Chapter 8 #4
“I never wanted anyone to suffer or not make it home because I didn’t know what to do.
” This from the man she’d judged for refusing to help her get justice for Aaron and failing her brother as badly as she had herself.
Nothing seemed to make sense anymore; the pieces of her long-held beliefs about Aaron and Gideon no longer fit neatly together.
The storm raged, slashing at the sides of the tower. Occasional rumbles of thunder sounded before lightning lit up the space in garish neon slashes. Her thoughts rolled and rumbled too, refusing to allow her to relax.
“Gideon?” she said softly. “Are you asleep?”
“Yes,” he quipped. “So don’t say anything too important because I can’t hear you.”
She smiled and took a breath. It had to be asked.
This was possibly going to be her only chance because she had no idea what would happen at the airstrip.
“What did you mean when you said you couldn’t cover for my brother again?
” The question seemed to hover in the air, crackling like the lightning that forked the sky outside their haven.
He was silent a moment. “It’s not important. Get some sleep while you can.”
“I’m wide awake. Tell me. I have to know.”
“Not now.”
“Yes, now.” When he didn’t respond, she bumped the bottom of his bunk with her foot.
“You must have noticed that our chances of getting out of this are growing slimmer all the time. If we actually manage to survive Al and Jerry, the dam and the wilderness, and get home, we aren’t going to be having coffee or bowling together anytime soon, you and me.
” Especially since she’d probably be in jail.
“There are hours until morning and this is the perfect time, so let’s have it. All of it. Now or never.”
“I don’t think so, Zee.”
She was going to fire with both barrels, let loose the rage she kept in check as best she could, but instead she swallowed an unexpected lump in her throat and sat up, climbed out of her bed, and rested her elbows on the side of his bunk so she could see him.
“I’m tired, Gid. Tired from everything.” And her body felt suddenly as if it would quit on her at that very moment.
Each mile in their journey had taken a toll, but so had everything else.
The moments that had morphed into days and months and years.
All of it. The truth began to pour from her like the storm.
“I’ve been tired for two years, since Aaron was killed.
Tired of hiding and sleuthing and sneaking and cover stories and podcasts.
” Tired, even, of who she’d become, the avenger, the truth seeker who would use anyone and everyone to get what she was after.
“I’ve gotten closure for others, solved their cases, but not Aaron’s.
I want the truth. All of it. Please, Gid.
Just tell me.” Why was her voice so desperate and thin?
And why did it wobble when she said his name? She sighed.
There was an extended moment of silence, and she thought maybe he wouldn’t speak at all until he rolled on his back, stared up at the ceiling, and cleared his throat. “Our senior year Aaron and I worked at The Dog House.”
She waited for a beat when he went silent.
“I know. Best gristly hot dogs in the state. Aaron always came home smelling like them. Mr. Hinkle was going to hire me when I was old enough. He promised.” The portly Mr. Hinkle and his tiny bird of a wife had seemed like relics from the past. Mr. Hinkle was a giant of a man with his red suspenders, and Mrs. Hinkle hand embroidered the names of all their employees on personalized aprons and baked a cake for each and every server’s birthday.
She hadn’t thought of the couple for years.
It wasn’t where she’d anticipated Gideon would start his story.
“We worked the after-school shifts.”
Something else she’d already known, but she sensed he needed to lay out all the facts, to sort through the details in his mind. She would let him tell the story in his way.
“It was homecoming week, and Aaron was trying to impress some kids from our school. Fooling around, sneaking free food to them.”
That was her brother. Rules rarely served him.
He was the epitome of the “life of the party” even in the workplace.
The trait landed him in regular trouble with teachers, principals, and as he’d aged, the police.
Her parents doled out groundings, confiscated car keys, and stripped him of his phone.
On each occasion, he appeared to be honestly remorseful, or at least saddened that he’d grieved them.
It was difficult to be mad at Aaron for long, impossible even.
Gideon rubbed his forehead as if the memory pained him.
“On their way to the big game, one of the jocks snuck into the kitchen and asked for some free fries. Aaron said yes, of course, and set some in the oil. The two of them started tossing a football around right there in the kitchen, and that’s when I decided to speak up.
I told them to knock it off, but Aaron got angry at me for embarrassing him.
When the jock finally left, he lit into me, and things escalated.
He was furious and threw a ladle that landed in the fryer and splashed hot oil everywhere.
The oil caught a kitchen towel on fire, spread to the old wood cupboards, and exploded from there.
Lots of grease to feed it. Everything was old and not up to code. ”
She tried to picture the scene as Gideon described. The fire, she’d been told, was accidental, a freak occurrence. In reality, it was her brother’s fault?
“It all happened in a flash, literally.”
She went completely still, listening to the sadness in his voice as he recounted the experience. Knowing Gideon, knowing Aaron, she was certain she was hearing the truth at long last.
“Mr. Hinkle was just arriving with supplies and he ran in, tripped on the threshold, and knocked himself out cold. So there we are, two teenage kids and an unconscious owner with the flames spreading and smoke everywhere. Aaron stared at me, and I’ll never forget that look.
He couldn’t deal with the situation. Total and utter panic.
” Gideon shook his head. “Maybe that’s enough, huh? ”
“The rest,” she said. “I need to know. What did my brother do?”
A gust of wind howled like a wounded animal. Gideon’s next two words fell like boulders.
“He ran.”