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"They were on , still dazed over what happened

"Still, it’s really creepy" She flips down the visor "And what poe about?"

I roll down theand let the breeze cool offskin "The one he wrote in my journal"

"You mean that creepy one you just put up on the wall?" She frowns "The one that sounds like it ritten by a serial killer?"

"That’s what you say about all poems," I remind her "And his was just deep"

"Whatever, E at you like that… you practically had an orgasm"

"No, I didn’t," I protest "And why is he a creep? Because he knew hs disdainfully "I’h the radio stations "I never said you were"

She smacks my hand away fro I’m not a fan of that kind of s, waving her hands and bobbing her head I rest my head back and watch the trees drift by I’m almost asleep when she slon the car

I open my eyes and start to unbuckle my seatbelt, but we’re stopped in a line of cars, not at the store "Where are we?" I rub my tired eyes

"Stuck in traffic" She i wheel

"Wait, what… traffic?" I quickly sit up The town is too small for traffic, yet there’s a row of cars lined each way over the bridge and down the road Police vehicles barricade the street and unifore with yellow tape and trying to detour everyone to the side

"What’s going on?" I et a better look

"So stupid," she replies in a bored tone as she inspects her fingernails for chips

The line of cars crawls forward and Raven presses on the gas, driving by slowly In the middle of the taped off section, an X is spray-painted across the asphalt and se is a rusted black Cadillac The s are broken, the hood is de froround and on the hood

"Isn’t that Laden’s?" I squint at the car "Oh ot into soht

"This couldn’t have happened last night," I say "I just saw Laden this "

"How can you be sure of what you saw?" she questions with a sparkle in her eye

I eye her over questionably "Is there soyou" She grins and cranks up the stereo

I turn back to the scene There’s an hourglass painted on the back of thein red, and feathers all over the hood and the ground It’s the exact scene of when the police found my dad’s car, just a different location And I worry that, like with my dad’s disappearance, I’ll become the priht arrives, I don’t visit the ce person and that there is evidence of foul play Myout on dinner and so Raven took her place at the table She acted like a lunatic, like she was high on the news of Laden’s disappearance, or high on so, I tried to press her about the details of last night, but she shifted the conversation to clothes every tiht, I’m woken up by the sound of my mom’s voice

"Ian," she yells up the stairs in a drunken slur "I need your help"

Ian is locked away in the attic, with his "ht so he can paint them I climb out of bed and pad to the top of the stairway

"Mo"What do you need?"

She frowns up at h and trot to the bottom of the stairway Her brown hair is disheveled and knotted and her eyes are bloodshot She used to be pretty, but her lifestyle has rapidly aged her

She tugs down the he She sarettes and her death omen smothers me, like it always does when I co in a bed of pills and bottles, dying in her own flauide her to her rooh heels

She blinks at h her blurry eyes "You look so "

She’s referring toher shoes onto the floor

"I wonder if you’ll turn out like hi onto her side "I bet you will… A killer… You did kill your grandged knife, but it’s not the first time she’s uttered them "Mom, Dad didn’t kill anyone"

"Yes, he did… Yes, he did" She drifts off to sleep

I force back the tears and rush out of her room I don’t cry--I never do--but I can’t fall back asleep So I read Caether and make no sense at all Just like my life