by J D Jacobs
My blood is boiling. How can Cody defend Jenkins after knowing what he’s done? That’s right. Cody doesn’t know. “You want to know why I think it’s Jenkins? Because Jenkins has done it in the past. Those visions I have, I saw him in one. And I saw Mr. Armstrong, Ryan, and Scarlett in it with him. Those three were at the Tryton gate, and Jenkins beat them and kicked them out. Jenkins killed two of our best friends for no reason! Beat Ryan to a bloody pulp. Ever noticed that scar that Jenkins has on his ear? Scarlett gave that to him when he threw her out. Jenkins tossed all three of them out like rag dolls.”
The letter slips from Cody’s fingertips and sails to the floor. After a few silent seconds, he shakes his head. “You’re lying to me. There’s no way. Ryan and Scarlett and Armstrong… They were in the car behind your dad and I and we lost them. They egotoned or they crashed their car or they died some other way. But there’s no way that they made it all the way to Tryton.”
I stare at Cody, my eyes bleeding honesty. As he looks at them, I can tell that he really wants me to be lying.
“When did you find this out?” he mutters.
“The very first day I got here.”
He pauses. “You’ve known this the entire time and you’re just now telling me?”
After all that, after telling him every major secret I have, he still can’t get over the fact that I waited this long to tell him. “Cody, what does it matter if I told you now or ten years from now? The point is that Jenkins killed Scarlett and Ryan.”
“No, the point is that you knew this and didn’t tell me! Did you…” he chokes up and walks across the room, pointing his arm at the door. “I think it’s time for you to leave.”
I shake my head, my heart in my throat. “Did I what? Finish what you were saying.”
“We were your best friends, Jaden! Us five, we were a group. We did everything together! Did you ever care about us? Or did you stop caring when you woke up in Westwood?”
The lump in my throat rises even further. I can’t seem to choke out a response. I shake my head, ashamed at both me and Cody for allowing this to escalate like it has. I don’t argue with him. I don’t plea my case. I do as he says and walk out of the room.
Then I head back to my room.
There I sit on my bed, thinking over how I just lost my best friend, until I eventually fall asleep.
…
Brrp.
Was that my walkie-talkie? I roll over and listen to my name being mumbled out of the speakers. What does Dad want at 4 AM?
I throw my arm over to the nightstand and drag the walkie-talkie up to my mouth. Brrp. “What’s up?” Brrp.
Brrp. “Jaden! Listen to me, it’s Cody. You need to get to the bottom floor of the hospital. Not the first floor, the bottom. This is urgent.” Brrp.
Cody? Brrp. “What’s going on? And where are you?” Brrp.
Brrp. “I’m at the loading dock of the hospital right now. This is important, Jaden. I was wrong.” Brrp.
Brrp. “Wrong about what? What’s going on?” Brrp.
Brrp. “I was wrong about–”
“Cody!” Brrp.
I hear a different voice cut in and interrupt Cody. I wait for him to continue talking, but the walkie-talkie never comes back on.
Brrp. “Cody? Cody!? Talk to me! What’s going on?” Brrp.
No response. Forget it. I grab the walkie-talkie and slide into my shoes. I sprint out of my room and head to the elevator, frantically pressing the button until it finally chimes on my floor. The only way to get to the loading dock is to go to the first floor and take the stairs to the bottom floor, so that’s what I do.
I sprint across the empty hallways, slipping on a few wet spots as I hurry. I pass by dozens of rooms until I slam the door leading to the loading dock open. It’s started raining outside, and the rain pounds unforgivingly on the tin roof of the loading dock. My head spins around for any clue as to what happened here. Out in the midst of the rain, lying sprawled out across the open concrete, is Cody.
I run out to him, the rain pouring down on me. Cody... I fall to my knees, looking over him and not believing what I’m seeing. He’s been stabbed in the gut multiple times. I press my hands against the wounds to try and stop the bleeding. I can feel his stomach convulse under his torn shirt, feel his blood pumping against my palms and oozing through my fingers. The wounds are so deep. I even feel one wound that’s been dragged a few inches up his stomach... There’s no use. The puddle of blood that drenches under him tells me that’s he’s already bled out too much.
“Cody… What… what happened, man? What happened to you?” I cradle him in my arms, looking down at his weak face. His body is limp; he’s stopped fighting against the pain. The life in him has seeped out and mixed with the rainwater. He has just enough energy to move his eyes up to my face. He can’t seem to look away from my burnt cheek.
“Jaden…” he weakly calls out. His voice is so fragile. It breaks me apart. Tears fall from my face and join the raindrops that hit him. His throat makes a gurgling sound as it clogs with blood.
“You’re fine!” I try to convince him, but we both know that isn’t true. He doesn’t respond to it. “Come on, Cody! Stay with me!” I shake him, hoping it will wake him up and bring him back to my best friend, the guy who joked about everything, the only person who has been there for me through everything I’ve ever went through in my life.
I look down at myself, covered in just as much blood as I am water. In Cody’s hand, I see the letter that Ricardo gave me. I shiver in rage; I can’t believe that I let the letter get between us. That argument seems so unnecessary now. “Cody, I’m sorry! I’m sorry for everything! For what happened earlier tonight, for ever doubting you, for not telling you everything! You are my best friend and I did you wrong! Come on, Cody, stay with me! Please! STAY WITH ME!”
My hopeless begging does nothing to him. He’s motionless, his face barren. He’s struggling to simply focus on staying alive. Through my sobs, I hear him mumble. I shut up and lift him so I can hear him over the crashing rain.
“Why…” his lips are barely moving, but he struggles to force them to. “…why didn’t you stop him?”
The words punch me as I watch Cody cough blood on to his chin. I scream out into the frigid rain, begging for anybody to save him, but it’s too late. He’s already taken his last breath.
43.
My footsteps echo against the empty hallway floors. Along with them, by blood-curdling screams for help scrape out of my throat. I beat on every door I pass by.
“Someone, please!” The blood on my hands rub off onto the doors I bang on. A woman finally opens her door. Standing in a robe, she tiredly rubs her eyes and looks at me. Shock immediately flushes her face once she sees me covered in blood, and she knows something is horrifically wrong.
I lead her back to Cody. Multiple nurses have now left their rooms and followed the commotion outside. All of them are appalled when they see who it is lying in the rain, dead.
My heart stops when I see his body a second time. The woman can’t do anything. She checks his pulse and reluctantly turns back at the small crowd behind her to confirm what everyone is dreading. I hear shrieks of horror. I hear a few nurses start crying. All of them look afraid, unsafe, defenseless.
They all think they are the next target. A murderer running the streets of Tryton. They all have no clue.
But I know it was that son of a bitch Jenkins. He did it. He did what Miguel Ricardo couldn’t do. And now he’s probably heading to my room to finish the other part of that letter.
Revenge begins to surge through my nostrils. More nurses have woken up and are following the noise to the loading dock. The nurses throw me worried and confused looks as I sprint by them. “WHERE IS HE!?” I shout through the halls. I hear a few people call to me and ask who I’m yelling about. I continue down the halls, hoping that Jenkins peeks his head around the corner. I salivate at the thought of getting my revenge.
He killed my best
friend. The thought clouds my brain. Cody is dead. Tears are streaming down my face. Rage builds with every step I take. Jenkins butchered Cody and left him in the rain to die. The thought of Jenkins shoving a knife through Cody...
I feel a tight tug on my arm. I try to break away from it, but I look to see that it’s Dad. He’s standing in the doorway of his room, wearing a white t-shirt and a ball cap. “Jaden! What’s going on? Why are you covered in blood?” The genuine worriedness in his voice breaks me down.
“He’s dead! Jenkins killed Cody!” My voice is cracked and flooded with tears. “I’ve gotta find Jenkins before he gets me next! I have to kill him!”
Dad’s face grows pale. He doesn’t say anything, but instead pulls me into his room and closes the door. “What happened? Cody is what?”
“He’s dead!” I shout at him. “Jenkins murdered him! I knew he was going to do it, too! I should’ve stopped him! Cody told me I should’ve stopped him! Dad, he’s dead because of me!”
“Son, calm down,” he calmly tells me as he throws a blanket over me. I didn’t notice but I’ve been shivering. “Sit down, Jaden. Please. Take a deep breath and tell me what happened.”
I pause, swaddling the blanket up to my neck as I try to calm my blaring adrenaline. “Cody called me on my walkie-talkie, told me to meet him at the loading dock. When I got there, he was bleeding. Jenkins stabbed him. Multiple times… Cody’s last words to me were that I should’ve stopped him.”
“Wait,” he begins as he leans against his desk, “why do you think Jenkins did it?”
I pull my arm out of the blanket to hand him the sopping-wet letter. He looks at it with confusion, then slowly takes it from me. “Miguel Ricardo gave me that letter before he was killed. That letter was written by someone in Tryton who wants Cody and I out of the picture. There’s no doubt in my mind that Jenkins did it.”
I give Dad time to read through the letter. His face emits a struggled look. “The ink isn’t legible; I can barely read this. Why do you think Jenkins wrote it? There’s no name at the bottom.”
“Dad… I know he did it.”
Dad looks over the letter multiple times, trying to make out as many words as he can. I expect him to ask me questions about the letter or to ask me questions about Cody just being murdered, but he goes another way. “What were your plans? Right then when you were running down the hall, where were you running to?”
“I was going to find Jenkins and murder him.”
Dad gulps. “Murder Jenkins? Son, that’s nonsense. You can’t do that.”
“Did you not read that letter!? Jenkins wants me out of the picture, too! I’m next! Unless I do something first, he’s gonna come after me!” I’m shaking in rage. “Dad, he just killed Cody… How could you defend him right now?”
“I’m not defending him,” he tells me, “you’re letting your emotions take control of your actions.”
“No! You don’t understand!” I yell as I stand up, throwing the blanket off of me. “I know I shouldn’t have showed you the letter. I knew you wouldn’t believe me. Jenkins killed Cody and now he’s going to kill me and you don’t care!” I immediately break down once I hear my own words. Dad takes me in and cradles my head against his shoulder.
“I believe you, son. It’s okay.” I even hear his voice crack as a tear falls off his face and on to the back of my neck.
…
I’m not sure how long I stayed in his office crying. I think right under twenty-four hours. Even when Dad left his office, I stayed there, too afraid to leave. The only place I feel safe in this city is Dad’s office.
People visited Dad’s office throughout the day and asked me about what I saw. I told the same story numerous times. Everyone seemed devastated to hear what happened to Cody. They all reminded me of what a good person he was, but I couldn’t seem to get the last face-to-face conversation we had out of my head. There’s no doubt that he hated me in that moment. I just… oh God, I just hope he didn’t hate me when he was lying in the rain.
So many years spent together… We did everything in our lives together… He was my best friend. All of that was thrown away all because of a stupid argument… And now he’s gone. He’s… he’s gone.
The Tryton police made a few stops to ask me what happened. I again gave them the same spiel I gave everyone else. They wanted to know what led me to the bottom floor of the hospital. I told them the truth, but I don’t think they fully believed me. They asked me if I could think of anyone who would have a motive to kill Cody. I considered telling them about the letter and the fact that Jenkins wanted Cody dead, but I couldn’t do it. If the letter couldn’t convince Dad, then it definitely wouldn’t convince the police.
There was no surveillance footage on the bottom floor or loading dock that caught Cody’s murder. The murder weapon wasn’t found at the scene, or anywhere, for that matter. No leads, no suspects. The only person with any connection to Cody’s murder was the guy who found him–me.
I didn’t mind the police visiting and asking me questions. I also didn’t mind the people who checked in to hear what happened. Talking to people kept my mind occupied. Every silent moment I had in Dad’s room, I was mocked by the last words that Cody ever said.
“Why didn’t you stop him?”
Those words have pierced at my ears like a knife. I couldn’t get them out of my head.
The funeral was the next day. It hit me hard. Hundreds of people showed up to it, most of them I didn’t know. The open casket was tough. Looking down at my lifeless friend who was once filled with so much energy was almost impossible. As I looked down at him, I couldn’t help but envision him waking up and forming those last words one more time.
“Why didn’t you stop him?”
The words continue to mock.
Dad gave the eulogy. I would have given it, but a combination of anger and depression wouldn’t allow me to even speak. I stood behind Dad as he gave it, though. Looking out into the sea of people, I couldn’t find any comfort. The closest I got was seeing Jasmine. She, too, was holding in anger as tears squeaked out of her eyes. I’m sure her anger came from what she had heard at school: that I’m the one who killed Cody. There’s no telling how many people think that I did it, but I couldn’t care less of what they think. I know who did this.
They dug a hole for Cody and laid him down gently in an isolated section of the cemetery. Sabrina seemed to cry more than I did while we watched him for the last time. For me, my tears had already been replaced with revenge.
I spent the rest of the day in flashbacks, revisiting the best moments that I was lucky enough to share with Cody. I watched us grow up again. I watched us tackle every hurdle that we ever faced in our young lives. I watched us laugh. It was… it was exhaustingly sad. After hours of flashbacks, I physically couldn’t take it anymore. I tried going back to the moment he was killed, but I couldn’t. To be honest, I don’t know if I really wanted to see it.
And no matter how many times I hear Cody’s lively voice in those flashbacks, I couldn’t seem to forget how weak it was when he spat out his last words.
“Why didn’t you stop him?”
And as I lie in my bed with the pistol on my chest, I ask myself the same question. Why didn’t I stop him? Cody doesn’t have the chance to stop him anymore, but I do. I don’t want to be bleeding out on the floor, asking myself that same exact question.
I look at the alarm clock on my nightstand. It’s 4:45 AM. I haven’t slept more than four hours in the two nights since Cody’s murder. Scat is curled up asleep on a pillow that rests on the nightstand. He and my dad are the last living connections I have with Westwood… That fact is a very depressing one.
“Pietro Beretta.” My fingertips glide across the engraved words. There’s no better time than right now. Now is the time for Jenkins to pay.
I stand up from my bed, knees weak. I’ve started shaking, agitated at the thought of what I’m heading to do. I stuff the gun down my sock, grab the stiff, wrinkled
letter, and walk out my room. I pace my way down the empty hallways to the elevator. My teeth are now chattering. I’m freezing cold, rubbing my arms to warm myself up. I don’t think I’ve ever been this nervous about anything. But I’ve never been more determined, either.
My heart skips a beat once I remember Sabrina. I can’t do this, not around her. I can’t go to their house and kill him when she’s there. I can’t even kill Jenkins. She’s Sabrina’s father, there’s no way I can.
But I have to remind myself: if I don’t kill him, then I’ll be dead soon.
“Why didn’t you stop him?”
I have to. Not only to keep myself alive, but for Cody.
The elevator chimes and the doors slide open, welcoming me to the main floor. The lobby is quiet and still, but there are three people sitting on the couches in the middle. They’re Scavs, as they are dressed in their white suits. Two of them look back at me, but I ignore them and make my way to the main entrance, hoping they won’t ask me where I’m going.
“Jaden?” a Scav calls out from the couch. Once his voice bounces off the marbled walls, I know exactly who it is.
I turn around on the balls of my feet. “Hey, Grant.” His maliciously meshed helmet sits as his feet, and he cradles a tall mug of coffee between his covered hands.
“What are you doing up at 5 AM?”
“Just… getting some fresh air. Why are you up?”
“Scavs leave for a mission later this morning. Flying to Texas. We’ll be gone all day, possibly longer, so early morning coffee is a must before we get things ready for the trip.”
“That’s cool, I guess.” I don’t really know what to say, and I don’t necessarily want to catch up with him right now. But Grant may have some information I need. “Hey, random question: Jenkins has an office, right?”
Grant looks at me funny, then walks over to me. “Yeah, it’s in the building right next to the old post office across town. It’s very close to the courthouse,” he tells me, his voice falling the closer he gets to me. “Why are you going to Jenkins’s office this early?”
