Moments
after the short seven minute video had ended, both Leigh and I sat side-by-side
in shock at the horrible scenes in the video.
The video
had first started out as a view of the starry night sky and from that beautiful
picture, it turned tragic. We both watched silently as, from a distance,
a younger Josh and Hope and Sonny were all seen stopping at different
houses. The video seemed to follow them for about a block until they
reached a somewhat isolated area of the neighborhood, and the images were
coming closer and closer.
Suddenly a
load moan was heard, and the video quickly zoomed in on a figure in black
lifting a shiny object and bringing it down forcefully. Then the video seemed to fade out, and Josh
was seen frantically searching the area.
I fought to not scream as I watched my husband being attacked, and then
Hope kidnapped. And then the video went
black.
After a few
seconds of nothing on the video, I reached to turn off the player, but
suddenly, the video sprung back to life. Now instead of the scene being
outside, it now seemed that it was shot from the distance of a hospital waiting
room. I quickly noticed the younger version of Heidi, myself, and the
other guys waiting anxiously for any news.
Then the scene changed to what looked like an ICU room, and it zoomed in
on the figure on the bed.
I felt
tears rise in my eyes as I saw that the figure was someone that I wanted to
remember as full of life, loving, loyal, and a lot of fun, but the only words I
could think of to describe him in the video was very close to death. As
the scene of my best friend’s husband lingered on the screen, my mind drifted
back to those days.
I was
brought out of my thoughts by a sob from Leigh, and I looked at the screen,
remembering the scene playing now was when we were told that Sonny was gone and
never coming back.
The next
scene literally made me feel sick to my stomach. In my years as a doctor,
I had visited the hospital morgue on a few occasions, but that would never
prepare me to see someone I was close to and loved as family lying in the
morgue, never to come back. I silently wished that the video would end,
but the scene changed yet again.
This time
it was back to the outside. From the
distance, Sonny’s funeral ceremony could be seen. Once the video faded to
black for what it seemed like the last time, I reached for the remote with
trembling hands and pushed the POWER button.
Then Leigh and I sat in silence, hoping for the others to come back
soon.
***
I found Heidi sitting on the dewy grass on the edge of her
backyard, her back resting up against a thick tree trunk. Chad, AJ, and Josh sat beside her. Chad had one arm around her, and Josh had his
hand resting on her shoulder, comforting her, while AJ stared morosely into
space.
“You okay, Heidi?” I asked softly, sinking down beside Josh.
Heidi lifted her tearstained face to look at me and just
shrugged. My heart ached for her as I
looked into her eyes, shiny with tears and filled with pain. She had been through so much in her
lifetime, and just when everything seemed to be going good for her, something
like this had to happen.
I was filled with rage as I thought about whoever had done this to
my friends. What kind of person would be
so sick as to take pictures of Sammy and Sonny in their last dying days? And how could they even get away with it?
I was so confused, upset, and frustrated with the whole
thing. I felt nauseous every time I
even thought about those gruesome pictures, and it was horrible not knowing who
had done it, who had turned our lives upside down yet again.
AJ must have been feeling the same way, for all of a sudden, he
jumped to his feet and kicked the tree trunk with all his might. “God damnit!” he shouted, taking out all his
anger and frustration on the poor tree.
After quickly wearing himself out, he collapsed into the wet grass and
just laid there.
“AJ?” I asked gently.
“I wish I knew who the hell did this. I’ll kill the mother-f*cking bastard!” AJ
spat, his voice muffled.
I couldn’t say I wouldn’t want to do the same thing. The problem was, I had no idea who the
“mother-f*cking bastard” was.
Obviously, it had to be someone associated with Justin. Maybe it had been Justin himself. If it was, he was already dead. And if it wasn’t, then who was it?
My first thought was that it was one of the other ‘N Sync members,
but I quickly dismissed that thought.
After all, the pictures I had seen were taken right before Sonny died,
and JC, Joey, Chris, and Lance had all been in jail then. My suspicions then moved to Britney, but I
doubted that one too. She had been shot
before Sonny died, and after she got out of the hospital, she had been taken
straight to jail for shooting Nick, so it couldn’t have been her either.
That meant one of two things – either it had been Justin all
along, or someone else had been involved the whole time. I seriously hoped it wasn’t the latter, for
the thought of someone else that we never even knew about doing this to us was
even more frightening.
***
I sat up against the wall in one corner of Abby’s room, my body
trembling with silent tears. What the
five of us had just seen was more horrifying than anything I could ever
imagine. We had watched for ourselves
the horrible experience our parents had gone through before we were even
born. It was scary enough when Mom had
told Hallie and I about it, but to actually see it was beyond description. There is no word in the dictionary that could
accurately portray the utter horror we were feeling.
“Who did this?” Abby asked softly, her voice meek and trembling.
No one responded.
“I mean, first of all, who filmed all this, and second, how did it
get in our DVD player?” she went on, her voice rising. “Sonny,” she said, turning to look at her
brother, who sat with his arm around Hallie, “someone put it there. Someone was in our house!”
Sonny looked up sharply as he realized Abby was right. Someone had broken into their house while
they were gone and replaced the move Abby had wanted to watch with that sick
home video!
“How could someone get in?!” he asked, knowing there had to be a
way, but unable to believe it had actually happened. “We had all our doors and windows shut and
locked, and I didn’t see anything broken.
Did you guys?”
We all shook our heads solemnly.
Sonny frowned in confusion.
“Everything seemed perfectly normal.
How could someone get in and out without messing anything up?”
We were all silent, thinking about it. Then Abby spoke up.
“Maybe he didn’t have to break in.”
We all turned to look at her.
“Huh?” Sonny asked, puzzled.
“What do you mean?”
“Ghosts can go through walls,” Abby replied softly, her voice
sounding hollow and monotone.
“Ghosts? What the hell are
you talking about, Abby?” Sonny scoffed.
I was as confused as he was for a few seconds. And then I realized what she meant. Justin.
I remembered the note I had gotten at school and our conversation at
lunch that day. Abby seriously believed
Justin had come back to haunt us.
Sean knew what she meant too.
“Abby thinks it’s Justin Timberlake, back from the dead,” he told Sonny,
rolling his eyes.
Sonny raised an eyebrow, glancing skeptically at Abby, and
snickered. “Abby, come on. You know there’s no such thing as
ghosts. I can guarantee whoever did this
was a live human being. He was just very
good at breaking in unnoticed.”
Abby glared at him, but she didn’t say anything. I glanced at her in sympathy, but I can’t
say I believed her either. However,
when I got to school the next day, my view would begin to change.
***
“Abby, what’s wrong?
You’re acting really quiet today.”
I glanced over at Derrick, who had taken his eyes away from the
road to look at me. It was Monday
morning, and he was driving me to school.
I pressed my lips together, considering telling him what had
happened the night before, but I quickly decided against it. Although Derrick knew some of what had
happened in our parents’ past from the night of the séance, he didn’t know the
whole story, and I didn’t feel like telling it all to him. He wasn’t a part of it, and I didn’t want
him to get involved.
“I’m fine,” I replied, forcing a smile. “Just tired, I guess.”
“Oh. Me too,” he replied,
glancing back at the road. “I hate
Mondays.”
I nodded, feeling a welcoming sense of normalcy as he griped, and
smiled wearily.
“So do I.”
***
I wasn’t really looking forward to going to school that day,
especially after what had gone on the night before, but once I was there, I was
actually sort of glad my mom had made me go.
I felt safe in this familiar place, with this familiar crowd of people. Nothing could hurt me or scare me here, not
like it could if I was home by myself that day. At least, that’s what I thought. When I opened up my locker a few minutes
later, I found out otherwise.
In what seemed like a flashback of the previous Tuesday morning, a
black piece of paper tumbled out of my locker and landed at my feet. A shiver running down my spine, I picked it
up and saw the familiar red font. It
was another note.
Red ghost,
blue ghost
One ghost
follows little cars
One ghost
blows the cars apart
But fun you
poked
This is not
a joke
I stared in horror at the note, shaking my head in horror. Follows little cars? That was what had happened to Hallie and I on
Sunday! And blows the cars apart? Hallie’s car had been blown up Saturday
night!
A million things ran through my head, from the realization that
one of my old childhood favorites, Dr. Seuss’ “One Fish, Two Fish,” didn’t seem
so appealing anymore, to the thought that maybe, as unbelievable as it seemed,
Abby’s suspicions weren’t so far from the truth.
***