Page 68 of We Already Dug the Grave

There’s no way it could be here.

It made no sense.

I pulled the helmet free and held it up, locking eyes with my sister.

“How?” was all I managed to say.

Because this wasn’t just some helmet. The stickers that covered it were long worn off, and the Sharpie marks were faded—but there was my name.

Milly+Casey BFF.

Chapter 25

Then

Everything passed in a blur—returning home, scrubbing in the sink until we were raw, changing clothes, then driving back to the bonfire as quickly as we could.

The music thumped loudly as I parked in the grove next to the other vehicles. More students had arrived since we’d left, and the party had picked up. Good. It would be easier to slip in undetected.

Casey’s dirt bike was still propped near the same tree. He hadn’t left. My nerves rattled at the thought of seeing him. It seemed a lifetime ago that I’d kissed him, seen his shy smile, accepted his invitation to be alone. And now…

And now everything was different.

I was different.

Frances and I walked silently toward the party, not speaking until we crossed into the pasture, where students stood in groups, laughing and drinking and dancing on wobbly legs.

There was a chill in the night air, but it was too warm for a fire. “You know what to do?”

Frances nodded, dressed in shorts and an oversize hoodie pulled almost to her chin. “Just walk around. Hold a cup. Make sure people see me.”

“Yeah. But don’t, you know, talk about anything. If anyone asks where you’ve been, tell them here. Around. We’ll leave as soon as we can.”

“No one’s going to ask where I’ve been.” Frances frowned. “I can promise you that.” She stalked away, disappearing into a tangle of our peers.

I walked toward the bonfire, not stopping until its heat was too much. It had been burning for over an hour and was still going strong, its orange flames glowing almost fluorescent as they licked the night sky.

The party had backed away from the heat, and anyone with a layer or two to shed had done so. The ground was littered with hoodies and flannels and Carhartts.

I stared at the fire, with burning cheeks and sweat pooling in my armpits. Maybe I should just walk right into the blaze. I was a killer. Maybe I deserved it.

You’d think having grown up hearing gossip about how my mama was a murdering bitch or how my aunt may or may not be a witch, or hell, even Ruth’s bones, would desensitize me to the idea of killing. But it hadn’t. Somehow it made it worse. I’d joined the family ranks.

Behind me, someone whooped, and I turned to see a girl from my AP Bio class—Jenny, I think?—executing a keg stand, her tan legs stretched into the air as two boys from the baseball team held her up. It was unsettling, how silly little things like parties and bonfires continued on while I felt fundamentally changed.

That was the problem. I felt. Ruth always said I felt things too deeply. And right now, I didn’t want to feel anything.

Maybe Jenny was on to something.

I knew it was a bad idea, but that didn’t stop me from walking toward the keg. I grabbed one of the red plastic cups that littered the ground nearby, and the second Jenny dismounted with all the grace of a drunk gymnast, I filled that cup to the brim and chugged.

“Fuck yeah! I didn’t know Witchy Milly liked to party!” I wasn’t sure which boy said it, and never lowered my cup to see as I flipped my middle finger in the air and spun it in each direction.

Cheers and laughter broke out around me. I wiped my mouth on the back of my arm, then immediately went for another. This time as I drained my beer, one of the girls started chanting “chug, chug, chug.”

Whoever had said I liked to party was wrong. But tonight was different. Tonight was about running from the guilty ache in my chest and silencing that whisper in my head, the one that softly said over and over: murderer murderer.

After my third beer, the small group that had cheered me on had moved on to something else. I didn’t care.