Holding My Breath [Wattys 2016]

8 8 ~ A n n a

                 

Flashback ~ December 31, 2010

The store clerk doesn't open the door the first time I knock. He doesn't open the second time either. I don't know what to do, and I don't know what to do as I wipe the tears from my eyes. It's different now. Everyone can see me out in the daylight, and the day is only a reminder of how real this is. How bad I've messed up.

I look up at the store clerk through the glass of the door. He walks up to the door. I think, hope, for a minute that he will open it for me. He doesn't.

He shakes his head.

"You know where he is, right?" I ask through the glass. The store clerk's face hardens. Caesar's dad's face. But he doesn't walk away.

"Please, just give me something to work with. I don't know what I'm going to do," I say, but I'm not sure if it's loud enough anymore for him to hear me. "Please, help me."

He unlocks the door. When he opens it, I don't hesitate before walking in.

"Okay, girl." He pinches his nose with his thumb and index finger again. I wait, screaming on the inside. I know it's his son, but he's protecting a murderer. "Nobody's going to help you, so I'll give you some advice."

I realize I'm hanging onto his every last word.

He licks his lips. "You're going to hide. The police will be looking for you. And move around from place to place. That's the only way to hide from him. I don't want to see you die, but I've got to protect my own, you understand that?"

I nod but don't respond.

"Don't trust anyone, okay girl? He has people working for him, just like you're going to be if you don't hide. They'll do anything for him because of his threats."

"Can you... Just give me anything?" I ask.

The old man in front of me walks into the back room. He searches around for a few minutes, then comes out with a book, some kind of journal.

He pulls something out of a page from towards the beginning. "This is all you're going to get from me," he asks me. I look down at the theater ticket he gives me.

"Wha—"

"That showing was on the closing night of the theater. It was months ago, but it might get you somewhere. Both of us went to it together, before we split up. It won't get you anywhere, but take it."

I start to ask something else, but he's ushering me back out into the cold, a bell ringing over my head as the door opens. The clerk looks past me to the park bench where Caesar was sitting minutes ago.

"Don't come back here, girl. They always come back home. That's how he finds them."

I stand there, shivering, gripping onto the ticket with all I've got, completely terrified of what comes next. How am I supposed to find his brother? Months ago... he could be anywhere by now.

And I've got a place to start, but I don't even know where that is.

When I think of the stakes, I know I have to play this game Caesar has planned out. Because if I don't win, he'll kill me. But if I do, then what is the reward?

What could he possibly have on his side that I need?