Chapter Four: Collin

Collin is heartbroken and a woman named Shelley lives with a volatile man she is terrified of.

 

                           

 

 

 

CHAPTER FOUR

COLLIN

( I )

            Collin felt like his world was ending. His girlfriend, Sheila, had looked him in the eyes last night and told him that she thought they shouldn’t see each other anymore. Yes, he was only seventeen years old, and he would have other girlfriends, but it still hurt. He picked up the phone to call Brad and remembered that he had gone out last night. He was supposed to have gone with him but Sheila had called and told him that they needed to talk. That was his first clue that whatever it was it wasn’t going to be good. It was never good when a girl told you that you needed to talk. Collin hung up the phone and went out onto the back porch for a moment to see what the weather was like. He shuddered and crossed his arms over his chest as the wind blew. It was chilly out this morning. He went back in the house and grabbed his jacket. He thought about whether or not he should give Brad a call anyway, and decided against it before heading out.

            He walked about a mile out of town on Main Street before cutting off into the woods. There was a path through the woods that would take him all the way to his destination. Right before he cut off into the woods, he saw The Gate, off in the distance in King’s field. Collin suddenly felt another chill that had nothing to do with the weather and zipped up his jacket as he headed into the woods. Minutes later he came out of the woods and into a small field that had a tiny hill at the end. When he reached the crest of the hill, he was on the stone walkway of the town’s dam. He looked out at the water that seemed to go on forever, but on a clear day he could see parts of Reagan that sat on the other side. Collin walked down the walkway and found the entrance that lead to the tunnels that ran through the dam itself. As he climbed down he thought about Sheila again. He could see her clear as day. Her long, brown, hair and beautiful blue eyes. He kept replaying their last conversation in his head.

 “Collin, I think we should see other people,” she said.

 “What do you mean?” He asked.

 “I mean that I like Chad McMasters and I want to date him now,” she replied.

 “Chad McMasters,” he repeated, trying to make it make sense.

Then before he could say anything else she had turned around and walked out. Collin had just stood there trying to grasp what was happening, but he just couldn’t get there.

            He walked on through the tunnels, the tunnels that he and Brad knew better than anyone else in town, probably even better than the people that had actually built the dam, and began to hear the cascading, deafening sound of a waterfall. The tunnel he was in ended with an opening on the actual dam face. Collin stood there and ran his hands through his shaggy, brown hair as he watched the water fall into the lake below, and wondered if someone could survive a fall from here. He stood there for another couple of minutes and decided that he was going to head to Brad’s house to see if he was home, and if he was sleeping that was just too damn bad.

( II )

            It was noon by time Collin found Brad. He had decided to check one of their other hang outs first, but there was no sign of him in the woods behind the middle school, so he stuck with his plan of going to his house. He cut through the front yard and went around to the back of the house. Brad’s mother was never home, and his father, before he died, had been a big CB radio buff, so he had put a huge antennae on the roof, but the framework for it ran all the way down to the ground. Doing like they had done hundreds of times before, Collin climbed the framework like a ladder to the roof of the back porch and then climbed in through Brad’s bedroom window, which was already open. Once he was inside he pulled the window shut behind him and waited.

            Not even ten minutes later the window slid open again, and this time it was Brad who crawled in. He slid it shut behind him as Collin had done, and headed towards his closet. He was taking off his shirt when Collin spoke.

 “Have fun last night?” He asked.

Brad jumped and turned around; his adrenaline was still a little ramped up from his cemetery adventure. He was relieved when he saw it was Collin sitting on the bed.

 “You scared the s**t out of me, what are you doing here?” Brad asked.

Collin got up off the bed and ran his hands through his hair, ignoring Brad’s question.

 “I have a bad night man,” Collin said.

 “Yeah, well I’m having a bad morning,” Brad replied.

 “What happened? Did the caretaker chase you out of there again?” Collin asked.

 “No, I was up there drinking last night, thanks for showing up by the way, when all of the sudden I see headlights. So, thinking that it was the police I laid down on the ground so I wouldn’t be seen and in my infinite wisdom I fell asleep,” Brad replied.

He left out the part about the footsteps in the house this morning; he didn’t want Collin thinking that he believed the stories about that house.

 “So what happened to you last night?” Brad asked, changing the subject.

 “Sheila broke up with me for Chad McMasters,” Collin replied.

 “Dude that is messed up” Brad replied.

 “Don’t I know it,” Collin said and sat back down on the bed.

Brad finished changing his clothes, still thinking about the cemetery. Now that he was safe at home he realized that the footsteps he heard in the house probably belonged to the owner of the car that was parked around back. Either way he was glad to be out of there.

( III )

            Shelley got up and early and made sure that breakfast was done. Joe didn’t like waking up to no breakfast in the morning. He said an empty stomach messed with his nerves and gave him intense stomach cramps which usually sent him into fits of violence. The truth was that he was just a violent man who enjoyed his alcohol, plain and simple. She had forgot breakfast once before, and he had given her a black eye and a split lip for her forgetfulness, and she wasn’t going to give him a reason to do it again. Even though he didn’t really need a reason, he hit when he felt like hitting, that was also plain and simple. A few minutes later Joe pulled himself out of bed and came out into the living room of their little trailer.

 “Breakfast is ready,” Shelley said.

He came into the kitchen and sat down. She went about cleaning up the trailer while he started to eat.

 “Come sit down with me,” Joe said sweetly.

He was in a good mood this morning. That didn’t usually happen after a night of drinking, and she knew he had been because she could smell it coming off of him. The trailer really did need cleaned, but she went to the table and sat down anyway. He leaned over and gave her a peck on the cheek. Yes, he was in a good mood this morning, and she wasn’t going to ruin it for anything.

 

Author's Note

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