Look Back (Part 1)

Monday, October 5th

“Oi Grayson!” Luis’ voice was shrill as he shouted over the hubhub of the crowded study hall. “We are sitting over here!” I made my way to the back of the class, stumbling over the occasional bag lying on the floor. The six idiots in my study group had gathered two benches and pushed them together, one opposing the other so that the three of them sat on opposite sides. Ah yes, the perfectly balanced idiocy levels of a dinner table. Symmetric. How… Idiosyncratic.

“Look at this weirdo laughing by himself.”

“I bet he thought of another stupid pun.”

“Come on now, they aren’t that bad.” I lacked even an ounce of conviction in my voice.

“I wanna jump off a building every time I hear one.”

“Same, but I also want to throw you off one.”

4 of those idiots in question were Luis, James, Daniel and Mat. They weren’t really friends, more so class acquaintances that tolerated me.

“Now now, I bet it was just about something related to how we are sitting and how much this looks like a dinner table.” Luke, the 5th idiot, said scribbling away in his notebook. “Right?”

“Spot on as usual, Mr. Holmes.” I put on my best Watson impression. “Picking through my brain must be elementary for you.”

“Oh no, my dear Watson. That’s just simply not true. You are quite the astute one yourself.” Luke grinned as I pulled down a chair from the massive stack standing at the corner of the room. Considering this was the room where the school Ensemble usually practised- that checked out.

“There they go LARP-ing again.”

“Do you two secretly roleplay gay lovers?”

“Don’t worry, we would totally support you guys.”

“Nah, I would be pretty jealous.”

I had just sat down at the head of the table closest to where Luke would be at my left when Mat dropped one of his signature nukes again. We collectively stared at him.

“What? Neil’s cute.” Mat said, completely nonplussed as always. We collectively groaned.

“Thank you?” I replied, unsure if it was something I should be thankful for.

“Man, you really need to stop with that.” James flashed me an annoyed look. How is it my fault?!

“Stop with what? Complimenting people?” Mat replied, browsing through his phone.

“That’s not complimenting someone, that’s just inserting unwanted sexual tension!”

“Oh, because you and I aren’t enough?” Mat smirked. His chubby cheeks lighting up with mischief.

“Besides-” He pulled out his phone with the meaning of the word compliment showing on-screen. “Last I checked, calling someone cute definitely fell under the ‘compliment’ category.”

“That’s not the part I am talking about!”

“Okay hothead, what specific word in my vocabulary do you take issue with now?”

“Why would you be jealous of them?!”

“Oh, that?” Mat snickered. “I love imagining the angst of cute boys discovering their love for each other. It livens up my withering heart.”

James deflated suddenly. A look of pain on his face. As if he would almost cry.

“Am I not enough for you anymore?!” He wrapped his hands around Mat’s shoulders and kept whimpering. “What did I do to deserve this from you? What did he have that I didn’t?”

“Jamie. You are killing me! Ick! Stop!” Mat giggled as James rubbed his nose on Mat’s neck.

“Awwwww.” We echoed at the sheer cuteness on display.

“Jamie! People are looking!” Mat half-struggled to get his words out. His usual smug facade rapidly falling apart.

“I don’t care! Just don’t break up with me, pweaseeeee.”

“Ugh.” Mat groaned. “You are actually the worst.”

“If you want me to stop, how about you take me out on a date this weekend?”

“Awwwww.” We echoed in adoration.

“Fine. But I am planning it this time!” Mat sighed as James leaned in to kiss him on his cheeks. Mat instantly turned red. I could almost see smoke coming out of his ears. It was embarrassingly sweet. To the point where I wanted to look away.

“Love you!” James pulled back and continued writing down his history essay, as if nothing had happened. Mat still appeared to be stun-locked. I hoped for his sake that he recovered soon.

I turned towards Luke as the mood in the group slowly tapered off into soft whispers and small laughs. We knew each other as friends of friends, mutuals of mutuals- so it was rare for a continued conversation to ever really persist. The study hall of Copperstown High School was something we didn’t visit nearly enough as a group for that kind of dynamic to ever really come to fruition. Not that I minded it. None of us did.

“What are you working on now?” I asked Luke. His notebook, a mess of words, shapes and colours. His phone, lying beside him with several tabs open. I took a peek to find news articles. A whole bunch of them.

“You haven’t heard?” Luke looked surprised. What had I missed?

“One of our seniors, Sam Lake.” Daniel started. He sat the farthest away from me so I leaned in to hear him over the loud ambience of the class. “He got hospitalised. Word is his room caught on fire and he was a sitting duck in the middle of an inferno.”

“Jesus fucking christ, seriously?”

“Yeah. Apparently the police are involved already, so definitely not just a freak accident.”

“Why…? Are there any conclusive reports out yet?” Sam Lake did ring a bell in my head but I couldn’t really connect it to anything significant.

“Not quite, but there are theories. Lots of them in fact. Not everyday that this town gets to have its own little almost-murder mystery to solve.” Dan sighed and went back to looking at his Biology notes. “I still don’t get why Luke has to be so fixated on it though.”

“Same reasons as everybody else. Nothing more satisfying than connecting the dots of an interesting mystery.” Luke said, his voice nonchalant but buzzing with the energy of having something new to sink his teeth into. Was he always this hyperactive? Probably. I wasn’t around him nearly enough to know for certain.

“So who put you up to this?” I asked. I knew he wasn’t the type to direct his energy himself.

“Not anybody in particular. I just kept hearing about it all day and that gave me a brain aneurysm.”

Really? Luke ‘energy-saver’ Rogers actually pursuing something on his own behest?

“But Luis did finally push me over the edge by bringing it up for the umpteenth time before you got here.” Ah, that made more sense.

“What have you got so far?” Luke wasn’t the type to half-ass his research. He was in fact the type to connect the dots and see patterns faster than anyone could.

“Well I have some threads I am following. Heard of Megan Clarke before?”

“The school Madonna? Sure.”

“The victim in this case, was her boyfriend. They had been dating for almost a month now.”

“...” Really. That’s where his dots led him?

“Don’t look at me funny. Just listen.” He paused, gathering his thoughts. “Every case has at least a victim, criminal, a method to the crime, the evidence and most importantly a primary motive.

“So let’s start with the victim- Sam Lake. Decent at academics, ace of the Tennis team, good looking and popular with the girls. Generally a good-natured, well-behaved fellow with no such rivalries to speak off. Has had little history of dating and his first real ‘official’ relationship ends up being with one of the most popular and prettiest girls in the school.” Luke’s words were concise in their delivery. “The Lake family has always been a familiar name. They run the biggest clinic in town after all. Doesn’t mean they are rich, but they are pretty well off. As an aside, there are almost no records of friction in the family proper but of course, it would be a pretty massive red flag to find anything in the public view.”

I nodded in understanding as Luke carried on.

“The evidence- frankly, we know very little for now. The police have been pretty tight-lipped about it. I asked a few different people who usually are in the know of shit like this, but even they are kinda stumped for additional info. Official records state that the source of the fire is unknown but the victim was found with heavy third-degree burns. Few media photos circulating around also seem to confirm a street facing window with a shattered hole in the bottom half. Almost like-” Luke looked at me, as if he wanted me to finish his sentence.

“Something had been chucked inside violently.” I said aloud without even realising. Luke nodded in acknowledgement.

“So a throwable object that has enough weight to fly through the air, shatter some pretty sturdy glass and also have a pretty sizable burn radius on impact. Now, what comes to mind immediately?”

“Firebombs.” Mat said. “I need to be firebombed.” He was still recovering, I suppose.

“Not quite. What else?” Luke said, visibly annoyed.

“Molotovs?” Luis chimed in enthusiastically.

“Correct! Hand-thrown incendiary weapons, typically a glass bottle filled with flammable liquid and sealed with a flammable cloth as its ignition source. It’s the definition of improvised.”

“Wouldn’t it still be kinda difficult for someone to actually make?” I asked, I didn’t see how someone could get their hands on something like that. Let alone make one potent enough to cause a fire of such a degree.

“That’s elementary, my dear Watson.” Luke said, his eyes lighting up. “Molotov Cocktails are surprisingly easy to make. Get a few mundane convenience store products and then you are just one youtube tutorial away from a very volatile, very dangerous little bottle.”

“That sounds kinda absurd. And also grossly oversimplified.”

“Not really. All you need is gasoline, alcohol or some sort of napalm-like mixture in a decently big bottle. Wrap around the mouth with a heavy material of some description and then let it hold the flammable wick hostage. You ignite that sonuvabitch and watch the world burn.”

Why did I even bother questioning Luke’s research?

“Okay but even still, why go that far?”

“I am getting there. But we need to narrow down the subset of potential suspects.” That sounded about right. “The thing about missing dots in cases is that they are often found in the path of least resistance. So, Sam Lake is a dud on the face of it. Pretty harmless guy for someone to go after. So does he have connections to someone who could potentially have people with serious grudges against them? The answer would be yes.”

“So I did a bit of digging on Miss Clarke and there’s some pretty juicy gossip to be found on her. Top-shelf dirt. Probably enough to bury her high school life, if given enough evidence to back it up.” I raised my eyebrows. All of us felt a bit on edge.

“Relax, I didn’t look too deep into it. I know that would be a very bad idea.” Luke’s words weren’t as reassuring he thought them to be. Megan Clarke was a force of nature. An enigma by definition. Fly too close to her and you could burn down in flames.

“Anyway, she’s probably gotten asked out by almost every single guy in this room. Anyone who was brave enough to take a shot anyway. Me included.” Luke raised his arms in a sigh of surrender.

“Eh?” We all asked in unison.

“...In middle school.”

“This motherfucker.” I groaned. As did everyone else in sheer disappointment.

“Would probably be more entertaining to hear about that than this wannabe Sherlock act.” Daniel mused. I almost agreed.

“Now now, let’s get back to the point at hand.” Luke smiled. “We are just getting to the theory-crafting after all.”

“Hey Luke, how about this?” I said growing increasingly certain that whatever Luke said after this would be hilariously off-the-mark. “Try the whole ‘Rakugo’ thing with us again.”

Everyone’s face in the group instantly lit up again. Luke was one of the most captivating people to listen to when we let him be the storyteller. Of stories and tall tales meant to enrapture the audience. And considering we weren’t wanna-be detectives, that seemed like the most entertaining alternative to this exercise in patience.

“What do you mean?” Oh Luke, pretending to play innocent isn’t gonna save you.

“Get in the brain of that criminal of yours. Tell us how he did it.” I said without realising the weight of my actions.

If only I had known the path I had put Luke on with those words.