Jed Had to Die

“For the love of God, stop using that word. You sound like a douchebag,” Bettie complains, coming into the hallway with Emma Jo on her heels.

“We heard loud voices and came down to see what was going on,” Emma Jo explains, looking nervously around the room and the tension flying through the air.

Leo tries to turn away and pull his arm out of my hand again, but I refuse to let go. Quickly moving around to stand right in front of him, I drop my hold on his arm long enough to grab fistfuls of his t-shirt and pull him down so he’s forced to look at me.

“Benjamin and I broke up before I came back to Bald Knob. He proposed, I said no and ended things, and I haven’t seen or spoken to him in over a month. We aren’t engaged, we aren’t planning a wedding, and I wouldn’t marry him if he was the last man on Earth, standing on a deserted island holding the last cup of coffee,” I explain.

“That cuts me deep, Babykins. Really deep,” Benjamin sighs.

“Shut the hell up before I punch you in the neck,” Bettie threatens. “Get your ass back in the kitchen and stay there until we tell you to come out.”

Benjamin does as he’s told, knowing better than to mess with Bettie first thing in the morning before she’s had a chance to cuddle up with Baby Cecil.

When he disappears from the hallway, Leo’s face finally starts to soften and not look so homicidal anymore. I move in closer to him right as his cell phone rings. I take a step back, moving over by Bettie and Emma Jo to give him a little privacy, even though we can hear everything he says.

“Hey, Buddy, what’s going on?” Leo speaks into the phone, keeping his eyes glued to mine. “Really, the M.E. got the report to us already? Right. Yeah. Something in a triangular shape, narrow at the top, and then tapering out?”

My mouth suddenly goes dry and Bettie whispers a curse under her breath next to me. While Leo continues to listen to Buddy talk, his eyes slowly move away from mine and go right to the side table that he’s standing next to.

“And he’s sure it was something in the shape of a triangle? Something with a point on one end?” Leo asks, staring at the empty table for a few more seconds before his eyes come back to mine.

As hard as I try to not look guilty, it just makes me think about it so much that I start doing everything that will point the blame right at me. I bite my lip, I wring my sweaty hands together, I fidget with my hair, and I bounce nervously from one foot to the other until Bettie finally has to put an arm around me to keep me still.

Leo finally ends the call, his eyes never leaving mine as he slides the phone in his back pocket and stands by the door silently. I can feel his disappointment and hurt like a physical punch to the chest and it almost makes me bend over at the waist, clutching my heart.

“Alright, fine, I admit it! I killed Jed with the stupid award that was on that table,” Emma Jo suddenly announces.

My head whips around to her and I stare at her with wide, horrified eyes until she gives me a tiny, barely visible wink and I realize what she’s doing. She’s trying to cover my ass with Leo and there’s no way in hell I’m letting her do that.

“Shut up, no you didn’t. I’m the one who killed Jed. I lost my shit in a blind fit of rage and stabbed him in the back of the head with the award,” I proclaim, smiling at Emma Jo when she narrows her eyes at me.

“No you didn’t! I killed him and that’s final!” she shouts.

“You did not! Stop trying to take his murder away from me!” I argue.

“I killed him and then I buried the award back in the woods where no one will find it, so THERE!” she screams at me.

“Oh, yeah? Well, I killed him and then tossed it into Bald Knob Lake where no one will find it, so HA!”

We go back and forth for several minutes until Bettie finally throws her hands up in the air and steps between us.

“For fuck’s sake. I’M the one who killed Jed. I actually got into town earlier than everyone thought just for that reason. Bettie Lake did it, in the backyard, with a major award,” Bettie says, like she’s reading a card from the game Clue.

“ALL OF YOU NEED TO STOP TALKING RIGHT THE FUCK NOW!” Leo suddenly shouts, causing all three of us to shut our mouths and look over at him.

His eye is doing that weird twitching thing again, and now I’m worried this is the thing that will officially throw him over the edge and give him an aneurism.

“Bettie, take Emma Jo and go sit your asses down in the living room. Payton, get your ass outside with me. NOW,” he orders, pointing to the door with his nostrils flaring.

“What should I do?” Benjamin asks, poking his head out from the kitchen.

“SHUT THE HELL UP!” all four of us shout at him in unison.

Benjamin scurries back into the kitchen, Bettie and Emma Jo go into the living room, and I follow behind Leo as he marches out the door and stomps down the steps. He stops when he gets to the middle of the front yard and turns to face me.

“You have one last chance. What is going on and what are you not telling me?”

I take a minute to think about everything that happened today and over the last couple of days. I think about the fact that if that murder weapon turns up, I don’t have an alibi for the night Jed was killed because I was passed out face-down on Emma Jo’s living room floor. And then my brain kicks into high gear and I realize, Emma Jo doesn’t have an alibi either. Hypothetically, I could have grabbed the award from the table, snuck outside in the middle of the night, and killed Jed without Emma Jo ever knowing because she was upstairs asleep. And the same goes for her. She could have just as easily done the same thing and I never would have realized she’d been out of the house.