A Life On The Edge

The Belt

“Sadie…” I said gently. “Put the gun down.”

“This guy was at the bar a couple days ago while I was venting to my good friend Eddie. I had no idea he was involved with you. But then again there was a lot I didn’t know about you then…but I know now.”

“Sadie…”

“Riley-Anne. That is your name isn’t it? Riley-Anne Elliot Swanson?” I froze.

“Tina where’s River?” I asked looking at the empty fort.

“In your room with…” she choked.

“With who?” Sadie demanded. We all kept quiet. “Answer me!”

“With nobody he’s nobody.” I whispered.

“He’s somebody you want to keep out of this, I need to know who he is.”

“Why?” I asked. “Why can’t you just leave him alone?”

“Because I don’t know who he is, or what he knows. Do you know?” she glared looking down at Dylan.

“Know what?” he asked.

“Don’t fuck with me! Do you know about me! What she knows about me?” Dylan was silent for a while, thinking over his answer. “Answer me!”

“Yes!” I shouted. “He knows, she knows too, everyone in this room.”

“What about him.” She said pointing to the door. I stayed silent wanting to keep Lyle out of all this. “Hey!” she shouted. “What’s his name?” I didn’t answer. “Okay,” she mumbled and clocked her gun. “You have till the count of three to come out of that room or else I’m shooting this asshole. One…Two…” Lyle opened the door and moved out with his hands up. “Mr. Clark?” she said surprised. She stared at him for a while, and then started to laugh. “Oh this is just too good. Not only have are you a drug dealing, convicted, murdering, prostitute on the run, but your sleeping with our teacher too! Oh god is there any law you have yet to break?”

“What?” I froze.

“Oh yeah, I know all about you Riley-Anne.” She chuckled. “You think you got dirt on me. Bitch you don’t even know half the shit I’ve done, but I know all about you.” My heart stopped. “My step-mom told me to call you Riley-Anne to shut you up. But then I got to thinking about that and why it mattered so much. Then I did research. Some intense research. I found some pretty interesting things. Like how you were arrested for drug possession and gang affiliation but then again you told the whole school about that. What you didn’t tell us though is that you burned down your foster mother’s house. You and your boyfriend. You didn’t tell us about how you were in a gang for years, and that probably means you’ve killed more people then you’re willing to admit.”

“Sadie don’t.”

“But I didn’t stop there. Nope, I got to thinking that maybe I’ve seen you before. And believe or not, I was right. I have seen you before. You were here, you were here earlier in the year but not with these guys. You were here with some other guy but you were in the same house, I saw you two walking inside one day. So I looked up the address and you won’t believe whose name it’s under. Some guy named Eli Straight.” My heart stopped. “Looked up his name found his Instagram and sure enough it was the first guy but his Instagram wasn’t the only thing I found. You want to know what else I found.”

“No,”

“I found his obituary. Yeah, died in a fire, just like the one at your foster mom’s house.” I felt like I was going to throw up. “But I guess he was still alive while the fire went up and drove into a lake. They couldn’t determine whether he burned to death first…drowned. I bet you know. Let’s be honest here, did you kill him too?” I didn’t say anything. I couldn’t find the words to speak. “Of course you did. Then I did some more research on you. I found your boyfriend’s name, the one you got arrested with, Ricky Malcolm. Guess what? He’s dead too.” And just like that, there he was open wound and all standing next to Sadie. Of course no one else but me saw him.