“I came home Saturday afternoon, she was doing laundry, cleaning the house, and we weren’t exactly friendly because I called her a bunch of names because she was being this Goody Two-Shoes.”
“Carry on,” Kate said.
“I stayed there Saturday night, but I left about four o’clock in the morning on Sunday because one of my buddies called me to say they had scored a deal, and, if I could come down and give him a hand, I’d get paid in drugs.” He shook his head.
“It seemed so simple and like such a great deal at the time, but who knew it would cost me so much? Anyway I went downtown and met them. They had broken into a store and stolen a bunch of stuff, so they needed to sort it by pawn shops, get the deliveries out, and they needed somebody with an unmarked car. So I did the rounds with them and helped them dispose of the items.” He sighed, as he rubbed his face again.
“Then I got high on the proceeds. And I stayed high for the rest of Sunday and all of Monday and Tuesday,” he explained. “I think it was Wednesday when I finally went home again. I was wasted when I got there. It was late, I think. I don’t know. I was looking for food, so I went into the kitchen and didn’t find anything. That pissed me off, but I just went upstairs to my room and fell asleep.
“When I got up on what was probably Thursday morning, I felt a bit better, but it was already about noon. By now I was in the kitchen, making peanut butter and jam sandwiches, and there was just this weird haunted silence around me. I didn’t know what the hell was going on, and I didn’t know where my sister was. I started calling out for her, but she didn’t answer.”
He stopped and took a deep breath.
“I had checked her room that previous night, and it was empty,” he noted. “And then I got really worried because her room was a mess. As if she had just walked away from the laundry that she had been doing when I was there on Saturday—which was very unlike her. She also didn’t have any friends who she would take off and do anything with. I don’t think it really set in at the time,” he added. “I was still flying on my own. You know? Like I’m a big man or something, and I wasn’t really thinking about where she was, although I was getting concerned because she wasn’t answering my phone messages. I sent her several more texts, and, at one point in time, I was close to her room when I sent one, and I heard her phoneding. I went into her room and saw her phone there. That’s when I really got worried. I checked it, and there hadn’t been any activity on it, beyond the messages I had just sent, since that Saturday when she had been there doing laundry.”
Kate sat back and looked at him. “That’s a long time.”
He looked up with tears in his eyes, and he nodded. “I know,” he whispered, “way too long.”
“Go on,” she said gently.
He nodded. “I did a full search of the house, at least I thought I did. I didn’t see her. I knew my parents were coming home the next day, and they would be frantic. I didn’t have any explanation. I didn’t know where she was. I didn’t know what had happened. I went downstairs to the basement, and there’s a cold room in the back. It was just on an off chance that I went inside and checked.” He stopped, swallowed, tears welling in his eyes. “And I found her,” he whispered. He shook his head. “God, that’s a sight I wish I could unsee.”
“No,” she stated, “when something like that happens, there is no unseeing it.”
“I know,” he replied, “but I wish it were possible. Nobody should ever have to see somebody they love like that.”
She nodded. “While you were at home that one day, did you see anybody else? Did anybody come to the door? Did you see anybody in the backyard or anything?”
He shook his head. “No, I think the cop told me that she’d already been dead for a day though.”
“Maybe,” she noted. “I’ll have to check the autopsy, which just means that this guy either saw that you came home and finished her off or that was the natural climax of whatever he had planned.”
“The fact that it was in our home with her there is what I think my parents could never quite forgive.”
“Why is that? Because in their mind you were there to look after her?”
“Well, I was supposed to be,” he said bitterly. “And, as you know, I’m well-known for screwing up big-time.”
Such bitterness was in his voice, and she understood entirely. “What did you do at that point?”
“I called the cops,” he said. “All of a sudden all my transgressions and reasons for never wanting to deal with the cops seemed so petty because here I was, staring at my dead sister. But, even still, I’m trying to formulate a lie, something, some reasonable excuse for what happened, before my parents came home, because that would be the end of it for me—once they realized what had happened and that I had been gone.”
“What did you tell them?”
“I told them that I’d been out on a job, trying to make some money, hoping they’d be proud of me, and instead it backfired, and I wasn’t home to protect her.”
“Instead of, youwereon a job but definitely not one that would make them happy.”
“No,” he admitted, “they would never be happy with that, and I think they knew it. They just wanted to believe me.” He shrugged. “You do anything you can to try and keep the faith alive, even though you know it’s unjustified.”
“When you’re a parent,” she noted, “I imagine that seems like the only answer available to you.”
He nodded. “Once the police came, it was just chaos.”
“So, at no time did you see anybody in the house that entire week, understanding that you’ve noted that most of the time you weren’t there. Did your sister say she was meeting anybody? Was she the type to have a friend online or on the internet? Was she somebody who got involved in online groups or chats?”
He shook his head. “Not that I know of. She was fifteen, really sweet, like I said, and she just wanted to marry a pastor and do good works.”