"Even the stars are lies"
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How can you prove somebody is innocent when you don't know the first thing about them? Every year, Luke and his half brother Ashton go to visit their mother Liz. When they were younger they met a boy name Calum, every yea...
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Work droned on for hours on end. For some reason, one of the delivery trucks at the store doesn't show tonight. Which is a problem, considering I'm on truck duty tonight, unloading all the packages. Rather than pay me to sit around for nothing, my boss ushers me out the door. "Go home. Get some rest. Tomorrow's gonna blow for everyone because we'll have that extra truck to unload..." she speaks to me with hesitation and caution, never meeting my eyes.
I think she could've found something to keep me busy, but she knows—everyone knows, it seems—that someone I'm close to is a suspect in a murder. Our town isn't big and maybe not"everyone knows each other, but when someone is shot to death, it generally makes its way around pretty quickly.
I hop in the car and linger in the parking lot, at a loss for what to do. Other than check my cell. Again. And try to call Calum. Again.
When he doesn't answer, I drop the phone into the empty passenger's seat, close my eyes, and wonder what it would be like if I never got to see Calum again. It was bad enough having no way of contacting him all those years. I tried.
Just as I put the key in the ignition, my phone lights up and rings.
Ash, probably. Or Mom. Though I don't know what either of them would need from me while I'm at work. I get the engine going so the heater can warm me up, then I pull the phone to my ear with a sigh. "Hello?"
"You should really stop calling." I freeze, heart lurching into my throat.
"Calum."
The line is infused with static. He sounds far away, like he's speaking from the end of a tunnel.
"I told Ash...you need to...lling, or you'll get yourselves in—"
"You're cutting out," I interrupt. He keeps talking, and I wonder if he can hear me at all. "Calum, listen, where are you? Let me see you and we'll talk."
For a minute, he's so quiet I worry he hung up on me, and then— "I shouldn't have dragged...this. I've cau...these problems."
"Don't worry about it right now." My throat constricts. I try to breathe. In and out. I try not to yell at him, to say anything that might make him disconnect or get upset. Everything about his voice is tired, heavy, cold. I can hear the waver to his words; he's been sitting in the snow for too long.
"Just tell me where you are. I'll come by myself. Just me, all right?"
"No," Calum hums. "No, no, no. This is the last...m calling, Luke. To say I love you. Promise you won...me anymore."
"Calum! No, just tell me where you are-"
"Promise me, Luke."
Before I can argue, the line clicks and disconnects. Dead. Gone.
