Page 50 of Kiss Slay Replay

The crowd slowly filters over to the ceremony space. Not my friends, who linger on the couches nursing cocktails.

“There you are,” Evan says as I approach. “I thought you took off.”

“Still here.”

“Good for you,” he says.

“Should we…” Wyatt says, standing.

“Yeah, we should probably go. We’re gonna get shit seats,” Cassie says, finishing off what’s likely her second cocktail. Or third? She’s a little wobbly heading over to the ceremony space.

Then again, so am I.

Evan links arms with me. “Where’d you disappear to?”

I sneak a look over my shoulder. Danny’s behind us, too close to talk about. “Nowhere.”

“Please,” Evan says. “I saw you with—”

“Not now,” I whisper-yell.

He turns around and stares at Danny, because he’s incapable of discretion.

“Well, well, well,” he says. “Well, well, well.”

—

Fourth row back on the right. I appreciate the different vantage point, a brief disruption to my déjà vu.

The ceremony happens just like my dream, with Olivia officiating, with “Love in This Club” playing as Steph walks down the aisle holding a bouquet of pale roses and purple dahlia and fuzzy moss.

They exchange their vows, and I watch the woods, my thoughts cycling from dream paranoia to medical paranoia to Danny to Ravi to Tanya back to dream paranoia. I feel vaguely guilty for not paying attention, but I can’t quiet my mind.

Steph and Jace kiss to raucous applause. Luke does his crazy loud finger whistle. Everyone jumps to their feet. I’m slow to mine.

I keep my eyes beyond the bride and groom, beyond their altar, across the lake, searching the distant woods, the shadowy spaces between the trees. There’s nothing. No one. I should let it go. Move on.

Except that’s what I told myself in the dream. That I was being crazy. And then we all got murdered. Just because I can’t see him doesn’t mean he isn’t there. Doesn’t mean he can’t see me.

I see you.

“Let’s go eat and drink and party!” Jason shouts as he runs past us, Stephanie beside him, holding her bouquet overhead like a trophy.

Everyone wanders over to the cocktail area. I follow. The chorus of conversation muddles together, the music plays again. “Two of Us” by the Beatles. Above the noise, the music, I hear it—a groaning. It’s in my head, I know. Like the brush of Steph’s cold skin—louder than the breeze. My hand hovers over her mouth, waiting for the gift of an exhale. It’s not coming. It’s not coming. She’s dying in my arms.

She’s over there taking photos with Jace and their guests.

Am I crazy? Am I mad? I can summon it so easily, with all my senses. So acutely. I’m ceding to a nightmare, to strange mania, and I know I should just let it go but I can’t. It’s over my head like a dark cloud, and I can’t sidestep it. This…this shadow of death. God, it’s so morbid. So melodramatic. But…

“Where are you going?” Cassie asks me.

“Bathroom,” I lie.

I start in my heels but quickly give up and take them off. I stagger barefoot along the path to the cabins. I don’t care if I’m being irrational. This is when it will happen. If it happens.

If not, I’ll make an appointment with a neurologist on Monday. Or a psychiatrist. Both.

I get to the first cabin—Steph and Jace’s cabin. I circle it, heels in one hand, my phone in the other. I don’t see anyone outside, all clear, so I let myself in. The door is open—it didn’t latch, so it didn’t lock.