Final Assignment

Eight

I stopped out front of the Blakelock house just as two people were heading up the driveway. A boy and a girl. The boy was about five foot six and maybe, soaking wet, a hundred pounds. He had black hair swept across his head that obscured his forehead and most of one eye, and wore a simple white T and a pair of black pants with sneakers.

The girl looked big next to him, although she was probably no more than five-nine, maybe a hundred and fifty pounds. Her blonde hair was streaked pink and fell to below her shoulders.

‘That’s Joel and his older sister,’ Lucy said. ‘I can’t remember her name.’

The pair stopped and turned when they heard the car stop, and the passenger door open.

‘Joel,’ said Lucy.

The boy’s expression was blank, as though he didn’t even see her. The girl edged in front of him, as though running interference.

‘It’s me,’ she said. ‘Ms Brighton, from school.’

‘I know who you are,’ he said.

‘And you’re Joel’s sister, right? What’s your name?’

‘Franny,’ she said. ‘What do you want?’

I was slowly getting out the driver’s side. Franny fixed her eyes on me and said, ‘Who’s that guy?’

‘That’s Mr Weaver,’ Lucy said. ‘Joel, we need to speak to you for a minute. Are your parents home? Or at least one of them?’

‘What’s this about?’ Joel said, half behind his sister.

‘We’ve got a couple of questions.’

‘Is it about Michael Vaughn?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Did you want to know if I was happy about him being dead?’

‘So you know.’

He held up his phone, which up to now I had not realized was in his hand. ‘Everybody’s talking about it. Someone even asked if I did it.’

‘God,’ Franny said. ‘People are just sick.’

‘Is that what you wanted to know? If I did it?’

‘No, Joel,’ Lucy said. ‘But there is something we need to talk about.’

‘Who’s that guy?’

‘Mr Weaver.’

‘Yeah, you said that, but who is he?’

Coming around the front of the car, I said, ‘I’m a private investigator.’

‘No shit?’ said Franny.

‘No shit,’ I said.

Lucy briefly shot me a look. ‘Is your mother home, Joel?’

‘Probably,’ he said. He nodded toward the blue minivan next to him in the driveway. ‘Her car’s here.’

Franny and Joel continued on to the front door and we followed. Joel didn’t get out a key, went straight in, followed by his sister.

Lucy put out her arm to stop me. ‘We’ll wait here.’

Like I was going to go barge in like I was part of a SWAT team. ‘Sure.’

About twenty seconds later, a woman came to the door. Late forties, round, hair so short it could have been a man’s military cut.

‘Yes?’ she said, and then, when she focused on Lucy, ‘Oh, hi.’

‘Hello, Ms Blakelock. This is Cal Weaver, who’s assisting me this afternoon. I need to ask Joel some questions, and I’d prefer it if you were able to be there.’

‘What’s this about? Is he in some kind of trouble?’

‘May we?’ she said, asking to be invited inside.

We were led into the kitchen, where Joel was already seated and waiting, a can of Coke in front of him.

‘What’s this about?’ his mother asked.

Joel shrugged. ‘I dunno. But I bet somehow it’s about Mike Vaughn.’

‘What’s that horrible boy done now?’ Ms Blakelock asked, her voice turning venomous.

Lucy said, ‘He’s dead.’

She whirled around. ‘What?’

Joel waved his phone. ‘It’s all over the place.’

‘Oh my God,’ Joel’s mother said.

Lucy, maybe seeking to make this meeting less confrontational, addressed her by her first name. ‘Alice, let’s sit down.’

We all sat, except for Franny, who had reappeared and was leaning in the doorway to the kitchen, taking it all in. I wasn’t going to ask her to leave. It wasn’t up to me.

Lucy rested her arms on the table and laced her fingers together. ‘Joel, I have something very simple to ask you.’

But he was looking at me, then at his mother. ‘You know what this guy is, huh, Mom?’

Alice Blakelock fixed her eyes on me. ‘What?’

‘He’s a cop.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m private.’

‘So this must be about Mike, right?’

‘His family called me when he didn’t come home,’ I admitted. ‘I was at Michael’s house, hoping to get a lead on where he was, when the police showed up.’

‘I know it’s bad to speak ill of the dead, but he was an awful boy,’ Alice said bitterly. ‘Him and that Chandler. What a pair. Do you know what they did?’

‘I do,’ I said. ‘But right now, Ms Brighton and I are here about something very specific that may or may not be related to what happened to Mike.’

Franny shifted from one side of the doorway to the other, folded her arms across her chest.

‘The suspense is killing me,’ Joel said.

Lucy took a breath. I decided to let her take the lead. ‘Joel,’ she said gently, ‘Chandler handed in a short story this week to Ms Hamlin that got her very concerned.’

I watched Joel’s face to see how he’d react. I wasn’t expecting a grin.

‘Don’t you mean surprised?’ he said.

‘Why do you say that?’ Lucy asked.

‘Well, the fact that he handed in anything must have been kind of a shock.’ He looked at his mother and smiled, as though expecting some sign of approval for the comeback.

‘I take your point,’ Lucy said. ‘So you’re aware that Chandler doesn’t always hand in assignments?’

‘Oh, I think everyone’s aware,’ Joel said.

‘What surprised me,’ Lucy said, ‘was that you might show any willingness to help him.’

Instant bafflement. ‘Huh?’ he said.

‘Chandler says you wrote the story for him.’

His jaw dropped. But it was Alice who spoke first. ‘Are you kidding me? What a lying little son of a bitch.’

‘Wow,’ said Franny. ‘Like he didn’t cause enough trouble for Joel. What a fucking douche.’

Alice shot her daughter a look. ‘I won’t have that.’

‘Well that’s what he is,’ Joel’s sister said. ‘He’s like the world’s biggest liar.’

Finally Joel weighed in. ‘Why would he say something like that?’

I said, ‘We were given the impression that it was your way of mending fences. You offered to do an assignment for him, and in return, he and Mike would never bother or make fun of you again.’

‘That sounds like a protection racket,’ Alice said. ‘Like extortion.’

‘According to Chandler, it was Joel who made the offer,’ I said.

Joel shook his head angrily. ‘I wouldn’t sharpen a fucking pencil for either one of those assholes.’

Alice saw no reason to admonish her son for that.

Joel continued. ‘Not only did I not write a story for him, but I have never even spoken to the guy since he and Mike did what they did to me. I mean, we had to be in the same room together when they made their stupid apology, but even then I didn’t say anything to him.’

Lucy and I exchanged looks. ‘I guess we’re done here then,’ she said. She pushed back her chair, and I did the same. ‘Sorry to have troubled you,’ she said, her eyes sweeping the room to include not just Joel and his mother, but Franny too.

In the car, Lucy said to me, ‘What now?’

‘We go back and see if Chandler would like to amend his story,’ I said.