FOLLOW THE LEADER - Chapter 13

Chapter 13



Rainbow was beginning to wonder.  It was dark outside. Jason drove the van as if she were not sitting beside him. She wasn’t there.

Behind her in the back, Peewee remained silent. But then she never talked much anyway.

 Rainbow was pretty sure they would have to leave Highway101 to get to Inverness, a cozy town with a little beach.

         “What are we going to do there?” she asked.

         “Dig for clams,” Peewee growled.

         “I thought they did that in daytime,” said Rainbow.

         “Night or day, it all depends on the tides,” said Jason.

         “Oh.”

They rode in silence for a while.

Finally Rainbow said, ”We’re not going to dig for clams, are we.”

“You are too dumb to live,” Peewee muttered.

 Jason asked Rainbow, “What did you think would happen?”

“What do you mean?”

“You texted your boyfriend from camp, then went to see him. Not once but twice.”

“That wasn’t my boyfriend. He was just a guy I went to school with.”

Jason gestured to Peewee. “There you are. He was just a friend.”

Peewee didn’t smile at her leader’s sardonic comment. But then she seldom smiled about anything.

 “Would it help to say I’m sorry?” asked Rainbow.

Jason glanced back at Peewee. “Would it help?”

“No.”

Jason turned onto a dirt road that led between two cornfields. He stopped near a tall redwood tree just off the road. It stood amongst thick brush and a gnarled scrub oak tree.

Rainbow saw no houses. No sign of anybody.

They’re going to kill me.

Her heart was beating fast. She looked behind her and saw Peewee’s machete lying next to her on the back seat.

It’s now or never, thought Rainbow. She was fast, she could jump out and escape into the cornfield, keeping low and zig-zagging.

She reached for the door handle. Tried it.

Locked. Child proof. As if she were a fucking infant.

“Why are you stopping?” she asked.

Jason and Peewee got out, leaving her alone in the passenger seat.

Inside the car Rainbow heard passing cars on the freeway and the song of a single mockingbird.

Jason beeped open the right front door.

He opened it and grabbed her arm but she pulled away and tried to crawl over to the other door. He grabbed her by both feet and pulled her out.

“Come on, you guys! Everybody makes mistakes!”

Jason yanked her up by her collar and turned her around.  He held both of her arms and pushed her ahead.

Peewee stood by an old tree stump. She was testing the sharpness of her machete’s blade and paying no attention to Rainbow’s struggling.

As luck would have it, they did not need a flashlight. The waxing moon lit the gray stump well enough.

“Help!”  Rainbow screamed.

The farmer woke with a start. A woman’s bloodcurdling scream came from his cornfield. But who would be out there in the middle of the night or morning or whatever damn time it was?  Maybe he had dreamed it. He lay awake and listened for more sounds. Something to confirm he was not dreaming. All he could hear was his wife’s fitful snoring. But soon there was something else, coming from the same direction: The faint sound of two car doors closing, one after the other. An engine starting. The car’s tires rolling onto a bumpy road—his road—then gradually fading until he could hear them  no more.

        He decided to call the local sheriff. But that could wait until tomorrow. He lay there wide awake for a long time before he finally drifted back to sleep.