Vivian Confidential - Part Six

Both Ray and I waited for G to say something. When she didn’t, I said, “I agree with Ray. S should have come back by now. We should check on her.”

“You two stay in the car,” G said. “I’ll do the checking. She may need girl help.”

Not really knowing what she meant by that, neither Ray nor I protested. We waited until the door slammed and the dome light dimmed before either of us spoke.

“S seems friendly, but G seems a little standoffish,” Ray said.

“Yeah, well we had a little argument last time I saw her.”

Ray rolled the rear window down. “It’s getting kind of stuffy in here,” he said.

East Texas night sounds began filling the car. The air was damp and still warm, the music of tree frogs and crickets flooding us with sound. Suddenly, it got quiet enough to hear a pin drop. Silence lasted only a moment. What we heard next sent a chill up my spine and caused the tiny hairs on the back of my neck to stand fully erect. It sounded like the piercing scream of a woman. In the almost total darkness, it was hard to tell if it came from a mile away, or a hundred feet from the car.We had little time to contemplate the answer as both the front and back doors opened abruptly. It was G and S. They were both out of breath and white as proverbial sheep in the momentary flicker of the overhead dome light.

“Get the hell out of here,” S said, huddling as close to Ray as she could possibly get, her arms draped around his neck in a virtual death lock.

G didn’t have to be told. Cranking the engine, she floored the under-powered six, spraying loose dirt as she spun away.

“What were you screaming about out there?” I asked, holding on to the door handle as G slid around a corner.

“It wasn’t us,” she said, still breathless.

To Be Continued