Payton Hidden Away (29 page)

“Are we there?” a man asks from
three seats ahead of mine. “I thought I felt us stop.” I can see the back of
his bald head turning as he looks as his wife.

“Go back to sleep,”
she answers. “We’ve got a long way to go.”

A long way to
go.

Damn right. Route
89 runs forever. It leads all the way to the edge of the earth and beyond. At
least that’s what we used to say. The last outpost the Greyhound will pass by on
the way out of Payton is the old Johnson farm, and as I look out my window, the
old farm is coming up on the right now. There are no lights inside. The house
is quiet and dark—blending with the shadows while secrets lie inside. A casual
observer would disregard the place as just an abandoned farm, and one might
wonder why it hasn’t been torn down. Not that any of the other passengers seem
all that interested, and not that there are a lot of other passengers. I count
five. And none of them are familiar. They’re tourists along for the ride,
passing through a small town on the brink of extinction, yet they’re witnesses
to the demise of a few hundred ordinary lives.

Now the farm is
directly out my window, and I feel like crying. Joanne’s in there. She’s cold
and alone. It was only hours ago that she was alive and eager—excited. It was
such a beautiful day, a happy day, and this is how it ends.

Thump, thump,
thump, thump.

I lean my head
against the cool glass of the bus window. The cracks in the road beneath the
tires sing a song I know all too well, and it’s the familiarity that I find
soothing. I shift to get comfortable and wrap myself within my own warmth.

Thump, thump,
thump, thump.

The voices
around me aren’t friendly. They sound bored and uncomfortable. The people are
making conversation if only to pass the time. We’re trapped together on a steel
arc while counting down the moments until we can go our separate ways. Closing
my eyes, I filter the strangers out, replacing the monotone chatter with voices
from my past.
You be careful
, Mom warns from the back of my mind.
I
love you
, Kristie giggles.
Kiss my grits
, Ritchie laughs.

Recoiling, I
dissolve into my mind until there’s nothing but a shell occupying space on this
ripped seat. The Johnson farm passes by, its broken windows looking like dark
eyes, the front door wide open just like a mouth.

Kristie is crying again, but this
time there’s fear in her sound. I guess I should be scared too, but something
in me snapped the moment I looked up and found Ritchie hulking in the doorway.
I should have seen this coming. I should also be afraid, but I’m not.

“You really are stupid,”
Ritchie growls. “This is how you tell her? You bring her here and show her? You
dig up the body of her dead sister and show it to her?” He chuckles. “Great
plan, genius. I remember you bein’ smarter’n that.” Stepping into the light,
his face is creased with age, but he has the exact same look he had the last
time we were down here in this exact same spot. “Guess what?” he continues. “There’s
no one around to hear her scream, and there’s no one to stop me from doin’ what
I’m about to do.”

“Why didn’t you
just kill me then?” I ask. “If this was your plan all along.”

He chuckles.
“Like I said, I remember you bein’ smarter’n that.” He takes another step
closer.

“I’m a slow
learner.”

“You and Joanne
disappeared on the same day. That made them go lookin’ for you. They thought maybe
you’d eloped, or maybe you even had somethin’ to do with it. Nobody ever even thought
to question me. I just pleaded arrogant while you went off to your big school
on your big scholarship, and that was that.”

“Ignorant,” I
mumble.

“I was worried
for awhile until I figured out how much you were afraid of me.”

“So, now what?”
I ask. “Are you’re going to kill us?”

He shrugs.
“Haven’t decided yet, but you gotta admit, it would certainly tie things off
neat and clean.” He chuckles—mostly to himself. “Of course, what kind of man would
that make me? You’re my best friend, and you know how much stock I put in
friendship.”

I just glare.

“I always wanted
us to be equals,” Ritchie continues. “Neighbors, the backyard barbecues—the
whole bit.”

My heart seizes.
“You wouldn’t.”

He grins. “I
might.”

“Ritchie,
don’t.”

“I already
killed my girlfriend, and I was thinkin’ maybe you might even things up.”

“If you touch
her, I swear to God I’ll—“

“You ain’t gonna
do nothin’, except what I say.” He looks around the room. “I told you not to
come back, but you did. Then you brung her here, because you can’t keep that
big fuckin’ trap of yours shut.”

“Ritchie…please…”

“We can do this
the easy way, or we can do it the
real
easy way. All I gotta do is stage
a murder-suicide, and they’ll think you done it. Both Joanne
and
Kristie. I’ll show up at your funeral and say what a great guy you were. I’ll even
add that I don’t think it’s fair that they labeled you a killer. After all, it musta
been a crime of passion or somethin’ like that.”

“No one will
believe it,” I argue.

“You don’t think
so? I think everyone’ll believe it. Think about it. You two disappearing at the
same time, then you coming back twenty years later because Kristie started
askin’ questions? So you killed her too before turning the gun on yourself.
It’s not even one of them head-scratchers. It’s reality TV.”

Ritchie seems to
have actually thought this through, and apparently, I’m predictable enough to
do exactly what he knew I would. Leaning over, I pick up the shovel, take a
step back and hand it to Kristie. It’s just a shovel, but something is better
than nothing, and Ritchie’s right; I brought her here. Kristie doesn’t deserve
this. She didn’t deserve to lose her sister, and she doesn’t deserve to lose
her life in this basement. I’m no hero, and I’m not tough, but I sure as hell won’t
make it easy for him.

“When he goes
after me,” I say without taking my eyes from Ritchie, “hit him with the shovel
as hard as you can.

“What?” she
asks, terrified.

“Then run,” I
say. “Lock the car doors, floor it, and don’t stop until you reach the police
station. Drive through the front door if you have to, but don’t stop for
anything. Red lights or anything.”

Ritchie smiles,
but there’s hesitation in his response. “What you gonna do, Triple A?”

“Whatever I have
to.”

“She won’t make
it.”

Thunder rumbles
somewhere outside.

“She’ll make
it,” I say confidently. “By the time you’re done with me, she’ll be halfway
back to town.” I smile. “I’m going to Hell, but you’re going to prison.”

“We can do this
together,” Kristie whimpers—her voice shaking.

“We
are
doing this together,” I snap. “This is the plan.”

Ritchie’s eyes
are going from me to her—the smile on his face replaced with concern. He’s
trying to sort things out, planning to charge, but not quite sure how or when.
She and I are standing on the opposite side of the hole Joanne’s resting in,
and he’s not nimble enough to jump over it. He doesn’t have a straight shot at
either of us.

“He’s going to
kill you,” she whimpers.

“I’m responsible
for Joanne’s death,” I say. “This is my chance to make it right.”

“Oh, boo hoo,”
Ritchie growls. “Are you still crying over that dumb whore? I did you both a
favor. I caught her and Tony makin’ out upstairs the day I done her.”

I smile. “You’re
panicking, Rich. I know that tone. You’re panicking because you know you’re
going to get caught. You know you’re going to lose.”

Thunder cracks
outside. Rain splashes up against the dirty basement window, water running like
beads along the inside of the walls down here.

“You dumb fuck!”
Ritchie shouts, his voice echoing through the room. “I told you not to come
back! No one had to know!”

I’m glaring at
him through slits, daring—almost wishing for him to charge me and get it over
with. “This has nothing to do with me,” I growl. “This is for Joanne.”

Ritchie just
glares.

“It’s over,” I
grumble.

“I beg to
differ,” he sneers. “Things are just gettin’ interesting.” But something’s
wrong. Suddenly, his left eye twitches, and he closes it tightly, doubling over
as he smacks the side of his head.

The headaches.

Kristie takes a
step back while I take a hesitant step forward. Suddenly, I understand, and the
simplicity of it all is so obvious that I’m surprised I never saw it before. They’re
not headaches. They’re a reaction to conflicting motivations. It’s that broken
mind of his, wires mixed up and crossing over, the dilemma between right and
wrong—kind of like the good bad words and the bad bad words. It’s the little
boy versus the man he never wanted to grow into that is momentarily paralyzing
him and momentarily opening a window for us.

Lightning
flashes, lighting the basement as thunder blasts the house. Reacting rather
than waiting, I leap the hole. “Now!” I shout as I hit Ritchie head on, the two
of us tumbling to the dirt floor. Kristie starts screaming. I start punching,
but Ritchie outweighs me two to one, and it doesn’t take much of an effort to
overpower me.

“Now!” I shout
again.

Kristie is still
shrieking when she swings the shovel. Her swing is clumsy, and the shovel
smashes me in the face, sending white stars to my eyes and bringing more
frantic screams of terror.

“Run!” I manage
through a stream of blood running from my nose into my mouth.

Ritchie reaches
out and trips her as she tries to slip past, sending her sprawling. She
scrambles to her feet, still moaning with terror, and she’s out the door,
stumbling up the stairs. Ritchie returns to me and delivers a haymaker that
steals my wind before landing another blow that opens a fresh wound on my other
cheek. But I’m not done yet, and I swing back, managing to connect with some
part of him that feels like bone. I can’t tell what I hit since my eyes are
filling with blood soaked tears, but I hear him ‘ooof’, and I feel his body
relax. I swing again, this time missing. Something hard strikes me across the
chin causing my head to whip painfully to the side. Another sharp crack sends
me to a white world where there are no dreams.

Kristie can’t quite get her
footing as she races up the stairs. She’s frantic and sloppy—clumsily tripping
over her own feet. Tears race along her cheeks, cutting through her makeup.
Throwing herself up the last three stairs, she rolls onto the kitchen floor into
a pool of rainwater where she’s greeted by a bright burst of lightning that
causes her to squint. Water is running along the walls in a sheet of clear
liquid glass that spreads like tendrils across the floor. She splashes through
the puddle as she crawls through the kitchen into the living room.

“Kristie!”
Ritchie bellows from below. “Where you at? I’m comin’ for ya!”

She tries
getting to her feet only to slip on the wet floor and crash forward, the oxygen
ripped from her lungs. She can’t seem to get enough air as she coughs into the
puddle she’s laying in.

Pounding
footfalls are climbing toward her. “I can hear you, sweetheart!” Ritchie
shouts. “Come to Daddy.”

She tries to
stand but can’t, so she scampers on all fours, pushing through the screen door
onto the porch. The boards beneath her whine under the strain and threaten to
give, but she rolls to the edge where she swings her legs over the side and
drops to the ground. No stumbling this time. No falling.

The rain is
coming down in torrents, immediately soaking her to the core. It’s raining so
hard that her car looks a million miles away. She begins stumbling through the
tall grass, trips over an old stump and tumbles face first into the mud.
Crawling again, hand over hand, she’s sobbing, her tears mixing with the rain.

“Kristie!”
Ritchie bellows, this time from the front porch. He leaps and hits the ground
running. “Where you at?”

Terrified, she
scrambles to her feet and races forward, charging head first into the side of
her car. The impact brings a flash of white light and sends her tumbling
backward, but she’s already pushing herself up again and groping for the
handle. Pulling the door open, she crawls into the front seat. Ritchie is
charging with powerful strides. She reaches out into the rain, fumbling for the
door handle, finds it, and yanks, pulling the door shut. Her trembling hand
smacks the automatic lock just as Ritchie crashes against the side of the car,
the whites of his eyes bloodshot with rage as he pounds on the glass.

Fumbling through
her pocket, she finds her keys and promptly drops them on the floor. Ritchie
yanks on the handle before balling a fist and striking the window. The glass
holds, and he howls in pain. “Open the fuckin’ door!”

Kristie reaches
between her feet, her fingers searching for the keys. She finds them, her
trembling fingers sliding the right one into the ignition, the idiot lights
lighting up the inside of the car.

“No!” he shouts.
He looks toward his own truck before turning back to her. Snarling one last
time, he balls his fist before turning away and breaking into a run for his
pickup.

Peering through
the water-streaked glass, she casts one last look toward the house. Joanne and
Tony are in there, both in the basement, both presumably dead. She turns the
key—firing up the engine—drops into reverse and slams on the gas while silently
promising that she’ll come back.

It’s quiet down here. Too quiet.
The only sound is that of the water trickling along the walls and pooling on
the floor. I open my good eye and look around. Joanne’s body still rests half
in and half out of the hole. There are scattered footprints all over the sandy
floor, but there’s no sign of either Ritchie or Kristie, which means they’re
not down here. They’re out there.

I warily stumble
to my feet and limp through the room to the stairs where I reach out and grab
for the hand railing. I yank myself upward, groaning as I go. I limp my way
through the kitchen and into the living room where the couch Joanne and I made
out twenty years ago rests against the wall. I look beyond the screen door into
the yard where Ritchie is racing through the rain toward Kristie’s car.

Hopefully, she’s
locked herself safely inside. Hopefully, she’ll be able to get out of the
driveway without getting stuck in the mud. Hopefully, she’ll get away. But I’m
not so naïve as to simply hope for the best, so I limp down the steps into the
tall grass, the rain instantly melting my clothing to my body. My legs are
rubbery. I can barely stand, and as I weave my way through the wet grass, I
realize there’s nothing I can do to help her. At least not from here. I have
only one play, and it’s a gamble at best.