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The Trial

A Short Story

By C.R. HughesPublished 3 years ago 5 min read
1
The Trial
Photo by Bill Oxford on Unsplash

The trial of Calvin Jamison was all anyone was talking about those days. It was as if he had just killed his best friend the day before but in reality, it had been almost a year.

I only remembered Calvin vaguely. He had been two grade levels above me in school and his brother, who was in the same grade as me, never spoke of him on the rare occasions when the two of us happened to exchange a few words.

I remembered Calvin’s best friend clearly though. Dementri Ranport wasn’t the type of person that you would forget so easily. He was the star of our school’s basketball team and had a sort of unconventional wisdom about him. I secretly dreamed of being like Dementri. He was who encouraged me to try out for the basketball team and when I made it, he always cheered the loudest at my junior varsity games whenever my family couldn’t attend.

After Dementri graduated, we never really talked again because he left for the big city a few hours away from our small town with a full ride basketball scholarship in tow. I would occasionally see him on social media with his carefree grin and once when I broke down in the city, I went inside a grocery store and saw him stocking shelves humming to himself, with a limp that he hadn't had before. He gave me money and drove me to the nearest gas station like we were still teammates. That was the last time I saw him. Two months later, people were writing “R.I.P” on his Facebook profile.

The news traveled quickly in our town. The tale of how one of our own had been shot and killed by another of our own. It was the kind of tragedy that made every conversation in our high school hallways or at the corner store interesting. Even those who never knew Dementri were discussing what a great guy he had been and cursing Calvin for his actions. The hype surrounding the event died down after just a few weeks but was resurrected once again the next school year after the long awaited trial date was set. The debates about whether Dementri’s death was a murder or just a tragic accident became all anyone spoke about. People took bets and discussed attending the trial, but I knew I wouldn't be going. Dementri was dead and there weren't enough lawyers in the world that could bring him back.

Two days before the trial, I received the brown paper parcel on my doorstep. It was plain except for a piece of notebook paper taped to it haphazardly with my name and a message written on it in scrawled permanent marker.

DO NOT OPEN. Drop this parcel in front of the court room on the morning of the trial.

I had seen enough horror movies to know not to let my curiosity get the best of me and to not play with fate, so the morning of the trial, with the sun barely peaking over the horizon and not a soul in sight, I dropped the parcel in front of the courthouse and stole away to the coffee shop across the street to calm my nerves.

"He was a friend of yours?" the barista asked after serving me my fourth cappuccino.

"Not exactly," I said, setting the cup on the table shakily, "just someone I went to school with."

The barista nodded and waved my hand away as I tried to pass him my debit card once again.

"This one's on the house," he said. "Friend or not, it's not easy losing someone so young."

I nodded my appreciation and watched out of the cafe window as the crowd in front of the courthouse grew larger.

I hid a twenty dollar bill under my coffee cup for the barista to find and stepped out into the warm Texas air to watch the crowd from a distance. I hadn't seen anyone take the parcel but with all of the people around, there was no telling who had seen it.

As I got closer, the dull buzz of the crowd began to form into coherent sentences.

"I heard Dementri was sleeping with Calvin's girl," one girl who I recognized from school was saying.

"I might have shot him too for that," the guy next to her said, and they both chuckled.

My skin grew hot, but whether it was from the heat or the anger rising in me, I still don't know. I stood outside of the courthouse for a long time that day. People were filing in or waiting outside as if it were some celebrity hearing. I watched as Samuel Jenks, the best lawyer in our part of Texas, strutted inside without acknowledging any of the people begging to ask him questions outside. Behind him, Dementri's parents and sister filed in with deadpan expressions.

I considered going inside for a split second, curious about whether or not the parcel would be shown on the stand as evidence of some sort, if it contained some important piece to the puzzle, but before I could make up my mind, security guards began barring people from going inside.

There was a roar of indignation from the crowd as they got shooed away from the building, but the knots in my stomach loosened slightly as I turned to walk back to the coffee shop. I had barely crossed the street when a loud explosion sounded behind me followed by screams.

I turned and blinked back against the dust and debris forming in front of my face. The explosion came from the courthouse.

I watched with an open mouth as the building crumbled and was swallowed by flames. There was a tap on my shoulder. I turned to see Calvin Jamison standing behind me with a sinister grin on his face.

"You might want to get out of here," he said looking past me, "I have a feeling you'll be the one on trial next."

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If you enjoyed this, feel free to leave a like and/or tip and check out some of my other stories. Also, follow me on Instagram @c.r.hughes

Thanks for reading!

-Chanté

Mystery
1

About the Creator

C.R. Hughes

I write things sometimes. Tips are always appreciated.

https://crhughes.carrd.co/

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