Remember Me | A Steve Randle Fanfiction

Chapter 39 | Deep

🌻Juliana's POV🌻

3 hours passed and the cops still haven't come. The others were still out cold and Soda, Steve, and I huddled in the back corner away from the trapdoor to the attic. I didn't have my pistol on me, as I had left it in the lockbox under my bed. I was shaking, tears streaming down like waterfalls, but no sound leaving my body. Soda sat in front of us, a switchblade in hand, ready to throw. He was good at knife-throwing and never missed his target. He gave me a sense of safety.

Steve kept his arms tight around me, though he was shaking about just as much as I was. I was squeezing the daylights out of him, refusing to let go, but he didn't mind. All he cared about then was my safety. 

We waited, and waited, and waited. The longer it took for the cops to show up, the more I thought. What if Evie had taken Darry out before the call could go through to them? What if they weren't aware of the situation?? Were we just going to die here? What the hell was going to happen to us?

I could still hear that harsh, piercing voice of hers.

"Goddamn it, Juliana, just give up!" she screamed. "Steve will be mine one way or another! If you don't come out by daybreak tomorrow, I'm going to tear this house apart until I find you!!"

Daybreak. Twelve hours. She was giving me twelve hours to surrender. Even then, I'd still be dead. She wanted me dead, and she was going to make sure that happened.

"Don't. Move." Steve whispered, not threateningly, but fearfully. He didn't want me to surrender. But like Evie said, either I surrender, or it would be a hundred times worse on me. Which one would I rather do? Surrender and die? Or have her find me and possibly kill all of us?

We stayed still, motionless for hours. We heard silence after a while and figured Evie had gone to sleep. Soda crept across the room, knowing we were all hungry, and quickly grabbed something that would make no noise for us to eat or open. He refused to let Steve or me move, so he did everything. He threw a blanket on us and told us to sleep, and he'll wake us up if he needed to.

Steve had fallen asleep shortly after, but it took a little over an hour for my body to allow itself to rest. Even if I had slept for a while, I wouldn't be sleeping very well, so what was the use anyway?

Three a.m. and Soda shook us awake.

"Three hours left!" Evie yelled right as I woke up. I figured he had heard movement from downstairs and quickly knew he should wake us up. I slept for maybe an hour, hour and a half, and I was still tired, in more ways than one. I wanted everything to go back to normal. I wanted to be safe with the guys. I wanted Evie to leave us the hell alone. I was close to just making it easier on her and jumping out the window, but I didn't.

I counted down the minutes until she was fed up, knowing Steve and Soda were going to keep me up here in hiding.

Then it got to seconds.

3...2...1.

I heard her heavy footsteps. It wasn't long until I heard a thud from across the room. She had found where we were. With almost no effort, somehow, she opened the trapdoor and immediately spotted us in the corner. Soda threw his knife without hesitation,

And missed.

That only angered her more, but just as she was about to shoot Soda, I broke from Steve's hold and shot in front of him, taking the bullet. I went into the darkness, reality slipping from me. I had gone in deep, completely unconscious, and possibly dead.