knew they were there," he said. Of course he had. That'd been the whole point of the dumb exercise.

Iris flicked to the next picture without turning the phone her way. It was of a police cruiser, parked in the lot next door. "I heard them talking," she said. "They had the cop on standby, waiting for you to lift whatever it was they asked for as part of the initiation into their club for losers. Was it vodka? I bet it was vodka. Some crap brand."

Collin took the phone. He enlarged the photo, flipped back to the first. It wasn't that big of a surprise, really. He'd been leery of Michael's offer from the start. "They didn't ask for anything specific," he said. "I was planning on taking that candy bar. The one you took."

Iris snorted, her laughter breaking the self-assured lines of her face into something honest and startlingly young. "You're an idiot," she wheezed.

Collin thought he ought to be insulted. He found himself grinning instead. "Thanks, I guess."

"Why'd you agree?" Iris asked.

Collin shrugged. Truth was, he didn't know himself. Michael'd had it out for him from day one. "I thought it'd be less trouble if I joined them, I guess," he said.

Iris' lip curled in a sneer. "Idiot," she repeated.

"You might be right," Collin agreed.

He sat on the floor, back against Iris' bed, legs stretched out. Iris nudged his shin with her foot.

"Hey," she said, "Tell me if you decide to go after them, okay?"

"You'll help me hide the bodies?" Collin said.

Iris grinned. "Not for free. And you've already ran a tab with me, so don't go racking up your dues."

"Nobody made you share your intel, you know," Collin said.

"Men ought to pay their debts," Iris drawled.

Collin rolled his eyes. "What do you want?"

"A little bird told me that you'll be tutoring your girlfriend over lunch," Iris said.

"Does that little bird answer to Derek? Because he's not little by any– Kira's not my girlfriend!" Collin spluttered.

Iris raised her brows. "And whose fault is that?"

Collin decided to ignore her. "Why do you care, anyway? You're good at calc," he asked.

"I was good at calc," Iris said. She tapped her temple, near her scarred eye. "Things are a little scrambled in here. My concentration is shot to shit, too. You've seen me in class."

Collin swallowed. He'd noticed Iris zoning out at school, but he'd chalked it up to her being bored. "Is it only math?" he asked.

Iris shrugged. "I can find audio lessons for the rest. Not always on the exact same topics we're covering in class, but close enough."

"Do you – I mean, I can record the chapters we're on right now. In history and biology, and-" Collin squinted, not sure he liked the look in Iris' eyes. "What?" he asked.

"Nothing. Mom's calling us down," Iris said.

She stood up. Collin scrambled to his feet after her, listing sideways only slightly. His head still felt a little too heavy for his body, but it was getting better. "You're welcome to join in for calc. You'll be there anyway," he said.

Iris hummed in agreement. "Get the lights," she said.

"I'm not Derek," Collin grumbled.

Iris threw a smirk over her shoulder, and left him to it. Collin got the lights. He saw, as the lamp flicked off, Iris' black cellphone on the desk.

He saw the silver one half-hidden under a stray notebook, too.