Page 18 of Wandering in Darkness
I sigh and sit down in a chair as I close my eyes. I don’t know if it’s being surrounded by his things or what, but it’s like as soon as I close them, I can hear Grayson saying, “You know I had no choice. I had to go.”
Is it selfish to be mad that he really couldn’t make his own decision? Is it even the fact that he couldn’t stay with me that irritates me so much?
No… I know it’s not. But I also know that I was determined to drown alone.
“And we are in. Would you all like to stop what you’re doing and praise me? Actually, I insist on it,” Felix announces.
I open my eyes and look at the man hovering over the computer. He’s so happy about what he’s done, but what if I shouldn’t look at what’s on that computer? What if I find something I can’t handle seeing?
Felix turns his beaming face to me, and whatever he sees there makes his smile falter. “Did… you not want me to figure out how to get into his computer? I can be like, ‘Oh no, I can’t getit. I’m amazing so really, Icouldget it, but I’m too amazingtoget it.’”
“It’s fine,” I say as I stand up and head over to the computer. He’s pulled up the site pertaining to Grayson’s phone and clicks the “Find my phone.” Honestly, it’s no surprise he’s at the exact address on the Post-it note.
I click over to his messages and see the message he sent to me at the very top. He’s messaged no one since. I click the message beneath it, but it’s a casual message to his sister, and the one beneath is to a guy I know is his friend from the military. Everything is fairly mundane with typical conversations. Really, nothing that stands out at all besides his current location.
“The ball is in your court,” Felix tells me.
“We all know you didn’t throw it there,” Lane says. “You can’t toss a piece of paper in a trash can directly in front of you.”
“Ha. Ha, funny. Sometimes I don’t know if you’re my greatest love or my greatest enemy,” Felix grumbles.
Lane seems quite proud of that.
“Let’s go,” I say. “Just drive by and that’s it.”
“We’re just going to peek in and slip out,” Lane agrees as I see him checking his gun over. Like what part of peeking in and slipping out requires a gun?
Felix pats Lane’s arm. “Lane, just because you can’t see the gun doesn’t mean others can’t,” he whispers.
“Oh, right,” he says as he quickly puts it away.
“We’re all going to get murdered because these two don’t know how to be normal. I’m staying in the car with the pig,” Antonio decides.
“We’re just driving by the place. We’re not even getting out of the car,” I assure him. “I’m not even going to slow down enough for either of you to get out.”
“Good plan,” Antonio says, while Felix and Lane look like this is the worst plan I could have ever come up with.
FIVE
CAL
When we pull up, it’s much like Google Maps had shown us—a wooded area in the middle of nowhere with enough dense trees to hide pretty much anything.
I make the mistake of stopping the vehicle to see if we can take note of anything, which gives Felix an excuse to jerk at the door handle.
“Oh no… Copper needs to potty,” Felix says as he pops out.
“Copper just went right before we left,” I remind him.
“I meant Brigs,” he says, and there he is, snapping the leash on the pig and the harness on Copper.
“Which part of this seems like a good idea?” I ask. “The part where you lead the most conspicuous animal in the world through trees or the part where you don’t listen to me? Like we all know that if you need to run, that pig isn’t running anywhere.”
“They’re both gone,” Antonio says, and I look over to see that they are indeed very gone, taking the dog and pig with them.
“Fuck,” I whine.
“I mean… if they want to get abducted, let them get abducted. Why should we stomp on their desires?” Antonio asks.
