The Reading Buddy

by Bryce Gibson

  My eyes scanned the shed, and I noticed a tall stack of wooden crates on my right. I moved slowly toward the exit. The man stepped closer to me, and when I thought that the time was just right, I reached out my hand and shoved the towering stack of crates toward him. The whole thing toppled over, but the impact didn’t knock him off his feet. Instead, the fallen crates created an obstacle that he would have to get past. Hopefully it would buy me enough time to make it out alive.

  I made it to the back end of the shed and, as soon as I ran through, I realized what stood in front of me—Mr. Callaway’s vineyard.

  I REMEMBERED HOW I once thought that it seemed possible to get lost in the scuppernong field at night. Maybe I could lose my pursuer in the thick of it. I ran as fast as I could to get there.

  I ducked underneath the first row and then the second. I went on like this until I was deep in the field. Then, only after I felt like I was a good distance from the maniac, I ran straight down one of the rows.

  I heard Dad calling my name from somewhere in the field. He was out there looking for me. A second later, I realized that he wasn’t alone. Blue lights were flashing in the distance.

  I stopped where I was and crouched down low so that my head couldn’t be spotted bobbing along the trellises. If I stay here, I thought, either the police or Dad will find me before the killer does.

  From my right, a gloved hand shot through the vines and grabbed onto my shoulder. I jerked away from the grasp, spun around, and scooted myself backward just as the maniac pushed through the vines. I scrambled to my feet and ran in the direction of the police car. At the end of the row, my feet slipped, and, to steady myself, I wrapped my hand around a small tree that was growing there. The slickness underneath my feet, in addition to the grip that I had on the tree, caused me to spin around.

  I fell backward into a mushy, sticky pile of goo. My hands came up and were covered in slimy gunk. Whatever it was that I had fallen into smelled ripe like fermenting wine. That was when I realized that it was the spot where Mr. Callaway threw baskets of overripe scuppernongs that were no longer suitable for selling.

  When I looked up, the man was standing over me. The rain jacket’s hood had slipped off his head. It was Jacob Tanner, The Caretaker and Lisa’s adoptive father. I looked past him and realized that Deputy Roper had found us. He was running in our direction. He was holding a flashlight, and the beam danced across the ground in front of him as he moved. “Hands up,” Mr. Roper yelled, and Mr. Tanner did as he was told. Behind the deputy, Dad emerged from around the corner. He had his arm wrapped around Lisa. Somehow, she had escaped. Dad and Lisa ran to where I was standing. I stepped out of the slop I was in and let both of them wrap their arms around me.

  I watched Deputy Roper handcuff Mr. Tanner. Some of the words Miss Steep said to me earlier that night replayed in my mind—“I’m worried the same thing that happened to Cade might happen to you.”

  THE REASON BEHIND JACOB Tanner’s actions was easy to explain—he had been protecting the creed of the community. People wanted that easy, straightforward kind of answer for Morris killing Davey, but there wasn’t one.

  The reality was that a series of secrets and lies had led us to where we were. Some psychiatrists say that people with social anxiety are wearing a mask. They say that there is a fear of honoring part of yourself. And, for me, it was true. The reality of Davey’s death was something I knew I would have to face sooner or later, and I was at the point where I was ready. It was time to let Morris rest in peace. Finally, if somebody were to ask me what I was hiding, I would tell them the truth—my stepdad didn’t kill Davey Steep. I did.

  chapter twenty three

  THE DAY BEFORE WE MOVED to Columbia, I asked Dad to drive me to Ridge Spring one more time.

  Even though I hadn’t talked to Katie Carmichael since the day before Davey died, I still had her number in my contacts. She was who I needed to see. She was a key player in the events that led to Davey’s death, but I didn’t know the complexity of it all. When she answered the phone, I noticed right away that her voice sounded timid. Eventually, she agreed that we could meet.

  At eleven o’clock that morning Dad dropped me off at Burger Heaven, where Katie still worked. It was too early for lunch and too late for breakfast. There were only two other cars in the parking lot, both of which belonged to employees.

  Shallow rain puddles stood all along the black asphalt. Because of the front that had brought the showers, the weather had turned considerably cooler. I zipped my jacket and shoved my hands deep into the wool lined front pockets.

  The building that stood in front of me was gray and dingy looking, but the logo on the sign was simple and bright—the name of the restaurant was spelled out in blue and had been crowned with a yellow halo. A pair of white angel wings stuck out from the B on Burger. People say that once you get to heaven you will be at peace with everything. I didn’t know what I thought the real heaven would be like, but I hoped that it was nothing like this.

  I saw Katie’s car making its way down the road. It was the same car that she had saved her money to buy. She was proud of that car. The right turn signal came on, and she pulled into the parking lot. I noticed that the rear-end was dented, and I wondered if she had been in an accident. I hoped she was okay.

  She got out of the car and locked the door. She shoved her hands deep into the pockets of her hoodie and went to the front of the building. Except for a quick glance in my direction, she did nothing else to acknowledge my presence.

  I followed her inside. The doors of Burger Heaven have always cracked me up. A set of decals with the image of a gate printed on each one was stuck to the glass. It was supposed to be that, when you walked in, it was like you were walking through the gates of heaven itself.

  The inside of the restaurant smelled like grease. At first glance I only saw one person working. It was a girl that I didn’t recognize. She was wiping down the counter. Then I noticed Tommy, the twenty-something guy who was the manager. He had his back turned and was busy filling a to-go order. I followed Katie to a corner booth.

  THEN...

  Fry duty was the worst assignment you could have at Burger Heaven, but I loved it when Katie was there.

  Katie was a year older than me and had just gotten a promotion to shift supervisor. She was beautiful. She was a little shorter than me and had brown hair that she liked to pull back in a loose ponytail. Somehow, she even made the little white visors we had to wear look cute.

  The position of the frying station was perfect for checking out Katie’s rear-end whenever she would bend over to get a tray from one of the low shelves.

  After closing that night, we walked to our cars together. I had parked next to her. It had been two months since I’d kissed her, and there seemed to be no awkwardness between us. Both of us acted like it never happened. After she unlocked her door, she looked at me. “What are you doing tomorrow night? I’m going to a party if you want to go with me.”

  “Yeah,” I told her. “I’d like that.”

  NOW...

  “How have you been?” I asked her. “How’s work?”

  Katie ignored the small talk and cut right to the chase. “Why did you want me to come here, Blake?”

  “You called me, remember? And I never called you back...” It was true. On the night that Davey died, I had received a phone call from her.

  “That was three months ago,” she said.

  “My phone...” I started to explain how it had been yanked from my hand and crushed on the concrete, but she cut me off.

  “I needed your help.”

  THEN ‒ 9:25 PM...

  I opened the front door and was about to put on my boots when Davey’s black Transam skidded over the gravel in the driveway. He stopped so that his car was between the house and my truck.

  As soon as Davey got out of the car, I noticed he was wearing his Burger Heaven uniform—a blue shirt and khaki pants. The restaurant closed at nine o’clock, and Davey usually went
home to change clothes before he went anywhere else.

  “Where are you off too?” He was walking toward me.

  “I’m going to a party with Katie,” I told him.

  “I thought you were done chasing after her.” Now, Davey was standing on the bottom step below me. Bugs swarmed around the porch light over my shoulder. “We’re friends aren’t we, Blake?” The question took me by surprise.

  “Of course,” I told him. “What are you talking about?”

  He shook his head. “You can’t be friends with me and her,” he said.

  My phone rang, and I looked at the screen. “That’s her now. I’ll ask if its okay for you to tag along.”

  Before I had a chance to answer the call, Davey jerked the phone from my hand, threw it onto the concrete steps, and crushed it with the heel of his boot.

  “Man, what the hell?” I bent over to pick up my phone and noticed Davey was walking away.

  I thought he was going to his car but he went around the side of the house. When he came back he was holding the axe from the wood pile. “Best friends are supposed to stand together,” he said.

  NOW...

  “Davey was stealing small bills from the register,” Katie began. “It was never a large amount—just a buck or two here and there. He must’ve thought that I was in the restroom, but I’d only stepped around the corner. When I came back I saw the whole thing. The rest of the night was busy, and when it finally started to slow down, Davey shut down the fryer. I confronted him and said that I would have to report it to Tommy. Davey had the fry basket in his hand, and he looked like he was about to fling the hot oil on me.”

  The fact of Davey stealing money wasn’t new to me. I’d known it, but I never said anything. Several times I’d even been with him when he shoplifted at the mall. I was never brave or dumb enough to do it myself, but I’d known. I wondered if not telling made me just as bad as him.

  “That’s not all,” she continued. “I sent him home early, and I had to close the store by myself. When I got to my car it wouldn’t start. I was trying to call you to come pick me up.”

  Now, everything was starting to make sense. With mine and Katie’s stories merging together, all of the pieces were beginning to click into place.

  THEN ‒ 9:29PM...

  We were back inside, and Davey tossed the axe onto the couch where it landed with a soft thud on top of the thick, leather cushions.

  For a moment, I thought he was ready to talk things out, but then he walked across the room to the gun cabinet. He jerked the drawer open and grabbed Morris’s pistol and a box of bullets.

  “Davey, what are you doing?”

  “I’m going over there myself.” He started walking toward the door.

  “What’s going on?”

  He stopped and turned around so that he was facing me. “What makes you think something’s going on?” He opened the box, reached inside, grabbed a few bullets, and dropped the rest to the floor.

  “I don’t know. I’m just trying to understand...”

  “Understand what?” A string of spittle flung from Davey’s mouth and landed on his chin. The pistol was loaded, and he closed the chamber. He raised the gun and pointed it at me. “What do you know?”

  I grabbed the axe and stood up straight. The next two things happened all at once—the gun fired, and I swung the axe.

  NOW...

  Katie uncrossed her arms, put her hands together, and placed her elbows on the table. “I kept calling, but you never answered so I called my sister to come pick me up. I figured you had stood me up. The next day we had the car towed to the shop, and the mechanic told us that there was sugar in the gas tank. That was why the car wouldn’t start. As soon as he said it I suspected Davey.”

  In Davey’s mind, Katie had become an enemy, and I was stuck in the middle. If I went, I would be taking her side over his.

  THEN ‒ 9:32PM...

  Blood was gushing out of Davey’s side. He raised both of his hands to cover the wound, but the blood sprayed through the gaps between his fingers. This seemed to go on for an eternity, and he finally fell face forward onto the carpet.

  I dropped to my knees and crawled toward him. I tried to pull him into my arms, but his bulk was too much for me to lift. I hadn’t meant to kill him. I’d only wanted to stop him. When I let him go, my shirt was drenched. I crawled away and huddled in the corner between the couch. I wasn’t trying to hide anything, but I had to get the bloody clothes off. I couldn’t stand the stickiness any longer. I stood up and stripped down to my boxers. I left the pile of clothes on the floor and went to my room where I put on a pair of flannel pajama pants.

  When Morris got home I was sitting on the couch. I wasn’t wearing a shirt. The loaded pistol was in my hand. Morris had been across town trying to finish cutting an old lady’s grass before it got too dark.

  “Blake,” Morris ran over and kneeled next to me on the floor. “Blake, what happened?”

  “I didn’t mean to.” I told him.

  Morris picked up the axe from where I’d dropped it to the floor. I’m still not sure what he was going to do with it, but he looked at it as if he was trying to figure things out.

  That was when the reality of everything snapped into place. I had to get out of there. I jumped to my feet, shoved the pistol in the pocket of my pants, and grabbed the keys from the table by the door.

  Morris was right behind me. He probably didn’t even realize that he was still holding the axe. He was yelling for me to stop. I made it to my truck and was about to unlock the door when I realized that the keys I had in my hand were not mine—they were Morris’s.

  I ran toward the Pool Supply store and locked myself inside. I think I understand now that Morris was afraid. When he shattered the glass, he was trying to get to me before I hurt myself.

  NOW...

  “Why didn’t you tell somebody?”

  Katie shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. “It wouldn’t have mattered. By then he was dead. I never told anybody about the money either. Everybody thought that Davey was perfect. He was the smart, good looking kid that everybody wanted to be friends with. I imagined that people would have thought that I was making it all up so I decided it would be easier to just let it all die with him.”

  THEN ‒ 10:03PM-DAYBREAK...

  After Morris busted his way into the store, I jumped up from where I was in the stockroom, left the pistol on the floor and slammed through the back door. Morris wasn’t too far behind. “Blake, wait. Let’s talk about this.” He caught up with me, reached out to grab my shoulder, and I tripped. The weight of my body falling against the pool brought the whole thing down.

  With my stepdad’s crushed, lifeless body lying close to me, I had more than enough time to dwell on everything that had happened. In the darkness, my mind rambled. There was no way people would believe I had acted in self defense, I thought. I’d been dumb. I’d run away from Morris when he was trying to help.

  Not long after Mom died, Morris told me something—“You’re all I’ve got now,” he’d said. “You are the only person I have in the entire world.”

  On the other hand, if Miss Steep found out the truth about her son, it would destroy her.

  I came up with a plan. There was nobody that the lie would harm in the same way that the truth would have hurt Miss Steep.

  I thought I had the perfect way out.

  NOW...

  After our meeting, Katie and I walked to the parking lot together.

  “Let’s keep in touch,” I told her before she got in her car. After she drove off, I called Dad to come pick me up.

  One day, down the road, all of this would be a memory. But I also knew that the truth of Davey Steep’s death would undeniably shape the rest of our lives, for better or worse. I had no idea what would happen once I admitted everything.

  Mrs. Reynolds had often told me that one day I would have to face my greatest fear, and my greatest fear was this—the truth. I was afraid of the consequen
ces and the inevitable change that would come with it. It was obvious that the events of the past had effected all of us, but the truth would likely take things into another direction.

  “Turn in here,” I told Dad, pointing to the driveway on my right.

  “What? The police station?”

  “There’s something I need to tell them.”

  one year later...

  I WISH I COULD SAY that I had overcome social anxiety, but it’s not that easy. The most important thing was that I was getting better.

  “I’m headed out to my interview,” I said and peeked into the kitchen where Destiny was busy preparing dinner. Dad was at work and should be home soon.

  Destiny looked up from where she was chopping vegetables on a cutting board. “You look great,” she said. “I hope you nail it.”

  I was wearing a button down shirt that was tucked in and everything. My hair was neatly trimmed. And my face had even started clearing up.

  Zee, who had grown a lot over the year, stood on his back legs and reached his paws toward me. I took one in each hand, leaned down close, and let him lick me on the face. The old lady that Zee was named after said her name meant “God’s helper”, and she must have been right because the dog was like a guardian angel to us. I don’t know how we would have gotten through Wolf’s passing without him.

  The weather was cool, and it was starting to drizzle rain. After I got in my truck, I drove to the end of the driveway where I stopped to get the mail from the box. There was a letter that was addressed to James Thomas and Family. I was family, so I ripped it open. It was an invitation to Riley and Lindsay’s wedding.