One Night Only (Season 1: Deni's Story)

Chapter Five

Bowie doesn't acknowledge Mom on his way out. Her eyebrows lift when he storms past, but she doesn't say anything to him or me. I'm sure it's just one more strike against Bowie in her mental tally that she hints at from time to time.

My phone dings in my hand. A message from Elton pops up on the screen, answering my earlier text.

They're both alive. The mother was treated for minor injuries last night and released. The daughter is at Children's Hospital and had surgery to remove shrapnel from her arm and her leg, but she's expected to be okay. How are you holding up?

The injuries, surgery, and shrapnel aren't good news, but knowing the fan I was supposed to meet last night made it out alive is. I tuck my phone in my pocket and amble down the stairs.

Two police officers stand in the foyer. One officer looks out a window that's next to the front door. I presume he's watching Bowie make his escape from me and anything that might be difficult or real. The other, a tall, dark-haired woman who looks to be in her thirties, observes me as I approach.

"Cayden?" she asks. I can't tell if her confirming this is a formality, or if she was expecting to see a pink-haired pop star instead of plain old me with my ponytail, puffy face, and worn T-shirt and shorts.

I nod. "Yes ma'am."

"I'm Officer Martinez, and this is Officer Lane." She gestures to the fair-haired man beside her, who turns his attention away from the window when he hears his name. "We'd like to ask you a couple of questions."

I swallow the lump that's rising in my throat. My recollection is fuzzy, but I remember answering questions last night at The Domino and also giving a statement to an officer. Most of this happened in the minutes between my fits of hysterics and eerie calm. I wonder now if I was incoherent and if Martinez and Lane are here to have me repeat what I told the other officer last night.

"Would you like to come in to the living room?" Mom's question is directed at the officers.

"This shouldn't take long," Martinez replies. "I think most questions were covered last night."

This is something different, then. "Do you know who did it?" I blurt out.

"We're still investigating," Officer Lane tells me, but the crease in his forehead and the way he shifts his weight from one leg to the other are signs he knows more than he's saying.

"Are you familiar with a nineteen-year-old man named Dallas Fernsby?" Martinez asks.

I must startle or give some other visual cue, because she and Lane both lock their eyes on me. Dallas Fernsby is a name I haven't heard in two years.

"Um, yeah." I cast my gaze down at a tiny piece of lint on my shirt. An image of Dallas as a lanky eleventh-grader comes to mind. I visualize his sandy hair, slate gray eyes, and freckles, and the brightly-colored ironic T-shirts and earbuds he wore back then like a uniform. Half the school had a crush on him, or at least it seemed that way.

"Does that mean you knew him?" Lane prompts.

Knew him. Lane is speaking in past tense. A knot forms in my stomach.

I glance up at the officers. "You just said 'knew him.' Was Dallas one of the people who died last night?"

"Did you know him?" Lane inquires again. I guess we're both good at sidestepping questions.

"Kind of, but not really." My voice is quiet. "He went to the same school Sawyer and I used to go to. Dallas specialized in performing arts and got a lot of lead roles in school productions. Everyone knew who he was, but I didn't know him personally."