The Understorey, Book One of The Leaving Series (38 page)

He grabbed a full black brush with incredibly
fine bristles and a ceramic ramekin. He unscrewed the lid to a
bottle full of light black powder and poured a small amount in the
ramekin. He took the brush, dipped it in the dust and shook off the
excess.

    “It’s better to under
develop than to over develop the print.”
He lightly brushed the top surface of the box, using a twisting
motion to get all of the ridges of the print.

He spun a hinged desk lamp over the top of
the box and flipped on the light. He recognized two possible
prints, maybe three but he also knew that we had touched the box.
He removed a Sharpie from a container above his workstation and
marked the edge with the number one. He took a piece of tape and
lifted each individual print and marked each one. He repeated the
process for each side of the box.

“Looks like they used latex gloves to
assemble the box. There’s white powder on the tape I used to lift
the print. That’s a rookie mistake.”

“What does that prove?”

“It proves that they handled it with gloves
on. Why would someone need to do that? To avoid prints right? I
doubt we’ll find anyone’s prints, at least on this side of the
paper but I’m gonna’ print you to use as a cross reference anyway
just to make sure. “Come here, “ he said and walked me to the
fingerprinting station.

“Gosh Danny, you’re a regular CSI.”

“Yeah,” he laughed.

He fingerprinted each finger.
    “I can tell you’ve never done this before. The
newbies are always awkward finger printers.”
    “Thanks?”
    “Yeah,” he laughed.
    “You’re going to need Jules’ prints too. Should
I call her?”
I was excited at the possibility of seeing her.
    “No, that’s not necessary,” he said.
    “Why? She touched the box too. It’s true there
was proof of female fingerprints. It could very well be
Taylor’s.”
    “Elliott,” he shook his head. “You seriously
have to let that theory go. Though, I almost prefer yours. I’m
thinking more dangerous thoughts.”
That statement made me shudder inside. He underestimated Jesse
entirely.
    “Wait,” I realized, “why don’t I need to call
Jules down here?”
    He hesitated, “Uhhh, because I already have
them.”
    “Shut up! You’re lying to me!” I said, with a
massive grin on my face.
    “Anyway, let’s move on.”
    “No, no, no. Back the truck up here Danny! You
have Jules’ prints? Why?”
    “None of your darn business Elliott!”
That’s okay. He didn’t have to tell me but Jules would have to
later. I was sort of averse to the idea of finding out but I was
also dying to know.
    “Okay, okay,” I said quickly abandoning the idea
that he was going to tell me.

Danny hadn’t handled the box with his own
hands, he had used a handkerchief he always kept with him but never
used. I sort of wondered why he even owned it until I saw him take
it out to the handle the box.

He went to a locked file cabinet and
retrieved a folder, flipped through it and took a sheet of paper
out that looked similar to the one he had just used to document my
own fingerprints. He put the rest of the folder back in the cabinet
and locked it.
Jules’ file
. He sat back down at the lab
table and reached for a shelf above him. He pulled a small
cardboard box out and opened it to reveal a stand magnifier. He
compared all of the signatures and found only mine and Jules’.

He decided there was nothing on that side of
the paper. He unwrapped the paper flipped it, repeated the entire
process and found nothing. Again, dusting the cardboard box that
held whatever it was that was inside but finding nothing.

    “Time to open it,” he
said.

I was pretty frightened to be honest with you
and I actually felt like telling Danny to let me do it in case it
was something that could harm him.

    “Danny? I think I should
open it, just in case.”
    “Nonsense. Wait,” he laid his ear against the
package. “Nope, not ticking. I’ll open it.”
    “This isn’t funny Danny. I’m pretty
nervous.”   
    “I know son. It’ll be okay.”

He pulled off the tape that bound the lid and
dusted it as well, finding absolutely nothing yet again. He peeled
the lid back.

My eyes widened in fear. Jesse was more
insane than even I gave him credit for.

    “My God.”

This is How I Win

Danny was taken aback by what he saw. He
stood up quickly with a gasp and nearly fell over his chair trying
to distance himself from what was in the box. I was frozen, my
hands trembled where I stood and I couldn’t willingly move a
muscle. I peered at the horrifying message he was sending with dead
eyes, a feature I wanted him to share with me soon.

A million thoughts streamed through my head.
At first, I wanted to run, to grab Jules and run with her,
somewhere far away, somewhere only we know, somewhere he could
never find us.

In that instant, she became my only dream, my
only wish for the future. I cared about nothing else and no one
could stop us, not when every fiber of my flesh wanted nothing else
but to be with her. My immediate reaction was flight until I
realized he would never stop looking. Jesse was no longer the
friend I remembered him to be. He hadn’t been for awhile. If we had
vanished, I knew he would try to find us and I was so scared to
imagine him still out there waiting for his opportunity again,
striking when we least expected, when he thought we were
comfortable.

He would wait until our thoughts of him were
a distant memory for us. I cringed. He had to be stopped, now. That
flaming box, came back into focus. I wanted to scream out, to tear
what I saw into a billion pieces. I suddenly wished I’d never told
Danny. I wish I had opened it on my own so the motive for the
murder I was going to commit because of it wouldn’t become so
apparent.

    “I have to kill him,” I
accidentally said aloud.
    “No!” Danny screamed, grabbing my shoulders.
Breathing deeply to steady his calm, he said, “I know you don’t
mean that son! Elliott, I’m gonna’ get who did this.”

I gained control of my neck and turned my
head toward him, “You’re going to arrest Jesse immediately?”

    “Elliott! We haven’t found
reason for him to want to do something like this. This is too
advanced for him.”
    “No,” I scoffed, “it’s not. You don’t know what
he’s capable of. Growing up I always knew he had a little bit of an
evil streak, I just underestimated it. He’s a lunatic Danny. You’re
wrong.

“Look, it obviously took two people to do it
Danny. How do you explain that? Huh? Taylor must have taken the
picture for him.” I pointed to the picture hanging off the edge of
the table. It showed the frame of Jules’ bedroom window.
    “Maybe he used a tripod Elliott, I don’t know
for sure but for the sake of argument, say I am starting to believe
your theory. I have no evidence that he’s done anything.”
    I stared hard at the two photographs in front of
me. It was him, I could tell, in the shape of his body, in the way
his fingers grasped at the blade he held at my sleeping Jules’
throat, in the way his eyes bore into mine through his dark ski
mask. I knew it was him and if Danny couldn’t prove it, bad things
were going to happen to him. He pushed through a really dark line
with me and was begging for a reaction. I’m guessing he wouldn’t
like what it was and I also guessed how much he underestimated
me.

The second photograph was Jules’ hanging
painting. The letters Y.O.U. dripping in red paint. I couldn’t
bring myself to pick up the photographs. I stared into the small
harmless cardboard box that contained them and noticed that the
filling inside was torn canvas.

    “Danny!” I yelled.
    “What?!”
    “The, the.......painting! It’s shredded in the
box!”

I was starting to feel nauseated. I knew what
the painting represented to Jesse. It was Jules. He was going to
kill Jules and soon.

    “Okay Elliott. Listen,” he
said, trying to calm me down, “we need to get back to your
grandma’s. We’ve wasted enough time here. Just let me lock all of
this in the evidence room and I’ll call Julia’s parents and..”

I knew what he was trying to do. He was
trying to downplay it, like it was something that could happen to
just about anyone, but I knew. I knew that this was probably one of
the sickest things he’d seen in Bramwell.

    “No!” I interrupted.
“Jules’ parents can’t know. They’ll leave Bramwell if they hear of
this.”
Danny looked on me with pity.

“I can’t Elliott. They need to know. Think of
the danger that Julia is in? Is it worth her life? This has spun so
out of control. It’s too serious to take the risk.”

    On our way back to my
grandma’s and granddad’s I could barely keep two thoughts in my
head. I was reeling in physical pain. My entire world was about to
crumble on top of me and there was nothing I could do about it. I
walked into the house and everyone was cheery and happy and full of
life.
    “Mom,” was all I could mumble off my tongue.

She could tell something was wrong. She ran
up to me and hugged me and I hugged her back. I felt like I was
seven again, and I’d skinned my knee and ran to my mom for her to
make everything better, to make the wound disappear but this hug
couldn’t make it all better. It was just a reminder that nothing
could fix the pain but a locked away or a dead Jesse. I didn’t
really want Jesse dead I just wanted the monster that was doing
this to die inside him and for him to be at least somewhat normal
again.

    “Let’s go into mom’s room
Shelby. I need to talk to you,” Danny said.
Everyone watched with solemn eyes as I nearly toppled over trying
to get to my grandparent’s room.
    “It’s okay everyone! Granddad? Can you put on
some music?” My dad said before closing the door to the bedroom
behind him.
    I plopped at the edge of my grandparent’s bed
and examined the fibers of the shag carpet beneath my feet. I
listened as Danny revealed the details to my parents but I felt as
if I were in a fog. The words were barely audible. They all buzzed
around me in slow motion. I snapped back into reality when Danny
mouthed the words ‘Julia’s parents’.
    “Wait,” I said.   
    “Elliott, I already told you, I have to contact
them.”
    “I know, but please, let me tell them? In
person?”
I looked at my parents and they kindly agreed it would be the best
plan.
    “Danny?” My mom asked. “Can you take him?”
That was my mom’s way of making sure I was safe and that I wouldn’t
take a much wanted detour to the Thomas house.
    “Sure Shelby, of course I will,” he said.

We got to Jules’ house and I willed my heavy
body up her mountainous front porch steps. I knocked on her door
with a deafening thud.

    The door opened and an
exuberant Jules jumped in my arms. “Elliott?” She asked in slow
motion.
    “Jules,” I said peeling her off of me, “I need
to tell you something.”

The terror that was in her eyes was enough
for me to die inside a million times over. Her smile faded into
sheer terror. Her lips were shaking as she’d ask questions. I stood
to support Jules while she relayed everything to her including
everything that had happened before then.

Jules’ mother had to be supported and taken
to her couch. All their lovely family from Pennsylvania stood
motionless, aghast at what they’d heard.

    “We’ll have to send her to
Mauch Chunk with you Isabel,” Jules’ dad finally said.
His words panicked my heart. It began to beat irregularly. I felt
empty and she hadn’t even left yet.
    “No,” Jules said calmly.
    “It’s not permanent Julia,” her mom said. “It’s
just until we resolve whatever it is that’s going on here.” The
tears began to fall softly down her cheeks.

Jules held my hand and the weight of our
predicament began to melt off. This immediate medicine was going to
be leaving me when I probably needed it most, but this was the
price I would pay to keep her safe and I wanted nothing more than
her safety.

    “It’s only a matter of
time,” I whispered. “I’ll get you back here before you know it
love.”
    “If you think this is best,” she said to the
room. “I’ll pack tonight.”

I’ll pack tonight. Three words. Three daggers
into my thumping chest.
I could go with her
, I told myself,
I could go with Jules. I’m sure Isabel wouldn’t
mind.......but
your
Jesse’s target,
I reminded myself.
Could he follow me? Would he do that?
Yes. He would. I would
have to wait until I could expose him for what he was and that
would clear the path for Jules to come home. The sooner, the
better.

    “Danny?” I asked my uncle
under my breath.
Everyone shifted uncomfortably in their own skin as they buzzed
about the house getting themselves ready to leave earlier than
they’d planned.
    “Hmm?” He asked.
    “What do you have in the way of video
surveillance?” I asked not expecting much.
    “We’re one hundred and nineteen people in this
tiny town Elliott. I hadn’t even had to dust for prints in over
five years. We have nothing,” he said, confirming my
suspicions.
    “I’m gonna’ go to Charleston then,” I
said.
    “Wouldn’t hurt to try,” he said, shrugging his
shoulders. He didn’t look hopeful.
    “Mr. Jacobs?” Danny said and began a private
conversation.

I snuck into Jules’ room to visit while she
packed. When I walked into the room she was alone, it was against
the rules, but under the circumstances no one would care. She stood
fearlessly at her window. The very one Jesse uses to invade her
home and stared darkly through the hundred year old glass. I rested
my shoulder against the jamb of the door and gazed upon her.

She was no longer a girl anymore. She had
thinned out so much lately and although Jesse was definitely to
blame I couldn’t help but think she was also shedding her youth a
little bit. In contrast though, her hips were a bit rounder, her
neck and face no longer, her bones had matured.