"Fourteen years old Haley Jameson, found dead near a river in June of 1967." Scotty Valens said, reading from the file in the storage room with the detectives. "She got a blunt trauma from blow to the head. They found a few bruises on her body. Ah, that's tragic." He sighed as he brought the file folder down.
"Cops said two young boys found her body that morning." Lilly said.
"No one was around at the time she was murdered?" Detective Will Jeffries asked.
"Nope, but cops believed her older brother was a prime suspect. " Lilly replied.
"Sixteen years old Jason Jameson claimed that he didn't do anything with killing his sister." Detective Kat Miller muttered as she read a copy of papers.
"What a terrible waste of time. Polices kept questioning Jason like a thousand times but no one believed he did it." Detective Nick Vera said, "He was a great student, straight A's student, popular, played football, and had a ton of friends."
"Ah, McDreamy guy." Scotty made a light joke.
"Haley was popular too." Lilly said.
"They might had enemies." Kat said.
Scotty turned and looked at her with a 'Yeah, right' smirk, "Nah, everybody said a lot of people in the small town quite liked them. They knew them too."
"Then why just Haley? Not Jason?" Lilly inquired skeptically.
"Who would want to kill Haley?" Kat wondered.
"I don't know. But that report said some neighbors claimed that Jason hated his sister's guts all the time." Nick said.
"Why not go ask Jason the McDreamy first." Scotty said, handling Lilly the photo of young Jason Jameson, staring straight at a camera. His hair was greased with gel. He almost looked frowned, didn't even smile for a camera.
"Well, I haven't heard that name for a long time since." Jason Jameson let out a long dejected sigh. He was in early sixties. His clean-cut brown wavy hair was replaced with a full gray hair, and his face grew more wrinkles. He had a cane with him. He leaned back against his red sofa chair. He was in his living room with two detectives. He eyed Scotty and Kat carefully. He was very a headstrong person.
"Then, can you tell me more about Haley if you can remember." Scotty said.
The image exposed a young teenage Jason looked up straight at them with his dark adamant eyes, and then he changed back to an adult. "Well, she was a great person. She had a lot of potentials. She surely had a lot of good friends. Everybody really liked her. She was kind of boyish like you know— a tomboy."
"So… you didn't have problems with her?" Scotty raised his eyebrows up.
"No, we didn't fight a lot. We were just cool with each other. We both stayed out of our troubles. We had our backs"
"Really? It is kind of funny because everybody said you hated your sister's guts. Is that correct?"
Jason paused for a second and then he replied back, "Okay I admit that, I did hate her guts. I was kind of doing rough things with her but not much. It was just like once. It was not really major concern to anybody."
"Can you tell us what do you remember that night Haley died?" Kat asked.
"Do you really think I killed her?" Jason didn't sound surprised. His voice sounded bitter. That meant he knew they immediately suspected him in less than five minutes.
"Did you?" Scotty asked back.
"No." He said simply.
"But you just said you were doing rough things with her, right?"
"It was not even serious."
"Not like threaten, beat her up to death, and left her dead for good?" Scotty said.
"Hey! That wasn't my thing!" Jason snapped at him all of a sudden.
"Then where were you at the time Haley was killed?" He said coldly.
"Home, I was sleeping!"
"How can you make us believe you?"
"Oh great, you are like other cops. What's next? Torture me?"
"Yeah, you are right. Come with me," Scotty said, grabbing his arm but Jason jerked his arm away from him.
"Okay, I was very angry at her. I didn't kill her, okay. I was just— when I was at home…"
It was a dark cool night. It was past midnight, everybody stayed home and warmed themselves. Everybody already slept in their beds except young Jason and Haley.
As he was about to head upstairs for bed, Jason turned a light off. Haley scurried to him and caught his shoulder.
"Jason, I need to talk to you." She said.
"What now?" Jason scowled.
"You can't stay mad at me forever. I'm so sorry. For real." Haley sounded remorseful.
"Haley, do you really expect me to forgive you eventually?"
"I did fix those things that I messed up. I did fix it."
Jason's jaws clenched tightly as if he tried to keep himself from screaming into her face, "You never fix it. You can't. It is not going back again. You really hurt me. Really bad."
"What do you want me to do? I'll do anything for you."
"You will do anything?"
"Yes," Haley nodded.
"Then stay out of my face. Stay away from me. Don't bother to speak to me again. Leave me the hell alone." He whirled around to walk upstairs, left Haley alone with a wounded look on her face.
"That's how I handled it with her. I just had a short talk with her before I went to bed." Jason admitted.
Scotty and Kat exchanged glances before they took a look again at Jason.
"Next morning, I found out she is dead." Jason said. "Maybe if I should forgive her earlier, and she would had been alive today."
Scotty didn't say a word, just fixed his gaze at the regretful elderly man.
Jason went on, "You have no idea. When she died, it destroyed my family's lives. My parents got divorced several months later. My sister… she kept Haley's old stuff in her closet, making sure no one threw away her stuff. She acted like nothing happened as if Haley was alive for the whole time. She kept passing out five plates instead of four on the table."
Scotty licked his lips, "Sir, I'm really sorry about your loss."
Jason let out a long, deep sigh. "Like you care?"
"I have one question for you. I hope you don't mind. Who is that boy?" Kat asked, held a photo of young eight year olds, Haley and a small curly-haired boy sitting together in front of a playground.
"Oh, that's Bryce." Jason answered.
"Who is Bryce?" Kat said as she placed it back where it belonged to.
"That's Haley's boyfriend?" Scotty requested, took a pen and notepad out of his black suit pocket.
"No, that is Haley's best friend since third grade. They were pretty tight all the time. He was very small and skinny kid like a twig." He snorted when he said twig. "He practically looked like a ten year old but Haley was a year older than him. Not a lot of kids were friendly to him and Haley, of course she didn't mind him at all." Jason explained. "You should've seen his face when he found out Haley died. He was very devastated. He missed her terribly. He was much a loner through high school. No friends. I felt bad for him. He was like my other family. So why not invited him to our house more often than usual."
Scotty nodded as he scribbled down his notepad, "What's Bryce's last name?"
Jason scoffed, "Sure, I never forget his name. Wells. Bryce Wells."
"Okay, thank for your time." Scotty said as he put the notepad away. He and Detective Miller left him alone.
Lilly Rush and Nick Vera walked through a car workshop garage, there were a dozen of young and older men repairing on cars. Lot of whirring and hissing sounds came out from saws. Sparks of orange lights fired up everywhere.
"Bryce Wells?" Lilly called. One man turned around to the two detectives, pulled his wrench mask back, revealed his face with a black smudge on his cheek. He was not pretty young or old.
"Yes?" Bryce replied. He sounded uncertain. Lilly and Nick walked up to him.
"Hello Mr. Wells," Lilly greeted, showing him a golden badge. "I'm Detective Rush and this is Detective Vera. We come here to investigate for the case. We work on homicide cases."
"Homicide?" He almost looked alarmed.
"Do you remember Haley Jameson? I heard you guys were best friends." Nick inquired.
"Oh…" Bryce said in a low whisper, "Yeah, I remember her."
"How was your relationship going with Haley?"
"Well," Bryce started to take his gloves off, tucked it into his pockets, and pulled a small blue towel out. He wiped a dirty grease off his hands with it. "I never forget her. She was pretty caring and a great friend. Not surprised if many people wanted to befriend with her, of course. She was the one who always saved me from bullies. She was like my hero. And I can't believe she died."
"Any else do you think Haley may had enemies before?" Nick shot him another question.
"What about school? A bully?" Lilly added.
"Nope, she never had a problem." Bryce shook his head.
"I'm sorry sir, but I have to ask you. Where were you that night when she died?" Lilly kept her eyes on his face, making sure if he was bluffing or not.
"I was with my dad in our garage at home. We were working on the hot rod car together. I couldn't sleep. My dad couldn't sleep too." Bryce said. He didn't look away or avoid eye contacts while he was speaking. His dark eyes just stared perfectly at the two detectives. Lilly determined he wasn't lying.
She nodded slowly, "Okay, did someone else get in your way or Haley? I mean like someone tried to break your friendship with her?"
Bryce sighed as he threw a towel on a car and placed his hand on a car hood, "Yeah, there was someone…"
The day the school was out, Haley and Bryce left together from Go Burger's, carrying hamburgers and milkshakes. A lot of loud noises, chatting, laughing, and shouting outside all over Go Burger's place, some people rudely bumped into Bryce's shoulder without apologizing to him as Haley and Bryce made it to an empty table.
However, two older boys quickly grabbed a table before Haley and Bryce arrived.
"Sorry little kids, go find another table." A blonde boy snickered. A guy with a greased-hair laughed along with his friend.
Haley sighed, annoyed at two disrespectful guys but she began walking past them. Bryce caught up behind her. He saw a girl coming toward Haley.
"Hey Haley," The pretty blonde girl approached them.
"Hey Jill," Haley said, but more like she was despondent to see her presence.
Jillian could recognize the sorrow in her voice but didn't say anything about it. "Listen, I need to talk to you. It is about Jason." she insisted, and then she glanced at Bryce who was standing beside Haley, "I mean alone…"
Bryce's jaws clenched, trying to keep himself cool down. He disliked Jillian at first because she kept stealing Haley away from him all the time. He never had a chance to spend time with Haley. Even though he didn't have a lot of friends, Haley was his only true friend. Otherwise, he let her go anyway because Jillian was also Haley's friend too.
Haley took a quick glance at Bryce, "Um, I kind of had a plan with him."
"It will take a few minutes. It will be quick. I promise." Jillian pouted. "I need to find a way to talk with Jason."
Haley sighed.
"Um, Hal. Let's go." Bryce urged, jerking his head toward an empty table he spotted on.
"You can go get a table, hold it for me please." Haley carefully shoved her hamburger and milkshake into Bryce's arms, trying not to spill all over him.
As Bryce sauntered away, he overheard their whispers. None of them made senses at all. He was confused for a second but he decided to ignore it.
He kept walking as he struggled carrying hamburgers and milkshakes in his two tiny arms.
"After that talk, Haley came to a table. She seemed upset. She said she wanted to go home and then she left. She didn't bother to talk to me about what happened." Bryce told them.
"Who was she hanging out with?" Nick asked.
"Jillian. Jillian Peverett. She was very pretty and popular. Every guy drooled at her. But too bad, she had a boyfriend. She was taken by Jason." Bryce replied.
"Jason Jameson? Haley's brother?" Lilly said.
"Yeah, they were dating for almost two years but then they broke up."
"When did they break up?" Nick said as he wrote it down on his notepad.
Bryce shrugged, "Several days before Haley's death."
"Okay, thank you for your time." Lilly told him.
Bryce nodded in response. Then the image exposed a young curly-haired Bryce, "Anytime." Then he changed back to adult Bryce.
Lilly and Nick turned around to leave.
