Page 3 of Ricochet

Why I think the scene in front of me, the one I’m recreating on this page, is…beautiful.

Why I want to capture it so I can keep it forever.

Why is it so fucking beautiful?

This isn’t the first time I’ve seen a dead body. I witnessed my mother’s last breath, in the hospital in the middle of the night, when I was eight years old. With the weight of my stepdad’s hand on my shoulder. Even after everything that came after, her death remains etched in my brain as the worst in my life.

But this moment?

Somehow, I’ve managed to capture all the feelings I’m trying hard to ignore the meaning of on this single page. More than a perfect picture of what I see, it’s a perfect picture of whatcan’tbe seen. What I’ll never admit out loud.

I tear the paper out of the book, the sound ripping through the tranquil silence of death.

As I fold the page several times until it’s a tiny square, I let my gaze linger a little longer on the beautiful, bloody scene before me.

I need to hide this sketch. I need to call the cops.

And I will.

Just a little longer.

A little longer to appreciate the best birthday gift I’ve ever received.

Three days is more thanenough time for the news of my stepdad’s murder to spread through town. Which means I don’t have to guess what the whispers that follow me through the long hallways of the high school are saying.

Now I know what it feels like to be a pariah.

I’ve never been one before. Being on the varsity hockey team as a sophomore has its perks. I have a lot of friends. Or, at least, I thought I did. I’ve heard from a couple of them in the past few days, but none of them have approached me since I walked through the front doors.

They’re probably contributing to the whispers.

I have no interest in checking for myself.

I’m only here to grab my shit from my locker and whatever documents I’ll need to transfer to the new school in Connecticut. Pennsylvania has been my home all my life, but I feel nothing about having to leave.

Or maybe I just don’t know how I feel about it yet.

Lewis Gibson wasn’t a good man. Even outside of the little slice of hell we shared together. He had gambling debts. Enemies. I’m not surprised someone decided to off him.

I reach my locker with murmurs clinging to me like the static of white noise. I drown them out because I don’t give a fuck what they’re saying. I’m out of here anyway.

“Hey, man.”

Max leans against the locker beside mine as I put in my combination. I give him a nod of acknowledgment.

“I heard you’re leaving.”

Again, I nod.

Ever since that night, I haven’t felt things that would be considered psychologically normal under ordinary circumstances. Undermycircumstances, maybe the relief and joy I feel wouldn’t make a psychiatrist blanch.

But this overwhelming sense of peace?

That might do it.

It’s so much more than what that man’s death means for me now. I can’t say for sure I was even thinking about that when I walked down those stairs and first laid eyes on the sight that would forever change my life.

In place of a constant state of chaos and fear, a blanket of calm has been wrapped around my shoulders, replacing the weight of everything else.

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