A New Life

It was cloudy over the skies of Twinbrook the day the Kanes drove into town. Housewives pulled back their kitchen curtains just in time to see an unfamiliar car pass by, and many stopped to watch as the ivy-trimmed house on Savannah Lane was suddenly stirring with life.

There, a couple was struggling to carry several boxes through the front door, and two children were playing in the yard, completely oblivious to any outside surveillance. The people of Twinbrook were naturally suspicious... So, for now, the Kanes remained an object of curiousty, while neighbors waited for the right time to come investigate why that house, unoccupied for so, was suddenly home to the newest residents of the town of Twinbrook.

Meredith Kane had found out why only several hours earlier. There were many heated words, between herself and her husband Jebidiah, when she found out that not only did they have a ridiculously large amount of savings in the bank, but they owned a second home in a God-forsaken podunk town in the middle of nowhere. Granted, it was certainly nice compared to what she was expecting, but it raised a whole lot of questions that lead to nothing good between the two Kane parents.



But, as the entire family stopped to look upon their new lodgings, everything fell into silence. After almost a week on the road, eating cruddy fast food, sleeping on uncomfortable motel beds, not to mention travelling with a toddler, the family had had enough... Especially when Jebidiah explained they had to ditch their old car and pick up a new one. No one was more confused than their son Travis, but his naivety to the situation was more a blessing than a curse, in this case.

"He could've done worse," Meredith found herself muttering under her breath as she gave the outside of the house one last lookover... But, she still was not entirely convinced. Maybe her house was in decent enough shape, but the town certainly wasn't.

Once Travis ran upstairs to play in his room, Meredith and Jebidiah were priviledged to their first moments alone together for over a week. You'd think, relieved and tired, it would be a time to collapse in each others' arms... If only.



"I can't believe you got us into all this, Jeb," Meredith jabbed, clearly angry with her husband. "First you lie to me about your job, then your loyalty to this marriage, and now this? Keeping a failsafe plan hidden away from me, hiding away money and buying a whole house in some town I've never heard o-- correction, I never wanted to hear of? This is outrageous, Jebidiah."

"I only did all this to protect the family, Mere. I needed a plan in case things went wrong, in case we had to--"

"But we never should of had to in the first place, Jeb! If you'd actually gone out and gotten a real job like everyone else, we wouldn't be here! We'd be back in Riverview! Safe! Happy!"

"Please, Mere, I--" Jebidiah croaked.



"No, Jeb. I'm through with this. I'm through with the lies, the coverups, the blame-games... And I've about had it with this marriage. You have no idea what I've been through, because of you."

"Mere, I'll do anything to make it up to you..." Jeb turned the most pleading gaze he could on his wife. "Please, just give me a chance to prove myself... I never did, I never got the chance to explain what happened. I will, and I'll--"

"And you'll what, change your feathers?" Meredith almost laughed.



"You know what you'll do? You'll go out and find a real job. You'll give up crime, give up everything that got us into this mess. Throw what's left of the old money away. We're going to live honest lives now, you hear me? You'll set an example for your children, whether you like it or not!"

Jebidiah sighed, but he'd never seen Meredith like this... Ever. There was only one way to resolve this: he had to give in. "Alright, alright... I'll do whatever you ask. Just give me another chance."

Upon further inspection of the house, Meredith decided that it was even better than the outside had let on. Definitely not perfect... There were leaky pipes, everything was covered in dust, she swore she heard something scurrying around in the basement.. But he'd apparently had the place fully furnished. It was definitely a well-thought-out getaway plan.


And Jebidiah seemed to have spared no expense. Her heart even skipped a beat when she walked out onto the lower deck, and found that there was an easel set up, just for her. While she still didn't want to say any more to the rotten scum awful... .... @%(&!%$... husband of hers -- he was looking through the paper for jobs, anyways -- she breathed a soft sigh, and found the supplies and began to paint.

As he watched her out of the corner of his eye, Jebidiah smiled.

Well, there were plenty of options, but the local paper revealed that the town of Twinbrook was in terrible need of some investigative work. Ads were all over the place asking for help on all sorts of topics -- and while Jebidiah groaned at the thought of helping with all these petty crimes, and the pay was horrible, he knew it would probably be enough to win over Meredith's approval.

"Who knows," he thought to himself. "Maybe digging up a little dirt, I'll get to have a little... fun... Hahaha..." He wouldn't want those sneaky pilfering fingers of his to get rusty, now would he?



Well... Day one of the job. It was time to get to work, and try to earn some money, since Meredith wouldn't allow any illgotten funds, anymore. He picked himself up some cool duds -- he may not have to look the part, but it helped him fit in better -- and decided to follow up on some lead about a guy who swore that someone was sneaking in and hitting his toes in the middle of the night.

Seriously? Were people in this town that thick? "I suppose it could work to my advantage," he thought to himself between questioning some of the client's -- Mr. Clay, I believe -- neighbors to see if they'd seen him sleepwalking. It was, of course, the most obvious explanation.



In the meantime, he decided to do some expert sneaking to discover some dirt about people in this new town of his...



... while Meredith was doing some sneaking of her own.



Unfortunately, for his first day, he didn't expect much. Daytime on the weekend seems to be the day for family outings, and nothing suspicious was going to come up while everyone was around, watching.



Not unless you count what he decided to "investigate" on the library computer. It's not like Meredith has to know! He was just doing... You know. Research. At least, that's what he'd tell her if she asked -- and for certain, there was no way she was going to find out, anyways. Maybe this Private Investigator thing wasn't so bad after all.



Especially getting to tell Harwood what an idiot he was for thinking someone actually wanted to stub his toes in the middle of the night. Jebidiah did his best to leave out choice words such as "idiot", "self-absorbed conspiracy theorist", and "next time put a video camera in your bedroom, stupidface", especially since the man actually paid him handsomely for his investigation.

"Wow. What a crazy old man." Jebidiah thought to himself as he climbed into his car. "I could definitely get used to this."

It seemed as if Meredith had cooled off quite a bit by the time he got home, as well. The family headed down into the basement to watch replay of Travis' favorite sports teams (to try and help him feel better about the move and all), and Jebidiah was surprised to feel an unexpected hand on his knee.


Maybe, the damage could be undone, and life could get better. All it had to take was a little effort... Maybe, they could forget about everything that happened.

... Maybe.