Finding Ford

chapter seventeen

"Hey lucid dreamer, make up your mind, caught on the other side." -I The Mighty, The Dreamer

"OKAY," JAS DECLARES, SLAMMING HER BOOKS on the table. Although it's a little dramatic, it's Jas, so I'm not very surprised. "I have the past yearbooks, three notebooks and pencils. We're going to write down what we know and possible suspects. I don't care how small or insignificant it may seem- write it down."

"Why are we doing this?" Ford asks. His feet are propped up on the table, pencil twirling in between his fingers. He's in jeans today that crinkle up at the bottom, rather than his usually sweatpants. His jacket is thrown on top of a t-shirt that is crinkled and desperately needs to be ironed, but what else would anyone expect from a dude who lives in motels?

Jas leans over the table, hitting Ford on the head with a yearbook. "Because you and Ava literally have no leads. And I plan on changing that. Now stop asking stupid questions."

Ford grumbles. I roll my eyes, "Suck it up."

"Grow some balls," Jas agrees.

"No, you two are not teaming up on me right now," Ford says. Jas smirks and swats at his feet. With a dramatic sigh, Ford puts his feet down, settling in his chair properly and leaning forward, taking a notebook from Jas.

"Alright," Jas begins, opening up the notebook. "Let's start with the basics. It's the same person who killed your mom, right?" When Ford nods, Jas puts the pencil to her lip. "Your mom died when we were freshmen. Right now we're seniors. That means if it's a student we go to school with, they would have had to be thirteen at the oldest when they killed your mom. Do you see a thirteen year old killing your mom?'

Ford blinks. "I didn't think of that."

I clear my throat slightly, shifting in my spot beside Ford. "Yeah, me neither."

"'Cause you're both idiots," Jas smiles. Her arm plunges up, fingers snapping. "Hey, can we get some coffee?"

As a waitress comes over and Jas begins to rant off what she wants, Ford and I sneak a glance at each other. Ever since last night and our confessions, he's been doing that a lot. I smile softly and he returns it, reaching for my hand and interlacing our fingers.

Jas takes a sip of the coffee brought to her, and hums. "Wow, this actually tastes like coffee. I should go out of Cailbridge for lunch more often." Putting down her cup beside the muffin she also asked for, Jas passes me a notebook and a pencil.  "Alright, squad. So, like we said before, it can't really be someone in our grade. At least, I seriously doubt it."

We all scribbled that down. Ford exhales, staring at the paper, as if trying to unscramble the words to find a different meaning. "We did have a couple of leads," Ford points out in a mutter.

"Right," Jas nods and scribbles something down. "Mr. Cutler, Lucas and..."

"That's pretty much it," I admit.

"Well," Jas sighs, "Lucas is out of the equation. Can we all agree on that?" After Ford and I nod, Jas continues. "Alright, then. Mr. Cutler. He's a lead because..."

"He has access to the school," I supply, leaning forward, suddenly feeling a lot more engaged. "So he would have been able to erase the tapes. Also, he would have had access to the jewellery box! Plus, he had a dislike towards Ford and his mother, and Ford thinks Mrs. Wilson and him might have been seeing each other at one point."

"Good, good," Jas absentmindedly says and she quickly writes down what I say. She leans back and studied what she wrote, biting down on her lip and frowning. "The jewellery box... Ford, you said you were talking to Mr. Stevens because he was asking if you were okay about your mom's death anniversary, right?"