Don't Trust Her

by Elizabeth Boles

  “Me too.”

  Nothing makes sense. The truth is all twisted and shredded, and the person holding all the cards is basing her idea on a vial.

  “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to think.” Blanche slowly closes her eyes. “Is this nightmare over?”

  I touch her hair, and a thousand thoughts flitter in my head. It would be so easy to lie and say that this will all turn out okay, that Faith will give up this idea. It’s not a nightmare, just a small bad dream that will eventually disappear into a mist or, like the ice outside, it will melt and be sucked up by the earth, disappearing for good.

  But I don’t tell her any of those things because even as I’m thinking them, a part of me knows that I’m wrong.

  This nightmare is only just beginning.

  Chapter 39

  There is no solace in the silence that follows us. There is only tension thick like a humid summer’s day, the sort of day that you can only have in the South. It is the kind where every hair on top of your head remains frizzed. It is the sort where you feel like you’re swimming through the air instead of walking, when the cicadas sing in the early morning and the brown thrashers chirp at dawn.

  That, in the South, along with the ripe honeysuckle vines that leave a bead of nectar on their stems, is what a day in summer is like.

  Multiply that oppression by about a thousand, and that is the atmosphere in the cabin. We are surrounded by four stuffy walls—four barriers covered with dead animals. A bobcat’s mouth is pulled back, its fangs sharp as it stretches its claws to strike. A turkey, wings back in frozen flight, careens toward the mounted deer that judge us quietly.

  The life is sucked from us, and with it, so goes the search for the missing cable, forgotten in the melee.

  Blanche turns on the TV. “Screw the power.”

  The news flares to life, and the reporter says the cold weather isn’t going to break. For once it will remain in the teens for at least another two days. No, we will not see the normal balmy sixty degrees that usually follows a cold snap. We will have more cold.

  She continues to say that the ice isn’t melting. Many of the main roads have been salted, but officials still tell people that it is too cold and the roads are too dangerous to travel on. Many roads are officially closed.

  We are all supposed to stay home.

  I want to scream.

  Faith has not said a word for at least an hour. Instead she has lurked nearby like a buzzard waiting for an ailing rabbit to finally succumb to death. She makes little noises every once in a while, just to remind us that she’s still waiting for one of us to admit guilt.

  But neither of us do.

  I can’t take the silence anymore. I can’t take being stuck in a house that will eventually lose power. I can’t bear to be locked in here one moment longer than I have to be.

  I go to the door and punch my feet into my sneakers and wiggle into my jacket. My arm screams from pain. Must be a bruise under my shirt. One of the many surprises from this weekend thanks to the car crash.

  “Where are you going?” Blanche asks.

  They don’t need to know the truth. “For a walk.”

  I have to figure out a way to bring us back together. This situation won’t mend on its own. It’s up to me to fix it.

  Faith studies me for a second before pinning her gaze back on whatever magazine she’s reading. She bursts into tears, and I am both heartbroken for her and furious.

  She’s sad because of Paige. Faith is sad because she thinks someone killed our dearly departed blackmailing friend. She’s sad because she’s afraid of going to jail or, worse, prison.

  But there’s more than that. Faith is cracking, and I can see it, sense it, as if I’m a feral animal picking up the scent of instability. She is on a pointless witch hunt, and it’s breaking her.

  It’s a perfect storm, really. Paige dying compounded by our current circumstance. We can’t reach the outside world, for fuck’s sake. That will make the strongest of the strong wobble. Then of course add the blackmail letter to that and it’s just one stressor after another, and Faith is not tolerating any of them well.

  She fluffs her hair absentmindedly and tucks a strand around her ear. She sucks the end of it like a teething toddler needing a cloth full of milk.

  My gaze flickers to Blanche, and I wonder if she sees what I do, the fissures in Faith’s psyche. What will another day trapped here do to her? She’s already deemed one of us a murderer. Will she go farther if we’re stranded here another twenty-four hours? Will she attempt to take justice into her own hands?

  The thought strikes deep in me, plucking my core like an infinite cord attached to it.

  Surely Faith is not so unstable. But she is a bloodhound, and justice means something to her. She admitted that she will not go to prison because of someone else. But how far will she go to ensure her safety?

  I open the door. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  “Make sure,” Faith says.

  I shiver because what glints in her eyes isn’t kindness or comfort. It’s suspicion, pure and simple.

  The cold steals my breath as soon as I’m engulfed in it. The sun is sinking quickly, and I swear it had just risen. Where has this day gone?

  My feet slip and slide, but I manage to get off the porch and head toward the trees. There must be a spot where a cell signal can get through. There is service in nearly every part of this state now. Surely I can tap into it somewhere.

  I head toward a clearing of pines on the west side of the house and see Paige’s balcony and my vomit from yesterday. I cover my nose and head on. The sun is brightest here. Its warmth caresses my face.

  Still no signal.

  I putter around the property, slipping and diving for God knows how long, until I can’t take it anymore. Until my fingers are red and stinging and until my toes hurt with every step. There must be a hole somewhere. There has to be a way to reach the outside world. I cannot be trapped with Faith, who is breaking, and Blanche, who is sulking. Must reach Tal.

  But after a good thirty minutes my face aches and my chest burns with every breath. My clothes and shoes are too flimsy for this temperature. I breathe into my cupped hand to warm my fingers and wiggle my toes to keep the blood flowing into them.

  I head for the back door and grab a few frozen logs from a stack by the house. The ice knocks off easily. The climb up the stairs drains me. My legs shake as I lift them one at a time. Is that from lack of food? Dehydration? I’ve barely put anything in my mouth in the last day. That must change. I have to eat.

  The back door slides open, and I enter to quiet. I drop the logs beside the fire and hope they dry enough to be used in the next few hours. I go out and bring more inside.

  “Blanche is taking a shower,” I hear Faith say.

  She sits in the living room and points down the hall. “She’s in there.”

  I hear the water running. “Okay.”

  Faith glances over her shoulder as if to make sure that Blanche can’t hear. Then she slinks to me and stops inches from my face.

  Her breath smells stale, like she’s been drinking Coke for hours without brushing. She folds her arms and lowers her voice. “We both know it was her.”

  “Blanche?”

  She nods. “You know as well as I do that she was the one who did it. You don’t have to pretend with me that you think any differently.”

  “Oh, Faith.” I’m so tired of this. “You’ve got to stop.”

  She grabs my arm. The movement is unexpected. A gasp escapes my lips, and Faith moves in so close that the blood vessels in her eyes look like rivers.

  “You helped me back there,” she relays.

  This is news to me. “I did?”

  “You know that, Court.”

  I repeat her words, trying to get Faith to elaborate. “Back there?”

  “You know, about what Paige wanted us to admit.”

  “Admit?”

  “About the bluff,” she gri
nds out.

  “Sure,” is all I can think to say.

  “I’m going to help you,” Faith coos. “I’m going to help both of us and make sure that Blanche tells the truth.”

  It’s my turn to grab Faith’s arm. “Whatever you’re thinking, stop it right now. We’ve been through enough. You need to take a moment and think about what you’re saying. You’re telling me that Blanche killed Paige,” I hiss. “You’ve got this all wrong, Faith. We need to be helping each other, not hurting one another. I will not support this idea that Blanche had anything to do with what happened to her.”

  “But—

  “Stop it! Stop it right now!”

  Faith wilts. It takes her a moment, but she slowly brings her gaze to meet mine. She opens her mouth to speak when every light in the house sighs.

  The lamps dim, and I exhale, praying that they’re not done, that we still have some gas. God, I can’t imagine being stuck with Faith in the dark. She will spend hours whining, braying about Paige being murdered. It won’t just be her cracking anymore. Blanche and I wouldn’t be far behind.

  Ever so slowly, the lights inhale to life. I exhale a breath lodged in my chest.

  From the bathroom, the shower turns off.

  My grip on Faith tightens. “Well? What will it be? I don’t know if you can win Blanche back, but she’s the best friend you’ve ever had. I’m still here. I’m still with you, but I have to know that you’re with us.”

  She shakes her head to argue, but stops. Her brow wrinkles with worry, and after a moment a tiny smile curls on her lips. “You’re right. Maybe I went too far. Maybe I need to calm down a little bit. It’s just, it’s all been too much.”

  “I know.”

  There’s nothing like a good old reality check to put things in perspective.

  “Faith, if we lose power, we’ll have to keep this fire going. We have at least another day here, maybe two depending on the road conditions. We don’t have a way to communicate with our families until we find the missing cable. We are stuck. We’ve got to keep warm. It’s our top priority. There’s no point focusing on anything else because the first thing we have to do is make sure this house stays heated.”

  The bathroom door swings open, and Blanche appears with a robe wrapped over her body. “The power?”

  “We still have it,” I confirm. “But it’s going to go soon. We’ve got to limit any more use of the generator.”

  She winces. “I know it didn’t help when I turned on the TV. Or the shower. But I needed a distraction. I still can’t find that damn cable.”

  “We needed an update on the weather,” I reassure her. “It was fine. And I think”—I point to Faith—“that we’ve come to an agreement on things.”

  Blanche’s dark brows arch in skepticism. “Have we?”

  I smile wide. “We’re only going to focus on what we can affect—like staying warm. That’s our main goal, right?”

  Faith nods slowly.

  Blanche eyes Faith up and down and with a swing of her head, pivots back to the bathroom, and shuts the door.

  Faith swallows hard. “Well, that went well, don’t you think?”

  No, it didn’t go well at all, but I can’t focus on it because the wood in the house is low and we have to prepare for the upcoming night.

  Chapter 40

  Blanche helps me gather more firewood while Faith stays inside and pushes towels beneath the doors and windows in an attempt to keep out the cold.

  “You haven’t checked her bags for the cable, have you?” Blanche says low, keeping an eye on the house.

  “No. I figured that she doesn’t have it.” Blanche says nothing. In her silence is a world of information. “You think she does?”

  “Court, we don’t know what she’s doing in there even now.”

  I shake my head. “She said that she’s going to drop it—all of it. Until I have a reason not to believe her, I’m going to trust that.”

  I hold my arms out, and Blanche heaves a log onto them. “She’s losing it. You know that, right?”

  My chest shrivels. “If we focus on staying warm, it gives her something else to zero in on.”

  “You think it will distract her? I don’t know.”

  “Right now all we have is each other. That’s it. Without a way to communicate, we’re our only hope. We are all that we can trust. I told Faith this, and she seemed to agree with me.”

  Blanche grunts as she lays another log in my arms. “She was pretty damn adamant about not going to jail and that someone is guilty—me, that is.”

  I shake my head.

  “Don’t argue. You know as well as I do that she’s been sniffing around my butt since Paige wound up dead. Faith wants a reason to think that I’m guilty, and she finally has it in her stupid little pill vial.”

  There’s no point arguing because it’s true. “I didn’t want to believe she would do that.”

  “Well, don’t worry, because you’re not in her line of fire.”

  Anger like scalding water burns in my veins. “I honestly don’t think either of us is exempt.” It’s a lie, but hopefully one that will make her feel better.

  Blanche picks up a log and kicks ice from it. “I don’t get what I’ve done to make her think I’d do that to Paige. Okay, that’s a lie. I do. And I know that I wasn’t the nicest the night we played cards.”

  “That’s not it. That’s not why she’s so suspicious.”

  Her face twists in question. “What are you talking about?”

  I sigh. “Faith swears that she saw you holding an extra card when you were reading our answers to the best friend question.”

  “What?”

  “She thinks that you planted the answer to give you a reason to be pissed at Paige.”

  A shot of laughter bursts from her mouth. “You’re kidding me, right?”

  “No.”

  “Fucking ridiculous. First of all”—she lifts her finger—“I’d have to somehow have magically pulled the card that asked the question. Secondly, I would have needed to stuff a card up my sleeve or something, ready to go. I never even knew we would be playing that stupid game.”

  “But you and Paige had played it before.”

  Blanche juts out her lower lips. “Are you accusing me now?”

  “No. No. All I’m saying is, look at this from Faith’s perspective. She thinks she sees a fourth card. Maybe in her mind the altercation between the two of you was created to make Paige look upset.”

  “Upset enough to take her own life?” Blanche shakes her head. “Bullshit. And you know that’s bullshit.”

  “I know that. I’m just saying that’s what’s going on in Faith’s mind.” I lower my voice. “But she’s going to drop it. She promised.”

  Blanche scoffs.

  “Like I said, we have to focus on our immediate circumstances.” I nudge her to hand me another log. “Let’s face it—what Paige wrote about a police officer, that might not even be true. She might have just done that so one of us would confess and give her what she wanted—closure for my sister.”

  Blanche hikes a shoulder to her ear. “Maybe. But having Faith breathing down my neck and pointing fingers makes it real hard to believe she’s just going to drop it. You know how she is. She can be a stickler for things.”

  “Then she can be a stickler when we get out of here, but not right now. Stop going over this in your head. It’s not helping anyone. Let it go. I’m not telling you to leave here as her best friend. God, I don’t even know if either of us can do that, but we’ve got to keep our eyes on the prize—leaving. To do that, we need to focus on staying warm for another night. And we’ve got to find that cable.”

  Blanche drops her voice. “We could start walking—you know, tomorrow. I’m sure we can find extra socks and maybe shoes that fit, something that will warm our feet. We can walk until we get a signal and let someone know where we are.”

  “It’s slick outside,” I warn her.

  “We go slow.”

>   With two of us, it could be easier. We could hold on to one another, maybe find some branches and use them like skiing poles to help us move across the ice.

  “What about Faith?” I ask.

  Blanche places a small log atop the others. My arms ache from the strain. My muscles are tight, and it feels like my tendons are about to snap.

  Blanche tells me, “I don’t know. If she seems stable, we take her. If not, we leave her here.” She laughs bitterly. “We’ll be back.”

  “We can’t abandon her, Blanche.”

  Blanche grabs a few logs for herself. “She already abandoned us when she accused us of murder. Just think about it. That’s all I’m asking. Come on. Better get inside before she thinks we’re plotting against her.”

  “Aren’t we?”

  Blanche stops and turns to me. Her gaze barbs my heart. “We’re doing what we have to in order to get out of here without causing any more drama.”

  “Leaving her will cause drama.”

  Blanche smirks. “But we won’t be around to see it.”

  “I say we tell her the idea, see what she thinks.”

  “She’s already turned against us once. She’ll do it again.” Blanche stomps her foot. “Faith can’t be trusted, Court. You’ve got to see that. She already said once that she would drop it, and then she went and found evidence to back up her belief. Accept it, Court. She’s not on our side.”

  Blanche turns toward the back door, and when I look up, Faith stands on the other side, scowling.

  My heart constricts, and I wonder how much she heard—if she heard everything or just a piece of the plan.

  Chapter 41

  It’s a precarious position being stuck between Faith and Blanche. But maybe I’m looking too deeply at it. Maybe I’m not stuck between them. Maybe I’m on my own level, looking down. Not better than them, but instead watching. Should I take Faith at face value?

  Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…

  I need to hope that we’ll all come through this better. Otherwise what’s the point? It’s easier to believe that Faith has seen the error of her beliefs than to dally in the other option.