by Riley Sager
“I’ve been good,” Coop says. “Mostly.”
I shudder at the word. So much horror resides in those two tiny syllables.
“It’s been hard, Quincy. There were times I came so close to slipping. But then I’d think of you and manage to stop myself. I couldn’t risk losing you. You’ve made me behave myself.”
“And Lisa?” I say. “What about her?”
Coop hangs his head, looking truly regretful. “That was out of necessity.”
Because she suspected something. Probably after Tina arrived seeking answers about Pine Cottage. Lisa looked into it because that’s the kind of person she was—big on details. And she kept looking after Tina left. She found those articles about the murders in the woods, wrote a few emails, pieced it together that Joe likely wasn’t physically capable of killing everyone at Pine Cottage. Not someone as big as Rodney or as athletic as Craig. Coop was the only person there that night strong enough to overtake them.
That’s why Lisa emailed me right before she was killed. She wanted to warn me about Coop.
“You knew her, didn’t you?” I ask. “That’s why she invited you in, gave you wine, trusted you.”
“She didn’t trust me,” Coop says. “Not that night. She was trying to get me to confess.”
“But she trusted you once.”
Coop offers the slightest of nods. “Years ago.”
“Were you lovers?”
Another nod. Almost imperceptible.
I’m not surprised. I think again of the photo in Lisa’s room. The way Coop’s arm had been so casually thrown over her shoulders suggested ease and intimacy.
“When?” I say.
“Not long after what happened here. I asked Nancy to put us in touch. Once I realized I had created a Final Girl, I wanted to meet the others. I wanted to see if they were as strong as you.”
Coop puts a matter-of-fact spin on it, as if the whole twisted idea makes perfect sense. As if I, of all people, should understand the urge to compare and contrast us.
“Lisa was impressive, I’ll give her that,” he says. “All she wanted was to help you. I can’t count the number of times she asked me how you were coping, if you needed help. I feel bad about what happened to her. Her concern for you was admirable, Quincy. Noble. Not like Samantha.”
I try not to show my shock. I don’t want to give Coop the satisfaction. But he sees it anyway and gives a half smile, proud of himself.
“Yes, I met Samantha Boyd,” he says. “The real one. Not this cheap imitator.”
He dips his chin in the direction of Tina’s body and purses his lips. For a sickening moment, I think he’s going to spit on her. I close my eyes to avoid seeing it if he does.
“You knew all along she wasn’t Sam?”
“I knew,” Coop says. “I knew it the second I saw that picture of you two in the newspaper. There’s a bit of a resemblance, sure. But I knew she couldn’t be the real Samantha Boyd. What I didn’t know was what to do about it.”
My mind flashes back to last night, when I came home and found the two of them together. I recall the way Coop’s hand was on her neck. It looked like a caress. It could have been a clench. He had planned on killing Tina too. Perhaps right there in the guest room.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I couldn’t,” Coop says. “Not without making it known that Samantha Boyd was dead.”
I groan, my pain and sorrow finally too much to keep hidden. I keep on groaning, getting louder, trying to block Coop’s confession. But I’ve heard too much already. I now know that Coop also killed Samantha Boyd. She didn’t drop off the grid. He had erased her from it.
“Why?” I moan.
“Because she wasn’t like you, Quincy. She didn’t deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as you. I flew all the way down to a shit town in Florida just to see her. And what I found was a weak, chubby piece of trash. Nothing like the Samantha Boyd I’d pictured. I couldn’t believe this was the girl who’d survived what happened at that motel. She was scared and meek and nothing at all like you. And so eager to please. Christ, she practically threw herself at me. At least Lisa showed some restraint.”
Suddenly, it all clicks into place. All those details. Like a necklace of beads. One stacking on top of the other, forming a full circle.
Coop had slept with all three of us.
Sam and Lisa and me.
Now two of them are dead.
I’m the last one left alive.
I continue to cry. Sorrow wraps around me like a fist, squeezing out the tears.
“She didn’t even ask about you,” Coop says, as if that justified her death. “Samantha Boyd, your fellow Final Girl, was so interested in getting into my pants that she never bothered to ask how you were doing.”
“And how was I doing, Coop?” I say, my words as bitter as my tears. “Was I doing okay?”
He puts the gun away, sliding it gently back into its holster. Then he comes closer, sidestepping Tina’s body, kneeling to where I’ve collapsed on the floor until his blue eyes are looking directly into mine.
“You were doing great.”
“And now?”
I tremble, afraid he’ll touch me. Not wanting to know what kind of touch that will be.
“You can still be great,” Coop says. “You can forget everything. About tonight. About ten years ago. You forgot it once. You can forget it again.”
On the floor, something pokes into my leg. Something sharp.
“What if I can’t?” I ask.
“You will. I’ll help you do it.”
I risk a glance away from Coop to look down, seeing that it’s a knife jabbing me. The same knife that dropped from Rocky Ruiz’s pocket. Tina had kept it for safekeeping. Now she pushes it toward me, somehow still alive, staring up at me with one bloody eye.
The tattoo peeks out from the sleeve of her jacket. Although it’s upside down, the word remains clear.
SURVIVOR
“We can go somewhere,” Coop tells me. “Just the two of us. We’ll start new lives. Together.”
He sounds so earnest. Like he almost believes it’s possible. But it’s not. We both know that.
Yet I continue the charade. I nod. Slowly at first but picking up speed as Coop leans in and touches my cheek.
“Yes,” I say. “I’d like that.”
I keep nodding until Coop kisses me. First on the forehead, then on both cheeks. When his lips touch mine, I will myself not to retch or yelp or squirm. I kiss him back while dropping my right hand to the floor.
“Quincy,” Coop whispers. “My sweet, beautiful Quincy.”
Then his hands are around my neck, squeezing gently, trying not to hurt me too much. He’s crying too. His tears mix with mine as his grip tightens around my throat.
My thumb brushes the knife blade, sliding across its shivery edge.
Coop keeps squeezing my neck. His thumbs slide against my trachea, pushing. Then he kisses me again. Breathing air into my lungs even as he’s squeezing it out. He keeps crying. Moaning words into my mouth.
“Quincy. Sweet, sweet Quincy.”
My fingers find the knife’s handle. They curl around it.
There’s no more breath in me. It’s all gone, even though Coop continues to kiss me, puffing apologies past my lips.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers.
I raise the knife.
Coop’s still squeezing, still kissing, still apologizing. “I’m so, so sorry.”
I expect Coop’s body to put up a fight, as if he’s made of more than just skin and tissue. Yet the knife plunges into his side with ease, surprising him into stillness.
“Quincy.”
There’s shock in that single word. Shock and betrayal and, I suspect, a little admiration.
His hands don’t fall from my
neck until I remove the knife. Blood spews from the wound, sticky and hot. Coop tries to pull away from me, but I’m too fast. The knife goes in again, this time in the center of his stomach.
I twist it and Coop’s body spasms. Flecks of blood and spittle fly from his mouth.
He puts his hands on mine, trying to remove the blade. I grit my teeth, grunt, hold the knife in place. When Coop’s grip weakens, I give the blade a final twist.
“Quincy,” he says again, blood bubbling at the back of his throat.
I give a single nod, making sure he sees it before his eyes roll back in his head. I want him to know that I’m more than a survivor, more than the fighter he always imagined me to be.
I’m his creation, forged from blood and pain and the cold steel of a blade.
I’m a fucking Final Girl.
FOUR MONTHS AFTER PINE COTTAGE
Beige wasn’t Tina’s color. It washed her out, fabric and skin almost indistinguishable from each other. Other than her pallor, she looked good. Same taut features. Same prickly body language. Only her hair was different. It was shorter, and deep brown instead of raven black.
“You’ll look like a different person when you get out,” Quincy told her.
“We’ll see,” Tina said. “Fifteen months is a long time.”
They both knew it could be shorter than that. Or not. It was an unusual situation. Anything was possible. Although Quincy was surprised by the length of the sentence, Tina wasn’t. It’s amazing the ways police can get you when you’re pretending to be someone else. Criminal impersonation. Identity theft. A dozen different types of fraud. The charges against Tina were so varied, stretching across several states, that Jeff warned she could spend up to two years in jail.
Quincy hoped it was less. Tina had been through enough, although she swore it was all worth it.
Some of it might have been. Mostly the part about clearing Joe Hannen’s name. His innocence had been proclaimed to the world, which is what she wanted all along.
Yet Tina had almost died, thanks to Him, the new person whose name Quincy could no longer utter. The bullet He fired missed Tina’s left lung by a few millimeters. It missed her heart by even less. The blood loss was enough to give doctors some concern, but all in all she recovered nicely. She healed up just in time to be sent to prison.
“You know you don’t have to do this,” Quincy said, not for the first time. “Just say the word and I’ll confess to everything.”
She looked around the visiting room, which was packed with other women in beige and their guests. Hushed conversations rose from the neighboring tables, in all manner of languages. Through the grate-covered window, Quincy saw dirty snow drifting against a tall security fence, looped at the top with barbed wire. She honestly didn’t know how Tina could stand it there, even though she was assured it wasn’t that bad. Tina told her it reminded her of Blackthorn.
“It’s not like your confession would get me out of here any faster,” she said. “Besides, you were right. I made you do that to Rocky Ruiz.”
Rocky emerged from his coma at roughly the same time Quincy was shoving that knife into Him for the final time. Rocky’s memory was hazy, though, less from the beating and more from the fact that he was strung out on crack when it happened. But he knew he had been attacked. Against Quincy’s wishes, Tina confessed to it. Rocky didn’t argue, and Detective Hernandez didn’t press the issue. Jeff suggested a plea deal, with Tina to serve time concurrently for both the assault and the fraud.
“You didn’t make me do anything,” Quincy said. “My choices are mine.”
That much was true. It was the repercussions of those choices that she couldn’t control.
“Have they found the real Samantha yet?” Tina asked. “I’ve been asking the guards for news.”
“Nope,” Quincy said, capping the word with a popping sound. “They’re still looking for her body.”
Once it became clear that Samantha Boyd had been murdered, police in Florida went all out trying to recover her body. Quincy had spent the past four months monitoring the news as authorities searched swamps, dredged lakes, dug up dirt lots. But Florida was a big state, and the odds were slim that she’d ever be found.
Quincy concluded that maybe it was for the best. Until they found Sam’s body, it would feel like there was another Final Girl out in the world. That it wasn’t now just her.
“How about Jeff?” Tina asked. “How’s he doing?”
“You probably talk to him more than I do,” Quincy said.
“Maybe. The next time I do, I’ll tell him you said hi.”
Quincy knew it would do little to change things. Jeff had made his opinion of her very clear that long, torturous night when she confessed all her misdeeds. It destroyed her to see him veer between love and anger, sympathy and disgust. At one point, he simply latched on to her, begging for a logical reason why she had slept with Him.
She couldn’t give one.
That’s why she decided it was best for them to go their separate ways, even if Jeff could possibly find some way to forgive her. They weren’t right for each other. They both should have seen that from the start.
“That would be nice,” Quincy said. “Tell him I wish him well.”
Quincy meant it. Jeff needed someone normal. And she needed to focus on other things. Like getting the website back in working condition, for starters. And laying off the wine. And quitting the Xanax.
The day after Jeff moved out, Quincy’s mother arrived for an extended visit. They did all the things they should have done years earlier. Talking. Crying. Forgiving. Together, they flushed all those little blue pills down the toilet. Now whenever Quincy got the urge for one, she sipped a bit of grape soda in an attempt to fool her Xanax-deprived brain. Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t.
“I read your big interview,” Tina told her.
“I haven’t,” Quincy said. “How was it?”
“Jonah did a good job.”
After Pine Cottage Part II, Quincy gave exactly one interview—an exclusive to Jonah Thompson. It had felt like the right thing to do, considering that he helped her, in his own smarmy way. All the major news outlets from Trenton to Tokyo picked it up. Everyone wanted a piece of her. But since she was no longer talking, they settled for Jonah instead. He was able to parlay all that attention into a bigger, better gig. He started at the New York Times on Monday. Quincy hoped they were ready for him.
“I’m glad it turned out well,” she said.
The room began to empty around them. Visitation was almost over. Quincy knew she should leave too, but one more question lingered in her head, begging to be asked.
“Did you suspect that He was the one responsible for Pine Cottage?”
“No,” Tina said, understanding exactly whom she was referring to. “All I knew was that it couldn’t have been Joe.”
“I’m sorry that I blamed him all these years,” Quincy said. “I’m sorry it caused you such pain.”
“Don’t be sorry. You saved my life.”
“And you saved mine.”
They stared at each other, not speaking, until the guard stationed at the door announced it was time to leave. When Quincy stood, Tina said, “Do you think you’ll come back sometime? Just to say hi?”
“I don’t know. Do you want me to?”
Tina shrugged. “I don’t know.”
At least they were honest with each other. In a way, they always had been, even when they were lying.
“Then I guess we’ll have to wait and see,” Quincy said.
Tina’s lips curled upward, on the edge of a smile. “I’ll be waiting, babe.”
• • •
Quincy drove her rental car back to the city, squinting against the sunset reflecting off the snow that had been pushed onto the highway’s shoulder. The scenery passing the window was underwhelmi
ng at best. A dull line of strip malls, churches, and used-car lots full of vehicles stippled white by road salt. Yet one business caught her attention—a sliver of storefront squeezed between a pizza place and a travel agency closed for the weekend. A neon sign glowed pink in the window.
TATTOOS
Without thinking, Quincy veered into the lot, shut off the car, and walked inside. A tinny bell over the door chimed her arrival. The woman behind the register had ruby bow-tie lips and a constellation of pink stars inked onto her neck. Her hair was the same color Tina’s used to be.
“Can I help you?” she asked.
“Yes,” Quincy said. “I think you can.”
An hour later, it was finished. It hurt, but not as much as Quincy expected.
“Do you like it?” the pink-starred girl asked.
Quincy turned her arm to examine her handiwork. The ink there was still wet and stinging, dark against the peach fuzz of her wrist. Pinpricks of blood bordered each letter like lights on a marquee. Still, the word was easy to read.
SURVIVOR
“It’s perfect,” Quincy said, marveling at the tattoo. It was a part of her now. As permanent as her scars.
She was still staring at it when breaking news flashed on the tattoo parlor’s TV. Quincy had snuck a few glances at it while all that black ink was being pushed just beneath her skin, more focused on pain than whatever it had to offer. But now she was riveted, held in place by what she saw.
Several teenagers had been found dead at a home in Modesto, California, the news anchor announced. In total, nine people were killed.
Quincy rushed from the tattoo parlor, driving fast back into the city.
Once home, she spent the rest of the night flipping among the cable news channels for more information about what was being called the Massacre in Modesto. Eight of the victims were high school seniors—attendees at a house party held while one of the kids’ parents were away. The other person killed was a maintenance worker at their school who showed up unannounced with a pair of sharpened garden shears. The only survivor was an eighteen-year-old girl named Hayley Pace, who managed to escape after killing the man who slaughtered her friends.