Kevin O'Brien - Disturbed

She made sure Erin was buckled in the front passenger seat. Then she reached back, took out a box of Juicy Juice from the bag, and offered it to her.

Erin took it, but then frowned at the box with the straw in it. “It’s already open.”

Nodding, Jenna started up the car. “Yes, I opened it for you, honey.”

“I want one I can open up myself,” Erin said.

“Don’t be silly,” Jenna said. “Now, drink up. . ”

“But I want one I can open—”

“Goddamn it, don’t be such a little brat,” she growled.

Erin gazed at her. She looked a bit scared.

Jenna shook her head, and clicked her tongue against her teeth. “You know, that’s what Molly’s always saying. She says you’re a very bad girl, and that’s why God made your mommy and daddy die. Isn’t that a horrible thing for her to say? I don’t believe that for one second. She’s just being mean. I think you’re wonderful, Erin. I wish you were my daughter.” She reached over and stroked her hair. “You have pretty blond hair, honey. But sometime soon, we should change your hair. In fact, we’ll both change our hair. I could use a different style and different color — nothing permanent, mind you. We could both be redheads for a week or so. Wouldn’t that be fun?”

Erin shrugged. “I guess. . ” She still eyed her juice container suspiciously.

“Of course it would be fun,” Jenna said firmly. She pulled into traffic. “Now, drink up. It’s your favorite. . ”

Fifteen minutes later, no one noticed the black Honda Accord parked in back of a strip mall, where half the stores were shut down. There, by the Dumpsters, no one saw Jenna take something wrapped in a blanket from the front seat of the car. She carefully transferred it to the trunk.

Then she ducked back inside the car and drove away.

He didn’t have the address anymore. It had been nearly eight months since he’d gone there by cab that one time. He remembered it was in Kent on Forty-second Avenue, one of those boring-looking new apartment complexes.

As Chris drove his father’s Lexus through rush hour traffic on Interstate 5, he kept thinking about that call to Mrs. Hahn. “How does it feel to have everything taken away from you?” the woman had asked. “Now you know what you did to me.”

Mrs. Corson’s husband lost his job and his family because of a sex scandal. Mrs. Corson had lost her daughter, too. Tracy Corson had run away and didn’t even come back for Mr. Corson’s funeral. “Because of you,” Mrs. Corson had told him, “our lives were destroyed.”

He and Molly had started it all when they’d reported to the principal about Mr. Corson hugging Ian in the varsity locker room after hours. The whole thing might have blown over, but his dad and mom had both become so worked up over the incident. Then Mrs. Hahn and Mrs. Garvey got involved. And between Courtney and Madison, it was suddenly all over the Internet, Twitter, and Facebook about Mr. Corson and Ian.

In a matter of eight months, all of the people responsible for Mr. Corson’s firing had had their lives snuffed out or destroyed.

Mrs. Hahn was wrong. The rash of deaths, accidents, and tragedies on Willow Tree Court didn’t start when Molly had moved onto the block. The devastation began shortly after Mr. Corson was murdered. And his death was still unsolved.

Chris gripped the steering wheel so tight that his knuckles turned white. He anxiously watched for the Kent exit and saw it was in the left lane of the Interstate. A car horn blared as he switched lanes to make it over in time. His stomach was in knots. He wished he had an exact address. He only had a vague recollection of how the taxi had taken him to Mrs. Corson’s apartment complex.

But he remembered Mrs. Corson very well, and that part didn’t quite make sense. She was kind of dumpy with frizzy brown hair and a birthmark on her cheek. Plus she looked older than Mr. Corson. According to Roseann, the woman with his dad at the hotel bar on Friday had been cute, with a good figure. Maybe Mrs. Corson had toned up, but most birthmarks couldn’t be removed.

The other thing that didn’t seem right was the toolshed catching on fire next door at Rachel’s house. She hadn’t even been living on Willow Tree Court at the time of Mr. Corson’s firing or his death. Why would Mrs. Corson pick on her?

Hunched close to the wheel, Chris watched for the street signs. He was pretty sure this was the same road that led to her apartment complex. He’d just passed Forty-seventh Avenue Southeast, and he could see a forest just beyond the new townhouses and apartment buildings. Just five more blocks, he told himself.

Another thing that didn’t quite make sense to him had been how his mother had been murdered — along with Larry and Taylor. Those two had nothing to do with Mr. Corson. Why did they have to die? Had they just been in the wrong place at the wrong time? He remembered how he’d planned to spend that night at Larry’s with his mother. Larry and Taylor had been scheduled to go on some overnight trip to Olympia, only it had gotten canceled at the last minute. Had the killer been planning to find his mother alone in that house?

Wrong place, wrong time.

He saw the street sign for Forty-third Avenue, and the layout was beginning to look familiar. Chris turned left onto Forty-second and noticed the NO OUTLET sign. He could see the gate ahead — and the four identical beige buildings beyond that. He remembered Mrs. Corson lived in the second building on the second floor, but he had no idea what apartment number it was.

Parking in an alcove near the entrance, he climbed out of the car and checked the directory by the pedestrian gate. It was one of those phone intercom-directories. The instructions on how to use it were embossed on the steel plate that had the touch keys and phone cradle. He hated these damn things. He pressed *99, and then selected 2 for the ABC listings. It was hard to see the names past the glare reflecting off the dirty glass to the display window. With the pound sign, he scrolled down the tenant roster to the C ’s. But he didn’t see Corson listed there.

Was Molly right? Had Jenna Corson moved onto their block? Was she calling herself Natalie now? He’d never seen Natalie. She’d probably been avoiding him, knowing he’d recognize her.

He heard a car approaching. He still had the phone in his hand, and pretended to talk into it as a woman in a station wagon pulled up to the entrance. He noticed her reach for something on her sun visor. With a click and a mechanical hum, the gate slid open. Chris watched her drive through and head toward the first building. He waited until she was far enough away; then he quickly hung up the phone and snuck through the entrance just as the gate started to close again.

Second building, second floor , he told himself. Maybe the current tenant knew where Mrs. Corson had gone.

The wind kicked up, and he hiked up the collar to his school jacket as he made his way to the second building. He glanced up at the overcast sky. It would be getting dark soon, he could tell.

Chris was pretty sure it was the second alcove with a stairway that had a sign: UNITS E — H. He climbed up only one flight, but he was short of breath as he stopped in front of apartment 2-F. Under the doorbell, he noticed a piece of white tape with Yeager scribbled on it. But he could see there was another piece of tape beneath that. Chris carefully peeled it back, and saw the handwritten J. Corson .

He rang the bell. He could hear movement on the other side of the door. He waited a few moments, then rang the bell again and knocked. The door opened as far as the chain lock allowed. Peering out at him was a slightly chubby woman with brown bangs in her eyes and a thumb-sucking toddler in her arms.