“Call me when you get there,” she finally says with a smile.
“I will.”
“Let’s go,” Ritchie says, slapping me on the back. “It’s a long walk.”
I stop in the doorway and turn back. “Lock the door after us,” I say. “And don’t stay up too late.”
She waves me off. “You’re always worryin’ after you’re old ma. I’ll be fine.” She’s tearing up, and as a consequence, I’m tearing up too. I’m going to miss her—her and her weird, overburdening, overly concerned, overly messy, overly motherly ways. I want to say something, maybe drop some kind of subtle hint that would break things open and expose what happened, but I don’t, because that would put her in danger too, and I already have enough to worry about. After all, if Ritchie is willing to kill me, then he won’t stop until he feels threat-free.
“I’ll call,” I say with a smile.
“I love you.”
I swear she’s said it a million times, but this is the first time I think I’ve ever actually heard it. My eyes well as Mom heads back to her chair where she’ll kick back, pull the footrest and go back to watching her program. I wonder how long it’ll take before she begins to worry. Tomorrow? The next day? Certainly once the news starts reporting on the disappearance of the twin sister of the girlfriend I’m leaving behind.
I say nothing. I just stand there looking at her, wanting to scream.
“We gotta go,” Ritchie says, patting me on the back.
Instead of screaming, I pick up my suitcase and head out the door. Ritchie follows, pulling the door shut behind him.
“We’d better get movin’,” he murmurs, jarring me from my nostalgic little moment. “Missing that bus would be a bad idea.” I don’t answer, and we don’t talk as we walk through town—so-called best friends. Once we arrive at the bus station, he hangs around, apparently determined to see me off. We don’t have much to say, so we just stand there like two strangers, wishing we could get on with it already. Eventually, the headlights of the Greyhound appear over the top of the hill as it heads toward town.
“I’m gonna miss you, bud,” Ritchie says, actual sadness in his voice.
“Fuck you, Ritchie.”
“It’s a nice offer, but I prefer chicks.”
“Do I look like I’m joking?” I snap.
“No. But you do look scared.”
Ignoring him, I take a step closer, lowering my voice. “I’ll keep my end of the bargain. I’ll stay away, and I won’t talk.”
“Good. That’ll make things easy for both of us.”
“But I swear to God, if you so much as touch Kristie…”
He snickers. “You’ll what?”
I stare at him a long moment. “Not even you can dodge bullets.”
Ritchie smiles. “Now yer talkin’. My little buddy is finally becoming a man.”
“That’s a promise.”
“Relax. You ain’t got nothin’ to worry about. I’ll keep my word. After all, a man’s only as good as his word.” He cocks his head. “You believe that, right?”
The bus pulls up, and I look at my ‘friend’ for the last time. “God saw you do it,” I say as the doors open, inviting me to board. “And He’s got a long memory. Your day will come.”
He smiles. “You tryin’ to scare me with religion?”
“You’re the one always getting on my case for my language.”
“Yeah, well, I say a lot of things,” Ritchie says. “I talk a lot of shit, but this is still Payton County. It ain’t a church. Here I don’t gotta be afraid of nothin’.”
“How do you figure?”
“Look around. It’s my town. My town. Here I am God.”
I say nothing. All I can do is glare at him while wishing the bus would suddenly explode, killing us both.
“I know you hate me,” he says. “But I don’t hate you, and despite all this, I think I’m actually gonna miss you.”
Turning my back, I climb aboard the bus, make my way down the aisle and choose a seat near the back. As the finality sets in, I’ve never felt so scared and so alone in my whole life. This is it. This is how it ends. I’m actually leaving. With everything that’s happened, I’m tucking tail and leaving it all behind. The bus moves forward, and outside, Ritchie lifts his middle finger, that big dumb grin of his on his puffy face.
I just look away.
Part IV
“Are we there?” a man asks from three seats ahead of mine. “I thought I felt us stop.” I can see the back of his bald head turning as he looks as his wife.
“Go back to sleep,” she answers. “We’ve got a long way to go.”
A long way to go.
Damn right. Route 89 runs forever. It leads all the way to the edge of the earth and beyond. At least that’s what we used to say. The last outpost the Greyhound will pass by on the way out of Payton is the old Johnson farm, and as I look out my window, the old farm is coming up on the right now. There are no lights inside. The house is quiet and dark—blending with the shadows while secrets lie inside. A casual observer would disregard the place as just an abandoned farm, and one might wonder why it hasn’t been torn down. Not that any of the other passengers seem all that interested, and not that there are a lot of other passengers. I count five. And none of them are familiar. They’re tourists along for the ride, passing through a small town on the brink of extinction, yet they’re witnesses to the demise of a few hundred ordinary lives.
Now the farm is directly out my window, and I feel like crying. Joanne’s in there. She’s cold and alone. It was only hours ago that she was alive and eager—excited. It was such a beautiful day, a happy day, and this is how it ends.
Thump, thump, thump, thump.
I lean my head against the cool glass of the bus window. The cracks in the road beneath the tires sing a song I know all too well, and it’s the familiarity that I find soothing. I shift to get comfortable and wrap myself within my own warmth.
Thump, thump, thump, thump.
The voices around me aren’t friendly. They sound bored and uncomfortable. The people are making conversation if only to pass the time. We’re trapped together on a steel arc while counting down the moments until we can go our separate ways. Closing my eyes, I filter the strangers out, replacing the monotone chatter with voices from my past. You be careful, Mom warns from the back of my mind. I love you, Kristie giggles. Kiss my grits, Ritchie laughs.
Recoiling, I dissolve into my mind until there’s nothing but a shell occupying space on this ripped seat. The Johnson farm passes by, its broken windows looking like dark eyes, the front door wide open just like a mouth.
Twenty-Nine
Today
Kristie is crying again, but this time there’s fear in her sound. I guess I should be scared too, but something in me snapped the moment I looked up and found Ritchie hulking in the doorway. I should have seen this coming. I should also be afraid, but I’m not.
“You really are stupid,” Ritchie growls. “This is how you tell her? You bring her here and show her? You dig up the body of her dead sister and show it to her?” He chuckles. “Great plan, genius. I remember you bein’ smarter’n that.” Stepping into the light, his face is creased with age, but he has the exact same look he had the last time we were down here in this exact same spot. “Guess what?” he continues. “There’s no one around to hear her scream, and there’s no one to stop me from doin’ what I’m about to do.”
“Why didn’t you just kill me then?” I ask. “If this was your plan all along.”
He chuckles. “Like I said, I remember you bein’ smarter’n that.” He takes another step closer.
“I’m a slow learner.”
“You and Joanne disappeared on the same day. That made them go lookin’ for you. They thought maybe you’d eloped, or maybe you even had somethin’ to do with it. Nobody ever even thought to question me. I just pleaded arrogant while you went off to your big school on your big scholarship, and that was that.”
“Ignorant,” I mumble.
“I was worried for awhile until I figured out how much you were afraid of me.”
“So, now what?” I ask. “Are you’re going to kill us?”
He shrugs. “Haven’t decided yet, but you gotta admit, it would certainly tie things off neat and clean.” He chuckles—mostly to himself. “Of course, what kind of man would that make me? You’re my best friend, and you know how much stock I put in friendship.”
I just glare.
“I always wanted us to be equals,” Ritchie continues. “Neighbors, the backyard barbecues—the whole bit.”
My heart seizes. “You wouldn’t.”
He grins. “I might.”
“Ritchie, don’t.”
“I already killed my girlfriend, and I was thinkin’ maybe you might even things up.”
“If you touch her, I swear to God I’ll—“
“You ain’t gonna do nothin’, except what I say.” He looks around the room. “I told you not to come back, but you did. Then you brung her here, because you can’t keep that big fuckin’ trap of yours shut.”
“Ritchie…please…”
“We can do this the easy way, or we can do it the real easy way. All I gotta do is stage a murder-suicide, and they’ll think you done it. Both Joanne and Kristie. I’ll show up at your funeral and say what a great guy you were. I’ll even add that I don’t think it’s fair that they labeled you a killer. After all, it musta been a crime of passion or somethin’ like that.”
“No one will believe it,” I argue.
“You don’t think so? I think everyone’ll believe it. Think about it. You two disappearing at the same time, then you coming back twenty years later because Kristie started askin’ questions? So you killed her too before turning the gun on yourself. It’s not even one of them head-scratchers. It’s reality TV.”
Ritchie seems to have actually thought this through, and apparently, I’m predictable enough to do exactly what he knew I would. Leaning over, I pick up the shovel, take a step back and hand it to Kristie. It’s just a shovel, but something is better than nothing, and Ritchie’s right; I brought her here. Kristie doesn’t deserve this. She didn’t deserve to lose her sister, and she doesn’t deserve to lose her life in this basement. I’m no hero, and I’m not tough, but I sure as hell won’t make it easy for him.
“When he goes after me,” I say without taking my eyes from Ritchie, “hit him with the shovel as hard as you can.
“What?” she asks, terrified.
“Then run,” I say. “Lock the car doors, floor it, and don’t stop until you reach the police station. Drive through the front door if you have to, but don’t stop for anything. Red lights or anything.”
Ritchie smiles, but there’s hesitation in his response. “What you gonna do, Triple A?”
“Whatever I have to.”
“She won’t make it.”
Thunder rumbles somewhere outside.
“She’ll make it,” I say confidently. “By the time you’re done with me, she’ll be halfway back to town.” I smile. “I’m going to Hell, but you’re going to prison.”
“We can do this together,” Kristie whimpers—her voice shaking.
“We are doing this together,” I snap. “This is the plan.”
Ritchie’s eyes are going from me to her—the smile on his face replaced with concern. He’s trying to sort things out, planning to charge, but not quite sure how or when. She and I are standing on the opposite side of the hole Joanne’s resting in, and he’s not nimble enough to jump over it. He doesn’t have a straight shot at either of us.
“He’s going to kill you,” she whimpers.
“I’m responsible for Joanne’s death,” I say. “This is my chance to make it right.”
“Oh, boo hoo,” Ritchie growls. “Are you still crying over that dumb whore? I did you both a favor. I caught her and Tony makin’ out upstairs the day I done her.”
I smile. “You’re panicking, Rich. I know that tone. You’re panicking because you know you’re going to get caught. You know you’re going to lose.”
Thunder cracks outside. Rain splashes up against the dirty basement window, water running like beads along the inside of the walls down here.
“You dumb fuck!” Ritchie shouts, his voice echoing through the room. “I told you not to come back! No one had to know!”
I’m glaring at him through slits, daring—almost wishing for him to charge me and get it over with. “This has nothing to do with me,” I growl. “This is for Joanne.”
Ritchie just glares.
“It’s over,” I grumble.
“I beg to differ,” he sneers. “Things are just gettin’ interesting.” But something’s wrong. Suddenly, his left eye twitches, and he closes it tightly, doubling over as he smacks the side of his head.
The headaches.
Kristie takes a step back while I take a hesitant step forward. Suddenly, I understand, and the simplicity of it all is so obvious that I’m surprised I never saw it before. They’re not headaches. They’re a reaction to conflicting motivations. It’s that broken mind of his, wires mixed up and crossing over, the dilemma between right and wrong—kind of like the good bad words and the bad bad words. It’s the little boy versus the man he never wanted to grow into that is momentarily paralyzing him and momentarily opening a window for us.
Lightning flashes, lighting the basement as thunder blasts the house. Reacting rather than waiting, I leap the hole. “Now!” I shout as I hit Ritchie head on, the two of us tumbling to the dirt floor. Kristie starts screaming. I start punching, but Ritchie outweighs me two to one, and it doesn’t take much of an effort to overpower me.
“Now!” I shout again.
Kristie is still shrieking when she swings the shovel. Her swing is clumsy, and the shovel smashes me in the face, sending white stars to my eyes and bringing more frantic screams of terror.
“Run!” I manage through a stream of blood running from my nose into my mouth.
Ritchie reaches out and trips her as she tries to slip past, sending her sprawling. She scrambles to her feet, still moaning with terror, and she’s out the door, stumbling up the stairs. Ritchie returns to me and delivers a haymaker that steals my wind before landing another blow that opens a fresh wound on my other cheek. But I’m not done yet, and I swing back, managing to connect with some part of him that feels like bone. I can’t tell what I hit since my eyes are filling with blood soaked tears, but I hear him ‘ooof’, and I feel his body relax. I swing again, this time missing. Something hard strikes me across the chin causing my head to whip painfully to the side. Another sharp crack sends me to a white world where there are no dreams.
Part II
Kristie can’t quite get her footing as she races up the stairs. She’s frantic and sloppy—clumsily tripping over her own feet. Tears race along her cheeks, cutting through her makeup. Throwing herself up the last three stairs, she rolls onto the kitchen floor into a pool of rainwater where she’s greeted by a bright burst of lightning that causes her to squint. Water is running along the walls in a sheet of clear liquid glass that spreads like tendrils across the floor. She splashes through the puddle as she crawls through the kitchen into the living room.
“Kristie!” Ritchie bellows from below. “Where you at? I’m comin’ for ya!”
She tries getting to her feet only to slip on the wet floor and crash forward, the oxygen ripped from her lungs. She can’t seem to get enough air as she coughs into the puddle she’s laying in.
Pounding footfalls are climbing toward her. “I can hear you, sweetheart!” Ritchie shouts. “Come to Daddy.”
She tries to stand but can’t, so she scampers on all fours, pushing through the screen door onto the porch. The boards beneath her whine under the strain and threaten to give, but she rolls to the edge where she swings her legs over the side and drops to the ground. No stumbling this time. No falling.
The rain is coming down in torrents, immediately soaking her to
the core. It’s raining so hard that her car looks a million miles away. She begins stumbling through the tall grass, trips over an old stump and tumbles face first into the mud. Crawling again, hand over hand, she’s sobbing, her tears mixing with the rain.
“Kristie!” Ritchie bellows, this time from the front porch. He leaps and hits the ground running. “Where you at?”
Terrified, she scrambles to her feet and races forward, charging head first into the side of her car. The impact brings a flash of white light and sends her tumbling backward, but she’s already pushing herself up again and groping for the handle. Pulling the door open, she crawls into the front seat. Ritchie is charging with powerful strides. She reaches out into the rain, fumbling for the door handle, finds it, and yanks, pulling the door shut. Her trembling hand smacks the automatic lock just as Ritchie crashes against the side of the car, the whites of his eyes bloodshot with rage as he pounds on the glass.
Fumbling through her pocket, she finds her keys and promptly drops them on the floor. Ritchie yanks on the handle before balling a fist and striking the window. The glass holds, and he howls in pain. “Open the fuckin’ door!”
Kristie reaches between her feet, her fingers searching for the keys. She finds them, her trembling fingers sliding the right one into the ignition, the idiot lights lighting up the inside of the car.
“No!” he shouts. He looks toward his own truck before turning back to her. Snarling one last time, he balls his fist before turning away and breaking into a run for his pickup.
Peering through the water-streaked glass, she casts one last look toward the house. Joanne and Tony are in there, both in the basement, both presumably dead. She turns the key—firing up the engine—drops into reverse and slams on the gas while silently promising that she’ll come back.
Part III
It’s quiet down here. Too quiet. The only sound is that of the water trickling along the walls and pooling on the floor. I open my good eye and look around. Joanne’s body still rests half in and half out of the hole. There are scattered footprints all over the sandy floor, but there’s no sign of either Ritchie or Kristie, which means they’re not down here. They’re out there.
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