Somewhere

Chapter Seventeen

To refrain from being freaked out, I lovingly named the wolf skeleton Costa, after an uncle of mine who had a snaggle tooth. If I stared at it for too long as a kid, he'd growl and start chasing me like a wild animal. When he'd catch me, he'd tickle me until I thought my sides were going to burst. Costa Rivera moved back to Mexico City and sent me a new postcard in the dead of winter just to remind me that sunshine still existed elsewhere.

After last night, Cooper told me in the middle of all the police lights and the rain and the judging stares of all our neighbors that "I don't want to go home."

We went back to the manor in the woods. Lucinda and Bash followed, taking things from their house like food, clean sheets and a couple of air mattresses. They told their parents they were camping, which was almost the truth. We held ourselves up for a couple of days and suddenly, we were the outsiders and everyone in Somewhere was the enemy.

"Let's start from the beginning," Cooper suggested.

We were scattered around the room. Bash spied through the displays, pointing out relics he recognized every now and then. Lucinda stared at the big map of Somewhere. It was an older map, but not much of the town has changed. The Historic Society would sooner watch this whole place burn before we put up a chain restaurant.

"We'll start with everything we know," Cooper said, a fire in his eyes. What his mother said crawled under his skin as if she indirectly challenged him to find the murderer first. He rolled a long scroll of paper across the table.

"Well," Lucinda said. "This all started when Sam found Carter Fleming's body in the alley-way behind the Italian Restaurant." Cooper nodded at her, scribbling down the name. I shuddered, hit by flashbacks. Just when I thought I repressed that trauma. Cooper glanced at me. His eyes lingered. Cooper was making a habit out of doing that and the attention warmed my face.

"Then, Angelica Brown," Bash added.

Lucinda tilted her head. "Where was she found?" Without warning, the girl climbed onto the table in front of the map. She stuck a red push pin inside the alleyway.

"They found Angelica in the park."

Lucinda added another pin. She then searched, grazing the map with the metal end of the pin until she dropped it right onto of the June Bug Bakery. Walking closer, I said the first thing that came to mind. "The spots, they're even." Lucinda nodded, taking out a Sharpie from her purse.

Cooper grimaced, "I don't think she should be ruining a map that's might be over a hundred years old-"

But before he could even finish, Lucinda was already drawing lines. She drew a box, even connecting the lines where there wasn't a pin. Bash was suddenly beside me. He suggested as we all stared at the map. "Make an X, Lucy."

She did and in the very center was a building. "Where is that?" I asked. No one answered. I spied the look of shock in Lucinda's face and shook her. "Hey? What do you see?"

"It's the coliseum," Cooper stated and I turned to look at him. His expression was hard. "It's where the tournament takes place." The tournament. It was a ticking time clock, counting down the days and while Cooper insisted it wasn't a death sentence, I couldn't shake the nagging feeling in my gut. It was like I forgot the name of one of my favorite movies. I just couldn't put my finger on it. Just thinking about him fighting all those wolves nauseated me.

"Coliseum?" I didn't believe it. "There's no coliseum."

"You know that abandoned building in town? It used to be a paper company, at least that's what everyone tells you," Bash asked.

"Of course."

"Haven't you ever noticed there's no markers? No sign saying what the building once was?" He started asking and by the look on my face, obviously I had never thought about. It was abandoned, and my mother said if I ever dared to play over there, she'd skin me alive.