Where There is Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth

Chapter 24: Trapped in a Pressure Cooker

Heat from two bodies pressed in from either side. Too close, even a foot away. 13 inches. Or 15. How many inches were in a foot anyhow? He should ask Gus, but Gus was already giving him that baby cow watery stare and tipping his buddy into full blown mooing wasn't on Shawn's agenda. Not right that moment anyway. Maybe later, when they could both laugh about it. A lot later. Something to file away alongside jerk chicken dinners and exploring underwater caves at night.

Juliet, on his right, also worried but there was nothing bovine about her expression. More golden retriever puppy if he had to label it. No, but that wasn't right either.

Dad, though... Dad looked like a grizzly bear that had just had his salmon dinner stolen by a skinny salt and pepper timber wolf.

“Absolutely not!”

Gus nudged from the left and bobbled his head towards the uneaten plate left over from lunch. Pulled pork with mild BBQ. The name more than enough to jerk uncomfortably at his insides, the stringy meat texture and red sauce was dredging up levels of discomfort and not all of them affiliated with nausea. Thank God for the endless Gus gullet. Shawn nudged back and the plate was immediately swept from the coffee table. The next few seconds reminded him of those creepy deep sea fish with the glowing heads when they'd catch a fishy meal almost as big as them.

“Henry, I wouldn't even ask, but...”

Gus appropriated the glass of milk next – only a little warm from sitting out for the last fifteen minutes. The glass clinked when Gus set it down again. A second later, though, he grabbed both the glass and the now empty plate and stood. The couch shifted down and up as he lifted from the cushion – Shawn tipping back and forth and feeling slightly like a boat at sea. The soft pad of feet carried to the kitchen – running water a smooth voice over to the actual voices rising in volume.

“When you called me, you said it was because you just wanted to ask Shawn some questions. You never said anything about visiting crime scenes or looking at bodies! Karen...”

That warm, red smell. Never ready for it slinking back. Red and black – cold. Rattly shiver of damp metal links. Iron clamped around ankles already swelling and rubbed raw – rubbed black and purple and aching, screaming, pain pulling so bowstring taut the skin ready to peel from bone – peeling... Pulling from bone in stringy shreds. So starved – literally starved... so hungry the rats had looked like scampering meals. The rich hot savor of lean meat... dark red and shiny with grease seeping up through the tissue. Torn... ripped off in hunks... It had tasted so good...

“It's not going to happen!” Whiplash of yelling – still goosebumps flushing across limbs most recently bound in a freezing prison of blood and bone – the startle back to his father's house took more than a second to remember where he was. Shawn scrubbed his forehead and felt a breath of wonder that his hands weren't tied behind his back – the only visible bites the old and faded marks from months ago.

Maybe dad had startled himself with that yell – his head snapping in a rough jerk as he gave the various cluster of humans degrees of his attention. It was the Chief he stopped his glare at. Enough fire to burn down the block, but Chief Vick had never been much of one to shrivel no matter how hot the flames. She held her hands together in front of her. She hadn't sat. Neither had Lassiter. He looked more uncomfortable than anyone else in the room. He usually looked uncomfortable unless he was the one in charge. Maybe that's why he yelled so much. Shawn squinted. Huh... maybe that's why dad yelled so much too.