After Tormenting Him, I Saw Comments and Fled

Chapter 2

By dawn, the rain had finally stopped.

I rolled up the shutter. More than a dozen fist marks dented the metal. Paint had chipped away.

Ethan was still there.

Standing at the bottom of the steps. His lips were bluish purple. Water dripped from his hair. In both hands, he held a clear plastic bag.

Inside was a box of cherries.

My favorite kind, triple-J grade cherries.

The fruit stand at Jade Market sold them for eighty dollars a pound. I had never been willing to spend money on them.

He raised the bag toward me. His lips moved. Using only breath, he forced out a word.

"Faye."

My chest tightened painfully.

But the comments were still flashing.

A: [Brian has arrived in Pearlgate! You're still going soft? You have less than twelve hours left!]

I turned around and went inside, pulled out the dusty community phone directory and found a number.

The front desk of Pearlgate Business Center, a branch office belonging to the Stone Group.

I dialed and only said one sentence, "Ethan Stone is at Stall A12 in Jade Market."

Five seconds of silence. Then chaos exploded on the other end. A woman urgently asked for the exact address.

I hung up and turned on the gas stove, setting a pot of water to boil.

Then I opened the medicine box beside my bed.

Grandma had heart problems. Sometimes she couldn't sleep because of the pain. The doctor prescribed sleeping pills.

I snapped three tablets in half and crushed them into powder. Then I mixed them into the soup.

At the doorway, Ethan was still standing there, completely drenched. But he was still clutching the cherries.

I handed him the bowl. "Come inside. Drink this. Then you go your way, and I'll go mine."

He accepted the bowl and looked down at the surface.

Something changed in his eyes.

He glanced at my face and my hands. Then the kitchen counter behind me.

He saw the pill blister pack I hadn't hidden in time.

Three pills missing.

Sweat gathered in my palms. I gripped my apron tightly.

Ethan looked back at me. A faint smile curved his lips. He lifted the bowl and drank every drop.

Then handed the empty bowl back.

Less than ten minutes later, he started swaying. His legs weakened. His body tipped sideways.

I supported him into the room and laid him down on the folding cot.

His fingers groped for my wrist. Cherry juice still stained his fingertips, leaving a small red mark against my skin.

His lips trembled. His damaged vocal cords couldn't form proper sounds. Only breath escaped.

"Faye... Don't..."

Then his eyes closed.

Twenty minutes later, three black vans blocked the entrance to Jade Market.

Seven or eight men dressed in black rushed inside. Leading them was a man in his forties. A golden Stone Group badge gleamed on his chest.

The moment he saw Ethan lying on the folding bed, his knees buckled. He dropped to the concrete floor. His forehead slammed against it.

Everyone behind him knelt too.

I stood among buckets of dead fish, watching a roomful of men in black kneeling inside my tiny seafood stall.

The leader raised his head. Tears streamed down his face.

"Mr. Stone! We've been searching for you for seven months!"

I lowered my eyes to Ethan's fingers still wrapped around my wrist. Using all my strength, I peeled them away one by one.

Cherry-red stains remained on my wrist bone.

When they carried him out, his head tilted slightly toward me. His eyes never opened.

I stepped back into the stall and pulled the shutter down.

Only then did I notice. The bag of cherries was still sitting by my feet. A sticky note was attached to it.

In crooked handwriting, it read:

"For Faye. Sweet ones."

I threw them,cherries and packages altogether, into the dustbin.