21 Dares: A Florida Suspense Mystery

by JC Gatlin

  Abbie and her sister had hid here, the night they heard the intruder in the house.

  He paused, shined the light on the ceiling. The scuttle to the attic loomed directly above him. Reaching up, he grabbed the cord. The ladder dropped.

  Chapter 10

  McKenzie and I were never friends, not really,” Abbie said while sitting in her therapist’s office. She was still thinking about yesterday’s lunch with McKenzie. It was on her mind when she woke up, and she replayed the entire conversation in her head. She told Clinton Reed all about it when he Skyped to wish her happy birthday. This time it was actually on her birthday. Though it didn’t feel like it. There were no balloons. No presents. No cake. No one sang Happy Birthday. In fact, other than Clinton Reed and McKenzie Thomas, no one really even noticed. Or cared.

  By the end of the day, Abbie walked to the Cypress Center Building, feeling a little sorry for herself, and sat across from Dr. Wachowski, like she did every Wednesday and Friday afternoon.

  “But she’s your only friend who wished you Happy B-day.” Dr. Wachowski sat back in his chair and brought his left leg over his right knee. Abbie folded her arms and leaned back on the couch.

  “To get me to buy into her Vitamin Ritamin business.”

  “Childhood boo contacts Pop to track you down, buys you lunch, meet-n-greet the bae and invites you to go out on Friday night, on your b-day nonetheless,” Dr. Wachowski said. “Hashtag: BFF.”

  A chill ran down Abbie’s back. On your b-day nonetheless. It was exactly what McKenzie had said. The phrase and the way he said it felt like an echo. Abbie shrugged it off to coincidence. “I’m telling you, it’s not about me. It’s not about my birthday. She just wants to increase her down-line.”

  “Fair enough. How about telling me your Webster’s for the word friendship.”

  The concept bounced around in Abbie’s head a moment. She wanted to say this in a way that made sense.

  “Friends are people who have your back.” She looked up at the ceiling, then back at Dr. Wachowski. The blue tattoo on his arm wrapped around his elbow and disappeared beneath his sleeve. It made her wonder what his high school and college life was like. What kind of friends did he have? Did they put up with his inane wannaa-be-hip lingo? Probably, if they were true friends.

  True friends. That’s what she wanted. Friends who had her back. That’s what she always wanted. And, he’d been right all along. She decided to go ahead and say it. “Like the Scoobies.”

  There. Now it was out there.

  “The Scoobies?” Dr. Wachowski smoothed the hair on his chin with the tips of his fingers. “You’re referring to Buffy the Vampire Slayer again?”

  “Yeah,” Abbie said. “Friendship, true friendship, is like when Willow, Xander, and Giles joined hands and performed this enjoining spell, and their individual strengths rushed into Buffy. She was fighting this Frankenstein-like soldier thing that couldn’t be killed, and she rose from the rubble with magical, orange eyes, speaking in some ancient Sumerian tongue. Buffy used the combined powers of the Scoobies to save the world. They had her back.”

  There was a long silence and Dr. Wachowski seemed focused on his notebook. He smoothed the beard on his chin to a fine point. Finally, he looked up at her.

  “Is this why Buffy the Vampire Slayer is so appealing to you?” he asked, setting his pen down on the notepad. “Because it’s about a girl who literally faces her demons and wins.”

  “No, that has nothing to do with it.” Abbie watched him fold his left foot over his right knee again. He wore Jesus sandals, like he always did, and she couldn’t help but stare at his hairy big toe. He needed to clip the toenail. Looking away, she glanced at her watch. There was still another half hour to go.

  “Then what is it?” Wachowski asked. Abbie didn’t answer, and the doctor continued. “Do you think your interest in Buffy is connected to that night when you were a child? When you were powerless to stop the monster that broke into—”

  “No, absolutely not.” She didn’t want him to finish that question and grasped the unicorn pendant hanging from her neck. Without thinking, she tugged on it as she spoke. “I feel like one of the Scooby Gang. They didn’t have a normal high school or even a normal college experience, or a normal home life, and I don’t either.”

  “That’s no JOMO, girl! You have a boo who is reaching out to you. A real live person say’n ‘Let’s get this party started’ and your head is in a fictional cemetery from a TV show no one remembers or cares about anymore.”

  Abbie swallowed. She was tempted to defend Buffy, but didn’t. It was her fault for bringing it up in the first place. “TV show relevance aside,” Abbie spoke slowly, still smarting from the slide on her hero. “If the boo you’re referring to is McKenzie Thomas, I haven’t talked to her in two years.”

  “So Styles is out. You still got Payne and Malik—”

  “Let’s drop the boy band references,” she said. “If you want to talk about pop culture references that no one remembers or cares about—”

  “Sorry not sorry. Hashtag: can’t take a joke!” He held up his hands, as if surrendering, and revealed the blue tattoo was a thorny vine wrapping around his forearms. “Let’s discuss the other compadre in your life.”

  “You mean, Susan.” Abbie regarded her roommate a moment. “Yeah, she’s friendly and all, but she doesn’t really get me. She’s not a Scoobie.”

  “How is she different?”

  “Buffy and Xander and Willow, they’re misfits. They’re picked on. But they had each other. They could call each other up. They could rely on each other.”

  “And you don’t have anyone like that in your life?”

  “No,” Abbie said quietly. “No, I really don’t.” She stared at him. That rumination put a bad taste in her mouth. It rippled along her tongue and down her throat like soured milk.

  “Abbie, girl, you got a whole world of love knock’n on your door and you just need to answer it. Hello? Come in. Now, go get yo some!” Dr. Wachowski snapped his pen and dropped it into his shirt’s breast pocket. He shut his notepad. “But we’ll have to dive into that next week. I gotta dipset.”

  Abbie looked surprised. “What?”

  “We’ll pick it up from here next week,” he said. “I got a bluebird lined up tonight. Plus,” he said slowly. “It is your b-day, isn’t it? You’re all twenty-one candles, am I right?”

  “Yes. Officially.”

  He smiled at her. “So what’s on the I.T. for your big two one?”

  “Nothing, really.” Abbie frowned. “I guess I could go to McKenzie’s multi-level marketing thing.”

  “There, you see. Now you got a bluebird too.”

  Abbie got up, grabbed her purse and crossed the room, then hesitated at the door. She looked back at Dr. Wachowski. “Doctor,” she asked. “Do you have a patient named Rocky Stern?

  He looked taken back. “Abbie, I can’t even.”

  “Okay,” she said, thinking about the answer a moment. “So then you’re saying you do, right? You have a patient named Rocky Stern, but you can’t discuss him.”

  “Abbie. Please.” An awkward laugh gurgled up from his throat. “I can’t have this conversation with you.”

  “Sorry not sorry.” She conceded and shut the door behind her.

  Leaving the Cypress Center office building, Abbie held the glass doors open for a grey-haired fellow wearing a bright red t-shirt with the word “RACHE” sprawled across his chest. He caught the door’s edge, nodding a silent thank you as he walked past her. Outside, Abbie looked up. The sky had cleared and seagulls swooped and cried overhead. The sidewalks were crowded. Cars passed back and forth on Fletcher Street, and a woman pushed a cart full of groceries from the Cuban grocery.

  Abbie made her way to the curb, where an impatient group waited for the crosswalk light to change. She joined them, and idly looked over her shoulder at the office building behind her. She noticed a man headed up the steps. It was him.

  Rocky Stern.
>
  Abbie raised a hand and called his name. He didn’t respond. She pushed her way toward him, through the crowded sidewalk. When she got to the front steps, he was gone.

  Abbie considered going back inside the building to catch up with him, then thought better of it. He was probably headed to Dr. Wachowski’s office. She knew she’d seen him in the waiting room, and this proved it. She wondered why he’d claimed he hadn’t seen Dr. Wachowski at lunch yesterday, then realized he was probably keeping it under wraps. Perhaps he didn’t want McKenzie to know he was seeing a therapist. However, nowadays, who wasn’t?

  Abbie returned to the street corner. A new group was waiting at the light now, and she stood between them. She looked at the crosswalk sign, at a few of the impatient faces surrounding her, then, for some reason, behind her shoulder.

  She saw the tan trench coat and brown hat. The man stood at the Cypress Center building entrance, his face lost in the shadow of his low slung hat.

  Chapter 11

  Abbie stepped back, bumping into the grey-haired fellow again. She looked at his bright red “RACHE” shirt, then back toward the office building. She couldn’t find the man in the trench coat. She’d lost him in the crowd.

  Abbie moved away from the street corner. Pushing through pedestrians, she ran down the sidewalk and rounded the corner of the Cuban grocery. She crouched down along the building edge and peeked around it. She saw him again. Brown hat. Tan trench coat. He waited at the entrance to the office building. Just stood there. As if he were expecting someone.

  Without thinking, Abbie was on her feet and bolted into the side street along the supermarket. Breaks squealed as drivers swerved around her. A horn blared. A deep, angry voice screamed, “You on drugs Look where you’re going!?” Abbie had a blurred impression of the white florist delivery truck that almost hit her. Standing on the opposite sidewalk, panting, she lifted her head. The truck turned on a side street. Several pedestrians paused, backed up, then hurried on their way.

  Abbie looked back, across the street, where she had just come from. There were people everywhere – shoppers waiting for the bus, teens riding bikes, kids on skateboards, a dog walker on roller blades , mommies pushing strollers. Just about everyone seemed focused on their phones. Abbie looked down the block, but the brown hat and tan trench coat had vanished.

  Turning, she scrambled across the sidewalk and into a Starbucks coffee shop. She plopped down onto a table next to the front window and watched the passing crowd. She saw no sign of the man. Taking her phone from her purse, she dialed Susan’s number.

  “I’m glad you called.” Susan’s voice came through loud and clear on Abbie’s phone. She launched into her story without as much as a hello. “So, I took my phone to the New Horizons Cellular on Bruce B. Downs and got it wiped. Then I went home and restored my back-up and I got everything back. But, now I can’t receive SMS text messages because I restored everything from my computer back-up, even though the New Horizons Cellular guy told me there wouldn’t be any problems.”

  “Susan.” Abbie tried to interrupt her, but it was pointless.

  “So now, basically, I wasted my entire day running around like some game show contestant who doesn’t know any of the answers but tries anyway and fixed absolutely nothing.”

  “Susan,” Abbie said again. “He’s here. He’s following me.”

  “What? Who’s following you?”

  “The strange man. He’s following me again.”

  “This again? You always think someone is following you.” Susan’s tone turned chilly. “Where are you? You’re usually home by four anyway.”

  “Not on Wednesdays and Fridays.”

  “Since when?

  Abbie sighed. She didn’t have time for this. “Susan, I go see my therapist every Wednesday and Friday.”

  “Since when?”

  “For the last two months, ever since I moved in with you.”

  “You never told me—“

  “Susan, please.” Panic rose in Abbie’s voice. “There’s a man following me. Just come get me.”

  “Didn’t you hear me? My cell’s got issues. Now if someone wants to get in touch with me but they don’t have an iPhone, they’re going to have to use Kik. I’m so ready to strangle someo—”

  “Please,” Abbie pleaded. “Come get me.”

  “Okay. Okay,” Susan said. “Where are you?”

  “I’m at the Starbucks on the corner of Fletcher and Spruce.”

  “Stay there. I’m on my way.” Susan hung up. Abbie looked out the window and watched the crowd. She didn’t see any sign of the man, but that didn’t stop her from keeping a watchful eye on the street.

  Maybe coming back to Tampa was a bad idea after all.

  Maybe she didn’t belong here.

  After that night, she and Clinton Reed moved in with her grandparents in Pembroke Pines. He stopped working the graveyard shift. In fact, she didn’t remember him ever having a job again. “Your Daddy’s too sad to work,” her grandma would say.

  He just stayed home and played checkers or built Lego houses with her. Sometimes he would even play dolls and, if he was really up to it, he would play tea party. And he always had this saying.

  “When it rains,” he would ask her, and she would answer, “Look for rainbows.”

  “And when it’s dark,” he would tell her, and she would finish the sentence. “Look for stars.”

  When Abbie turned six and other children started grade school, Clinton Reed kept her home. He taught her the alphabet and how to spell. Addition and subtraction came next, as Abbie was home-schooled. She didn’t mind really. Sometimes she would watch the school bus stop at the corner, and stare at the kids climbing out of it. They’d walk along the street, past her grandparent’s home, and disappear into houses down the block.

  She didn’t belong there, in Pembroke Pines, either. Abbie realized that the older she got. That’s why she applied for BHU. That’s why she returned to Tampa.

  That’s why she was waiting for Susan now.

  Thirty minutes later, Susan’s blue Honda Civic pulled up to the curb and Abbie ran out of the coffee shop. She piled into the passenger seat as fast as she could.

  “Thank you for picking me up,” Abbie said. Susan pulled into traffic, cutting off a motorcycle.

  “Why am I seeing so many dudes on crotch rockets lately?” She mashed her horn. It blared for several seconds. “Have you noticed they all have GoPros attached to their helmets like it’s some kind of YouTube cult to see who can post the bloodiest crash. At least it’s entertaining.”

  “I think it’s the adrenaline,” Abbie said, sinking deeper into her seat.

  Susan merged into traffic and they headed for the apartment. After a few minutes of silence, she glanced over at Abbie. “How were classes today? As if I even need to ask. BHU is nothing but a retirement community for people who peaked in high school.”

  “Classes were fine.” Abbie turned her head to look at the street behind her. “It’s the strange man following me that’s the problem. I’ve seen him a few times, like the other night.” Abbie debated whether to tell Susan about Rocky Stern, or seeing him at her therapist’s office and then meeting him again at lunch with McKenzie. Abbie wasn’t even sure if it was actually Rocky walking into the building.

  Susan glanced at her. “What does he look like?”

  “He’s wearing this trench coat and hat.” Abbie turned back around in her seat. She still felt shaken. “Every time I’ve seen him, he’s wearing the same thing.”

  “So, like, how many times have you seen him now?” There was a critical tone in Susan’s voice. She was clearly making fun of the situation. “This strange man wearing a hat and trench coat.”

  Abbie shook her head. “I’ve seen him twice this week when I was leaving Dr. Wachowski’s office. Then again when I was waiting for a friend at SoGo Sushi.”

  “Well, you’re safe now.” Susan came up on a slow moving Buick and tailgated behind it. She honked again, th
en maneuvered around it. Passing the car, she screamed at the driver then turned to Abbie.

  “I think you’re feeling stressed. You’ve been gone a long time.” She slammed the brakes as they strolled up to a red light. “It’s funny. I know if I leave for a couple of days, it feels like I’ve been gone a couple of years. I come home and everything’s different. I swear Tampa is part of a different space-time continuum.”

  “That’s not it,” Abbie said quickly. She decided to tell Susan about Rocky. “I keep thinking about this guy I just met. He’s the fiancée of this girl I used to know.”

  “And now you think this guy is following you too?”

  “Not too. I think he’s the one… maybe… I don’t know.”

  The light turned green and Susan’s foot mashed the accelerator, launching her Civic into a left turn between a break in oncoming traffic. Then, she slammed the brakes again. Abbie lurched forward in her seat, the seat belt restraining her from hitting the dashboard. Susan honked repeatedly as two boys jogged across the intersection.

  “I swear my soul grows darker every time a pedestrian ruins a left turn.” Susan thumped the steering wheel. Oncoming traffic passed, and Abbie’s anxiety heightened. Though this time for a different reason. Susan slapped her steering wheel and screamed. “I think all pedestrians should be banned. You either drive or stay home.”

  Traffic finally cleared and Susan crossed into the apartment complex parking lot. She pulled into her regular spot and turned off the engine. Abbie took a breath, then noticed Susan staring at her. “It’s your birthday today, right?”

  “All day long,” Abbie took two deep breaths then said a silent prayer, thanking God for getting her home safely.

  “Your twenty-first birthday?” Susan checked her makeup in the rearview mirror and ran a hand through her short hair.

  “It’s really no big deal.” Abbie got out of the car and slammed the door shut. She headed for the staircase. Susan followed and Abbie spoke as they climbed up the steps to the third floor landing. “I just want to feed Clem, shut my bedroom door, and read.”