by Terri Reed
Johnny walked around the gym gathering up the empty and half-empty foam cups of hot chocolate.
When they met up at the garbage can, Johnny said, “This was a great idea. If we reached one kid, it’ll be worth it.” There was a wistful quality to his voice that made her respect him even more. This battle, the war on drugs, as the media called it, was personal. He was determined to make a difference and save lives.
Ellie stuffed the empty doughnut boxes into the large gray garbage totes. “I owe you an apology.”
Johnny stopped and cocked his head.
“I gave you a lot of grief over arresting my brother. I thought you were wrong. I did blame you.”
“Your brother is lucky to have you. To have a family that cares.” He reached out and slid a strand of her hair through his fingers. When she looked at him with a question in her eyes, he held out his fingers. “Chocolate.”
Ellie felt her face heat. “Love me a chocolate doughnut.”
Johnny laughed and wiped his fingers on a napkin he snagged from a nearby table.
Ellie lowered her voice. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why did you let me believe my brother was innocent?”
Johnny ran a hand across his jaw. “Would you have believed me?”
Ellie bowed her head. Would she have?
“Hey,” Johnny said, reaching out and tilting her chin up with his warm finger, “loyalty and loving someone so much that you want to believe the best of them is a good thing.” He swallowed hard. “Don’t fault yourself for that.”
Ellie pulled her sleeves down over her hands. “Do you think my brother is involved now?” The thought of her brother using her shop as a drug drop made her ill.
Johnny touched her hand lightly. “I don’t think so, but I do have to consider his history.”
Nausea welled up in her throat and she breathed in slowly through her nose. “I pray he’s matured since his reckless high school days.”
He squeezed her hand, but didn’t say anything.
“Thank you for being here.” Ellie gazed around the room, hoping to see more garbage she could collect, something to distract her from this intense conversation, a conversation she felt went deeper than her relationship with her brother.
Ellie ducked away from Johnny and grabbed a wet rag from the utility sink in the corner of the gym and wrung it out. She wiped down the two tables and paused. “I hate to think any of these kids are involved with drugs. They seem like such good kids.”
“Even good kids can get caught up in drugs. I’ve seen it too many times to count.”
She turned around to face Johnny. Something dark swept across his face. “I’m sorry about your mom.”
A half smile tilted the corner of his lips. “Unfortunately my story isn’t unique.”
Ellie stopped wiping the table and touched his forearm. “You’re a good man.”
He patted the back of her hand. “You hardly know me.”
She shrugged, unable to articulate what she really wanted to say. Something along the lines of, “That may be true, but I like what I see, anyway.” She rinsed and wrung the rag in the sink and spread it out on the edge to dry. “I think we’ve put everything back in its place. The kids can take care of the rest.”
“How long have you belonged to this church? You seem at home here.” The sincerity in Johnny’s question piqued her interest.
Ellie gave his question some thought. “Yeah, I guess I do. It’s like a second home. My family has belonged to this church since I was a little girl.” She paused. “Of course, I was away for a few years, but when I broke up with my boyfriend and moved back home, this was…well, also part of my coming home.” She looked up and flushed when she found him watching her. “Does that fall under TMI?” She giggled nervously.
His unwavering attention made her flush. “Too much information? No, I like learning more about you.”
Ellie glanced down at the hardwood floor and the solid red line of the basketball court. “Um, do you belong to a church?”
“No, I don’t. Mom worshipped at the altar of drugs.”
Something akin to regret welled in her gut. Their conversation had gone from sweet and lighthearted to suddenly dark. She swallowed hard. “I’m sorry.” She didn’t know what else to say.
He held up his hand. “Nothing for you to be sorry about. My mom made her own choices. Most of them bad.” He pulled up the lining of the full garbage can. “Because of her, I am what I am today.”
Ellie watched as he tied the bag closed. “We can take that to the Dumpster on our way out.”
She walked ahead and held the door open for Johnny. They had spent a lot of time together recently and she had grown to enjoy his company. She did feel a little guilty about keeping him from helping his grandfather pack up the home on Treehaven. However, by Johnny’s account, his grandfather didn’t seem in much of a rush.
Johnny and Ellie strolled across the parking lot. The light from the lampposts reflected in the rain puddles. The fall air had turned crisp and Ellie zipped up her fleece jacket. Soon, fleece wouldn’t cut it and she’d have to break out her thick winter jacket and a knit hat. She wasn’t looking forward to that. She never had.
Johnny hoisted the garbage bag into the trash and it landed with a wet plop. She scrunched up her nose as the putrid scent of refuse floated out to greet them from the Dumpster. He wiped his hands together as they strolled toward his vehicle.
Ellie slipped her hands into her pockets and waited for Johnny to unlock the car doors. “Do you think any of these kids know who provided Kerry with drugs?”
“Tough to say. But one thing I do know, they wouldn’t have approached us in front of their friends. The most I can hope for is that they took my business card and will call me directly. Anonymously, even.”
The sound of shoes running on pavement sent goose bumps racing across Ellie’s arms. She spun around, bracing herself. Johnny was at her side in a heartbeat. He discreetly ushered her behind him with one hand and had his other hand under his jacket, no doubt reaching for his gun.
They were in a church parking lot. Wasn’t he overreacting a bit? Overreacting? Tell that to her racing heart. Ellie set her shoulders back while her eyes strained to see who was approaching out of the shadows.
“Agent Rock?” The young girl’s anguished face became visible under the light of the lamppost.
Ellie stepped around Johnny, relief now pulsing through her veins.
“Kaylee?” Her voice came out high-pitched and squeaky, a result of being startled. The teenager had been in one of the art classes she’d offered as part of her ministry at church. “Is everything okay?” Ellie scanned the parking lot. “Is something wrong?”
Kaylee smiled; a tentative smile, not the genuine smile of a teenager gathered around her friends, laughing at a joke or smiling, trying to get the attention of a young man. No, Kaylee was definitely not herself.
“Um…” Kaylee glanced around, much as Ellie had done. She took a few deep breaths.
Johnny stepped forward, relaxing his protective stance. “Did you need to talk in private?”
Kaylee shook her head, her blunt-cut bob framing her face. “I’m worried about my boyfriend.”
Ellie stepped forward and touched the young girl’s arm. “What’s going on?”
Kaylee’s eyes flicked to Johnny, then back to Ellie. “Things were going great until the end of the summer. Then he got distant.”
“You guys are young. Maybe he didn’t want a girlfriend his senior year.”
Ellie cut Johnny a sideways glance at his frank comment. Could he be any more insensitive?
“What Johnny meant…” Ellie attempted to soften his comment when Kaylee held up her hand.
“It’s okay. That’s what I thought and I was, like, whatever.” Kaylee wiped a tear from her eye. “But then I started seeing him around school. Well, when he bothered to show up. At the rate he’s going, he won’t graduate with the rest of us next spring.”
“Are you w
orried he might be involved with drugs?” There had to be a reason Kaylee had come to them with her concerns. Johnny had just spoken to them about the dangers of drugs and how they needed to reach out to an adult if they had concerns.
Kaylee lifted her shoulders and let them drop.
“Do you want us to talk to him?” Ellie asked.
Indecision creased the young girl’s forehead. She tugged at her T-shirt. “Maybe you can stop by his house. Talk to him.” She shuffled her feet. “Without him, like, knowing I told you.”
“Maybe we can talk to his parents,” Johnny said, a question in his voice.
The whites of Kaylee’s eyes glinted under the lamppost. “His dad left his mom a few months ago. His mom works all the time. And when she’s not working, she sleeps.”
There was a slight pause before Johnny said, “What’s his name and address? I’ll stop by and talk to him.”
Kaylee rattled off her boyfriend’s information, relief evident in her posture. “Don’t tell him I sent you, okay? He’d be really mad.”
*
“I’ll take you home first.” Johnny pulled onto the main road, his focus on the yellow paved line illuminated in his headlights. He wanted to put off seeing this Collin kid, Kaylee’s boyfriend, but something told him he should reach out to him tonight.
If only someone had reached out to my mother in time…
Ellie shifted in her seat. “No, I want to go, too. He’s more likely to talk to me. I know him from our church. Collin’s one of the kids who helped me paint the shop. With Kerry.”
She let that little nugget hang out there. Collin and Kerry—the young man who was clinging to life after an overdose—were friends.
“He trusts me.” Her voice turned shaky. “I have a hard time believing this kid is caught up in drugs.” She tugged on her seat belt. “I wouldn’t have pegged Kerry for using, either.” She sighed heavily as if to say, “What do I know?”
“Even good kids make bad decisions.” Johnny scratched his head. “I have to take you home. I can’t put you in danger.”
Ellie groaned. “Danger? He’s a seventeen-year-old kid. A kid I know. He’s not going to hurt me.”
He shook his head, deciding not to fill her in on his experience with violent kids far younger than seventeen.
Apparently sensing her misstep, Ellie said, “Please. If you sense any danger, I’ll go back to the car. Lock myself inside.”
The image of shattering glass from the other night scraped across his brain. Locked in his car wasn’t exactly Fort Knox. Johnny sagged into the seat and slowed at the stop sign. Collin lived in the trailer park on the other side of town. A sense of urgency made his leg twitch.
“Okay.” It would save time, but he didn’t like it.
A few minutes later they pulled into Cedar Heights, a name far too fancy for the ill-tended trailer homes, many with rust stains on their once-white walls and spare car parts decorating their postage stamp–size front lawns. His assessment was overly critical, but he realized he came upon it honestly. It was in a trailer park like this one in a suburb of Buffalo where his mother had hit rock bottom. Even before his mother had met her fate, he’d felt his had been sealed. The kids in school had teased him relentlessly. Trailer-park kids didn’t rank high on the popularity scale.
Kids were ruthless.
Drugs even more so.
“Kaylee said he’s in number 34—the last one in this row.” Leaning forward, Ellie tugged on her seat belt and angled her head to read the numbers—if there were any—on the sides of the trailers. “There it is.” Just as Kaylee had said—the last one.
Johnny slammed his car into Park and grabbed Ellie’s hand as she pulled the door release. She smiled up at him under the dome light, understanding in her eyes. “Anything weird, I get back in the car and lock the doors.”
Johnny gave her a curt nod.
He walked around and met her by the front of the car. They headed toward the metal platform that served as the front stoop. Just as Ellie’s foot hit the first step, Johnny noticed a handlebar poking out from the side of the trailer. He gently touched the small of her back and whispered, “Look.” Grabbing her hand, he led her to a motorcycle. Ellie glanced up at him, an expression of shock moving across her face.
“Do you think…?” she whispered, glancing over her shoulder toward the stoop.
“I never got a good look at the make and model of the motorcycle, so maybe it’s a coincidence.”
The front porch light flipped on, making them both spin around.
A young man Johnny assumed was Collin pushed open the screen door and dragged his hand across his mussed hair. “Hey, get away from my bike.” He blinked a few times and his features seemed to soften a bit when he recognized Ellie. He coughed in his hand and cocked his head. “What are you doing here, Miss Ellie?”
Ellie let go of Johnny’s hand and stepped forward, even though Johnny had the gut feeling he should stand in front of her, protect her. “We wanted to check on you. We heard Kerry’s in the hospital.”
Collin twitched and scrubbed a hand across his face as if they had woken him. “Kerry’s messed up.”
“How are you doing?”
Collin crossed his arms and rolled up on the balls of his feet. The crickets filled the silence.
Johnny finally spoke. “This your bike?”
“Who’s asking?”
“This is my friend, Johnny Rock.” Ellie spoke up before he had a chance to.
“What’s it to you?” Collin braced his hands on the metal railing and glanced over his shoulder at the front door.
This boy was hiding something.
Johnny stepped forward, his nerve endings on high alert. “I’m Special Agent John Rock of the FBI. Is this your motorcycle?”
The boy’s gaze swung to the bike, then to the darkened road. As if on a springboard, he vaulted down the steps and sprinted between the trailers.
Ellie gasped.
Johnny groaned and took off running. Why did people think running away from a federal agent was a good idea?
Johnny bolted between the trailers, his eyes adjusting to the heavy shadows. He slowed as he approached the corner of the trailer and listened.
Nothing.
He grabbed his gun from his shoulder holster and eased closer to the side of the trailer. When he reached the corner, he stuck close to the cover of the building and sneaked a peek. Collin was crouched down, looking as if he was ready to tackle Johnny if he had blindly chased the kid.
Not a bad idea, kid, if he hadn’t been a federal agent who knew better.
Johnny pivoted around the corner, his gun aimed at the crouching teen. “Don’t move.”
*
“Don’t shoot him!”
Ellie blinked a few times, her eyes adjusting to the darkness. Adrenaline made her blood run cold. Johnny had his gun trained on a hunkering Collin. The boy had his hands up, but seemed frozen in an awkward position. In the moonlight, terror glinted in his eyes.
“I’m not going to shoot the kid,” Johnny said, a mix of frustration and disgust lacing his voice. He tucked his gun in its holster. “But I don’t like surprises. If I had run around this corner, your friend Collin here would have tackled me.”
Without the gun aimed at his head, Collin stood and seemed to regain some of his swagger. “Why did you pull a gun on me?” The tone suggested Collin might actually have had the nerve to call Special Agent Johnny Rock “dude,” but somewhere deep down the young man had mustered some of the manners Ellie knew he had been taught, and refrained.
“Why did you run from me?” Johnny widened his stance, ready to take on Collin if necessary.
Ellie’s pulse thrummed in her ears. Now what had Collin gotten himself involved with?
Collin’s shoulders sagged and he sat on a beat-up wicker chair, perched precariously on uneven aqua indoor-outdoor carpeting. His body folded like a crushed pizza box and he jammed his hands into his unruly hair. To Ellie’s surprise, his shoul
ders began to shake. Was he crying?
An outdoor spotlight flicked on and a sharp pain jabbed her in the eyes. The harsh light illuminated the yard, unmasking its truly depressing state of disrepair. A broken umbrella stood sentinel over a worn picnic table. Collin, a boy whose preschool Sunday school class she had assisted, sat broken and confused, on the cusp of being a man, but obviously not ready to step with both feet into the adult world. A shadow crossed the window below the spotlight and Ellie knew her opportunity to talk to Collin was fleeting.
Ellie crouched beside Collin and placed her hands on the arm of the wicker chair. A broken piece of wicker pricked her finger. “What is it, Collin?”
He looked up, his face tearstained. “I didn’t mean for you to get hurt. It was just a BB gun.”
Ellie slowly stood, a cold chill skittering down her spine. An understanding stretched between her and Johnny. She swallowed hard. “What did you do, Collin?” Her voice held a distant quality, as if she were outside herself watching the situation.
“What’s going on out here?” A brassy-voiced, disheveled woman shouted at them as she stormed around the side of the trailer. Ellie barely recognized her as the young mother, lines creasing her eyes and mouth, who used to show up in church with her husband and son in a neat sweater set. That all seemed a million years ago.
“I’m sorry, Mom.” The pain in Collin’s eyes broke Ellie’s heart.
Anger and confusion fought for dominance on Mrs. Parker’s tired face. “Who…?” Her tone was uncertain. “What’s going on?”
Johnny was the first to speak. “I’m Special Agent John Rock. I’d like to talk to your son if I can.”
Mrs. Parker rubbed her eyes and tried to muster some of the anger that had brought her storming outside only moments ago. “Does he need a lawyer?” Her voice shook. “I can’t afford a lawyer.”
“I need to tell them,” Collin said, sounding more like a little boy than a teenager. “I need to shake this guilt. I can’t stand it anymore.” He looked up at his mother with all the conflicting emotions of a son who was about to come clean and accept his punishment.