​20 Weeks – Chapter 5 (Part 1)

20 Weeks – Chapter 5 (Part 1)
 
 
“Well, that’s it, I’m officially out of ideas.”
 
“It’s not that your suggestion to burn him, and the bar, wasn’t helpful…” Bijuu began, looking up at the tall boy who was seated next to her on the floor.
 
“It’s just… the whole point of getting rid of the body is so that I don’t lose my job, remember?”
 
“I know… it’s just…” the dark-haired boy began.
 
“Do you know any pig framers?” he asked then, as if a helpful memory had suddenly surfaced.
 
Bijuu though just shook her head, and thought of that horribly stupid movie trope.  As if people in London actually keep pigs…
 
“Personally, I still like the lye and pressure cooker idea,” Ben said then, suddenly changing the subject.  “How did you come up with that one?”
 
“And now we’re back to cutting up the body.  Fucking aaawsoooome!” the unhelpful ghost intoned from the top of the jukebox.
 
Bijuu though just cast her a scowl, and did her best to ignore the ever-intrusive entity.
 
Which only annoyed the ghost even more.
 
“Squishy bits!  Remember!” she shouted loudly then, as if to prove her annoyance.
 
“I used to want to be a teacher,” Bijuu told the boy, with the innocent eyes, truthfully enough.
 
“Why didn’t you?  Become a teacher?” he asked, prying for information no one else had ever cared for.
 
“Because…” she began, slowly.
 
Then, looking away, she finished, “my mother said it was a waste of time, that there were a lot of other, smarter people who wanted the few jobs out there.”
 
She looked back to him then, with dry eyes and the petulant scowl she normally reserved for her mother. 
 
“She said I’d never make any money at it.” 
 
And then Bijuu looked down at her moth-eaten sweater and her Walmart shoes and for a moment she wanted to bawl. 
 
But the tears got stuck in her throat when she looked again at the lifeless body of her boss.
 
“No matter what it was, mum always had a reason it wouldn’t work.  Besides, High School was a hard time for me, and college wasn’t really an option.”
 
Bijuu said the last with the tightly-managed smile she normally reserved for her tables.
 
“Well, it’s an option now.  You could start at the community college and work your way up,” the stupid boy offered then, most unhelpfully.
 
But Bijuu just froze, like a polar vortex, and she’d just been caught naked in it.
 
Then, she looked down at her belly, then quickly over to the dead guy. 
 
“That was the plan.”
 
“I still say you should just call the police,” Ben said then, when he couldn’t think what else to say.
 
“Look… if you don’t want to help that’s fine.  Just leave.  But I can’t call the cops.  You and I both know that people like me don’t get off easy. They’ll never believe it was self-defense.  No one ever does.”
 
“That’s not true,” Ben said, just as her ghost snorted loudly, and then blew a raspberry directly in his face.
 
Bijuu scowled at the murdered woman, but remained silent.
 
“It’s just… I don’t really want to get involved.  Not with this.”
 
Bijuu heard the pain in the boy’s voice.  Still, she couldn’t help cringe at how cowardly his words had felt.
 
“If you’d have just needed a ride.  Or… wanted me to beat someone up…”
 
The boy stood up, and then paced for a second before he pointed at the small, bloody man.
 
“But this… this is serious.  Really serious,” he told her.  Like she didn’t already know.
 
“I don’t think… I just don’t think I can get involved,” he said, finishing lamely, as he plopped himself down in the only remaining upright chair.
 
“Pussy!” her ghost screamed from behind the register.
 
“That’s not helpful,” Bijuu told her in a plain tone.
 
“I know,” Ben replied.
 
“And I know I said ‘anytime’.  But… Bijuu…”
 
Bijuu’s face though was a blank slate that the inexperienced boy couldn’t begin to read.  And for a long moment the two of them just sat there in silence.
 
Then, slowly climbing to her feet, Bijuu looked at him and said, “You know… I couldn’t believe it when you came out and helped me this morning.”
 
Her voice was soft, yielding even, and not at all what the boy had been braced for.
 
“No one had ever helped me like that before,” she told him truthfully, as she moved in as close to him as she could get, without straddling him.
 
“And that’s really-really fucked up, Bijuu.  That you know so many assholes…” the boy began, but before he could finish the girl was on top of him, her large, full breasts just inches away from his chest.
 
“I would literally do anything you ask, if you just help me with this one little thing…” she cooed, almost as if she knew what she was doing.
 
“Oh my god, gross!” her ghost cried from just a few feet away.
 
“Bijuu…” Ben began, placing both of his hands on her shoulders, just as the desperate girl started to grind down on top of him.
 
“Bijuu!” he said more forcefully, almost thrusting her away from him.
 
“Stop!”
 
“Yeah, stop!  You gross little whore!” her ghost said then, sliding up and around the suddenly mortified girl.
 
Bijuu though, just bit her lip and doubled-down on her last-ditch effort to get someone (ANYONE) to help her save her life.
 
And so, she once again placed her hand on his chest and said, “You were so wonderful this morning.  It made me feel so protected.”
 
And then she pressed her lips to his cheek.
 
But Ben’s big hand just pushed her face away.
 
But the look on Bijuu’s face was more than the boy could take.
 
“Fine!  I’ll help.”
 
 
 
 
© Raena Exe 2020
ISBN   978-1-7332979-8-1
 
*All characters, places, and events are completely fictional.
*All rights reserved.