Overexposed

by Adrianne James

  “But I saw you with them before Dad was laid off. What was that about?”

  “That was me trying to get close to the team to get close to Mindy. She only hangs out with them and have you seen her? But I promise, I don’t do them, I just sell them.”

  “Do you know what they did to our art projects? Ashley was going to use hers for her college applications.” He really did look upset. He shook his head no and swallowed hard before resting his head against mine.

  “Tell her I am sorry. That I will help her rebuild it at our house. But please, just give Brock the pictures.”

  “I will tell her, but Jason, we already went to the principal. This morning. She is supposed to be looking into it.” He cursed under his breath and stood up quickly.

  “Damn it, Vi. You should have talked to me first. Brock is going to be furious. He is going to have to tell his supplier that we need to chill out for a while and who knows how that will go down.”

  “You mean Brock isn’t the supplier?” I stood up too, not letting Jason leave just yet. After days of being ignored, he was finally talking to me and I wasn’t ready to give it up.

  “Of course not. He is just a high school senior. He has someone who supplies him. The one who really makes the money. And no, I have no idea who it is. He won’t tell us. I have to go. Be careful, Vi.” Jason opened the classroom door and went back inside. I stood there for a few moments trying to comprehend everything I had just learned from my brother.

  When the bell rang, I headed back to the upper class hall to meet Macy, and hopefully Ashley, outside of Mr. Bennett’s classroom.

  Macy was standing exactly where she said she would be. I walked up to her and waited for Ashley. We stood there, not really talking, just waiting. Waiting for our friend who would probably not be coming. The problem was, I didn’t know if she wasn’t coming because she was pissed off at me, or because something was really wrong.

  “It’s been ten minutes. Where is she?” Macy asked, scanning the now emptying halls.

  “I don’t know. We had a fight.” Macy stopped looking around and turned to me.

  “What happened?”

  “Art project ruined, life ruined, all my fault. That is the basic gist of it.” Macy just gave me an apologetic look, and squeezed my hand. “Look! There she is!” I pointed down the hall and saw Ashley running towards us.

  “Macy! Your truck! Come on!” We looked at each other for a brief second then we all ran out to the parking lot. There was a group of kids surrounding Macy’s truck, gawking at something. As we pushed through them, we saw what it was.

  “Oh my God,” Macy whispered as she slowly moved forward, almost as if she was hoping if she moved slow enough, the image before us would change. Her beautiful truck had spray paint all over the sides, the windows were all shattered, and the tires were all slashed. The words ‘Nark’ and ‘Bitch’ were not only spray painted in bright red, but also carved along the side.

  “Who did this?” an authoritative voice came from beyond the crowd. I looked over trying to see who it was when Macy went up to her truck, the glass crunching beneath her feet, and opened the door to look inside. “I said, who did this. One of you had to have seen something?” The voice belonged to Mrs. Nash and she did not look pleased.

  “Macy, let’s go call your father. Everyone else, go home. Now!” Mrs. Nash shooed the crowd with her hands as if they were flies attacking her tea. Macy looked to me, then to her truck, and back to me. I knew what was coming. This was the same look Ashley had given me just half an hour before.

  “Macy, do you want us to stay?”

  “No. Please go. I can’t handle any more of this.” Mrs. Nash put her arm around Macy’s shoulders and led her back into the building. I looked to Ashley, hoping she would be ready to talk to me.

  “Ash?” When she turned and walked away, not even answering me, I had my answer. She was not ready to talk. I still had no idea how this had all turned around on me. Sure, it was my idea to find out all the secrets, but I had never in a million years expected to find a group of students selling drugs.

  I walked home through the snow in silence, just a few feet behind Ashley. She never once even looked over her shoulder to see how far behind I was. I wondered if they had just listened to me, and not turned the pictures over to Mrs. Nash, not told on them, if all this would be happening. I mean, I wanted to forget the whole thing. I still could. I had all the pictures and Mrs. Nash said she couldn’t do anything about it without more evidence anyway. I could just copy all the pictures to a CD and hand it over to Brock. He would leave us all alone, and I would just keep my eye on Jason until I graduated and moved away. I would do everything I could to make some money so he wouldn’t feel like he had to sell drugs. The harassment would stop, Ashley and Macy would be safe even if they never spoke to me again, and Jason’s record would be clear.

  When Ashley turned onto our street ahead of me, she stopped walking. When I caught up to her, I saw why. Brock and Jason were fighting in the front yard, my father trying to separate them, and the Sherriff’s car pulling up with the lights on.

  “WHAT THE HELL?” I asked no one in particular. Ashley looked at me, took a deep breath then grabbed my hand and pulled me forward. “Does this mean we are okay?”

  “I may be furious with you, but it looks like you need me right now.” I smiled at her and squeezed her hand. Then I looked back at the scene before us, not even knowing where to start to begin processing everything.

  When we crossed the street, Dad and the cop had gotten the boys separated and unfortunately, cuffed. Jason was cursing at Brock still and Brock just smiled at me.

  “What is going on?” I asked my Dad who was standing back from the police car watching as his son is arrested.

  “I heard your brother screaming at someone, I came out and saw Brock take a swing at him. Jason ducked, but then went right for him. It took fifteen minutes to get them apart. I had no choice but to call the Sherriff’s office because I couldn’t do it myself. The neighbors were no help, they just stood there watching.”

  “But why were they fighting?” Ashley spoke up.

  “Apparently, Brock was in your room, Vi. I have no idea why, but your window is broken and the water drain is broken from where he climbed up. Why would he be breaking into your room?” I looked up and saw that my window was broken, the shards of glass that fell below were reflecting the sun just as the snow they sat on, effectively camouflaging it.

  I knew it was time to tell my Dad what was going on. My keeping quiet wasn’t helping Jason at all anymore, and Dad needed to know the truth. I had a feeling both Jason and I were both going to be in trouble.

  ***

  “Dad, we need to talk,” I said as the police car drove away with both Brock and my brother cuffed in the back seat.

  “I’m listening.” He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at me. Dad had a way of always knowing when I was going to tell him something he didn’t want to hear. Granted, this time, it was rather obvious what with the broken window, the fighting, the police involvement, and all.

  “Why don’t we call Ashley’s parents and maybe Mom so we only have to explain it once?”

  “Fine. I will call them, you two go inside and start cleaning up the glass. Oh and look through your room to see what all was damaged so when we go to the station we can file a report. Take pictures before you touch anything.” I laughed at the irony, take pictures of the damage that taking pictures had caused. The glare from my dad told me he found nothing funny.

  “Come on, Vi. Let’s go see what he did.” Ashley led the way into my house and up the stairs. My bedroom door was still closed and from the hallway, it looked just as it should. Opening the door on the other hand, revealed a very different story.

  My room was absolutely destroyed. Every one of my books were torn apart, the pages thrown around the room like confetti on New Year’s Eve. My pictures that adorned my purple walls were smashed, the glass littering the ground. The ma
ttress had been thrown off the box spring and each of the exposed boards of the box spring, broken. My desk was empty, as all the contents had been shoved off and onto the floor. My laptop was nowhere to be found. Running over to my closet, my box with all the money I had saved up since buying my camera was gone, too.

  “Did Brock have a bag with him?” I asked, almost in a whisper as I slowly walked around my room.

  “I don’t remember. If he did, the police will have it.” Ashley stepped over a broken picture frame and walked to the window. The glass had been broken from the outside, in, so the large shards of windowpane lay right below it. “Ew, looks like he cut himself.”

  Ashley pointed out a smear of red along the sill before turning around. I didn’t even know where to begin taking pictures of the disaster that used to be my room. Pulling my backpack around to the front of my body, I unzipped it and slowly pulled out my camera, grateful that I always carried it with me.

  Ashley stood out in the hallway as I began to document the damage. Each click of the shutter brought on a new tear. With the first, I took a picture of the room as a whole. Then wiped away the salty streak, making sure to dry off the viewfinder and LCD screen on Jilly. Then I moved onto detail shots. They always say, “It’s all in the details.” I never really thought about it much before that moment, standing in my room, taking pictures of all the disaster that Brock left in his wake.

  Once I had finished photographing what I considered the final straw, not that Macy’s truck wasn’t a big deal because it was, I walked out of my room, closed the door behind me and padded down the stairs. Ashley followed behind, not saying a word, just letting me deal with everything in my own way. My entire life had just been destroyed, and my computer stolen. My computer that held every single picture I had ever taken, every college application essay I had ever written, and any chance I had of leaving Willowspring.

  Walking over to the couch, I sat down. Then I lay down. Then I bawled. I had cried over the whole situation before that, but in that moment, I completely lost it. I bawled my eyes out, cuddled with a couch pillow, and refused to unbury my head from my arms.

  “Vi, honey, everyone is here. It’s time to tell us what is going on.” Dad rested his hand on my heaving back, than began to rub circles on it. I felt the couch shift and more of Dad wrapped around me, enveloping me in his embrace. Sometimes a girl just needs a hug from her daddy to make her feel better. This was one of those times.

  TELLING OUR PARENTS what we had been up to was no easy feat. They kept interrupting to yell at us, or to gasp in shock at what had happened, or crying themselves, wondering what they could have done to make us come to them in the first place. My parents were furious over keeping Jason’s involvement a secret, Ashley’s parents were angry with me for getting their daughter involved, and surprisingly, Ashley and I both felt much lighter after telling the truth.

  “We need to go to the police station. Right now.” Mom stood up and marched to the door, grabbed her keys, and just stared at the rest of us still sitting in the living room like we were idiots.

  “Vi, get your camera so you can show the police the pictures of your room,” Dad said as he grabbed his coat and helped Ashley with hers. I ran upstairs and I heard the adults all begin talking at once. Ashley’s parents screamed at mine for raising such ‘hooligans’—a drug dealer and a snoop. Mom and Dad were defending me and refusing to blame Jason without more proof, Ashley’s parents (who had always thought I was a great kid, by the way) pointing out the whole assignment was my idea, Ashley speaking up, taking responsibility for her part in everything, defending me. Even with everything going on, that made me smile a little.

  The drive to the police station was tense. No one talked. If I even moved in my seat both of my parents searched me out in their mirrors to see what I was doing. Thank goodness Willowspring is so small, I don’t think I would have been able to mentally handle much more of that.

  Ashley’s parents parked first, and then stood waiting for us out in the snow. It was as if they thought we would drive right passed, leaving them to deal with everything. Sure, they had been tormenting Ashley, but she wasn’t the only one.

  Dad parked the car and we all climbed out, Ashley and I finding each other’s side immediately, linking our arms to not only support each other, but to show the parents that we were in this together and they could not separate us.

  The evil glare I received from Mrs. Nichols was enough to make anyone shake in their boots. I quickly looked away from her and instead focused my attention on the police station in front of us.

  There were ten snow-covered stone steps leading up to the oversized doorway of the Willowspring Sheriff’s station. Once inside, it felt more like an old western movie than the twenty-first century. The metal holding cells were positioned only a few feet behind the old wooden front desk. A few benches lined the walls along the front and sides of the room and there was a rotary phone mounted on the wall in the very back corner.

  Jason was being held in the cell closest to the door, so we could see him right away. He looked really bad. His face was bloody and I couldn’t even see his eye because his cheek and nose had swollen closed around it. Mom gasped, gaining the attention of the Sheriff who was intently doing paperwork with her back to us until that point.

  “Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Blake. We have some more paperwork to do on Jason, and then we can release him into your custody.”

  “There’s more. You need to talk to Vi and Ashley. They have quite the story to tell you, Sheriff.” She looked between the two of us, and Jason had jumped up from his seat, getting close to the bars, glaring at me with his one good eye. Brock was nowhere to be seen.

  “Where is Brock?” I asked, looking around the small room.

  “His parents were in here and got him already. Boys fight, always have. Nothing much to do about it.” My heart sank. I had hoped having him already in jail would make turning him in easier. No such luck. The only one they had was Jason and I really didn’t want him to have to stay.

  ***

  “Well, ladies, it seems you have had an eventful few days. I will have Max take those pictures from your camera and I will send him out to your house to take his own. The laptop with all of the pictures is completely gone? No trace of it?” Sheriff Vincent asked.

  “No, sir. I had hoped you would have found it in Brock’s things.” I sat at a table in a little separate room, next to Ashley. In the middle of the table was a gray recorder, capturing every word we said. I continued to stare at it, as if telling the recorder what had happened wasn’t as bad as telling the Sheriff who sat not three feet in front of me.

  There was a knock on the door and Max poked his curly blond head in. “Sheriff, Macy is here with her parents. Should I send her in?”

  “Yes, send her on in. Make sure all the adults out there have some coffee. Oh, and order Jason a meal, until all this is cleared up, he isn’t going anywhere.”

  Just hearing that I groaned and banged my head against the desk. I heard Macy come in and settle in a chair on the opposite side of Ash. She muttered a quick hello to the Sheriff then sat stiff as a board.

  “Macy, when we spoke earlier at the school about your truck, why didn’t you tell me about the pictures and the other harassment you and your friends have been through?” His voice had been soft the whole time he was asking us for a statement. There wasn’t one inflection of mistrust coming from him and that was nice. He believed us and he hadn’t even seen the pictures we took the night of the dance.

  “I don’t know.” Macy’s voice was weak. She was being extremely quiet and I didn’t know why. I sat up and looked at her. She was staring at her hands in her lap, picking at the skin surrounding her thumbnail.

  “Macy. Do you still have the pictures you took the night of the dance?”

  “No. I gave the memory card to Mrs. Nash. She said she needed it to look into the allegations more thoroughly.” The Sheriff made a noise that sounded like a cross between a ‘huh’ and
a growl.

  “Okay girls, you all can leave with your parents, but if anything else happens, I want you to call me. Okay? I take this very seriously and I want to keep our little town safe and drug free. I will get to the bottom of all of this and hopefully get you your laptop back, Vi.” The Sheriff pushed his chair back from the table, creating a God-awful noise when the legs scratched against the concrete floor, and stood up. “You can stay in here for a moment or two if you want, because I have a feeling once you leave here you may not get to speak to each other again until school tomorrow. I will try to talk to your parents, reassure them this is not the fault of any of you. You should have come directly to me, but you did tell someone in authority so you did try. Don’t worry, we will make this better.”

  When he left the room, Macy stood up to follow him. “My dad said I can’t hang out with you guys anymore. I’m really sorry. I tried to tell him it wasn’t your fault, but he said that I never got into any kind of trouble before I started hanging out with you two. Now, in one week I am being harassed and my truck gets smashed to bits. I’ll see you in class tomorrow.”

  The door opened and closed, with Macy on the other side, before I could even respond to her. Macy’s parents wouldn’t let her talk to us, Ashley’s parents were very close to saying the exact same thing, and here I was, wondering why no one was pointing the finger at Brock and his cronies.

  “Ash? Do you still blame me?” I couldn’t look at her when I asked. I didn’t think I could handle seeing the look in her eyes when she told me that she did.