Powdered Murder

The first thing that caught my eye was a pile of red snow.

Lila was on the ground in her wedding dress. She yelped out in pain as she clutched the side of her calf. Patrick was kneeling beside her, his eyes wide with a disturbed expression. In between the two of them was a shiny hand gun. It looked small enough to be concealed in a jacket pocket, but it was big enough to intimidate me. My eyes darted from Lila to Patrick.

"Patrick?" I spoke softly. A breeze rushed by me, and strands of my hair became unpi

"Essie?" Lila looked right at me. She groaned as she squeezed her wound. Beads of dark red blood dripped from in between her fingers. "Get out of here!"

"No, Essie," Patrick blurted out. "It's not what it looks like."

I hesitated.

Part of me, the sensible part, wanted to run back to the hotel and wait for Sheriff Williams to sort this all out. But the other part of me knew the minute I turned my back someone might end up dead. I didn't know who that would be. My eyes skimmed over Patrick, focusing on the way his hands were opened rather than clenched. There was a blood stain on his knee from kneeling too close to Lila's open wound. My eyes then observed Lila. She clutched her calf desperately. It was obvious she had been shot. Her face grimaced from the pain as she attempted to stay sitting so she could watch me stay or go.

"Then what exactly is going on here?" I gulped.

"I didn't shoot her," Patrick pleaded.

"Oh, please," Lila argued. Her lip trembled and a tear trickled down her cheek. "Look at the gun. He just barely dropped it before you came around the corner."

I glanced down at the weapon – the gun that none of us had yet to reach for. The first person to lunge for it would be assumed to be the guilty party. The handle faced Patrick. It looked like it had been dropped into the snow near Patrick's right hand.

"Before you make any assumptions, Essie," Patrick shouted over Lila's groaning. "Remember Camp Viddletin? Eighth grade?"

I dove into my head and tried to remember Camp Viddletin. It was almost as if I opened up a filing cabinet in my brain and took out a folder labeled eighth grade. It was tradition at our middle school that each graduating class had the opportunity to spend the last week of the school year at a special camp before moving onto Bison Creek High. It was a week spent canoeing, hiking, and horseback riding. For me, it had been a week spent mostly in my cabin braiding friendship bracelets. There'd been one afternoon where Patrick and his posse walked past my window on their way to the archery station. I decided to casually join them, and I ended up shooting four bullseyes in a row.

I took a deep breath. What did Patrick want me to remember from that trip? We didn't talk much. Just the regular banter that middle schooler's say. Patrick had teased me at first for holding the bow wrong. Then I'd teased him for the way his toes pointed out like a penguin when he had taken his stance to shoot. He made me stand on the other side of him so he didn't have to look at me when he was trying to concentrate. I had to keep switching sides when it was his turn. Back and forth, and back and forth.

My eyes went wide as I looked at the hopeful half-grin on Patrick's face.

Patrick used his left hand to shoot arrows. I remembered the times I'd sat behind him in class watching him write right-handed. But he stood goofy-footed on his snowboard, always boasting that he was ambidextrous. He ate with his left hand. He threw with his left hand.

And he shot with his left hand.

I tucked a strand of wild hair behind my ear. I looked Patrick in the eyes and felt a piece of my chest warm up just enough to help me breathe easier.

"Don't let your feelings for him cloud the truth here," Lila stated. She frowned as she looked down at the crimson stain on her wedding dress. The dress was very form fitting. It hugged her fragile body, showing just how tiny she actually was. So ski

"What?"

"The co

"Lila," Patrick said quietly. "Don't do this. Let's all go inside and talk."

"I agree," I responded. More tears ran down Lila's cheeks as she looked at me.

"You're crazy too," she shouted. "Is everyone in this town completely mad? Hasn't anyone around here ever heard of binge eating or daytime television? That's how normal people deal with their problems. I'm tired of all the ‘he said, she said.’"

"Calm down," Patrick instructed her. "Let's go inside before we all freeze to death."

"Do you really think that I'd be stupid enough to shoot myself in the leg?" Lila cried. "That's insulting!"

"No one is saying that," Patrick replied. He glanced at me and then carefully leaned towards the gun. My entire torso felt heavy as he stared at it.

"Stop!" Lila screamed. "Don't believe him, Essie." She scooted forward in the snow, letting a white blanket of powder drift up her hem and ruin part of her dress. "He's a murderer!"

"I didn't so much as touch Do

"That's a lie too." Lila scooted again. Her hand was inches from the pistol. "You touched her the night we got to this wretched town, and who knows what else."

"She was upset and she couldn't stop crying. I gave her a hug. That was it." Patrick shook his head. "How many times do I have to tell you that nothing was going on between us?"

"Hmmm." Lila tilted her head playfully. The grimace erased from her face. She began acting like she hadn't been shot and she wasn't bleeding into a pile of flurries. "I don't know. At least a dozen more times."

Patrick raised his eyebrows. I took a few steps forward, my eyes glued on the gun.

"Stop it," I said looking to Patrick and then to Lila. "The both of you."

"Oh to hell with it," Lila muttered. In one swift movement she let go of her bleeding calf and scooped up the pistol. She slowly stood up and shifted her weight onto her good side as blood oozed down her leg, forming a crimson pool around her foot. She hardly even acknowledged it. Her expression was fixated on Patrick rather than the pain that was undoubtedly shooting up her extremities. "I've had it with the trips down memory lane. The secretive glances. The secret rendezvous on Canyon Street. I knew I couldn't trust you around her, Patrick." The look on Lila's face changed again in less than a second. Her gentle eyes became more still and doll-like. She didn't smile. The best way to describe the look on her face was that she had a devilish smirk.

"Now Lila…" Patrick took a couple of steps away from me, putting more distance in between the two of us. His gaze fixated on hers, holding her attention as best as he could.