Final Girls(28)

The name prompts a deep, internal shiver. It feels like a chunk of ice is tangled among my organs.

“You said his name.”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“I’ve never said His name.” There’s no need for me to clarify. She knows who I’m talking about. “Not once.”

“It doesn’t bother me,” Sam says as she pulls the bottle from my grip. “I think about him all the time. I can still see him, you know? When I close my eyes. He had cut eye holes into the sack. Plus a little slit right over his nose for air. I’ll never forget the way it flapped when he breathed. He had tied string around his neck to keep the sack in place.”

I sense another chunk of ice forming in my gut. I take the Wild Turkey from Sam even though she’s not finished with it. I swallow two gulps, hoping it will melt the chill.

“Too many details?” Sam says.

I shake my head. “Details matter.”

“What about you? You remember any details at all?”

“A few.”

“But not much.”

“No.”

“I’ve heard it’s not a real thing,” she says. “All that repressed memory stuff.”

I help myself to another swallow, trying to ignore the vague needling from Sam. Despite all we have in common, she’s incapable of peering into my brain and seeing the black hole where memories of Pine Cottage should be. She’ll never know how comforting-yet-frustrating it is to remember the very beginning of something and then the tail end. It’s like leaving a theater five minutes into the movie and returning right when the end credits start to roll.

“Trust me,” I say. “It’s real.”

“And you don’t mind not remembering?”

“I think it’s probably better that I don’t.”

“But don’t you want to know what really happened?”

“I know the end result,” I say. “That’s all I need to know.”

“I heard it’s still standing,” Sam says. “Pine Cottage. I read it on one of those shitty true crime sites.”

I had read the same thing several years ago. Probably on the same website. Once the investigation was over, Pine Cottage’s owner had tried to sell the land. No one wanted it, of course. Nothing sinks land values more than blood in the soil. When he went into bankruptcy, it passed into the hands of his creditors. They couldn’t sell it, either. So Pine Cottage remains, a cabin-sized tombstone in the Pennsylvania woods.

“You ever think about going back there and taking a look?” Sam asks. “Maybe it would help you remember.”

The very idea nauseates me. “Never.”

“Do you ever think about him?”

It’s obvious she wants me to say His name. Anticipation pulses like body heat off her skin.

“No,” I lie.

“I figured you’d say that,” Sam says.

“It’s true.”

I have another swallow of Wild Turkey and stare into the bottle, taken aback by how much we’ve drank. Actually, by how much I’ve drank. Sam, I realize, has barely touched it. I close my eyes, swaying a little. I can feel myself teetering on the edge of being drunk. One more drink will do the trick.

I tip the bottle back, take two gulps, relish their burn.

Sam’s voice has become distant and tinny, even though she’s right beside me. “You act like you’re totally over what happened, but you’re not.”

“You’re wrong,” I say.

“Then prove it. Tell me his name.”

“We should try to sleep,” I say, looking to the window and the increasingly lightened sky. “It’s late. Or early.”

“There’s no reason to be afraid,” Sam says.

“I’m not.”

“It’s not like it’ll bring him back to life.”

“I know.”

“Then why are you being such a pussy about it?”

She sounds exactly like Janelle. Nudging. Prodding. Goading me into something I don’t want to do. Annoyance swells inside me, tinged with anger. When I try to tamp it down with more Wild Turkey I realize Sam’s taken the bottle from my hands.

“You are, you know,” she says. “Being a pussy.”

“That’s enough, Sam.”

“If you’re so over everything that happened, then a simple name shouldn’t be that big of a deal.”

“I’m going to bed.”

Sam grabs my arm when I try to leave. I jerk free of her grip, slide off the bed and hit the floor. Hard. Pain spreads up my hip.

Drunk on both Wild Turkey and lack of sleep, it takes some effort to stand. The whiskey sloshes sourly in my stomach. My vision swims. Sam makes things worse by saying, “I wish you’d say it.”

“No.”

“Just once. For me.”

I turn on her, wildly unsteady. “Why are you making such a big deal out of this?”

“Why are you so against it?”

“Because He doesn’t deserve to have His name spoken!” I yell, my voice loud in the pre-dawn silence. “After what He did, no one should say His fucking name!”

Sam’s eyes go wide. She knows she’s pushed me too far.