When we walk outside, there is a black car waiting for us, shining in the sunlight. Guess I was out for half a day. "Impala? Year... 68?" I ask. Dean looks at me and raises an eyebrow. "67. I'm impressed though." I look at him and smugly say, "Thanks." We get in the car.
"If you don't mind me asking," Dean says, "How is it that your family died but you didn't?" The car is silent for a few minutes. "Hey if you don't want to talk about it, that's oka-" I cut him off, "No." I say. "It's all right I was just deep in thought I guess." I clear my throat.
"Every sunday we play a board game. Risk, Settlers of Catan, Monopoly, something fun. We were going to play Risk. I just finished college a few weeks ago. I don't have a job quite yet, and I'm just staying with my parents until I can find one and buy a house. Right now I'm just sort of renting my bedroom. My payment is making dinner, doing all laundry, vacuuming every other day- just easy chores to pay it off." I smile, until I remember my family is dead. Until I remember Tommy's decapitated body.
"Anyways we were going play Risk." I say, a little loud. Dean looks at me in concern. "I went upstairs, got the board game, and when I came downstairs, I see my brother's head chopped off in front of me, while my other brother's neck is broken. My… My mom. She saw me. She looked at me and mouthed 'Go.' I couldn't though. How could I leave? Then the men moved to my parents and ripped their chests opened. They must not have known that I was in the house because they didn't even look for me. They left, and I went downstairs, packed some food, you guys chased me, knocked me out, cut me, and now I suppose I am going to live with you. The end." Near the end of the happy story my voice starts to quiver and I look out the window, hoping Dean doesn't see the tears falling down my face.
"Hey." He says quietly. "Why dont you get some shut eye? Sometimes sleep helps." I nod, still looking out the window. I lay my head against it and close my eyes. Sleep doesn't come soon, but eventually it does.
The quick nap turned deadly. Flashes of my family dead. Flashes of the black eyed demons.
When I wake up, it is to someone nudging me. "Hey." Dean says. "We're here." I open my eyes, and see my family's house. I look at the dashboard, the clock says five pm. But it is still looks like noon. Such is the way of summer in Kansas. I open up my door and step onto the driveway. "Do you want me to come with you?" Asks Dean. I hesitate at first, then nod my head, biting my lip. He comes up to me and puts a hand on my shoulder. Together we walk to the front door.
The door opens easily, because I didn't lock it. When we go inside, the smell hits you hard. The body's had begun to decay and it smelt. Bad. I try not to look at them while walking to the stairwell. It's hard though, because the stairwell is attached to the living room, which is where my family lay dead. I walk to the stairs.
Once Dean and I are up, I open up my bedroom door. My room is a fairly clean, just a few clothes sprawled on the floor, a book or two on the bed.
I walk to my dresser, and take out my ten shirts, three tank tops, and six blue jeans. I move to my dresser, and look at Dean. "Could you uh… Leave for a minute?" He looks at me confused. "Why?" I sigh and say, "Because I need underwear and don't want you to see it. Be helpful and go get the suitcase out of the hall closet? Very end of the hall, to the left." He rolls his eyes but does as told.
I take out fifteen pairs of underwear, fifteen pairs of socks, two pairs of pajamas- one for when it's hot, one for when it's cold. I place everything in neat stacks on my bed, and shortly later Dean walks in. I don't say thank you, because I am on the verge of crying. I take the suitcase and try to hide my face from him. I'm sure he saw though. I place the suitcase on the bed and begin putting belongings inside.
First my clothes, then some toothpaste and my toothbrush, then some 'feminine necessities'. I take all my books from my bookshelf, which is about thirty. They won't all fit in my suitcase. I turn to Dean again, "Can you get me another one?" He scrunches his nose and asks, "Why do you need all these books?" I look at the books fondly and say, "Because, books seem like the only place where I am truly happy." He stays a moment longer, sighs, then goes to get me another suitcase.
After he returns, I put all my books in the suitcase, and it is full. I go to my dresser again where my guitar and piggy bank sits on top. I open the piggy bank, and take out all the money, a grand total of one hundred and twenty seven dollars and eighty three cents. Not a lot, but enough for the moment. Before we walk downstairs I also grab my guitar.
Dean and I walk back downstairs, and he helps me scavenge up our family albums. Trips to different island, baby pictures of the boys, first time I rode a bike, birthdays, things like that. Then we walk into my parents room and grab all the pictures. There are only a few, seven to be exact, but they are all important. They are of my parent's wedding day and anniversaries, and pictures of my deceased grandparents and aunt and uncle.
I look in my mother's sock drawer, praying that they were there, and they were. Passports, birth certificates, important documentaries. I grab them all, but before we leave their room, I look for my parents emergency stack of money.
I first check under the bathroom's scale, bust. Next in my mother's old jewelry box, also nothing, but when I look behind my parent's wedding picture, ding ding ding! One thousand dollars.
Dean whistles when he sees it. "Lot of cash." He notes. "Yeah," I say. "I'm going to need it, right?" He scratches his head. "Only if you don't feel like going to an ATM anytime soon. We kind of… Do... Illegal things. Stolen credit cards, fake IDs, you know." I don't know, but pretend I do anyways. "Guess it makes sense." Dean nods, "Yeah."
After I got everything packed up, Dean helped me carry the suitcases down the stairs. Right before we close the front door behind us, never to return again, I stop. "Wait," I say. I go back inside, Dean watching me. I bend down to my mother and father's body, the smell horrible. I bend down to their left hands, and take their wedding rings. My mother had a necklace she got from her mother right before she passed. It was a simple, golden chain, on it a simple pendant. The pendant was of a flying raven, made out of diamond. I took the necklace, and placed my parent's rings on it, then put it around my neck. I then walk to the kitchen and dial 911 on the phone. Then I leave the phone out as the receiver picks up and I hear, "911 what's your emergency?"
I walk back to Dean, and he examines my necklace, but doesn't say anything. I say,"Alright then. Lets roll. I called the police so… If you do illegal stuff we should probably get out of here."