With the act fulfilled to completion, the shovel hit the ground with a soft thud against the grass whilst rugged, uncontrollable breaths fell from Morgan Finch.
Lee noted that whilst the grave did not look exactly identical to how they had found it originally, it was damn-near close, like looking at a twin instead of a mirror. She nodded to herself in approval, grateful that the night was nearly over, or perhaps not grateful at all, she wasn’t sure. For now, she was in her emotional purgatory, and waking up to a new day could very well alter that completely. “Would you like to say some words, baby?” Lee muttered quietly, as if the words may spook Morgan out of the trance she had committed herself to.
Morgan Finch remained solely focused upon the newly-covered grave, her sly remarks a distant memory. For a fractionof a second, Lee debated as to whether her girlfriend had even heard her at all, until she ushered back just as quietly a simple “sure.”
Lee took her place beside Morgan, now, placing a gloved hand against her back, adding further stains to Morgan’s white tank top presently covered in dirt. As the silence lingered for a few moments, Lee debated as to whether to begin the speech herself, only for Morgan to chime in seconds later. “Margaret Spence—you were someone’s daughter, someone’s wife, someone’s friend. I won’t disrespect you any further by pretending I know anything about you, but I’m sure that there are people out there that smile upon hearing your name. You will be remembered by myself, and Lee, but more importantly, by the loved ones you left behind. I’m sorry for what unfolded here tonight. We can’t expect your forgiveness, but we do hope that you can still rest easy now.”
Lee Holmes silently wished that she could rest easy after this, too, but after Morgan’s speech, she wasn’t so sure that she deserved to. “Let's leave her be now, babe. Don’t forget your jacket. Once we’ve burned the boxes and stopped by the thrift store, it might even be preferable if we act slightly drunk for the sake of the CCTV in our apartment complex just in case we need to present a reason, other than our charity donation, for being out so late as our alibi. It is our anniversary, after all.”
“I’d happily down a whole bottle of whiskey right now and not have to act at all, honestly,” Morgan commented, sounding sullen, as she grabbed her jacket from the grass alongside the shovel whilst Lee retrieved the empty spray bottle on the opposing side of the grave. It was strange, Lee thought, how the emotions rippled from Morgan whilst she herself remained completely vacant. The acts that Morgan had committed prior at their apartment seemed far more worthy of guilt, and yet it wasclear at that moment that the culpability she felt lay solely for Margaret Spence.
The both of them departed from Margaret’s grave in silence as they made their way back to the car. With all their energy depleted, climbing over the fence seemed a much more arduous task than it had previously, but as the pair worked through their exhaustion, they exhaled a sigh of relief in unison as they stared through the metal fencing to the cemetery that was now on the other side.
After opening the trunk of the car, they set the used boxes alight with Morgan’s metal cigarette lighter upon the stone path as the pair watched them burn. As the fire crumbled each box into ash, Morgan used the same lighter to spark a cigarette from her jacket pocket; the same jacket that was now, fortunately, covering her dirty white tank top. “You want one?”
Lee Holmes had never smoked for the entirety of their relationship, and yet, it appeared that such a declaration never seemed to matter. Morgan would always offer, and Lee would continue to say no. Shaking her head, Lee Holmes retrieved the shovel from Morgan’s other hand, dragging some of the ashes into the grass beside the fence, grateful that it was overgrown. “I presume you have the common sense to take that cigarette with you.”
Morgan Finch exhaled a puff of smoke into the crisp air. “I was planning on it. Speaking of planning, I wish we’d have thought beforehand about the massive fucking burn mark these boxes would leave on path,” she said, half of the sentence partially shrouded by the cigarette as she perched it back inside of her mouth.
Lee shrugged her shoulders, her eyes slightly scrunched together whilst she devised another plan. “At least we’re not standing beside the grave anymore. Light a few more cigarettes,without putting them in your mouth,” she emphasized, “andleave them on the ground so that it just looks like teens were here smoking and setting fire to things or something.”
As instructed, Morgan did exactly that, focusing her attention on each cigarette as it burned. Lee knew Morgan well enough by now to know that a heavy focus like this could only mean that she was temporarily lost to the outside world—a dissociation that she herself wished she could adopt.
“One more stop,” Lee commented, expelling Morgan from her detached state, opening the trunk and placing the shovel and spray bottle inside, dropping the last remaining remnants of the concoction into the interior. “We’ll have to clean this mess up as well,” she continued, motioning towards the stains that had settled on the carpet of the trunk.
Morgan nodded, removing her gloves from her sweaty palms as she climbed into the driver's side of the car, awaiting Lee’s arrival on the passenger side. “Time to give away your teapot.”
The car roared to life as Morgan placed the key into the ignition. Meanwhile, Lee placed her seatbelt into its buckle with a satisfyingclick. “I told you that I don’t want to give away my pot, Morgan.”
Her girlfriend looked over at her, a glint in her eye as the car began to roll down the concrete path. “And I’m tellingyouit’s good karma.”
Chapter Five
After a day of rest on Saturday, Lee Holmes felt the farthest thing from rested.
Upon returning home from the cemetery on Friday, Morgan had taken a second trip with the rest of the body, which had also resulted in the disposal of both Lee’s favorite backpack, and one of the hold-all bags from their last vacation. The location of the last-remaining identifiable parts continued to remain a mystery to Lee, and she found herself partially relieved, and partially terrified at the same time. Body disposal wasn’t a school project, and yet, to Lee, it felt like she had handed her assignment in half-finished. Only this time, she would prefer to receive none of the credit whatsoever.
A recollection of a documentary from Lee’s childhood had led both herself, and Morgan, to Jerry’s Diner on the Sunday; a short five-minute walk from the apartment that now made her lungs burn when she breathed, inhaling an excessive amount of cleaning product and three cans of spray-on deodorant to mask the smell. The apartment that had once smelt of hyacinths andperfume now resembled a scent that wasn’t entirely dissimilar to a fraternity house.
The documentary in question followed a group of scientists conducting an experiment on a placebo drug in order to assess its effectiveness against genuine medication. At present time, the diner, she proposed, was her placebo—a means of numbing the headache without actually treating the symptoms. Perhaps the distraction would be enough to temporarily hide in the monotony and normality of it all, as if she could drown her demons at the bottom of a coffee cup.
With her mind so preoccupied, Lee didn’t even notice the waitress heading towards their table until the swaying of her ponytail caught her peripherals. Extending a hand into the pocket on the front of her apron, she pulled out a tattered notebook and a ballpoint pen. “What can I get for you two lovely sisters today?”
Lee’s eyes were on Morgan now, a smirk at the corner of her girlfriend's lips. Upon approximately the fiftieth time of correcting strangers of their relationship with one another, they both came to an agreement to simply stop bothering altogether. Lee could hear Morgan’s previous aggravations in her head whilst she pretended to look through the menu.Why do people always assume we’re sisters? Why not friends? Or cousins? We don’t even have the same accent. Pair that with the fact we look absolutely completely fucking different, you don’t need Sherlock Holmes to crack the case on this mystery.
Morgan Finch had not been wrong. Lee’s own naturally red hair was hardly comparable to that of her girlfriend’s naturally dark brown hair. In addition, her pale, freckled complexion was essentially the opposite of Morgan’s tanned, olive skin.
Her own mouth formed into a smirk now, as she set down the menu and ordered the same thing she always did. “Coffee,please. Black, two sugars. What would you like to drink,dear sister?"
Lee felt Morgan’s leg against her own as it bounced underneath the table in frustration. “Skinny vanilla latte, please. Sugar packets on the side. As many as you are willing to part with.”
For the briefest of moments whilst they ordered their regular beverages, it felt as if the placebo might truly be working. And yet, like a pill to water, the feeling dissolved with every stare from the waitress that felt like just a second too long, as if she could reach inside Lee’s brain and pull out the reason for wanting a placebo in the first place. Would every interaction with a stranger now feel as if she was being lobotomized? Lee exhaled only when the waitress departed with a pleasant “coming right up,” and a curt nod.
There was an elephant in the room, Lee Holmes deduced, and it was becoming larger and larger the longer she waited to ask the question that had been on her mind for the last two days. “What now?”
When Morgan opened her mouth to speak, Lee could see the hesitation on her features, the crease in her eyebrows, pondering the best way to phrase what she was about to say next. It was the equivalent of saying “bomb” on an airplane, the pair of them needing to decipher how to talk about the bombshell that was killing another human being without actually mentioning killing another human being. “We could go back to the way things were,” Morgan said, leaning forward, understanding Lee’s question instantaneously. “...orthis could be a new chapter for us. This doesn’t have to be your swan song. You don’t have to be…a one hit wonder. Do you understand?”
Lee’s senses had become heightened within the last couple of days, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up when someone was in close proximity to her; her vision, not improvedper se, but keener, more curious to her surroundings. Perhaps it came with the territory of aiding a killer, or worse, being one.
