Page 91 of We’re All Going to Die Tonight!

“Why didn’t you tell someone?” Caulder asks. “Show someone the messages? God, why didn’t you tell me?”

“We talked at the debate competition about going to the school when we got back,” Marlene says. “But like I said, nothing about the texts was that incriminating. We needed something so damning that they’d be forced to fire him.”

“So you asked him to meet you outside during the game,” I say.

“We knew Lucas was always filming everything,” Kaitlyn says. “And if Marlene said she needed his help to film something, we figured he would.” Kaitlyn’s eyes cut to Lucas and narrow. “We had no idea he would let her down.”

“Mari, I didn’t know,” he says. “I didn’t realize it was that—”

“I had already slipped the note under Jay’s door,” Marlene says. “So I asked Lucas to meet me outside after Caulder and Avery went in the room, and then I left.”

Her gaze settles on Lucas.

“Jay came out. Lucas didn’t.”

I taste bile in my throat. I don’t want to hear what happened next.

“Mari—”

“He tried to kiss me,” she says. “I figured Lucas would show up at any moment. But when I realized he wasn’t coming, I pushed Jay away. He didn’t like that. He told me I was being a tease. I told him to let me go, but he grabbed me by the shoulders. He turned me around, and his hands…They were going everywhere. I tried to scream, but he put his fist in my mouth.”

Both Caulder’s and Lucas’s bodies have gone almost entirely rigid. Lucas’s entire face looks shattered, the shame and regret rolling through every feature.

“The rain made everything muddy. That was the only thing that saved me, really. At one point, he sort of slipped, and as he tried to get his footing, I was able to wriggle out of one of the arms of my hoodie to get away. He grabbed the sleeve and tried to yank me back, and it sent me flying into him. He stumbled in the mud and…he fell.”

Outside, thunder rumbles. Marlene waits for it to pass before lifting her eyes and looking at each of us in turn.

“His head hit a rock,” she says. “I’ve never heard a sound like that.”

In the van, I’d wondered how hard someone would need to hit his skull for it to crack.

Apparently, one slam into a rock was all it took.

“You see?” Emerson says. “She admits it. She’s the murderer—”

“No,” Marlene says, shaking her head. “I’m not. But you’re right. I did panic. I knew the teachers would think I pushed him. They wouldn’t believe me. After all, people had believed Emerson over my mom—”

“Your mom? Emerson?” I ask, confused. I look at Emerson, but suddenly, he doesn’t seem so sure of himself.

“She was the nurse at the private school Emerson and I went to,” Marlene says. “She’d been there for years. Everyone loved her. One day, she saw Emerson in the hallway taking pills that he wasn’t supposed to have. She asked him if he had a prescription for them. He said it was ‘none of her fucking business.’ When she reported him to the principal, he told them she was stealing drugs from students. And even though they couldn’t prove anything, they still let her go. And because I was only allowed to go to the school tuition-free because she was an employee, I ended up here.”

Marlene laughs, a hollow, empty sound as she glares at Emerson. “I don’t think you even realized she was my mom. Didn’t even know we went to the same school. He left our school willingly because he wanted a better shot at glory or whatever. Meanwhile, because of his bullshit, I had to leave.”

“Wait,” I say. “What do you mean, you panicked after Jay…after he fell?”

“I saw the telephone box,” she says. “It was near where we were…standing. I figured Emerson would call the police and tell them I killed his family friend and teacher. So, I grabbed all the wires, and I yanked them out.”

She looks over to Kaitlyn. “And then…Kaitlyn found me.”

Now we all turn to Kaitlyn, who folds her arms over her chest.

“I knew we just needed to play it cool and figure out what to do next,” she explains. “Emerson had had us throw our clothes on the floor anyway, so I grabbed Marlene new stuff, she changed, and we went back inside to act like we’d just been hiding during the prank like we were supposed to.”

“Of course,” Marlene says. “Things then got complicated. Because that’s when we found—”

“Lucas,” Caulder and I say at the same time.

Marlene nods. “Emerson’s story…It didn’t make any sense. I’d been outside. Sure, maybe someone could have snuck around, but they probably would’ve passed by the side where Jay and I were. They would’ve seen us. Why wouldn’t they have attacked us? Or, if they were robbers, why go to a house where you see people outside? And even then…wouldn’t I have seen them run away at some point?”