He Was A Ten

I Realize I Don't Really Know My Friends

After English, the rest of the day flew by. Thankfully, since Chase wasn't at school, and all of my friends refused to let me walk down to the bus loop alone, I was actually able to make it through an entire day of school without getting hurt. God, I was starting to miss the days when that was normal. And to think it wasn't that long ago. Like, seriously. Where did my life go?

When I finally got home I was tired. It had been a long day and I was considering trying to take a nap before dinner. I decided against it though, and decided instead to try and work on the project for social studies. Cindy and I had done a lot of good work on the slide, but the essay still needed a lot of work.

"Hey Paige!" Joshua cried as I walked into the kitchen to grab a quick snack before working on the essay. "Can you help me with my homework today?"

I stared at my brother suspiciously. "You know, I'm starting to wonder if you actually need my help or are just using me to get your homework done faster."

"Can I be doing both?" he asked.

I rolled my eyes and shook my head, smiling. "Sorry, but I have stuff I really need to do today. Maybe later. Don't wait for me though. You should go ahead and get started."

I grabbed a bag of chips and brought it up to my room with me.

I got online and brought up the links I had found at school. I read through the articles. A lot of them contraindicated each other and each one was as likely as the last. 

One of the articles suggested that Johnny Bones had gotten severely injured or fallen ill, causing him to retire, and quite possibly die. Another suggested that Lady Stitches may have been the one to take the fall, leaving Johnny Bones alone and too depressed to carry on without her. There was also an article that suggested that they were both still alive and well, secretly planning to exploit a new heist, bigger than they'd ever done before. Their extended disappearance was only to lull the authorities into a false security, so they could harness the element of surprise.

After an hour or so, I realized I was getting no where. All I had done was confuse myself more. 

I went to slam my computer shut when I saw something in the article that caught my eye. I opened my computer back up and looked at the image on the screen. For a second, I thought it could be Marcus. The person in the picture shared nearly all of his features. But the eyes were different. Marcus' eyes were emerald, but this person had grey eyes.

I read the caption and saw that this was one of the only pictures ever found of Johnny Bones. The police were never able to verify if it actually was him though, so it very well could be a fake.

It unnerved me how similar this picture of Johnny Bones was to Marcus. If it wasn't for the eyes...

Opening a new tab, I quickly searched up Lady Stitches. Again, she didn't have many pictures, and she was wearing a mask over the lower part of her face in all of them. Clicking on one of the close ups of her face, I studied her eyes. They were a familiar green color, darker than Marcus', but still similar.

I sat back, trying to process the information going through my mind. If that picture really was of Johnny Bones and he really did get with Lady Stitches...was it really possible? I mean, it would explain why Marcus was a ten. I couldn't see someone's number in a picture, but after reading all these articles, I knew that these two had to be dangerous. If Marcus was their kid, it would help explain why he was so dangerous.

Also, the timeline worked out. Marcus looked like he could be their kid too.

But then why wouldn't Marcus have told me? Did he even know? Why would he even talk to me if he did? His parents were criminals and my mom was a cop.