Look, for nine months everybody has tried to make us believe that our dad's dead. They say we're in denial. Whatever. Denial's underrated, you should try it sometime, its highly effective, and its only denial if you're wrong.
It doesnt make any sense, our dad is the last guy who would ever get lost at sea. The compass coming back to us, out fathers compass which was passed down for generations, its a sign. Our dad is still alive, and we're gonna find him
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I woke up and went for a quick run, when I got back I saw JJ looking at a paper that was on the door "Hey, whats that?" I asked him, I took the paper and saw that it was from the DSC, I groaned looking at it
"Come on, lets scare John B" said JJ banging on the door "DSC! I know you're in there" he looked at me and smiled, then jumped on the window, I saw John B jump really scared, JJ and I started laughing and i opened the door
Today we were going over to Lana Grubbs and ask her if she knew anything about why the compass was in the boat. I changed quickly and then got into the van with the guys
"Im just sayin', I dont understand why you dont atleast try with Kiara" said JJ "She clearly likes you" i added "She's like 'oh John B!'" said JJ imitating Kie
"Is that what she says?" asked John B "She's sketching about you diving, and then she kissed you bro" said JJ making a point
"She kissed me on the cheek, its not like we were making out or something" said JB "Low - hanging fruit bro" said JJ
"Dont pretend that you dont notice, I see it in your eyes, youre like, 'I kinda like that', then you start blushing" i told him "I blush?" he asked "Yeah" said JJ
"Really?" he asked us again "Yeah" JJ told him again, then he grabbed the compass making John B freak out and try to take it away from him "Hey, John B, its okay, he was just looking at it" i told him
"i gotta admit, your fathers compass in Scotters boat, thats freaky" said JJ
"Yeah, and thats exactly why we're going to talk to Ms Lana, figure this whole thing out" said JB
"Im sure she would just love to talk to us, its not like her husband just drowned or anything" said JJ
We arrived at the house, it looked really hippie "You know what this house looks like?" asked us John B
"Whoever lives here smokes too much weed" said JJ, as we got closer to the house we heard things breaking and some men screaming
"Maybe we should come back. Its a little too soon" said JJ, I grabbed his hand and squeezed it
"No, no, shut up. Shut up JJ" said my brother getting closer, the closer we got the more we heard the men and Ms Lana sobbing, both JJ and i stopped and looked at eachother with concern in our eyes
"come on" said John B, we walked to the wall and got down, hearing the men threatning Ms Lana to hurt her while she just cried "Still think we should stay?" i whispered, I heard them mention the compass and looked at John B, JJs hand were still interwined with mine and i grabbed them harder
I soon felt something falling in my hair "Is that paint?" asked JJ shaking it off of his hair "Yes, its paint" said John B
"We should just go. He's got smuggler-" said JJ but was cut off by JB telling him to shut up "Smuggler written all over him" continued JJ, we saw the men walking out of the house and quickly stepped back
"Dude, those are the guys that shot at us" said JJ as we saw them get into the boat "Go back, go back, go back" JB told us as they started leaving
We waited a little until they were gone and got into the house, we heard Ms Lana sobbing, I looked at JJ really questioning if we should be here
"Ms Lana?" asked John B "Ms Lana. Hey, hey" he said rushing over to her and kneeling besides her "Hey, are you okay?" asked her John B "Its okay, its okay"
"Dude, she's tweaking, lets go" said JJ and pulled me with him, JB ignored us and said "Do you need a doctor"
"Lets call the sheriff's department" i told them, but Ms Lana was quick to say "No cops, please"
"Mm, thats not good, come on dude. Lets just go" said JJ "You shouldnt be here" said Ms Lana sobbing "Thats enough for me, come on" said JJ pulling me but John B told us to wait, I got closer to JJ, and hugged him
"What do you know about these guys?" asked John B "They were looking for something" she said, JB looked at me and took out the compass
"Does it have anything to do with this?" he asked her showing her the compass "Do you know anything about this? This was my father and Scotter had it. Why?" he asked her
"Scooter didnt have it, okay? Dont tell anyone that you have it" she said, I got really worried "Come on" i said but John B didnt listen to me
"Why?" JB asked "They cant know! Youve gotta get out of here" she exclaimed "What do you know about the compass?" said John B again, JJ and i knew that we had to go so we both started pulling John B up "We gotta go, lets go!" i told him
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"And then we were right outside like this, and all we hear is 'Bam! Bam! Bam!' knocking paint off the wall, G! From the inside, all right! And i was just looking at them like- Wait, first off, look at this shit. Look at it" said JJ telling the story to Kie and Pope, and started shaking his hair to show the remaining paint
"That's dandruff, disgusting" said Kie "Okay thank you" said Pope since JJ was throwing him the paint
"Look at all that, all right?" JJ said "That's paint. At that point, I was just, like... Im waiting for death" he said looking all flustered from telling the story
"Okay, so, you saw the guys that shot at us, right?" asked Pope "Yeah" i replied "Did you get a good description of them? What they looked like?" he asked us "Anything is helpful" said Kie "Anything that we can bring to a police report, maybe" said Pope looking at JJ
"Burly" was all he said "Burly?" asked pope "Yeah, you know, like-" he said but Kie cut him off "Thats not very helpful"
"Okay, well, no, like the type of guy at my dad's garage. I mean, you guys know he made cargo hides for drug smugglers" said JJ
"Yes, yeah, no we know-" started saying Kie but JJ continued talking
"So i can tell you with full confindence, these boys, these killers" he stopped and took a hint of his blunt, then continued "Theyre square groupers"
"Theyre square groupers, like narco square groupers? Like Pablo Escobar square grouper?" asked pope
"Yeah man" said JJ "You guys, not everything is a kingpin movie" said Kie
"Okay so how do these square grouper look like? Specifically" asked pope again
"you werent there" said JJ raising his voice a little "Cause apparently, you dont know what to look for" said Pope stressing out because he didnt have a good description of them
"Dude! I wasnt taking little mental polaroids the entire time, man, I was under duress, okay?" exclaimed JJ "But i can tell you. I can tell you by the way Ms Lana was screaming, that these guys are serious, serious hombres, man. Its a heavy vibe right now, okay? Im not liking this very much"
"Why would they want the compass?" asked Kie "That thing is a piece of shit, you could pawn it for five bucks if you wanted to" Pope said, then looked at John B and i and said "No offense guys, I know its like in your family-" John B cut him off and said "The office"
"What?" Pope asked "Our dad, our dads office" he looked at me "He always kept the office locked because he was worried about his competitors stealing his royal merchant research" he said
I got up and went to drink an Advil beacuse i had a headache from everything that was happening right now, then I saw all the guys entering the house and following John B into our fathers office
"Hey princess, you coming?" asked JJ "Yeah, i'll catch up with you guys, i'll just go change quickly since my shirt is full of paint" i told him, he smiled at me and said "Okay, i'll wait for you"
"Oh, Its okay, you can go with the others" i told him, he came over and hugged me "fine, but be quick" "I will" i said
I washed the cup and went into my room to change, I was picking out my shirt when I heard someone scream "John Routledge" what? Then I recognized the voice, it was one of the guys that was hitting Ms Lana 'fuck, what do I do, what do I do?' I asked myself thinking quickly, I got into my closet and put my hand over my mouth trying to not make noise
I heard them breaking stuff and i started crying, hearing them closer every second, then I heard a gunshot and a sob left my mouth, I covered it again and tried to control my breathing, but still cried in silence
Some time passed and i opened the closet "Ava!" i heard everyone screaming throughout the house, I was about to open the door but then it opened and i saw JJ, I collapsed into his arm and cried "oh my god, Ava are you okay?" he asked me worried as he held me, I nodded not being able to form words "dont ever scare me like that again, princess" he whispered in my ear, I opened my eyes and saw John B coming into the room
"Thank god you're okay Ava" he said, I let go of JJ and went over to my brother hugging him, we just held each other glad that we were okay