Condemned by Christopher Renna (iphone ebook reader txt) 📕

were kids. But it wasn't until, like, seventh grade when we started to be friends.

TREVOR: Yeah, we were best friends for a long time. Until . . . well, until the end.

ADAM: Yeah. Like, since the third grade or something.

Was there something special about Jared that made you want to be friends with him? Some quality or common interest?

CONNER: He was funny. When we were kids, he always made the other kids laugh with things he said or did. You know, like telling jokes or playing pranks and stuff. Like, if I was in a bad mood or something, he'd try to make me feel better.

LEVI: Me and Jared were on the same soccer team in seventh grade. That's how we became friends. We liked the same sports. Like soccer and wrestling. Softball during the summer. Conner and Adam and Trevor were always focused on basketball. Sometimes they played softball. But me and Jared became friends on the soccer field.

TREVOR: He was fun to be around. We were in a lot of the same classes, so we'd always be partners in biology or work on team projects together.

ADAM: He punched another kid in the face once when we were in the fourth grade. Or maybe . . . no, I think it was the fifth grade. This one guy always liked to start shit—oh, shit, sorry—um, this one guy always started crap with me. And one day, Jared punched him in the nose. I don't know, I thought that was cool. Then we were best friends.

Being pretty good friends, you must have been close to his family too.

CONNER: Yeah. The four of us hung out a lot. We all knew his parents pretty good. Maybe not Levi so much. But yeah.

LEVI: Not like I was a part of the family or anything. But my cousin, Brayden, he was friends with Jared's sister, Leah. So, like, I knew the family. Just not totally. You know what I'm trying to say?

TREVOR: I think I hung out the most at his house. We all did. But sometimes when we weren't all together, it was just him and me at his house. So, yeah, I knew his family pretty good.

ADAM: Well, yeah. I mean, we went to school together, and we hung out. Why wouldn't I know his family good?

Did he have a good relationship with his family?

CONNER: Huh? Well, yeah. Didn't you interview his dad? [Yes.] Yeah, okay. So, didn't he tell you? I mean, I know Jared got along with them. Sometimes his dad was really hard on him about sports or grades. Typical stuff.

LEVI: As far as I know, he did. He never told me he didn't.

TREVOR: What? Why are you asking me that? Aren't I here to talk about Jared and me? So, it's kinda weird that you asked me that. He had a good relationship with his family. If there was something that happened, or they didn't get along, I didn't know about it.

ADAM: Yep. They were like one of those families that didn't yell at each other or anything. It was all good.

Now, this is important to the investigation. I know you might think the question is inappropriate or too private. But we really need to piece together everything to know exactly what happened to Jared.

CONNER: Okay.

ADAM: [Laughter] You gonna ask me something embarrassing or something?

Everyone agrees Jared started acting differently several months ago. Do you know of anything that might have influenced that change in him?

CONNER: I don't think so. [Nothing that veered from his normal routine of things?] Not really.

LEVI: No.

TREVOR: You mean like drugs or something? He didn't take any drugs. Even if we drank some beers, he never really got buzzed or anything crazy.

ADAM: Like something bad that happened to him? Um. Well, no. I don't think so. Wait, what do you mean exactly? [Anything that you might have considered out of the ordinary.] Oh. Uh, I gotta think about it for a minute.

Do you know if he made any new friends? Maybe someone that was a bad character.

CONNER: We would have known about it.

LEVI: I never saw him with some new strange friend.

TREVOR: A bad character? Please! We were always together. He didn't have any new friends. Why would he? He had us.

ADAM: Nope. He didn't hang out with anybody else.

No shady character that you might have seen him with once or twice?

CONNER: No.

LEVI: No.

TREVOR: I already told you no.

ADAM: Nope.

So we ruled out drug abuse and new friends. Did Jared have any secrets? Something about his lifestyle that his family didn't know.

CONNER: Secrets? I'm pretty sure Jared didn't do anything that was a secret from his parents.

LEVI: Uh, I don't think so. I mean, no drugs and stuff, right? So that would have been a secret. [Nothing you can think of?] No.

TREVOR: If he had a secret, why would I tell you? That has nothing to do with what happened to him. [If he experienced something that he didn't share with his parents, that might be something of value to know.] Actually, the last few months when we weren't friends much, I don't know if he told his parents anything that was like a secret or not. I don't know.

ADAM: Well, maybe. I mean, nothing bad or anything. Just the usual stuff, you know? [Such as?] We all smoked weed a few times.

Jared's dad mentioned that he thought his son might be intimately involved with one of you. For Mr. Smith's sake, was that something that Jared wanted to hide from his parents?

CONNER: [Laughter.] I'm not going to talk about Jared's sex life.

LEVI: Seriously? I'm the fag, so of course you're asking me, right? You gotta be kidding me. Did you ask the other guys too? [We haven't interviewed Trevor or Adam yet.] Well, obviously straight Conner didn't say it was him, so now you're asking me. [I don't wanna upset you. And honestly, Mr. Smith doesn't care. It was just a question that he didn't have any answer to.] I'm sure