Chapter One
Fallen Friend
September 20, 1996
The door chimed as I stepped into Sammy’s Shop Smart.
“Alex, where’ve you been?” asked Vivian, a woman I’d begun to call Mom.
“At the community college. I stopped by to see Dad for a few, though. You need somethin’?”
Mom punched a few keys into her register, and it shot open. Glancing at the woman in front of her, she grinned and said, “Thank you. Have a nice day.”
The customer took her change, patted her small boy on the butt, and hissed, “Now quit begging. No more candy this week or your father’ll have a fit.” She ushered him out the door as Mom came around the counter to give me a hug.
“How was school?”
“College is different from high school. The classes are a bit more grueling. Mr. Tanner’s Intro to Environmental Science is taking more time than I thought it would, especially with everything else.”
She nodded, understanding the implied everything else better than most people. Vivian and I had been getting along a lot better since the previous year’s incident. Even my stepsister Abby seemed to have turned a corner. She took Gloria’s passing hard, maybe as hard as me, but lately she’d focused on school a bit more. She even made a friend or two in high school.
“Yes, but I needed a hug,” Mom said, after releasing me and my book bag from her grip. “How’s Abby? Still doing better?”
I nodded. “Yeah, she’s just taking it day by day, like the rest of us.”
“Good.” Her lips trembled, and her eyes glistened with unspoken words, but after a shake of her head, she grabbed a box from the end of one of the small aisles. “So Abby made it home alright?” she asked, unpacking the box and hanging bags of peanuts and trail mix on the assorted pegs.
“Yeah, Mom. I walked her most of the way home from school before stopping by the cemetery. What is it? What’s on your mind?”
“It’s nothin’ new, hon,” she said, averting her eyes and using the edge of her red work apron to wipe away some tears. “Just still gets to me, is all.”
I nudged the edge of the box with my shoe, giving her a moment. “Look, I know I said I’d stay and help out like most days, but Mr. Tanner gave me a boatload of homework. You mind if I skip out today?”
She nodded. I slipped out as quietly as I could, brushing past a group of teenagers who had just made their way from school. Backpacks in tow, they were jabbering about movies and video games. I caught just a snippet of their conversation, but it was enough to trigger a few memories. The childhood joy of no responsibilities and familiar, loving parents had haunted me for years. Dad was a good man, but since the wreck when I was in eighth grade, my family had been through a lot.
At least the Drunk is out of our lives, but was it worth the cost? I wondered. A shiver ran down my spine, and I pushed the question from my mind. There was no use contemplating what couldn’t be changed.
I trekked over the concrete sidewalks, past the black, iron fence surrounding the late Brogand Manor, and under the tall trees shading the street. The wind was calmer, but the leaves still rustled overhead. I was careful not to touch the fences. You never know what might have happened in the past. I didn’t mind helping out when the ghosts found me, but I wasn’t gonna go looking for trouble. I barely had enough time to finish my homework as it was.
I crossed the railroad tracks in thought and unconsciously followed my daily routine toward our new trailer. It was by no means new, but none of us could stand the thought of staying in the Drunk’s old one. Even in prison he held the deed, and we wanted nothing more to do with him. It didn’t take more than a few weeks to convince Mom that our combined income at Sammy’s would more than pay for the rent on another trailer. At first I’d pushed for a house, something more like what I’d grown up in with her and Dad. It would’ve been good for Abby, and probably for the rest of us too, but those meager paychecks were more than enough to demonstrate what we could and couldn’t afford. All the beer the Drunk and my stepbrother Frank used to consume took up most of the income they brought in, but with Mom and I both working full time over the summer, it still wouldn’t have been enough for anything more than what we already had. We found a place a few rows over. It was a little newer, probably no more than a dozen years old, and wasn’t infested with the putrid, lingering smell of stale cigarettes.
The memory of stepping into clouds of rolling smoke assaulted my senses. Even with him gone it was sometimes difficult to get the man out of my head. His slurred, drunken voice echoed in my ears, drowning out the squeak of his recliner and the vague chatter of a street chase radiating from the television. “Stupid, disrespectful kid. Cants even call me, Dad.”
A shudder ran through me. Then I stepped over a curb, and a wave of knee-high grass whisked along my jeans, jolting me back to reality. At one end of the vacant lot was a wooden fence where someone’s house butted up to the lot. It had been mowed in the search for Helen, Abby and Gloria’s mother, but the grass had again grown up. It wasn’t to the same height as before, but was still high enough to partially cover the white cross we’d placed in the field.
After receiving my first paycheck that summer, Abby and I went to the florist and picked up a memorial cross for Abby’s mother. The pink Delphiniums she chose, Helen’s favorite color, still ran across its arms, marking her first burial place. The flowers seemed to have taken root and peered out between blades of grass. At least something’s growin’ here, I thought. Hopefully it won’t be completely lost as nature takes over again.
Seeing the lot in daylight was easier to handle, but the memories were difficult to overcome. The vision again assaulted my senses: the bed of the truck clanging shut, the feel of being dragged through waist-high grass, and the chook—shiff, chook—shiff of the shovel carving the hole in the ground, then slinging the dirt aside. I stepped onto the street’s edge and followed it to Tranquil Heights Trailer Park.
The large sign at the entrance was faded, with cream and brown paint chipping and weeds growing from the mulch at the base of its wooden posts. The green moss may have taken over more of the sparse shrubbery than last year. At least I no longer dreaded coming home each day. Although the visions haunted me, the familiar, forlorn sense of impending doom was absent from them.
“Hey, Alex,” Abby said as I entered the trailer. “What’re you doin’ home so early?” She sat at the kitchen table, her school texts spread before her.
“Hey, Black Mamba,” I hissed with a teasing smile. I’d recently given her the nickname since learning about the snakes in science class.
“Alex, cut it out,” she said, frowning. “You know I hate when you call me that.”
I slung my bag into my room down the hall and made a beeline for the refrigerator. “I can’t help what your hair reminds me of.” She’d recently taken to partially braiding some of her jet-black hair.
“Well, I’m not gonna stop for you,” she said, without much conviction. “It’s what a lot of the girls at school are doing.”
“You don’t have to. It’s your hair, but since when do you go along with what everyone else does? I’ve never known you to be a follower.” While digging through the fridge, I noticed her running fingers through one of the braids, unconsciously loosening it. I smiled at the milk, grabbed the carton, and poured myself a glass. “Listen, I’ve got a bunch of homework, so I’ll be in my room if you need me. Just give a yell.”
“Mmmm-hmmm,” she murmured back, not bothering to look up from her books.
The remainder of the evening was dull, uneventful, and consisted of me, a couple ham sandwiches for me and Abby, my CD player and headphones, a desk lamp, and school books. I’d never studied so hard before. I spent high school in a daze. Now life was different. When people are depending on you, you can’t give up.
Mom came home late and disappeared into her room, saying she had to be up early yet again. Flicking the light off at close to midnight, I slunk out of my hea
vy metal t-shirt and jeans, and slipped into bed.
* * *
The next morning was much the same. I escorted Abby to Madessa High School, my alma mater. It was her first year there, and I normally didn’t stay long.
“Hello, Mr. Drummond,” said Mrs. Easely, spotting us as we approached the clock centered in the courtyard. Her face and tone were grim, like she’d just bitten into a rotten prune. This was why I avoided good ol’ Madessa when I could. I ignored her.
“You good to go?” I asked Abby.
She nodded. “Yep, have fun at school.”
I forced a smile under Stone Face Easely’s accusing gaze and focused on Abby. “I’ll try.”
I turned to leave as Abby walked away, but my old Trig teacher’s voice echoed through the yard again. “I know you heard me, Mr. Drummond.”
I stopped and slowly turned to face her. “Yes… yes I did, Mrs. Easely. Is there something I can help you with?”
By this point, my blood was simmering, but I couldn’t speak my mind for fear of what she might do to Abby in class. They say the sins of the father will be visited upon the son. Well, there’s a good many years between a father and son, and only the summer between Easely’s classes with me and those with my stepsister. Considering the rumors going around after Coach Moyer vamoosed, some people—faculty included—think I had something to do with it. While they’re right, I certainly wasn’t the one to blame. But telling that to Stone Face Easely would be like trying to coax a viper over for a cuddle.
“I hear tell that you’re in college.”
“That’s right.”
“So what do you want to do when you drop out?” The question came out with such nonchalance I stalled for a second, rewinding her words and running them through my mind again.
“I’m sorry. I don’t believe I heard you right.”
“You certainly did, Mr. Drummond. You’re wasting your money on school right now. You barely scraped by in my class last year, and that was solely due to my giving nature. You can’t cut it in college. We all know it, and you won’t be able to pull the same thing you did with Mr. Moyer. Your professors won’t run away just because you threaten them.”
My jaw dropped… threaten? My face flushed and I had to clench my fists to keep from shaking some sense into her. “Mrs. Easely, I’ve never threatened anyone for a grade, but I will make you a promise: I will graduate. And to answer your question, I’m working on a degree in Criminal Justice. In fact, I’m sure you’ll be seeing a great deal of me, because I’ll be the one pulling you over and watching you stumble over a sobriety line while trying to find your damn nose!” By my final word, my voice had risen about twenty decibels. Clusters of students throughout the courtyard were all turned toward us. Abby stood by the waist-high, rock wall that encircled the tall, narrow clock and flowers. What little color her skin possessed had drained from her face, but a smile twitched at the edges of her lips. “And another thing,” I continued, my voice returning to a more reasonable volume. “If I hear so much as a peep about you treating Abby different than the rest of your students, I’ll have your job.” I wasn’t sure how I’d do it, but I meant every word.
My old Trig teacher paled and seemed to shrink a few inches. A few students clapped, but as soon as Easely resumed her composure and turned to find the culprit, all sounds stopped, leaving barely an echo resounding off the buildings. She turned back to me with eyes blazing. “You unethical, irresponsible child. You think you can threaten me and get away with it?”
A momentary pang of regret shot through my gut. “Actually, I think I just did.” Breaking into a grin, I turned on my heels and left the sixty-five-year-old teacher fuming. A swift glance back at Abby told me she shared my happiness. “Have a nice day,” I shouted to the math teacher. Then I waved. Considering the monotony of how I awoke, the day was turning out better than expected.
* * *
A finger tapped my shoulder as I stepped into the college cafeteria. “Hi, honey. How’re things going?” asked Paige, as beautiful as ever.
The cafeteria was more like a mall’s, with six or seven small fast-food joints arranged in a semicircle. The windows covering the far side of the cafeteria were enormous and made up the entire circular wall, filling the large room with light. The sun shone through the windows, and the rays played off her brown curls.
I couldn’t help but smile as I stared into those honey-brown eyes. “Hey, beautiful. Going great now that you’re here. How’d I get so lucky?”
She blushed and averted her eyes, then glanced up at me from under long eyelashes. “How can I resist that sweet talk?” Brushing by, she whispered, “Keep it up and someday you might just get lucky.”
Her affectionate tone anchored my feet to the semicircular pattern of tiles below, and I was forced to catch back up in line.
She’d elected for Chinese food, which we both enjoyed, and grabbed a tray.
“You know I love it when you tease me like that,” I whispered in her ear as she ladled noodles onto her plate. I grabbed some Kung Pao Chicken, rice, and eggrolls, then paid for our dishes. As we slid into a booth, I said, “You’ll never guess who I spoke to today.”
“Who?” she asked, slurping a noodle with a smile.
“Stone Face Easely.”
“Oh yeah, how’s she doing?” Her tone was more affectionate than I expected.
“Well, fine I guess, but she’s really got it in for me.”
Paige paused. “What do you mean?”
“The old nag blames me for manipulating Coach Moyer into leaving.”
“You did.”
“No I didn’t. I… I spoke with him and revealed the truth about what he did. I may even have insinuated that people might find out. But I didn’t do it for the grade or to be vindictive.”
“I know that. Are you telling me she thinks differently?”
“Yep, Easely said I was going to drop out, couldn’t hack it, and wondered what menial job I had in mind for the future. Then she had the gall to say my professors won’t skip town because I threaten them. She even said I only passed her class because of her good graces.”
“Well, you have to admit that you didn’t do much in her class,” Paige contended.
Every time she spoke, she blew my thoughts out of the mental water. She was my girlfriend. Why was she supporting this horrendous woman? “I know, and maybe she was lenient toward me. Compared to any other teacher, that should still have given me a B+, but saying I threatened Coach Moyer, and insinuating that it was the only way I could’ve passed, was too much.”
She shrugged mid-chew, swallowed, and said, “Maybe, but look at it from her perspective. The only things she has to go on are rumors. You know the truth, but aside from me and Jessie, you’re the only one. You should be used to people not understanding by now. You’re the only one that experiences these visions, so the only thing other people see are your actions.”
My shoulders slumped. She was right. I’d only managed to get the nerve up to tell my best friend Jessie over the summer, and I wasn’t always sure he believed me, but at least he didn’t act like I had some disease. “I know. She’s wrong though, and I’m afraid she might take it out on Abby.”
“She might, but life isn’t fair. You can understand how she came to that assumption though, can’t you?”
“Yeah,” I muttered, “here you go again, always acting as my voice of reason.”
“That’s what a second opinion is good for, an unbiased way to look at a situation. Now quit yapping and eat your food. Your eggrolls are getting tough. They’ve probably been under that heat lamp for long enough to cure beef jerky. If you wait too much longer, you’ll break your teeth.”
I nodded. “’Kay. Where were you this morning when I needed you?”
Paige’s brow drew down in confusion. “What do you mean? I was in class.”
“Yeah, but I wasn’t the nicest to Easely.”
“Oh, no,” Paige whispered, leaning in. “What did you say?”
<
br /> It wasn’t like anyone around cared about our conversation, but I played it up and leaned in, too. “I was kind of a smartass, said a few things, and told her that if she treated Abby any differently I’d have her job.”
Paige chortled and about choked on a stray noodle. Then she shook her head. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“I know. Like I said, where was my beautiful conscience when I needed her?”
“Around,” she answered with a teasing smile. “And how on earth did you expect to pull off that threat?”
It was my turn to shrug. “Not sure. Sounded good at the time though. Besides, I think it meant a lot to Abby to see someone sticking their neck out on her behalf. She hasn’t had a lot of support over the years.”
“That’s true.”
The rest of the meal went by like normal with grins, laughs, and moments that I’ll never forget. Unfortunately, on the way out of the cafeteria, things changed. I wasn’t searching, but a victim found me. As we stepped through the foyer, I spotted Jessie on the veranda outside. Telling Paige I’d catch up, I walked over to him. He was the same old Jessie, but a bit more cleaned up in jeans and a long-sleeve polo. However, his hands were stuck deep in his pockets like he was searching for some hidden route to Wonderland.
“Hey, Jess, what’s happenin’? I thought you were supposed to be up in DC trying out for the Nationals.”
He nodded and put on a forced smile. “Yeah man, I was. I even made it. I’ll be pullin’ stakes and movin’ there for a while. Gotta play triple-A first, but I’ll make it to the big time. Maybe it’ll actually turn out that going to school is plan B for me, but I’m back for a different reason.” His smile faded. “Did you hear what happened to Junior Lee?”
Junior Lee was a couple years behind us at Madessa High. He played football with Jessie and was a good guy all around, nothing like Grant Brogand used to be. “Nah, I haven’t heard anything. What happened?”
A Life of Death: Episodes 5 - 8 Page 8