Teen For Hire

A Clean Slate

Chapter 14

There were very few moments in Reece's life when he would actually find himself afraid. Fear didn't seem to run well in his family. The last time he actually felt anything even close to this was when he almost got run over by a truck when he was 12 but even then, the feeling left as soon as that truck managed to swerve around him and by the time he got shouted at for standing in the middle of the street, all he thought of was how annoying the driver was.

This time, it was different. It shivered down his spine and to every part of his body, everything inside him threatened to spill out. His lips quivered as Reece tried to find the words to say but everything just fell to pieces each time he attempted to make sense of it. All he could do was stand and stare.

Stand in front of the girl that looked like Sierra, but had eyes colder than the girl he knew possibly could have had. Stare at the metal bar her firm grip was wrapped around on, with the thick red liquid dripping bit by bit from the edge; seeping into the dirt below in an almost solemn rhythm.

"I can explain," she said, letting go of the crowbar and making him flinch as it hit the ground with a hollow ring.

"What... happened?" he asked though something in him felt like he didn't want to know. "Did you...?"

Sierra looked at him, and he could see in her eyes that she was just as lost as he was. "I don't know." Her voice was strong but she spoke like broken glass; fragile from the inside out, the cracks showing up everywhere. "He was following me and I­-I tried to throw him off, I really did." Then she gasped, her eyes travelled frantically to every thing around her, the coldness in them slowly being replaced by a dawning realization. "I ran through these alleys and... I didn't know where the hell I was but he was still there." Her hands cusped her mouth and she glanced at the crowbar near the edge of her foot in horror. "And I saw this bar so I..."

She looked at Reece in the eyes this time, and he could feel himself breaking into pieces too.

"Sierra," he said, a hand on her shoulder as calmly as he could possibly be. "Where's the- where is he?"

After turning by a few corners that seem to lead to endless paths surrounded by red bricks, they finally stopped upon reaching a garbage bin. It stood beside a door like the other bins he had seen before, but the door was pale, almost shrunk up from the sides and the railings looked rusty. The cover of the open was wide open, despite having no garbage bags inside. Below it, a stream of what looked like dark liquid flowed at the edge of the metal, its drops forming a small pool on the ground.

"That's where he is?" Reece turned to look his friend.

"Last I saw him, yeah."

He frowned. "How did he end up there?" While he didn't doubt Sierra's capability to knock someone out with a crowbar, he had trouble believing she somehow managed to fling an unconscious man into a garbage bin that was almost as tall as she was.

Sierra shrugged her shoulders. "I was hiding behind that thing when he came. When I... when it happened, he just fell there and I-I think I pushed...him."

As they approached the bin, Reece had to swallow back a feeling of disgust that bubbled in his throat; there wasn't any strong smell and yet the air seemed unbearable to breathe in. He walked briskly towards the bin, not wanting to linger any more of his seconds. Once he came close enough, he first saw the unmoving hand of a man; maybe it was the dark walls of the bin but the skin looked sickeningly pale. Another surge of panic shot through Reece and this time, he had to step back a little, take a deep breath to get a grip on himself. Behind him, he could hear Sierra swear as she tried to peek into the bin before regretting it.