Page 32 of Not Quite Dead Yet

Jet smirked at him, through the ornate art deco mirror hanging in the center.

She approached the sink on the left – his – placed her pill bottle on the counter, and reached up to open the wooden cabinet above.

Her fingers closed around the matching bottle of Lotrel, and she turned to hand it to Billy, no speaking this time, no need to.

Billy pushed down and twisted the bottle open with a clack that echoed around the tiles.

‘Here,’ Jet said, clearing space on her mom’s dark oak vanity, pushing away bottles of perfume and makeup brushes.

Billy followed her over, tipped the pill bottle, and let the yellow capsules tumble out. More than had been in Jet’s bottle, almost a full pack. Dad must have picked up his prescription last week sometime.

Jet pinched one carefully, raised it to her eye. There was a small dent in the capsule shell where one half met the other. The two white bands against the yellow background didn’t quite line up as she rolled it between her thumb and finger.

‘Shit,’ Billy said, studying a different pill, noticing the same thing. ‘These don’t look like yours did. They look –’

‘– Tampered with,’ Jet agreed, picking up a few more to be sure. ‘Open one, Billy.’

He was already doing it, unscrewing a capsule, the job easier this time, like it had already been done once before.

He tapped the open capsule out, white powder trickling down against the dark wooden surface. It had a different texture than hers, the grains of white a little larger, a little shinier, like tiny crystals.

‘That looks different,’ Billy commented, putting the empty shell down.

‘That is different,’ Jet agreed. She dipped her finger into the powder.

‘The taste test might not be useful.’ Billy watched Jet’s finger move toward her mouth. ‘If she swapped it out with another medication, how would you be able to tell?’

Jet flicked her tongue out, pressed it to the powder.

It soaked through, disappearing in her mouth, the taste immediate and bitter.

Jet coughed. ‘I know exactly what that is. It’s salt.’ Her eyes met Billy’s. ‘Table salt. Try some.’

Billy took a pinch, placed it inside his mouth. Swallowed. ‘Yep. Definitely salt.’ Like it stung his eyes too.

‘Salt,’ Jet gasped, the taste sinking in, and the meaning behind it.

‘What?’

‘That’s, like, the worst thing you could give someone with PKD,’ she said. ‘Open some more, check them.’

Billy did.

‘Salt,’ he said. ‘Salt again. And here. They’re all salt, Jet.’

Her gut twisted, made a break for her spine, hairs reacting, standing up.

‘We’re supposed to follow low-sodium diets,’ she said.

‘Can’t even have the good fucking cheese.

Salt increases your blood pressure, and if Dad hasn’t actually been taking Lotrel for months, but a whole bunch of salt instead …

oh my god.’ Jet leaned against the wall, hand slipping on the tiles.

‘You’ve seen him. That’s why he’s det-de-d – got so much worse this year.

His kidneys have started to fail, doctors talking about transplant or dialysis soon.

’ She took a breath, hardened her voice, coming out of shock, finding rage on the way.

‘Because Sophia has been poisoning him. She’s been killing him. ’

‘Fuck,’ Billy hissed, tucking his hands under his armpits. ‘Fuck.’ Because no other word would do.

‘Fuck,’ Jet said too, kicking out at the legs of the vanity, making the yellow pills judder and roll. ‘Seems there was more than one murder going on in the same fucking house. And if Sophia is willing to kill one in-law , then …’ Jet pointed to herself, thumb screwing into her chest.

Billy gestured to the pills. ‘What should we do? Take these to the police?’

‘Fuck the police. No offense to your dad.’ She sniffed. ‘They’re convinced it’s JJ. I don’t have time to wait around un-convincing them. This is for me, not them. I will deal with Sophia. And I don’t want my dad taking any more of these.’

Jet scooped up as many pills as she could in her left hand.

‘Grab the rest,’ she told Billy, heading toward the toilet.

She dropped the yellow capsules in, floating and twirling in the waiting water, keeping just one, sliding it into her back pocket.

Billy followed her, double-handed, with the rest.

Jet flushed and the pills disappeared in a rushing whirlwind, Billy’s hand skimming hers as they watched, side by side.

‘To Sophia’s house?’ he asked.

Jet cracked her neck, bit down on her back teeth.

‘There’s going to be a lot of yelling, isn’t there?’

‘I’ll go in alone,’ Jet said. ‘I’ll get more out of her alone. You wait down the street.’

‘But –’

‘– Don’t worry, I won’t turn my back on her, in case she has any more hammers lying around. I want to see her face when she realizes that I know. That she’s been killing my dad. Should have just kept you as my best friend, huh, Billy? You’re not the poisoning type.’

Billy sniffed. ‘Yeah, you should’ve.’

‘One more thing.’

Jet walked back to her dad’s sink, picked up her bottle of Lotrel pills, untampered with. She placed them in her dad’s cabinet, in the exact same spot where his had lived, closed the door.

Her final gift to him. Jet didn’t need the pills anymore. And maybe it wasn’t too late for her dad.

She caught herself in the mirror again, the fire behind both eyes, filling that endless black pit and whatever lay underneath, held together with screws and wire mesh.

‘To Sophia’s,’ Jet said. ‘I am going to … fuck … her … u–’