You Can't Run From The Silence

Chapter three

   "Wait, who went missing this time?" I asked. Captain Lynch just handed me the towns newspaper. There was a picture of a girl holding a trophy on it. 

   "Alicia Myers, 15, competitive swimmer who won a lot of trophies for the town. Went missing last night. Same note and all" he said monotonously. I could tell he was getting tired of this kidnapper and his antics. I examined the newspaper further.

  "And also Mr. Fords house is ready for a thorough inspection. If you swing by there now you might find something of interest" he said huffing.

   "Detective Harrington it's completely understandable if you would like to quit this case. Because of your um, condition" he said stuttering a little to find the fight words.

   I unconsciously looked at my arm, or what was left of it.

   "No sir I'm well enough to continue" I said through gritted teeth. I got a small nod from him and that was all.

   Johnny and I bid the Captain farewell and went on our way to the house.

   There was a barrier made of police tape around the scorched building. The top half of the house was threatening to fall and a lot of the material was peeling off. The whole thing was black and burnt with the smell of smoke still lingering the premises. We tentatively entered making sure that we checked were we stepped.

   We proceeded cautiously not saying anything to each other until his raspy voice startled me.

   "You don't have to answer but do you mind explaining to me what exactly went on with you" he asked treading carefully with his words. It sort of irritated me how vague his question was but I answered anyway.

   "Well, The plant doctor gave me that tea right. But it wasn't actually Lilly tea but the juice of an unclassified Datura plant as you said that causes auditory and visual hallucinations which caused me to amputate my own arm because of all the emotional stress the hallucinations caused me" I said all in one go like it was taken straight out of a Wikipedia article. If I rely on facts and statistics to get my point across I don't need to open up too much to him.

  Johnny nodded his head while pursing his lips together. "That's not what I meant. What happened when you were . . . . um hallucinating" he said reluctantly.

   I just marched on forward avoiding the fallen cupboard that in what seemed like the remnants of his kitchen. I ignored his question and made sire that my face was facing away from him as much as possible. It was like I could feel the awkwardness coursing through the air.

  "I'm sorry" Johnny said as softly as he could. I turned around and gave him one of my rare hugs. Or half a hug. I'm still getting used to doing things without my arm especially because it's my right one. I could tell Johnny was a bit taken aback because of his delayed reaction. But eventually hugged back.

   "I'm not really ready to tell anyone yet" I said simply as I ended the conversation with that. We continued searching the house with no clues rising. I just want to say randomly that I hate this case. So much more than I did at the start. For God's sake I'm searching for my sister and another girl with no leads whatsoever a crazy plant man made me drink poison. I have one functioning arm and when we think we have the culprit another girl gets missing. Sometimes I just want to curl up into a ball and die. But I don't have time to be sad at the moment.

   I think about an hour passed with me and Johnny upturning various broken down pieces of wood and brick and found nothing. The entire upstairs was completely demolished because we found it was the place the fire started.