The Understorey, Book One of The Leaving Series

  Jules took forever to pick out music. She said there was an art to choosing the correct songs, to provide diverse choices that would suit any mood. I had to admit she was pretty good at it.

  “Should we ditch today and stay here?” She asked. “I bet we could get a lot more done if we did.”

  “Whoa! We just got stow away privileges and you already want to rock the boat? Any minute now we could capsize and never make our destination.”

  “You’re right,” she sagged with a sigh. “Let’s get to school.”

  “Aye, aye, cap’n!” I said with a salute.

  That day was a B day and I’d only have fourth period Chemistry with her. I didn’t get to see her that morning but at least we got to eat lunch together and I was able to finish the day with her.

  The hours ticked by so slowly but I absorbed the little information I didn’t already know in Economics and Algebra and ran to the cafeteria to see my Jules. I saw her sitting at our usual table but didn’t see what I had imagined all morning. She had her arms folded across her stomach as if in pain and a look of panic strewn about her perfect face. I instantly ran to her and pleaded to know what was wrong.

  “Jules! What happened?”

  The tears were just beginning to flow. I guess they had unconsciously been waiting for me. They knew how much I hated them. They were a sign of pain in Jules and that was unacceptable to me. She tried to speak but couldn’t and instead just handed me, with trembling hands, a folded piece of notebook paper torn from a binder. It was a printed note and read,

  Julia, you’ve got something that I want and I’m determined to make it mine. I think you know what I mean. Watch yourself.

  My hands tremored and the paper shook furiously in my hands. I crumpled it up but the frustration didn’t subside as I’d hoped. I needed to find Jesse and immediately. I stared out across the cafeteria.

  “I’m going to find Jesse,” I said as calmly as I possibly could.

  I began to stand but she pulled me back to my chair.

  “No, babe, please. Have you considered that it might be from Taylor?” She asked.

  I hadn’t thought of that but I guess I could see how it could also make sense. Both people made sense as its author but Jesse was the outright psycho, not to mention the unveiled threats, not that Jules knew about those. Jesse was the only one who could have done it, in my book.

  “Damn it!” I said a little too loudly.

  Jules stroked my arm to calm me down but it wasn’t helping. I could tell that she was scared because her fingers shook and she was nearly screaming it through our touch.

  “You know it’s going to be okay, right?” I asked her.

  “No,” she said.

  “Why would you think otherwise Jules?”

  “Because I know something you don’t,” she offered begrudgingly.

  “This better not make me want to kill someone,” I said honestly.

  “Never mind then,” she squeaked.

  “Just tell me Jules,” I clipped.

  “Well, I found it in my messenger bag this morning in class.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, it was early. No one was around. My messenger bag hadn’t been any place but in my room and your truck since last night and the note definitely wasn’t in there after school because I would have seen it when getting out my books to do my homework after dinner. No one could have had access to it unless............” She stopped.

  “Unless,” I said, picking up where she left off, “unless they had been in your house?”

  “Yes,” her lower lip trembled.

  “And it would have had to have been while you had been sleeping?”

  “Yes.”

  I shuddered.

  “We have to take this to the Principal. Now.”

  I grabbed her hand and our stuff and the note and practically dragged her down the hallway. Principal Rudolph’s office had never seemed so far before. Of course, when I was hauled down there after my fight with Jesse it was the shortest walk ever but now it was a million miles away. Go figure.

  I burst into secretary Millie’s office and demanded I speak with Principal Rudolph. Jules stood beside me, confident. It was a bit of a ruse. She was frightened and it was something only I could sense. She was a strong girl, stronger than anyone I knew, but this was beyond the both of us. It was too unbelievable to imagine.

  “Principal Rudolph is out today kids,” Millie said, her head buried in paperwork.

  “Will you tell her that we stopped by?” I asked.

  Without waiting for her response, I dragged Jules back to the cafeteria. She didn’t want to eat and I didn’t blame her. We sat at our table and agreed that we should act like the note we had found didn’t bother us in case someone was watching and by someone we meant one of Taylor’s cronies, since Taylor didn’t share this lunch with us and Jesse was gone. I wasn’t taking any chances. I grabbed Jules’ hand, leaned into her neck and breathed into her ear that I loved her.

  I blasted a concentrated amount of feeling through her throat and the heat relaxed her at once. The electricity that flowed between us was as powerful as a river’s.

  We discovered we could control the dosage, so to speak, but had to be careful because releasing too much made us sleepy as heck. It soothed us both to experience the exchange and was quite addicting.

  I craved it at night especially. It was when we were away from each other the longest and I found myself waking earlier and earlier each day just so I could touch her as quickly as possible to mollify the necessity for it.

  She audibly sighed in relief and that cleared my head a little. I was too preoccupied with her suffering to start analyzing the note and deciphering its real meaning. I was incredibly shocked at the brazenness of the culprit breaking into her house. I say culprit, I mean Jesse. He’s the only one I know who would do something so monumentally dangerous for his health. A week ago, it would have been beyond anything I thought he could do.

  As I held her hand, I studied my fingers desperate for an additional clue.

  “I think I’m gonna’ call my Uncle Danny,” I said.

  “You think it’s serious enough that we’d have to involve the police?”

  “Yeah, I think so, Jules. I mean what’s the harm in it really? My uncle is bored at the station anyway, this will give him something to do.”

  After school, Jules and I rode in silence to Danny’s station. I had the note in the back pocket of my jeans and could feel the searing heat of its intentions blistering down the back of my leg. As we rode, I kept Jules’ hand in mine for comfort and when we arrived my Uncle Danny came rushing out of the door. I’m guessing he saw us through the window.

  “Hey son!” He called out.

  “Hey Danny!” I said, closing the creaky driver’s side door.

  I pulled my jacket closer to my body to keep the winter air from chilling me any further than my daunted bones already ached.

  “Well Jules, every time I see you, you just get prettier and prettier,” he said before turning to me. “You’re gonna’ have to break ‘em off with a stick Elliott!”

  “That’s actually kind of why we’re here Danny,” I said.

  His eyes turned serious.

  “What’s goin’ on?” He asked, furrowing his brow.

  Uncle Danny was no longer there. We were now speaking to officer Danny.

  “Well,” I said, pulling the flaming note from my pocket and handing it to him, “Jules found this note in her messenger bag this morning.”

  He unfolded the note and read its words, then looked at us in silence.

  I continued, “And basically, it’s not something we’d have wanted to involve the police in but we think the person who put it there had broken into Jules’ bedroom to do it.”

  “Wait. Wait, now. You said it was in her messenger bag. It could have been any of the kids at school. This could very easily be a joke.”

  “Well, unfortunately we’ve run into a few issues with some peopl
e at school so we know it’s not a joke. Also, I thought it had to have been put into the pack this morning but Jules said the messenger bag hadn’t been near anyone at all that morning except herself and myself, that it hadn’t been in there last night when she was doing her homework and when she found it this morning she knew the only way it could have gotten there was some time while she was sleeping.”

  He sat for awhile and deliberated what his next steps would be.

  “Chances are it’s just mean teenager crap but I’ll follow up on it either way. I better call Principal Rudolph at her home and just fill her in. Who are these people giving you trouble Elliott?”

  He looked at me suspiciously but decided I wasn’t the type he’d easily associate with trouble.

  “Uh, Jesse Thomas,” I said reluctantly.

  “Jesse Thomas? Your best friend Jesse Thomas?”

  “Ex-best friend,” I corrected.

  “But it could also be Taylor Williams. She hates me too. We’re just not sure which one,” Jules laughed nervously.

  “Okay,” he said shaking his head, rubbing chin stubble between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ll be right back.”

  Jules and I heaved ourselves onto the hood of my truck. The heat from the engine was a comfort. I made sure she sat closely so our skin would stay in contact and it’d keep me calm. It was freezing but neither of us made an attempt to go inside because our contact kept us a balmy ninety-eight point six, maybe warmer. I don’t think we wanted to hear the conversation he was having either. We remained silent, keeping a conversation within ourselves.

  I tried extremely hard not to imagine Jesse sneaking into Jules’ room, slithering his way around, going through her stuff. I also tried not to think about all the different ways I’d kill him when I found out for sure that it was him. I tried not to think about what I was going to say to him at school the next day as well. I did think about avoiding him altogether and skipping school but I had to see for myself the way he acted around me, around us. I knew him well enough to recognize when he was acting shady, though Jesse 2.0 might be a little harder to decipher.

  Jules squeezed my hand tightly into hers to ease my restlessness. She was reading me. It worked. I closed my eyes and let the sleepy current soften my rigid torso. I took a deep breath through my nose and nearly drowned from the heavenly delirium that was Jules’ perfume. I fought past that and could smell dark smoke, most likely from a couple miles ahead of us at the Miller’s house. They always started burning old wood from the prior winter seasons first and I could smell the burning of dormant kindling.

  I looked up and saw my Uncle Danny hanging up the phone. He swung his coat over his shoulders and stomped his heavy boots across the old wood floor of the station and out onto the little covered porch.

  “I’ve let the Principal know. She promised to keep an eye on things. I’ve decide it’d be a good idea if we took a ride over to the Jacobs’ residence and search around the property for any signs of forced entry.” He paused and stared at our distressed faces, “I’m sure it’s not a big deal kids. I’m just taking the necessary precautions.”

  Danny came close and patted me on the shoulder. His kind words did nothing to alleviate my fears and I was positive it didn’t help Jules either. We knew Jesse and Taylor and either one of them was capable of jumping the line of rationality, we’d seen it with our own eyes, but we never thought it could come to this. My money was still on Jesse though.

  Jules and I jumped into my truck and followed Danny to the Jacobs’ house, again, as quiet as before. When we arrived, Danny walked us around Jules’ house and asked her where her window was. She pointed at the windows that belonged to her room and Danny moved in closely to the one at the back of the house.

  “I see no signs of entry here, let’s check the other window at the side of the house,” he said.

  We rounded the corner and saw one of the most painfully terrifying things I’d ever seen. Two sets of old foot prints, barely visible in the snow leading from the brush to the side of the house and back. The prints were so faded I had no idea how large they actually were and therefore unable to figure out whether it was Taylor’s or Jesse’s prints, or both. Did Jesse come to the window twice or once with an accomplice?

  Against the wall laid two cinder blocks, one right next to the other, the longer sides parallel with the side of the house. When we looked closely at the window the paint had been freshly scratched where the intruder had pried open the bottom of the ancient window, probably with a crowbar from the width of the scratch. I watched Jules start to lose it a little bit so I grabbed her and held her steadily against my side.

  “Strange,” said Danny.

  “What is?” I asked.

  “Well, I’m sort of flabbergasted as to how Julia didn’t hear the wood of the window cracking or the intruder?”

  Jules blushed slightly and scrunched her nose.

  “I’m an extremely heavy sleeper,” she admitted.

  “Ahhh,” he said. “Well, whoever it was that actually entered couldn’t have been that tall. These windows aren’t very far from the ground. They needed cinder blocks to see or get inside.”

  He pointed at the blocks against the house.

  Taylor then?

  “Okay,” Danny said, “I’m going to call Julia’s parents and let them know what’s going on. Maybe they can stop by a home improvement store and get some additional locking mechanisms for the windows. Be right back.”

  He left us there staring at the creepiness that was the intruder’s handiwork.

  “She’s insane,” Jules said, her voice shaking.

  “Or they’re insane. There’s something else that’s bothering me.”

  “What’s that?” Jules asked.

  “Well, who would risk getting caught boldly waltzing into your room at night? They must have known that you were a heavy sleeper, but nobody but myself and your family would know something like that.........unless you’ve told someone else? Do you remember talking about it at school with anyone?”

  The blood drained from her face and she nodded, keeping her eyes steady with mine.

  “Don’t you remember?” She asked. “We did, with each other, in front of Jesse. When we came back to school after Tanen’s party fiasco, you were talking about the night and broke off to tease me about that fact that I could sleep through a hurricane. Later,” she trembled, “we were all hanging out at Thatcher’s. When Jesse thought you weren’t looking, he poked me in the ribs and told me that if I wasn’t careful he’d come in while I was asleep and rearrange my furniture.

  “I thought he was just messing with me, trying to get a rise out of me as usual, like he got some sort of sick pleasure out of scaring me. In the past, I’d always felt you were kind of harsh on him about me and the few times I would let you in on the stupid things he’d say to me, you’d scold him and he would just take it out on me later. That’s why I kept it from you. It’s why I’ve kept a lot of weird things he’s done from you.”

  “It’s okay Jules,” were all the words I could rally up.

  So it was a joint effort. I gritted my teeth and tried to hold back what I was thinking, but couldn’t.

  “He’s crazy! The both are!” I said.

  “This whole thing is going to be squashed tomorrow and I’m going to be the one who does it!” she exclaimed, her eyebrows furrowing at the last bit.

  “You can’t Jules!”

  “Why?”

  “Because we need to ignore this behavior, whatever their motives are, and pretend like we have barely taken notice of them or their note.”

  “So from here on we just pretend they haven’t scared the crap out of us?”

  “Yes,” I said, not really certain if that was the best route to take. “I think it’s the best thing to do, for now, at least.”

  “Alright Elliott, if you think that’s best..........but if things take even the slightest turn for the worse, I’m taking charge.”

  “And I’ll be right ther
e beside you.”

  My Uncle Danny came back around and let us know that Jules’ parents didn’t take things well. They wanted to take Jules out of the school immediately but Danny had talked them into taking it easy and waiting to see how things turned out.

  They reluctantly agreed and the next day we returned to school and acted as unbothered as we possibly could, albeit slightly more touchy-feely than usual, which was already borderline obscene. Jules held on tightly to me every second she could, said that it made her feel safer. I sort of liked that bit. If Jules felt more comfortable touching me, that suited me just fine. I witnessed Jesse and Taylor squirm a little bit at the sight of it, but this time it didn’t give me the satisfaction that it normally did.

  I wasn’t one hundred percent certain Taylor was involved or not. I studied her reaction to see if it still fell under her normal crazy self but couldn’t tell. If I was a betting man though, I’d probably put all my chips on the both of them. I felt an uncontrollable rage to hurt Jesse, well both of them really, but luckily for them, Jules was the deterrent.

  We reached the Friday before Thanksgiving break without incident and Jules and I felt a lot better about the note by then. We figured it was just a onetime thing since the entire school, its staff and the police knew the details. We felt confident that Jesse would stifle any plans for future pranks.

  Early the next morning, I sat around my kitchen table and chatted with my mom while I waited for Jules’ parents to pick me up.

  “So I talked to Danny last night,” she said.

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Yeah, he thought like we did. That whoever did this thing is done.”

  They didn’t want to point fingers at Jesse and Taylor. My mom especially didn’t believe it was Jesse. He did a spot on impression of Eddie Haskell with her, if you catch my drift. I didn’t argue with any of them. I knew the truth and thought that as long as they were quiet, there would be no need to taint any smallish reputation of being decent they still had, despite the fact that it hung by a thread. Their razor sharp indecencies would cut those on their own. I’ve found it’s always better for people to discover things like that without my help. I’ve found that when I did help things along, the shock would lose its potency and water down the needed reaction.