Aaron wasn’t waiting for her at the water tower, thank god. But Norah wore her dad’s sweats—the ones that are so big they look like Hammer pants—and a hoodie pulled tight over her chin, just in case. Not that Aaron would have easily recognized her. She hasn’t worn eyeliner or eyeshadow in weeks, which means that she looks like a squinty naked mole-rat.
Through the smoky half-darkness, beyond the crush of cars in the grassy lot, Norah can just see the line to the ticket trailer. It snakes past the bales of hay that form a wall around the perimeter of the Thicket, spilling into the first row of the teeming parking lot.
All of the kids in line are waiting for an hour on a Friday night to pay twenty bucks a piece to see the room where her brother died.
The black hole in the pit of Norah’s stomach seems to expand as she walks through the roped-off lanes. As the brittle wind picks up, she imagines watching people turn, one by one, to look in her direction. To find out why the air has suddenly turned heavy.
Nobody does, of course. Instead, they crane their necks eagerly toward the ticket trailer at the other end of the parking lot and shriek as the wind whips up debris in tiny dust devils at their feet. They laugh and poke each other. They squeal as dark figures in masks and hoods weave through the line. They stamp their feet up and down to get warm in their skimpy costumes as they huddle together near the blazing orange fire barrels every few yards. They are silent and oblivious, bent over their phones while they wait.
Norah stops walking and looks back at the dark parking lot, vaguely wondering if she’ll remember where her car is parked. Third row? Maybe halfway across the lot. There aren’t any marked sections, just an endless loop of rope held up by white plastic poles—many of which are now lying horizontally in the grass.
She shrugs. The information has tipped into the black hole.
In the distance behind her, a steady line of blinding headlights inch forward toward the parking lot flagger wearing a reflective vest. Norah touches the cold rectangle of her phone lying in the kangaroo pouch of her hoodie. There are now 3,500 RSVPs to “Double Dog Scare” tomorrow night. But that’s tomorrow.
Norah realizes that it has started snowing. Just a little. Unseasonably early, tiny flakes that could easily be mistaken for rain if not for the shifting beams of light cutting through the night air. The flakes fill her with an unexpected sense of nostalgia as they dance through the headlights.
“You’re so high,” Norah whispers to herself as she glances back in the direction of the car again. She thinks about texting her mom, telling her they should watch Schitt's Creek together tonight. The new season has been out for a while. She imagines microwaving a bag of popcorn and dragging the enormous afghan from the couch into her parents’ bedroom like they used to do. It might be nice.
And then Norah hears the screams.
Shrill and distant. First one. Then a long, lingering chorus.
She closes her eyes while the buzz from the strawberry drop pulls the screams directly into the black hole.
They’re not real screams. They can’t hurt her.
After a few moments, Norah opens her eyes. She watches as the end of the ticket line creeps further around the edge of the hay bale wall.
She doesn’t actually want to be at home watching TV.
The only place she really wants to be is here—but five weeks ago. To ruffle his too-long hair and roll her eyes instead of leaving him alone. To be counted among the kids who walked right through Cabin Twelve—and then later realized that the blood in the bathtub was real.
Norah knows that it's not possible to go back in time. She knows that finishing the trail tonight won’t change anything. She knows it won’t bring him back. But she also knows that she owes him this much.
And if it’s awful, fine. Nobody is punishing her for what she did. So she’ll punish herself.
Norah steadies herself then walks past the last row of parked cars. She makes her way down a dirt path running parallel to the ticket line, toward the end of the queue.
The line wraps around the hay wall enclosing the main plaza. The kids in line are separated into clusters every few feet, where the glowing fire barrels cast slim circles of warmth. She can just see the end of the line from here.
The bruise-purple sky is still spitting tiny flecks of white, just visible in the licking flames that curl over the edge of the fire barrels.
As she continues toward the end of the ticket line, Norah makes eye contact with a girl who can’t be much older than ten—younger than Brandon.
The girl smiles and adjusts the hem of her sequined tube top, leaning away from the fire barrel as she fluffs the bangs on her purple wig. Then she grabs her friend’s arm, whispering something in her ear that makes them both giggle. The friend is dressed as a vampire, with rivulets of blood painted on the corners of her mouth.
Norah pulls the strings of her hoodie tighter. When the girls don’t sneak a second glance, Norah breathes a sigh of relief. They weren’t talking about her ginormous sweatpants or Unabomber hoodie. Or the fact that she’s probably not walking in the straightest line.
As if on cue, a man directly behind the girls glances up at Norah.
He’s older, with gray hair curling around his ears and a thick, untrimmed beard. He’s wearing army fatigues and a puffy down coat. Norah can’t tell if he’s Army or if this is a costume. Based on his proximity to the girl in the purple wig, he’s her dad.
The man smiles weakly at Norah before turning back to his daughter.
Norah looks at the ground and hurries away, digging her fingernails into her palms. Don’t look at anyone else, she instructs herself. Just walk to the end of the line.
CHAPTER 24
The drive to Declo takes longer than Taylor anticipated. She knows that part of the problem is how slowly she’s driving. When her dad offered to let her drive tonight, the clocks were still an hour ahead. By the time they hit the road tonight, the sky was nearly dark.
The lack of streetlights and endless black hills make Taylor feel like even her brights can’t cut through the darkness. Rupert isn’t a metropolis by any means. Right now, anyone who isn’t at Maisie’s party or headed to the Thicket on Friday night is cruising the short drag between the I-84 and the presbyterian church, or packed into the Taco Bell.
But out here, where the scraggly foothills are dotted with town names that most people have never heard of—Malta, Albion, Sublet, Almo, Elba—even the side roads and sidewalks disappear. The sparse, dilapidated manufactured homes and crumbling barns tucked just off the road—does anyone live in them anymore?
Deep purple clouds sit heavily along the dark horizon where the last slip of sunlight has turned the sky deep pink.
“I’m turning the music down just a little,” Taylor murmurs, twisting the radio dial as a few flecks of white appear on the windshield. Jamie and Maren don’t notice. They’re looking at Maren’s Instagram account now and shrieking when the phone loses service. Another set of headlights blazes into view, making Taylor squint.
Scanning the shoulder of the road for a place that’s safe to pull over a little, Taylor slows down even more and lets the other vehicle pass before the driver starts flashing their lights. From the passenger seat, Jamie looks up from her phone and sighs. “Are you sure you don’t want me to drive, Tay?”
Taylor shakes her head as a reflective green and white sign comes into view. Declo: 5 miles. Thank god. She can feel her fingers cramping up from her vise grip on the steering wheel. “We’re almost there.”
As they crest the next dip in the road, Taylor can see a long line of red tail-lights just ahead. The turnoff is marked by an unassuming, hand-painted wooden sign staked at the edge of a mowed field. Thicket: ¼ mile.
Maren and Jamie put their phones down as the car creeps forward in the long line at the Thicket’s parking entrance. Maren pulls a tube of lipstick from her purse and flips open the dash mirror as Taylor squints into the darkness, looking for an empty parking space. She breathes
a sigh of relief as she follows the line of tail-lights in a slow serpentine pattern through the enormous dirt parking lot. At least nobody expects her to drive faster here.
Beyond the hay bales surrounding the parking lot, the now-dark sky is lit up with strobing lights. The music from the DJ booth is so loud she can hear the lyrics inside the car.
They finally find an empty spot six rows back in the crooked rows of cars parked on the matted dirt and grass. Maren rolls down her window a few inches, putting her hand up to feel the outside air. “Jesus, that’s cold. I’m bringing my coat.” The music from the DJ booth gets louder. Immediately, the smell of smoke, concessions, and a faint whiff of something both sweet and putrid—the corn syrup factory—fills the car.
Jamie shrugs, studying a new text message. “Me too, I guess,” she murmurs, reaching absently for a puffy blue coat at her feet.
Maren giggles as she gets out of the car, pointing to a sign affixed to a reflective white pole. “If you see something, say something,” she intones seriously. “Like what? Blood?” She points at the front of Taylor’s sweatshirt and laughs then shrieks, “I see something!”
The Thicket entrance is marked by a wall of stacked, house-high hay bales bridged by a dimly lit banner to form an entry tunnel into the main plaza. With the flurry of new snow, the ground is a little muddy. Already, the parking lot is turning a little soupy from all the foot traffic.
As they reach the path to the entrance, Taylor can see fire barrels blazing in the distance and the ticket trailer. The kids standing in line look like shadows, backlit from the sparking orange fire barrels.
As they stride toward the strobing lights ahead of them, footsteps fall in unison on the damp ground, Maren grabs Jamie’s arm and giggles. “Wait a second. Now I see something. Check out that guy.”
Jamie and Taylor follow Maren’s line of sight to an older kid wearing a bunny costume and rabbit ears. He’s walking toward the end of the line, flanked by two boys dressed as mediocre vampires. And he’s holding what appears to be a bunch of real carrots in one hand.
Taylor stifles a laugh. “Of all the costumes out there, he chose that?” she whispers incredulously.
Jamie is trying to hold back laughter so hard she’s starting to shake. “Is he going to eat those tonight? Like, are they a snack or …” She trails off, earning her a snort from Maren.
As they approach the end of the ticket line, the rabbit turns around to give Maren and Jamie an appraising look. Beside him, one of the vampires lets out a low wolf-whistle.
Maren lets her coat fall slightly off one shoulder. She gives all three boys a coy smile as she pushes her chest out and moves a little closer. Then she slowly shakes her head back and forth as she points at each one of the boys in turn. “Nope, nope, and nope.”
Jamie tries to match Maren’s ice-queen poker face but can only manage half a second before she crumples against Taylor with a squeaky honk, shaking with laughter. The rabbit looks at Maren like he’s debating whether to use the B-word or the C-word, but ultimately he goes with a classy “asshole” under his breath. He turns around and shuffles a few feet forward in line, still clutching his bunch of carrots.
Maren shrugs and pulls her coat snug around her chest again, squinting into the tall, bright spotlights surrounding the ticket trailer. The spotlights are a new addition, positioned like four small suns above a metal detector and table at the front of the line.
A guard wearing a tan collared shirt and heavy black coat, his brass badge blazing white in the halogen glow of the spotlights, is positioned next to the metal detector. He’s taking his time emptying the contents of purses, directing kids to reveal the insides of their coat pockets, and collecting masks from the kids who have clearly been living under a rock for the past several weeks. Only after this laborious process are the kids allowed to walk to the trailer window to purchase their admission.
The line isn’t quite as long as Maisie warned, but Taylor still guesses they’ll have at least a thirty or forty-minute wait to get into the plaza. She shivers and pulls her sweatshirt and coat around her more closely, hoping all the fake blood has dried by now.
“Holy crap, look!” Jamie squeals suddenly, pointing and practically jumping up and down. The rabbit ahead of them glances over his shoulder at her with a look on his face that says he isn’t afraid to pull out the real insults now. When he realizes that Jamie is motioning toward the front of the line—not at him—he looks relieved.
Taylor gasps. She sees it too. Approaching the metal detector in the distance is a short, skinny kid wearing a beak mask.
Maren sees it now as well. She laughs out loud, standing on her toes for a clear view. “Oh my god. Are you kidding me? I wish we had some popcorn right now.”
Before the kid in the beak mask can even make it to the metal detector, the security guard is on him.
The front of the line is still too far away to make the conversation that ensues audible. But from the way the guard is gesturing, hands flung out to his sides, thick frame towering over the kid in the mask, it’s not hard to guess what he’s saying. For a second, it looks like the guard has decided to escort the kid into the plaza—maybe to call his parents? Maybe to jail?
Taylor isn’t sure what the protocol is here. But when the kid takes off the mask it’s clear, even from here, that he’s crying. Actually crying.
The security guard runs a hand over his mouth, shaking his head in exasperation and letting his hands fall to his sides. After a moment, he holds out a hand and takes the black beaked mask, striding over to the table and dumping it into a rain barrel next to the metal detector.
An enormous sign stating NO MASKS, visible even from here, is taped to the black barrel.
“That was freaking amazing,” Maren breathes. They watch in silence to see if the kid makes it through the metal detector once he reaches the ticket window.
He does, cowering in front of the guard as he slips through. And then the ticket line resumes its low rumble of chatter and shuffling along the dirt and gravel path.
“That was nuts,” Taylor exclaims to Maren, taking a couple of steps as the line inches forward.
Jamie, who has unhooked her arm from around Taylor’s waist, doesn’t move forward with them.
When Taylor turns around, she sees Jamie’s face lit blue from the screen of her phone. She is texting furiously, a look of panic in her wide green eyes.
Maren sees it too and takes a step back in the line. “James. Earth to James. What’s up?”
Jamie doesn’t look up from her phone. She just shakes her head quickly.
When Maren tries to grab the phone, Jamie takes a step back and nearly collides with two girls in line behind them. Her jaw tenses, but she still doesn’t look up. “Nothing, okay? Just leave me alone.”
Maren’s glossy purple lips twist into a frown. ‘
Taylor grabs Maren’s arm, sending her a meaningful look. Then she says, “Jamie? Stop texting for just a sec and tell us what happened, okay?”
Jamie stares at the phone a moment longer then suddenly shoves it deep in her coat pocket. Taylor can’t tell if she’s about to cry or explode.
Ahead of them in line, there is another ripple through the crowd and a few gasps. Taylor peers around the staggered queue of kids to see what everyone is looking at now. This time it’s a girl with spiky black hair who’s getting the third degree. The security guard holds her purse in one hand, gesturing toward the line of kids with the other.
It’s still too far away to hear what they’re saying or what the guard is holding for that matter. Taylor turns back to Jamie but reaches a hand inside her purse to make sure there’s nothing that could be construed as a weapon in there. Chapstick. Gum. Keys. Tampons.
“Just—tell me if I’m, like, overreacting,” Jamie blurts out. Her eyes narrow as if she is already anticipating their response. “Russ just texted me a photo from Maisie’s party. He’s already there. And guess who’s hanging all over his shoulder, boobs practical
ly in his lap?”
Maren shakes her head and frowns. “The angel.”
Jamie nods. She’s shaking slightly. “He knows I can’t even stand her. Is he, like, trying to make me feel bad for not going to the party with him tonight? I already said we’d stop by later. Is he messing with me? Like, what the hell?”
Taylor loops her arm through Jamie’s, pulling her closer and taking a few steps in line. “What did you text back to him?”
Jamie falters and takes a shaky breath. “I—I just said, ‘what the hell?’ And then he acted like he didn’t know what my problem was. And then I sort of blacked out and told him that he’s an asshole.” she adds miserably. “Was that too harsh—I mean, given the circumstances? Crap, maybe I am overreacting.” She looks stricken and pulls her phone back out of her pocket. “I’m going to apologize.”
Jamie hesitates, looking at the photo on the screen then handing it around. “But just look at that. Does that look like a photo of somebody with a freakin’ girlfriend?” She buries her head in Taylor’s shoulder and groans.
Maren is still shaking her head. “Tell him you’re not going to Maisie’s party anymore.”
Jamie lifts her head from Taylor’s shoulder and looks at Maren, startled. “What? But we already—”
Maren gently takes Jamie’s phone and puts it in her own pocket. “It’s simple, James. If he’s trying to mess with you, he’s not worth your time. And if he legit doesn’t understand that he’s messing with you—even after what you just texted him—the last thing he deserves is a sexy devil in his lap too.”
Maren pauses to glower at the rabbit, who is clearly eavesdropping on their conversation. Then she angles herself away from him and continues. “That angel skank doesn’t hold a candle to you, James. I mean, for one thing, her forehead is massive. Like, Elliot-Stabler-from-SVU massive. Where does it even end? And I’m sorry, but there’s a very fine line between classy cleavage and desperate cleavage. Know how to work it, bitch.”
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