"A Final Confession"

“A Final Confession”

By Cody Williams

 

Mr. Edgar Whitehead

Ridgewood Nursing Home

107 Bronx Avenue

Betsy, Tennessee 37720

July 20, 2014

 

To Whom It May Concern:

 

My name is Edgar. Edgar Whitehead. I am 86 years old and I live in Ridgewood retirement home in the heart of Betsy, Tennessee. The doctors came into my room this morning and informed me that my time is running out. They said that they would be surprised if I lived another week.

My son moved me into this retirement home ten years ago and I’ve been rotting here ever since. The last time I saw my son was five years ago. You would think that I would be lonely. But that simply wasn’t the case. At least not until recently. When I first moved in here at the Ridgewood, I be in good company. The four guys I used to run around with as a kid and young adult lived here too.

There were five of us in all. We called ourselves the Big Five. Dirty Danny was the oldest and also our leader. But unlike many gang leaders, he wasn’t hated around the town. He was loved. Dan and myself along side our good friends Jimmy Heyse, Brock Holland, and Todd Belmont formed the Big Five. To many of the citizens of Betsy, we weren’t a gang at all. We could never do any wrong. But that wasn’t exactly the case. We were a gang. And we did something horrible. Too horrible to mention.

The year was 1944. I was 16 years old. Dan was 18. It was the day of annual Betsy Fair. The fair kicked off with a parade of the acts followed by a concert and fun night at the carnival. We’ve never had any interest in the hoopla of this stuff, but for some reason Dan really wanted to go. We didn’t think much about at the time. We went with Dan and stood right outside the Old General Store that had since been closed down, to watch the parade. The first float was Lindsey Carrington. She was the hottest woman country star fresh out of Nashville. She had gorgeous blonde hair that ran halfway down her back. Her body was slander and her fair skin was flawless. Her tits were nice and pikey. Yeah, I’d say that she was the most beautiful thing I had seen up to that point in my life.

Seated next to her was her seven-year-old daughter Becky. She too had long blonde hair and was wearing a blue and white-checkered dress that reached just past her kneecaps. Her feet were covered with ankle socks and shiny leather shoes. Dan looked around at us and smiled. We could always tell when he had an idea. He would always smile at us and he had that sparkle in his eye. We all smiled back at him. As the float drove farther and farther down the road, he motioned for us to follow him and we did.

The monument parked the parade floats down. We stood behind a row of shrubs as we watched Lindsey and her daughter leap out of the float. The Best parade always ended with the same type of concert show with some lame a*s C- country star headlining. But this year was different. It was Lindsey Carrington! She was the type of celebrity woman that a young man would love to hang a poster of her on the ceiling above his bed if he could find one. Lindsey grabbed her daughter by the hand and led her to the backstage area. Dan looked at us all again with this cheesy smile and then put his arms around us and pulled us into a tight circle.

“Get the girl!” He said to us simply. We all looked at each other in a puzzled way and then looked back at Dan. “Yeah! We’re going to go backstage and get the girl.” He repeated.

“What are you going to do with her Dan?” I asked him. “We’re just going to have some fun alright! Get the girl. And maybe we’ll be able to get an autograph from Lindsey!” He said. I know we shouldn’t have. I know that we should have known that something was wrong and in some ways we did. We ignored it. If there was one thing I learnt in my short friendship with Dan it is you don’t your back on him. The last time someone did that, they were found floating face first in the river just outside of town. And of course, he wasn’t even a suspect in the case. But we all knew. We all looked around once more and exchanged looks. We agreed.

Dan led us to the backstage area. We stopped and waited for Lindsey to enter the stage before we walked over to Becky.

“You sit right here Becky. Momma will be right back! Okay?” Lindsey said. Becky looked up into the sky and placed her little index finger on her chin as if she were deep in thought.

“Yep!” She said as she smiled sweetly.

“That’s a good girl!” Lindsey said. She bent down and kissed her on her forehead and then walked through the curtains to greet the roaring crowd.

“Come on!” Dan said as he nodded over towards the girl. We obeyed and walked over to the young girl.

“Hi there Becky!” Dan said as he placed his hands on his knees and bent over to put his face next to hers.

“Hi!” She replied shyly.

“Do you want to go out to the carnival and ride some rides?” Danny asked her.

“Mommy said I have to stay here!” She said as she clutched her teddy bear.

“Oh. I just talked to your mommy. She said that we could take you to ride rides if you wanted to.” She looked up into the air again as if she was in thought and then nodded. Danny grabbed her hand and led her out of the backstage area and we followed. We began making our way towards the woods behind the barn where the concert was being held. Becky looked up at Dan.

“Um, Mr.? Where are we going?” She asked him.

“We’re just taking a short cut sweaty. Just a short cut.” He said. I knew that wasn’t true. But I said nothing. I not quite sure why. Maybe it was out of fear. Perhaps I just didn’t want to believe it. But stayed quite. We got about fifteen minutes into the woods when Dan stopped. He looked around to make sure that nobody was there. I wish I could tell you that I didn’t know what he had in store for the young girl. I wish I could tell you that. But I couldn’t. There was some part that knew the whole time. Dan slapped her across her face and she fell to the ground.

“Dan! What are you doing?” I asked. He just glared at me. Dan reached down and ripped Becky’s dress and pulled her white panties to the side. Then he undid his fly.

“You little whorelette, you are going to take what I give you. You got that b***h?” Dan shouted. He grabbed her by the wrists and held her down. I don’t think I really have to tell what happened after that. I think you already know. That’s right, he raped her. When he finished he knew the little girl couldn’t live to tell what happened. He had all of this figured out. Dan reached into his pocket and pulled out a large kitchen knife and slid the blade across her throat. We just stared in shock of what we saw. Dan looked up at us and pointed towards a shovel that was leaning up against the tree across from him. We knew what he wanted us to do.

We berried her. So that nobody could find her. When Lindsey realized that her daughter was missing she searched high and low with no success. After about a month she accepted the fact that her daughter was gone. To my understanding she was staying in the motel down town when she put a bullet through her head.

Dan made it clear that could never tell anyone. And we didn’t. We grew apart but all buried that horrible tragedy that witnessed deep into our memories hoping that never surface. A couple of the boys went on to kill themselves. I guess living with that was too big of a burden. As for me, I got married and had a son. My wife died ten years ago from breast cancer. That’s when my son decided to move me into this goddamned place. Dan lived here for a while and up until last week, we were the only two left. Dan died of lung cancer. His last words to me were “Don’t tell anyone Edgar! Keep it buried!”

I just couldn’t do that. As I lay here waiting for whatever happens just before you see that blinding white light I thought I would tell what really happened. This is my final confession.

 

Edgar Whitehead

Copyright 2014 by Cody Williams

Courtesy of TRUE TERROR PUBLICATIONS

A division of TTP Entertainment

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Author's Note

I hope you all like it! Comments and reviews are welcome as always!

-CW

Reviews

[B-poet]

A cleverly written story. I liked the plot all throughout. Using a flashback was great way to introduce the setting of the story along with the lead character involved using a first person narrative. The fitting ending worked well with this story too. Great work Cody. An enjoyable read. :)

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading Bpoet!

-CW

[Nia Hope]

The plot itself was a bit different than usual but it was a good different :)

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading!

-CW

[Sharon Kim]

I admire your ability to jump into such a variety of characters and tell their story. This was well done and shocking.
I think you should add the word [On] the first float was Lindsey Carrington, otherwise it sounds like Lindsey was the float. ;)

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading Sharon! I'll make the correction.

-CW

[knapp darko]

good story, l really like the use of flashback. great climax. needs a little work on punctuation but that's easily done. good story

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading!

-CW

[Emily]

A very sad and shocking story but well written :)

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading Emily!

-CW

[J. K. Beach]

This one is certainly a shocker, but I'm sure that was intentional... The plot and the story were well conceived and executed. I especially liked the first person letter/confession as a way to tell the story. There are a few typos, even whole words left out, but that can all be cleaned up. The way you tell the story is usually the hard part, but you have done that very well. Great work!

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading JK!

-CW

[Ken]

Wow! I was amazed men! You really put up a very good climax out there. I was really shocked and amazed about what Dirty Dan did. It was just a heartbreak in my part. It was so dirty for Dan to do it. Keep up writing more stories men. I'm so going to read it all :)

-Ken

[Cody Williams]

Many thanks for your kind words Ken!

-CW

[Lyn Anderson]

Unsettling, but overall well done. A few things.
"The monument parked the parade floats down" -- not sure what you intended to say here.
Sweetie is spelled sweaty in one place. That whole paragraph prior to the description of Dan's crime, there are missing words and sentence fragments.
Buried is spelled "berried" in one place.
A good once over for spelling and grammar is necessary.

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading KL! I'll give it another read through.

-CW

[Dayran]

Nicely done Cody ... a great set up for the plot. Its possibly the worst any man does ... in the name of male integrity ... and the perceived sense of female stupidity ... at spoiling it for the men. Its revealing ... but much of it still remains hidden. A background on Edgar would have helped some .

[Cody Williams]

Thanks for reading Dayran!

-CW