Escape From Norriswood

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

It only took a few moments driving down Hardy's road in the back seat of House's car, for Rosalyn to realize that the punk next to her, Bobby, didn't recognize her.

That he'd never seen her, that he dated her best friend for a year, and yet Tara had never shown him a picture of her.

If he knew her name, would he catch on? Would the sound of it remind him of a story he'd heard about her, did Tara mention anything to him about her?

Before House had thrown himself into the car, and cranked the thing down the street, he'd ran back into Hardy's house, and helped a lady cop out from inside. Rosalyn had watched the way her arm wrapped around House's shoulders, leaning on him as she hobbled down the wooden front steps, and into the back of one of the cop cars that had pulled up onto the road.

House had stood there, bent over the passenger window of the car for a moment, and then that car had flicked its siren once, a test, u-turned around and darted down the road. House hadn't said a word since he'd opened his own driver's side door, and turned the key in the ignition, revved the thing down the road.

Three cop cars running after each other. Rosalyn would have been hard pressed to think of the last time she'd seen that in Norriswood, and she wondered if people watched the three of them trail-blaze by from the windows of their living rooms, wondering the same thing.

When they had reached the bottom of Hardy's road, however, the cop car that was in front signaled left, towards the highway, and Rosalyn realized then that the car was carrying the woman officer to the hospital. The other two cars turned right, and had stayed on the main road, and House pushed forward at a slow pace, 40 klicks an hour down the suburban drag.

"Hey," Bobby said beside her, as the car pulled passed an exterminated apartment building that had previously been a shop where Rosalyn rented video games, and VHS movies.

"Who's the chick?"

House stared straight ahead. He flicked the turning signal on suddenly, and dipped the car off the road. Thick brown clouds of dust rose upward around the car windows, and when House slammed his door shut, and began moving around outside, Rosalyn saw how his uniform became a shadow within the murk.

Rosalyn's door tugged open, and she jumped back, almost colliding with Bobby.

"Get out," House said.

She scooted outside while Bobby slurred a series of syllables toward her, and House pushed the door closed.

"I was just giving you a ride, OK? As a friend." He turned her around, and flitted the key into the handcuffs.

She pulled her hands away free, and Rosalyn looked into his eyes; saw the faded layers of skin that folded outwards around them.

"And as a friend, I'm inviting you to Phillip Newell's funeral tomorrow. 10am. St. Mary's Cemetery. And as a friend, I might want to speak with you after."

Rosalyn just stood there, gazed around, as House hopped back into the driver's seat, and tore off, the gravel splaying beneath his tires, dust swirling around Rosalyn's hips, climbing up to her throat.

She made her way toward the Barbershop. She'd call a cab, she thought. Use some of the cash Deidra gave her for groceries on a ride back to the Moorland. Spend the entire ride popping her knuckles back and forth, hoping Deidra was there when she got there.