COREY
For the last five years I’d lived by one simple rule: Stay alive.
I put that rule to the test by making one simple statement. “This isn’t a good idea.”
Vance waited in the shadows, molding himself to them. The whites of his eyes narrowed. He clenched his jaw.
“I’m not asking for your opinion.” He lifted the hem of his shirt and stuck his thumb into a belt loop. His piece glinted against the little bit of light filtering through the row of windows on the garage door.
I gripped the bat in my hand and gritted my teeth. Being in jail had rusted my instincts, short-circuited my sense of self-preservation. All I needed was the sight of Vance’s gun to remind me of that.
“I know what I’m doing, Fowler. Right, boys?” His question echoed and fell around me as he nodded to Drew and Jaimie. They stood at the back of the detached garage in their matching black shirts and jeans, holding flashlights. Drew frowned, a grim line set across his mouth.
I cleared my face of all emotion, a blank canvas, tightening my hold on the bat in my hand, and tried to convince myself it wasn’t created to hit baseballs, but rather elite sports cars.
“You know you want to. That lawyer deserves worse.” Vance crept closer to my ear, egging me on with his jittery presence. “Just one swing, right there on the front windshield.”
Hopper didn’t deserve it. Not really. Especially not after everything he did to get my sentence reduced. Which wasn’t part of his job, considering he was the prosecuting attorney.
“Not like he can’t afford another one,” Jaimie taunted.
The words didn’t offer me any comfort. My hands kept sweating, making my hold on the bat slick. I forced myself to shut off the danger sign flashing at the back of my head. This wasn’t exactly how I planned on paying back Hopper for his kindness.
I rolled the bat back and forth, tossed it in the air, and watched it twist, the black ingrained logo showing its face with every turn. Vance’s wide grin reflected across the shining surface of the car.
“A year in that hell. And for what? Nothing you did.”
I almost snorted at that one. Maybe I hadn’t done exactly what I was charged with, but I still picked the path that led me to the dank and dark cell.
“Corey, do it.”
This time, it wasn’t a question. Jaimie and Drew had already dumped out all the garbage onto the patio, spray-painted the back and side of the house, and broken a couple of windows. All the commotion was blocked out by the house party next door. When the lawyer was away, the neighbors came out to play.
I gripped the bat tighter and ground my teeth as I pictured the look on Mom’s face every time she came to visit me in prison.
What the hell was I doing here?
Playing chameleon. Shifting colors. Changing back into one of them. If I didn’t, I’d end up dead. Or worse.
“I mean, I could always get your mommy or brother to take your place.” Vance’s threat rang in my ears.
The sorrowful picture of Mom was replaced with an image of bleeding cuts zigzagged across her skin. The picture kept my cowardice at bay. A silent motivator. I lifted the bat and pulled back my arms.
My first swing landed on the windshield with a sick crunch. The broken glass webbed out from the point of impact, caving in.
“That’s my boy.” Vance smacked my back like a proud father who just watched his kid hit a home run.
My gut tightened, like my stomach had taken the hit, not the car. Sweat dotted my skin, clinging to the back of my neck. What the hell was wrong with me? I needed to get my head back in the game.
Vance unzipped the backpack he’d thrown onto the concrete floor when we’d first broken into the garage. He lifted a can of spray paint and tossed it to me. I thought they’d used all of them on the house.
“And that’s not all.” He tipped over the bag to show me the other cans he’d brought along. “Do your thing, Picasso.”
I should have known. Vance had let me stay back while Drew and Jaimie worked on spraying the house and breaking windows earlier. He’d led me into a false sense of security, and now I knew why.
This was the finale. And I was conducting it.
I slipped on the painting mask and took in a deep breath. The familiar shape of the can held easier in my hand than the bat. The metal ball bearing clanged as I shook the can and squatted down. A hiss and my hands glided against the side of the car as I directed the flow of the paint, shaping it, creating. I was the master and the paint was my bitch.
Jaimie and Drew tipped over the boxes sitting on the metal shelves, the sound ricocheting against the walls. Papers flew around me; one landed on my head before floating to the floor. But I couldn’t be bothered. I was in the zone. This was my aerosol-ridden heaven. Every now and then, a crunch or squeal of broken glass managed to disturb my work but not enough to knock me out of the high I felt when painting.
Vance pulled out a cigarette and lit it, the flame flickering in the dark, showcasing the scar that sank on his left cheek. He never got his hands dirty with stuff like this. He made sure it got done, that we didn’t back down.
I ground my teeth and went back to work, spraying the finishing touches to my masterpiece.
An ache lanced along my muscles. I stood up and rubbed my shoulders, pulling my hoodie up over my head. June nights in Pennsylvania could be suffocating, but I didn’t want to risk being recognized and my dark sweatshirt did the job.
I cleared my throat. “We should get out of here.”
Vance eyed me for a second, predatory in the dark. He smirked and said, “Good idea. It is getting kinda late.”
I turned around and surveyed the wreckage: the crushed windshield of the Porsche, the flames I’d drawn on the black paint, shining, ready to carry it away into the sky. Maybe the badass work would make up a little for the rest of the car.
Drew and Jaimie had been busy while I’d painted. The trophies on the shelves were bent and broken. The headlights were smashed, the sides of the car so fragmented it seemed like it was hunching in on itself. They’d also turned over one of the shelves. A paint puddle formed on the ground by the back of the garage.
A sharp smile edged on the side of Vance’s mouth. “We did good.” He rubbed his hands together. “I think Hopper will get the message.”
With caution coating our movements, we pulled up the door of the detached garage, the only way out. When we’d first arrived, there was still enough noise to cover our entrance, but the party had died down and the night had stilled with the quiet ready to turn on us. We’d managed to get the door high enough for all of us to duck into the driveway when the sound of a motorcycle pulling in up front made us freeze.
“Shit, what’s she doing here?” Vance muttered.
I yanked my eyes up to his, stomach plummeting. This was supposed to be an easy job, in and out. No witnesses. I should have known better. Fisting my hands, I squeezed until my arms shook, trying to calm the anxiety climbing higher.
The headlight bounced around as the girl maneuvered up the driveway and stopped in front of the garage, unaware of the mess surrounding her. A helmet hid her face behind the dark visor. She parked the motorcycle and turned it off. We ducked low as she slipped off the helmet and shook out her hair.
Vance gave the signal when she turned her back to us, and I blinked myself back to the damaged garage.
“Run!” I’d barely said the word when the girl twisted around and finally noticed us, her eyes widening.
“Hey! What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
We scattered into the darkness. One of the guys slammed into my back while Jaimie ran into the girl, accidently knocking her down. My foot stuck against an uneven part of the pavement, and I struck concrete with a thud. I sprang up and ran to the fence separating the house from the woods behind it.
“Stop!” The girl screamed again. “Wha-wha-what did you do?” The horror in her voice grabbed ahold of my instinct to flee.
My hands were around the top of the fence.
“Ah!” A short, high-pitched scream made me falter. “Ow, ow, ow.” The girl hissed in pain.
I stared at the fence in front of me. My heart rate steadied, and I gained control over my breathing. The girl let out another whimper, and my hands retreated to my sides.
Go. Just go.
Clenching my fists while fighting a snarl of annoyance with myself, I turned around and headed for her. Pulling my hoodie over my face, I hoped it would conceal me if I stuck to the shadows.
She held her leg while biting her lip, her jacket clinging to her curves. Her eyes narrowed and raked over me, the anger searing, making me forget for a second why I was there in the first place. Guilt held tightly to my stomach, but I pushed it away and held out my hands to let her know I wasn’t planning on hurting her.
Vance and his guys were long gone. Reluctantly, I approached her. She scooted back on her butt.
“Don’t even think about doing whatever you think you’re going to do, because trust me when I say I know how to handle myself.” She growled the words.
My steps faltered. Shit. I dropped my hand and realized how stupid I was being. Damn me for suddenly growing a conscience. Where had it been all those years before I went to jail?
“Are you okay?”
“Why the hell do you care?” She jumped up on her uninjured leg. She was several inches shorter than me but more than capable of glaring at me in a way that made me swallow hard.
She put some pressure on the injured leg as if daring me to challenge her words.
I moved my eyes to hers. “I’m sorry,” I whispered before making a run for the fence again.
My hands scraped against the unvarnished wood. I gripped tightly, the splinters digging into my skin, braced a foot against the fence, and lifted myself up and over, landing with a thump on the hard ground.
“I’m going to kill you! There’s no way you’re going to get away with this!”
The fence jolted, and I jumped up. She was trying to climb over.
“Stop! You’re going to hurt yourself.” I hit the fence with my palm.
“Why do you care?” she yelled.
Holy hell. Was I seriously having a conversation with some girl through a fence after vandalizing her house?
“Just be careful. And ice your ankle.” Apparently, yes.
“Anything else?” Her tone hadn’t lost the highest level of pissed off.
“I—I … I’m sorry.”
“Not as sorry as you’re going to be!” The fence jolted again.
That’s what I got for trying to help. I lifted my hoodie back onto my head and ran through the shadowed forest.
Copyright © 2020 by Prerna Pickett
