Murders Of The Past

TWENTY-NINE

MY BOOTS THUD as I stomp across the wooden porch. I grab the door handle, expecting it to be locked but thankfully it's not, and I step into the house.

  "No way, Cheerios are the best."

  "Not compared to Cinnamon Toast Crunch."

  "Well, that's just pure sugar."

  "Exactly. You can't compare something healthy to something made of pure sugar."

  "You want to talk about cereals made of pure sugar? Have you heard about the Cosmic Brownie Cereal? What the hell. I thought cereal was supposed to be a breakfast!"

  "That's probably healthier than a Pop-Tart."

  "Oh no, don't even get me started on Pop-Tarts!"

  The door shuts behind me and the three people turn to look at me, falling silent.

  "Hey, Caroline," Dylan gives me a small smile.

   "That's not her name." Wesley turns around in his chair so his back is facing me. He grabs a pile of cards and shuffles them. "It's Sadie."

  "What?" Vivian asks.

  "Oh shut up," I grumble, walking past them and towards the hall.

  "Where have you been?" Wesley asks and I roll my eyes.

  "Out."

  "Doing what?"

  "Wouldn't you like to know."

  "That's kind of why I asked." I shake my head, and without looking at them I walk down the hall and into Wesley's room, shutting the door and opening his dresser. I shuffle through his clothes, eventually finding a gray T-shirt, which I put on after taking my jacket and shirt off. I bend down to slide my jeans off when my eyes land on something. A gun. Sitting right on the table beside the bed.

  I finally look away from it when my phone rings. I slide my pants all the way off before kicking my clothes into a pile by the wall and reaching for my phone, answering it.

  "Yeah?"

  "Sadie, how are you?"

  I sigh, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "Fine. What do you want?"

  "Maybe I just want to talk to my sister who I haven't seen in almost two weeks." I shrug.

  "Well you're talking to her."

  "Yeah."

  "Yeah." I roll my eyes. "Julie, what do you want?"

  "I told you, to talk to-- "

  "No. What do you want?" She's quiet for a while.

  "I know what you're going to say, but I'm still going to try. Will you come home?" I groan, falling back onto the bed.

  "Julie, listen." I run my hand through my hair. "It's eleven o'clock on a Thursday night, I've had a shitty day, and I'm drunk. Why don't we continue this conversation when I don't hate everyone?"

  "Sadie."

  "Julie."

  "Carlos is gone." I narrow my eyes.

  "Julie, I really don't want to talk about anything, much less Carlos."

  "I heard about this guy who kidnapped you." I roll my eyes, waving my hand.

  "Yeah, just some dumb guy who wants revenge for something that happened a long time ago. Not a big deal."

  "I think it's a big deal."