Her vibrant red hair is gone—most of it, anyway—the remaining strands turned black and plastered to her skull. Her clothes are gone, too, leaving her completely naked like a sickly alien creature birthed from the depths of a sewer. Her arms hang limp, reaching out into empty space, skin peeling away from her fingers and wrists like torn latex gloves. Some are missing, but I can still make out her pink and black acrylic nails.
My lungs burn as I scream her name, rocking back and forth, hovering over her face like I might be able to wake her up, only to throw my head back in nauseated hopelessness as I sob into the treetops. Mason lets go of me and stumbles backward in shock, erupting into another torrent of screams. He collapses onto his hands and knees in the water, shaking, screaming, and sobbing into his arm as he looks on in horror.
I don’t know what I was expecting. I knew the outcome wouldn’t be a good one, but I wasn’t ready. I would never be ready.
When I roll my head back in anguish, I catch sight of Mason on the bank, doubled over, red-faced and screaming into his phone. My own pathetic sounds drown out what he’s saying as I descend further into madness and despair.
All I can do is sit in the water with Evie’s body melting into mine, tears and snot leaking out of my face while I keep screaming. I’m holding her so tight that my fingertips sink into her slimy, ruined flesh and, even though I’m convulsing with coughs and retches, I can’t bring myself to let go of her.
I can’t let go of her.
By the time we leave the woods, I don’t know how much time has passed. The only sounds now are muted voices drifting under the crack of the door at the police station. After a wave of law enforcement and EMTs flooded into the clearing, they peeled Evie, quite literally, off of me, and took us all out of the woods. I don’t know where they took Mason. I don’t even remember how I got here.
All I know is that I’m sitting in an interrogation room, staring at the white cinderblock walls in a near catatonic state. Someone peeks through the window periodically, probably to make sure I don’t kill myself on their watch.
“They’re on their way down…” I hear Tate’s voice in the hallway, “he’s covered in…Jesus…get some clothes, take him back to the locker room, and shower him off before the parents get here.”
I glance down at the front of my grey t-shirt and jeans, streaked with the remnants of Evie. My skin is stained with a thin film of decay and I smell like I myself am dead, too.
Everything moves in slow, fluid motions—undressing, dropping my clothes into paper bags, robotically scrubbing my body with a nondescript bar of soap, rinsing the death from my skin under scalding water—until I’m back in the same room I started in, this time in grey sweatpants and a different grey t-shirt with the police department logo on the chest.
When the door finally opens, the first person I see when I look up is Lena. Her puffy blue eyes lock on mine and she breaks away from Dan, my parents, and Tate and rushes toward me. Her chin trembling, she collapses onto her knees in front of my chair and wraps her arms around my torso. As soon as her cheek hits my shirt, she lets out a shrill scream that breaks me into pieces all over again.
I clutch her around the neck while she shakes uncontrollably, covering my face with my other hand. She clings to me, her voice wrecking me from the inside out as she screams Evie’s name over and over, punctuated by curses and desperate pleas to God.
My mom is kneeling next to Scott on the floor, crying into her hand while she holds him around the shoulders with the other. He sits against the wall, having slid down to the floor as soon as he saw me.
He buries his face in his hands while his shoulders shake with sobs, “No, no, no…my Evie girl…please, no!”
I cry even harder when I hear his voice. It’s one I’ve never heard since I’ve known him. It’s too high-pitched and cracked for such a big man—the sound of a father’s heart breaking when he realizes his only child is dead. She’s dead, and he doesn’t know how she died or who did it. He doesn’t know who stole her away from him.
When Lena finally pulls back, she reaches up and grasps my contorted and swollen face, brushing my wet hair away from my forehead like only a mom would. She doesn’t say anything, just gazes sympathetically at me through the tears streaming down her face.
“Oh, Colson…” she sighs, “oh, God…I’m so sorry…” she shakes her head and pulls me close again.
She just found out her only child is dead and she feels sorry for me. But I know what she’s thinking. Who wants to thank their daughter’s brother for finding her dead body? Who wants to feel any kind of relief when Evie’s still dead and someone had to find her like that? I don’t want to let go of Lena, and she doesn’t seem to mind.
In an instant, time stops and loses all meaning. The rest of the world goes on, the sun sets, and another day starts. But, regardless, she and I are both left suspended in time, clinging to each other in the absence of the one we really want.
●●●
I used to wish that Evie and I went to the same school, but now I wonder if it’s better that we didn’t. On one hand, I don’t think I could deal with the endless conversations, condolences, memorials, tributes, and Evie’s face plastered all over the school. Not to mention the media coverage…she’s the first homicide in Canaan in 14 years. But, on the other hand, maybe if I was closer, Bowen would’ve left her alone.
That’s what I’m thinking about while I stare at him over her closed casket, draped in violets and tiger lilies. I sit motionless, my arm firmly around Dallas, holding her close while she sniffles into my shoulder. I hate this for Dallas, even more than for myself. Freshman year of high school is hard enough, and now her life’s been turned upside down. How can I leave for college next year? How can I leave her like this?
It doesn’t matter where we are, it’s always the same; Dire Ridge and Canaan split clean down the middle, a line drawn in the sand. Mason and his parents stand behind us with Alex and his older brother, Adrian, while Aiden and the rest of the Raffertys stand further to the side.
On the other side of Evie’s casket, Bowen stands with Hildy, Jay, and Hannah while Tate, Wells, Bowen’s parents, and Jay’s parents stand nearby. I can see Aiden’s face in my periphery, eyes burning a hole through Jay’s forehead, daring him to look in their direction. Although visibly uncomfortable, Jay comforts a sniveling Hildy while Hannah clings to her arm and sniffles right along with everyone else.
They all have a lot of nerve showing up here after everything that’s happened—after everything that happened before this…
Bowen knows I’m looking at him, ignoring everything else around us. I’m studying his face, trying to decipher what’s going on inside his head, and it’s fascinating. He stands next to Jay in a crisp, blue button-down rolled up to the elbow, looking like he’s dutifully waiting for this to end before moving on with his day. That is, until he thinks someone is watching.
In an instant, his face twitches and he focuses on Evie’s casket, sniffing once, pinching his eyebrows, and pressing his mouth together. After a couple times, he just starts doing it on loop.
Twitch, sniff, pinch, press…
I don’t hear anything of the graveside service, because it doesn’t matter. I know who Evie is, and I know why she’s not here anymore. When it’s over, and everyone finally starts drifting back toward the limestone church up the hill, I don’t follow. I’d rather hang out with her, like usual. I stroll up to the edge of the casket, thinking about how she’s right on the other side of the glossy wood.
But soon, I feel Bowen’s stifling presence next to me, invading my space with his vile existence like it’s his goddamn job.
He takes a drag off his cigarette, “I’m sorry for your loss, Col.”
I blink and exhale slowly, concentrating on the mahogany wood grain and thinking about how good that cigarette would sound searing into his eyeball.
Feeding off the tension, I keep staring straight ahead, “She told me about you—about how you treated her after she got into school.”
He flicks his cigarette ash onto the astroturf, “You tell anyone else?”
“Yep.”
“I doubt it’ll matter much,” he blows a puff of smoke into the air, “let me know how it goes.”
Bowen has no conscience; his pride is the only thing he cares about. I may be a selfish and conceited asshole like him, but I still have something resembling a moral compass, regardless of how bent and broken it is. But the question still lingers—why would Bowen go out of his way to do any of this? From what Evie said, he was content to show up when he wanted to and blow her off when he didn’t, just like every other girl. What set him off so bad? Unless…
Sounds like he thinks you’re going to abandon him and he’s freaking out…
I glance at Bowen out of the corner of my eye, staring silently at Evie’s casket, and let out a scoff, “She told me she was going to dump your ass that night,” I say with a hint of amusement, “become your summertime sadness. Shit,” I laugh under my breath, “so this is what happens to the only girl who could make Bo Garrison feel anything…”
