Chapter 16: Message Sent

“There! Pause it, what’s that?” I tell Benny to stop the video from its high-speed playback.

“Looks like the colors of a Maplewood Mustang’s jacket to me,” Benny says. The rain is obscuring the clarity of the video, but there’s no mistaking that familiar blue and white. “Let me back it up some more.”

He backs it up to the time of 19-hours and 44-minutes, 7:44 pm, and resumes play in half-time speed. Rain, more rain, then someone comes into view on the left side. It is a Maplewood letter-jacket, and the person, a big guy by his size, has a grey hoodie on under the jacket. The hood is pulled over his head, hiding his face in shadow.

I had parked my Jeep by backing it into the space, so the front end is facing the camera. The guy makes his way around the rear, and then to the driver’s side door so his left side is facing the camera. The movements of his head turning indicate he’s checking towards the entrance drive from the road, and then over at the front door to the restaurant, obviously checking if the coast is clear. I notice that he didn’t look in the direction of the camera.

He squats down and pulls out a tool of some sort, possibly a screw driver, the image is not clear enough to discern. I see him begin to gouge the paint on the Jeep’s door. Large up and down swoops of the words “ASS FUCKER” are being engraved. I find this painful to watch, who really wants to witness as their own property as it’s being maliciously damaged? We can definitely see the action being committed, but dammit, I still can’t positively identify the culprit.

Once the gouging is done, the individual stands up and admires his dirty work. For a moment, it looks like he’s going to walk around the backside of my Jeep, the way he came. As he does this, his back is momentarily facing the camera. “Stop it there!” I shout to Benny.

He freezes the video, but due to the rain, the image is still unclear. There’s enough that I can tell the idiot has his name on the back of his jacket above the Mustangs team logo. As I’m squinting to try to make it out, Benny tells me, “I can frame by frame it, maybe we’ll get a clear one.”

After scrolling several frames that all look very similar, one comes in clear. There it is! L, A, R, C, H, in bold white letters, “I knew it!”

“Let me screenshot that.” Benny saves the image. “Wow, is this guy a complete dumb-fuck, or what? He actually wears a jacket with his name across the back while committing a felony?”

“That’s our Dirk, and that’s why we love him,” I laugh. “We should send this to the people that make those funny Darwin Award video compilations of dumb-ass criminals caught in-the-act on camera.”

We resume watching the video at half speed. Instead of going around the back of my Jeep, he changes his mind and starts to move towards the front end. The direction the rain is falling suddenly shifts to a diagonal pattern with a gust of wind. This must be just as the intensity of the storm was beginning to pick up velocity at 19:46, going by the camera’s time counter. That gust of wind is strong enough to blow the grey hood off his head. “Freeze it there!” I shout.

A flash of lightening momentarily brightens the entire image. Here it is, the wavy blond hair and face of Dirk Larch is clearly visible. Benny takes another screenshot.

The remainder of the video segment shows Dirk fast-walking to the left. 30-seconds later, we see his dark blue Camaro cross the screen from the left to the right as he leaves the premises.

I ask Benny, “Can you isolate it from 19:44 to 19:48 and send that to me?”

“No problem, Buddy. I’m glad we got this.”

He saves the video portion and emails it to my phone, along with the screenshots. “We got that fucker, Kyle!” he high fives me.

“Thank you so much Benny, I owe you big-time.” I could hug him right now.

“You owe me nothing. Go on and do what you need to do.”

I now have what I really need to nail that asshole. If all I had was the video of him sucking Tyler, it would definitely wreck the rest of his High School days; but football has, long since, been over and we only have about 6 weeks of school left before we graduate. After that, who is really going to care? I would be open-season for him again, only now he would have a renewed passion to screw with me ... and screw with me bad.

Thinking before acting is the name of the game here. I keep my mouth shut about it the next day when I go to school. My teachers have been talking about preparing for upcoming final exams, but I’m mentally sorting out my options of how I should handle Dirk.

The logical thing to do would be to send the video from the camera feed to Officer Worlinski and let the Spring Haven Police take it from there. I have a hard time accepting this because, for so long, this guy has been antagonizing me, and so many others. I want the satisfaction of cornering this asshole and watching him squirm, I really do.

I decide I’ll send both videos to the star of the show, Dirk himself. I’m curious to see what happens, but first, I need some insurance. I’ll wait till I’m home and save the videos on a few back-up devices. If nothing else, I always have the option to send it to the police.

The next step is, I need to somehow get Dirk’s cell number; the problem being that I don’t have any mutual friends with him. There is a chance Tiffany might still have it from her days when she dated that jackass, but the odds are that she deleted it and blocked him to avoid being harassed after we inducted him into the “Cum-Licker Club.” Asking her would bring up too many questions, questions that I don’t want to answer as to why I want Dirk’s contact info.

In my Modern World Studies class, I look over at Tyler sitting next to me. I tellya, this guy makes me want to puke for what he did to Donny. He’s busily engrossed with his phone and quietly snickering to himself. “So ... how’s things with Donny?” I ask, I couldn’t resist.

“Things are great, Donny’s a great guy,” he replies, without looking up from his texting. I’ll bet they are, you red-headed, fuck-wad, I think to myself.

Our teacher, Mrs. Delaney announces, “Okay class, we’re going to be looking at a video covering the impact of current Chinese Economics and how it relates to the World Market. This is some important stuff you will need for the upcoming final exam, I want you to give it your full attention. If anyone needs to use the restroom, please do so now.”

Tyler hops up, sets his phone on his chair and leaves to use the bathroom. I look over at it and notice that he did not log-off or lock it. Here’s my mutual friend, if you could call him that. I nonchalantly look around, no one seems to be paying attention to me and reach over to grab the phone.

I see he has been texting with someone named Brandon Jenkins. My nosy side quickly scans some of the messages, I’m curious what he was finding so funny. I see conversation of, “I can’t wait to have you again,” “Your cock is fantastic,” and, “You taste so good!” followed by some dick-pics they’ve been sending each other. Oh-kay, doh-kay, then ... looks like Tyler has lots of boyfriends.

Having seen more than I bargained for, I go to contacts and scroll to “D”, yup, there it is, Dirky. Dirky? Oh, good god ... I shake my head. I jot down the number, restore the phone to the text screen with Brandon and put it back on Tyler’s chair as he left it.

That afternoon, I copy both videos to my tablet and onto two flash drives. Not knowing what could become of this, I plan to take one flash drive to hide at work and the other to my locker at school. Probably over-planning on my part, but with the beast that I’m looking to cage, I’m not taking any chances.

In my bedroom, I punch in Dirk’s contact number in my phone. I’m actually quite nervous, because I know that once I hit send, there’s no taking it back. I cue up the Tyler video, pause for a second and take a deep breath. With such a slight movement required of my thumb, so much is about to change...

Change for the better – Send!

Next, I cue up the parking lot video, and this time, without any hesitation – Send!

One more to go, I type, “FYI – I have these backed-up in multiple locations.” – Send!

Wherever Dirk is at this very moment, I can only imagine the nuclear, blinding white flash of reality exploding his world ... I hope you’re numb, asshole!

I’m physically shaking, not from being nervous, it’s a tension release brought on from a true turning of the tables, finally in my favor. I take a deep satisfying breath and lay back on my bed. I feel like I could take a peaceful nap right now.

Seven quiet minutes pass, then my phone bloops, it’s a text saying, “Can we talk, Kyle?” I do believe this is the first time Dirk has ever used my given name to address me.

I type, “What’s to talk about?”

“Please...” comes the immediate reply.

I get up off the bed, set my phone on the dresser and walk out of my room. I think I’ll go see what Luke is doing, maybe he wants to shoot hoops or play some X-Box games. Dirk can wallow in his own stink for a while...

It’s Wednesday, and I find avoiding Dirk at school to be an incredibly easy task, I don’t see him at all. He must have skipped school, that’s a good sign this is getting to him. I didn’t receive any more texts, but I still must keep my eye out if he tries anything. I’ll need to make sure that I am not alone at any time for him to jump me. If I don’t hear anything more, I’ll contact Officer Worlinski tomorrow.

I’m working the dinner shift and report to work at 4:00. Today, I’m working with Benny and Eric in the kitchen. I wave at Bill in the back office after I punch-in. “Hey Kyle, come in here for minute. Benny told me you have the video proof now. Have you sent it to the police?” he asks.

“No, not yet.”

“Why not?”

“I want to handle this on my own right now.”

“I understand, Kyle, but I don’t want you putting yourself in harm’s way. What if things don’t go how you want them to?”