Name Blame, the Bonding Game

Anxiety in the Avenue

Oliver-

"Neither of them  get it, and now I'm stuck in the middle." Hanna's voice says as she talks to Zack in the kitchen of his apartment. We'd shaken things up since it's Friday night and the Boulevard preps don't seem to have anything big going on.

"This is going to be when I tell you to bow out." Zach says, "Before you overwhelm yourself past recovery."

"Ayyy!" Harry yells into the kitchen, "Where's the food and drinks?" He asks propping his feet up on the coffee table and Jenna curls into his side, 

"We'll talk later." Zach promises Hanna and he appears only moments later kicking Harry's feet off the coffee table and putting down the large tray of food, Hanna comes out and puts down ten drinking cups. How she managed to balance all of them on two plates is beyond me. "Feet off the furniture." Zach says shooting a look at Harry.

Harry just rolls his eyes and sits up to grab a plate of food and a drink. He hands them over to Jenna and grabs a second one for himself. Rosalyn has decided to ignore me for the night, which doesn't bother me, since I've got somewhere to be in fifteen minutes.

"I actually have to get going, I'll see you when I see you." I tell everyone standing up and grabbing my helmet.

"Got a date Mr. I Don't Date?" Joe asks as he picks up a plate for himself.

"Is she pretty?" Leif jokes getting a plate for Lynda, his sister and himself.

"I'm not about to date after what happened at school. Not any time soon anyway."

I notice Rosalyn's posture either relax or go from normal to sulky. Neither of which should bother me, but they do anyway.

"The only date I'll be having is with the punching bags at my father's gym." I tell them, "Do you have any more useless questions I have to answer before I leave?"

"Can we go with you?"

"Honestly I don't think you'd want to." I tell them, "I'm going to  the Boulevard part of town."tell them, I'm going to the Boulevard part of town, for information. Rumor has it Drag broke out, I've got to find out, rather I want to find out if it's true or not.

I put on my helmet and head out to my bike revving the engine  and tearing out into the streets. I merge and blend in with the traffic noting that Rosalyn had decided to tail me. I pull into my father's gym and park my bike trading it for my truck instead and then continue on my way, Rosalyn had taken the bait and went into my father's gym. What part of I'm going to the Boulevard part of town didn't she make out. They jail is on their part of town, the prison and jail. Not that they're much different, around here anyway.

"Name and reason for entry."  The woman at the counter says.

"Oliver Stone, visitation."

"I need your wallet, anything metal, and anything in your pockets in this bag." She says handing me a Ziploc bag. I put my knives and wallet into the bag along with my watch, dog-tags, and Bike tool kit. I finish emptying my pockets and step through the detector, only then realizing my shoes had metal chains on them.

"My shoes have metal on them, the metal can't be removed." I tell her as she runs her sensor over me and nods.

"Take off your shoes and I need your shoe size." I take off my boots and give her my shoe size. She hands me a pair of sneakers, I don't want to know where they came from. "Here's the key for your locker the number is 1150. Visitation hall is on the right." She says sending me along.

"Name of the person you're visiting." The officer at the door says.

"Drag, I mean, Darren Lightfoot." I correct.

"He is not allowed visitors at this time, would you like to make an appointment to meet with him tomorrow?" The officer continues sounding bored out of his mind. Making me suspicious, why is he not allowed visitors?

"Yeah, sure, what time can I come, and why is he not allowed any today?"

"We open to visitors at noon." The officer says. "And that information is classified."

"I'll be here at one." I tell the officer, "Thank you."

The officer says nothing else just nods and lets me walk away. i pick up my things from the counter and return the shoes to the desk getting my boots back.

"My hunch was right, now you wanna tell me what you're doing here?" Leif asks leaning against my truck with his bike already in the bed.

"How did you know?" I ask him as I unlock the doors and we both get in.

"I think you forget how well I read people. The only person I couldn't read was Drag, that's how he got away with bringing a gun and getting himself arrested. Zach may be the sensible one of the lot of us, but I'm the one that knows the rest of us. It's why my sister and I get along so well."

"Someone told me Drag escaped from jail. I had to go see for myself. The officer's said I could come back tomorrow afternoon, I made a one o'clock appointment, if they tell me I can't see him then, then something is up."

"If he got out, don't you think he would've come to us?"

"He couldn't or wouldn't not when they know that's where he would go. That's if he even escaped." I tell him, "Don't tell anyone, especially not Lynda."

"Now I'm keeping secrets from my sister, great." Leif says.

"I didn't ask you to come over here." I remind him, "You did it on your own, I'm going to go get dinner, so it's only going to take a few minutes."

I pull into the nearest restaurant and ask for  something to-go, as I'm waiting Marisa and her boyfriend come in and Marisa stops dead in her tracks staring at something ahead as she's being seated. I try to make out what she's looking at, but I'm not sure what it is, I can't really see it. It looks like a silhouette of someone. Someone I don't know. I wonder who it is.