Chapter 25

Saturday, September 8th, 2012

"We're calling the police."

Kaspar muttered coldly as he gazed into the blaze of the campfire they had started in the backyard of Finn's cottage home.

A pang of panic hit West's stomach as he stiffened in his lawn chair. "Wait-"

"We're calling the police, West!" the redhead spat, his rage having breached past the forced calm he put on while listening to his three friends recount the incident near the tail-end of yesterday. It had him shooting straight up out of his seat, which fell back into the grass.

When his hand dug into his jeans for his phone, Justin, who sat next to him and Finn, grabbed his arm to still him.

"Woah, wait, dude! Just think about this."

Kaspar smacked the brunette's hand off and glared in livid disbelief. "Think about it!? There's nothing to think about! Gottverdammt, I knew there was something sketchy about that creep!"

West swallowed a lump in his throat as he watched his furious cousin grab a small rock beside him and fling it into the fire, causing it to snap and crackle until a wave of heat bellowed out as it grew slightly bigger. Finn warily looked back at his home, looking for a light to shine in the window of his parents' room. Guilt punched the team captain's insides. Maybe he could have made a difference if he had focused on letting Neil know about his shady cousin's whereabouts, but lust had fogged his mind. West, despite being a teenaged guy, didn't think much about sex often. Basketball, schoolwork, and teaching himself about cameras always took the forefront of his mind. So, how in the hell had what transpired yesterday happen?

"And you guys are telling me not to call the cops on an abuser and a potential rapist!?"

The metaphorical knife twisted.

"Chill!" Justin snatched another rock Kaspar was about to throw. "We're right beside a dark forest. You know what happened last time we thought we were alone."

He looked away from the glaring redhead and gave West an apologetic glance. The blond just sighed and went to stand before his cousin, looking quite contrite.

"Trust me, man. I wanted to do that, too. We all wanted to, but don't forget, this might be a gang we're dealing with. They already warned my family off once. And something's telling me I won't get another chance."

Kaspar scoffed, unmoved. "Oh, please. Nothing will happen to you. You're the son of a famous basketball player. Every investigator in the nation will pull up in Tuct Side if you disappeared."

"I'm- We're so lucky Fifi wasn't there when our house got vandalized. But if we call the cops and find out it was us… dude…" he choked up at the thought of Ophelia becoming a subject of one of those AMBER alerts.

He couldn't even imagine the prospect.

And so couldn't Kaspar because his fists bunched up tightly, eyeing his blond cousin icily. "They wouldn't! I and the rest of this side of the town would kill every last person on the west side if they were stupid enough to try!"

That was the difference between West and Kaspar when a loved one was harmed. One would curl up into a weeping ball and hope to die while the other would raze the town down with fire and blood. He admired Kaspar so much for that. It was time he stepped up, too, but in a different way that wouldn't leave any of their families in the path of the flames.

"But we're not going to test that theory, are we?" Finn spoke up for the first time since Kaspar blew up.

Said boy growled lowly in his throat before his shoulders slumped, a little of the edge flowing out in a deep sigh. "No. No, we're not. But we need to do something."

Finn nodded. "Yeah, I don't feel comfortable sitting back and letting shit like that happen."

"Same here," Justin raised his hand before seizing a pack of marshmallows.

"Of course. We'll do something," West agreed. "In fact, we're doing something right now."

-

Sunday, September 9th, 2012

"West! West! Wake up!" A voice cut into his consciousness as his body was shaken.

Roused from sleep, West sluggishly pushed up from his bed, rubbing at his eyes as his older sister and brother came into focus. "Wha… What? What's up?"

"Look!" Isaak shoved his phone in his sibling's face. "The news! They did it! They caught the guy!"

West peered at it through tightly narrowed eyes, and on the screen displayed a blonde woman standing and talking in the middle of a blue studio newsroom.

"What?" West shook his head to get rid of some exhaustion. "Who?"

"They caught the guy who sprayed our house!" Vanessa stated proudly, grinning alongside Isaak.

Hearing that, all the tiredness promptly vanished, West hurriedly swinging his legs off the bed to get a closer look at Isaak's phone screen. "What! Really!?"

He read the headline just below the woman, saying:

BREAKING NEWS! VANDAL OF EASTERN TUCT SIDE CAPTURED AND ARRESTED!

"Justice is about to be served once again in the small town of Tuct Side, Idaho," she spoke. "Just two weeks ago, the home of famous German basketball player, Friedrich Kuttner IV, had been vandalized by an unknown perpetrator. However, after fourteen days with no leads, the suspect seemed to have come out of hiding and had confessed to the crime after he walked into the police station two days before today. Twenty-six-year-old Erick Manzanares led police to his apartment in western Tuct Side, where he held the object – a spray can – and analysts have been able to match the paint used in the crime with the contents of the can. Manzanares is currently in police custody and is awaiting further questioning."

An image of a Hispanic man popped up next to her, revealing the face of the vandal. This "Erick Manzanares" seemed like your everyday, blue-collar family man, his round face a dark tan and slightly scruffy black hair with a mustache and goatee. His expression appeared to be uncertain and wary as if he was just told to do something he knew would get him in great trouble.

"Holy shit," West breathed out, not believing his eyes.

Just after he admitted yesterday that he was going to do something about the shady happenings in the town.

"I don't get it," Isaak quirked an eyebrow. "He admitted to it, so why not just throw him in a prison cell."

Vanessa shrugged. "I dunno. But dad's seeing to that, I bet."

The eldest sibling swiped at his phone and tapped his thumb on the screen once. West could no longer see what was going on, but he could hear the voices just fine.

"Kuttner and his wife's brother-in-law have come in to speak on the matter," the blonde woman continued, "breaking their silence for the first time in the two weeks since the incident occurred."

The team captain recognized his father's voice immediately.

"Less stains on the streets this way. You don't mark someone's house and get away with it. Der Tor scared family, and now he will face the full extent of the law."

"It must have been a trying time for you all," a male interview stated, sounding bland in his sympathies. "Not only that but being in the public eye as well."

Another voice piped up, this one being Kaspar's dad, Elmar. "Rich said it all. This will be a lesson to those who think they can get away with doing whatever they want. We are a big community in a small world. Acts like this not only hurt us but our neighbors as well."