Prints: Part Three

...you want to know the truth? After I thought about it for awhile I didn't even care what happened to any of their family. What I needed more than anything was to get out of this inbred little town. I'd been kidding myself all these years that Praise was "homey; that it was "family oriented", well it was sick and people like the Stams weren't civic leaders or models, they were at best loony and at worst evil.

I packed my clothes and left. I planned on making the road trip about a two-hour scat to "forget-this-town". The sheriff's red light quickly got my attention. He came to my window. "Where are you going Jim?" "I'm gone; this town has made me sick". "Actually you're not going anywhere. The Stams have been found dead and the last thing I recall was you acting stupid and rattled." The sentence hit me like a ton of bricks. I felt dizzy.

It was not a premeditated act. I didn't think. I hit the sheriff and grabbed his gun. I shot him as he was on the ground but aimed low. I didn't wait around to see what I hit. I only knew I didn't kill anybody and I had to find out what was going on or I risked losing my life one way or another.

I left for the Stams house. There were still emergency vehicles around the house but there was no urgency to what they were doing. I parked my car about a mile away and snuck towards the house.

I slipped around the back and looked in the back window. There were two covered adult bodies on the floor. I was already in hot water so I took a chance and slipped in the back door. I raised the cover and looked into the vacant eyes of David Stam...so the guy with no scar had killed him!

Then I lost my breath; it was the guy with no scar; it wasn't David.

I flew out of the house. As I ran to my car my lungs felt on fire. Once I reached it I sat on the ground and slowly but surely began to feel a rage; at life; at David, and at God. I had never hurt any one and now I was knee-deep in this garbage.

Then, right then, I vowed I would end this thing one way or another...and soon!