Beach Day

14: Tiff Commits Library Crimes

Matt drums his hands against the wheel, parked on the side of the road in front of his parents' house. "I need you to not freak out when you see what's going on in this place."

"I'm assuming it's just a place where you keep weapons and shit? Nothing too out there?"

"I guess so." He scratches the back of his neck.

"I'm well-acquainted with weapons, Matty Joe." She pops open the door of the passenger's seat. "What are you so worried about, huh? Silly goose. Let's go in so I can get like... a gun or something."

She hops down. She can hear him climb down on the other side, asking, "Do you have—" He cuts himself off as he drops his keys. "Shoot."

Tiff pauses. "Are you alright?" The grass climbs up and around her ankles, and she feels it through the crusted salt on her body.

They didn't stop at the motel; Matt said they would drop by after this so Tiff could grab the aloe needed for her sunburn, a drink of water, and her notebook. She left the latter on the bed in the motel, and would like access to what few notes she has on the subject at hand.

"I've been meaning to say," she blurts, on the way up to her cousin's family's garage, holding Kepler in her arms, "thank you for helping me with this. I could do it on my own, but it's nice to have someone around."

He fiddles with his keys, approaching the garage's side door. "I've been thinking the same thing, honestly. Most of the time, we have to do things on our own and it's... taxing. It's nice to have someone who knows just how fucked up the world is, and how horrible all the things in it are."

She deigns not to object on the grounds of her thinking that the supernatural is beautiful and wonderful. "We?"

"People I work with." He shrugs. "Don't worry about it."

Though he tries to play it off, she can tell— that isn't the whole story. She isn't sure what he's hiding. She just knows he's hiding something.

It would be hypocritical of her to push further. Tiff has secrets she isn't telling, after all. Maybe they're not hers, but the sentiment is the same.

Matt unlocks the door and leads her through a familiar garage. She spent a lot of time here a few years ago, grease on her hands, tools held steadily. Uncle Mike, after hearing that Tiff chose welding as a necessary CTE credit during her freshman year of high school (home economics had been full, much to her mother's rage), decided not only that he would teach her to drive when the time came, but that he would teach her to participate in his own hobby of fixing motorcycles under the guise of allowing her to do extra scripture study with her cousins. In reality, Matt and Adrianna were always at dance classes at those points, so it was really just the three of them— Uncle Mike, Aunt Samantha, and Tiff.

Sure enough, there is the familiar board of tools, the workbench, the toolbox, the tarp covering whatever her uncle has been neglecting while out on the road for work. She wants to take a peek between old cardboard boxes of childrens' toys and memories, but she doesn't. She follows Matt to a panel on the wall she never thought to investigate. She always thought it was the fuzebox.

Matt flips a switch inside. Something in the garage clicks; a hatch under a rug works itself free.

Tiff knits her eyebrows together. "So... that's a weapons bunker under the green rug?"

Matt closes the small panel and walks over to the rug. "Yep."

"And it's been here this whole time?"

"Yep." He peels the rug back. Sure enough, there it is: a door older than sin, made of the same cement as the ground.