Chapter 2: Zavier

“I’m going to a junior college across the state. It’s my first choice, and I’m very excited about it.” Zavier lied with a grin.

“I’m so excited for you, I think you could do great things.” replied May in a cheerful tone. At least Zavier wasn’t the only one lying.

Zavier smiled and kept sweeping the fries on the floor into the pan. It was past closing time and Zavier was very much ready to go home. Truth be told, he did not really need this job at the local burger joint. He had enough of a scholarship that his parents could cover the rest of his looming tuition payments next fall. It just felt nice to have a little play money for his last semester of high school. When Zavier got paid, he would always fantasize about using it to go to clubs in nearby Seattle or blow it on some vain girlfriend. In reality his existing pattern of expenditures was currently just on his computer gaming account. There was always the possibility of next week or the summer for things to happen. But Zavier would admit that was likely a lie he told himself.

Zavier made his last round sweeping around the restaurant. As he finished, he sighed and prepared to lock up. May was long gone. She never stayed until the end of the shift. The manager did not mind as long as it was ten or fifteen minutes beforehand and not overly egregious. Zavier suspected he would get the same leniency but he did not want to bet his job on that assumption. Zavier signed out at 11:00 sharp, walked out, and hopped into his Toyota Camry.

It was about a twenty minute drive through his suburb to his parent’s home where he lived. Zavier turned on the bluetooth, started his music playlist labeled “chill”, and pulled his car onto the road. This in many ways was the best part of his day; The drive home. His job was not all that strenuous so it was not really the elation of finishing. It was more about driving around the town during the night with the soft synthesizer beats coming through the car speakers that gave him a free flowing feeling that he enjoyed. He felt the most free during these times. His independence, not from his parents, but from the uninspired path he felt at every other moment of his life, never seemed more real than now. It was a terribly cliche feeling, but it never got old.

As Zavier pulled up to his house, he parked his car along the curb of the front yard. There wasn’t enough room in the garage with his parents' cars. Bzzz. His phone buzzed. It was a text from May.

“Come smoke.”

Zavier pulled his car back out of the lot.

Zavier wasn’t much of a stoner or a pothead. He smoked socially which meant he did whenever someone he did not hate asked him to. May was one of those people. She was really hot. There was no way around it without being blunt. But Zavier knew he didn’t have prayer. He wasn’t a bad looking guy or anything but to continue with being blunt, he just kind of sucked.

Zavier reflexively attempted to correct this overtly negative self-talk that May had unknowingly triggered with her text. He did not suck or was overtly and offensively terrible. There was just not much that was decisively positive about him or his life. At eighteen, he was a minimal existence woefully short of anything noteworthy. Because of this, May texting him to smoke was just something he had to speed off for everytime it happened. At the very least Zavier could feel like he was doing something that someone else wished they could. Those other wishers for May’s time were primarily just an avalanche of horny guys. But he got May’s invite consistently because she knew he was not about that. She knew he was not stupid enough to run full sprint to rejection.

Zavier pulled the car to the empty movie theater. This was the meeting place for their late night rendezvous. Most movie theaters stayed open past midnight during the summer but this one was small, old, and it was a Wednesday. The lot was empty except for a few parked cars by the only street light. These must be extra cars or those owned by the maintenance workers. Either way Zavier went to the dark end of the lot. By the spot. He sat there waiting, surprised that he got there before May.

God I hope she's not bringing someone else. Zavier thought to himself

Her car pulled up. He waited for a few more moments. It became clear to Zavier that May must want him to come to her. So he did. The passenger door opened. Zavier glanced around inconspicuously. There was only May in the car. The radio was off and the A/C was all the way up. May liked things way too cold in Zavier’s opinion.

“Are you too cold?” May asked as he settled in the passenger seat.

“Nope. It's the middle of June. You ready to do this?”

“We’ve got to go pick up.”

“I’ve got extra in my trunk. If you’ve got five or ten dollars-”

“I don’t want your stuff!” There was about ten seconds of the A/C blowing after May yelled. She brought her voice back to pleasant to resume their conversation, “Look, I’m trying a new guy. I’ve heard the stuff is good.” Given the inherent risk of buying from someone new, it was becoming increasingly clear why Zavier was invited.

“How far away?” Zavier asked. He slumped in his chair and stared out the window.

“Only across town. And I’ll give you half for free, I just don't know this guy very well. I’ve actually never met him.”

“Is this a good idea?”

“Oh come on, he camps out by the mall with the Nordstrom. Listen Zavee, you might be leaving me in two months but I got one more year stuck here. And another summer after that at the damn burger place before college. If he’s got good stuff it's going to make me a very happy girl next year. You wouldn’t want me to be sad, would you?”

“You know I’m only going to be forty-five minutes away, I could just come back.”

“What would you come back for?” Zavier’s heartbeat beat a little harder than he would have liked after that response from May.

“I guess my parents,” he said dismissively.

“Ok, that’s… reasonable.” May trailed off and put the car in drive.

They drove in silence the entire way there. The car finally lurched to a stop when they reached their destination. They were behind the mall they had set out for. Or more accurately they were behind the grocery store connected to the mall. Zavier had not been to this mall in years. A lot of people from his high school came out here because it had some brand stores that his side of town did not. He was not that type of consumer. His needs were met with convenience more so than variety or prestige. The back of the megastore mainly consisted of service entrances and loading bays. Despite being near midnight, Zavier was quietly shocked people got away with dealing here. About five minutes after they arrived another car pulled up and stalled its engine on the curb.

“Let’s go.” May said quietly as she turned the key and slinked out.

Zavier quietly followed. They walked together over to the second car. The window rolled down. Inside was the scruffy looking guy. He was an odd looking fellow with buggy eyes, a patchy shadow on his chin and neck, and hair that was unsymmetrical in a less than pleasant way. He looked like he was in his thirties but there were enough youthful facial features that Zavier knew he was much younger, most likely around their age. He just looked older.

“Hi, I’m May, are you the spider?” May said in a hushed voice.

Zavier was thoroughly unimpressed with this man as it was and could barely keep a straight face upon learning his little nickname. The man did not respond to the question. He looked past May and gave a dead-eyed stare to Zavier. Something about this guy was just insulting to Zavier. He felt a growing urge to tell him to go fuck himself that was getting closer to an action with each passing second.

“Excuse me, I’m May, Hi. Are you going to sell me weed?” May said again, this time rather impatiently with only a thin veneer of false kindness.

Not taking his eyes off of Zavier, he replied in a low, annoyed voice “I’m here to buy as well.”

“Oh, so you’re not our guy,” Zavier said as he grabbed May’s arm, “Well don’t let us ruin your night.” He turned and started heading back to May’s car with her following behind. Zavier did not want to admit it, but May letting him guide her back was rather exciting despite the circumstances that preceded it.

“Hello May.” called out a new voice as they returned to her car. Another man emerged from behind one of the truck bodies. This man was clearly an adult and dressed in a nice suit with his hair slicked back. “I apologize for being late.” Now here was someone who looked like they sold weed to high schoolers! This American Psycho knock off was most definitely The Spider.

“You’ve brought so many friends. I thought this was a small transaction.” The Spider said in an amused but clearly uncomfortable voice.

“This is Zavier, my friend, and I have no idea who the hell that is.” May said, eyeing the stalled car across the lot.

“Is he coming out?” the Spider asked in a friendly, mature voice.

They all looked at the car. Nothing.

“I need to talk to him then, it isn’t a good practice for me to have people just hanging out while I deal.” The Spider’s smile had washed away to a scowl as he sighed, tensed up, and walked towards the car. As he approached it, he knocked and motioned for the other man to roll down the window. The Spider had returned to a smile but this one was pretty deliberately unfriendly. The window did not roll down.

The Spider knocked again on the window a little harder, “If this dude doesn’t…”. His temper began to flair as the inconvenience had become too much for his manners. Suddenly, the door flung open and a brilliant flash of yellow light bloomed out of the door. The impact knocked the Spider flat on his back.

Zavier’s reaction was nearly instantaneous. He grabbed May and almost dragged her back into the car. She was shell shocked and did not say a word. Zavier grabbed the keys out of her clenched hand and started the vehicle. Every maneuver was made with speed in mind as Zavier kept expecting to be fired on at any given moment. As they sped away, he nervously looked in the rearview mirror. The car was stalled, its driver seat open. The man known as The Spider was lying on his back about ten feet from the door. He was unconscious at best. The other man was nowhere in sight.

This was incredibly concerning but Zavier felt like his best choice of action did not change. He quickly turned around the bend to the front of the grocery store, gunned it to the mall lot exit, and turned on the main road. The car was going nearly double the speed limit as Zavier raced back to their side of town.

“Slow down!” May suddenly screamed. It was like she had broken out of suspended animation. Zavier toed the gas and brought their speed down to just above the legal limit.

“We can’t let ourselves get followed.” Zavier spoke in a panicked voice. His initial reaction to the immediate threat had blunted his emotions until now. As he answered May, his voice was finally revealing how he really felt.. What the hell just happened?

“What do we do?” May looked at Zavier in desperation, hoping that he had some idea on how they could normalize the events this evening.

Zavier slowed to a stop at a red light and tried to piece together a plan that shielded May and him from any type of fallout.

“Zavee.” May shrieked impatiently. She was now crying. Zavier had to give her something or she could screw them if she panicked.

The light turned green and Zavier slammed on the gas and cleared his throat. “We do nothing.” Zavier made a special effort to avoid showing as much panic as he did moments earlier. “We go home. We were never there. There’s no cameras behind that mall or people wouldn’t deal there. They’ll find the body, they’ll investigate. We’re innocent so even if they track back to us somehow, we’ll just cooperate and say the truth and that we did not come forward earlier because we were scared. Otherwise we stay out of whatever that was.”

“You don’t think he's dead? The Spider.” May said in a hushed voice.

“That was point blank and it had to have been a firearm.” Zavier replied. He could feel his heartbeat slowly coming down as he approached the movie theater where his car was parked.

“ But it didn’t look like a gunshot. It didn’t sound like-”

“I don’t care.” Zavier interrupted. His anger surprised him, he was usually never this short with May. The situation had brought it out of him. “It does not matter, that was clearly a weapon. We’re high school kids trying to buy marijuana, May! Whatever that was is something we should never be around! Ok! This Spider guy and other dude are bad news. We need to steer clear!”

“He has my number.” A pit formed in Zavier’s stomach. May just blurted it out. Even though her saying it had no effect on the fact itself, Zavier was quietly upset that she verbalized it. It was impossible to ignore that fact now with it just out there. He had hoped to drop May off, drive home, and let this wash away by the weekend. That scenario was not happening. There was no way they were not contacted by the police now. Spider’s phone was going to have messages from May putting her at the scene tonight. This meant the nightmare had just started. May was silent, her gaze patiently on Zavier, waiting for him to figure out what she should do. Zavier looked at the clock. 1:02 AM. It was so late. He was so tired.

“We don’t have to do anything right now.”

May was taken aback by his cavalierness. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, we can talk to the police tomorrow. We’ll go to the station in the morning. Right now let’s just go home and sleep.” Zavier felt his adrenaline begin to come down as he spoke those words. He had made his mind up on the problem. It was just not going to be urgent until tomorrow.

Zavier had reached his car and parked May’s next to his. He began to unfasten his seatbelt when May grabbed his arm rather tightly. “You’re not going to leave me alone on this, right?”

“No, I’m just going to get some sleep and clear my head. We’ll both miss school tomorrow and deal with it together in the morning, ok?” Zavier made strong eye contact with May and tried to give the most reassuring look he could. He needed her to let him leave the car. He also needed to inspire enough confidence that she wouldn’t do something stupid on her own.

May looked at him for a couple seconds. She did not break eye contact and projected a pleading look into him. Zavier felt sad that she thought so little of him as to be so scared that he would just abandon her. After another second or so she let go, looked forward, and spoke with a calmness that was reassuring for Zavier’s priorities. “Alright, I’ll go home and skip class tomorrow. I’m texting you right at eight. You better respond fast.”

Zavier took a deep breath and reached for the driver's side door. “I will, I promise.” He opened the door and began to walk out and over to his car. There was some trepidation about leaving May and risking her doing something rash, but he was just too exhausted and could not bring himself to care enough to prevent him from getting to house, to his room, and finally to his bed. As Zavier opened his own car door, he turned back and spoke to May in a stern voice, “Do not tell anyone else about this including your parents until we figure things out. We can’t undo things once we do them and we need to avoid making a mistake.”

May looked at him and nodded. That was enough for Zavier, he had given the extra effort to cover his ass the best he could and no longer felt too nervous to leave. He put the car in reverse and pulled out. As he drove away he saw May still sitting in the passenger seat, just staring out into the night. Letting out a deep exhale, Zavier turned his attention to his turn out of the movie theater parking lot and went on his way.

6:45. Zavier felt a sense of relief seeing those three numbers in big block font when his phone lit up. He almost never slept past his first alarm at 6:45 on school days, much less 8:00. But the consequences of sleeping late would be disastrous today. He had set numerous alarms in five minute intervals starting at 6:45 before he fell asleep when he had gotten home the night prior. Zavier would be in the business of overkill on safety for the foreseeable future.

Scrolling through his alarms on his phone screen, Zavier turned all the ones before 7:30 off. Now that he had woken up the first time, Zavier was confident he would not fall back into deep sleep before that alarm. Until then, the priority would be to rest his eyes. There was not going to be a need to talk to May or do anything else until eight anyways. It did not make sense to sit around and stress for seventy-five minutes. He needed thirty minutes max to get himself ready to face the day.

Zavier rolled over in bed and closed his eyes, reaching for the embrace of inactivity and sensation reduction. It was unattainable. He lay motionless for a few minutes in vain before ripping his covers off and getting out of bed. Zavier’s body was covered in sweat from the night before and he had a feeling of mustiness he couldn’t shake. Lumbering to his bathroom, he kept trying to figure out why he felt so gross. This trivial matter was suddenly incredibly important to him. As he reached the bathroom and flipped on the light, Zavier took a good look into his mirror.

Zavier was an average height with a bit of a wide baby face. He had no real facial hair yet and kept his auburn hair short but messy. His nose was small and gently sloping and while he was not blessed with a particularly chiseled jaw or angular facial structure, he had a near perfect set of straightened white teeth. Growing up, Zavier had always been told he had a beautiful smile. This was sometimes a compliment in absence of another obvious one but it was true nonetheless.

Zavier stared intently and intensely into his wide green eyes, giving himself an awkward look he only reserved for when he was alone with a mirror. In a split second, a realization came over him and he gave his reflection a wide smile. He had not showered at all last night when he had come home. The mystery of his gross feeling was now solved. It was likely because he was rushing to fall asleep given how the evening had gone and his own exhaustion. Zavier did not have any other insights as to how he had forgotten to shower as his memory of his cognitive process after he drove off from May was murky at best. A very simplistic but pleasant feeling washed over him as he picked out a towel and started up the shower. At least one issue solves itself today.

Zavier stayed in the shower for much longer than the five minutes he would spend on a typical morning. He was not going to school so there was much more time to let the warm water and the hot steam it produced relax him. Leaving the warmth of the shower today was going to be particularly taxing on his willpower and he was fine with indulging himself a bit. Zavier just had to be out by about 7:50. So in theory, he could be in here for an hour.

Zavier did not end up taking an hour. It was 7:25 on his phone after he dried off and checked it again. He flipped off the rest of his alarms. There was no point in trying to steal a few more minutes of sleep. He wouldn’t be able to anyway. Zavier quickly got dressed in one of his typical spring outfits: a plain white t-shirt, an orange flannel, some standard jeans, nike white socks, and plain black tennis shoes. When it came to his fashion, Zavier was a certified box checker.

He gave himself one more quick look in the mirror to make sure everything was in order and went across the room to grab his phone. As Zavier reached to pick it up, he froze. It was only 7:40 but he already had a missed call from May about two minutes ago. Zavier had expected nothing until eight from her. As trivial as twenty minutes was, the disruption from expectations for Zavier had the effect of snapping him back to an arduous reality. His adrenaline spiked and the feeling of morning energy and renewal gave way to nerves and a returning deep sense of tiredness. He was not ready for this.

Quickly he tapped the call back option. Hopefully she just was jumpy and wanted to touch base as early as possible. The phone rang once before it was picked up.

“May.” Zavier spoke with a calmness that masked his real feelings.

“Zavee.” May’s tone was frightened.

“What’s going on? You called early, I could have been asleep.”

“Please come over now, hurry!” May maintained a frantic tone.

“What’s going on, you didn’t tell your parents did you? You told me you’d wait for-”

“I didn’t tell anyone.” May snapped back with some palpable resentment in her voice. “I did exactly what you said. Even though you left me last night to drive home on my own. You really need to come over right now. I’ll explain things in person when you get here.”

May’s emphasis on in person sent a clear signal to Zavier. She was not going to tolerate anything else from him and she would not share anything until he was with her. He took a deep breath and collected himself. “I’ll come over now, just wait for me to get there.”

May affirmed the course of action and hung up. Zavier went into the kitchen to grab his keys. Both of his parents were already on their commutes to work so he didn’t have to worry about prying questions with him missing school. They definitely had seen his car still in the driveway and heard the shower in his room running way too long but Zavier was at an age where he did not get the scolding or concern he would have gotten in years past. Once he had his keys, Zavier walked into the garage, started the car, and made his way to May’s house.

May lived across the main road in an adjacent subdivision so it only took Zavier a few minutes to reach her house. As he parked on the curb and got out, Zavier texted Here he to May. Slowly walking his way up her driveway, he kept his eye on their text chat so as to not miss any sudden special instructions. Right before Zavier could knock, the front door swung open and May stood in the doorway and motioned Zavier inside. He obliged this request.

May’s mother sat at the kitchen table, methodically working on the morning crossword. Zavier's heart skipped a beat. Did she tell her parents?

“Mom, I’m going to the basement with my friend Zavier. He’s the guy who works the late shifts with me.” May’s mother looked up from her crossword at the sound of her daughter’s voice. Her eyes locked in on Zavier and she smiled.

“That’s fine, honey. Just let me know when you two are done so I know when it’s ok to come downstairs.” With that, the middle aged housewife returned to her puzzles and May opened the door to her basement and began walking down.

Zavier was very relieved. There was no way her mother knew. Clearly she was a much more casual parent with May than his own parents were with him. This was evidenced by her disregard for May seemingly missing school to bring a boy over. However, it would be comically asinine to ignore her daughter’s activities in the same way if she knew the happenings of the prior night. Zavier’s mind then wandered briefly to the implications of May’s mother being unfazed by her daughter needing the basement for a boy who May’s mother had not met prior. It definitely was not something Zavier wanted to think through further.

He would not have to dwell on these matters either way. The second they had reached the bottom of the stairs, May turned around and put her phone into Zavier’s face. The light from May’s phone took Zavier a second to adjust to. He always instinctively conserved the battery on his phone by keeping the brightness down. May did not take similar precautions. Once his eyes adjusted he saw a conversation opened with an unnamed number. The most recent message had been sent at 7:32 this morning. It read: Need to meet and talk about last night. Respond ASAP.

“Who sent this?” Zavier asked in a hushed tone

May responded in a similarly discreet and quiet manner, “It’s from the Spider.”