Beautiful, Deadly. - 5. Chapter 5

Alex woke up slowly and stared at the wall for a minute. Today would be the last day, and then Casey would be going up north, where it was safe. He rolled over in bed to find Casey, and… he was gone.

Alex knew right away that he wasn’t just awake for classes. The bed was cold, and had been for a while. Casey’s pajamas were strewn about, so he had even changed clothes. Alex tried to remember what time he had fallen asleep. Midnight? One? How long had Casey been gone?

He changed out of his pajamas and headed for his car. Alex got to Izzy’s place and took the elevator up. The door was locked, and he pounded away at it until an unhappy Izzy opened it. “I should have figured it would be you,” Izzy spat angrily. “But he’s not here.”

“Where is he?” Alex demanded, feeling his stomach roll with panic. Casey would have come here. If he wasn’t here—where was he?

Izzy’s mouth twitched, trying to force back a smile. “Why don’t you go check the alley?”

Alex didn’t move right away. Why would Casey be there? But he knew already. The elevator couldn’t move fast enough to get him to the bottom floor. He rushed out the front doors and went around to the side of the building.

A pair of feet stuck out from behind a dumpster. Alex ran for them, finding Casey laid out on the ground.

“Sh*t,” Alex hissed and dropped to his knees, cupping Casey’s face in his hands. His skin was stone cold. Still, Alex tried desperately to wake him up. “Casey? Jesus Christ, I told you not to come back here—“ Alex’s words caught in his throat and turned into a sob.

Casey’s eyes were open, and dead. It scared him. Alex shakily reached out and closed both eyes, then pulled his hand back like it had been on fire. He huddled against the side of the dumpster, staring at what was once his friend and roommate.

The scuff of feet from behind gave away Izzy’s presence. He couldn’t see, but Alex knew it was him. Who else would approach so calmly?

“You killed him,” Alex croaked out, eyes blurring with tears.

“He would have died anyways.” Izzy shrugged like it was nothing, but his eyes were fixed only on Alex.

“You’re sick,” Alex sobbed. “You did this for fun, didn’t you?”

Izzy didn’t answer. He stood around for another minute before leaving the scene. A few minutes later, police started to show up. An ambulance carried Casey’s body off, while Alex was forced into one of the cruisers. On his way to the station, he wanted to scream who did this.

Izzy. Izzy had done this. He lived right in that building where they found Casey.

But what evidence was there? The only evidence would be any drugs in Casey’s system. Maybe they would say he overdosed.

Alex broke down into sobs again as soon as they asked what had happened. “He got into drugs,” Alex choked out. “From some guy named Izzy who lives in that building. I tried to keep him out of it, but he kept going back. I was going to take him to my parents this weekend—“ that was as much as they got out of Alex.

They sent him back to his dorm room, where Alex collapsed onto his bed. He faced the wall, not even daring to look at the other side of the room. He didn’t go to his afternoon class.

Later, some school official’s came by to talk. They informed him, officially, of Casey’s death. The circumstances were still unknown. The counseling office on campus was open for Alex to use. All of Casey’s things would be collected and sent back to his family.

Alex just listened numbly through it all. Once they finally left, he called home and explained over the phone. Casey wouldn't be coming over this weekend.

His mother demanded that he come to spend some time at home while things settled down. Alex agreed and avoided his room as much as possible. The next day he arranged to take a week off from school, earning mostly sympathy from his teachers and classmates. He got some assignments ahead of time to take home.

He packed up a bag with some clothes and personal things. Alex left his cell number and his parent’s number, as well as their address for the police if they needed to contact him.

Alex was sure there would be a funeral, but probably out of state with Casey’s family. Alex wouldn’t go anyways. He didn’t want to look again.

Sunday morning he left for home, almost not even having the nerve to do it. He hadn’t heard anything on a cause of death or if they had arrested Izzy. He wondered how that would work, or if the case would just… drop.

The thought that it might end that way made his chest tighten in pain. But if they couldn’t find any evidence against Izzy, not to mention what ever he was… Alex had a feeling how it would all end. Some sort of accidental death or something like that.

Crazy guilt ate up his drive home. He had to pull of the road twice to calm down, slow his breathing, and wipe away the tears so he could drive. It just felt so wrong. Casey may have been loud and more friendly, but… Alex’s mother had put it a certain way—they were both mama’s boys.

Casey’s mother would be heartbroken. She’d never see her son again.

Alex made it home in the early evening and was immediately pulled into his mother’s arms. “Honey, I’m so sorry. I wish we could have gotten him up here sooner… you tried to help.”

He didn’t try hard enough, though. From that first encounter, he should have tried harder. Convinced Casey not to go into that room of drinks. And that whole time, Izzy was trying to keep Alex away, saying that it would end badly and that Alex should just save himself. Forget his friend.

How heartless was Izzy? Did he really expect that badly of people—of humans? That they would rather watch someone die over themselves?

Alex holed up in his room that night, refusing dinner. His room became dark with the sinking light. He opened up his bedroom window a crack, even though the air was chilly. He sucked in a lungful of the pine scent.

Out here, in the middle of nowhere, he was safe from the city and Izzy.

He crawled into bed and let the temperature of his room drop as he snuggled under the covers. Alex stared at the screen of his cell phone, waiting on some word of Casey or Izzy.

His mother stopped outside the room later, announcing they were going to bed and there was dinner in the fridge if he wanted some. Alex didn’t move from bed.

He kept his eyes fixed on the screen of his cell phone, until they felt heavy and tired. It was early morning by the time he fell asleep.

When he woke up at noon, Alex stared groggily at the ceiling of his home. He tried not to let the thoughts of the last couple days enter his head. His nose picked up on the scent of food—finally realizing it was the smell of his favorite short ribs in the crock-pot downstairs.

The smell made him hungry and sick at the same time. He remembered the conversation with Casey about their favorite meals, made by their mother’s. Alex buried his face in his pillow and tried to keep calm.

After another hour he emerged from his room and made an effort to clean up. He took a shower and brushed his teeth. By that time, his father was waiting outside the bathroom door. Alex jumped when he opened the door, and just stood there.

His father’s eyes inspected him quickly. “Do you want to talk?” he asked.

“No,” Alex mumbled and averted his eyes. He couldn’t stand all the emotion in them. “I just want some time alone.”

“Your mother is making her short ribs,” his father pointed out.

“I know; I can smell them.” Alex went around the man and locked himself in his room again. His room was a good amount colder than the rest of the house with his window open. He stared out across the empty ground around them at the tree line. There was a good forty of fifty yards of dirt between the house and the trees.

It didn’t make sense. Alex was raised in almost solitude. He should have been the one that was overly trusting of strangers, naïve. Not Casey.

But then it wouldn’t have happened to Alex anyway. Izzy had mentioned something about protection. Why the hell was Alex protected, and by what?

Alex ventured out of his room a couple hours later. He grabbed a small snack from the kitchen and exchanged wary looks with his mother.

“How are you holding up?” she asked softly.

Alex shrugged and bit into a fruit. His mother came over and wrapped him into another hug. “You tried, sweetie. There’s nothing you can change now.”

“Would it have been better if I just let it happen?” Alex asked. “If I knew there was nothing I could do, should I have just let it happen?”

His mother sighed. “No. That would have made you feel even worse. You cared about him, there was no way you could just sit by. And maybe now you’re thinking you didn’t do enough… but everything you did try is better than not at all.”

Just like how Alex had thought of making Casey eat food. Alex buried his face in his mother’s shoulder for a while before she made him sit on the couch. She turned on the TV and let him get lost in the mindlessness of it while she worked around the house.

After an hour of TV, Alex patted down his pockets for his cell phone, but he had left it upstairs. He went back up to his room, and searched around the sheets of his bed. He checked in the bathroom. He checked on the floor, under his bed. He even checked the toilet to see if it had been dropped in there, but he couldn’t find it.

He tried to keep down the slow creep of the panic inside. How would the police contact him now? How would he know anything about Casey, or Izzy? Alex cradled his head in his hands for a few minutes.

The computer.

Alex pulled out his laptop and turned it on. He looked up the number for the station online and called from the house phone. He told them he’d lost his cell phone, like it would matter any to them, and recommended they contact through his parents landline.

Nothing had been made towards Izzy—they even said they didn’t know who he had been talking about. Just that Casey’s cause of death was asphyxiation. Nothing simple like a drug over dose—now they were looking for who ever smothered him.

“It wasn’t me,” Alex said defensively.

“We know. We matched some of your prints with the ones on him. Not a match,” The person explained.

“Were there any drugs in his system?” Alex asked. What had Izzy put his friend on.

“No, there wasn’t anything in his bloodstream or any sign of drug use at all,” he was told. “But his wallet and money were gone. They’re leaning more towards a robbery. Possibly someone homeless attacked him for money and killed him.”

Alex stopped listening after that. He hung up on that person and slammed the phone down. Why would someone rob Casey, but then take the time to stop his breathing? How stupid were they?

His mother came into the kitchen and gave him a look. “What was that about?”

“Casey died from asphyxiation. They’re saying it was a robbery,” Alex tried to tell her calmly.

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Nothing about drugs?”

“There weren’t any in him,” Alex admitted. He didn’t want to try and explain it to her. She let it drop and finished putting dinner together.

They sat awkwardly around the table, Alex picked at his food. He wanted to eat it, but he couldn’t. His throat was too tight and it hurt to swallow even. He managed a few bites of meat, letting it melt on his tongue. He ate a few red bell peppers as well, and downed a glass of milk. That was all he ate of dinner before returning to his room.

He looked more for his cell phone, but still couldn’t find it. His room was starting to get cold again as the sun dropped.

He gave up on his phone and got ready for bed. Alex crawled under the sheets again and pulled them up over his head. Even then, his body shook as he fought back tears.

Why couldn’t the police figure out what really happened? How could they not know Izzy?

Alex struggled to fall asleep again.