Fugitive

Chapter 23

I dropped the gun, and disassembled it quickly so it would fit back in my bag. Mostly so I wouldn't change my mind about sparing his life. I stayed on the roof. How could I prove it was him? The black clothes he was wearing? No, no one else saw the black figure but me. It would be useless even if I could find them. I have no way of proving there was even a black figure to begin with. If I found them, all the police would see is some black clothing, that I brought them. I need a confession. I need to record a confession. I could wear a wire or something. First, I need to get him to meet me. As a spur of the moment decision I climbed down the fire escape once more and ran to his house. I knocked on the door again. Dennis came to the door and opened it. "You again"? I pulled out my shotgun pressing into his stomach. He froze. "I know your name is Dennis Penfold. I know you killed my sister and Toby". "I don't know what you're talking about". A lie. He was toying with me. "Cut the bullshit alright. Tonight, meet me at the big parking lot down the street. Be there, or I will kill you". "Right, I'm just going to show up so you can kill me in the middle of a parking lot". "If you seriously think that's what's going to happen, you're a lot dumber than I thought". "Well what do you want"? He breathed deeply. The gun still pressed into his stomach. I pushed it in further grabbing onto his shoulder. "I want to talk". "Why can't we can talk now"? Shit I don't know? Because I don't have the recording thing yet! "Just be there. 11:00pm". I pulled the gun back and placed it in my waistband before walking off. I heard the door slam behind me. I checked to make sure no one had seen before walking down the street. I needed to find some kind of recording device. And soon. I found a tech store after a while of walking. It seemed like my best bet. I pulled my cap over my eyes and wandered inside. Left and right there were different cell phones on display. Some laptops at the far end and tablets of all sizes. There were several types of cables that I didn't recognise. If I got a decent cell phone I could record Dennis on that. I didn't think they'd have any recorders. They'd be too old to be sold in stores now right? Something I've realised about my parents' generation is that they have no initiative. Like none. At all. My parents struggle to work a TV remote. It took them almost two weeks to learn how to skype someone. I don't mean it in a bad way. I know I grew up with it. But I can pick up something I've never seen before, like a different model of phone or some weird tablet thing and be working it in a matter of minutes. I think my parents would give up after ten minutes. I guess they just don't know. Which is fair enough, but you would think they'd have grasped onto the concept by now. Cat was the real technology person in the family. She got extremely annoyed when Mom asked for her help with something. I remember one time Mom asked how to find someone on Facebook. Cat simply yelled out go to the search bar! Mom had trouble finding the search bar. It's literally right there. Right at the top of the page. They would ask the most seemingly idiotic questions. Cat got sick of always being called to help. Because I was the baby of the family, I was seemingly helpless too. Cat did know more than me. She had more experience. I could have probably helped if they had asked. But they never did. I wasn't going to offer. Explaining stuff to them is like trying to teach a penguin to fly. Impossible. Anyway, back to the recording thing. My current phone would definitely not work. It's about time I switched it out anyway. I made a mental note to dump it when I left the store. I browsed around for a few minutes. I didn't have a lot of cash to spare. I did need to eat at some point. I hitched my backpack up higher on my shoulder. A smiling assistant came over to talk to me. He looked Indian. Darkish skin. Dark hair. Wide smile. "Can I help you with anything there"? "I'm hoping to record something. Which phone would be the best for that"? "Well, this one here, has a really good camera. But the cost is quite large. If you wanted a cheaper model you could get this one which is cheaper, obviously not quite as good but it's probably the best value for money here". The first phone was ridiculously expensive. It had a lot of features. The second one looked better but I didn't really care about the camera. "What about the speakers? Which one had the best speakers"? "Well, hold on". He walked around another shelf looking for something. He picked up a box. "This one here has the best specs but from person experience I would go for that one beside you there. It's got good specs and good reviews. Music plays a bit louder on those phones than any other models". I looked down at the price. Surprisingly, it was okay. I nodded. "Ok, I'll grab that one then". "You don't want to test out any other options"? "No thanks". "Okay, follow me". He led me the front of the store where he scanned the phone. "Would you like to add a case"? I shook my head. "We have a special sale on at the moment with a phone plan. Half price for six months when you purchase any new phone". "No thanks, I'm okay". I wouldn't have this phone for six months anyway. "Could I grab a sim card though"? The man picked one out from behind the counter and scanned it. "There we go". I paid in cash and left the store. I sat down on a seat outside distancing myself from the CCTV cameras I could see. Who knows how many more hidden ones there are. I pulled out one of the remaining energy bars and munched on it while I unpacked the phone. It was a good phone. I turned it on. There wasn't much battery left. Just enough to get set up. I filled in all my details and checked out the voice recorder. I tested it on a couple walking past. Afterwards I played it back. It would work. As I got up to leave I pulled the old disposable phone from my pocket and slipped it into the bin beside me along with the energy bar wrapper. I got up and continued walking. There weren't too many people around being a Sunday and everything. A few families out for lunch after church. I've never been a religious person myself. Mom and Dad once took us to church one Sunday. Dad's parents were catholic so he grew up with that religion but abandoned it as soon as he moved out. Mom was never religious at all. So, we never went to church as kids. Mom decided we should try it just once to see if we enjoyed it. Hence that one Sunday we went to church. She wanted to make sure we didn't feel limited just because they weren't religious. They gave us options and encouraged us to ask questions about it. I wasn't convinced myself but I have to admit the passion in that room was something I was jealous of. I wanted something to believe in that strongly. I never found anything. The sun was just starting to disappear behind some thick clouds. It was going to rain soon. The sky got darker and darker with every minute. There wasn't much else for me to do but scope out the parking lot. I picked it because there are no good vantage points in case he decided to try something. It's a vast open area so while anyone should be able to see me, obviously not ideal, it also means I can see them too. There's nowhere for anyone to hide. And a populated area during the day so nothing can be set up. I headed over there. My stomach was starting to growl. I hadn't had a decent meal in a while and I was about out of energy bars. There was a diner on the corner. I walked in and walked up to the counter. I sat at a stool there and grabbed a menu. I wasn't planning on staying but a burger sounded pretty damn good right now. A young waitress wearing a top that was clearly too tight walked over. She popped gum in her mouth before she started talking. "What can I get you"? She leaned forward showing off her cleavage. I'll admit my eyes were drawn down, but I adverted them seconds later. "Just a burger please". "Fries"? I nodded. She wrote on a note pad and went to walk away. "Wait, can I have those to take away"? "Hmm, you sure about that"? She winked at me. I nodded. "I'm sure". She turned away clearly unsatisfied with my answer. "Thanks". There was a newspaper sitting next to me. Right on the front page, a picture of me. Great. I casually leaned to the side and flipped the paper over to some other article. No one seemed to pay any attention to me. There weren't many people around. The waitress walked past a few seconds later. I called her over. "On second thought, I will have that burger here". She smiled. "Sure thing". Cat and I used to run down to a diner every Friday night, as soon as we were old enough and bring dinner home to Mom and Dad. They liked the half an hour break they had while we got food. It gave them a moment of peace. We were loud kids. Always running around. Wanting to play tag or run through the sprinklers. Even doing the whole lemonade stand thing one summer. No one every really came down our street so we were forced to beg Mom to buy it. She always did. We were always so proud of the money we made. It wasn't much. At the time, it seemed like a lot. Cat and I used to split the money equally. Well I thought it was equally. But I wasn't very good at math. I eventually figured out she'd been tricking me out a couple of dollars each time. We spent the money on candy mostly. We would then tip our candy onto the table and make trades. It was a bit of a Friday tradition. Buy candy with the money we made, and trade it with each other. While Cat tricked me out of her money I tricked her out of her candy. I feel like she always knew our deals weren't fair, especially for her. She had favourites. I would play on those favourites. Sometimes even getting three times the amount of candy for that one thing she wanted. I was pretty much a master negotiator, when it came to candy. Not much else apparently. Cat used to make me do all of her chores too. We made deals that weren't fair for me. She would get me to do almost an hours worth of chores for $1. When I wanted her to do something for me; like print something off the computer (I didn't know how at that stage and Cat wasn't going to teach me. She'd lose her source of income) she would charge me an insane amount. Mom always stuck up for me though. Sometimes she would do her half of the deal and I would be about to pay her when Mom would come over and explain how unfair it was. Then I wouldn't have to pay. Cat got pretty mad about this sometimes. As she'd already done her half, for nothing. She deserved it really. But at the same time looking back I almost feel sorry for her. Almost. I mean it's not her fault I was dumb enough to make the deals. I moved from my spot on the stool to a booth. I sunk into the soft seats. It felt kind of foreign. But nice.