Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-27353245-20151206073251

Rose Petal Bed

Kaiden’s head rested in his hands. He stared down at the table’s bland surface, avoiding eye contact with the man sitting in front of him.

“Hello, Kaiden, my name is Dr. Warren and I’ll be asking you a few questions today. Is that alright?”

Dr. Warren looked up from his clipboard, his eyes hidden by the glare in his glasses. Kaiden’s hands dragged down his face, slowly, as he lifted his head to look at the doctor. His chin now rested in his hands.

“I already answered questions.” He mumbled in a tired, almost monotonous voice.

“Yes, I know, but…”

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore…”

“I’m here to listen, Kaiden. Trust me.” Warren gave a weary smile to the teenager sitting across from him.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Kaiden’s eyes met with the doctor’s in one sudden motion. The boy stroked his own bare chin with one hand and let his eyes drift away again. “...Will this help me.. feel better about it?”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Yes, Kaiden. I’m here to help you. Lets start from the beginning, though. Start from where you first met Jeremy, alright?”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“How much is it okay for me to tell you…?”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“All the way until the end, if you’d like to.”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Kaiden’s chair creaked as he leaned back. “...Alright.”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">************

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I met him through Everette. There we are at school one morning, it’s kind of cold out, and the sky is grey. But it’s like a bright grey, and hard to look at. Those kinds of mornings. It was our senior year, and Everette came up to our friend group one day with this short kid tagging along beside him. So I look at Everette and then look at the kid and Everette tells me, “This is Jeremy.”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Jeremy had this like, tough kid vibe about him, like he would puff up his chest when I looked at him. He was probably trying to look mature or something… I tried not to laugh. I just smiled down at Jeremy and said,

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Hey. What’s up?”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">And the kid looks at me and says “Nothing. Who are you?”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">And again, I’m trying not to laugh; Jeremy’s voice was still small like a middle schoolers, and here he is, puffing up his chest, and it hits me that this kid is a freshman, and he’s new, and he just wants to fit in with us, the big kids… and I felt kind of honored, I guess.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I tilt my head up at him a bit and I tell him my name. “Kaiden,” I say, and he kinda leans in a bit like he didn’t quite hear me so I repeat myself, “My name is Kaiden.” And I motion over to my friends, who are standing beside me. “This is Hal, and Jake.”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">The four of us, Hal, Jake, Everette and me started talking to him. The month went on normally after that. Jeremy just sort of became part of our friend group. He fit in easily, even though he was a lot younger than us; it was sort of like having a younger cousin, cause ya know, they don’t live with you, but you see them often, and it’s like your cousin is a sibling almost. That’s how I felt towards this kid. He was cool.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">….The... night it happened, I didn’t realize at the time what it was. I feel so stupid. It was so fucking obvious what happened, I guess I just didn’t want to believe it… So I ignored it.. And I looked for other solutions.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">It was  just… We went out one night, you know, to Jake’s house. It was Saturday. We were all going to spend the night there drinking and getting high and playing our favorite games. we did most of that. I remember Jeremy coughing as he drank vodka for the first time, and we laughed at him, and then we started to play Mario Kart. It was around 12:30 something when Jake decided he wanted to go out and buy more food, and Hal decided he was going to tag along with him. So of course, Jeremy asks if he can go, too. They say yes and then pile into Jake’s car and head off down the road…

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">And that was it. I got a call from Hal while they were out, probably 10 minutes after they left. I picked up the phone like it was nothing. He asked me if Jeremy had come home, and I said no, only really half paying attention to Hal and half paying attention to the game I was playing and then he says it.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“We can’t find him. I thought maybe he went back. Are you sure he’s not there?” Again, I’m only half paying attention, and I’m a little drunk by this point, too, so I just shake my head and say “no” nonchalantly, and Hal says “okay. try texting him, or something.” and hangs up.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I pause the game and look down at my phone. Everette looks over at me and asks me what was going on, and I told him. He takes out his phone, too, (Everette had one of those old flip phones. He says he just likes them better for some reason. I don’t know.), and texts Jeremy.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I call Jeremy. His phone rings twice, and then cuts to voicemail. I call again. I figure blowing up his phone with calls would work. But again, it rings twice, then cuts to voicemail. I look at Everette. He shrugs, and I put my phone down on the floor beside me with the ringer on, so if he decides to call back I would hear it.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">An hour passes, and the front door opens. I get up. I’m on my feet, totally excited- I feel my heart rush a little, and the door opens and it’s Jake, Hal, and a few bags of chips and a slushie. That was all.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Where’s Jeremy?” I ask. I can feel my hands start to numb, sorta… It’s hard to explain. It climbs up my hands and into my forearms… Jake looks at me and shakes his head.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Maybe he went home,” he says, “maybe his folks got mad at him and he went home and was too embarrassed to tell us.”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">And Hal and Everette and I, we all just went with it, and sat back down. But in my gut, and in my arms, and my feet, and legs, it felt like something was utterly wrong about it. Jeremy is a small kid. He’s young. He’s vulnerable. He talks tough, with a smart ass mouth, and it was bound to get him in trouble. I couldn’t take the worry anymore and I looked at Everette and I suggested that we call the cops.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Everette nods, but Jake says “if we call the cops, they’re ganna wanna see us. We smell like weed and booze.” He was right, of course. We did smell like weed, and booze, and it was Jeremy’s first time, so he was probably high out of his mind, or drunk, sitting at home getting a lecture from his parents.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Monday came. Then Tuesday. And Wednesday. And finally, Thursday rolls in, and Everette decides to call the cops without telling Jake or Hal, so it’s just me and Everette, sitting in my bedroom after school on the phone with the dispatch woman and he tells her everything. His hands trembled as he held his phone to his ear, the other hand running through his hair and he turns away from me to talk to her some more, occasionally looking back at me to see if I remembered anything he was missing, or knew any clues to where Jeremy would be. I would shrug, or nod, or fill him in on some details about the night.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">He hung up the phone with a “thank you” and then sat there with his head in his hands. He didn’t cry or anything, he just sat there, trembling. I saw him put his hands together in front of his mouth. I didn’t hear him say anything, but I just assumed he was praying, cause that was the sort of thing Everette would do, so I left him alone and went into the bathroom, came back five minutes later, and he just looks at me with this sullen expression on his face; like everything was pale, even though his skin was dark, it was paler than before and I could see redness on his nose and in his eyes and around his mouth like he was choking up, but he still didn’t cry or anything.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">He said to me, “Kaiden. This is our fault,” and he pauses and looks down at his feet while shaking his clasped hands, like he was begging, or praying again and he says “what if we never find him? He’s probably waiting for me to come get him- he was always following me everywhere- “ and his words came out fast and jumbled as he started sputtering to me about how he should’ve been there and how he was going to Hell now… I ended up letting him crash at my house that night. We didn’t say much, really. We were worried. Who disappears at almost 1 am, at a gas station, into thin air? It hurt to think about it but the only plausible explanation I could come up with was that Jeremy was swept up by some old creep when Jake and Hal weren’t looking.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Friday comes, and it’s lunch, and we’re all sitting together. I’m sitting beside Hal, to the left of him, and across the lunch table is Jake and Everette. It’s quiet, and we’re not saying much about anything other than the occasional “did you hear about the new Street Fighter game?” or jab at someone's arm, trying to kick up a conversation, but it was like kicking up dirt; it would just fade back down into nothing, into silence. Eventually Jake broke the silence.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“I told you not to call the cops.” He said it openly, like he was speaking to all of us. It was clear he didn’t know which one of us had done it, and in a way it made me feel dirty; like I had put us all in danger (even though I wasn’t the one who called).

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Everette speaks up, “I had to,” he continues in a hushed tone, “he’s still out there, and if I didn’t call… If I didn’t call, they would suspect <span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-style:italic;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">us <span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">, or something…”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Jake sat in silence, scrolling through something on his phone before looking away from us in an almost angry manner. He was bouncing his knee nervously. I could tell he was scared, just as scared as the rest of us.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">The bell rings, and damn near deafens me, and we all get our stuff and start to leave. Me and Everette have the same class after lunch, so we walk together. Jake and Hal have opposite classes from both me and Everette and from each other, so they usually walk by themselves, but after Jake walks away, Everette pulls Hal aside and starts asking him questions.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">He says “What were you and Jake doing when it happened?” and Hal kinda steps back and doesn’t say anything for a moment, like he is trying to collect his memories, because he was drunk, and scared at the time, ya know? and he looks back at Everette.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“I was getting chips, and Jake went to another aisle to get something else, like food or soda or something, and I’m not sure what Jeremy was doing… He wasn’t with me, though. I went down a few aisles to get stuff and then came out and looked for him and Jake and I saw Jake pacing around the entrance to the store. He comes over to me and says that he can’t find Jeremy anywhere and thought maybe he left the store and was waiting outside, but when he checked he wasn’t there.” And then Hal’s voice kinda trails off, and I leave them there and I go to class. I heard enough of it.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Everette comes into class a few minutes after me and he sits beside me and he says, all quiet, “You know, Kaiden, I have to find him, or I’m going to Hell.” and he shakes his head and looks off towards the front of the classroom, but I can tell he isn’t paying attention to a word the teacher is saying. Everette just kind of zones out, into his own little world. Over the next few class periods it was obvious that Everette was becoming more and more obsessed each minute with finding Jeremy; with getting God’s forgiveness. I don’t think it was just that, though, I know he cared about Jeremy… I know he knew as well as I did that something bad happened to Jeremy.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">So, school ends and I start to walk home with Everette. But he tells me that he wants to go to Jake's house, and ask him about Jeremy, to see if he saw anything that Hal didn’t. I tell him “goodluck” because I don’t want to go to Jake’s house again. I was tired… and I just wanted to go home, ya know? I wanted to lay down and forget anything happened, convince myself that Jeremy just suddenly ran away or something.. And that he’d turn up by the end of the month. And Everette looks at the ground and nods as he walks away.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I ended up texting him later on, probably around 3 in the afternoon. He told me that Jake was angry with him because he didn’t want the cops to come to his door and find the drugs. I tell Everette to suggest that Jake gives the drugs to Hal to hold on to, but Jake tells him that he doesn’t know which one of their houses the cops will come to first, if they do come, to ask questions, so it could end bad either way, and that he doesn’t trust anyone else enough with it not to rat him out or to smoke it all while they’re supposed to be holding it for him.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I tell Everette to just apologize, even if he doesn’t mean it, just so Jake would shut up. An hour and a half passes, and Everette won’t reply to me, so I call him. It rings twice, and then I hear Everette’s voice on the other end:

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Hello?”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I say “What’s going on?” and then it goes,

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Yeah… uh huh… Haha, well sorry but I’m not actually here right now. Leave a voicemail and I’ll get back to you later!” and the phone beeps for me to leave a voicemail, and I hang up.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">So I go to Jake's house. I figured that Jake got heated and him and Everette were probably fighting, or something, because that’s the kind of thing Jake would do when he gets heated. I pull into the driveway, and I hear people talking, calmly. Relief kinda softly washes over me and I knock on the front door. But there is no answer, and the door wasn’t locked, so I just let myself inside the house… I.. I remember all of this, the most, I remember this so clearly.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I remember the smell of the air. It smelled like mold and weed and like when you forget to clean the fridge after like a month, and the food inside is all rotted and shit. To my left I can hear the voices again, still so calm, but when I turn, it’s just the T.V., and no one is in the living room.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">From the living room is the entrance to the kitchen, and there’s like a bar you can sit at there, and you can see clearly over it into the kitchen, so I can see that it’s empty. To the right is the hall leading into Jake’s bedroom and his parents’ bedrooms, and the bathroom, and I go down the hall into Jake’s room, and he’s not there, either. So I knock on his parents’ bedroom door and it opens as I knock on it; I see Jake sitting on the bed looking through what looks like photos or something, and I can just barely see his eyes peek up at me through his hair… He looks back at the photos and then he starts talking and says to me “my parents are coming home later tonight.” At this point, I just kind of assume Everette must be using the bathroom, or something. But I ask anyway.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">“Where’s Everette?” I say and Jake just sits there, unchanging, looking through the photos still.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">He said, “Everette went home, like ten minutes ago.”

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">But of course, if Everette was home, then he would have answered me. So now I’m getting worried, because what if whoever took Jeremy took Everette, ya know? Because Everette was getting SO involved in the situation… I don’t say anything to Jake; I’m just standing in the doorway of his parents bedroom, when I hear this kind of murmuring. And the murmuring picks up into a shout, and a thud, off to my left, and I can tell it’s not the T.V.; the T.V. is still playing the movie and everything just starts to move so fast because JAKE gets up from the bed and all of a sudden he’s in front of me with this aggressive look on his face and he’s still moving towards  me and I realize he’s not ganna stop, he’s going to ram into me, so I panic and run down the hall.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I’m about to run out the door when I hear shouting again as a loud “HELP ME”, coming from what I  thought was the kitchen- but I go into the kitchen and the nasty smell kind of intensifies… I’m in the kitchen now, and I see nothing. I can HEAR THE SCREAMING, BUT I CAN’T SEE ANYTHING, THERE’S NO ONE THERE. AND Then I feel something wrap around me and lift me up off the ground and I’m kicking and shouting and trying to pry Jake’s arms off of me and he just throws me onto my stomach. My face slams against the kitchen tile and my nose breaks and I can see the blood kind of splattered or splashed in front of me and seeping into the cracks of the tiles……..

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">Jake is on top of me, like sitting on my back, with my arms pinned to my back and one of his hands, like his fingers go through my hair and he sort of twists it and he wraps the hair around his fist and pulls my head back, so I’m kind of bent in this odd way, looking up at the ceiling and blood is running down my face and dripping onto the tiles. And I can still hear it. I can still hear shouting, and cries for help, and in my daze I realize it’s Everette, and as this thought flashes into my mind Jake gets off of me and furiously drags me by my hair with the same hand and I hear something heavy slide across the floor and the creaking of wood followed by something that sounded like coins or... like metal clinking together. He drags me further down and I see that he had moved the refrigerator to the side and pulled up this wooden door with metal rings on it. And he drags me down there behind him. It’s dark… I’m kicking and grabbing at my hair but it does nothing and I just shut my eyes and the shouting gets louder and I suddenly hear Everette shouting my name “Kaiden! KAIDEN! KAIDEN! NO, NOT KAIDEN!” there's sniffling in between some of the words.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">We stop moving, and I lay there for a few moments before opening my eyes and lifting my head up to see what’s around me. There’s a light coming in from a window, like one of those cellar or basement ones that are small and narrow. The light comes in beams over my body and the floor around me and to my left, against the wall and out of the narrow light, I see Everette, and there are tears running down his face. There’s something I think was like, dried blood, on his cheek, and his arms are chained above his head. His wrists were bloody and scabbed like he had been trying to pull his way out of the chains, and before I could say anything to him Jake came towards me with a metal rod and I put my arms up over my head to protect myself. He just walks past me, though. I was relieved; I thought I was going to be spared, but then I felt the metal rod come down on my right leg and I scream and try to drag myself away from him but the room is so small and I hit the wall with the window at the top of it.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">So I’m under the window now, and Jake, he came to me again with the metal rod and my right leg isn’t broken yet, but it hurts so badly and I’m scared and cornered and sweating and I shut my eyes and again, he does it again and again until there's this really loud snapping sound...and I stopped screaming…

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">It still hurt, it did, really, but after the snap, the pain just kind of felt the same each time and I…

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I couldn’t move my legs anymore.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">But when Jake is done, he leaves. He goes back up the stairs and shuts the door, and I hear the fridge being pushed on top of it again. Everette is in the dark side of the room, to the left, I know I said that already, but… I don’t know… I can hear him sobbing, very quietly, and asking God to forgive him. He kept apologizing in whispers. I use my arms to drag myself across the floor to him, but on my way I see a shoe in the ray of light coming from the window. The rest of the leg is in this part of the room that the light isn’t touching, because the light is narrow and just lights the mid section of the small room. Some of the light kind of brushes against a face, but I can’t make out anything other than a nose and the bottom lip.

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<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I drag myself over to the person. As I get closer to him, I look up, and I see that it’s Jeremy. And I’m so happy for a moment. He looks down at me. The small amount of light makes his eye look like gold, or amber. But around it I can see purple and yellow bruises, and his top lip is cut up. There's dried blood trailing from one side of his face and I follow it up to this empty eye socket of his and I say, “Jeremy, what happened to your eye?” and he stares back at me and Everette is still praying behind me in the background, and it takes me just a moment to register that he’s dead. Jeremy is dead, and he’s staring at me, with this golden color in his eye and this somber expression and even though he must’ve died long, LONG before I even came to the house, it felt like he saw me, and like he was relieved that we found him.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">I screamed. I cried, and I screamed, and shouted “No, no,” over and over because I felt like I had failed him, and Everette, and Hal, and myself….

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">My hand brushes against something thin and soft on the wood. I pick it up between my fingers. It’s pink. Like a deep, almost dark, shade of pink, and I realize there is more of them, surrounding Jeremy, and some of them are across his lap and there's a few on his chest. He just looked down at me with that soft, lifeless gaze. I laid my head beside him on the floor. One of my hands reaches up to his small one, and then I held it; I just wanted to make sure he wasn’t going anywhere again.. and from there, the petals were so close to my face, that the scent of roses fought the rotting stench. Just barely.

<p dir="ltr" style="line-height:1.38;margin-top:0pt;margin-bottom:0pt;"><span style="font-size:14.666666666666666px;font-family:Arial;color:#ffffff;font-weight:400;font-variant:normal;text-decoration:none;vertical-align:baseline;white-space:pre-wrap;">The cops came for us hours later. So I was told; it felt like days down there, but I was told it was 3 or 4 hours. They were searching Jake’s house for Jeremy because he was a suspect in his disappearance, and they were smarter than I was-they noticed the wood under the fridge and demanded he take them down there, and he argued and then they just knew that he was hiding something. And then they found us. Three beaten boys and a dead, empty shell of a body. It felt so weird to see Jeremy like that. His eye. I can’t forget the color of his eye, for some reason… I remembered him puffing his chest up the day I met him. This kid, however small he might’ve been, was so full of personality and love and then it was all just sucked out of him. I imagine it more like fading away. Or like dust, being kicked up into the wind, and fading into silence. <ac_metadata title="Review my story please? &quot;Rose Petal Bed&quot;"> </ac_metadata>