Peter

Chapter 7

"Okay." I could hear Officer Woods's confusion with the situation. He didn't see anything that happened inside the store.

I spent the next few hours figuring out where things should go in my new room, along with where things should go in Peter's room. I would've gotten Peter to help me, but he was preoccupied playing with Sparky, the Boston Terrier, and Turbo, the Golden Retriever. Hunter was sitting with me, he's still settling.

"Arielle," Officer Woods called up the stairwell, "grab Peter, we need to go stock the kitchen." Stock the kitchen is what Officer Woods said instead of grocery shopping.

"Okay," I called back, "I'll be down in a minute. Peter, c'mon, time to go." Peter likes going out and came to my side immediately. "Let's go buddy."

We spent a long time in the grocery store. We didn't know where anything was, and we needed more things than usual. It was the same grocery store chain as the one in our old town, so Officer Woods had a card and needed to get his name in this store's system. On the way out to the car I felt perfectly fine, then it happened.

I felt lonely, empty, like half of me was missing. I remembered a boy, a brother, Peter. I grabbed Peter and hid behind the wheel of the closest car, I couldn't protect everyone, but I could protect myself.

"What are you doing?" Officer Woods was really confused about what was going on.

"Get down."

"What?"

"Now!" Right after I said it they came. The cracks. There were too many to count, and the came at the speed of a drum roll. Officer Woods dove behind the car at the sound of the first one. This time I noticed it. Whenever I remember him, they are close, and they will try to kill me.

The shooting stopped a minute after it started, I stood up, and Peter followed. Officer Woods was awestruck at my ability to know. At first he just stared at me, then he spoke.

"How, how did you do that?"

"Do what?" I'm just avoiding answering.

"Know. How did you know that they were going to do that?"

"Every time, all three times they tried, I remembered him, Peter. It's sort of an uncontrollable flashback, but it's like my mind knows it's coming before I do, so I just go with my mind."

"Wow, that's amazing. It must be so scary." I looked down, then nodded. It is scary, it's terrifying. "Let's go home." I nodded and took Peter's hand.

We were silent on the way home. Once in the house the phone rang, and Officer Woods answered.

"Officer Taylor Woods, how can I help you?" There was a pause, then Officer Woods smiled. "It's for you." He handed me the phone.

"Hello?"

"Arielle? Is that you? It's Detective Fulton." I recognized the name. He was the man that told Officer Woods about Peter. I smiled.

"Oh, hi! How are you?"

"How am I? Arielle! How are you? You were just in a shooting!"

"I'm fine. I didn't get hurt, neither did Officer Woods or Peter. We're all fine."

"Good, good." Detective Fulton sighed. I knew he was relieved.

"Is that all?"

"No, but the other stuff I called for is between Officer Woods and me."

"Okay." I handed the phone back to Officer Woods and rushed upstairs, taking Peter with me. There's another landline in Officer Woods's room. I quickly picked it up and put it to my ear, covering the mouthpiece.

"What did you call for?" It's Officer Woods.

"It's something else about Arielle."

"What about her?"

"Not neccisarily her, but her brother. Apparently, we sent in a spy a few months ago, and he came in contact with a family."

"Get to your point, sir."

"The father of the family is the man who kidnapped Peter, he keeps Peter in a room in the back, playing it off as an adopted child with special needs. Sometimes Peter breaks out and says stuff like 'I want my life back' and 'why did you take me from my sister'."

"Whoa. This is a lot to take in." Officer Woods was speaking for the both of us, my brother wanted me back.

"But there's still one more thing."

"What?"

"He's the next-door neighbor of your parents."

"Wait, what? How is that possible? I've heard about both of their neighbors and their both really nice. I've never heard anything about any of this."

"Well, I called your parents and it turns out that they knew about him, but haven't met him because he's violent and they don't like talking about him." I hung up. I didn't want to hear anything else, and I sure wasn't going to bring this up to Officer Woods. We were going to continue life as is, and I'll see if he ever tells me. He will, but he's going to wait until I'm ready.