Homewrecker

61 - 𝓳𝓾𝓭𝓮

I didn't realize it until I caught a glimpse of it through the windshield over Jason's shoulder, dried rain splatters dotting over the glass, but there was a part of me that thought his home would look different from the last time I saw it.

The pale, sun-bleached yellow siding was still peeling from the house, exposing the decaying wood underneath, and the white porch steps were still sagging but the caution tape had been taken down, although I could see as Ethan pulled in alongside the curb that where it had been tied around the railing was still there, torn but not untied.

There were still holes in the screen door in front of the front door, black garbage bags were still puckering behind the broken windows, and the mailbox attached beside his door was slanted somewhat. I did notice, however, that there was a cat dish on the first step as a makeshift ashtray. It looked almost exactly the same way I left it a couple of months ago when I came here looking for my mom after the tornado.

Except now, his truck was in the driveway.

"I didn't know you well enough to say it before," Ethan told me, still staring ahead at Jude's house as he put the car in park, "but I think It lives here."

"What lives here?" Natalie asked, frowning.

"It."

"Yeah, what's it?"

"He's the titular character from a Stephen King novel about a clown who eats—"

"It's from a movie," Jason interrupted him before looking over at me as I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for the door handle. "Do you really think it's safe to go in by yourself?"

I nodded. "You're right outside. If you see him carrying out my body in a rug, I'm sure you'll do the right thing."

Ethan nodded. "Absolutely. Help him load you into the car."

"Exactly," I replied. "Alright, be back in a minute."

I slammed the car door behind me before I heard any further protests, or horror film references, and started what I wanted to look like a confident stride to everyone leering behind the tinted windows, but the splinters and cracks in the sidewalk slowed me after the toe of my shoe caught on one. I tried to remember if those had been there before the tornado hit, or if the turbulent winds were the cause of them like the broken windows of his house.

Then, I wondered if maybe the tornado hadn't broken those windows, but maybe my mom had. Maybe Jude brought her back here that morning. Or maybe he didn't, and the tornado broke the windows like it did dozens of other houses.

A couple of the limbs of the oak trees around the property had been snapped, but bark and wood torn so violently it resembled fibers kept them attached. Walking over his front lawn, I was slower, even though I didn't want to look like there was some part of me that wanted to back away from this house, and not because I thought a child murdering clown lived inside.

I was beginning to feel like there was so much about my mom I didn't know before she died, things she would never tell me herself, and adding Jude as her drug dealer wasn't something I wanted to do. But the thought was already in my head, and it wasn't like I could forget about it.

I was approaching the sagging porch steps, the wood still sloped unnaturally and curved, when I got a text message on my phone, from Ethan. When I opened it, I was expecting it to be another reference about a particular horror movie, but instead, it referenced something else.

Ma'am? Hey, sorry, ma'am?

I bit back a smile. I'm not used to being called ma'am. Thought you meant someone else.