happy place || jj maybank ON HOLD

chapter three

I gave up asking John where he was taking me after he ignored me asking about 20 times.

First he walked me back to the boneyard, and I was confused. But then he pulled out the keys to a Volkswagen van and started driving. I'm glad he decided to drive because it would've been a long walk, and I was starting to get tired since it was already midnight and I traveled all day.

After about a ten minute drive, we pulled up to a small house, which I recognized as the Routledge's.

John again didn't say anything, only got out of the car, opened my door and began pulling my arm again, leading me inside.

We entered a screened-porch area and I saw a boy sleeping on a couch.

John continues pulling me forward, the boy on the couch hears the porch door close and looks up as us, confused.

John pulled me inside the house and to my right, there's a girl asleep on a pullout couch. I furrow my eyebrows in confusion at all the random people asleep in his house.

John pulls me toward a room and opens the door, to find the blonde boy from earlier over top a girl.

"Dude! Come one, man. Get out of here." He speaks.

"Just a second, JJ" John speaks quietly, walking into the room, leaving me in the doorway. I make eye contact with JJ who gives me a look of disgust before I break eye contact at John's hand grabbing my wrist again. "Wrap it up JJ." He speaks again.

John closes the door, dragging me past the kitchen to a second room. He hesitates at the door and never opens it. Instead, he turns around and takes me out to the porch. The boy who was sleeping on the couch is now inside speaking to the girl on the pull out.

"John, what is going on?" I ask, praying this time I get a response.

He shows me what he got out of his room,
a black cylinder-shaped container, and pulls a compass out of it, handing it to me.

"This might sound crazy, just hear me out." He finally speaks, sitting on the couch where the boy once was.

"Of course."  I smile, since he's finally speaking to me, and sit beside him.

"My friends and I were out in the Marsh one day, on the boat when we hit a sandbar. Turns out there was a sunken Grady White under us which we found out belonged to a broke marina rat that we knew."

He adjusted his seating, facing me more and ran a hair through is hair.

"His name was Scooter Grubs. He went out into open water during the hurricane, and ended up dying. But we were all like, how'd he get a Grady White? So JJ convinces me something valuable must be in the boat since the police closed the marsh for the search and everything."

I nod, letting him know I'm listing and to keep going, and I continue inspecting the compass.

"So we got some scuba gear and I dove down. We were expecting to find money or even a shit tone of weed or something. But we found that." he says, pointing at the compass. I furrow my eyebrows at him.

"I know, it doesn't seem like much." He takes the compass from me and and flips it open, to reveal a word etched into the metal; Redfield.

"But this was my fathers, that's his handwriting." He says pointing to the word. "Pope, Kie, and, JJ all thought it was a coincidence. I knew it wasn't. Now with what you showed me I really know it can't be. The compass matches the one on your necklace."

I widen my eyes, realizing what he's saying.

"The R on my necklace, maybe it's not for Routledge, maybe it's for Redfield too." I speak.