Two Dead, Two Missing

Lorelai Mot frantically rubbed her hands together under the flowing water. She watched in a state of shock as the blood-red swirling around the sink’s smooth contours became diluted and finally clear. She wiped a few last drops from the grimy faucet and checked for more splatter, but there was none. Then, she inspected herself in the mirror.

Splashed with clean, sin-free water, the collar of her floral blouse had no more stains to indicate any wrongdoing, but her guilt could not be washed away so simply. It was embedded in the cloth, in both doe eyes, in her trembling bottom lip.

The clock on the bathroom wall read 3 AM, and its weighty hands ticked in half-time to her fawn-like heartbeat.

She could not hide there forever.

Rushing to the ladies’ room, she hadn’t noticed how many people were on the other side of the door but hoped there weren’t many at this ungodly time between night and day.

And she was right.

A handful, if that, of truckers and odd insomniac regulars were the current patrons of the Clay Canteen―a 24-hour diner on the side of the highway, a mile or so away from a gas station in one direction and a police station in the other.

‘What can I get you there, sweet pea?’ the kind cliché of a waitress asked Lorelai as the denim of her jeans squeaked on the leather seat of one of the empty barstools.

‘Just some water. Thank you,’ she replied, linking her fingers on the counter.

Then, the strident trill of the diner door’s bell alerted them to the arrival of another patron.

‘What’ll it be, Harlan?’ the waitress called, as she poured water from a large jug into a tall tumbler.

The unyielding clomps of the man’s footsteps drew closer.

Lorelai kept her head down after nodding thanks to the waitress and guzzled her drink in seconds. She noted the shiny black of his pointed shoes and the straight cuffed hem of his well-ironed greige pantlegs. A lawman.

‘Someone’s thirsty,’ he observed, staring down at Lorelai.

She offered a demure acknowledgment in the form of the upward curving of the side of her mouth.

He crossed his arms and nodded, muttering a low interjection, and then turned towards the waitress. ‘Coffee. To go,’ he said simply.

‘You don’t fancy sittin’ in for a spell? I made apple pie earlier. There’s still a couple of slices left.’

Harlan merely shook his head in response.

‘What do you got going on? There can’t be that much happening at this time o’ night,’ the waitress speculated.

‘Too much, Francine. Too much.’

‘In Eutaw?’ Francine chuckled. ‘What happened? A mess o’ ‘coons steal bags o’ crops out of Mr. Beaufort’s pickup truck again?’ she mocked, securing the plastic lid on his takeaway cup.

Harlan shook his head again. ‘Incident off the I-20. Two dead.’

Francine gasped, nearly dropping Harlan’s full cup of hot coffee.

‘Two dead?’ a voice inquired from a booth in the back.

Harlan looked up and lowered his opaque Aviator sunglasses. ‘That’s right, Joe.’

Lorelai watched as the man wiped his mouth with a napkin he scrunched up and left on the table before making his way towards them. He propped his elbow on the counter next to her and tipped his dusty cap before turning towards the officer. ‘Tourists?’ he asked.

‘I didn’t recognize them,’ Harlan replied, ‘what was left of them, anyway. Pretty gruesome.’

‘Dear Lord, Harlan,’ Francine exclaimed, ‘Was it a terrible accident?’

‘Welp… I’m not too sure it was an accident.’

The words sent a tingle down Lorelai’s spine.

‘I’ve called it in. Two dead, two missing,’ Harlan continued, working off Joe and Francine’s piquing curiosity, ‘I found bags and other belongings in the trunk and the back of the vehicle. Looks like a family of four set off from wherever. There’s an APB out for the other two. Let me know if y’all notice anything fishy before sunup.’

‘Fishy?’ Joe pushed.

‘Peculiar happenings,’ Harlan elaborated, ‘Strangers.’

Francine’s head jerked in Lorelai’s direction. Helplessly tactless, her wide eyes warned the officer of her blatant prejudice before she could alter her expression.

‘More water, darling?’ she managed with a simper after clearing her throat.

‘No, thank you.’

‘That goes for you too, Miss.’ Harlan said after a brief pause, deliberately reaching over Lorelai to grab his coffee.

‘Hmm?’ she reacted, startled.

‘Don’t hesitate to call on the law, now, if you see anything suspicious.’

Lorelai nodded and gulped down the last remnants of her second glass of water as he glared into her flitting eyes from over the top of the pair of sunglasses resting on the tip of his narrow nose.

‘Of course,’ she assured confidently enough, attempting to match his gaze.

But, of course, she would not call on him or anyone else for that matter. If it were up to her, this small-town uniformed joker and his band of hicks would never learn the truth.

She would not admit that she was, in fact, one of the two persons he sought―not missing at all, but sat in front of him, within his grasp, inches away from a pair of handcuffs hanging from his belt, glimmering in her periphery. She would not tell him that the two dead nameless tourists were her parents. Lorelai would not even let herself think of what had happened, lest the horrific images of her mother and father slashed to pieces in the front seats of their family car in her mind’s eye paint a vivid picture across her forehead for the officer to scan like an open book. No, she would not disclose a thing. Nothing could bring her to confess to knowing exactly who was responsible for such carnage. Although it would be tempting to mock him, she would not tell him that he would never find the second person he was looking for, her brother, because she was more determined than anyone to capture him―and deal with him―first.

‘You’re not from around here, are you?’ he examined.

‘I’m visiting my cousins.’

‘What’re their names? Maybe I know them.’

‘They keep to themselves, mostly.’

‘Mhm. So, what are you doing out so late, on your own?’ he probed.

Lorelai thought fast. ‘I was on a date. With a local boy,’ she started, struggling to implement a southern twang to her inflections. ‘He stopped the car and got a little too familiar. I just got out and started walking. I’m waiting for my cousin to pick me up.’

Francine sighed and clutched at her apron. ‘Oh, you poor dear! Boys, eh?’

‘Boys will be boys,’ Joe added, adjusting his cap and shaking his head, making his way back to the booth.

Francine scoffed alongside Lorelai’s rolling eyes in retort to Joe’s off-the-cuff remark. ‘It’s 2020, Joe!’ she cried out as he dismissively waved his hand in the air. ‘You’d have thought we wouldn’t have to go through stuff like this anymore, ain’t that right, honey?’ she whispered, reaching over to pat Lorelai on the shoulder before pushing through a double swinging door leading to the kitchen.

The smirk which formed on Lorelai’s face as the waitress turned her back was almost instantly effaced by the lawman’s tenacious bearing.

They may have fallen for it, but he certainly didn’t.

After what seemed like an eternity, the sound of the kitchen door swinging open as Francine backed into it cut through the deafening silence.

‘Here you go, honey,’ she offered, placing two plates of fresh apple pie and two sets of knives and forks on the counter. ‘On the house,’ she announced, ‘you too, Harlan. Sounds like you have a mighty tough night ahead of you. Harlan?’

But he did not answer.

‘Why don’t you hop in the back of my squad car… I’ll drive you home,’ Harlan asserted.

‘Oh, that’s a good idea. Isn’t it, sweetie?’

But Lorelai did not answer, either.

Francine’s face scrunched in bewilderment as she witnessed the veritable Mexican standoff in front of her, where both Lorelai and Harlan continued to outstare the other.

Tension lingered.

‘Oh!’ Francine finally screamed, pointing, knocking over a plate in the process. ‘Harlan!’ she warned.

Lorelai’s head jerked and she regarded the waitress with contempt. Then, she peered down in the direction of her pathetic, quivering index finger and lifted an elbow to inspect it, briefly, before turning back to face the lawman.

His glare did not falter. Not after the sound of his unsuspecting friend’s scream, nor after the sudden shattering of the porcelain plate on the floor.

Lorelai ruminated. It appeared the jig was up. The waitress had spotted a patch of blood on Lorelai’s blouse she had missed earlier in the bathroom. She couldn’t clean it up now. And there was no point in attempting to manipulate the lawman.

He had already noticed it minutes before.

―

Devlin Mot submerged his hands in the cool contents of a watering trough by the side of the road. Parched, he splashed water onto his face a couple of times before cupping his hands to take a drink. As he slurped away, bright streaks of light began to descend and encircle him. He looked up to admire the rosy hue across the morning sky. Sunup. He would be more visible, now.

Limping, he dragged his feet along the harsh concrete until he heard a sign of life. Music. Devlin followed the soft melody skipping in the distance like a siren’s call. As he inched closer, he came to a diner on the side of the road. “The Clay Canteen”, he said under his breath, reading the large neon sign which hummed and intermittently twitched high above him.

Devlin grunted as he pushed the door open and stumbled inside. In a far corner, he noticed an old-fashioned jukebox with its glass smashed. ‘Hello?’ he called, the doorbell’s warble still echoing behind him. ‘Can somebody help me, please?’ he continued. But he would find no help there.

As he took a few more cautious steps inside, his ears pricked up to the squelching of something underfoot. Devlin looked down to find he was standing in a pool of blood. This was fresh, unlike the darker, old bloodstains covering his clothing.

Just then, his sister emerged from a double swinging door with an assortment of cans, crinkling packets of food, and bottles of water in her arms.

She lowered everything onto the counter in front of her, reached down to grab a backpack, and stood up again to shove each item inside.

Devlin gaped as she walked a couple of feet more towards the till, broke it open, and stole the money from inside.

‘Don’t just stand there,’ she demanded coolly, ‘If you’re not going to be look-out, do something useful and search their pockets for car keys,’ she said, gesturing to the rest of the diner.

Mouth agape, Devlin scanned the diner in horror, seeing his sister’s latest collection of souls forlorn across the floor.

‘Lorelai…’ The hoarse word managed to escape his lips as tears ran down his face. ‘What have you done?’

She folded the notes and slid them in the inner pocket of a denim jacket she took from one of the murdered patrons and lifted the backpack strap onto her shoulder.

Making her way through the scattered bodies, she stopped and bent over, digging into Joe’s front pocket to retrieve a set of jingling keys before continuing towards her brother.

‘I take it that means you’re not coming with me?’ she asked, inches away from Devlin’s face, already knowing the answer that awaited her.

Devlin looked down at the bloody kitchen knife in his sister’s steady hand and back up at her cold, unwavering eyes. In choked desolation, he somehow found the courage to say, ‘No.’

Lorelai exhaled her disappointment in her brother’s weakness, his disloyalty.

‘Shame,’ she dismissed simply. She knew what she had to do.