Total pages in book: 112
Estimated words: 106839 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 534(@200wpm)___ 427(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106839 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 534(@200wpm)___ 427(@250wpm)___ 356(@300wpm)
No. It’s not him. It’s a stalker. And I should not even open this letter. I should just hand it over to Amon and…
I let out a breath and with it goes my fortitude. A moment later, I’ve got a fingertip under the seal and I’m poppin’ it open.
I hold my breath as I unfold the paper, then let it out in a rush. “What the fuck is this?” I’m confused as I look at the letters. They don’t say anything and it’s not a puzzle like the rest. It’s just… letters. But they are paired up in a weird way. ZC. RN. ZC. LS. HW. AS. JK. UC. EC.
What does this mean?
I flip the paper over, hoping there’s something on the other side, but there’s not. It’s just blank. Then I just sit and stare at them, trying to figure it out. Do I rearrange all the letters until they spell something? How do I figure it out?
Well, despite where I’m currently sitting, I do live in the modern age. So I pull out my phone and type the letters in just as they appear on the paper.
I get nothing, of course. My fingertip taps out a pattern on my chin as I think. There has to be a way to understand the message, or why send it? Furthermore, I know it is a hidden message because the three prior worksheets made it very clear.
I add the word ‘code’ to the end of my string of letter pairs, but again, the search pulls up things that don’t make any sense to me. It’s a lot of computer stuff. I study them for several minutes anyway, thinking maybe I’m just too simple to understand the results.
But no. I decide this search is not helpful.
What other way could I phrase it? Then a lightbulb goes off—they’re not codes. Not really. Because these things actually have a proper name. They’re called ciphers.
I type that in with the keywords ‘double letters’, and bingo! The third result down says, ‘Key for the Digraph Cipher.’
When I click the link it’s a decoder! I quickly type in my letter pairs and hit the decode button.
Meet me. You know where.
Ho-lee shit. It’s real. It’s a code and it’s from him! Erol! After twelve years, he’s finally gotten in touch with me. He sent the worksheets to like… prime me, or something. To make me think about codes and puzzles so that when he sent the message, I wouldn’t just dismiss it and toss it in the trash, but try and figure it out.
You know where.
And I do know where.
I quickly strip off the rest of my clothes and start pulling on my jeans. I don’t even hang up my dress, I just leave it all on the floor, grab my purse, and leave, my keys already jingling in my hand as I power-walk to my car.
Five minutes later I’m zooming down the loop towards the main highway. Once I get there, I turn left and start heading down into the valley. I pass the turn-off to Revenant and just keep going, all the way down the river to Fayetteville. It’s not a big place in the grand scheme of things—less than three thousand people call this area home—but compared to the Trinity towns, it’s downright big city.
Even though I have claimed to have dated many a man from Fayetteville over the years, I actually haven’t. It’s just a hookup location because it’s got a couple of motel choices.
But before it was that, it was something special because it was where Erol and I would go. I would take the bus home from school, but instead of getting off in Disciple, I’d ride it down to Revenant. Erol would be waiting for me at the highway loop intersection and we’d drive down into Fayetteville and hike a trail up to a little waterfall that wasn’t on any of the maps. It wasn’t a river waterfall, just a creek. But it was pretty and always changing. The water might be a soothing trickle down the rocks one day, then gushing over like a dam broke the next.
There wasn’t a picnic table, but there was a collection of stumps that we used to sit on. Of course, we did other things there too. It’s entirely possible that Cross was conceived in that very clearing.
When I arrive at the trailhead, I park my car, get out, and start up the main trail, searching for the smaller one that will lead me to our spot. I have to backtrack a few times, it’s been so long since I’ve been up here, but about a half hour later, I find it.
Erol was my first. And if he hadn’t gone missing, he might’ve been my only.
I scan the clearing, taking it all in, memories flooding back like it was yesterday instead of twelve years ago. And that’s when I see it. A plastic baggie sticking out from underneath a rock, which is on the very stump I used to sit on when we were up here together.