Smoke and Mirrors

71

Raymond Gee had bought the three-bedroom house as an investment, and he made his son, Alan, work on it like a slave all that summer, only paying him twenty bucks a day for ten hours or more of hard labor. All that was left was to sand and paint the Sheetrock, which would take another couple of weeks. The central heating was hooked up, as was the plumbing. Raymond Gee owned seven rental houses and was always telling his son that by the time he retired, the houses would be paid for and the rent checks they generated, after legitimate expenses, would pay him more than he made as a salesman at Gates Tires in Batesville.

Since Alan had a key, he and his best friend, Buddy Graham, had been hanging out in the house’s basement. They would smoke cigarettes, drink a beer or two, and party with Amy Buckley when she could sneak out and come there with them. While she was only fourteen to their sixteen, she was built like an eighteen-year-old, and she loved to get high. In exchange for a few hits on a pipe and their sworn promises not to ever tell anybody, she would take off her shirt and let the boys look at her breasts as long as they didn’t touch them. She enjoyed watching them masturbate to the sight of her boobs. Although this had only happened twice in two months, they were getting worried. The house would soon be ready to rent and, once it was, they’d be without a clubhouse for their tit-peeking jerk-off sessions.

The boys knew that the neighbors were accustomed to Alan working inside the house, and since he parked his Ford Fiesta there all the time, they paid no particular attention to when the young boy’s car arrived or left the property. They were smart enough not to let other kids hang out or party in the house, as it would certainly have resulted in Raymond finding out and putting an end to the clubhouse, not to mention Amy’s intoxicating generosity.

When Alan put his key into the lock and turned it, there was no resistance.

“Damn, it isn’t locked,” Alan said, locking and unlocking the dead bolt twice, testing it. “If I forgot, and any tools got ripped off, my dad’s going to freak out.”

“Maybe your dad was here and he didn’t lock it. Sounds like there’s water running,” Buddy said. “Is the shower on?”

“Maybe a pipe busted,” Alan said. “Shit!” Alan rushed to the bathroom door. “My dad’s gonna freak out.”

When Alan opened the door and saw what was in the bathtub, he screamed, slammed the door, and ran from the house, Buddy hot on his heels.