Letters From Cages

I gripped my steering wheel tightly and drove through my small town for what seemed like hours, but was merely just minutes slowly passing by. Both the picture and the scribbled note of Jerry's address, or at least, what I thought was Jerry's address were laying on my lap. I felt somewhat sick to my stomach, like I knew that I needed to do something to figure things out, but I didn't know exactly what.

When Carter was arrested, I wasn't allowed to see him much. There was so much media frenzy around the case that me even stepping anywhere close to where Carter was would cause a huge commotion. So, I stayed my distance, wondering how any of this could possibly happen. Living in a conservative town, seeing a wealthy businessman and a surgeon's son who had nothing but a bright future being put in jail accused of a heinous crime, people became absolutely infatuated with it all. It gave everyone something to talk about.

When I finally got to see Carter, in short intervals, I'd plead to have him tell me what happened. He never said much other than that he was sorry, and it wasn't until that day when I had visited him, after he was convicted, that I ever heard him say anything more. When he had shouted "Jerry did it." I was surprised, but at the time I didn't believe him. I thought he was just yelling anything at me to get me to not leave. If he was telling the truth, then why hadn't he mentioned it before when I had asked him? How could I believe that someone else did it? That Jerry just framed him? I sat through that trial, I saw the lawyers tear Carter's case apart, there was so much evidence claiming that he was there, that he did it. Forensic teams did demonstrations, everything pointed to him. If he did it, why would he lie right to my face and say that someone else did. Was it to spare my feelings? Or to try make me still believe that he was the same Carter he had been in the beginning of our relationship?

"Shut up," I muttered under my breath to myself. I had to stop thinking about everything. I turned the radio on and a soft classical song played through my speakers.

Suddenly, I passed a street sign that made my eyes widen, and my car stop abruptly. Thank God no one was behind me. I looked up to see the bright white sign in deep green letters, 'Filmot'. I didn't even know what part of town I was in, I was just driving aimlessly, but that aimless driving led me here, and I knew that I couldn't just turn back, now that I knew that I was close to the address that was written on the paper sitting delicately on my lap.

I turned right and slowly made my way down the street. There were houses of all different shapes and sizes, but almost all of them had large porches extending in front of them. My headlights glared on the street as the rain pounded on my windshield, I could barely see the numbers of the houses, but finally 2487 came into view.



"Where are you taking me?" I asked as Carter smiled and drummed on the top of his steering wheel with his fingers as we drove. It was a nice, clear night out and Carter picked me up and told me he was taking me somewhere special.

"I'm not telling you," He replied and then turned left onto a street that was crowded with cars. Carter stepped on his breaks and we were in bumper to bumper traffic. I looked out my window at people impatiently sitting in their cars and sticking their heads out of their windows.

"Why is everyone going this direction?" I asked and stuck my head out of the window as well. In front of me I saw those types of lights that shoot up in the sky going off in every direction. It looked like there was some kind of event going on.

"Each year, a fair comes to town, except this fair is different, it's more like a carnival. With weird clowns and men on stilts and a circus show right in the middle of it," Carter explained. "It's a huge deal around here, mainly because this town is so boring that for something remotely interesting to come along creates pandaemonium. It's only in town for a few nights before it moves on, so I really wanted to take you."

"Really?!" I asked excitedly and then stuck my head out of the window again. Carter laughed and reached out to pull me back in the car.

"We'll be there soon," He assured. I smiled and sat back in my seat, nonetheless thrilled that Carter would take me somewhere like this.

After enduring bumper to bumper traffic for about twenty minutes, we finally pulled into the grounds and parked in the enormous parking lot they had available. I excitedly got out of the car before Carter could open my door and he grabbed my hand and gave it a squeeze before we walked towards the commotion. I could hear different styles of music coming from different parts of the fair and they all mixed in to make one loud beat.

Once Carter paid for the tickets and we went inside the gates, all I could hear was people yelling, laughing and cheering each other on in the side games that were placed everywhere. There was a ferris wheel, a large loop like roller coaster, and men and women dressed in the most peculiar outfits. I felt like I was in a different world. A woman dressed as a gypsy came running towards Carter and I and she handed me a small indigo bracelet before walking off and handing others more. Carter smiled and grabbed the bracelet and placed it on my wrist and tied it in a knot. When I was finished, I looked up at him and at that instant, I knew I was in love with him. I always knew that I was in love with him, since the moment I saw him and, like some creepy girl, convinced myself we belonged together. But at this moment, I knew that I wasn't just in love with the image of him, I was in love with who he was.

Carter took my hand and we strolled through the carnival, watching like spectators at everyone and playing games here and there. Carter had won me a fish by throwing a ball into a small bowl. I didn't understand the game but I was still excited as I held the golfish's small bowl in my hands as we walked through the carnival.

"So, what are you going to name him?" Carter asked as we walked.

"What's the most generic goldfish name you can possibly think of?" I asked back and looked down at the small fish swimming in circles.

"Goldie?" Carter replied.

"Then his name is Goldie," I responded. Carter just laughed and I smiled back, until I saw his face dropped immediately when he spotted something behind me. I turned my head to see Charlie, Marco, Jerry and a drop dead gorgeous girl walking in our direction. Charlie still resembled a middle aged man who rode motorcycles and did tattoos, Marco still had his copper hair and crooked teeth but still looked very friendly and nice. Jerry had his hands in his pockets and he shook his dirty blonde hair from his handsome face as the girl held onto his arm. She looked Asian, or possibly half, was very tall and thin, and had straight dark hair that fell down to her mid back. She reminded me of Piper, but she looked mean, and intimidating, and I was dreading them coming over, and from the look on Carter's face, he was dreading it too.

"Funny running into you two here," Jerry said. It was the first time I ever heard him speak. He grinned, showing his perfect teeth. He looked like a spitting image of James Dean.

Jerry's eyes wandered to me and he looked at me like I held no importance to him whatsoever.

"Yeah, it is," Carter said under his breath. I could tell by is demeanor that he wasn't happy to see his friends, who he had adoringly seemed to be so in love with the first time he introduced them to me. I was confused.

"Gwenith, this is our good friend, Annabelle," Marco stated. I looked at the girl, who just smiled, but I could tell from her sharp eyes that her smile didn't mean anything. Why did this group give me such bad vibes? It was like they were up to absolutely no good.

"Hi, nice to meet you," I replied and stuck my hand out, Annabelle shook it quickly and then dropped her hand.

"Nice to meet you as well," She replied. I awkwardly placed my hand into Carter's, and he grabbed onto it tightly, almost to the point where it hurt. Something was wrong, and I knew that this group had something to do with it.

"Are you enjoying the fair?" Charlie asked me happily. "I know you just moved here so you've probably never experienced this all before." He added with a small laugh.

Before I could even answer, Carter interjected. "We better be going," He said, adjusted his grip on my and and began pulling me away.

"We'll be seeing you, Carter!" I heard Jerry yell after us, but Carter didn't look back as he pulled me through the crowd, not even caring that water was spilling out of the fishbowl that I was holding and that I was hitting multiple people as we ran. I uttered 'Sorry's and 'Excuse me's until we finally came to a stop and Carter let go of my hand.

"Carter!" I yelled, breathing heavily. "What is going on? What's wrong!"

Carter angrily ran his fingers through his dark hair and paced back and forth until he let out a deep breath, regaining his composure.

"Nothing, nothing is wrong, sorry," He muttered. I scoffed, obviously not believing him.

"Well, that's the biggest lie I've ever heard," I retorted and placed the fishbowl down by his feet and stepped towards him. "Why did you want to get away from them so badly? I thought they were your friends."

Carter sighed and reached out to pull me close to him. "It's complicated," He mumbled into my neck before letting his lips linger there for a quick second. He pulled his head back and then kissed me softly on the lips before reaching down and grabbing the fishbowl. "Let's just forget about that, and get back to the fun night we were having before, shall we?"



I sat in my car, across the street from the house that's address was written down and put in a book in Carter's bedroom. I clutched it in my hand as I stared at the small house. It was older and it had a large wooden porch in front of it. The rain had died down and now just small sprinkles were falling from the sky onto my car. I contemplated getting out and just possibly knocking on the door, but I couldn't help but feel scared, thinking it may be a better idea to come back when it's not raining and when it's not pitch black dark outside.

Suddenly, I saw two bright headlights emerge from behind me and I ducked a little in my car just so they wouldn't shine on me, where I would look like some weird person who parked their car and sat in it in the rain on dark streets. I gasped when the car pulled into Jerry's driveway and came to a stop. I waited impatiently for the driver to get out, and I leaned closer to see Jerry get out of the driver's side door. I saw the passenger door open as well.

It was dark, and all I could see was an outline of the person's body that had come out of the passenger side door, and it was obviously a girl. She was wearing high heels, but had a long trenchcoat and a hood covering most of her face. It looked like it was possibly the Annabelle girl I had met. Jerry grabbed the girl's hand and they both stepped up to the door and what surprised me, they rang the doorbell. So this wasn't Jerry's home?

Lights turned on from inside the house and the front door swung open to reveal the outline of a man. I strained my neck to see who he was, but I couldn't make out his face as he let the two inside. The door shut, and then the light from inside turned back off, and I was left, sitting in my car as the rain built up and began pounding again on my windshield.

It was then that I finally knew that there was more to this than I ever thought, but the feeling in my stomach that I got whenever I thought about speaking to Jerry, or to any one of them, made me feel as if I was never going to be brave enough to figure out just what this all was.