by Max Parrott
"I got you."
"So stop worrying your head over it."
"Okay," she said, taking a big breath. "I'll try."
"First order of business, enjoy the moment you're in. Get out of your thoughts and look around."
She did so, and suddenly realized she was right in front of a beautiful florist's shop. The perfume of a dozen different flowers wafted out at her. A little ways up the street, a mailman was performing his rounds on foot, hoisting a huge sack, waving and smiling at the people he passed. Behind, a young woman and her two-year-old daughter sat on a bench, enjoying ice cream from the parlor behind them.
There was a man with them, bending down to tie his shoe... and when he sat up, Jasmine recognized him suddenly.
It was the man she so often saw walking around Wildwood in the evening. The unknown stranger who was neither student nor staff.
And the woman beside him, Jasmine realized, was none other than Lucille
Whitaker, her international fiction professor. She had been hard to recognize at first, under the huge sunglasses she was wearing. But as she turned to wipe her daughter's face, the large bump formed by baby number two was obvious.
Feeling a sudden and inexplicable stab of fear, Jasmine turned on her heel and hurried mechanically up the street.
"Park?" she asked.
Luffy was far too excited by that single word to notice the change in her demeanor. Jasmine walked up the next crosswalk, crossed the street, and doubled back to reach the same park they had passed earlier. She hid herself away in the shadows of the trees, letting Luffy run around and chase bugs while she tried to calm herself down. The dog was right; she was thinking way too much.
Chapter 5
The weekend passed in a slow, confused blur. Rather than enjoy her relaxation period, Jasmine felt like she was rotting away in inactivity. She had the feeling that she should be doing something useful... but no amount of reading, writing or studying would get rid of the feeling. Going to work didn't help either, though it distracted her for a few hours.
Finally, the dreaded day arrived. Monday. She had heard through the grapevine, or rather through a terse text from Charles through a conversation they normally only used to organize their rides home, that Dean DuPont would be giving an address to the entire school at noon. That was well enough, because it got her out of her least favorite class, but for some reason she dreaded seeing any of her fellow students.
It took her until mile three of her jog to figure out what was causing the dread.
It was guilt.
She didn't understand that either for a little while. But after reflecting on what she and Luffy had talked about on Friday, she realized that the guilt came from the same place as the dreadful feeling of wasting her time. Deep down, some stubborn part of her assumed that she ought to be out there investigating. That, since she had taken part in two successful cases, she somehow owed it to New Market and Wildwood College to solve the thing.
It was a silly notion. But as with so many other silly notions, the knowledge that it was silly did nothing to dispel it.
For no purpose other than to vent her frustrations, Jasmine picked up her pace and blazed onto campus at a dead sprint. Students on the path took one look at her and quickly shuffled out of the way. Luffy tore ahead of her, absorbing her energy, barking and wagging his tail at everyone he passed.
They finished their sprint outside the gym. Jasmine bent over with her hands on her knees to catch her breath, staring at the ground as little drops of sweat fell off the tip of her nose and darkened the paving stones. Darkened them like blood...
Shaking her head, Jasmine stood up abruptly and hurried inside the building. The huge wrestling mat was empty. No sparring happening this early, and apparently no pilates classes. Perhaps the instructor had used the death of Oliver Bridges as a convenient excuse to take the day off.
In a moment they were stepping into the female locker room. Luffy heard it first, his ears perking up, letting out a sympathetic groan. Jasmine heard it a second later; the sound of someone sobbing, muffled and distant.
She frowned in sympathy but went on her way, visiting her usual bench to start pulling out a fresh change of clothes. It wasn't the first time she'd heard someone who thought they were alone, crying out their woes in the locker room. A boy broke their heart, a professor used harsh language in critique of their work.
But then she remembered her vision.
"Crap," she said, cramming her clothes back in her bag and carrying it across the room.
As she came closer to the toilet stalls at the back, she recognized the sound. She had heard it twice now. Once in her vision, once at her apartment. And now Alicia was crying again, pitifully and brokenly. She made sounds that could not have been caused by a breakup or a bad grade. This was real, deep hurt, the kind that might not ever heal.
For a long moment Jasmine wrestled with the question of whether to leave her friend alone or offer a shoulder to cry on. Finally, during a lull in the sobbing, she shuffled around a bit to make it clear she was there and then knocked on the stall door.
"Alicia?" she said.
"Go away!" the girl shrieked.
Jasmine and Luffy both jumped in surprise, then turned to walk away. They hadn't made it four steps before the stall door banged open behind them.
"Jasmine?" Alicia said.
Jasmine looked back, trying to smile. "Hey, kid."
"Sorry," Alicia replied, wiping her red, puffy eyes with a tissue. "I didn't know it was you at first."
"It's OK, I shouldn't have interrupted."
"No, it's fine. I just figured you were one of those witches on the track and field team who live to torment me."
Jasmine crossed the space between them and wrapped Alicia in a tight hug.
"Is it anything you want to talk about?" she asked.
"Not really," Alicia said, her voice shuddering and heavy with misery.
Jasmine held the girl at arm's length. "Well, I'm here if you change your mind. I mean it."
Alicia nodded. "I know. Don't you have to get to class?"
"And so do you," Jasmine said with a smile. "I just need to shower really quick, then we can walk over together. How does that sound?"
Alicia smiled too, wiping another tear from her sunburned cheek. "Okay. Luffy will keep me safe, won't you boy?"
"Absolutely!" Luffy barked. "Safe from what, I don't know. But if whatever it tries to mess with my friends, I'll do a number on them that'll put a chainsaw to shame!"
Jasmine's eyes went wide and she nearly lost her balance. She shot Luffy a warning glance, but he just looked up at her innocently. It was a game he liked to play sometimes. Say something shocking, try to get a reaction out of her in front of other people. He thought it was a riot, but Jasmine hated it.
No one in the world knew what she and Luffy shared, or about her visions. So far, she had no intentions of changing that.
***
The morning session with Professor Hawke was a heavy one. Unnecessarily so, Jasmine thought. He veered away from what they had been discussing lately and touched on a number of books, essays and short stories that dealt with death. Perhaps this was some attempt to get them ready for the heavy emotions that were sure to be flying around at DuPont's talk, but Jasmine thought it was more like Hawke hadn't come up with a good lecture for today and decided to go for the easiest option. He did not strike her as a warm man, and as far as she knew Oliver Bridges wasn't in any of his classes. But perhaps this was an unfair assessment. After all, she didn't know the man all that well.
"Where's Alicia?" Charles asked quietly, ten minutes into the lecture.
Jasmine glanced to her right and saw an empty seat.
"I didn't even see her leave," she said.
"I did, but I figured she had to visit the restroom," Charles replied. "I advise that you keep a close watch on that girl, Jasmine. She hasn't been right since the news went out on Friday morning. Come to think of it, she wasn't right direc
tly before that either."
"How do you know?"
"Because I was with her," said Charles.
"With her? On Friday morning?"
He nodded, staring vacantly toward the front of the class and doodling random shapes on paper to make it look like he was taking notes. "You know Alicia. Always waiting until the last second to finish things. She asked for some help with an assignment she had due that afternoon."
"And you just decided to do it out of the kindness of your heart, right?"
Charles shook his head. "Heavens, no. I did it in exchange for a favor."
Jasmine rolled her eyes. "Please. What on Earth could Alicia Newman have that you don't?"
"A face you don't want to punch," Luffy said.
"Fair enough," Jasmine replied.
"What was that?" Charles asked.
"Huh? Nothing."
"Well, to answer your question, she has connections of the feminine variety."
"Wow, did you really just say that?" Jasmine asked.
"I did. And if you would let me finish, perhaps you wouldn't think it was such a foolish thing to say. Or perhaps you would. That's your prerogative as a sentient entity."
"Big words," Jasmine said.
Charles shrugged. "We are sitting at Wildwood College, a place known for its English language programs."
"Touché. Sorry for interrupting... what were you saying?"
Charles grunted in frustration. "I was saying, essentially, that Alicia is good friends with a girl I happen to fancy."
"Ooh, who is it?" Jasmine asked.
"That's not your concern. I was just trying to explain why I was with Alicia so early on."
At that moment, a piece of chalk came sailing up the rows of seating and hit Charles square in the chest. He jumped in his seat with such energy that he knocked his fake notes to the floor.
"Quite a conversation you two seem to be having," Professor Hawke called out. "Care to share with the class?"
"No, sir," Charles replied. "In fact it was rather boring. We were simply discussing what effects the writings of Thomas Paine might have had on the French Revolution. Your earlier mention of the guillotine put us on a bit of a tangent, I'm afraid."
***
"As I was saying before we were rudely interrupted," Charles continued as they walked to their next class, "Alicia was acting out of sorts that morning, even before the news got round to us."
"Out of sorts how?" Jasmine asked.
"Just being quieter than normal. Preoccupied is a good word to describe it. She had more than enough time to finish that assignment, but it seemed she couldn't be bothered. Something more important was weighing on her, I suppose."
Jasmine told Charles about that night she had Alicia over to her apartment. The way she left in tears, the things she had said.
"I suppose that might explain it," Charles said. "She had some sort of family drama distracting her. When we heard about Oliver, though, she went very quiet. I left quickly thereafter, feeling quite uncomfortable."
"We should look for her," Jasmine said.
"I can do that," said Luffy. "I might be able to pick up her scent, you know?"
"You two have an absolute ball with that," said Charles, "but I have a class to get to. She and Oliver Barely knew each other. I'm sure she'll get over it."
***
Despite their best efforts, asking and sniffing around the school, they did not have any success finding Alicia. Time was short, and Jasmine rushed to her next class, arriving just in the nick of time.
Professor Keller was as dry as usual. But this time he was dry in a depressing way. The empty seat previously occupied by Oliver Bridges stood out like a sore thumb, and Jasmine couldn't stop staring at it. Nothing of any great importance was discussed during the class, at least not that Jasmine could remember.
It was almost eleven by the time she left LnL. Not enough time before DuPont's talk to do anything useful, but too much time just to sit around. She and Luffy wandered through Wildwood, walking up and down each hall. When they exhausted interior options they took to the grounds, skirting the fields in a long loop, coming within a few feet of that unruly barrier that separated the remote college from the dense wilderness beyond.
Just when the fresh air was starting to help Jasmine get her head on straight, an alarm went off on her phone that she had set a little while ago. It was time to head back inside and find her seat in Wildwood's auditorium.
The last time she had entered that vast chamber was to get writing advice from a master of the craft, a published author who had been working in the field for twice as long as she had been alive. The energy in the hall today was decidedly different, quiet and somber. No one was ready with their phones to get video and screenshots. No one was carrying a book to be signed afterward.
Jasmine found Charles and took the nearest empty seat to him. She looked around, but didn't see Alicia anywhere.
The screech of microphone feedback pulled her attention to the stage.
Elden DuPont, the Dean of Wildwood College, was standing at the podium. He was a large man in every way it was possible to be large. Tall, broad, outspoken and egotistical. His family had been among the first to settle in the area, before New Market was even New Market, back in the late 1700's. This was a badge of honor that DuPont wore every day of his life.
Today, the large man seemed to be sweating a lot more than usual. He was dressed in a heavy tweed suit, but he was always dressed in a tweed suit. The sweat must have been caused by something else, Jasmine thought, but she couldn't imagine it was from nerves. She didn't think Elden DuPont had been nervous a day in his life. Why would he be? As far as she knew, the man had never faced a meaningful challenge. His position at Wildwood had pretty much been his birthright; everything had been handed to him on the proverbial silver platter.
"Greetings, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters of Wildwood," DuPont began. The only thing small and delicate about him was his voice, but it rang clearly through the silent hall. "We're gathered here today to pay respects to a fallen member of our family..."
Behind him, a giant poster of Oliver's student ID photo had been pasted to a moveable wall.
"Anyone who knew anything around here understood the truth of Oliver Bridges," DuPont continued, mopping sweat off his brow with a handkerchief. He was stuttering his words now, barely getting them out. "I had the pleasure of meeting with this bright young man on several occasions. There are those who might say Oliver's future success was already guaranteed by the fame and riches of his renowned father, Chef Lyle Bridges. But I say to that, nonsense. Oliver could have been born in the lowest of places, among the most downtrodden of society, and he still would have found his way to greatness. He had a keen mind, an intellect so sharp you could cut yourself on it, if he hadn't been so nice. And that was the main thing about Oliver. He had a heart of true compassion, a rare thing in this world and something to behold. No grudge would ever have found a place in his heart, no hatred or anger. Only love and understanding. If he had been allowed to live a full life, I..."
For a moment it seemed DuPont had finally gathered steam. His tongue had started flapping, as though it were a windup toy and someone had finally found the key, and didn't seem liable to stop anytime soon. But suddenly he ground to a halt, the words falling out of his mouth and fading away. He abruptly bowed his head, falling forward against the podium.
"Sorry, I..." He looked up at the crowd, smiling or grimacing; Jasmine couldn't tell which. "I didn't think I would ever have to make a speech like this. I suppose I don't have the same kind of heart that he... that Oliver had, so perhaps I should just get to the practical details."
He cleared his throat, flipping through a few pages in front of him.
"First of all, the date that Oliver died will officially be marked as a special one in Wildwood's calendar, from here on out. On that day each year staff and students will be able to attend a special vigil in his honor, where various community outreach
programs will be staged. A grand idea, but not mine... It's all thanks to Oliver's father, who unfortunately couldn't be with us here today. He and the entire staff of his restaurant Pineapple will help fund these programs in Oliver's name.
"Second, I want to say that we here at Wildwood are going to do our best to help the community of New Market heal from this awful tragedy..."
***
Jasmine woke to two sounds.
First was the sound of rain. The heavens, having been clouded over with blankets of gray for the past couple of days, had finally decided to open. The rain was coming down in sheets, or more accurately in buckets. Glancing out the window, Jasmine was unable to see more than ten feet. Her visions was obscured not by mist or fog but by the sheer density of the downpour. It hissed and pounded at the pavement below, drumming on the cars, putting up such a din that she almost didn't notice the second noise.
She picked up her ringing phone as she hurried across the living room, wiping drool from the corner of her mouth. There was one window in particular in her apartment that always let the rain in, and she was suddenly soaked from head to toe as she rushed up and slammed it shut.
Luffy, curled up in a ball on the floor, blinked his sleepy eyes and glanced at her.
Jasmine checked the time as she brought the phone to her ear. It was a quarter past five. She had been home for almost two hours, and had spent most of that time asleep.
"Hello?" she said into the phone.
"Hello there, Jasmine," the cheery voice of Officer Luke Barrett replied. "Say, I didn't wake you, did I?"
"You might have. But I wasn't intending on sleeping that long anyway."
"Well, you're welcome. Anyway, you're probably wondering why I'm calling you back..."
"Not really. I just figured you maybe had a few more questions to ask me."
"Oh! Well, that would be a good reason," he said with a chuckle. "But actually... well, maybe it would be easier to explain if you just came on down to the station. If it isn't too much trouble, that is."
