An hour after I finally went to bed and turned the lights off, a cell phone rang.
This time, it was my father's cell phone, which he picked up while cursing. He answered the phone and listened to the person on the other side of the line.
"Wait, wait, hang on. Talk a bit slower, Cam. I don't get what you are saying," Dad said, and I knew Mr. Vinton was calling Dad about what had just occurred.
Then I heard Dad agreeing and denying things he heard on the phone. He sounded tired, not only because he had been sleeping before but because the whole situation was exhausting.
"What time did they tell you to go?" Dad asked, "And you are going alone. You don't want me to go with you?"
Then silence.
"Okay, Cam, calm down. It's going to be fine," Dad told Mr. Vinton. "I'll pick you up at the Police Department....do you think they'll call me too?"
Then Dad groaned, annoyed.
"I just hope they don't interrogate me, man! Like, I'm at my house right now. What more do they want?" I heard my dad complain again, and then there was a small, silent break.
Finally, Dad said goodbye to Mr. Vinton and put down his cell phone.
I heard Dad explaining to Mom what had happened. The whole thing, meaning the robbery, the hit and run, and the chase. Then Dad told Mom that Mr. Vinton had waited with his son for the ambulance to pick up the remaining officer looking after the wounded one. They left in the ambulance moments later, and Detective Hudson and Diaz soon showed up. They interrogated Mr. Vinton and Zack about what had happened.
As Zack had witnessed most of the incident, he was the one to explain it.
After hearing news about the Thunderbird and the van chasing it, they proceeded to exit the scene, but not before telling Mr. Vinton that the best thing he could do for now was to go back to bed. But they also told him the next day they wanted to talk to him at the Police Station in Vernon, as they had more information about this whole investigation.
Even in my state of shock, I still found the last part of the retelling of the conversation interesting. What did the detectives want to tell Mr. Vinton that they needed him to go to the Police Station? It had to be something important, maybe a big lead or something like that.
Dad left for work the next day, and Mom drove me to school. On the way to school, Mom decided to tell me about the incident. I had been waiting the whole morning, but even at breakfast, they had remained silent, especially Dad. I think he didn't want me to worry about Zack, although I already knew all about it.
But alas, Mom told me about the call that my father had received later at night. Trying to make myself less suspicious, I pulled my best performance, pretending to hear this for the very first time.
After my performance of shock and horror, I sat the rest of the way quietly, looking outside my window like I was deep in reflection, when the only thing I really wanted to do was to pull out my phone and ask Zack what the detectives had said.
Morning passed as if in a daze, as nothing earth-shattering happened. Lola reunited with Armando, although her father still suspected they were secretly seeing each other. Lucy talked about taking her dog to the vet, and Camilla's grandmother, who had fallen sick, was given a good prognosis for her disease.
The whole time, I wanted to see Zack's face on my phone screen and ask him if he was physically and psychologically alright, although I doubted it.
The broken body of the officer lying like a pile of clothes in the darkness was still on my mind, and I only wanted one thing; to pry it out of my head. I was sure that it was the same for Zack. I just wanted to hug and share my horror with him, as I couldn't do it with someone else.
I told my friends nothing because I didn't want to worry them and risk them spilling the beans. I decided that, at least for now, Zack and I were the only ones who had to know what we saw.
As lunch arrived, I ate my food in a hurry, causing some confusion among my friends, but I told them that I just needed to do something quick. Afterward, I walked to the last floor of the school and into an old classroom that was left empty at that hour.
I then called Zack.
A pinch of dread came to me when he didn't pick up at first, but after the fifth ring, he finally did.
"Hello?" He asked. I could see he was walking around his schoolyard.
"Zack, hi," I said, a bit uncomfortable. The last time I saw him, he was running home to tell his father to call the ambulance. And I could see how much the event had affected him. He looked like he hadn't gotten much sleep, with deep, dark bags under his eyes.
"Hi, what's up?" He asked me.
"Not good. But you know that," I told him, shrugging. He chuckled bitterly and nodded.
"Yeah," he said. "I'm pretty bad too."
"I'm so sorry, Zack," I told him. "I wish this wasn't happening."
"You don't need to say sorry," he said, giving me a sad smile. "I'm actually glad that we both saw it. At least I'm not alone."
I smiled back at him and agreed, although I wasn't so sure.
"Hey, I heard your dad called mine after the whole thing. Did the detectives really show up?" I asked him, cutting to the chase. I wanted to know if they had said something new.
"Yeah, they showed up after the female cop took his partner to the hospital," he said. "They both look exhausted and angry."
"Really?" I asked, my mind filling with theories. "Why is that?"
"I don't know," Zack said, "but I suspect it is because they know something we don't."
"Is that why they asked your Dad to go to the station today?" I said. "I heard Dad talking to Mom about it."
"I guess so," Zack said, shrugging. Then, his expression changed from depression to mild excitement. "But check this out.."
"What?" I asked, wondering what had made him change.
"When Dad went to open the garage this morning, he went without his keys," Zack told me. "He thought that the thief had just left the garage door open, you know?"
"Right," I said, nodding, leaning on the classroom wall.
"But as I left for school, I saw him walking back home, so I stopped and asked him why, and you are not going to believe this...," He said.
"What?" I asked.
"The doors were locked. And the car was back," Zack said, shrugging in disbelief.
"How?" I asked, disconcerted. "When did the thief have time to do all that?" Didn't the detectives go after him?"
"I guess they missed him? We will see what happens when Dad returns from the station," Zack said.
The boy was clearly nervous about his father's situation. Maybe it was good that he was going to the station, or perhaps not. We didn't know, as we didn't know what the detectives had been gathering from the situation.
"When do you think that will be?" I finally asked him.
"I have no idea," Zack said and sighed. "Hopefully, they won't keep him for long."
After visiting my grandmother, I went to the shop, expecting to see Zack and Mr. Vinton, but neither was there. Only Dad and the other mechanics were at the shop, fixing an old Jeep that seemed to have arrived recently.
Dad didn't look happy in the slightest with my visit, but still calmly told me to go home, as things were pretty serious. I frowned, feeling slighted, and asked if Mr. Vinton was still not back from the station.
"How do you know that?" Dad asked.
"Mom told me this morning," I said.
Then Dad shook his head as he cleaned his hands with a rag.
"No, baby. He's not. I'm going to pick him up in a few minutes," he said. "And it would be better if you were not here when I returned with him."
I frowned again but said okay.
"I'll just go see Zack at his house," I said and went to turn, but then my father grabbed my arm and shook his head again, staring at me with all the seriousness of a worried parent.
"Tammy, he saw someone get injured badly," Dad said, trying to explain. "That poor boy has been through enough for you to bother him. Try another day, okay?"
I wanted to tell him that I knew that, that I wasn't stupid, but I couldn't do it. I wasn't going to reveal that I had also been involved.
Frustrated, I stood there quietly for a few minutes, thinking about what to do, whether to go home as my father had said to me or something else. Maybe pretend to leave and then return to Zack's house through the alley.
In the end, it wouldn't be necessary as Zack showed up a few moments later, his hands in the pockets of his jean shorts and a sour expression on his face. Even with my father there, I couldn't help myself and ran to hug Zack. I wanted to take away the bitterness from his face with my warmth and tell him everything would be okay, even if I suspected it wouldn't.
The hug felt so good and necessary that I completely forgot where I was. When I remembered, I pulled back and stared at Zack, who looked less bitter but still worried, probably about why his dad had taken so long to return home. He then glanced behind me and frowned.
"Your father is looking at us ugly," he whispered. "Is it because you are hugging me?"
"He has old ideas about boys," I whispered back. "But he also doesn't know that I saw it too."
"He doesn't know?" Zack asked me, and I nodded.
"No. Did you tell your father about me last night?"
"No, I didn't. I didn't want him to know I was spying on the cops for so long," Zack told me, smiling.
"That makes us both liars," I told him, smiling back.
For a few moments, I felt the returning urge to kiss him, but then Zack looked behind me again and pushed me away. As I turned, I saw that Dad was coming toward us.
"Hello, son," My father told him and shook his hand. "Has your dad called?"
"Yes, sir," Zack said, "he asked if you would be kind enough to pick him up from the Vernon Police Station."
"I told your dad I would," my father told him, patting Zack on the back. "How did he sound?"
"He sounded mostly tired," Zack said, "but also kinda disturbed, and I wish I knew why."
"Do you want to come with me to the station?" Dad asked Zach while scratching his ear.
"Can I come too?" I asked, hoping Dad would say yes, but he shook his head.
"It's better that you don't get involved," Dad said.
Zack then suddenly took my hand, making my heart skip a beat, and told my dad that if he was going, I should come too.
"Son," my dad gasped, annoyed. "Your dad probably wants to see you. Please don't turn this into a childish thing."
"I want her to come with me, Mr. Curry, please," Zack said, pleading with my father. "Tammy is my friend. And she is your daughter. No matter what happens, she will find out in the end. There's no point in hiding stuff from her."
My father groaned as he stared at us, but after sitting for a few moments on top of the Thunderbird, wiping the sweat from his forehead, he agreed to take us with him.
I didn't say anything, as I knew my father was probably keeping his anger at our disobedience deep inside. He had to pick his battles, and picking up his boss and friend, trying to keep things positive, was more important.
After indicating to the rest of the crew that he would bring Mr. Vinton from the station, Zack and I followed my father to the pickup truck. We sat in the back, silently looking at each other, nervous and thrilled.
The Vernon Police Station was in the same modern concrete building as City Hall, and I was pretty excited to visit it, as I've never been inside either of the two. Dad parked close to some bushes, and we got out of the car, following behind the tall man, trying to be a respectful pair of teens.
We saw Zack's father sitting on a bench beside a water cooler inside the station. He had his head in his hands, which he lifted the moment he heard Zack's voice call his name. He then got up, and Zack ran to hug him. My father and I slowly walked to them and greeted Mr. Vinton with a shake and a wave.
"So, how did it go?" Dad asked Mr. Vinton. "Did they interrogate you, tell you anything new?"
Mr. Vinton hugged his son tighter and then looked at my father. "You have no idea what we are dealing with. It's madness."
"What do you mean?" Dad asked, concerned.
"He means..." Detective Hudson appeared behind a door, saying, "What we are dealing with goes beyond any light illegal activity."
Dad turned to stare at Detective Hudson, who greeted him.
Dad then shifted his eyes to Mr. Vinton and, with a face filled with resolution, demanded that the detective tell him personally what was happening.
"I'm right here. Let's just get on with it," Dad said.
Detective Hudson laughed but nodded and agreed to my father's demands, telling him he would. However, they had to wait for Detective Diaz to show up. After a few moments, Detective Diaz returned from her break, and Hudson explained the situation. Although Diaz's face showed subtle indignation, she let Hudson guide her and Dad to an empty boardroom.
Zack and I followed behind, avoiding being noticed by the trio.
We stood outside the boardroom as they began talking, our ears as close as we could to the closed blinds. Díaz and Hudson, all this time, had been checking the backgrounds of the victims of the crashes. They intended to discover the connection between them and the supposed illegal racing circuit that had been theorized by the police.
But there was no evidence. Nada.
None of the victims were connected in any way, and they still didn't have the identity of the driver of the Thunderbird. The detectives had gone to great lengths to find out about what type of racing they were dealing with in Vernon and Los Angeles, to the point of using undercover cops working in vice to see if anything was going on.
But that also led to a dead end.
"Okay, so what's happening?" Dad asked the detectives. "Can you tell me what is really going on here?"
"After all our research in this investigation and the recent developments that occurred last night, we have come to believe we are not dealing with an illegal racing ring," Detective Díaz began saying.
"The people in those cars weren't being raced. They were being chased. All by the same man," Detective Hudson said.
"The driver of the Thunderbird?" Dad asked, and Hudson told him that it was right.
"We think this man is using this car as an instrument," he told him.
"What do you mean?" My father asked, confused.
"Yo, like a serial killer on wheels?" Zack whispered to me, and I looked at him, stunned. That's exactly how it was sounding from this side of the glass.
"The modus operandi of the man is to race people, but these people are not aware of the race. So they end up being persecuted by a psycho in a car, and they crash," Díaz said. "We believe these crashes are on purpose."
As she said that, I remembered the crash at the junction and how it looked like the Thunderbird had bumped the car on its side, intending to throw it against the wall. It seemed that had been the plan all along.
It all sounded so wild, but the more I thought about it, I could totally see it. Just like Zack was saying, the dude taking out the Thunderbird was killing these people with the car. But what was his motive? It was such a strange way to kill people.
"Wouldn't it be easier to just get your own car to screw these people over?" I thought as we kept listening.
"How do you know the crashes are intentional?" My father asked.
"Because it happened to the undercover van used on the surveillance job," Hudson said. "It crashed while pursuing the Thunderbird."
"It crashed?" Dad asked, aghast.
Both detectives told him that it had, although thankfully, the driver and the passengers just suffered minor injuries as they had crashed into a fence.
"This is a sick individual, Mr. Curry," Detective Hudson told him, "this is not just someone with a random bloodthirst. Mr. Vinton indicated to us that the garage doors were closed, and the car was left inside, just like it had been left yesterday before closing time."
"That son of a bitch. Does he think we haven't noticed?" Dad exclaimed.
"It seems that even in the face of being caught, he doesn't care. As Hudson said, this man has a clear motive. We just don't know what it is," Díaz said.
A small, silent break happened, and then Dad laughed, to the confusion of Hudson and Díaz.
"Well, at least you now know the driver is not me, as you haven't asked me where I've been this whole time," Dad said.
"Very funny, Mr. Curry," Hudson said, and then added. "Mr. Vinton told us he called you after last night's incident, and you were in bed with your wife. We think that counts as an alibi, does it not?"
"You are no longer a suspect in this case," said Díaz.
I smiled and quietly sighed in relief when I heard that. At least Dad was off the hook in all of this.
"The time of the incident and the description of the driver, according to the officer driving the van, discards you as a one."
"What does he look like?" Dad then asked.
"We are not available to disclose that information. If we did, it could interrupt our research," Hudson told him.
"Well, is that all?" I heard my father say, slamming his hands on the table.
"For now. We'll be communicating with Mr. Vinton about any updates," Detective Hudson said.
I heard the sound of moving chairs, which made Zack and me pull away from the entrance. We sat on a nearby bench, waiting for my Dad to exit. The door opened, and the trio walked out, still discussing some details.
"Because of last night's incident, we have concluded that aerial surveillance is preferred. There will be nightly checks from now on," Detective Hudson told my father as they shook hands.
Dad turned his head and noticed both of us sitting on the bench. I tried my most innocent face as I stared back at him, but it must have been a face I had pulled when I was younger, as my father's expression changed from surprise to upset.
"Jesus Christ. You have been listening to us all this time, haven't you?" Dad asked us.
I opened my mouth to say something, but couldn't. I hadn't been caught this quickly in my life. So I just looked down and shrugged apologetically.
"I'm sorry, Mr. Curry," Zack said, embarrassed.
Dad looked back at the detectives, who just smiled at him, and then back at us and sighed.
"Come on," he said, disappointed in our behavior. "Just.... let's go."
He then gently pushed us back to the station hallway, where Mr. Vinton was still waiting. As we walked out of the station and into the parking garage, Dad talked with Mr. Vinton about his conversation with the detectives. When Mr. Vinton interrupted my father, telling him that maybe they were revealing too much, my dad said it didn't matter, as we had already listened to the entire conversation.
Mr. Vinton sighed, disappointed, and turned to look at Zack.
"Jesus, what's wrong with you?" he asked.
"I wanted to know," Zack complained. "What's wrong with that? I saw the whole thing go down!"
"I know, and I'm sorry. But you could have asked me when we got home," Mr. Vinton argued. "You don't sneak up on police when they are talking about private things with someone else."
"Fine, I'm sorry," Zack said, sounding hurt. "I won't do it again."
The drive back was awkward and full of tension.
Zack and I stared at each other while riding in the back of the truck. We held hands to keep our spirits up, but I knew we were in trouble. When we returned to the Vintons' place and said goodbye to the two men, Dad told me to get in the passenger's seat.
I did it quickly and silently.
Then Dad placed his hand on my shoulder, and I saw his face finally deflate like a balloon. I knew he was tired and sick of my shenanigans.
"You are grounded," he told me.
I pressed my lips in anger. I knew Dad meant well, but I was just trying to be a friend to Zack. We were all in the mud together. Me, him, his dad, my own father, and everybody else in that damn shop. I was just looking for my own.
He then started the car again.
"No more shop or Zack's place for a month. Do you understand me?" My father asked me in a commanding voice. "Unless they invite you, don't come near this place, alright?"
I felt my heart fall into my chest and took a deep breath so as not to burst out crying. Then, without looking at Dad, I nodded in agreement.
What else was I supposed to do? Say no?
All I could think at that moment was just...
"Shit!"