Regan Wolfrom - After The Fires Went Out - Coyote

Kayla Fucking Burkholder. She wanted me for some ungodly reason.

And Kayla isn’t the type of girl who gives up.

I knew Matt would be a problem, that it was only a matter of time before he told Justin about his suspicions. I couldn’t even guess what would happen when Justin found out about a hidden drug lab, but I had a feeling whatever it was wouldn’t bring us all closer together.

He’d either use it to score points, telling anyone who’d listen about Baptiste the unstable drug addict, or, more likely, he’d start searching, and not give up until he’d found the underground school bus and the treasure inside.

And then, knowing him, if he had drugs he’d sell them, especially the meth. He’d send it to Detour Lake, to The Souls in Timmins, to anywhere that had something to trade, and in the process he’d probably get us thrown right into the middle of a drug war. Assuming that one of his customers didn’t simply decide to drop in and take his supply and leave two dozen corpses floating in McCartney Lake.

The more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed that Justin would find a way to get us all killed.

I had to make sure he didn’t find the drugs.

And I’d need help.

Lisa and Graham still hadn’t returned from their trip to Helena to tow back the combine harvester, and I was tempted to just tell Sara and see if she’d help me for the greater good, but I heard her arguing with Fiona of all people, so I knew she wasn’t in a charitable mood.

I thought of telling Kayla the whole story, what little she hadn’t already put together, but I wasn’t as confident as I needed to be that she wouldn’t pass the information on to Matt. Truth is I don’t know her as well as Sara does, and there must be something to how much Sara hates her, even if I can’t see it.

There must be something. Otherwise…if Kayla’s as good as she seems lately…well, things won’t end well with Sara and I.

So I waited, finding menial tasks do keep myself busy and to try and look less like a man trying to keep a secret.

Lisa and Graham didn’t return until the sun had already set, and Fiona was already trying her hand at black bean enchiladas.

I wanted to pull them over to the side and talk to them, but one thing I’ve learned is that there’s really no way to do that when everyone’s downstairs waiting to eat.

So I waited, and we all waited, and then we ate, and as I stuffed my face full of black beans, goat cheese, and window-box cilantro, I thought about just how much colder it was getting outside as evening headed into night.

I got my chance at Lisa when she quietly excused herself from the table and headed toward the stairs. I made up a lame excuse about needing to check something on my tablet I’d left upstairs, and followed her up.

“You after something?” she asked as we reached the top.

“I need your help,” I said quietly. I nodded toward her room.

She laughed. “I don’t help with that kind of thing.”

She led me to her bedroom, but stood just inside the door.

“What’s today’s drama?” she asked.

“I have a drug problem.”

“I know. Just stop taking those heart pills and life will improve for the rest of us.”

“I found a school bus buried up Murphy Road. Some kind of lab, filled with MDMA and meth. Kayla told me it belonged to Dave Walker’s boys.”

“You told Kayla where to find a crapload of narcotics?”

“She doesn’t know I found the lab. But she did find some of the ecstasy.”

“So you brought it back here?”

“I took a bag of each…just to have it…in case of…uh…”

“In case of you’re an idiot?”

I nodded. “And Kayla saw the ecstasy.”

“And so you need me to kill her and dump her body in a snowbank? I can do that…”

“We need to bring the rest of the drugs back here and hide them.”

“Because you’re an even bigger idiot than I could have imagined?”

“Because Matt found the ecstasy Kayla took. And somehow he’s figured out where I got it.”

“So Kayla told him you gave her drugs? Your reputation’s taking a godawful shit-kicking.”

“I know…”

“And if Justin Porter finds out about this…”

“Can you help me, Lisa?”

She tilted her head, thinking it over.

“I’ll owe you one,” I said.

“You owe me so much…” She smiled. “Are you wanting to do this right now?”

“Yeah.”

“Does Sara know?”

“We’re not really talking…”

“I’ve noticed. So how do you propose we move however many bags of drugs without anyone noticing?”

“I have no idea.”

She shook her head. “Well obviously we’ll use Helena as an excuse…”

“We’ve got more to bring back from there?”

“Supplies. Bags of flour, plastic tubs filled with sugar and coffee…”

“So we take a load from Helena, with some room to spare, and we mix in some extras from the magic school bus.”

“We pile them in the basement, and while we’re at it, we figure out a special storage area for your crap.”

“Under the subfloor. There’s a good half a meter under the plywood.”

“Sounds pretty obvious to me.”

“I’m open to ideas.”

She shook her head at me. “You have a real talent for getting us to the worst case scenario, Baptiste.”

“You think I should have just left it alone.”

“Yeah…now you’ve stolen someone else’s drug stash and brought it home with you. What part of that plan makes sense?”

“The previous owners are dead.” And I’d needed the MDMA. But I didn’t tell her that.

“Dead, eh? You sure about that?”

“Fifty percent sure…”

“I think the only question is whether or not we’ll all live long enough to see this bite you in the ass.”

At least I didn’t need to guess how she felt about it.

By the time Lisa had pulled Graham aside and told him the story, it was almost seven at night, and we figured that it wouldn’t make much sense to be out hauling supplies in the middle of the night. We’d have to wait until morning.

Of course, there’s our weekly meeting in the morning…always at just the wrong time.

But I’d figure something out.

In the meantime, I could hear laughing from upstairs in Fiona and Kayla’s room. Not just the two of them, but another laugh that I hadn’t heard before.

I went upstairs to see.

They were in the middle of a movie night, having brought the big screen upstairs and planted it on Fiona’s desk. Fiona was sitting on the bed beside the red-haired girl, who was sitting up for a change.

Not only had no one invited me, but they’d decided to watch one of my old favourites.

Or maybe they’d picked it because they knew it would lure me in.

“ Anchorman ?” I said. “About time.”

Fiona shushed me as Ron Burgundy explained the German roots of San Diago.

I sat down on Kayla’s bed beside her.

She gave me a quick squeeze on the thigh and a warm smile.

I looked over to the red-haired girl and gave her a smile of my own.

She saw me and looked back at the screen. She didn’t seem to want to acknowledge me.

“I’ve never heard of that expression either,” Fiona said as she watched the movie. “When in Rome?”

I didn’t know how to answer that.

“Yazz flute?” she asked a moment later. “What’s that? I don’t really get this movie.”