AHMM, June 2012 by Dell Magazine Authors

Author:Dell Magazine Authors
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Dell Magazines

Fiction: LAST SUPPER by Jane K. Cleland

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Art by Tim Foley

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I pinched myself real hard the way my used-to-be best friend, Jackie, taught me, and it worked, just like always—I stopped crying.

The police tape was still up. For three days now, walking from the corner where the Chappaqua Middle School bus dropped me off to the Morrisons’ house, I'd run past the spot where Tommy Jennings's body had been found, not wanting to see anything, not wanting to know. Today, even though my throat tightened and my mouth dried up, I paused to look.

Yellow and black crime-scene tape, just like you see in the movies, stretched around six orange cones positioned along the sidewalk from the hedge to the curb. Other than that there were no signs that a murdered man had laid there. No blood. No trampled flowers. No tire marks from a quick getaway. Nothing. Maybe that's why the police say Tommy had been killed somewhere else and his body dumped here. I sighed, then sighed again, then shuffled off toward the house, the place I lived now, the place I was supposed to call home.

Halfway up the walk, I heard a car and turned around. A black Caddy rolled to a stop just beyond the marked-off area. Burt Raleigh, co-owner of the restaurant where'd I'd fussed around last summer helping him and Tommy, his business partner, figure out how to use a graphics program to create their daily menus, was behind the wheel. He got out and stood for a moment, staring at the grassy area inside the police tape. Burt was short and round and bald, and he looked upset. His eyes never left the ground. He was frowning.

"Hi, Burt,” I called, heading back in his direction. “Are you okay?"

He looked around as if he wasn't sure where the voice came from. When he saw me, his brow smoothed out a little.

"Hi, Laney,” he said, giving my shoulders a friendly squeeze. “I just came to try to be close to Tommy, you know? It's a silly idea. I was here yesterday, too, just walking around. I even went to where his car was found, over at Seven Bridges Road. It's so empty there. No one around. Just woods.” He looked away, as if he were embarrassed. “I get no sense of him at all. None."

"It's so hard,” I said just for something to say.

"Yeah, well, anyway . . . I'm sorry it's been so long since I've seen you, Laney. You look great—as beautiful as your mom, you know? You doing all right for real?"

"Thanks, Burt. I'm doing fine. I mean, the pain . . . I guess it never goes away, not completely, but over time—” I broke off. Mr. Adams, my grief counselor, said that just because someone asks a question doesn't mean I have to answer it. “I'm fine. So . . . I'll get to see you a lot if I can help out with the menus again this summer.

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