Dad doesn’t yell. Not ever. When he’s angry, he just speaks in this very low voice. “I didn’t realize you were still in touch.”
“We weren’t. We just ran into each other at the pizza place earlier today, and he…wanted to talk to me.”
“So he invited you to talk at the ravine?”
“No.” I tell him we were in the Montgomerys’ backyard when we heard Thatcher yell.
Dad closes his eyes, then opens them again. “It was foolish of you to go to the ravine with him.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “Besides, Seth didn’t do anything. He couldn’t have. We were together the whole time.”
“Addie—”
“I’m tired, Dad.” I know he wants to talk more. Rehash it all. Assess me and see what kind of further damage I’ve sustained. I can’t deal with it right now. “Can we talk about this tomorrow?”
After a moment, he nods. “Of course.”
I leave Dad to double-check the locks on all the doors, then head up to see Davy, figuring he’s waited up for me, but he’s passed out on top of his bed, the lights on. I turn them off and pull a blanket over him, then after a short, hot shower to wash Ramsay’s hands off me, I go to bed myself and toss and turn for hours. When I do fall asleep, it’s worse than being exhausted and awake. I see Thatcher’s unmoving body, his blank, lifeless stare, over and over, and then he transforms into Fiona. She’s not still, though. She reaches toward me from the bottom of the ravine, trying to crawl up, her neck bent at an odd angle as she calls out, Addie, look out— Addie, behind you—
I wake up in a cold sweat before sunrise. My room looks ghostly in the gray light. It’s on the first floor, an added-on room on the east side of the house. It has its own bathroom and its own door to the outside, making it convenient to sneak in and out of. Not that I’ve had many places to sneak off to this past year.
I check my phone to find a DM from Seth at 4:12 a.m.
I’d told the detectives the truth; about a week after Fiona died, Seth DMed me that he wanted to talk. I ignored him. He tried again a week after that, and again a few weeks later. Then he’d tried texting and twice he’d even called. No voicemail. I blocked him after that.
This DM just says, You ok?
I immediately feel like shit. Because I should be the one sending him that. He’s the one who just lost his cousin who was like a brother to him.
Thatcher killed Fiona, I tell myself. I shouldn’t be wasting time feeling sorry for Thatcher Montgomery. But the seeds of doubt Seth planted inside me have grown in the night. They’re even bigger this morning.
We heard him call out.
The police aren’t treating this like a suicide.
Those eyes on the back of my neck in the woods.
I shouldn’t be talking to Seth. Detective Carter told me as much before I left. During the course of this investigation, I advise you not to speak about any of this with Mr. Montgomery.
But it’s not like I have friends left to talk to anymore.
And I need to talk to someone.
I look down at Seth’s DM. I’m sure if I was able to afford a lawyer, they’d also advise me not to answer. But Seth is grieving, possibly alone, the way I was last summer. And he would answer me. I know he’d answer me.
Not really. You?
The answer comes almost instantly. No
I’m sorry.
Then I type, Do you want to talk?
I pause before I hit send.
Seth and I have never been best friends. But we know each other in that way only someone who’s known you since you were little can. We’ve spent every summer together since I was five years old. But we’ve never talked during the school year. As kids, we bickered and competed over anything and everything: who could run the fastest, who could climb a tree the highest, who could find the Bier treasure first. Seth and I would seek each other out in any game, from manhunt to our annual cannonball contest, and try to get the other to lose. I was happy to argue with him over whatever topic had come up. He was always fun to argue with.
Even more fun to kiss.
The first time it happened was the summer after eighth grade, on the star-watching rock, after drinking butterscotch schnapps straight from the bottle. No one was more surprised than me. We were arguing—I can’t even remember what about—and suddenly we were kissing. I couldn’t tell you who kissed who first. The next day, we pretended like it had never happened.
The only person I told was Fiona. I still remember her smile, that little eye roll. Took you long enough. How annoyed I was that she’d seen it as inevitable. I resolved to not let it happen again. That resolve lasted a month. Then another week. Before I knew it, we were making out almost every night on that rock, and I was coming home and stealing Fiona’s concealer to hide the marks he’d left on my neck.
We repeated the pattern the following summer, and the one after that. Never going any further. Never talking about it around the others, even though Fiona always knew where to find her concealer when it wasn’t in her room. Just admit you’re in love with each other, she told me once. I told her never to use that word regarding me and Seth again. He could never actually like me like that. It was just a summer thing. Just a way to pass the time. It could never go beyond that.
When me and Jeremy started dating for real, midway through junior year, I decided to put Seth and his kisses out of my mind for good.
Until last summer, the night Seth and I became inextricably linked.
And last night, that link grew stronger.
I should never have set foot back on that street.
But I did. I can’t ignore Seth now.
I hit send.
A moment later, a response.