This choice: Follow up on Sawyer Harrison • Go Back...Chapter #4Belinda and What She Said by: Seuzz   Following the Sawyer thread means going to see his sister, Belinda, who is a freshman at the school. So when classes end you thread your way through the crowded halls to the freshman wing. She's talking to friends with her back to you as you approach, and you stand patiently behind her with a faint smile on your face, waiting.
The Asian-American girl she's talking to spots you quickly, and smiles up quizzically. Belinda looks over her shoulder and gives a little start. Her puzzled expression clears up as she looks past you. "Hi Joe. Waiting for Shawn?"
You glance back, to see Shawn Gregory--fellow senior and member of the basketball team--slowly approaching with his arm around Sarah White, his freshman girlfriend. "Nah, I was looking for you. How's your brother doing?"
She turns a little pink at this display of solicitude, though it is not as brazen as it might seem: Joe, as part of the investigation, had already talked to her about the accident, and had even been over to her house. But still, her eyes fall at the reminder of the tragedy. "No change in his condition," she murmurs. "They're talking about bringing some people in from Johns Hopkins to--"
"Hi Joe!" Carrie Carmichael, blonde and venomously effervescent, inserts herself between you and Belinda. She grins up madly at you.
"Well, hey, Chrissie," you reply. Her face falls at the "mistaken" name. You ignore this reaction, but envelop her in your arms and pull her close, gently pressing her face against your chest with an open palm on the back of her head. She goes very stiff for a moment, then relaxes and clasps you tightly back. With her carefully shut up this way, you look over her head and continue talking to Belinda. "John Hopkins? Is he like a famous doctor or someone?"
"University," she says. She looks at Carrie with ill-disguised distaste, and the girl behind her rolls her eyes. "They're, like, specialists in--"
"Well, I was talking to my dad about your brother last night," you interrupt. "He's not like a doctor or anything, but he has some friends out at the VA hospital who've seen some crazy shit with head injuries and things? You know?" You gently rock Carrie back and forth, as though lulling her to sleep, and her grip on your torso tightens. "Think maybe we could get together after practice--I gotta go in a minute--and you tell me some more about it?" You lightly stroke the back of Carrie's head.
"Uh, sure, I guess," Belinda says. She looks from you to Carrie and back a few times with an expression that combines vexation and puzzlement. It's like watching someone trying to find an adverb inside a math equation.
"Durras, what are you doing here?" Shawn's voice comes from over your shoulder. "Haven't you got enough girlfriends in the senior class?"
"You can never have enough. Some day they might be rationed," you laugh back at him. Then, to Belinda: "Do you mind sticking around, or should I meet you at your house?"
"I can call my mom to pick me up later." The girl behind punches her hard in the shoulder. "I mean--"
"Cool. Meet you in the library, then? Four-fifteen?"
She hesitates fractionally, then agrees. You put your hands on Carrie's shoulders and gently push her back. You don't meet her eyes, though, but gaze around distractedly. "Has anyone seen--"
Oh. There she is. The space around your heart tightens. Monique, Jonathan Straussler's girlfriend, at her locker. Joe's been watching her from a distance the past few days. She's still wearing black t-shirts. Disposing of Blackwell, Joe's instincts tell you, is even less important than getting Jonathan's mask back, so that the Jonathan-shaped hole in his family's and friends' lives can be filled back up again, even if it is only with a golem.
* * * * *
Basketball practice is a fun, hard-fought thing, but you don't lose yourself in the running, the jumping, the dunking, the stealing, and the trash talk so much that you forget to extend your investigation. You drop a few references to Straussler into the talk, to prompt others into volunteering if they've heard anything new, but your hints provoke nothing interesting. On your way to the library for your meeting with Belinda you check your phone and find a text from your partner, saying he'll be at the house around six to talk and compare notes.
Belinda, to your relief, is alone at a table, and she smiles brightly as you slide into a seat opposite her. "You look like you're holding up well," you say, and smile broadly at her.
"Well, while there's life there's hope," she shrugs. "That's what my dad says. But what does your dad say?"
"Your room's a disaster, clean it up. Oh, you mean about the doctors?" She doesn't laugh at the jest. "Like I said, they're VA guys. They've seen a lot of head injuries, guys exposed to toxic shit. Dad's kind of fascinated by that stuff. He watches these gross shows on cable TV. You were saying there might be something to do with chemicals in your brother's accident?"
Her expression turns grim. "It's that stupid company he was working at. I told you Sawyer got fired? They said he was drinking, but my parents are thinking maybe he was exposed to, like, toxic waste and stuff."
"That would suck, but didn't it happen out here on school property?"
"Well, I don't know how it would work. But yeah, him and some friends were at the school when he just fell over in a coma. They said," she adds in a tone heavily freighted with skepticism.
"What were they doing?"
Joe has already had this conversation with her, and you don't expect her answer to be any more enlightening, and it isn't. "I don't know. No one could get a straight answer from them. It was all, just, 'We were sitting around talking, and he just fell over.' They pumped his stomach, you know, and there wasn't anything in there."
"No head injuries?" She shakes her head. "Were they playing around with anything, like chemicals?"
"If they were, they won't admit it." Her expression darkens, and she leans in close. "My parents are thinking of suing that company. They had a lawyer over at the house, and they were talking about the accident. The lawyer said that might be the only way to get any real answers."
"That still wouldn't tell you what happened when they were out here at Eastman."
"Except it might. It was all kind of confusing, but the lawyer said that the company would have to-- Oh, what's the word? Something about getting his friends to talk about what happened. But under oath."
"Depose them?" Too late you forget that Joe plays the "dumb blonde" act at Eastman, and Belinda gives you a funny look. "I watch lots of Law and Order," you lamely explain.
"Yeah, I think that's the word. It's like, we can't get his friends to talk, but the company could. If we sued them."
"That would be a mess," you reflect aloud. And then you stop cold, and a tingle runs up your back. "Who are these friends that the lawyers would be deposing?"
* * * * *
"Dude, this life sucks!" Will Prescott shouts from the other room. The front door slams, and he trudges into the kitchen. "If I'd known it was going to be like this--"
"Don't be such a whiner," you snap back. You wipe the knife against the bread, spreading the last of the peanut butter, and toss it into the sink without looking up at him. You rip a huge bite from the sandwich.
"I think I have a right to-- What are you doing?" Will asks as you, thrusting your hand before you, push him steadily back into the living room, and shove him onto the couch. "The fuck?"
He looks dopey, with that hair sticking out every which way and the thin arms thrusting from the oversized t-shirt. He looks even dopier as his jaw falls open when you plant a heavy foot on his crotch.
"How come I'm doing a better job thinking with your brain than you ever did?" you demand.
"What the--?"
"I had a long talk with Belinda Harrison after school today," you tell him. "Apparently you were too busy ogling her tits during your first interview to actually hear what she said. Or to hear the things she didn't say. She's cute, but if Frank was here--"
Your partner flushes. "If you're going to pretend to be a better version of me, you could try to be nicer about it."
"Yeah, okay," you shrug. "How was your day?"
"It sucked! Everybody hates you. It's that--"
"If I'm going to pretend to be a better version of you, you can remember that that--" You jab a finger at him. "Isn't me anymore."
"Fine." He rolls his eyes. "Everybody hates Will Prescott, then."
"With good reason, probably. He was a fuck up and he came to a bad end." You relent enough to add: "But he met some guys who helped him out, and he's really grateful to them."
The guy on the couch turns a shade that combines green and purple, then shakes his head. "I don't know how to role-play this, because I don't know who you're being. But you're in charge, right, so: Remember that hex Blackwell put on you? It's fucked things up so much that I can't get close to anyone to talk to them. This is a fucking useless disguise." He crosses his arms and frowns belligerently up at you. | Members who added to this interactive story also contributed to these: |
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