by PJ Fernor
“I can’t wait to leave here,” she said. “There’s nothing good to watch.”
“Hospitals are the worst,” Ben said. “Bet you can’t wait to get back to dance, right?”
“Soon enough,” Connor said.
“Well, Nelle wanted to come by and see her today,” Cat said.
“That’s good,” I said.
My mouth kept moving but I didn’t say anything else. I wasn’t in a position to start lecturing on what to do next. That was up to them to figure out.
For me, just seeing Jessie alive, cleaned up, and smiling was enough.
“I’m actually hungry,” Jessie said.
“All she’s been doing is eating,” Cat said.
“Which is really good,” Connor said.
“The food here isn’t,” Jessie said. “I just want…”
Jessie stopped talking.
Her face turned bright white.
I heard the clicking of footsteps next to Connor.
Jessie slowly turned her head and watched with fear in her eyes.
When I turned my head, I saw a nurse approaching.
Jessie let out a breath and color returned to her face.
That hurt to see.
She was going to live with this for a while. It was going to take a lot of work - hard work - to get beyond it.
“Ready to go home, Jessie?” the nurse asked.
“Yes, please,” Jessie said.
“We’ll get out of the way,” I said. I looked at Connor. “Out of the way for good now.”
Connor grinned.
“We just wanted to see how you were doing,” Ben said.
“Thank you,” Jessie said to us. “I…”
“Say no more,” I said to Jessie. “You just go take care of yourself, okay? You’re so much stronger than you realize right now. And someday you’ll realize how strong you are… and by then you’ll be even stronger.”
Jessie nodded.
Ben and I walked down the hallway.
I looked back and paused.
It was just in time to see the family of three hug. Cat and Connor squeezing Jessie between them. A quick hug, but it was better than fighting. Connor then touched Cat’s shoulder. She looked at him and smiled. She lifted her left hand and touched his hand on her shoulder. She rested her cheek to their hands for a second. Then Connor leaned over and kissed Cat’s forehead.
I wasn’t sure what it all meant.
It didn’t mean they were going to end up back together or work it all out, but at the very least, I wanted more than anything for the two of them to let the past go and work on raising their daughter together. As parents. And someone to know when to pick Jessie up from dance…
As we turned the corner, I walked right into Ben.
He had stopped walking and I wasn’t paying attention.
I looked up at him.
“You okay?” I asked him.
“I don’t know,” he said. “Are you sticking around here?”
“The hospital?”
“No, Allie. Here. This town.”
“Yeah,” I said. “I’m here for Lo. Why?”
Ben looked nervous. Almost like that shy boy I used to know who wiped his hands with a dirty rag five hundred times as we talked.
“What’s wrong?” I asked him.
“You want to go out sometime?” Ben asked.
“What?”
“Never mind.”
Ben tried to turn and I grabbed his arm. “Did you just ask me out on a date, Ben?”
“Yeah, I did. And I should have done it a long time ago, okay? There. I asked. I said it. Whatever.”
I smiled.
“What’s so funny?” he asked me.
“I have one question for you.”
“What is it, Allie Down?”
“What took you so long to ask?”
Chapter Seventy-Eight
I paced from the kitchen to the dining room table. Back and forth, losing count after twenty-five times. I told myself there was no reason to be nervous. It was Ben. Just Ben. That was it. No matter what happened in life, he was the kind of guy who understood things. That’s the way he always was.
But he deserves more than that, doesn’t he?
The bathroom door finally opened and I paused mid-pace.
Lo stepped out and looked at me. Her hands were tucked into the arms of her hoodie. She jammed her hands to her eyes and groaned.
I swallowed hard.
This was uncharted waters for me at the moment.
Lo was having a really bad day. A really, really bad day. And on top of a really bad day, it was a certain time of the month for her. I foolishly should have known it was coming too.
“She told everyone a stupid rumor,” Lo said. “Why?”
Her chin quivered.
I stepped closer to Lo, taking my life into my hands.
I was able to hug her.
She hugged me back.
“I’m so sorry, Lo,” I said. “Sometimes people are just bad.”
“She’s not bad,” Lo said. “She’s a bitch.”
“Logan…”
“What?” she yelled. “She is. She does this. She’s mean. She’s a bully. She’s the one who…”
“The one who, what?” I asked.
Lo backed away. She wiped her eyes again. “I hate her.”
“This is hitting you really hard,” I said. “Why?”
“Because it is.”
“Lo…”
“Okay, fine,” she said. “You know what? Fine. I need you right now, Allie. I haven’t slept in a while. I know everything that happened with those girls and that creepy man. You haven’t talked to me about it though. And you almost died. Your shoulder…”
I looked to my shoulder. I hadn’t even considered it. It ended up being a small cut from the machete and where the bullet grazed me. Nothing a few bandages couldn’t take care of. But for Lo…
“You were shot!” Lo cried out.
“Shot at,” I said. “I’m fine.”
“Yeah? Well I’m not. And I don’t want Miss Kesslier here tonight. I want you here tonight. Because everything is falling apart again. And I don’t feel good. And that… that…” Lo gasped for a breath and looked at me. “She kissed the guy I like. On purpose too. She did it in front of everyone. All because I wasn’t brave enough to tell him I liked him. And because I haven’t…”
I grabbed Lo and hugged her again.
Now I was angry.
This poor girl had to carry so much at all times. And now this. The terrible high school angst of liking a boy and not sure what to do about it.
“Why don’t you find something to watch?” I asked Lo. “We’ll order bad food, eat junk food, and trash the heck out of this girl. Show me a picture of her. I bet she has fluffy eyebrows and giant, purple warts on her forehead, right?”
Lo rolled her eyes. “At least you’re trying.”
Lo walked by me and I hung my head.
Yeah, Lo, at least I’m trying.
She plopped down on the couch and there was a knock at the door.
I opened the door and Ben stood there with flowers.
He was in dark jeans and a black t-shirt that wrapped around his thick, muscle-laced arms. It was almost like the t-shirt was made for just his body.
All those years of working at his father’s garage plus being a cop and detective really did wonders for him…
I stepped into the hallway and frowned.
“What?” Ben asked.
“I’m so sorry.”
“Why?”
“Lo is having the worst day ever,” I said.
“What happened?”
“Teenager stuff,” I said. “And me.”
“You?”
“It’s hard for her to think about what I do.”
“Ah… poor kid,” Ben said. “Take the flowers and share them with Lo. If you need me to hit a store and stock up on ice cream or anything, let me know.”
Not even an ounce
of a frown on his end. Or an ounce of being upset at me or the situation.
“I was…”
I saw movement from the corner of my eye.
I turned my head and saw Miss Kesslier poking her head out of her door.
She looked at me, looked at Ben, looked back at me, then she smiled big and gave me a thumbs up.
“Come on in for a minute,” I said to Ben.
“You sure?”
“Please, yes,” I said.
We went into the apartment.
Lo was on the couch, her legs tucked into her hoodie with the hood pulled up.
Some kind of reality dating show droned from the TV.
“See what I’m working with here?” I whispered to Ben.
He smiled at me. “Mind if I take a stab at this?”
“Careful,” I said as I touched his hand. “I won’t be able to save you if she attacks.”
Ben turned his hand and squeezed mine.
He handed me the flowers and then pulled one from the bouquet and walked to the couch.
He plopped right down next to Lo.
“Hey, Lo,” he said.
“Hi,” she said.
“Here,” he said. “It’s a flower.”
Lo looked at Ben. “Uh, thanks.”
Ben pointed to the TV. “So what do you think here? There’s no way in hell Jasmine is going to fall for Trent’s crap again, right?”
“You know this show?” Lo asked.
“Wait a second,” I called out. “You watch this, Ben?”
Ben looked back and forth. “What? Dad watches cowboy shows and the news all the time. It’s good to sit back and relax once in a while.”
“Once in a while?” I asked.
“Okay, fine,” Ben said. “I DVR and binge it.”
“You binge it?” Lo asked.
Ben clapped his hands together and pointed to the TV. “Oh, no way, Jasmine. Don’t you dare let Kyle swoon you now. Come on, girlfriend.”
Ben leaned forward and stared at the TV with intense eyes.
Lo looked at me.
I shrugged my shoulders.
Ben sighed and sat back. “Hey, Lo.”
“Yeah?” Lo asked.
“Did I ever tell you the time I got shot in the butt by a biker chick?”
“No,” Lo said as she started to giggle.
I walked from the front door to the kitchen.
The flowers were beautiful but I had no vase for them.
I opened the cabinet and found the biggest glass I could.
The flowers didn’t fit.
Trim the stems, Allie.
I rolled my eyes.
That’s how long it’s been since someone gave me flowers.
I cut the stems and put them into the glass and filled it with water.
Then I stood at the kitchen window.
I heard Ben telling Lo the story of how he got shot in the butt by a biker chick.
It made me smile.
It made me shake my head.
In between the story, they both ooohhed and aaahhed at the TV over the trashy reality show they were watching.
But it was perfect.
I opened the blinds and took a deep breath.
Two people walked down the sidewalk next to each other.
In the apartment building across the street, there were random lights on in random apartments and random rooms.
There was always something waiting.
A missing cat.
A missing girl.
But right then… right now… it was good to be alive.
It was good to be home.
Epilogue
(10:49 pm)
It started with her hair.
The sweet, succulent smell of honey mixed with strawberry, dancing through the air, through all those people, hitting his nose. Just for him. Because nobody else looked. Not a single person moved their eyes from their smartphone to look at the woman walking near them.
In the presence of beauty, royalty, something so life changing and defining that it… well… changed everything.
He wasn’t going to bother with it anymore.
The slashes hidden behind the picture in the living room read | | | | as the reminder of what waited inside of him.
The smell of her hair stopped him.
A man behind him bumped into him and he dropped his phone.
“Moron,” the man said.
He had a decision then.
And for the first time in his life, he left it up to fate.
Meaning he let the woman walk away.
Fate will bring her back.
He followed the man who called him a moron.
He wanted to know why the man would talk like that in front of such a beautiful woman…
Instead of asking that, he waited for his chance and he put his hand to the back of the man’s head and smashed his face off the corner of a brick wall four times.
The man didn’t even scream.
The first hit must have knocked him out.
By the fourth hit, his face caved in.
He let the man fall to the ground and went home, smiling and whistling, ready for the next day.
The day came and the smell hit him.
That’s when he knew it wasn’t just fate.
It was right.
It was meant to be.
Teasing him with that honey, strawberry smell.
Did she not know his favorite breakfast was homemade waffles with honey dripping on them and fresh cut strawberries on top?
Or maybe she did.
She was out there on purpose.
And now…
“She was mine,” he whispers.
He rubs his hands to his face, as though he just finished shaving.
He shuts his eyes and wishes he could hear her voice again.
One more time.
But that’s not how this works.
He slips his right hand behind her head.
“We had such fun, my love,” he whispers.
She’s been dead for ten minutes and he misses her more with each passing minute.
Her blood is on his face.
Her memory in his heart.
He looks to the picture on the wall.
He smiles.
Number five is my favorite number of all time.
(10:49 pm)
(miles away)
He runs his finger to open the envelope.
“We know what we know and that’s all we can know,” he says.
That’s just simple logic.
The way life goes.
Each little piece coming to life. Truths told that people can’t see.
It made it hard to live… but soon enough it would be known.
He pulls out the piece of paper and opens the letter.
The words ring out in his head.
He can hear her voice. Her perfect voice. The only voice that ever meant anything in his life.
And she gave him trust.
From the day he met her.
He swallows hard and swears to himself he won’t cry.
He promised her he would never cry.
Because death was an experience. It was a goodbye. And in the universe of time, it was just a regular goodbye. If you believed in time… the numbers on a device made by man… then the goodbye of death hurt.
He drops the envelope and walks across the room.
The box on the table has sat for way too long.
“How did it take this long?” he asks.
He opens the lid and looks into it.
It’s everything to him.
Nothing to everyone else.
She always told him he was never truly alone. The stars were the eyes of the souls that the others couldn’t see. The breeze was the breath as the universe sighed in complete relaxation… because everything was okay.
Even when seeing the bad… it was still okay.
She’s on the second step. She’s in heels. She never wears heels. I want to say somethin
g but I can’t. I’m not allowed to step into the work of the universe. So I have to watch her step on the third step and twist her ankle. I have to watch her topple down. I have to feel the embarrassment as she looks around to see if someone saw her even though she’s bleeding from her nose. I already see that I’m going to talk to her. Help her. Get her to an urgent care center and stay with her. I already know I’m going to make her laugh and she’s going to kiss me on the cheek.
He shakes his head.
Sometimes knowing ruins the fun.
But sometimes…
He turns and walks into the next room.
She’s tied up on a chair, bleeding from the side of her head, mostly awake, her own shirt being used to gag her mouth.
He smiles.
She’s scared.
But that’s okay.
He already knows all of this…
… he knows everything.
Keep reading
Hey there Reader
Again, thank you for reading this novel. I’m sure you noticed at the end, we are far from saying our goodbyes.
Allie Down, Ben, Lo, Miss Kesslier, Garrison, Muldavey, and all the others are waiting for you in the next book - DOWN THE DRAIN.
Find out what happens when a ninety-year-old woman commits suicide on her birthday with an address written on her hand… leading to the discovery of decades of murder…
FREE PREVIEW BELOW:
I sat back down after Dana slid into the booth.
“Everything okay?” Leah asked.
“Yes and no,” I said.
“Meaning?” Dana asked.
“Murder,” I whispered.
“Murder?” Dana called out.
“Shh,” I said.
“What happened?” Leah asked.
I knew the looks in their eyes. They were thinking about their favorite TV shows. But this wasn’t that. This was real life. Johnny Barby called me about a serial killer. He wanted my help. Or to just flirt with me…
“It’s a pretty gruesome thing,” I said. “Whoever did this did it in their apartment. The killer’s apartment…”
I stopped myself.
Am I really doing this? Dishing out murder details with friends?
“Whoa,” Dana said. “Was it a bad date gone really wrong?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I was told it’s the… I shouldn’t be talking about this.”