CASSIUS

We cross the South Carolina state line and pull up in front of an old, rickety house. The shutters hang from the siding and the paint on the front door we're approaching is peeling. Quinn rings the bell after a moment of hesitation.

I'm not sure who she brought me here to meet. She's been pretty secretive about this whole trip.

"Oh!" She chirps. "Forgot something. I'll be right back!"

She runs over to the car and pops the trunk, rummaging through it. I turn back around to face the entrance, waiting for this mystery person to answer.

When Quinn returns to her spot next to me, I notice something from the corner of my eye. A flash of grey metal has me doing a double take.

"Quinn, what the fuck?" I exclaim, quickly angling my body toward her. "Why do you have that?"

She seems genuinely confused about my line of questioning as she holds a shovel in one hand and a roll of fucking duct tape in the other.

"What do you mean? I need this stuff."

"For what?! Who lives here? What's going on?!" I whisper-yell through clenched teeth.

I'm panicking. I don't want to go back to prison. Warren is gonna be pissed. Max is going to kick me out of the club partnership.

"I don't know." She replies, shrugging.

"You don't know who lives here?!"

Okay. I knew she was crazy, but this is fucking mental institution crazy. I try to snatch the shovel away, but she holds on for dear life. We engage in a battle of pushing and pulling. I'm trying my best to be gentle so that the wooden handle doesn't give her splinters.

The sound of footsteps approaching from the other side of the door causes us both to freeze and it's too late to run.

This is going to go one of two ways. I'll be able to deescalate the situation, and we'll all get to walk away, or my girlfriend is going to murder someone and I'm going back to prison for life.

Nobody would believe someone her size did this. I have a record. I drove the car. And I wouldn't think twice about taking the blame.

When the door swings open, I shove Quinn behind me to conceal the murder weapons she's brandishing. The woman who answers looks to be in her seventies, walking with a cane and a permanent scowl hidden within her wrinkled face.

I have no idea what to do. I don't know who this is or why we're here or what this old lady did for Quinn to contemplate murder. So, I stick my hand out.

"Hi – hey. I'm uh – I'm Cassius. Cassius Moretti. We – uh."

I can feel Quinn pushing against me, trying to peek over my shoulder, so I reach behind my back and hold her still with one hand. The woman watches my movement with caution, so I let it drop back by my side.

"I just – do you have a quick moment to talk about our lord and savior, Jesus Christ?"

What the hell am I doing?

The stranger stares at me with untrusting eyes.

"Okay. Sure."

No. You were supposed to turn me away! Think, Cassius. What did the bible say?

"Well...as you knooow..." I speak slowly, trying to buy myself enough time to come up with something. "Uhhh...Jesus had that boat – ya know, with all the animals?"

"That wasn't Jesus!" Quinn hisses from her spot behind me.

Fuck. Of course the future murderer knows more about this shit than I do.

"I mean, he didn't have a boat. But he had...his mom...was a hooker."

"Oh my god, Cash, stop! That's the wrong Mary!" she mumbles, mortification hanging onto every word.

I've gone full on Quinn. She finally did it. Transferred all her crazy to me. My body has been consumed by it. I'll never be the same. I put up a good fight but, in the end, I was no match for her.

In my temporary moment of weakness, Quinn manages to wriggle free and make herself known to the poor, unsuspecting old woman who's looking at me like I'm Satan himself. Her eyes grow wide when she sees the shovel and duct tape in Quinn's hands.

"Hi! I'm Quinn. I don't know if you remember, but I wrote you a letter about twelve years ago."

The lady studies her a moment.

"Yeah, I 'member."

"Do you remember what it said?"

"I sure do." The woman speaks with a thick southern accent.

"Well..." Quinn takes a deep breath. "I'm ready."

The woman's face softens and a smile tugs at the corner of her lips.

"Congratulations."

With that, she shuts the door on us.

As expected, I don't know what's happening. But I take comfort in knowing everyone is still alive so far as Quinn leads me into the backyard of the stranger's house.

I have a million thoughts running through my head. Maybe I'm the one she's going to kill, and this lady is just letting Quinn use her backyard as a burial ground?

She runs to a tree and doesn't hesitate to dig the head of the shovel into the ground, using her foot to burrow it even deeper. I'm just watching because I don't know what else to do. My brain is so exhausted that my body doesn't remember how to operate.

The elderly woman watches Quinn from the window overlooking the yard, still smiling.

After a few short minutes, Quinn pulls a box from out of the hole she dug and plops down underneath the tree. When she looks up at me, her eyes are glossed over and filled with fear.

I switch to autopilot and quickly make my way over there, squatting down in front of her. I take her face in my palms and press a kiss to her forehead.

"What's wrong, Quinn?" I whisper against her skin before pulling away to give her some space.

She removes the lid from the box and stares down at the contents hidden away inside.

Quinn once said that she buried her heart in the backyard of her family home. It was a heartbreakingly beautiful explanation of how she felt. But this is Quinn we're talking about. Which means it wasn't just simply an explanation. It was the truth.

There's a piece of notebook paper cut into the shape of a heart, colored with red marker, ripped in half. It sits alone in the shoebox, and she can't take her eyes off it. The two small scraps of paper are brittle and curled up around the edges from old age.

She unrolls some of the duct tape and rips off a small strip, using it to fuse the two fragments together. She holds it in the palms of her hands like it will shatter if she's not careful. The minute she starts to move her hands toward me, I understand.

My eyes sting with hot tears that are begging to break free. They've been watering since she took the fucking lid off and I saw what was inside. My hands clasp around her small ones, closing over the most fragile thing that's ever belonged to me.

"It's yours, Cash." She whispers. "Please take care of it."