✲ .｡ ﾟ ﾟ｡. ✲ ❛ PARCEL NINE ❜ ✲ .｡ ﾟ ﾟ｡. ✲ S 01 E 06
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"I'm sorry, you're welcome to stay where?" Kiara asked for the umpteenth time as I sipped on the lemonade that JJ had brought me, my back leaning against the bar of the wreck.
"Tannyhill. Your dad said he also got a call— so did Heyward. Ward just offered to step in because I was with Sarah at the hospital and I defended her when Topper showed up." I groaned. "This is the third freaking time I've said it."
"So you've got an invitation to live with Sarah Cameron."
"Okay, look, the only reason I'm welcome to live there is because Ward's keeping an eye on me until I have a shit ton of legal shit to do when my inheritance processes, right? And, it's way better than me having to work three jobs 24/7, plus they have killer food. Second to here, obviously, but still free food." I walked over to the group, my backpack slung over my shoulder that didn't have a sling on it and my lemonade that was nearly finished in my hand.
"So, do you have a like, invitational membership to the clubs now?" Pope teased as I set down my cup on the table where we were presumably going to plan our next step in the gold-hunting process.
"Pope, I swear—"
"What about those golf carts they drive around? You get one of them?" JJ continued, his eyes silently watching me wince and sit down at the chair. Goddamn my tailbone.
"Does it come with a sweater-vest or do you have to buy your own?"
As I cherished the momentary buzz I received from my friends teasing me, the other girl in the group snapped the mood back down. "Look, you promised that you wouldn't get close to her."
"What else was I supposed to do? You and I were—"
"Just own it, Chayse. You're besties now." The blonde that was now at my side teased, the hand on my good arm swatting at his bicep.
"If you wanna hang out with her, that's fine. But I'm letting you know in advance that I'm not doing anything with Sarah." The brunette continued.
"Do you guys see her here?" I ran my free hand over my face in exasperation. "She's not even here right now, so shut up about her and get back on track. It'd be fantastic if we could get some focus. We've got the map, right?"
"It's all out of whack 'cause the guy was ganja'd when he drew it." JJ shrugged, looking at the outspread map.
"It's because the coast changed." Kie looked up at him, blinking. I stifled a laugh, which earned a soft whack on the shoulder from JJ. It only fueled my amusement.
"So we just have to look for landmarks that haven't changed." Pope tried to round up our focus.
"What about the old forts?" I offered.
"Battery Jasper." The girl across from me realized, pointing to the fort on the map.
———ˋˏ ∵- ✿ - ∴ ˎˊ———
"Okay, so the road should split up here." Pope directed me towards where Parcel Nine should be, which we had determined was a subdivision now and not actually a part of Tannyhill. "All right, so you're gonna take a left here."
With a wince, I turned the wheel down the road he had pointed out, my eyes searching carefully for a stone wall of some sort.
"That looks like a stone wall to me," JJ commented from behind us, his head popping between the two front seats.
"Good job, Sherlock," I commented and parked the car, letting out a breath. I got out of the car and groaned at the sight of the house that we had arrived at. "Of all places it had to be the Crain house."
"Are you kidding me?" Kie huffed, walking up to the wall beside me. JJ followed suit, standing behind us and speaking with a panicked tone in his voice.
"Worse case scenario."
"Why'd it have to be here? Of all places?" Pope added on. The four of us looked at the wall, a sense of impending doom looming like a storm cloud that was ready to downpour.
"I heard that Mrs. Crain buried her husband's head on the property." The blonde whispered to me, which made me turn back to him with a fear-filled glare. "What?"
"It's nowhere near Halloween, and we're at a haunted house," I grumbled, motioning with my free hand to the wall. "Let's get this shit over with."
"I'll go first since y'all are all pussies." Kie huffed, walking up to the stone wall and glancing back at us. "And a cripple."
"Shut up." I laughed and watched as she hoisted herself over the wall, grunting as she landed on the other side.
Pope followed after, and JJ helped me so I could get over it without hurting myself too badly. Thankfully I had ditched my sling as soon as I was discharged from the hospital, so it wasn't all that difficult to scale the wall. Once we met up on the other side, the four of us walked into the overgrown garden and towards the house, leaves and branches brushing up against our exposed skin. I was wearing a pair of baggy jeans, so my legs were spared, but the plethora of scratches and bug bites that will most likely cover my uncovered arms later will not be pretty.
"Look, you guys know whose house this is, right?" Kie reiterated, stepping around a random statue.
"Oh, yeah. No, I do." JJ commented from beside me.
"I'm gonna be honest, I don't really believe the stories of this place— Pope, stick your finger in my face and shush me one more time and I'll stick it so far up your ass that it'll come out your nose. Dead serious, dude." I commanded sarcastically, which made the boy smile.
"I'm trying to listen to what JJ's gonna come up with in that brain of his." He chuckled from beside me.
"Which stories did you hear?" We watch the blonde jog over to the other girl, who only glanced at him, half annoyed.
"The one where she killed her husband with an ax and that she's been holed up ever since." She kept walking, entertaining the blonde's antics. "On certain nights when the moon is full... you can see her in the window!"
She wiggled her fingers and made a ghost sound while I howled like a wolf, the two of us laughing at JJ's growing irritation.
"No, it's not funny because it's all true! I swear to god, guys, this is all real. I knew Hollis. Jeez!" He flinched at another statue. I laughed at him. "Shut up and stop laughing at me, Chayse!"
"You flinched at a statue. Scaredy-cat." I laughed more before going back to the conversation. "I forgot you knew Hollis Crain! She's hot. So hot."
"Dude, how do you two know Hollis Crain?" the pope asked us. I shrugged.
"She was my babysitter and Chayse came over a lot because she can't stay away from me for more than 2 hours."
"Don't flatter yourself."
"Regardless, she told me all about it. Told me the truth, about her mother, and what happened in this house." I glanced at the blonde as he talked, my interest in what she had told him growing. "So, as a kid, she heard all the stories that her mother killed her father, and she was a murderer and all. Hollis didn't believe it, until that night."
"What night?" Kie smacked my arm as I egged him on, but I ignored her continued to hold his eye contact.
"It all came back to her," He said ominously, not a single sign of amusement on his face. He looked around the garden, making sure there was no one else listening. "When Hollis was six years old, she heard her parents arguing downstairs. So, she goes downstairs to see her mom washing her hands in a sink... full of blood."
"Spooky." I blinked, nodding in his direction. "Please keep going."
"Her mother just says that she cut her finger. The next morning, she says that her father and her split up. It seemed plausible for a while because they were always fighting, but then Hollis noticed something." He continued, deathly serious. His face was stone cold and he was gazing around the group holding eye contact as he talked. It was terrifying. "Her mother was going into the parlor constantly, in and out and in and out with plastic bags. Weeks pass and Hollis decides to use the outhouse. And as she's using it, she looks down, and there, in the outhouse, is her father's head, looking straight back at her."
He stepped close as he finished the last sentence in a last-ditch effort to scare me. I laughed in his face, stomach clenching. "God, you are so full of shit."
"Dude, I swear to god."
"Did she call the police?" Pope wondered aloud.
"She didn't have time," They kept talking and I grew impatient, my shoulders slipping past them to continue on the path. "Wait! What are you doing?"
"I'm following the stupid code message. Obviously."
"You sure you wanna do this? She's an ax murderer. You're practically immobile!"
"One, I'm not immobile, two you're being a pussy. I don't give a shit if she's an ax murderer. She's practically dust by now, and if she chops my head off, then I can tell everyone in the afterlife that I got murdered by an 80-year-old woman. I've got nothing to lose." I rambled, waving my good arm in the air. "Ándale, let's go cause some chaos."
Everyone else followed immediately after as I led us further into the garden, JJ begrudgingly following at the end of the line we had. Once we were at the front of the house, I motioned for everyone to circle up.
"Okay, so, here's the plan. we need to look for the wheat near the water like it said in Denmark's letter."
"Like, what kind of water? Pond water?" Pope prodded, trying to get a better idea of what we were looking for.
I heard a light chuckle emit from the end of the semi-circle, JJ's head leaning back towards the group. "Bong water?"
"To be honest, I wish, but no. It— it just said to look for water, 'kay?" I sighed, frustrated.
"That's the shittiest secret message ever." Kie scoffed, grumbling more beneath her breath.
"You wanna complain a little more, Kie? I don't think the statues back there heard you." I rolled my eyes. "It's not like I wrote the damn message, and no one said it'd be easy. It's called a treasure hunt for a reason."
"Okay. Kie and I will search the northeast quadrant, you two search the northwest. Don't let her get any more hurt than she already is." Pope addressed all of us, pointing directly at JJ for the last line.
"Great, give me the cripple and the decapitation quadrant."
"shut up!" I scolded him, the two of us walking off to go and explore the garden.
"You know, C, you're really funny when you're pissed. The statue joke? Genius." The blonde mindlessly commented, which made me scoff and take a long drag of my cart.
"Am I really?"
"Yeah, your filter just disappears. It's so entertaining." We laughed softly before a bird called from ahead of us, startling us. We both shook off the slight scare and trudged on, eventually ending up at a worn-out and slightly opened door to the cellar of the seemingly ancient house.
Kiara rustled around behind me, Pope not too far behind. "Come on, this is the only place we haven't looked."
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