Chapter 9
“How do you think they’re going to get their ransom
without us out there to access our bank accounts?” Howie asked Kevin.
Kevin shrugged as he frowned at Nick who was sitting
with his head between his knees. Howie
glanced over at him too, the effects of the drugs had worn of, leaving him
miserable. Brian flopped down beside
him, stirring up more dust from the old chair.
Nick sneezed a few times before settling back down.
“Hey Nick, how’re you feeling?” Kevin asked coming
closer to him.
“Like I’ve got boulders stuck in my sinuses!” Nick
groaned massaging his temples, “Anybody got a sledgehammer to knock me out
with?”
“Hey,” AJ said smiling slightly and actually looking
like he wanted to be helpful, “You can go upstairs and knock on that door up
there... I bet those guys with the big guns would be glad to give you a good
knock with the back ends of those babies.”
Howie rolled his eyes at AJ, as Brian snickered.
“AJ, how can you take this so lightly and joke about
it? We’re gonna die in a few days...”
“Howie, they said they’d let us go..” AJ began.
“That’s what they always say!” Howie fumed folding
his arms over his chest and glaring down at the floor.
Kevin felt helpless in the situation. What exactly could he say to ease the
tension in the room? What Howie had
said might have been true. They had no
insurance, or contract signed that said these guys would keep their word. They had probably killed their manager Max,
and their bus driver, Carl. Why would
they keep them alive? Kevin knew his
family would pay with anything they had to try to protect his life... but there
was still no guarantee that the kidnappers would stay true to their word. It was actually safer for them to kill them,
then they wouldn’t have to worry about a complicated exchange of cargo.
“Where are you going Nick?” Kevin was aroused from
his thoughts by Nick’s sudden motion of standing up.
“Up those stairs to knock on that door up there, and
see if one of those nice gun men will konk me out with their gun butts,” he
said simply, actually heading for the stairs.
Kevin sighed and stared as Nick rounded the bottom
the stairs and was about to start ascending them, “Nick, get back here. Howie, come over here too.”
Howie was reluctant to return to the faded couch
where the others were curling up ready to hear Kevin’s words of
inspiration. Even Nick looked vaguely
interested.
“This is an unbelievable situation we’re in..”
“No shit Sherlock,” Nick muttered, disguising his
comment with a cough.
Kevin narrowed his eyes at him and Nick looked
innocent. Brian nudged him with his
elbow in an attempt to warn him to keep quiet.
“We have to stay calm,” Kevin said trying to keep his
voice steady. Who was he to be
instructing anyone else to be calm? He
was scared out of his mind. He didn’t
want to die, and he didn’t want the others to either. He didn’t even want to begin to imagine what his family could be
going through as he spoke. But, if he
wanted to survive this situation, and if his friends, his little brothers,
wanted to survive this situation, the first rule was don’t panic.
“Calm? KEVIN
THERE’S FREAKIN’ SEMI-AUTOMATIC..”
“Howie! Don’t
you see? If we spend every possible
second down here freakin’ out about what’s going on upstairs, or what’s gonna
happen days from now... We might as well die now.”
“There’s that ‘D’ word, again,” Nick uttered, resting
his head on his knees, avoiding Kevin, Brian, AJ, and Howie’s glares.
“We have to have faith... Faith that God will protect
us, and let these guys be honest and release us when they get what they want..”
“But what if they can’t! My family doesn’t have the kind of money these people will
probably be demanding as ransom. I have
the money! But I can’t get it from
here, and neither can they!” Howie began to pace the room, his head down, to
hide the tears that were building in his eyes, “My Mama’s gonna be so upset...”
AJ sighed and stood in Howie’s way to stop his
pacing. Howie crashed directly into him
and tried to push him out of his path, instead AJ flung his arms around him,
“It’s ok to cry D... But Kev’s right.
We’re gonna make ourselves sick if we just sit and think about this all
the time..”
“Well, it’s kind of hard not to!” Nick pointed
out. He lie his head back on the couch,
“Can I go upstairs now?”
“Nick, would you just stop acting so...”
“Immature?” Nick finished, “You get me some
antihistamine, and I’ll do whatever the hell you want.”
Kevin stared at him, then began to walk towards the
stairs.
“Now, where are you
going?” Brian asked.
“Up the stairs to get the guys with the guns...”