Six Little Words

Six Little Words

J.L. DuRona

“Just take it and walk away.”

That’s what he says. 

Take it. 

Walk away. 

In that order.

Six little words. 

And I do. I take it and walked away.

Finn Walters smiles as he slaps “it,” the “object,” into my upturned palm. The clamminess of his sweaty hand lingers on it like dog slobber. 

“Good choice, spod,” Finn says. He learned that word last week on some TV show, and now everyone, from classmates to teachers, was a spod. At least it wasn’t just me; sometimes it’s good to not be special.

I stare at the “object” in my palm, not really seeing it. The outline is clear, but everything within is a blur. This happens to me sometimes, especially when I’m anxious or when I know I’m doing something—

“What’re you waiting for, huh? Get lost!”

“Sorry,” I reply, quickly stuffing the “object” into my bag. “Sorry.”

I turn to go, when from behind me comes a series of muffled cries. It’s Mitch Weaver, who Finn Walters has pinned against a massive redwood. His voice is weak, pleading.

“Jake! Please! Don’t—”

“Shut up, spod!”

 Finn Walters interrupts, and the cries are replaced by a grunts and hollow smacking sounds. My own breathing is enough to drown them out as I quickly make my way to the other side of the tree, away from the scene, and back to the schoolyard. 

Peg, who’s on the swings, spots me before I make it all the way back. She hops off and runs to me, but slows down halfway.

“What’s with you?” she asks, her usual grin replaced with a dubious frown. “You look like you just ate the goulash. You didn’t eat the goulash, did you?”

Peg feigns taking my temperature, putting her hand on my forehead. I push it away. “Knock it off.”

I try to maneuver around her, but she blocks my way, her arms spread wide. The green streak in her blonde hair glistens in the sun above her.

“Seriously, Jake, what’s up?” Peg has a thing where she can look both angry and concerned at the same time, and she’s using it to full effect. 

“Nothing’s up, really.” I adjust the bag on my shoulder, the weight of the “object” making it heavier with every second. 

“You can’t fool me,” she replies, shaking her head. “If you don’t tell me, I’m gonna—”

The recess bell goes off with a shrill chime. Amid a chorus of groans and complaints, everyone in the schoolyard meanders back to the double-doors to finish out the day. I take the opportunity to dodge away from Peg and join them.

I’ve never been happier to go to class in my entire life.

* * *

The “object,” the thing Finn Walters shoved into my hands at recess, sits in my bag the rest of the day. I don’t dare take it out in case anyone sees me with it, especially Peg. She can’t know what happened. Ever.

So it sits in my bag. Waiting.

“Just take it and walk away.” That’s exactly what he said. 

I don’t have even a second to myself until my dad sends me upstairs after dinner to do my homework. Just as I push my way through my bedroom door, my phone buzzes.

Again? It’s been going off since I set the table, but Mom doesn’t let me check it during “family time.” 

I groan, take the phone out of my pocket, and squint at the bright display:

“HELLO RU THEIR??”

It’s from Peg. They all are. A string of messages so long I don’t bother swiping to the top. One thing’s obvious, though, each message is more urgent than the last. 

I set my bag down on my bed and send a reply, ignoring her lousy grammar: “Sry dinner whats up?”

The reply is almost instant: “MITCH WEAVER IS MISSING! I JUST SAW HIM IN TRIG!!!”

My stomach spins as I read the message over and over until another one, again from Peg, pops up: “YOU HAVE AP LIT WITH HIM RIGHT?? WAS HE THEIR??”

I shake my head automatically, an action my brother calls a “tell,” which means I’m lying. Luckily Peg can’t see that, so I take a second, then compose a new message: “I didnt see him. Does anybody know what—”

Wait—did I see Mitch in Lit? I squeeze my eyes shut and try to visualize the classroom, try to visualize his seat: two rows ahead and three to the left. I can’t picture him.

The last time I remember seeing him was during recess, by the woods, pinned to a tree by—

“HEY WEAR’D U GO???”

The shrill ding from Peg’s newest message startles me. I swear at the screen; doesn’t she know I’m trying to think?

Oh, right, I haven’t replied yet. I delete what I’ve typed and start over, actually being honest this time: “I can’t remember.”

She doesn’t like that answer, but what else can I say? If I can’t remember something, I can’t remember it. Maybe I don’t want to remember.

I don’t want to remember Mitch’s face as she stared at me with wide, terrified eyes, as Finn Walters’ hand gripped the front of his shirt. The look of betrayal in his eyes as Finn slapped the “object” in my hand.

“Just take it and walk away.”

I sit on my bed and stare at the bag beside me. The flap is open, exposing my homework folder, but the “object” is still out of sight, buried deep within. I haven’t actually laid eyes on it since that afternoon, but I know it’s there.

“ITS ALL OVER THE NEWS!” Peg’s newest message says. “THEY DON’T WANNA SAY HE WAS KIDNAPPED BUT HE TOTALLY WAS I KNOW IT!!!”

A familiar blurring fills my vision. 

Kidnapped? 

No way. 

Who would want to kidnap Mitch Weaver? And why? It made no sense.

“He probably went to the library and didnt tell anybody,” I write.

And even if he was kidnapped, it couldn’t have been Finn Walters, right? He was just shaking him down for lunch-money, or something.

“NOONE GOES TO THE LIBARY ALL NIGHT!” Peg replied. “NOT EVEN A BRIAN LIKE HIM!!” 

I smirk. A kid named Adri Reddy ran for student council last year, and his campaign poster said, “Vote for Adri and his big brian!” It was supposed to say “brain,” obviously, but the damage was done. From that day on, anyone smart was known as a “Brian.”

Mitch is a Brian. Always has been.

The “object.” It’s calling to me, a silent scream, and I quickly reach into my bag and dig it out. I hold it in my palm, the experience no longer sullied by Finn’s slimy grasp. 

Still, it feels wrong to have it, to hold it in my hand and call it “mine.” It’s feels unnatural, like it wasn’t meant for me.

The “object” was all I could think about for weeks. I had an entire notebook—my U.S. History three-subject—devoted to sketches of it. Peg said I was “hyper-fixated,” whatever that meant. I wanted it more than anything, but I knew I’d never have it.

Because it wasn’t mine. It did belong to me. 

But now, somehow, it did.

How did this happen? How?

Finn Walters never traded, borrowed, or sold anything. Yet here I am, sitting on my bed, ogling the prize I’ve wanted since forever. It’s my reward for keeping my mouth shut while Finn Walters finished his—his business—with Mitch.

He knew exactly what he was doing when he handed it to me, knew what power the object had. He knew I couldn’t resist it.

“Just take it and walk away.”

That’s what he said and that’s what I did. 

I took it and walked away, like the spod I am. 

But Finn Walters can’t be the reason Mitch is missing. He can’t be. If Mitch had disappeared during school, they would’ve sounded the alarm immediately. The bus drop-off would’ve been full of police cars and fire trucks.

That’s it. That’s why I don’t remember seeing Mitch in AP Lit. I was avoiding him. I don’t remember seeing him because I wasn’t looking at him. That’s all.

Whatever happened to Mitch happened after his encounter with Finn Walters.

But it doesn’t matter, because nothing happened to Mitch. 

He’s okay. I know he is.

He has to be.

Something hits my windowpane with a clack. I drop the “object,” stand, and run over to the window, expecting to see Peg in my yard. 

I pull the curtain open. 

There’s no one.

Nothing.

Just the still night air. I’m alone. Just me and the “object.”

When I turn around, my room feels smaller, tighter, like a freezer with too much frost. Has it always been this small? I just cleaned it the day before, and it usually takes me a few days to mess it up again.

My phone buzzes. I ignore it, my gaze fixed on the “object” on my bed. Its round shape stands out amid the multicolored squares on my quilt, and I can’t take my eyes off it. 

The object. Once upon a time it belonged to Finn Walters. Before that, before Finn took it, it belonged to Mitch Weaver.

Now it belongs to me.

“Just take it and walk away.”

The screen on my phone lights up the dim bedroom. I pick it up and am greeted with a still image of Peg’s face; she’s wearing a wool scarf and a hat with panda ears, a picture from last winter. 

She wants to video chat. 

Crap.

To be safe, I grab the “object” and shove it into my pocket before answering. I don’t have a chance to say hello before Peg starts talking. “You will not believe this!”

My skin gets colder and colder as she talks, the words filling me with a dread usually associated with a math test. She tells me that the police are surrounding Mitch’s house right now, and his entire neighborhood is out in the street. 

But that can’t be right; he only lives a block away, and I was just looking outside. There’s not way I’d miss the sirens and flashing lights.

“Hey, are you listening?”

Peg butts into my thoughts. 

“Uh, yeah,” I say. “M—maybe it’s no big deal.”

“No big deal?!” Peg’s voice peeks on the tiny speaker, and I have to hold the phone away. “There’s, like, ten cop cars in his yard!”

Ten cars? Ten? That’s a lot, even for a missing kid.

“Hello! Earth to Jake!”

And even if there were that many cars at Mitch’s house, what are they doing clustered on his front lawn? Shouldn’t they be out looking for him?

“That’s it,” Peg says, “I’m coming over.”

The call ends before I can protest. This is the last thing I need.

Swiping out of my recent call log, I open a browser and search “missing kid” with the name of my town. 

No results; no recent ones, anyway. 

I search again, this time with Mitch’s full name. Still nothing. No Amber Alert, no live coverage, no anything. 

My hands drop to my sides. How could a kid go missing with no one reporting it? He has, like, ten cop cars in his yard! 

Doesn’t he?

There’s a buzzing in my hand, but this time it’s not my phone. The “object” thrums in my pocket, an electric vibration that makes the hairs on my arm tingle. What does it mean? Did it ever do this for Finn Walters? For Mitch?

Another clank on my windowpane. I open the curtain to find Peg on the other side, gesturing for me to let her in.

“What’s with you tonight?” She says as she climbs inside. She’s wearing a gray hoodie and black sweatpants, the spitting image of a burglar. “The entire town’s in an uproar, and you’re acting like a total zombie!”

The thrum of the object grows strong in my back pocket, sending a mild shock through my body. “I’m not acting like a zombie.”

“You totally are!” Peg grabs my shoulders, shaking them hard. “We need to go look for him! We need to—”

She freezes, her hands still clinging to me. Her brow furrows. “You have it, don’t you?”

I frown. “Have what?”

“Don’t lie! I can feel it!” Peg lets me go and looks me up and down. “Is it in your pocket?”

She reaches for me again, but I rear back. “Stop.”

“I know you have it, Jake,” Peg says, her eyes bright and intense. “It’s the only thing that explains why you’re being so weird.”

How am I the weird one here? She’s the one freaking out about one missing kid. And why should she care that I have the “object?”

Peg takes a step toward me and reaches out again. I try to push her away, but she’s ready for it. She grabs my hand, spins me around, and holds my arm behind my back.

“Ow!” I scream. “Let go!”

“Not until you stop lying!”

“I don’t have it!” I say with a grunt. “I swear!”

She’s way stronger than I am. No matter how hard I struggle, I can’t get free.

“Fess up!” Her voice is hoarse.

“No!”

Peg twists my arm even harder. Could she break it? Would she? I don’t think she would, but the pain is so bad it’s hard to think. How have my parents not heard all this?

“Okay!” I scream, my voice high-pitched. “Here!”

I pull the “object” from my pocket and hold it up for her to see. She lets go of my arm, and I fall to my knees.

Peg looks at me, her arms crossed. She’s become a shaky, blurry outline.

“I didn’t want to believe it,” she says. “Was it worth it?” she asks. 

“Worth what?” I ask, rubbing my arm.

“Losing your best friend?”

What is she talking about? I didn’t do anything to her! All I did was what Finn Walters told me to do. How could she—

Wait, I get it now. She’s not talking about herself.

She’s talking about Mitch.

Mitch, who lives one block over.

Mitch, who I’ve spent hours with writing sci-fi stories, filling hundreds of notebooks over the years, which now lay in dozens of banker’s boxes in my basement.

Mitch, who always beats me at “Battle Dragons,” unless Peg’s there too.

Mitch, who was the sole owner of the “object.” 

Until this afternoon, that is. 

Until Finn Walters took it from him.

Finn Walters, who took the “object” and gave it to me to me in exchange for my blind eye. 

“Just take it and walk away.”

I lean forward, my stomach in knots, the “object” still clutched weakly in my hand. “Mitch isn’t missing, is he?”

Peg shakes her head. “He told me everything after school, after I saw him get on the bus on his own. He never does that.” 

She’s right. Today was the first time we didn’t ride home together. I don’t even remember sitting alone. Did I sit alone? 

“Just tell me one thing,” Peg says, her eyes red. “When Walters gave it to you, did you think about it? Even for a second?”

I nod. I know my eyes are red now too, because they sting with tears.

She chuckles, more to herself than me. “Well, I guess that’s something.”

I try to hand the object to her, but she steps back, shaking her head.

“It’s yours now,” she says. “If you give it back to Mitch, maybe he’ll forgive you, but I hope he doesn’t.”

She turns and climbs through the window without another word. 

The “object,” once so important, is no longer buzzing with energy. It’s lost its power.

But it doesn’t matter now. I did exactly what Finn Walters wanted.

“Just take it and walk away.”

That’s exactly what I did.

I took it and walked away.

From everything.

~End