A Secret Promise

Kim Vine is not only Chris's sister, but she is his best friend. At the moment she is taken from him he begins his search for the truth. He soon finds out he might be digging his own early grave.

Chapter 1
The smell of fresh cut grass entered Chris Vine’s nostrils. He expected that it would be hot, but not this hot. Even for North Carolina this type of heat was unexpected by everyone there. The beads of sweat rolling down his back couldn’t even put a cool chill to his burning skin. He thought to himself that grandma was right; he should have worn his lighter color suit, not the black one. Either way, today was a time he should be looking his best regardless of the temperature. After all, he owed it to his sister to look topnotch. Kim Vine was not only Chris’s sister, but she was his best friend. Out of all the people he knew, she was the one he could always count on and she was the one that he could tell anything to with no worry about the secret getting out. After all, she could do the same with him. Chris knew a lot of people would be coming over to say their goodbyes to Kim, considering all of the people she grew up with were there. Chris stood there holding the trembling hand of his grandma. He could feel how weak she was when he placed his arm around her shaking body. She had been through so much in the last few years, a loss of a husband, son-in-law, daughter and now standing over her only granddaughters’ coffi n. Thinking back to that Friday night when everyone was wondering where Kim was, everyone knew she was good at

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missing her curfew, but never this late. Grandma had called all of Kim’s friends over and over asking if they had found out anything, but no one ever heard anything from her. It was about midnight when she decided to call the highway patrol, that’s when the knock came at the door. It was easy to tell it was the police by the way they beat at the door and grandma went running. As soon as the door opened it was like letting a nightmare walk through that doorway. There must not have been an easy way to say it from the look of the deputy’s face, but he tried his best to explain that Kim’s car was found upside down lying in a creek bed after it had fl ipped over the guardrail of a bridge. He was sure to add that speed was not a factor; it was due to the heavy rain that caused her to loose control of the vehicle. Gary, Chris’s brother was standing on the other side of his grandmother, he never did show much emotions, but he was always hard to read, even for the ones closest to him. Chris assumed that people never understood his brother because it was so easy for him to blame everything on their parents’ car accident three years ago. He stood in the same suit that he had worn to his parents’ funeral; he called it his death suit. Every few minutes he would look around with the illusion that everyone was looking his way. It bothered Chris that Gary wasn’t attempting to comfort his Grandmother, especially now when she needed it the most. Standing next to Gary was Uncle Charles. Even in his older age at sixty, he looked in his forties. However, what looked old was his suit, he must have only had one, because it’s the only suit anyone ever seen him wear. He had spent his life working on his historic farm with the dreams of transferring it into a place where couples could have outside weddings in a peaceful environment. No one really
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knew why he thought of weddings when he was the one that never married. Besides, Uncle Charles had a new girlfriend frequently, he never did keep them to long. He was always worried that one of them would try to take his money and his farm. He trusted very few people and it would be over his dead body if someone tried to take the farm that he had spent his life working with. Uncle Charles was always easy to get along with, except when he was drinking, than another Charles would come to the surface of the man everyone knew. Chris liked the sober Charles a lot more than the drunken Charles; after all, he was a smart man when he wasn’t around liquor. All the kids thought of him as Superman when they were younger, he could do anything in the eyes of a child. But now, Uncle Charles’ was the place to go if problems popped up, his advice would get anything solved, but the everyone always called fi rst to make sure he wasn’t drinking. Chris had so many things running through his head as he stood there staring over Kim’s coffi n that was refl ecting the suns light. Why did this happen? Out of all the people in this world, why Kim? He held his breath as he took a hard bite across his teeth to hold tears behind his eyes while his thoughts turned back to that Friday night football game. Remembering Kim’s last words, still dressed in her cheerleading outfi t standing next to her car, “If you don’t have a place to run, make a place. That a way to get a touchdown.” Chris couldn’t hold his breath any longer freeing a hard sigh through his nostrils sending tears falling across his face. Wishing he had just fi ve minutes left to tell her how much he loved her, instead he just smiled and nodded his head. He thought about all of the things people had been saying since Friday night, about Kim had left a party drunk and that’s

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why she crashed, but that couldn’t have been true, considering the police report said she had no drugs or alcohol in her system and she didn’t drink at all. She learned her lesson not long after she had turned sixteen when she clipped a tree driving drunk. No one knew she was trashed, only Chris and he wouldn’t ever tell, especially now. Chris looked down to his sister’s face, a lot of people complimented on how peaceful she looked, but she didn’t look peaceful, she looked dead. Her skin only held its tan due to a lot of makeup and she had no smile or laugh to refl ect on her personality. Tears begin to fl ow like a river down the sides of Chris’s face wondering if there really was a God. After all, if there was, how could he take someone’s parents and now, not only his best friend but his sister, the one that meant the most to him in the entire world? What kind of God could do something like this? He turned his thoughts back to when they was younger. Kim could take a simple block of wood or a piece of paper and somehow make a game of it. Even if she thought it was stupid and boring she still had fun entertaining other people. After a few moments Chris turned his thoughts to that large Oak tree over on the far side of the pond at Uncle Charles’s place. It was their special spot to talk about their problems and help each other work them out. Besides, it was the coolest and most peaceful place around in the summertime. The water was soothing and the foliage of the tree kept the sun at bay. Uncle Charles never bothered the kids if he seen them at the farm. He knew if they needed him that they would come fi nd him their self.