Karen

The cart grumbled as it rolled over small potholes and rubble. I took in a deep breath, surprised the wheels hadn’t let up under my weight. The wind lifted my tank top and whipped it around my waist as I hooted and hollered with my arms up and out. My chest heaved as an exhilarating breeze picked up, zapping me with an electrifying momentum. I was so loud that people looked over their shoulders at me, distracted from loading up grocery bags or kids into their cars.

Halfway from Tatum’s Fresh Foods entrance, the cart drifted left and my eyes widened. My excited clamoring digressed to an aghast shrill.

“Shit, shit, shit!”

I shifted my body to the right, trying to put the thing back on course for the brick wall that separated the parking lot from the road, not the lone red van parked a few feet before it. Jumping out was a no-go. Neither had it crossed my mind. I was too high on soft brisk winds to entertain the thought of tumbling across the asphalt. The red minivan approached faster with every sway and jolt I put on the basket.

“Shit!” I screamed. The cart slammed into the fender and shoved my body across the hood. My knees and stomach skidded over the hot metal as my body flung forward, pushing me down onto the pavement. My head broke my fall.

Dazed, I grunted and laid on the festering ground sucking down thick humid air.

Soles smacked the ground with a heavy speed. Panting hard, Lance halted and leaned over me, watching me lay there, blinking hard at the sun.

“Damn man! That was...shit!” He got close with his phone, filming me panting on the ground. “Good thing you gave me your phone this time. Your mom would be pissed if you broke another one.”

“Yeah.” I sat up and winced at the sharp cramp in my knee. “Making wipe out videos and pranking strangers isn’t the best excuse.” I groaned and ran a hand over my aching, sweating scalp. “But she’ll get over it once we’re rich.”

Lance moved around the van, searching it. He winced at the hood. “Damn man, we need to get out of here. The hood has a nice dent on it. And…” He pulled the cart and pushed it off to the middle of the parking lot. “Oh shit. This is a nice deep scratch over here too.” He shook his head.

“Whatever.” I peered around. A balding man gawked at us with a serious scowl across his bare face as if we’d disturbed him from loading his car. Another woman rolled her eyes before getting into her blue convertible. Her kids, no older than ten, laughed and whispered as they held their phones up. I smirked. “Anyway, did you get the whole thing?” I asked, exerted and aching at the joints.

“Yeah! I mean, this is gold! We can upload it right now. Forget the old folk's home. I’m sure they can wait until tomorrow for the diaper prank. But this? This is going viral tonight, guaranteed.”

“Really? I was looking forward to Meadow Oaks. It’s been...I don’t know, fifteen years since I got to shit myself and not get in trouble for it?”

“That last part being the most important, right?”

We laughed.

“You’re a slob,” he said.

“Says the guy who dips his grilled cheese in sour cream.”

He shrugged. “Don’t knock it til you try it.” He poked at his phone with stubby fingers. Sweat trickled down his face and caught his exposed chest. His t-shit looked like a dog chewed the collar before stretching it. I know it was hot, but why the hell was Lance always so wet? Even in the freezing winter, he’d always sweat.

“Ugh. Dude, move. You’re getting your fat boy fluids on me,” I said.

“Shut up,” he said, taking a couple of steps back while recording me standing up. I adjusted my basketball shorts around my hips and twisted my tank top straight along my waist.

I chuckled, shaking the dizzy spell from the fall. “Let’s get outta here before—”

“Hey!” An unfamiliar voice. I looked over my shoulder, past the van. A fair-skinned, dark-haired woman approached; her loafers paced with a hurried stride as she clutched her purse tight to her side. She pointed. “Hey!”

As we looked on at the red-faced woman, I couldn’t help but think of my neighbor, Ms. Monica. She whined as much as Mom and demanded as much as Coach Valders. When she wasn’t calling the police to complain about me bouncing a ball at nine o’clock on a Friday night, or calling my mom to tell about me and Zoe skipping school at my house to make-out, she was busy sipping on Starbucks, knitting zany hats, or yelling at her cat to stop hissing and scratching at her little ankle-biting yapper. Zoe called her Karen but I’m sure her name was Ms. Monica Berry.

“Oh my God.” Her eyes watered as she stared at the fender on the opposite side. “Look at what you assholes did to my car,” she growled.

“Uh, we’re sorry,” I said.

“Sorry?” she said. “You’re sorry?

I nodded. “It was an accident. See, my cart got away from me when I—”

“This doesn’t look like a—” She rounded the vehicle for the hood. Her jaw dropped and eyes popped. “What the hell?” she whispered.

“Look, ma’am, I swear it was an accident,” I said. I wasn’t sure if it was the utter shock on her face or the tears in her eyes, but I felt the same disappointment in my bones that I did whenever Mom lectured me about being irresponsible. ‘Sorry’ seemed to paint a smile on Mom’s face. But it wasn’t working for this woman.

She glared at me with red eyes and twitched.

“Ma’am, I—"

“Who’s going to pay for this?” she growled.

“It—it was an accident—”

“I said, who the hell is going to pay for this,” she said. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath before mumbling something to herself. It sounded like a low chant.

“I—”

Her eyes popped open and the left one flickered as if it were struggling. Her sunken cheeks expanded with heavy, exasperated breaths. “W—where are your parents?”

“I—” I started.

“Dude, run!” Lance said after taking off and gaining a couple of feet on me.

“Oh shit!” I took off after him for Montpelier Ave and passed him. We whisked past storefronts along the busy street before cutting right into an alley. Colorful graffiti and city dumpsters crowded my peripheral as they hid from the aggressive heat in the thin shadows. I made a sharp left on Harper Road at the alley’s end and stopped in front of Numbers Phone House. I mopped my brow clean with the back of my hand and put my hands to my knees.

“Shit.” I threw my head back and squinted at the clear sky. “Oh, man.”

Lance stumbled out the alleyway, breathing as if his lungs were shrinking. I swaggered over to him and drove my fist into his wiggling gut. His shirt rode up his belly, exposing the curdled mess that I called ‘hang time.’

He wailed and lurched over. “Fuck was that for?” He sounded like he was about to barf up the potato chips and cheese pizza he sucked down before we left my house for the afternoon.

“You were supposed to be looking out!” I said.

“Well shit, I—”

“Just like you were supposed to be looking out for the guy that broke my phone the other day! You fucked up again!”

“Come on! You can’t blame me for that. How was I supposed to be on the lookout and record? That’s not fair!”

“Nope! That’s it! If the footage is fucked, I’m not going back in that cart next time, you are!”

“Aw come on, Reese! You’re lighter. The cart will go faster! It’s dynamics!”

I glowered at him. I hated, no, I despised when Lance tried to sound smart. It was a cheap attempt at tossing my barely passing ninth grade in my face or rubbing in his advancement to the eleventh-grade next year. Cousin or no, he sure knew how to rub me the wrong way and he wasn’t afraid to take advantage of it especially since he moved out to the suburbs. He’d turned his nose up and looked down on me since. I wondered why he even bothered coming to the city every summer. Sometimes, our relationship seemed forced with Mom and Aunt Rose ignoring the fact that Lance and I were drifting apart.

“I don’t give a shit! You’re going in the cart; I’ll record and be on the lookout! At least I’d be affective.”

“Effect—Ah!” he wailed when I pinched and twisted his nipple. “Son of a bitch!”

“Yeah, I got your son of a bitch.” I flinched at him with balled fists. He jumped and threw his hands in front of his face.

“Knock it off, man.”

I limped on my cramped knee up Harper.

“Hey. Wait up,” Lance said, catching up to me. “Look, I’m sorry about all that. I really am.  But at least we got the shots we needed. Ready to get back to your house and edit the video?”

I sighed. “Yeah. I guess.” I grimaced at the subtle burning on my arm. “I think I clipped my elbow.” I twisted my arm enough to find a red scratch on the opposite side. “My knee is shit too.”

“I noticed the slight limp,” he said. Lance winced. “Ow. That looks like it hurts.”

“Ya think? That's why your fat ass is going on video next time.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes the hell you are, Lardy McFatass!”

“Oh no. Is it because baby girl needs her rash cream? Are your scabs hurting, little girl?” He whined.

“Shut up. Belle is ten and she’d kick your ass in a heartbeat.”

“So you’re going to get your little sister to beat me up?” He shook his head. “Classic Reese.”

“The better question is do you want your ass kicked and buried under Mom’s garden?”

His face crumbled. “Really? How do you plan on explaining that to my mom and dad when they finally come and get me from this hell hole?”

“Hey! Get off my city! Everyone doesn’t have a mansion in the hills where there is fuck all to do.”

“Fuck all to do? It’s better than walking or catching the bus everywhere. Do these people know there are smells besides hot piss?” He yelled.

“Well, if you hate it so much, go home. Oh, wait. You can’t because you’ll eat your parents out of house and home, you fat fuck!”

He let out a condescending chuckle. “Really, Reese?”

“Yeah really. And I know you think you’re better than everyone, but you’re not the only fucker who can do something with his life.”

“Wait? You have plans other than living at your Mom’s house?”

“Yeah asshole, I’m going to law school.”

He scoffed. “No, you’re not.”

I scowled. “Why’d you say that?”

“Because lawyers are smart and you’re as dumb as a blonde on a short bus.”

I growled. Lance laughed and took off running for the corner.

I took off after him, grunting with a burning face. I’d tear his ass in half. I wasn’t stupid. Far from it. School was just not fun. It was the last place I or anyone else wanted to be. At least in college, you got to pick what you wanted to study, right? And besides, I wasn’t the one stuck spending the last three months of summer here. Lance was. I couldn’t wait to tell Belle. Lance had just signed a contract to be the ass of every prank in our household. And there was plenty to go around…literally.

Lance hit the street with a stride I’ve never seen out of him. He laughed, gasped, and held his stomach with both hands while he hunched over, leaning into his sprint.

“I’ll kick your ass in the street, Lance! You’re not going to—”

The quick wind whipped by, pulling some weight off my feet. It went by so fast that my legs locked before I stepped off the curb. A van ran through Lance, picking him up from the street. He hit the hood with a thick womp and rolled across the roof. He hit the ground and rolled about a foot before he rocked on his side and landed belly down.

“Oh shit!” I yelled. My jaw dropped as I watched the Illinois plates drift further up the street. The tires tore into the road as it made a right a few blocks up. The engine grumbled as the sick fuck pushed it to the limit, heard but unseen.

With stiffened legs and staggering thoughts, I inched into the street. I dropped to my knees at Lance’s side. “Oh, God. Lance?”

I didn’t touch him. I couldn’t see his face. I wanted him to roll on his back and laugh it out. But he laid still, cheek against his extended forearm and forehead to the ground.

“Lance!” I cried.

“Someone call 911!” a woman said. The door to Anthony’s Stromboli closed behind her when a man wearing an apron nodded and went back inside. She rushed from the corner and kneeled beside me.

“Lance?” I said.

“Sweetheart, I need you to help me get him on his back. Can you do that?” She tied her thick hair back.

“I—I—” The street spun and my heartbeat became deafening. I squinted at the woman; her voice sounded like it was traveling through water. 

“Come on,” she said. “I’ll hold his head and I need you to turn his body upright. We have to do it together, all right?”

“A—all right,” I said in a small voice.

She put her hands on his ears.

“Push,” she said.

I pushed, landing him on his back. She turned his head, making him face the sky.

Tears seeped from my eyes as I watched Lance. Blood poured from his gaping mouth, dying his teeth red. His cheeks bruised and scrapes tattered his pale face and arms. The slit on his head oozed blood that pooled in the street.

His eyelids sagged like a drunk’s as his dark eyes stared at me.

“His name’s Lance?” she asked.

I opened my mouth to speak but small squeaks came out.

She snapped her mahogany fingers. “Hello? Are you with me? I can’t help him unless you help me. What’s his name? I’m a nurse. I can help. Is his name Lance?”

I nodded.

“Lance? Lance are you with me?” She searched his vacant eyes. She pressed two fingers against his neck, dropped her head, then looked at me. “I’m sorry, he’s gone.”

Ice swooned my body, pumping violent chills through my veins. My heart sped, numbing my limbs as trembles surged through me. I had to be dreaming or roaming around a nightmare. Sirens sounded off in the distance and rubber scraped cement nearby. I looked up. The minivan’s red grill raced up the road, flying through stop signs.

I got to my feet. “Move!” I yelled at the nurse, who was staring at her watch.

I grabbed her collar and tugged hard enough to pull her to her feet.

“Hey kid!” she said, snatching away from my grip.

“Mo—” I couldn’t explain, not in time at least. I yanked her short-sleeve hard enough for a button to pop off her cleavage. We both tripped over the high curb as I stumbled.

Lance’s body bounced and jumbled under the van before its back tires rolled over him, leaving bloody tracks.

“Oh my God!” the nurse said. She pushed me and went for Lance's body.

“Wait!” I said.

She pulled Lance’s swaying collar only for his body to stay still. “Ugh! Help me!” she demanded with desperation in her brown eyes.

Frozen, I stared at the ignited taillights. The van did a U-turn, rolling over the curb before the tires landed back in the street.

“Watch out!” I said.

The nurse looked up and her eyes nearly popped from her face as the vehicle raged toward her. She let Lance’s shirt loose and leaped from the street as Karen drew close, bringing the van to an abrupt stop. We watched as the woman stepped out, fidgeting with something in her hands and sobbing.

The nurse stepped off the curb.

“No, stop!” I told her.

She waved me off and headed for Karen. “Hey what the hell is your problem lady! You killed this—”

Karen stepped out front of the van, aimed a magnum, and fired at the nurse.

The nurse screamed, hunching over, and turning on her heels.

“Run!” I yelled as I turned and hauled ass. Bullets struck the pavement, fences, and trees around us as we darted up the street.

The nurse yelped as she fell.

I kept running, making a right on Ann Street.

I peered. Karen stood over the nurse and pointed the barrel at her. The nurse put her hands up, shielding her face. Karen let off a single round, tearing off the back of the nurse’s head and painting the sidewalk with blood splatter.

“Oh shit. Oh, God!” I ran. “Help!” I screamed. The neighborhood didn’t respond. Birds chirped and squirrels skulked by. People rushed inside their homes, beckoning their kids to do the same.

“Someone’s shooting!” I heard a man say. But I kept my sprint. Not looking back.

In the distance, an engine roared to life and revved up an angry growl. Sirens drew close but, in the city, you never knew where they came from. They bounced off every building and came up as whispers across the South Side. For all I knew, the ambulance was still stuck in traffic and Lance’s body would lay in the street for another fifteen minutes.

It didn’t matter.

I kept running, cutting across yards until I ended up on Dexter Avenue, a few blocks away from home. I slowed to a jog, looking around at anything and everything. A fire hydrant flooded out the plushy yards of whoever managed to crack it open to play in. An old couple gathered their things from their porch and headed inside. A young couple hurried by while holding hands and searching my face with uncomfortable gazes.

“Please. Can I use your phone?” I asked.

“Ugh,” the woman replied.

“Hey kid, get the fuck outta here before I curb stomp your ass.” The stocky guy put his arm up, blocking the woman’s chest as he stepped to me. I backed away and crossed the street.

Sweaty and out of breath, I slowed to walk on my toes, ready to take off at the site of a minivan, whether it be red or green, Karen or not.

Harsh breaths burned my throat. The street spun, colliding brick apartments, parked cars, and green grass into one. How was I going to tell Mom about Lance? Aunt Rose would be crushed. Uncle Bobby would be devastated. Belle and I gave Lance a hard time but he was our only cousin. We had a right to torture him. Laugh at him. Start shit with him…Cry with him.

I sobbed and sucked back breaths.

Karen’s tires rolled over him like he was common roadkill. She laid waste to him. Ended him forever. One minute he laughed and teased. The next, his skin lay split open and his blood painted the road dark red.

An upcoming stop sign blurred under my tears.

I sniffed. “Lance,” I whispered. Never to be seen alive again. And I left him there, festering in the hot street for all to see. Sirens boomed and shrieked nearby. So close, I was sure they came to collect the strange kid lying dead in the street.

Maybe Lance was all right. Maybe he would shake it off. A little beat up and broken in some spots, but Lance could still be alive. Right? There’s no way I’d know. I left him there in the street and ran before I ended up just like him, smeared across the road.

I wiped my eyes and put a hand on the pole holding the stop sign. Berkley Ave. Only four blocks until I made it home. I looked both ways and my heart sank faster than sand in water. A red minivan waited at a stop sign the next block up. The sunken hood and tattered grill were all too familiar. 

A black Charger came to the crossroad, off Hubbell, and waited, unknowing of the standoff. Its horn bleated, but the minivan only sat, staring at me.

I did a hurried backpedal as the Charger proceeded through the stop sign. Karen cut through the sign and slammed into the Charger, pushing it off and into a light pole.

I darted back up Dexter and dove into the alley parallel to Berkley. Home was that way, the way that crazy bitch was charging from. I needed to get there, the only place I’d be safe. I put my back to a dumpster. Dammit, why didn’t I take my phone from Lance? Moreover, why did I set Karen off? It was a bad idea, from the cart, to the crash, to Karen. Now Lance was gone and this insane cunt wanted to end me too.

Where were the police when you needed them?

Facing the opening at the end of the alley, air burst from my chest while I waited. The soft rumbling of an engine eased its way into the alley, opposite the dumpster.

I held my breath. No matter who it was, I didn’t want to be found. And if they didn’t hear me, they wouldn’t see me.

A door slammed but the engine stayed alive.

“Make this easy for yourself, boy. You deserve it! Just like Jester and the kids. You need this!” Her harsh, light voice echoed, sending a shiver down my back.

Fuck, I thought. Who the hell is Jester? And the kids? I didn’t ask or give a shit. I wanted her to go away and I needed to wake up to find Lance snoring in Mom’s recliner with spilled popcorn in his lap. I probably fell asleep at my keyboard with my game still going, allowing it to plant runaway cars and gunshots in my mind. That’s all. Wake up, asshole.

“You little mother fuckers dented my car!” A hint of desperation riddled her tone. “You thought I’d let you get away! Not anymore! Not today. No more fucking me over,” she blubbered. “All I’ve done for them. The sacrifices I’ve made. The time I’ve invested to give them what they needed. No more! I need this. I deserve this!”

“She’s mental,” I mouthed. Guilt bloomed inside me, tightening my chest.

“Come out and make this easy,” she said. “I deserve it, dammit!”

I said nothing. I cupped my mouth and felt my staggering heartbeat.

A door screeched when it opened somewhere up the alley. “Is everything all right back here?” A deep voice. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” the man said. “Please drop the gun.”

“I’ve had enough of people telling me what to do and what they want from me! What about what I want?” Karen sobbed. “What about me?”

“I can give you what you want,” he said. “But you have to drop the gun first.”

“You can’t give me what I want!”

“Ma’am, please. You’re not making any sense. Just drop the gun.”

“No! Not until I get him.”

“Ma’am?”

“Don’t come any closer,” she yelled.

“I won’t. I just need you to tell me what’s going on. I want to help you.”

“You can’t help me. It’s too late. J—Jester took everything! The kids. My house! Everything’s gone. I’m left with nothing. Just this fucking van and a sad-ass apartment. Why? Huh? I don’t deserve this.”

“Ma’am, Jester’s not—”

“Don’t you dare say his name! Don’t you dare.” She grunted. “He took everything from me! My life. My youth! And for what? For her!”

“Ma’am, please tell me what I can do to make you drop the gun. There are kids in this building. Good people. You’re scaring them and they’ll call the cops unless you give me the gun.”

“I want the boy,” she said.

“What boy? There’s no one here.”

“The boy behi—"

She shrieked and cried, “Let me go!” Feet shuffled and groans sounded.

“Give me—the gun you—crazy bitch!” he said. 

“Get off me!” Karen yelled.

Eyes wide, I peeped past the edge of the dumpster. A tanned slender man tussled with Karen, jutting her arms up, aiming the barrel at the clouds.

I pushed myself up and took off in the opposite direction.

“He’s getting away!” she said.

The man yelped and the gun went off. I hopped and skipped, expecting a bullet to strike my flesh. Bullets ricocheted off the brick buildings as I zig-zagged from one side to the other. I ducked low wherever there was a dumpster and crouched behind a stained mattress.

The shots stopped before I made it to the end. While I turned on Berkley Street, I glimpsed the mess behind me. My would-be hero lay in the middle of the alley. Karen’s van door slammed, and her tires cried out as the minivan took off after me.

I tore up the pavement, spitting heavy breaths and beating the sidewalk with my sneakers.

I went for the yard to my left and ran up the driveway that ended in the backyard. I sucked down sobs and lurked through tall grass, overturned yard toys, and an old vintage car that vines and weeds grew into. It was damn near impossible to spot the rusting bars on the screen door behind the overgrown yard.

I knocked.

“Come on. Come on,” I muttered. No matter how much my legs wanted, I knew running home wasn’t the best choice. If Karen was as sick as she sounded, she wasn’t letting me go alive. That strange woman would kill me on sight. I needed to get off the streets.

I struck the metal screen. “Hello?” I yelled.

I put an ear to the door. A soft breeze fell through the house on the other side.

“Hello!” I said, slamming my hand onto the screen. “Please, you gotta help me,” I cried. “I need a phone!”

I listened, this time, sucking back desperate gasps.

A crackling engine nearby. The motor seized and a car door slammed. Feet crushed foliage, inching their way across the rubble of the decrepit driveway. Metal on metal clanked hard as someone fiddled around on their way back.

I crouched behind a shrub near the back door. I knew that sound. If playing Lance on Vice Gods taught me anything, it was the importance of a reloaded weapon.

I peered at the backyard entrance.

Magnum leading the way, Karen slouched and stepped with careful feet. She jerked and looked left and right. Nostrils flared, she moved overgrown grass with her feet as she headed for the old car. She snatched vines and weeds, freeing the car from rouge greenery.

Her back to me, I braced myself against the house, staying under its shadow. I scaled alongside it, headed the opposite way I’d come in. Whenever my feet crushed dead leaves, I tensed and watched. Karen was too busy clearing the car, making her own ruckus with the unkempt yard. The door creaked when she snatched it open and stuck her head inside.

She screamed. The blast from her gun sent a family of raccoons spilling out around her. She stepped back and waved her arms around as if a colony of bees swarmed her.

I couldn’t skip the chance.

I shot up from the shrubs and booked it around the house.

A tall wooden fence separated me from the street. My chest imploded with the heavy blow. Karen’s fast footsteps drew close as she kicked a Lil Tike’s mini-van and tripped over a deflated beach ball.

“No. No. No,” I said. With a running start, I climbed the fence. Bullets chopped wood, missing my feet and arms.

Perched on top of the fence, I wailed as a hot, stinging pang stunned my shoulder. The pain knocked me loose and pushed me into a face plowing fall. I hurried to my knees and ran a hand over my shoulder. Blood soaked my fingers and ran down my numbing arm. I pushed myself from the browning grass and hustled to my feet. I ran while using my hand as a bandage.

“Help!” I screamed. I’m not sure if anyone heard me. If they’d seen the madwoman with a magnum, they probably closed curtains, called the police, or hid until she and the kid she’d been chasing left the block.

Still, I searched the houses with pleading eyes, scanning over windows and doors.

The block could’ve been dead.

When I made it to the corner, the minivan’s engine wailed. I didn’t stop to look, not for a second. I crossed the street and ran up a block. My heart lurched when I read the street sign facing me: Petoskey Ave. Home. I was home. I ran faster than a running back to the end zone, counting down the houses before I ended up next to mine. Revving and hungry, the minivan fishtailed at the corner failing to pick up speed. The engine clicked and clacked under the impelled hood.

I crossed Ms. Monica’s yard and cleared the wooden fence with one arm, propelling myself several feet into our cemented yard. My skin ripped as I skidded on my shoulder.

“Ah, shit!” I had a feeling I would lose an arm before this was over. The damn thing was about ready to lop off.

I crawled to my feet and raced for Mom’s wine patio; the only unlocked door. Though risky, I praised Mom for her overbearing, worrisome ways. She’d leave the door unlocked for me and Belle just in case we were running from a stray dog or a deranged serial killing psychopath.

The van reduced the fence to wood chips.

I ran inside, slammed the door, and locked it.

“Mom! Belle!” I called out, searching the next room.

Tidy and put away. I sighed, relieved, as I went for the note on the fridge.

Tried calling and texting, but you didn’t respond. Be back soon. Don’t burn the place down.

Love, Mom.

Well…

Karen tore down the fence and was probably creeping around the backyard, but the brick walls would be enough to stop her. She’d fuck off eventually because no matter what, she wasn’t getting in.

She couldn’t get in.

Right?

I ran upstairs, burst into my room, and eyed the space. I didn’t have my phone and we didn’t have a landline. But I had Discord on my computer. I used it daily to talk shit on the live stream, troll, and piss people off across the globe. There had to be a way to reach the police with it. Or reach someone who’d call the police for me. I clawed through crumpled candy bar wrappers, pizza boxes, and dirty boxers.

“Come on!” I yelled. I knew my headphones were there somewhere. I had them the night before. I knew I did. I snatched up a pair of jeans. I tossed a t-shirt over to the bed. Where—

My body shuddered. Banging against the back door. My breath caught in my throat when the door smacked the wall.

She was inside.

My sneakers caught ahold of stray clothes as I lodged myself under my bed and listened to my heartbeat.

“I know you’re in here, bitch! How many people have to die before you come and get what you deserve?” Karen’s muffled voice from below.

I held my breath. This was it. She’d find me and shoot me. Even worse, she’d probably wait for my family to show up and kill them too. We’d end up a bloody stain in our family’s history.

And it’s all because I needed to make a video. To go viral. To become a rich kid.

I shook my head.

They’d die because of me. People have died because of me. Lance is gone because of…

No. Not like this. I couldn’t have Mom and Belle come home to more than finding out that Lance was dead. I had to do something. I needed to get to Ms. Monica’s and call Mom and the police.

I pulled myself out from under my bed and crawled for the door. I stopped and listened. Bumps and crashes shook the house from below.

I opened the door enough to crawl out into the hallway.

My palms pressed against the carpet as I approached the stairs. I grimaced whenever I forgot to leave the weight off my bummed arm, which quivered with stinging spasms. I put my back against the wall when she rushed past, headed for the kitchen.

I looked down. The front door sat at the foot of the steps in the hallway.

I was better off darting for the exit. She was going to shoot either way. Why make it easy for her?

I took a deep breath, rose, and raced down the steps.

Karen growled and charged while aiming up the hallway.

A bullet hit the stair post and wall before I grabbed the doorknob and yanked it open.

Karen let off another shot, catching the column on the porch. I tripped on my foot and stumbled down the steps. I grabbed the rail and pulled myself to my feet and ran. I ran until I stopped short. Agony sank my heart. Ms. Monica’s car wasn’t home.

Karen came out, aimed at me, and let off another shot.

I ran up the driveway, headed for the Molson’s, the family who lived across the alley. But Karen hopped off the porch and went to reload her gun again.

I squeezed past the van that was lodged into my gate, then paused. The thing was still running. I looked down the driveway. Karen tussled with her gun, dropping bullets as she sobbed, trying to refill her weapon.

I opened the van door and took the driver's seat. I peered around. It was much different from Mom’s Buick. But, according to her, all cars worked the same. I put the thing in reverse and stomped the accelerator pedal. The tires shrieked as the van took off. Karen turned to run, but the van mowed her down before she could make it out from between the houses.

Her body thumped underneath as if I rode over a cluster of boulders. Her body lay still once the front tires backed over her. I stomped on the brakes and watched. She didn’t move. Her mouth gaped, allowing blood to run free and flow down the driveway. I trembled and gasped as I put the thing in park. I laid my head on the steering wheel. My limbs shook and shoulder ached. I closed my eyes. Lance’s body rested behind my eyelids: unmoving and bleeding out at the skull. I forced my eyes open and stared at my lap. I’d seen enough blood and damage for a lifetime. No amount of Vice Gods could prepare anyone for this.

I peered back at Karen. Tire marks crossed her body and her face froze in a petrified, twisted glance.

Sirens blurted their traumatic call as tires scratched the road.

But I stayed put.

There was a small silence before banging and footfalls evaded the driveway.

“We gotta body!” a woman called out.

I wanted to cry out, beg for help. But what if Karen sprouted up? I know it sounds crazy, but if she proved anything, it’s invincibility. It was like my breaths were a beacon for her, guiding her straight for me. I stayed in the van; eyes trained on her.

Then the door flung out, introducing the barrel of a pistol to my face.

“I found the boy,” the cop called out. She holstered her pistol. “It’s all right. You’ll be fine.”

Slowly, I faced her, meeting the concern in her hazel eyes. Then I leaped up and buried my face into her chest. Her Kevlar vest was hard against my nose. “La—Lance is dead,” I cried.

“Get a medic over here, now,” she commanded. “Are you hurt?” she asked.

“Lance and the nurse and the man from the alley, they’re all dead because of me,” I sobbed.

“Come on, sweetie. Let’s get you to the ambulance so they can help you,” she said, pulling me away from the van and leading me down the driveway. She nearly carried me as I put my good arm over her shoulder and limped on my knee.

I wailed, “This is all my fault.”

The cop shushed me as we approached the ambulance. They helped me onto a stretcher and hoisted it up on wheels.

“Looks like a gunshot wound,” a man said. 

“Son, where are your parents?” the police officer asked. 

I looked up at the officer and dread ripped through me, crumbling my face.

“Yeah, he’s on his way to St. Johns.” I turned my head to find Ms. Monica standing outside her SUV and talking on her phone. “No, no, don’t worry, I’ll go with him and meet you there. All right.” She smiled at me as she inched over.

“No! No! Get her away from me!” I screamed. It was like staring into the face of a demon. Jolted by fear, I went to turn on my side and howled when my shoulder writhed in pain.

The medics pinned me on my back and strapped my wrists down before putting a mask over my nose.

“No!” I protested. “No. No…pl…ease…”

Ms. Monica’s discerning glare faded to black as I drifted off, plastering her face in my memory.

Karen is the first story in my short story collection Trinity of Horror: Macabre Tales Vol. 2. Get it on Amazon today.

Get the short story collection from your store: https://books2read.com/u/31KGra

On Amazon: mybook.to/deadlysummerdayppb

Or the Kyrobooks store: https://www.kyrobooks.com/bookstore/trinity-of-horror-macabre-tales-vol-2-a-deadly-summer-day