Here in the Second Moon

Chapter 2: See you later alligator

Emma's P.O.V.

I noticed a few students missing the first day of school. I didn't give it much thought, there are always people coming and going here in California. I didn't knew them much, so I thought to myself that maybe they moved to a different part of town, after all, we didn't see them or their families at the local Target or restaurant anymore. Then a few days later my folks where watching the news, and there they were: "double murder by teenage son" on the headlines. It was shocking to think that I used to share pencils and pass papers during class at a first-degree murder perpetrator.

-Hey, Emma, wasn't that a classmate of yours in the news? - Said my mom, while my little brother and I ran to the TV

-OMG! Yes he is! I said.

I remembered all those times when you see serial killers on TV, and their friends stating that they never thought they would do THAT. "They looked so normal" they always say, like a well practiced social cliché.

–I guess you never know people - My dad said.

"People are innocent until proven guilty", the law says, but when we watch it on TV, we unconsciously think they are guilty, of course. We wouldn't engage a conversation like: "Poor John, to fall into such misunderstanding, I wonder what we could do to help him prove his innocence". We boost ourselves in how good we are because we aren't them, because we didn't fall into the "devious" category.

If anything, this news just made me more suspicious of strangers, or not so strangers as a matter of fact. So I just went on back to my bedroom upstairs, were my safe little world was. My brother did the same; after all, his Heroes of War videogame was way more important than a lousy sermon based on safety and caution. So off we went. I laid down in bed, plugged in to my music, and disappear into my favorite All Time Low song. I guess my brother did the same thing with his headphones and his game, because he didn't hear a thing of what happened next either.

After only fifteen minutes, I hear this bang on my door, so strong, it made it wide open, as a police officer suddenly screams at my with a gun pointing at myself. I felt about to faint from the shock, but I manage to take my earphones off and heard him say:

-To the floor I said, NOW!

-What's going on? Where are my parents? Where's my brother? - I shouted with a fearful but demanding voice.

For the first time, I felt this sensation of being abandoned by the same people that where supposed to protect me. You see, when authority works, you learn to trust them blindly, but then, when authority fails, is almost like getting baptized in doubt. From that moment on, the trust and respect you have on whoever is supposed to look after you disappear, and you feel that after an incident like this, you are on your own. You don't feel sheltered anymore; you don't feel safe or secure. You get a sense of doubt that doesn't go away. You become your own personal bodyguard.

So I laid on the floor and put my hands on by head (you always see it on movies, so I might as well). I smelled my dirty carpet for the last time. I remember I used to hate that smell. It reminded me of my clean up chores. I made such a big deal out of it. I guess I didn't know how much I was going to miss the smell of freedom and shelter, until now.

Mr. Cop put some cold handcuffs on me and lifted me up from the floor. While we were walking outside my bedroom, I saw my brother Jake at the other side of the hall, red from screaming, trying to reach out to me like if I was strong and powerful enough to get him out of this awful situation. The whole scene got me so anxious... I had to try at least to give him a hug, to let him know this wasn't the end of it, and to remind him that it was probably a mistake and that we were going to be all together in no time.

So I tried to get the cop's hands off me. While I was at it, I saw his hand had a tattoo, a little musical note, with some numbers next to it: 01101. I would never forget those numbers; it was the first time I said to myself "I'm not going to let you do this, even though I know you can". So I got loose, and I ran to Jake. The hall had a balustrade rail and an open area, where you can see below to the living room. As I was running, I turned my head right, realizing this was no misunderstanding: this was a crime scene, and the victims were my parents. They were lying on the floor, in inhuman positions, like if they were, well, dead. So I stopped, I felt to my knees, and realized that my life was never going to be the same. I was crying so badly, and then I remembered Jake, so I looked at him crying and feeling hopeless, while he was taken into custody. I will never forget his face... ever.

I was so angry at the whole situation: it wasn't fair. But I needed to find out what was happening and make it right, for Jake, myself, and society in general. That's when I decided to run. I wasn't going to sit and wait while some bureaucratic idiot figured out my life. I couldn't bare the fact that my ruined life depended on how many files where pending or if it was pass lunchtime to figure it out. I had to figure out a plan. I'm not too big or too rough, but I'm fast and a good jumper (made it to cross country finals, yeah!), and I only had a few seconds left, so I turned to the cop that was taking me into custody and asked:

- I don't know if I'm ever going to see my brother again, may I at least say good-bye?

See, I knew that he was standing directly in front of his bedroom window, which was an egress window, you know, those meant for emergency escapes, like this one, I suppose. It was wide open, and below the window, there was a very flat and small rooftop from the first floor, with a vine that would hold me perfectly, some bushes at the bottom, just in case, and a low division to my neighbors yard.

I took a deep breath while the cop positively gave me permission to say my good-byes. I got close to Jake. He knew I was up to something, we both saw it in our eyes. I approached him, gave him a kiss while preparing to run, saw him directly in his eyes and said:

-See you later alligator.

I used to say that to him when we had to stop playing for a while. It was my way to playfully say that I was going to be right back.

And then I ran as fast as I could to that window. It seem that it took ages. My heart was pounding so hard, yet my mind was going so slow. I could see my brother's face of worry. I could feel the cop's fingertips trying to grab my shoulder and stop me. But I kept going. I told myself I had to, no matter what, not just for myself, but also for my parent's present death, and for my brother's future freedom.

So I jumped. I jumped as precisely as I could with the speed I got from running away from the cops. I jumped while turning around, so that I would fall on my back and not on my face. The handcuffs didn't help at all. I even scratched my elbows with the windowsill while jumping. I painfully felt on my side, and rolled down to fall on to the bushes, I figure I wasn't going to have enough time to get up and jump a second time. Falling to the bushes is not as easy and soft as you see it in the movies. There are bigger trunks inside a bush that easily chip and rip your skin. I was all hurt on my back, and I bet bloody too, but my red shirt made it unnoticeable. So off I went, running and running, avoiding anything that would require my hands for landing, until I was blending in on the streets.