by S. R. Grey
“Are you kidding?” He chuckles. “Crick is going to love you.”
“You better be right.” I sigh. “I just want to make a good impression for you. I don’t want to come off like some scared little rabbit.”
Flynn laughs. “Babe, I’m sure Crick is just as nervous to meet you. Remember”—he glances over and holds my gaze—“we’re all broken here.”
That we are. And that’s what turns out to break the ice.
A short while later finds the three of us in a booth at the diner, laughing and talking, our dinner plates cleared. Flynn was right; I had nothing to worry about. Crick was way more nervous than I was about meeting. So much so that when we were initially seated, Crick ordered a Coke and proceeded to knock it over not ten seconds after it arrived.
“Shit, man,” he said as syrupy soda flowed everywhere.
His eyes flittered from Flynn to me as he nervously pulled napkins from the dispenser on the table.
“Sorry, miss,” he directed to me, his pale skin turning about twenty shades of red. “Please excuse my clumsiness. Oh, and my cursing.”
“Don’t worry about it. You’re fine,” I assured him. I then grabbed napkins on my own and helped clean up the mess on my and Flynn’s side of the table.
Our waitress came over with a rag shortly thereafter and cleaned the table more thoroughly. She then brought Crick a new drink, and when she left he plucked up an ice cube from his lap and plopped it into his new soda, proclaiming, “Guess my clumsiness at least spilled the ice for us, yeah?”
Flynn busted out laughing. “Dude, you mean ‘broke the ice,’ not ‘spilled the ice.’”
The three of us couldn’t help but chuckle over the spilled-ice incident that did indeed ‘break the ice.’
Our conversation moved on from there, and as of the last few minutes we’re discussing our plans for the future. A topic that used to make me sad, but now makes me smile. Just knowing I have a future fills me with joy.
Noticing my grin, Flynn places his hand over mine. “Yeah, we got it all planned out,” he tells Crick.
“Do ya now?” Crick replies.
“Yep,” Flynn says. And then he proceeds to tell him, “Jaynie’s going to be making an appointment over at the community college in Lawrence. She’s ready to sit down with a career counselor and sign up for some classes. She has a dream, you know?”
Flynn is so proud of me. I hope I can live up to his expectations.
One day at a time, I remind myself.
Crick smoothes back his stringy blond hair and asks me, “What’s your dream, Miss Jaynie?”
“I’m hoping to someday help kids who are in situations like the one Flynn and I were in.”
I’ve put more thought into what I want to do down the road, and I keep returning to the helping kids/social work idea. Flynn is fully onboard, of course. He’s my biggest cheerleader, in fact. He even completed all the financial aid forms for me online, using Bill’s computer.
Crick nods approvingly. “That sounds real nice. Giving back and all, that’s what life is all about.”
“For sure,” Flynn agrees.
Crick picks up a straw and taps it against the edge of the table like it’s a cigarette he’s flicking ashes from. He must be jonesing for an after-dinner smoke.
Flynn, watching Crick flick the straw, says to him, “Hey, man, if you need to go outside and grab a smoke, we’re fine with that. I’d join you, but I’ve finally quit for good.”
“Good for you,” Crick says, his tone revealing he’s genuinely pleased for Flynn. “I’m actually trying to quit for good myself.” He holds up the straw. “Been collecting these everywhere I go. I read somewhere that after you’ve weaned yourself from the nicotine, it’s mostly missing the action of smoking that gets ya started again.”
“Hmm,” Flynn says, “that kind of makes sense.”
We stay and talk for a while longer, but eventually we must go our separate ways. Not before making plans to meet up again sometime soon, though.
In the car, as we start heading home, I scoot over and lean my head against Flynn’s shoulder. “Tired, babe?” he asks.
“A little,” I reply. “Mostly, though, I feel relaxed. We had such a good time. I really like Crick. He’s a good guy.”
“He is,” Flynn agrees. And then, with a smile creeping into his voice, he says, “And as for relaxed, relaxed is good. No. You know what?”
“What?”
“Relaxed is more than good. It’s great.”
“It is,” I agree, yawning.
On the way home that night, I think about how our lives are changing, all in positive ways. The only thing hanging over our heads is the Allison Lowry situation.
But that’s a worry best saved for another day.
Flynn
We put it off and we put it off…
And then one evening, right before bed, Detective Silver calls with the news that it’s happening. That which we’ve allowed ourselves to forget as we focused on learning to enjoy our lives is about to occur—Allison is slated to be released from prison in July.
When I hit ‘end’ on the devastating call, Jaynie is just coming out of our bathroom. I inform her of the bad news immediately.
She pales and mutters, “That’s only a month away, Flynn.”
“I know.” I take a seat on the edge of our bed and place my head in my hands.
“We have to do something,” she says.
“Like what?” I mutter, out of options.
Jaynie throws her hands up in the air. “I don’t know, Flynn.” She sounds exasperated. “I guess we better do what we should have done before. We need to return to Forsaken and search the hell out of that property. There has to be something we missed.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, but there must be something.”
“You’re right, you’re right.” I run my hands down my jeans and stand. I always think better on my feet. As I begin pacing our small room, I give voice to my burgeoning thoughts. “We never properly searched the new barn, we know that. It was too dark the night we were up there to really see anything. You remember that night, right?”
My eyes meet Jaynie’s and she blushes ever so slightly. She’s so cute. “I remember everything about that night, Flynn,” she whispers.
“As do I,” I reply. I go to her and urge her to sit with me on the bed.
Neither of us will ever forget the time we spent in the forest, the way we re-connected. And hell, whatever we did that night worked, as both of us are doing better than ever. But we won’t be faring all that well if Allison is released from prison. That bitch will surely seek out vengeance on Jaynie. Her hatred for my girl runs deep. I always wondered why that was, but knowing what we now know, it all makes sense. Jaynie resembles Debbie, the missing girl Allison most likely offed.
“I like our new life, Flynn,” Jaynie says as she leans her head against my shoulder. “I don’t want it to be ripped apart. Everything always seems to get taken from us.”
She starts to cry and I hold her in my arms. “Not this time,” I say, determined. “Nothing is going to change. I swear to you, sweetheart, I will not allow us to fall back apart.”
“But we already are,” she sobs. “Or at least I am. I haven’t cried in weeks, and”—she lifts her head from my chest so I can see her puffy and tear-streaked face—“look at me now. This is me backsliding, Flynn.”
“You’re not backsliding, Jaynie. I won’t let you.”
And that is when I promise her that I will do everything in my power to make sure Allison remains locked up. No matter what it takes. Hell, I’ll plant the damn evidence if it comes to it. And Jaynie doesn’t know this, but I have the means to do exactly that. That’s been my back-up plan for a while now.
Still, I hope it doesn’t come to what would definitely be the commission of a crime, since the only thing worse than Allison’s early release from prison would be for me to end up behind bars. I’d be unable to protect Jay
nie, not to mention I’d be breaking every promise I’ve ever made to her.
Fuck, man, it just can’t come to that.
Jaynie
The next day, we decide to return to the Lowry property.
It’s a lazy kind of Saturday, but not for Flynn and me. We spend the entirety of the afternoon combing through the work barn and the surrounding outdoor areas.
When we find nothing useful, we search the house.
We even search the old barn again on the off chance we missed something when we were up here with Detective Silver.
It’s an easy sweep of the old barn, since the excavation crew left the interior essentially destroyed. We find the stall walls torn down, the wood piled neatly in the corner, and the trunks emptied. And though the dirt floor has remained mostly intact, it’s clear from the way our sneakers sink into the soil that several feet of the barn floor was dug up and sifted for clues.
Resigned that Allison must have covered her tracks so well that nothing will ever come to light to implicate her in Debbie’s disappearance, I sit smack-dab in the middle of the mushy dirt floor and pull my knees up to my chin. I’d like to curl up in a ball and disappear, but the best I can do right now is lower my head to between my knees and close my eyes.
Blowing out a breath wrought with abandoned hope, I quietly declare, “We’re screwed, Flynn.”
I feel his warmth as he sits down beside me. “Hey,” he says encouragingly, “we’re not out of options yet.”
I lift my head, open my eyes, and gape over at him. “Are you high? There’s clearly nothing up here to implicate Allison of anything. I’d say that equates to us being screwed.”
He frowns. “Just because we haven’t found anything doesn’t mean there’s nothing here.”
I’m at the point of near exasperation. Can’t he see the truth?
“Jesus, Flynn, there’s no evidence, okay? It’s time for us to accept it.”
He reaches around to the back pocket of his jeans, and says quietly, “Maybe there is some evidence, Jaynie.”
I watch, wide-eyed, as he pulls out a vial of blood. “Holy shit, Flynn! Is that what I think it is?”
“Yes,” he replies, turning the vial over in his hands and peering at it like it may hold the key to everything. “It’s blood.”
“Who the hell does it belong to?” I ask, even though I have a feeling I know the answer.
Flynn says softly, “Uh, it just may be a sample of Debbie Canfield’s blood.”
“May be or is, Flynn?”
His eyes focus on me as he says, “It’s Debbie’s blood.”
Like a thunderbolt, it dawns on me where this blood must have come from.
“Oh, God, Flynn,” I exclaim, shaking my head. “You stole one of the vials of the missing girl’s blood from Detective Silver? When did this happen? Did you take it during the car ride up the day we met with him? God, you must have. What in the hell were you thinking? And where have you kept it all this time.”
“I kept it in a little cooler in the closet where I was keeping my candy stash,” he says. “And as for what I was thinking, I was thinking it may eventually come to this.”
“What does that mean?” I tentatively ask.
“Jaynie, I think you know.”
I do, but I just don’t want to say it. Flynn is going to use this blood to plant evidence.
“Flynn—” I begin.
He cuts me off. “I told you before that I’ll do anything to keep you safe.”
“Even if it means planting evidence,” I whisper.
“Even if, Jaynie.”
“Shit.” I stare at the vial of blood. “How’d you steal it, anyway? I didn’t notice anything amiss that day in the car.”
I glance up at him and, and, proudly, he says, “I guess all that time as a runaway, me living as a kid who had to steal to survive… Well, I guess it finally paid off. Remember the heavy coat I left in the detective’s car that day?”
“Yeah, I do.”
Of course, I remember. Flynn was too hot, having not planned for an early spring warming.
He goes on. “Then you also probably remember how Detective Silver laid my coat on the front seat before we got out of the car.”
“Yes, I do.”
“He did that to cover the files and the blood. He even told us it was good I didn’t need the coat, that I was actually doing him a favor since he could use it to cover Debbie’s file and blood samples from prying eyes.”
“Jesus, Flynn.”
“Anyway, when we got back in the car, and I grabbed up my coat, I also managed to snatch one of the vials of blood.”
“But Flynn, Detective Silver had to have noticed a vial went missing. Funny he never mentioned it.”
I’m at a loss as to how I should feel. Should I be elated or terrified?
“I guess he never noticed.” Flynn shrugs, and we both stare at the blood. “Or maybe he thought he lost it. After all, there was a lot of opening and closing of car doors that day. One of the vials could’ve easily fallen out onto the ground.”
“But a vial didn’t fall out.”
“No, it didn’t.”
“So what happens now?” I ask.
Flynn tilts up my chin so I have no choice but to tear my gaze from this blood that may turn out to be our saving grace.
With his steely gray eyes as determined as I’ve ever seen, he says, “Let’s go find a knife.”
Flynn
I can’t believe we’re doing this. Or, rather, I can’t believe I am doing this. But it’s okay; I’ll deal with the fallout if it ever comes. Jaynie doesn’t need to go down with me. No need to have her directly involved with planting evidence.
Sure, she’ll probably get in some kind of trouble if we’re ever caught, simply for being at the Lowry premises while I did the deed. But if she doesn’t actively participate, she’ll be looking at nothing more than a slap on the wrist. Not too bad compared to what will happen to me.
“Flynn.” Jaynie sighs. Her frustration with me not allowing her to handle the knife or the blood we’re about to plant is showing as we get underway with our crime…or rather, my crime. “At least let me hold the knife while you pour the blood on it,” she practically begs.
No way.
We’re standing in the middle of the kitchen in the Lowry house. Or, more accurately put, we’re in what remains of the kitchen. This room, like all the others in the house, has been ransacked. The table and chairs that once sat in the middle are busted to small pieces. Their scattered remains lie about, along with cabinet doors that have been ripped from the hinges. All the drawers have been pulled out as well, their contents strewn all over.
This cluttered mess made finding a good, sharp knife easy enough. There was one particularly lethal-looking blade wedged behind a broken chair leg. I picked it up and wiped it off, hopefully leaving it devoid of fingerprints.
But now I’ve reached the hard part—making this kitchen knife look like a murder weapon.
“I’m good,” I insist as Jaynie once again asks if I need assistance.
As I hold the handle of the knife with one hand that I’ve wrapped in an old dishrag, a measure taken to prevent transfer of my own prints, I balance the vial of blood in my other hand.
“I’m just going to pour a little bit of Debbie’s blood here and there,” I murmur.
“That should work,” Jaynie says, nodding encouragingly.
I tip the vial to pour the blood, but then I re-think my strategy.
“Hey, maybe I should pour a lot, and then wipe the blade off. That’s probably what someone would do with a bloody knife they’re planning to hide, right?”
Jaynie sighs. “I don’t know, Flynn. Just hurry, okay?”
Her eyes flitter about, like someone might walk in on us at any moment. I’m pretty certain that’s not going to happen, but there’s no telling her that. Now that we’re in the commission of a pretty major crime, she’s a nervous wreck, convinced that the police are going to do
some random property check and catch us red-handed.
“I think I’ll pour and wipe,” I decide, at last.
“Whatever. That’ll work.”
I kick out the edges of an old towel I placed on the floor earlier to catch any dripping blood. “We should probably plant this towel with the knife,” I muse, more to myself than to Jaynie. “It’ll look like Allison used it too, seeing as it’s hers.”
Jaynie found the old towel up in Allison’s bedroom, kicked under what remained of her bed. I recognized it right away as belonging to Allison. The bubblegum pink color, her signature shade, gave it away.
Beyond the nauseating hue, however, I remember all too well from the days when Allison would prance around in front of me wearing only this towel, or one like it. Once she called me in to the adjoined bathroom and asked me to hand her what could’ve been this exact one. She was standing in the shower buck-naked, propositioning me with her eyes.
Allison was always hitting on me when I lived here, but to no avail. I despised that skanky bitch from the start. I couldn’t even bring myself to hate-fuck her. Though I sure am fucking her now, and my actions are brimming with hate.
Yes, it’s pure hatred I feel as I pour Debbie Canfield’s blood all over the knife, the excess dripping to the towel beneath in big crimson globs. When I pick up the pink towel and start to wipe the excess blood from the knife—as I imagine Allison would’ve done with the real items, if they exist—I murmur, “I know you killed her, you bitch. This may not be real evidence, but it’s going to be just as good.”
With the deed completed, Jaynie and I head out to the new barn, the one we used to work in, to plant the knife and the towel.
The plan is to hide these two items in a hidey-hole I once dug in the ground. It’s the only spot in the barn where one of the concrete slabs covering the floor ever came loose, which was kind of odd in a new structure. No matter. I noticed it last year and utilized the space beneath the slab as a hiding spot for food.
Five minutes later, I’m lifting up one end of that loose cement slab.
