Oblivion

by Karolyn Cairns

  ~ ~ ~

  Jace could hardly forget his argument with Daphne hours later. He paced as he waited for Merrick to get back. He couldn’t stop dwelling on what she said. Was it true? Would he have realized everything Lindsay wanted for them wasn’t what he wanted at all? Would it have ruined their relationship?

  He didn’t like the way he felt to know an outsider read the situation better than him and he’d been in it. The night he refused to go to Georgia, he put his foot down. He meant what he said. If she couldn’t wait for him it was over. It took six months and Marnie’s situation to tell him he couldn’t leave. He dragged his feet because deep down he knew it would change everything between them.

  He died before he found that out for himself. Lindsay would have never been happy to stay in Little Bend and go to a local college. She was determined to go to Georgia Tech even when she could have gotten into better schools closer to home. It was her dream, not his. He knew that now. He started to see that and balked at it. Everything began to unravel from there.

  Had he lived she would have left. They would have seen each other when she had breaks from school and the summers. Sooner or later she would have stopped coming home or met someone else. Girls like Lindsay never went without a boyfriend.

  Wasn’t that why he used half his savings to buy her a ring? He knew now it was because he didn’t think she would wait if they weren’t engaged. He didn’t plan to ask for the right reasons. Yes, he loved her and always had, but they were too young to get married. It was his last ditch effort to hold onto her, knowing he would lose her anyway.

  Daphne pointed it out and he was furious with her for it. What did she know? He didn’t want to dwell on the past. It was the future he was worried about. That didn’t change just because he realized their relationship was doomed now.

  He had to get back and make sure Lindsay was safe and the kids were taken care of. Cameron was running loose too. A small part of him wondered if he had a child to see born with a fleeting hope.

  It was wrong to hope Marnie’s baby was his just to keep some part of him alive, selfish in a way he never was before. Here in Oblivion he had only himself to look after and the others. He was seeing how little thought he gave to his own needs. Besides football, he had no hobbies. He was restless and bored with so little to do when they weren’t training.

  For the first time in his short life, he wondered if everything happened for a reason or it wasn’t just rotten luck. Did he have to die to figure out what he really wanted when it was too late to do anything about it now?

  “Jace, is that you?” Daphne called from the guest room in a worried tone.

  “Yeah, I’m just waiting for Merrick.”

  “Can you come here a minute?”

  Jace didn’t want to be anywhere by the hot redhead who put his whole life into perspective in one sentence. He was angry and wanted to rail at life’s injustices. Taking it out on Daphne wasn’t happening. She only stated the obvious. He was just angry she was right.

  “What is it?” he asked as he went to the room. She stood at the window. He was thankful she put her pants on. She had her back to him.

  “You’re mad at me,” she stated and didn’t turn. “I have a bad habit of saying what’s on my mind and being blunt. You get that way being a waitress all your life. People are always telling you their problems.”

  “No, you would make a great therapist or a shrink. You were right, about everything. It doesn’t help to know the life I lost wasn’t one I was living for myself anyway.”

  Daphne turned and smiled sadly. “Yeah, I feel that way too. I loved my son, but I kept feeling like I cheated him out of having a better life when I got pregnant by Aaron. I knew by then he would be a rotten father and a crummy husband. It was too late.”

  “We both learned something new today,” Jace said and smiled. “It’s becoming a habit and I’ve only known you seven hours. A good thing I wasn’t a regular at your diner.”

  “I’m going back to check on my son,” she said and he could see nothing would deter her. “I just want to know Jacob is safe and happy with my parents and his father isn’t blamed for my death.”

  “I’m going back to check on Lindsay and my family,” Jace replied and his brown eyes filled with admiration. “I’d rather spend eternity wandering there than the next fifty here chasing Deadheads.”

  “Jace, I don’t think this is the message we’re supposed to take from this place, but I can’t get passed my baby.”

  “I can’t get over my girl and my family. You don’t need to tell me. I can’t pretend that I’m happy to realize I was doing everything Lindsay wanted, but that isn’t her fault, it’s mine. Had I been confidant I wouldn’t lose her; I might have taken those risks.”

  Daphne grinned. “I never thought I’d ask this; but how do you haunt a house?”

  “We don’t have a manual here in Oblivion, but it can’t be too hard.”

  “When do we leave?”

  “What do you mean ‘we’?” Jace asked.

  “I thought we could leave together and meet back,” she ventured softly. “You’re coming back, right?”

  “We can’t leave the door open. That’s why they forbid it.”

  “Why can’t we close the door for one another? The buddy system?”

  Jace grinned. “I knew you had more skills than just being a waitress. How much time do you think we would need?”

  “How about two weeks?”

  Jace realized what they were doing would land them in deep trouble with Raymond but he didn’t care. He had a murderer to catch and his girlfriend and the kids needed him. Even if he got tossed to the demons upon his return, it was worth it to see Cameron Chase get his.

  “That’s enough time to say goodbye and set things to rights.”

  “That’s all I mean to do and I’m going first,” she assured him with a glint in her blue eyes.

  “You just want to make sure I come back,” he accused and smiled.

  “Yeah that too, but I don’t want to haunt Aaron forever, just two weeks to see if he had anything to do with this.”

  They regarded one another with mutual relief. For now they both had secrets from the group. Jace would do what he promised Merrick and fulfill their expectations of him, but he would protect his own from Cameron. He couldn’t allow the chips to fall where they may. Too much depended upon Lindsay following through with her plans. His brother and sister’s futures also weighed heavily upon him too.

  Despite the twinges of uncertainty that he and Lindsay wouldn’t have lasted that year of separation, he still loved her as much as when he was alive. Hope didn’t die with him they would have worked all those problems out had he lived.

  Despite Daphne pointing out the flaws in their perfect love, it certainly did not lessen his feelings of loss and anger to be denied a life with Lindsay.

  Thinking about her now made life in Oblivion bearable. Lindsay was like that white light he failed to see upon his arrival, leading him back to her side. Two weeks didn’t seem like enough time to set matters to right. It didn’t seem fair. To stay any longer would be foolish and make leaving them all harder. He would go back to make sure the ones he loved were back on track, nothing more.

  Jace’s brown eyes grew cold to think of Cameron. The friend he was betrayed by so cruelly would think he got away with his murder. He could only imagine how Cam covered it up that day. He knew no one would ever believe he did it. The face Cameron showed to the world was a far cry from the savage one filled with rage that stabbed him to death upon the ground next to his truck.

  What troubled Jace the most was why Cameron did it? He was second choice for the football scholarship. His best friend knew it was his when he found out Jace wasn’t going with Lindsay.

  Cameron set up his sleeping with Marnie over the holidays as a favor, assuring him he was fine with it. Jealousy didn’t factor into his actions at all. It didn’t make sense. If it wasn’t the scholarship or Marnie; why di
d he kill him?

  Why did it matter to him so much to know? He was dead by Cameron’s hand, no matter the reasons. He wanted to know what was worth killing him for. It burned within him.

  He didn’t buy Merrick’s assessment it was a thrill-kill thing for Cameron. The killing was done out of rage, pure unadulterated rage. The flashes of the attack left him shaken and filled with fear for anyone who crossed paths with his killer. He remembered more of that day in fragments that made him cringe in remembrance.

  Jace just got done showing Cameron the ring, telling him his plans when his friend asked that he pull over. Cameron seemed surprised he was asking Lindsay to marry him. He remained strangely quiet after that.

  Jace just leaned over to put the ring back in the glove box when the first blow fell from behind through the window of his truck. The knife had been driven into his neck, severing his jugular. He gasped and stared in horror and surprise as Cameron stood outside the window with the bloody knife. His blue eyes were cold and flat, devoid of emotion.

  Jace fell against the door, holding his neck where blood poured from the wound when Cameron yanked open the truck door and let him fall to the ground. He was helpless as the knife descended again and again into his writhing body, until he knew nothing but blackness and the pain and horror were gone.

  Cameron deserved to get his now, despite Merrick’s talk of Karma and the law of averages bad people met a bad end. He always believed in what went around came around. For the first time in his life and death, he wasn’t content to let it come out in the wash. No, the boy who cost him everything would pay before it was all over.