by Bella King
“Okay,” I said, digging into my purse for my wallet. I pulled it out and slipped my ID out of the clear plastic covering, handing it to the burly man.
He took it, holding it between an index finger and thumb, and looked at the picture of me on it. “You look different,” he said, lowering it.
“I used to dye my hair black,” I said. That was true. I went through a bit of an emo phase when I had the picture done. It was embarrassing, but I hadn’t bothered to change it. Maybe now would be a good time.
“Alrighty,” he said, sliding it back over the glass counter to me. “You say you’re looking for a pistol of sorts. Any idea what model?”
“No,” I said truthfully.
“Okay, let’s back up a second. What do you need it for?” He said as I retrieved my ID.
“I just want to keep it in my car for self-defense,” I said.
“Do you have experience handling a firearm?”
“Yes,” I lied, afraid that he might not sell me one if I didn’t.
“Okay, so you probably don’t need anything huge, but since you don’t intend on carrying it with you, you don’t need anything small. I would recommend this one right here,” he said, pointing a finger at the glass below him.
I looked down to see a medium-sized black pistol. It was basic, but that’s all it needed to be. “I’ll take it,” I said.
He chuckled. “Sounds good. Let me get some paperwork for you to fill out and you can be on your way.”
“Thank you,” I said, my eyes never leaving the gun. I was fascinated by it, never actually having fired one. I wondered if I should take it out somewhere and unload a clip to see how it felt. I figured it might even be good when we went camping, in case there were bears.
Maybe that was flawed logic, but once the idea was in my head to buy one, I really wanted to try it out. I felt more powerful having something like that in my car with me, like I was invincible. I knew it wasn’t true, but the illusion was powerful.
The man behind the counter had me fill out a few pages of paperwork, which I breezed through. He even gave me a little piece of candy before I left the shop, which was possibly more exciting than the gun I was walking out with. I was still youthful at heart.
When I got back to my car, I placed the little black case that the gun had come in beside me on the seat. I had bought a small box of ammunition to go with it, but for the life of me, I had no idea how to use it. I would need to watch some videos on my phone and hope I didn’t blow my fingers off trying to handle the thing.
All said and done, I felt pretty good about my new purchase. Megan better watch out. I wasn’t fucking around, but I think she might know that already.
Chapter 11
Revenge is a gift that keeps on giving.
I went straight home, not wanting my parents to think I was up to something. Plus, I needed to work on my dresses. Just because I had gotten wrapped up in school drama didn’t mean I had to give up my passion.
I tucked the gun and ammo into the glove compartment of my car and locked it twice after parking in the driveway. I leaped up the stairs and into the house, having gotten my keys back now so I could let myself in.
“Hey, Ava, can I talk to you for a second?” My father said the second I stepped inside.
Uh oh, had I done something wrong? I felt my stomach drop as I slipped my shoes off to join him in the hallway.
“What’s up?” I asked, trying to look as innocent as possible.
“The painters were here the other day and your fingerprints are already in the paint,” he said with a scowl.
Thank god it wasn’t anything important. I breathed a heavy sigh of relief. “Oh, I’m so sorry dad. I’ll keep my hands off it next time. I didn’t know.”
He nodded, his lips pursed in a very father-like smile. “Good. I want you to tidy up your room. The maid is doing a full cleaning tomorrow and I don’t want her to have to go through all your junk.”
“Isn’t that what the maid is for though?” I asked, wrinkling my nose.
“Don’t talk back to me. Just do what I said, please,” he said.
I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes in front of him. It was difficult. I felt like I had to force my eyeballs to stay still as I answered. “Yes dad.”
“Good,” he said, still standing awkwardly in front of me. “How is school going?”
Ugh, why couldn’t he just let me go? I loved my family, but I honestly didn’t have time for his half-assed questions. It wasn’t like he really cared. It had almost been two weeks, and this was the first time he had asked.
“It’s fine. My grades are good,” I said, telling him what he wanted to hear.
His face relaxed. “Good, good. I guess I’ll let you go now.”
I smiled at him and he stepped aside so that I could leave. I made my way down the hall and turned left to the staircase, jumping up the stairs as soon as I was out of sight. Damn, that had been awkward, but it always was. I never had much of a connection with my parents.
When I got back to my bedroom, I found the place in total disarray. Clothes were strewn everywhere, and my belongings were scattered across the floor like someone had flung them out of the dresser at manic speeds. What the hell had happened?
Now I knew what my father had been talking about when he told me to clean my room. The place looked like a tornado had hit it, sucking everything up, and flinging it around in no particular order. Who had done this?
I looked around for some sign but found little in the way of evidence. My window was closed and locked, as it always was, which meant that the intruder had entered from elsewhere in the house.
Suddenly, I remembered my bag. Megan had it all night yesterday, and she could have easily made a copy of our house key while I was passed out in a ditch. Fuck, I was in deeper trouble than I had thought. All the more reason to have a gun, I suppose. Maybe I should keep it in my room tonight instead of my car. I couldn’t trust my own home anymore.
I looked around, wondering if anything was missing. I couldn’t tell at first because of the horrible disarray everything was in, but I noticed that my makeup seemed to be all over the place, lid missing, and tubes of lipstick squashed up. I went into the bathroom and found out why.
The long mirror in the bathroom had a message written on it in lipstick. I had to stand back to read it.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LISTENED.
Creepy enough, but that didn’t have much of meaning without knowing who wrote it. If I assumed it was Megan, then she was warning me to start obeying her or get wrecked, so to speak. Thankfully, I wasn’t as easy to manipulate as Molly was. I didn’t give two fucks that she defaced my mirror and fucked with my belongings. It didn’t scare me.
I gave a middle finger to the mirror, then squatted down to grab the glass cleaner from the cabinet underneath the sink. I sprung up with a bottle of blue liquid in hand and sprayed the mirror, wiping it clean with an old washcloth.
I wasn’t planning on retaliating with force, but I did want to get keys back from Megan if she had made a copy of them, and it looked like she had. It was that or have the locks to the house changed, and I didn’t want to try to explain why somebody had our house key and was royally pissed off at me to my parents.
I let the mirror with a slight pink smudginess to it, too lazy to clean it to its original reflectiveness. I needed to straighten up my room first, and that was going to take a while with how badly everything was scattered around.
As I began picking up my stuff, I spotted something on my bed that I hadn’t noticed before. I was a photograph that looked to have been taken with an old polaroid camera. They sell those now at stores in the mall for teenagers who want to waste their money on novelty items.
I picked up the photo and examined it, taking a second to realize it was a photo of me. I was in the back of some car, clearly unconscious. This must have been from the alcohol misadventure that ended up with me lying in a ditch all night.
I flipped over the photo,
and there were words on the back, written in black marker.
YOU’RE NOT THE ONE IN CONTROL.
Well, in that particular situation, I wasn’t, but I wouldn’t let that happen again. I folded the photo and tossed it in the metal garbage bin in the corner of my room. If Megan thought that she was going to scare me with theatrics, she was dead wrong. I’m not stupid.
I finished straightening up my room the best that I could and went downstairs to go back to my car. I should probably get my gun if I was sleeping in my bed tonight. My home was now part of the warzone, and warzones have guns.
Chapter 12
Once the ride begins, you must ride it until the end.
I fell asleep clutching an empty pistol, as I was too scared to load it up before falling asleep. I didn’t want to shoot myself by mistake or otherwise injure an innocent person if they happened to wake me up at the wrong time. I figured just having a gun would be effective enough for now.
I was woken up in the night, but not by anyone inside of my room. The sound of small rocks colliding with my window every few seconds managed to bring me out of my troubled sleep. I should have thanked the thrower, because I was having a nightmare about drinking so much that my bladder exploded.
I went to the window, clutching the gun in my hand tightly. I was surprised to look down into the yard and see Molly wearing a black hoodie and looking up frantically at me.
Confused, I unlocked the window and rolled it up, sticking my head out into the crisp night air. “What the hell?” I called down to her.
“I came to warn you,” she called back, looking behind her after saying it, as though someone might be listening in.
“About what?”
“Come down here and I’ll tell you.”
Fuck, I wasn’t sure whether to trust her or not, but she had every chance to do harm to me before. I didn’t think now would be any different. I doubted anyone wanted to kill me in my front yard. In addition to that, if she was sent my Megan, then she would have had a key to get in already, not throwing pebbles at my window like a Shakespearean actor.
I sighed and tucked the gun into the waistband of my pajama pants. It wouldn’t stay there, being too heavy for the thin elastic. They always made it look so easy in the movies. I left the window and slipped the gun under my pillow. I guess leaving it there was better than trying to bring it out with me.
I threw on a hoodie to match Molly’s and crept down the stairs so that I could sneak out of the house. I was thankful that my parents had disabled their annoying alarm system that announced when anyone opened the door. They had to after I had tripped it so many times that they grew tired of waking up to the sound of me sneaking out. They turned it off to get some peace.
I opened the door, slipping out into the night to meet Molly. Her expression was wild, and her eyes were as glossy as ever. She hysterically waved at me to come over, like time was of the essence.
“What’s the problem?” I asked, striding up to her with my hand tucked into the front pocket of my hoodie.
“I got tipped off that Megan is sending someone to your house. I don’t know why, but they said something about leaving you a warning,” she blurted out in a whisper.
“They already did that before I got home,” I said. “I think they must have a key or something.”
Molly frowned. “Oh, I thought they would do it at night.”
“So, you came all the way here to warn me?” I asked, impressed that she would do something so bold.
She nodded. “I thought you might be in danger.”
I shrugged. “Clearly, I am, but you know what? I got a gun too.”
Her eyes lit up. “You bought one?”
“Yep,” I replied, leaning back in a cocky manner.
She rubbed her pointed chin. “We should go shooting sometime. I can teach you, since I’m assuming you don’t know how to use one.”
That took my ego down a notch, but it was a fair suggestion. “How did you know?” I asked.
“Are you kidding me? The way you looked at my gun in the car was like you had seen a ghost. I can tell you don’t have any experience, but that’s alright. I can help you out.”
“I’d like that,” I said, reaching out a hand and patting her on the shoulder.
“Well, I guess I should get going. Just stay safe, please,” Molly said, looking at me with those pleading brown eyes.
“Sure,” I said, “But I need to get my keys from Megan tomorrow. I can’t have her running in and out of my house whenever she wants.”
“True,” Molly replied. “But how are you going to get them?”
“I don’t know. I’ll think of something,” I said, drumming my fingers against the front of my leg.
“Just don’t do anything illegal. You don’t need to stoop to her level,” Molly warned.
“It’s a little late for that,” I said, shrugging. I thought back to me threatening her in the bathroom with a knife. Yeah, it was definitely too late for that. I was playing a totally different game now, one where lives could be lost if I wasn’t careful. And to think, I hadn’t even been at Palm Valley for two weeks. Crazy.
Chapter 13
Time flies when you’re trying to survive.
I didn’t have time to go shooting with Molly before the camping trip. I wanted to get away for an evening when I didn’t have to sleep with the fear of someone breaking in. I figured being in the woods with all those other people was safer than my own home.
I let my parents know that I wouldn’t be coming home on Friday night, and I packed my stuff in the trunk of my car. I had a sleeping back and a tent rolled up in a large bag for hiking. I hoped I would have the strength to carry all that for a few miles to the camping site.
I didn’t see Megan at school on Friday save for a brief passing in the hallway, so I couldn’t confront her about the keys. It was possible that I could talk to Bradly on the camping trip to see if he had anything to do with it, and perhaps he could get me my keys back. He seemed to be a sucker for blonde hair and big tits. I fit that bill nicely.
Mr. Griffon had the gall of giving a surprise test at the end of the day, and on a Friday no less. I think I barely passed it, but I wouldn’t find out until Monday. I needed to pay more attention to school, but it was getting harder to keep up with everything with all the crazy shit that I had been through. There really was no rest for the wicked.
Molly didn’t show up to school the day of the camping trip, and I had to find out from one of the other girls that she had come down with the flu and couldn’t make it. That sucked. She was the only friend I had there. I guess it would be a good time to try to make some more, because I wasn’t very sure if Molly would turn out to be someone I could trust. She was awfully close to Megan.
I didn’t have her phone number so I couldn’t check on her, but I made a mental note to get it once I returned from the trip. We needed to go shooting as soon as possible because I was getting an itchy finger with this gun sitting in my car all the time. I wanted to know how to use it.
I still brought it in my car to the parking lot where everyone would be leaving their cars to start the hike, but I made the decision to leave it there. It wouldn’t be of much use if I couldn’t even load it properly.
There were seven guys and five girls on the hike, all seniors in school. Everyone there was over the age of 18 and looking to have a good time. I wondered how many of them would end the night puking their guts out outside of their tent. I predicted at least one of them would set something on fire by accident. That was always how these types of trips went.
Bradly and three other muscular jocks climbed out of a tank-like SUV a few minutes after I pulled up. They were shirtless and strapped themselves up with enough luggage to look like they were jumping out of a plane instead of going on a hike. It was amusing, but it also made Bradly look even more enormous than he already was. I had to say that I was a little aroused by it.
The other women with us were too, even the ones that had
brought their boyfriends. I could see the jealousy seething inside of them as they watched their girlfriends drool over Bradly. I couldn’t blame then, but then again, I was single. I didn’t need to worry about such things.
Look, but don’t touch. That was my motto with Bradly. He was a troublemaker and I knew it, but something still made me view him in a more innocent light than Megan. He had never directly done anything wrong to me as far as I knew, if you didn’t count standing in front of the doorway while Megan poisoned me. Okay, maybe that was wrong, but aside from that, he was alright.
I shouldn’t have been apologizing for him, but it was difficult not to when he glanced over at me and winked. I didn’t know whether that was a sexually suggestive wink, or an “I’m going to kill you in your sleep” wink, but did it matter? I felt all gooey inside the moment it happened.
Straighten up bitch. This is no time to get sucked into some stupid jock’s tricks.
I got the feeling I would have to remind myself of that often. As much as I detested Megan and her crew, I was having trouble keeping my head straight around Bradly. I mean, could you blame me? He was the definition of sex.
I had to remember that he had probably helped in my kidnapping the other day, and that under no circumstances could he be trusted. He may have even been the one to have snuck into my house, but I suspected that was a woman. Who else would think to write something in lipstick on the mirror? It was almost comical picturing Bradly hunched over in my bathroom with a tube of lipstick in his hand, trying to write a threatening message with it.
It must have been the work of a woman, especially with that theatric photo on my bed. The handwriting was too neat for a high school guy to have written it, especially for someone who focused on sports more than anything else.
Bradly may not have been the one with the keys to my house, but I still had to ask him. Maybe he knew who had them, and how I could get them back. A little seduction could go a long way, and I wouldn’t mind pushing a few boundaries to get what I wanted. I was dealing with some serious business, and desperate times called for desperate measures, as cliché as that was.
