Final Breath Page 2

  She hadn't had much time to write anything. All it said was: "Warren Tunny has a gun in his jacket. I'll call 9-1-1."

  A click interrupted the third ring tone: "Seattle Police Emergency," the woman said. "9-1-1 operator."

  For a moment, Erin was speechless. She was watching Gunther's reaction. Frowning, he set her note on the desk, then glanced in Warren's direction. "Tunny, stand up!" she heard him bark.

  Oh, no, no, no, you stupid son of a bitch, she wanted to scream.

  Erin became aware of the 9-1-1 operator on the other end of the line: "Police Emergency. Can I help you?"

  "Yes, I--I'm not absolutely sure if this is a real emergency," Erin said under her breath. "But--but I think maybe--"

  "Could you please speak up?" the operator interrupted. "What's the nature of your emergency?"

  While the operator talked, Erin could hear Gunther's voice, raised in anger. Suddenly a girl in the classroom screamed: "Oh, God, no!" Then there were more screams, and it sounded like someone knocked over a chair.

  "Oh, Jesus," Erin said, louder this time, her voice cracking. "I'm at--at--James Madison High School, outside room 207, and this guy's got a gun..."

  Through the window in the door, she could see Gunther shaking his head and raising his hands. He looked terrified. Any minute now, she expected to hear the first shot.

  The 9-1-1 operator was telling her to remain calm. The woman wanted to know if anyone had been hurt and how many gunmen there were.

  "It's just one guy, a student, Warren Tunny. I'm outside the classroom right now, but I can still see them in there. I--" Erin fell silent as she caught a glimpse of Warren and Mr. Gunther in the window. Warren pressed the gun barrel to Gunther's head. The wiry little hard-ass teacher was cringing and trembling.

  "Everyone, just shut up and sit down!" Warren screamed. He shook even worse than Gunther. Warren's face was so flushed it was almost matched the color of his frizzy red hair. "I mean it, shut the hell up, all of you..."

  "Oh, my God," Erin whispered into the phone, backing away from the door. "I think he's going to shoot somebody. For Christ's sakes, please, do something! Send the police here..."

  "All right, stay calm and tell me your name," the operator said.

  "Erin--Erin Travino."

  "Erin, I want you to confirm for me that you're calling from James Madison High School on Ridgeway Drive, and right now in room 207, one of the students has a gun and he's threatening people. Is that correct?"

  Erin couldn't answer her. She couldn't move or speak, because at that very moment, the door to room 207 was opening. Warren Tunny stood at the threshold, gazing at her--with the gun aimed at her heart.

  "Come on back inside, Erin," he whispered.

  She gaped at him. Tears welled in Warren's eyes. He looked scared but determined.

  Erin could hear some girls quietly sobbing in the room. She didn't know where Gunther had gone, but he wasn't in the doorway with Warren.

  "Put away the phone, and come here," he whispered.

  "Erin? Can you answer me?" the 9-1-1 operator was asking.

  With her eyes fixed on the gun in Warren's trembling hand, Erin obediently clicked off the phone and slipped it into her purse. She shook her head. "Please, Warren, don't shoot," she whispered. "Can't we just talk? You--you don't have to do this..."

  "Inside," he said, nodding toward the classroom.

  Terrified, Erin edged past him and into the room.

  Warren stepped in after her and shut the door. There was something so final about the sound of that door closing and the catch clicking. It made Erin flinch.

  She saw Gunther in the far corner of the room, facing the blackboard with his hands behind his head. Shaking, he warily glanced over his shoulder at her and Warren.

  Someone had thrown up, and the horrid smell filled the room. Erin noticed several classmates crying helplessly--and not just the girls. Some students had their heads down and hands clasped in prayer. Others seemed in a state of shock. It was as if they were all paralyzed in their seats. No one would dare move. No one wanted to take the first bullet.

  That seemed reserved for her at the moment. Warren still had the gun pointed at her.

  From her desk in the middle of the room, one girl cried so hard she started convulsing. The whole desk shook as the mousey, thin, long-haired girl sobbed uncontrollably.

  Her neighbor, Molly Gerrard, stood up, grabbed the girl's hand and steadied her. "Warren, you need to put that gun away," she said, with a slight tremor in her voice. Most of the guys in the junior class were hot for Molly; Warren was almost certainly among them. "You're scaring everyone," Molly said to him. She nervously touched her glasses. "I know you've suffered, but you're better than this--"

  "Shut up!" he cried.

  Erin felt the barrel of the gun poke the back of her head. She gasped.

  "No, Warren," Molly continued, her voice still shaky, but even louder than before. "You need to hear this. You're so much better than the assholes who have picked on you. You're not a bully, Warren. You have all the power right now. But you also--you also have an opportunity to show everyone that you're--better than the people who have been mean to you. You're better than them, Warren. You know you are..."

  Grabbing Erin's auburn hair, Warren snapped her head back. She recoiled and cried out again. Yet at the same time, she realized he was now pointing the gun at Molly. His breathing was even heavier than before, more agitated.

  "Listen to her, Warren," she managed to say. "Molly's right. You don't have to do this. You--you're a nice guy, and a good artist. Your cartoons, they're--brilliant--"

  His grip loosened on her hair. "I don't want to hurt anybody," he muttered.

  "I know you don't," Molly said. "You're a good person, Warren. So, please, put the gun down..."

  "You're only making things worse for yourself, Tunny!" Mr. Gunther called out from his corner. With his hands still raised, he glanced over his shoulder toward Warren. "You're already in a heap of trouble, mister, and I can guarantee--"

  "Why don't you just shut up?" Molly retorted. "You're not helping!"

  Someone in the classroom gasped at her remark. Erin glanced back at Warren for a moment. A smile flickered across his splotchy face, and he lowered the gun.

  "Warren, don't listen to him," Molly continued. "Listen to your heart. You haven't hurt anyone yet, and I don't think you will. Everyone in this room--right now--realizes that you've gotten a raw deal. And I for one am very sorry. I hope you'll accept my apology..."

  Warren said nothing. But Erin felt him let go of her hair. For a moment, no one said anything. Then Erin heard a click. Panicked, she swiveled around and saw it was merely Warren setting the gun down on Mr. Gunther's desk.

  He started to cry.

  At that same time, she heard the sirens shrieking in the distance. Warren must have noticed them, too. Tears streaming down his face, he turned toward the window.

  All at once, someone in the front row yelled out: "Grab him!"

  It happened so quickly, Erin barely saw the two guys charging toward her and Warren. One of them shoved her out of the way, and she slammed into the teacher's desk. It knocked the wind out of her. Screams filled the classroom--competing with the sirens' wail outside. One guy savagely pummeled Warren, who cried out and fell to the floor. The other student started kicking him. It was utter chaos--with everyone suddenly jumping out of their seats and heading for the door. Desks and chairs were knocked over. All the while, Gunther kept screaming, "Hold him down! Hold the son of a bitch down!" He sprung from his corner and grabbed the gun off his desk.

  "Stop it!" Molly yelled. "Stop! You're hurting him!" She ran up the aisle and tried to pull one of the guys off Warren, but he shoved her away. Molly's glasses flew off her face and she tumbled into the front row of desks. "My glasses!" Molly cried, just as someone inadvertently stepped on them.

  Dazed, and curled up on the floor by Gunther's desk, Erin tried to catch her breath. The sirens outside were gettin
g louder and louder, almost deafening.

  When it was all over, Warren Tunny had two cracked ribs, a fractured arm, a broken nose, a black eye, and several cuts and bruises. The police took him to Harborview Hospital. In the ambulance, Warren had insisted that he hadn't intended to kill anyone--just himself. He'd planned to shoot himself in front of his classmates. He'd figured, maybe then, they'd be sorry for treating him so badly.

  Of course, no one believed him. By the end of the day, the same people who made fun of Warren were making jokes about what had almost happened, and they were still referring to him as Pubes.

  Warren's two study hall classmates, after beating him so severely, had figured they would be portrayed as heroes of the day by the local press. But Molly and Erin garnered all the attention and accolades. They'd been the ones who had defused a potential bloodbath. They'd been the ones who had pleaded and reasoned with the gunman. They'd gotten him to surrender, and the media linked them together as heroes.

  Maybe that was the only reason Molly had asked Erin to hang out with her after school the day before yesterday. While picking up those cool new glasses with the square tortoiseshell frames, they'd talked about Warren and the creeps who had been mean to him. Molly had wanted to visit Warren in the hospital, where doctors and police kept him under surveillance. She'd asked Erin to come along with her and show Warren she had no hard feelings. "You don't have to say yes right now," Molly had told her. "Think about it, and tell me later. I just figure it would mean a lot to Warren if he knew you'd forgiven him, you know?"

  Erin hadn't yet committed to making the hospital visit. The notion of seeing Warren Tunny again and being nice to him--so soon after he'd held a gun to her head--kind of freaked her out. At the same time, she didn't want Molly to think she was a jerk. They'd agreed to talk about it later. It had seemed as if they were becoming very good friends.

  So Erin couldn't understand why Molly blew off their movie date tonight. Hell, Pride and Prejudice had been Molly's idea.

  With a sigh, Erin frowned at her reflection in the washroom mirror again. The audience watching the Italian comedy upstairs let out another round of laughter.

  Erin's cell phone rang once more--that same, stupid "I Just Called to Say I Love You" tune. She quickly retrieved the phone from her purse and switched it on. "Yes, hello?"

  "Erin?" the woman said edgily. "Is this Erin?" The voice wasn't familiar.

  "Yes. Who's this?"

  "Erin, I'm Hannah Gerrard, Molly's mother. Is Molly with you--by any chance? Have you heard from her?"

  "No, she's not, Mrs. Gerrard," Erin murmured. "She was supposed to meet me and my friend here at the Harvard Exit for a movie about an hour ago, but she didn't show."

  An older woman with short-cropped silver hair stepped into the restroom. She frowned at Erin, then brushed past her and ducked into one of the two stalls. Erin ignored her.

  "Listen, Erin," Molly's mother said, a tremor in her voice. "The police found Molly's car an hour ago--on that little road behind Lakeview Cemetery. The car had a flat. The driver's door was open, and the hazard lights were blinking. It--it just doesn't make sense. Molly's got a cell phone, for God's sake. Why didn't she call us for help? We're only five blocks away..."

  Erin knew the road: a narrow strip of pavement that ran a few blocks alongside the sprawling cemetery's high chain-link fence. There was a park on the other side of the road--with a smaller, unfenced, old cemetery for Veterans of Foreign Wars. Only a block away, quaint, charming houses bordered the park, but there was still something remote and slightly foreboding about that little back road--especially at night. Surrounded by so many graves, it was an awfully scary spot to have car problems.

  But Erin figured Molly had kept a cool head, the same way she had with Warren last week. Molly was a lot braver than her. Still, Mrs. Gerrard was right. It made no sense. Molly's car was found only five blocks from her home--and less than a mile from this very movie theater. Why hadn't she called anyone for help? What had happened to her?

  "Young lady?"

  Erin swiveled around and gaped at the woman with the close-cropped silver hair. She still had that same haughty look on her wrinkled face as she emerged from the stall. "The use of cell phones is prohibited in public restrooms," she announced.

  Erin curled her lip at her. "What?"

  "You're not supposed to use cell phones in here!" the woman said loudly. "Why are you an exception? There are cameras on cell phones. It's prohibited to be using--"

  Erin started to wave her away.

  "I don't appreciate having my privacy invaded!" the woman declared. "I'd like to take a pee without having it broadcast coast to coast on your stupid cell phone! Why don't you go talk in the lobby, for God's sakes? Why do you have to talk in here?"

  Erin held the phone against her breast for a moment as she ducked into the other stall. "Christ, lady, get off my case!" She shut the stall door and locked it.

  "Rude!" the woman exclaimed, over the sound of the water running in the sink. Then Erin heard the roar of the hand dryer.

  "I'm sorry, Mrs. Gerrard," she whispered. Standing in front of the toilet, Erin had her back pressed against the divider between the two stalls. "There's this crazy woman here..."

  "The police are combing the neighborhood right now," Mrs. Gerrard explained. "When she left, Molly told me she had to run an errand before the movie. That was at five o'clock, over three hours ago. I keep thinking--if Molly was meeting someone, maybe this person has an idea where she wandered off to. Does she have a new boyfriend she didn't tell me about?"

  "I--I don't think so."

  "Erin, please, if--if you know what she planned on doing before the movie, and Molly asked you to keep it a secret--"

  "I swear, Molly didn't say anything to me," Erin cut in. She didn't know Molly well enough yet that they'd share secrets. She wondered if perhaps Molly might have gone to the hospital to visit Warren without her. But hell, if Molly's car was found five blocks from her house, then she must not have even reached the hospital.

  The hand dryer shut itself off, and all Erin heard was the sound of the faucet dripping in the restroom sink. She figured the silver-haired woman had left.

  "Will you call me if you hear from Molly?" Mrs. Gerrard asked on the other end of the line.

  A shadow suddenly swept across the tiled floor, distracting Erin for a moment. She couldn't see anyone's feet in the gap beneath the stall door, but obviously somebody else was there. Was that crazy lady still in the bathroom?

  "Erin?" Molly's mother said.

  "Um, of course, I'll call you the minute I hear from Molly, Mrs. Gerrard," she said, at last. "I--I'm sure Molly's all right. Could you have her call me when she gets in?"

  "I will," Mrs. Gerrard said with a tremor in her voice. "I hope that's soon. Thank you, honey."

  Erin heard a click on the other end. Someone passed by the stall again. She spotted a shadowy figure--so briefly--through the crack in the stall door, where it was hinged. Whoever it was, they hadn't gone into the other stall or used the sink. So why were they sneaking around in there? She could still hear the faucet dripping, but no footsteps.

  Maybe it was the disconcerting news about Molly that unnerved her, or the fact that two people had just chewed her out for using her cell phone. But she had a feeling something was horribly wrong. She'd had that same awful sensation in her gut last week when she'd been sitting next to Warren Tunny in fifth period study hall.

  With the phone tightly clutched in her hand, Erin leaned toward the hinged side of the stall door. Something darted past the door again, and Erin gasped.

  It was a man. She saw him this time, but she didn't get a look at his face. He moved too fast--toward the stall behind her. It looked like he was wearing one of those clear, thin, plastic rain jackets over his dark clothes.

  "Who's there?" she called out, her voice quivering.

  No response--just the sound of that faucet dripping steadily.

  "I know someone's there!" E
rin said loudly. "I'm gonna scream in a minute, I mean it!" She turned and glanced down at the gap under the stall partition and the floor. It didn't look like he'd ducked in to the next cubicle. If someone was playing a perverse joke on her, he certainly would have given himself up by now.

  But this was no joke.

  Trying to catch her breath, Erin focused on the phone in her hand. For the second time in a week, she dialed 9-1-1. She was about to press the SEND button when something flew over the top of the stall.

  Startled, Erin recoiled. The small lightweight object bounced off her shoulder, then landed on the tiled floor--right by the base of the toilet.

  Erin saw what it was, and all at once she couldn't breathe or move. Paralyzed, she stared down at the pair of glasses with square tortoiseshell frames.

  One of the lenses to Molly's new glasses was cracked.

  "Oh, my God..." Erin whispered. With a shaky hand, she punched the SEND button on her cell phone.

  Suddenly, she felt something sting her just above the ankle. Crying out, Erin looked down and saw a rubber-gloved hand reaching beneath the stall partition. She saw the glint of a knife. It slashed at her ankle again. She felt the blade scrape against her bone this time. Blood sprayed across the black-and-white tiled floor.

  Erin screamed. She tried to back away. But like a snake, the gloved hand darted under the partition and grabbed her by the ankle. All at once, the cell phone flew out of Erin's hand and fell into the toilet. Water splashed out of the bowl. Erin struggled to keep her balance, but it was impossible. She slammed against the partition wall and then tumbled to the wet, tiled floor. She screamed and kicked. The more she kicked, the more blood spurted from the wounds across her ankle.

  But he wouldn't let go. He was pulling her through the gap under the stall divider and dragging her across the floor. He still had the knife in his other hand. Terrified, Erin struggled and cried out for help.

  But her shrieks were muted by a thunderous wave of laughter from the audience in the theater upstairs.

  No one else heard her screams.