CHAPTER SIX
[6]
song: come a little closer by cage the elephant
She found solace in the fact that if Rafe made the call to Kitty Hawk, they wouldn't come and get her until Monday. But even then, as she sat in The Chateau watching the sun rise, she couldn't help but wonder how long she'd be gone this time.
She tried to think of ways to convince her grandma not to let them take her again. To tell her to give her a drug test, tell her that someone was lying, that she couldn't go back. But her grandma made that call once herself before, and even despite all of Cassie's letters saying she was fine and doing a lot better, she kept her there for a year. Maybe it was easier not having to worry about Cassie all the time when she was on the island, easier not to have to feed two bodies.
Another sleepless night added to her list of many. The Chateau, which was supposed to be her getaway from the bedroom where she was first hauled away, had now become the place Rafe Cameron had showed up in the night and threatened her. If she slept, if she even closed her eyes, she were leaving herself vulnerable.
Three cheap coffees in, Cassie spent her morning cleaning up the mess JJ had left from his stays here. Empty beer cans, dirty dishes in the sink, an unmade bed and clothes everywhere. She expected nothing less from the boy, but if John B were ever coming back, he deserved to come back to a clean house at least. And it was something to do to keep her mind off of the night before.
At eight thirty, she got two texts from her brother.
jj maybank:
we're On our way! home btw
and we have a surprise
two surprises
cassie maybank:
ok well i'm still at the chateau so i'll see you then
It was then she wondered if telling her brother, or anyone, about what had happened would be worth it. JJ would just end up doing something stupid if he heard what Rafe had said to her, if he knew he was here, alone, with his sister. Kiara would just get pissed. Pope would at least try to be calm, but in the end he'd probably join JJ in the act of doing something stupid.
She just wanted to enjoy today. She wanted to be with her friends, and have a care-free weekend like she should be able to. Like she used to.
And as Cassie dragged a trash bag down the porch stairs and over to the dumpster around the back of the house, she caught glance of a bigger, nicer fishing boat approaching the dock.
She dropped it into the trash can, keeping her eyes steady on it as she tried to see whose it was. My Druthers Too it read on the side. The Cameron's, surely, but that wasn't Rafe on there, that was her brother.
And John B.
Dropping the lid with a loud slam, she felt her feet start carrying her down to the docks, and fast, before her brain could even register what was happening.
"What's up Cassie Jude!" John B yells happily from the boat.
"Oh my god." Cassie mumbles with a smile, practically leaping onto the wooden dock as they got closer. "Oh my god!" She yelled, coming to a stop as JJ leaned off the side to tie up the boat.
JJ, Pope, Kiara, John B and Sarah Cameron. All here in the backyard.
When the boat was stable, John B got off first, brushed some dirt off of his board shorts, then looked up at Cassie with a smile and held his arms out.
It was an invitation for her to run towards him and collide him in a hug. And so she did. And she about knocked him right back off the dock in the process.
He lifted her up off the ground, letting out a happy laugh as she pulled away, shaking her head frantically as she tried to process how he was here, standing in front of her.
"What—" she looked to her brother, then to Pope, then back to John B. "What happened I thought you were in the Bahamas?!"
"Long story." Pope answers for him. "Very long story."
"You got tall." John B says, glancing from her to JJ.
JJ throws a rope back into the boat, holding out a hand to help everyone else off. "Yeah, chill out." JJ brushes it off with a scoff.
Cassie felt herself wanting to cry. This was the start of something better, a normal life once again. "You're so sunburnt." She squirmed, looking up at John B's face.
"Heyy!" John B exclaimed, turning to Kiara and Pope who got off the boat next.
Kiara snorted. "We told him you'd say that." She says, bringing Cassie in for a hug next. "That was the weirdest twenty four hours of my life." She huffs, pulls away, then looks at Cassie pointedly. "You okay?"
Cassie wondered what it was that made her ask that. Her dark circles, or her puffy red eyes from a night spent crying. "Yeah, yeah— I'm fine just—" she let out an exasperated laugh. "This is crazy."
And next, Sarah Cameron got off the boat, John B helping her. It looked like it hurt to move, like there was some strain there, and Cassie caught glance of a white bandage underneath her shirt.
The girl was just as Cassie remembered. Beautiful, and graceful, even despite an injury. And she was sweet, she offered to help JJ tie off the boat, she told John B thank you for giving her his hand. And when she saw Cassie, despite the fact that the two had never really spoken before, she smiled and pulled her in for a hug.
"I'm— I probably reek right now, I'm sorry." Sarah laughs into the hug. Cassie looked up at JJ and gave him a smile over Sarah's shoulder. The girl pulled away, nodded and then got a good look at Cassie. "I'm Sarah." She said.
"Cassie." She responded.
Sarah smiled again. "I was beginning to think you weren't real." She laughed a bit. "Every time JJ disappeared you knew he was writing to you. It was just this like— collective understanding." She says.
John B comes and stands next to Sarah. "How are you?" He asks.
Cassie inhales sharply, nodding. "I'm good." She then quickly gestures to them, shaking her head, realizing she should've asked them first. "How are you?" She looks to Sarah. "Are you okay?! There's a first aid kit I can—"
"I'm good." Sarah nodded, waving it off. "I got it all sewn up."
"We've got so much to tell you." JJ says, walking past Cassie on the dock to tie off the last side of the boat, leaving her with a pat on the shoulder.
"Can we start with how you have one of the Cameron's boats here and not Kie's car?" Cassie says, glancing past them towards the large fishing boat that looked like a yacht compared to her grandma's that sat next to it.
"Yeah, so my parents wouldn't let me take the car— then they threatened me with boarding school." Kiara remarks.
"Boarding school?" Cassie's eyes widen.
"I gotta be honest, I'm not exactly looking forward to a check in at home." Kiara nods, leaning against the railing with her arms crossed. "They've probably already arranged my funeral."
"And, yeah, so we ended up taking my pop's truck, which broke down and we just left in the middle of nowhere." Pope says. "So I also predict unpleasantries at the Heyward household."
And this was when Cassie should've said that this very well could be her last weekend here, but she kept quiet.
"No one knows we're here, right?" JJ says, watching as the group's moods slowly begin to falter. "And you two aren't gonna get into any more trouble for showing up twelve hours later. Am I right? Or am I right?"
Pope shrugs. "Well, I mean you're not wrong."
"So, that means we have twelve hours to do whatever we want. Huh? A little Pogue fellowship?" JJ says excitedly.
"Let shit hit the fan tomorrow." John B agrees
"The cops could be looking for us it could be really stupid." Sarah shakes her head worriedly.
Cassie narrows her eyebrows to Pope. "So that didn't— clear them? The material evidence?"
Pope sighs. "Yeah, no. Bitch was crazy. Started chasing us down the streets with guns and shit—"
Cassie whipped her head over to Sarah, gesturing towards her wound. "Did they—"
Sarah shakes her head. "No, uh—" she thinks for a minute, then swallows. "This was my brother."
Cassie felt her heart drop. "Your brother?" She pauses and think. "Rafe? He shot you?"
Sarah nods, looking at John B. "Yeah, he... we ran into him and my dad in the Bahamas a few days ago. He had a gun— I don't know. I don't think he was aiming at me but—" Sarah never finished her sentence.
If he was willing to shoot his sister, Cassis feared how easily he could have done the same to herself.
"Enough with the logical thinking." JJ cuts into the conversation. "Sarah Cameron, you've heard my philosophy, right?"
"Stupid things have good outcomes all the time." John B mutters.
JJ spins around with a smile on his face, pointing at John B. "Exactly. Come on, twelve hours. Let's get some beer!" He says, making his way back down to the boat he had just finished tying up.
"It's like— barely nine am." Kiara says, following JJ back down the dock.
"It's twelve o'clock somewhere." JJ says confidently.
Kiara glances at Cassie, who was already following them back down to the boat. "How does he get that wrong every time?" She questions quietly.
And it was here, sitting on this boat with her friends, gliding through the waters on a Saturday morning, heading into town to get some beer, that Cassie felt normal again. That she could laugh, and joke, and smack her brother's arm when she finds out he'd done something incredibly stupid. When she can gasp when she finds out how the group had found each other in Charleston. It was here, listening to their stories, hearing John B's voice, seeing JJ act happy again, that things felt good.
She twisted the radio dial until it landed on a station she was happy with, feeling the breeze on her skin as she steered the boat towards town.
Sarah sat closest to her, leaning over the back of the seat to watch Cassie as she clicked a few dials and manned the ship for a while. "Where'd you learn how to do all this?" Sarah asks curiously.
Cassie turns around and glances at her, smiling before turning back to look forward off the boat. "When I first moved back here— from Texas— my dad had me docking ships at the boatyard for some cash for a while." She says. "I didn't even have a boating license— but it tipped well." She shrugged happily.
Sarah watched the girl. "Did you like Texas?"
Cassie nods. "Yeah, I was there for like ten years so I... I guess I know it better than the island? But," she pauses, thinks for a moment, looks over to JJ, who was on the other end of the boat, sitting next to John B, Kiara, and Pope, and then she smiles. "But this has always felt more like home to me. I don't know." She shrugs it off.
Cassie pulls the boat off to a stop at the general store docks, on the edge of town. "Can you get like a fizzy drink? Not just beer? Like— I don't know something with flavor?" She says, watching as JJ and Kiara climb out of the boat and onto the docks.
"You're such a girl." JJ says, pulling Kiara out of the boat, to which she smacked his arm, turned to Cassie, and nodded a 'yes, ignore him.'
"Okay, so this Limbrey girl, she's—" Cassie sits back down in the captain's seat, shaking her head at Pope and urging him to continue the story.
"She's like an evil super villain, alright? She walked around with a cane in this huge-ass mansion, and—" Pope uses his hands to speak. "And she has henchmen. And they chased us down the streets because I was like, I'm getting the fuck out of here. I don't know— shit was crazy though."
Cassie turns to John B and Sarah. "And you two just literally run into them? Running from Limbrey?"
John B nods, then uses his hands to demonstrate. "Yes, like full on collision. We came out of an alley and crashed into them on the sidewalk."
Cassie let out a laugh, shaking her head. "What are the chances of that?!"
"That's what I said!" Sarah says, flailing her hand out towards Cassie.
"Lemonade hard seltzer." JJ announces, as he and Kiara carry a collective of four boxes of drinks back down the docks and towards the boat where everyone waited. "Is that fizzy enough?" JJ asks, hopping back in the boat.
Cassie happily takes the box from him and sets it down behind her chair. "It'll do."
When the sun set, it was a full on private party at The Chateau. The cover of the hot tub was taken off for the first time in forever, golden lights were strung from tree to tree, music played from a loud speaker, the fire burned and Cassie's stomach ached from one too many s'mores.
Sat in the hot tub besides Kiara and across from Sarah, Cassie listened as Sarah gave her and Kiara that run down of what exactly had happened in the Bahamas, in the time her and John B were presumed dead.
"Ok, so you actually got married?" Kiara asks Sarah.
The girl laughed a bit. "It wasn't exactly legal, but, yeah." Then she narrowed her eyes forward at Kiara. "And, am I crazy, or is there definitely something going on between you and Pope?"
Kiara's lips pursed into a tight line, and Cassie about shot up out of the water with excitement. "I knew it!" Cassie exclaimed, and Kiara swatted at her, laughing.
"Shut up!" Kiara says, glancing over to where the boys stood by the fire not too far from them.
Cassie smiled proudly. "I knew it."
"So, what happened are you two like—" Sarah tried to press Kiara for more. "A thing? Officially?"
"No, no." Kiara shook her head. "Not officially."
"Make a move, tonight's a perfect night to do it." Cassie encouraged her. "Just— I don't know, go somewhere private and... get to it."
Kiara turns to Cassie with wide eyes, fighting off more laughter. "You're— ew."
"She's right though." Sarah shrugged, taking a sip from her beer, then she gestures to Cassie. "What about you? Have you talked to anyone since you've been back?"
Cassie took a breath, realizing that since the second she's been back it's been pure chaos, and the only people her age she's even socialized with were the people here.
And Rafe Cameron.
She swayed her head from side to side, scrunching her nose up until the head-swaying eventually turned to a head-shaking. "Not really." She frowned a bit. "Been a little side tracked."
"What about that Caleb guy that sits at the table across from us in AP gov?" Kiara says, turning her head towards Cassie. "Didn't you two have a thing before you left?"
Cassie snorted. "If by a thing you mean he kissed me once at a boneyard party and then never glanced in my direction again, then yes."
Kiara frowned, then looked to Sarah. "She struggles in the man department."
Cassie about spit out her beer. "I do not?!"
Cassie's experience in dating was limited. Back in Waco, she had a boyfriend in fifth grade. He was her neighbor, and her mom's friend's son. They held hands once, and that was the extent of that relationship.
When she was fourteen, Cassie talked to one guy for a few months, only texted, never actually hung out.
She's always had a crush on John B. Everyone had a crush on John B. He was pure charisma, and charm, and he was just good. He'd always been nice, and respectful, and always made sure everyone felt included. But he never viewed Cassie as anything more than a little sister, as he so often liked to remind her.
When she was fifteen, she had her first kiss with Caleb, which was embarrassingly short, and even more embarrassing since she had to be the one to initiate it, as he was too nervous to do it himself.
And that was it.
Kiara laughs, then nods quickly. "Girl, yes you do. But in a good way, you just never— catch on when someone's flirting with you. You assume they're just being nice, so you don't give anything back, and then—" Kiara shrugs. "And then nothing happens."
Cassie wanted a boyfriend, sure. But it had never been something she'd actively pursued. If it happens, if happens, if it didn't, she'd be content with that too.
Cassie leaned back against the edge of the hot tub. "I don't—" she stops. "Yeah, I— yeah I do."
And then, like something switched all at once in the boys, all peace was gone, and chaos ensued. JJ had made some sort of helmet, with eyes cut out, out of an empty beer box, putting it on his head, and then cannon balled into the three-feet-deep Hot Tub.
But of course, he opted to remove the handgun— that Cassie didn't even want to begin to wonder where he got it— from his waistband to leave on the cooler before he jumped in, because 'safety first.'
The music got louder, and the previous conversations fell to a close, as the only things the group wanted to discuss now was how many beers JJ could shot gun in sixty seconds. Or, who was the better freestyle rapper Pope or John B, to which they had a rap battle, and Cassie felt so much second hand embarrassment there were tears in her eyes as she watched it all go down.
At some point, Cassie reached her hand out to accept the blunt that was being pass around, to which JJ shook his head and muttered a quiet, "Don't, Cas." And the hot tub fell into an awkward silence as Kiara hesitantly handed it to Pope instead of Cassie.
It wasn't worth explaining to everyone there that weed and painkillers were not really in the same wheelhouse when it came to her addiction. It wasn't worth ruining the mood, so she just passed on it for tonight.
"Done." Cassie says, after braiding John B's hair into two tiny little buns, as sat in front of her on a lawn chair.
"Oh, wow, John B." JJ says, looking up from wrestling Pope in the grass. "You're beautiful."
John B flipped an imaginary strand of hair behind his shoulder. "Thank you." He says.
"Next!" Cassie announces, tapping John B's shoulders and urging him out of the chair.
"Go, JJ." Pope pushes JJ off of him, after he'd quickly returned to their game.
JJ let his head fall into the grass with a huff. "I can't move." He says reluctantly.
Pope bends down and yanks him up and off the ground. "Come on, come on."
Cassie watches happily as Pope pulls JJ into her salon chair, a beer in his hand as he huffs into the seat. Kiara and Sarah smile and watch from under the tree in the distance, and John B takes JJ's place in the wrestling game.
"Do you want matching buns?" She asks casually.
"Can I opt out?" JJ answers.
"Mm, no." Cassie shakes her head, grabbing a tuft of her brothers blonde hair. JJ lets out a breathy laugh, and Cassie smiles. "Tonight has been so fun." She says, starting the braiding process.
JJ sighs deeply. "Yeah, yeah. It's been good." He says, as the two siblings watch as the commotion continued ahead of them. "What was—" JJ starts, but wasn't sure how to word it. "How was your meeting the other night with Kitty Hawk?"
Her heart couldn't help but skip a beat when she heard the name. "Fine." She shrugs. "They're just gonna keep checking on me to make sure I'm still good."
There was a small period of silence. "And are you?" JJ eventually asks.
Cassie keeps her eyes focused on his hair. "Mhm." She answers.
She could tell it was hard for her brother to try and have serious conversations with her. It wasn't something they ever experienced with their dad, if there were problems, they ignored them until they went away. If someone was upset about something, you cried it out on your own. You don't ask for help, you don't expect encouragement. You deal on your own.
But JJ had realized a long time ago that Cassie needed these things. She needed to talk it out, she needed the encouragement, and she needed the help. It was one of the main reasons he had told her grandma about Kitty Hawk in the first place. Her way of dealing on her own had become dangerous.
And he knew she'd hate him for it, which is why he'd never tell her it was his idea and not her grandma's. He knew, despite her quiet responses on how Kitty Hawk was fine, he knew it was hard on her. But she was here, and she was alive because of it. So he'd never regret any of it.
"Would you tell me if you weren't?" JJ spoke up.
"Weren't what?" Cassie asks, tying off the tiny braid with a hair tie.
"Like—" JJ uses his hands as he tries to think of the right words. "Doing good anymore?"
"Doing well." Cassie corrected.
He snorted. "Okay, doing well."
She shrugged a bit, not confident in her answer, but wanting to give him that ease anyways. "Yeah, of course." She said, and when JJ opened his mouth to respond, to continue the conversation, she announced she was, "Done!"
"Where's Pope?" JJ says disappointedly when he gets up from the chair and realizes have his audience had left him. "And Kie?"
Sarah gives Cassie a knowing look as she sat by the fire, and Cassie's mouth formed and 'oh' shape.
"Seriously?!" JJ says, looking around at all of his friends as they laughed. "I leave for two minutes and you two just go and let them— fondle?"
Sarah about choked on her beer. "Fondle?!"
"Ew, God, JJ." Cassie says, walking past him and towards the house. "Do you need anything from inside?" She asks him, turning around briefly to wait for his answer.
"Um, bleach. And a knife. To stab myself with." JJ retorts.
"Mature, JJ." Cassie hears Sarah mutter as she keeps walking.
On the inside, it was quiet, but she could still hear the laughter from outside, she could still hear the bass of the music from the speaker. She could still feel the happy hums in her heart from a day well spent.
Grabbing a box of half eaten cereal from the pantry, and a can of whipped cream from the fridge, as she made her way back down the steps from the porch to the yard, she felt the silence.
Stopping and looking up to see John B, JJ and Sarah frozen, and all staring out towards the tree line, she turned to see a car coming to a slow in the distance.
"Go, go, hide!" JJ says, quickly and frantically, and everyone sprung into action at once.
Cassie dropped her things, not exactly sure who it was they were hiding from, she couldn't see around the bushes, but she did as she was told.
She ran around to the side of the house, watching as JJ quickly helped give Sarah a leg up as John B pulled her up and onto one of the branches of the large oak tree. Cassie was too far away to hide with them, and they were too far away to hide with her.
"Shit, come on!" John B whisper-yelled, as JJ climbed the tree higher until they were fully covered by the branches and leaves.
And just as Cassie were about to settle into a hiding spot behind the dumpster on the side of the house, she caught glance of the handgun sitting on the cooler.
It was as if she had a split second to decide, because she did. Springing up from her spot, while hearing whispers of protest from the tree, she ran, grabbed the gun, and nestled back to her hiding spot before getting caught.
Footsteps came next, two of them, crunching against the leaves and getting louder as they got closer.
She felt the weight of the heavy gun in her hands, not sure why she grabbed it, as a completely foreign object to her. She wouldn't know what to do if it came down to it. She forced herself closer against the wall of the house and sucked in a breath, as she heard footsteps come towards the front porch that she was just around the corner from.
Whoever it was, slammed the door open with a loud kick and she clung a hand to her mouth to quiet her heavy breathing.
Peeling her head off the wall, slowly she peaked around the corner to see none other than Rafe Cameron standing by the freshly put out fire, her friends all hidden up in the tree right above him.
He wore the same clothes he had on the night before, although this time, there was a gun tightly held in his hand.
She felt her body begin to tremble. Suddenly the darkness she hid herself in didn't feel safe either, as if at any moment someone could come around any corner and grab at her ankles, her throat, and kill her there.
"Where the hell are you?" She heard Rafe whisper to himself as he slowly moved his head around to scan the property, readjusting his grip on the gun.
Cassie heard glass break from inside and she jumped, squeezing her eyes shut.
The last thing Cassie would imagine Rafe would do next was to show up with a gun and try to kill her. Maybe that was naïve. Maybe in that, she'd given Rafe the benefit of the doubt.
His little speech about feeling guilt about it all fell futile as she watched him search the yard, hungry to kill, and she, a lamb to the slaughter.
Whoever was inside came charging out, angry, she could hear it in each step they took, hear it without the porch door slammed against the wall as they shoved it open.
Rafe looks up, shaking his head. "Anything?"
"Nah, ain't shit in there, bro." It was Barry with him.
"Nothing?"
"No, nothing, Rafe." Barry responds annoyedly.
"Obviously they were just here based off the smoke?!" Rafe raises his voice, pointing his gun at the fire.
"Yeah, yeah, great observation, boy scout." Barry cracks back.
"They've gotta be around here somewhere." Rafe says, starting to pace. "She was just here, I talked to her last night, right here." He yelled, gesturing towards the porch. "They can't be far."
Cassie glanced up at the tree, she could barely see them, but all Rafe needed to do was look up, and they'd be dead. No one would bring a gun somewhere just to have a conversation. Whether it was Cassie, or someone else, Rafe was here to kill.
"Cassie!" Rafe yelled, an anger in his voice that made her name strain in his throat. "Sarah!"
Cassie closed her eyes, pinning her body against the wall as she grazed her finger over the trigger of the gun at her side.
"Come on," Rafe yelled again, and she could tell he was pacing, walking around the yard, as he yelled. "Come on, we know you're here!"
Cassie called his bluff, and now since Kitty Hawk was no longer a viable threat, he had to get rid of her another way. And he knew his sister was alive, back in the OBX, one of the only other few people who knew what he'd done— he had to get rid of her, too. And John B, and whoever else wanted to try and get in his way.
Cassie felt herself stepping out from around the corner, just slightly, as she brought her other hand to cock back the gun like she'd seen in the movies. Instinct, maybe, but her brother was right there.
"Aw, your sister's a Pogue for life. Who woulda thought?" Barry taunted him, as Rafe stood right in front of the carved out memorial for John B in the tree trunk he hid in. P4L it read.
Cassie couldn't see his face, but she could see the rise and fall of his shoulders, of the cracking of his knuckles, of the scrunching of his nose, and the tired, slow blinking of his eyes, as he grew angrier and angrier by the second.
Glancing up at the tree, trying to get a better look at them, she met JJ's eyes, watching her, he glanced at the gun in her hands, back up to her, and then slowly, he shook his head.
"Shit!" Rafe yelled, making Cassie quickly retreat back behind the wall with a start.
And then she heard gunshots, two loud ones right after another, and she brought the gun up to her eyesight, panicking, trying to understand if it was already cocked, or if it were on safety, or if it even had bullets. But she needed to protect JJ, or at least try.
"Hey! Whoa! Chill, Rafe!" Barry yells, pulling Rafe away, grabbing at his arms and sending the bullets flying upwards toward the tree.
Cassie peaked her head around quickly, jumping with every shot, fidgeting with the gun in her hand. Her brother was right there.
"Chill out! Rafe! Chill your shit!" Barry yells. "You're gonna get our asses busted, bro." He pushed back on Rafe's chest forcefully until he stopped. "Let's bounce, come on— let's go!"
Cassie's hands trembled, and as she watched Barry start running back towards the way she came, half hidden behind the wall, she watched as Rafe lingered in his spot for a moment.
Slowly, he breathed in and out. She could hear the shaking in every inhale as he collected himself, as he let the rage simmer out, and then, as he turned to follow after Barry, he saw her.
Laid before him, stupid lamb, in a slaughterhouse.
Both of them were still, both of them trying to calculate the other's next move. There was something unspoken there as they stared at the other, a mutual fear, a mutual understanding, as Rafe glanced down at the gun in her hands.
She thought back to what he said only the night before. 'Would you not have done the same thing, if that were your brother? If someone was holding a gun out towards your brother— would you not have done everything you could've to protect him? Even if it meant killing someone?'
Could she have done it? Could she have fired the gun at Rafe if it meant she'd be saving the life of someone she loved? Could she kill someone? Like he had done for all the same reasons?
He had the perfect shot, the perfect opportunity to kill her and save himself.
Deer-hunter, waste not your arrow on the hare.
Rafe blinked a few times, whether he was hesitating or just coming to, but he never took his eyes off of her, until he turned to leave.
a/n
i hope ur all enjoying this bc i'm having way too much fun writing it :') pls vote and comment and all that <3
- jane