Depths

The Death Compass

The morning sun wakes Harli from her slumber as it pours in through her bedroom window. She blinks her eyes to adjust to the light coming through and reaches beside her to find the other side of the bed empty. She sighs as she realizes that JJ must've gotten up to make his way back to the pullout sofa before John B found him in her bed. When he removed himself from her bed is a mystery to her and has her mind wanting to spiral with ideas and worry. JJ's her best friend and she doesn't want things to be awkward between them just because she was having a bad night and needed company. But, lately things had felt different between them. He had to feel that too. But, what did it all mean?

Harli spends a few moments staring at her bedroom ceiling before getting out of bed to face the day. Her thoughts are back to running wild about their other problems as she gets up thinking about what they're about to go do. John B was very adamant last night about going to see Ms. Lana today and there's no doubt that his mind hasn't changed this morning either.

 Harli wasn't sure if it was a good idea to be going to the home of a woman that just lost her husband to question her about a compass they'd found on his boat- a boat that they weren't supposed to be around in the first place. So many things could go wrong. Lana could turn them in to Peterkin for finding the boat and taking Scooter's things off of it. Peterkin could call DCS and have her and John B removed from the island. JJ could face charges for stealing money and an unregistered fire arm from a crime scene. Her mind was swirling with these thoughts and she was falling further and further down that black hole of anxiety.

After about ten minutes of thinking up every scenario possible to how this was going to go down Harli finally emerged from her thoughts and forced herself to get ready for the day ahead of her. She took a long shower and got dressed quickly as she knew John B and JJ would both be waiting for her to go to Ms. Lana's house. Once she made the exit from her bedroom she sure enough found John B and JJ sitting on the couch waiting for her. John B quickly jumped up and ushered the two of them out the door and to the Twinkie. JJ shot Harli a worried glance as the two followed the brunette boy out the door.

 JJ picks at John B about Kie from the passenger seat of the Twinkie as Harli listens and laughs from the back seat. John B denies anything going on between them and Harli rolls her eyes at the denial. It's clear something is going on, whether Kie actually likes John B or is just being a good friend is beyond her, but Harli can always tell when her brother is crushing on someone. JJ reaches for the compass on the dash and John B lunges forward trying to take it from him.

"Be careful with that!" John B scolds JJ when he's unable to snatch it from JJ"s hand.

"I'm just looking at it." JJ replies. "Are you sure we should be going to see Lana?"

"I need to know why Scooter had the compass. She might have some information."

"Right, I'm sure she'll wanna talk to us. It's not like her husband just drown or anything."

"I need to know." John B states firmly again.

As the three teenagers pull into Lana's driveway the brightly colorful house comes into view. John B parks the Twinkie as JJ makes a comment about the house looking like the people that lived there smoked too much weed. Harli rolled her eyes and scoffed at the boys comment considering he was always rolling a blunt for himself. JJ jumps out of the van and slides open the side door for Harli, offering her his hand to help her out. She takes it with a smile, feeling as though nothing has changed between them and easing her worries from this morning when she woke without him.

The three teenagers make their way through the tree line that hides the house when they hear yelling and screaming coming from inside the home. Harli tenses up immediately from the loud noises, freezing in her tracks, sharing a quick glance with JJ and John B as they stop walking as well.