The Family Plot

by Megan Collins

  But don’t we all have darkness? Pitch-black parts of ourselves that even those who love us can’t see? Andy had the trees, his ax, the stormy thing that bubbled up inside him, desperate for release. And not just that. He followed Fritz to the shed one night. So he must have known, somehow; he must have had a feeling that something wasn’t right, that something unnatural was afoot. But he kept that hidden from me. And if Andy could carry things inside him I never would have guessed at, then surely Fritz could, too.

  My head jerks at another sound from above. The footsteps stutter across the shed, and then—one second of nothing, two seconds, three—it seems they’re gone.

  I wait another minute to be sure before I approach the stairs. Legs shaking, I climb my way up.

  The shed above is instantly warmer, even in the chill of November. Out of the hole, I turn to leave—and then I go still. Fritz stands, arms crossed, at the threshold, his body like another door, sealing me in this space.

  “Why were you down there?” he asks.

  His voice is steely. Colder than I’ve ever heard it. His eyes seem distant, as if detached from the moment, and he shuffles toward the center of the shed. I edge backward—“Fritz, wait”—until the wooden counter stops me.

  Fritz stops, too. Then he slams the trapdoor shut.

  The sound reverberates, throbbing in my ears. He bends down to grab the key, but I’m younger and faster, plucking it from the lock, curling my fingers around it.

  He looks at my closed fist, his expression flat and blank as an empty plate. And it’s that—his stoicism amid such horror—that sharpens my fear into rage.

  “What was that?” I demand. “In that room. On the wall.”

  It’s a stupid question. But there’s a wild, desperate part of me that hopes I’ve got it all wrong, and until I hear him say it, until he defines what was down there, that part of me will wonder if my rage is meant for someone else.

  “Trophies,” Fritz says.

  My fingers loosen and the key slips against my palm.

  “Tro-trophies?” I stammer. “That’s what you call them?”

  It’s a common enough term. Robert Hansen, the “Butcher Baker,” kept his victims’ jewelry. Ivan Milat, the “Backpacker Murderer,” collected the camping equipment of the people he killed. But hearing the word now, about the photographs I just saw—faces with swollen lips, necks reddened by rope—I feel dizzy.

  Fritz lumbers forward, arm outstretched, fingers bent into hooks. I recoil, pressed against the counter with nowhere to go. Turning my head, I squeeze my eyes shut.

  He doesn’t touch me. Instead, there’s a squealing, sliding sound, and when I open my eyes again, he’s holding a roll of double-sided tape, removed from the drawer left open beside me. He crouches down on the floor, careful with his bad leg, and rubs pieces along the edges of the carpet. He works quickly, methodically. He’s done this many times before.

  Words lurch into my throat. “Is that what Andy was? A trophy?”

  Fritz stiffens, tape hanging from one finger like a strip of molting skin. For several moments, he’s doesn’t move—a blinkless, frozen figurine. Then, without warning, his palms strike the floor as he slumps onto his knees.

  “Andy,” he groans. He’s hunched like someone about to retch. “That poor boy.” He lifts his head, nearly in tears. “I didn’t know he… I would have never…”

  But he doesn’t tell me what he would have never. The sentence dissolves as I watch his cheeks grow wet with silent crying.

  Who is this man? Whose legs did I hold on to as a kid, laughing as I used him as a barrier during tag with Andy? Surely this isn’t the same man who lifted his arms like branches, pretending to be an impenetrable tree that Andy couldn’t find me behind. Surely he’s not the man who let Andy pretend to chop at him, my twin’s hands gripped around the handle of an invisible ax, Fritz slanting, then stooping, then staggering to the ground, at which point Andy erupted into cheers.

  “Andy,” the man on the floor now murmurs. He slams his fist against the wood, a spurt of anger that makes me jump.

  “Andy,” he repeats.

  Each time he says his name, the shed seems to shrink around me.

  I need to get out of here, get away. I need to call the police.

  But as soon as I take one step, Fritz jerks out an arm and seizes my ankle. I cry out, try to shake him off, but his hand tightens like a tourniquet.

  “Wait,” he says. “We don’t have to seal it up. Help me get rid of it all instead.”

  His eyes flick to the trapdoor, half covered by the carpet. Anguish has slipped from his face, replaced instead by desperation. And finally, I can picture it: Fritz wearing that same expression when he discovered Andy knew what was beneath the shed. Some cool, stunned part of me can even understand it—almost: the fear of getting caught, the instinct toward self-preservation.

  I look down at my foot, his hand circling it like a cuff, and somehow, I find the strength to crouch down beside him, to bring my lips right next to his ear.

  “You’re disgusting,” I murmur.

  He sucks in a breath. His grip loosens. Wrenching my ankle free, I take off running.

  Right away, tears blur my vision, springing up with every step. I’m not sure if it’s sorrow or fear that keeps them coming—part of me is still too numb to know—but it doesn’t matter. My body is ahead of my mind, erupting with sobs as if trying to shed the shock of what I’ve witnessed.

  Ripping open the back door, I burst into the house. Then I race down the hall until I collide with Charlie, who’s rounding a corner.

  “Jesus, Dolls,” he says.

  “Don’t let Fritz in here!”

  Charlie recoils, startled by my shout. “Why not?”

  I shake my head, reaching into my pocket for my phone. My fingers tremble as I punch in the passcode, failing two times before I get it right.

  “What are you doing?” Charlie asks.

  I dial 911.

  “What’s in your hand?”

  Phone to my ear, I open my other fist, surprised to find the key still inside it. Charlie reaches for it, right as the dispatcher picks up, and I snap my fingers closed.

  “The Blackburn Killer,” I blurt. “I know who it is. Please. Get here now.”

  Silence oozes for a moment, until the dispatcher asks for my name and address. But I’m staring at Charlie, who’s rigid and astonished, working to put it together. Finally, he looks at the back door. His brow furrows; his lip curls back. “Fritz?” he says.

  “Ma’am? Can I have your name please?” the dispatcher asks.

  “Sorry,” I say. “Dahlia Lighthouse. I’m at 16—”

  Charlie snatches the phone from my hand. Then he ends the call with a stab of his finger.

  I gape at him. A flurry of emotions—panic, confusion, disappointment—sweep across his face.

  “Dahlia,” he says, and his voice is coarse. “What the hell have you done?”

  * * *

  The police march in and out of the shed, a trail of ants with cameras and clipboards. From here, at the kitchen window, their white gloves make their hands look porcelain; their bright blue shoe covers could be mistaken for slippers. I watch the scene with drowsy detachment, standing between Mom and Tate as my mind moves at a sluggish pace.

  You’re in shock, Elijah told me when I mumbled apologies, slow to comprehend his questions. Take your time. But time has only dragged me further from the shed, making me wonder if I dreamed those photographs, if Fritz’s hand on my ankle was only a hallucination.

  Behind us, Charlie keeps grumbling. He grips a bottle of Glenlivet, storming back and forth across the tile. Every so often, he pauses, shoots an angry glance out the window, and scoffs.

  “Unbelievable,” he mutters now, the first coherent word he’s said since Elijah and his team arrived.

  “I’ve been working relentlessly,” he says, “to show people we’re nothing to be afraid of, and now we’ve got police traipsing around our yard like
we’re a gang of criminals. Thanks a lot, Dolls.”

  “Knock it off,” Tate says. “It isn’t her fault.”

  Charlie scoffs again, rolling his eyes until they land on the bowl Mom deserted when I ran into the kitchen, crying about what I’d found. With his free hand, he stirs furiously at the wet ingredients, slugging his whisky with the other.

  His resentment rouses me enough to respond.

  “Are you really saying I shouldn’t have called the police? I was supposed to just—let it go, the fact that, under our shed, there’s a… a…”—I fumble for the words—“serial killer’s headquarters?”

  “We don’t know that’s what it is,” Charlie says.

  “You didn’t see what I saw! The photographs. Fritz’s trophies. That was his word. What he called them.”

  Charlie frowns at that. “Trophies,” he repeats, finally sounding disturbed.

  Beside me, Mom lets out a tiny whimper as Tate shakes her head.

  “I still don’t understand,” Tate says. “Fritz confessed? He said he was the Blackburn Killer?”

  “Not in those exact words. But he asked me to help him get rid of the evidence.”

  Tate turns to Charlie. They exchange a dumbfounded look.

  “And there was a chest,” I continue. “In that room, a locked chest. Only it had been broken into. By an ax.”

  I wait for their gasps of comprehension, the catch in their throats as they register that Andy has entered this story. They all stare at me, though—Tate and Mom wide-eyed, Charlie squinting.

  “An ax!” I say again. “And the chest was empty, but… but Andy was there. The night of our birthday!”

  Tate scrunches her brow. “How do you know it was that night?” she asks, and I realize I’ve left so much unsaid. I fill them in on what Ruby saw: Andy fidgeting with the key, and the week before that, Andy sneaking behind Fritz as he carried a—

  I freeze in my retelling, stopped by a realization, a timeline snapping together.

  “Oh god,” I moan.

  “What?” Tate asks.

  I knead my forehead with my knuckles. “Ruby said Fritz was carrying a big bag into the shed, a week before our birthday. That would have been right around the time Jessie Stanton was found. Which means— He was probably carrying Jessie.”

  Another moan drains from my lips.

  That dark energy that had been fizzing off Andy the days before he died. Now I know its source—even if parts of it remain a mystery: how much he witnessed in the shadows of that night; if he knew exactly what Fritz had done, and to whom. But he saw enough, it seems, to wreck him for the rest of the week. So why, then, did he swallow down his discovery, never telling anyone—not even me?

  I see the chest again, its splintered wood conveying desperation. Maybe he’d been waiting for evidence, for proof—the kind he gained access to only on the night he was murdered.

  I take in a shaky breath, numb again, unable to feel the tears I know I must be crying.

  “I think Fritz killed Andy,” I say, and my voice is so flat, so distant, it sounds like it’s coming from somebody else. “I think he killed him for what he saw. When I asked Fritz about that, he kind of crumpled, said if he’d known, he would have never. I don’t know what that means, but… he didn’t deny it.”

  Charlie and Tate stare at each other, silent. Mom’s hand flutters up to cover her mouth.

  “I can’t believe it.” She lets out another whimper, though her eyes, shifting to the scene outside, remain dry. “I’ve known Fritz for decades. We trusted him. My parents. Daniel and I. How could he have—”

  Her question cuts off as Charlie nudges her aside to look out the window. An officer is walking from the shed, out toward the side yard, a clear plastic bag in his hand. Even from here, I can tell what’s inside it: a photograph.

  Charlie groans. “Everyone’s going to know.”

  “Maybe not,” I say. “Elijah told me not to speak to reporters. He said they don’t want this public yet.”

  “Yet,” Charlie echoes with contempt. “And where is Detective Good Boy, hmm?”

  “He took Fritz away for questioning.”

  But before that, he disappeared into the shed while two other officers stood outside, guarding our groundskeeper. Fritz leaned against a tree, gaze far off, defeated, as if waiting for the moment they’d haul him away. When Elijah finally emerged from inside the shed, he nodded to the officers to follow him, and they each wrapped a hand around Fritz’s arms, guiding him as he limped dutifully after the detective.

  Now, officers continue to enter the shed as their colleagues exit. Whenever someone comes out, there’s a heaviness to their gait, like they’re trudging through mud that sucks at their shoes.

  “I can’t watch this anymore,” Mom says. She turns to the kitchen island and digs a measuring cup into the canister of flour. She doesn’t scrape off the excess, like Greta always does when she makes the café’s muffins. Instead, she dumps the heaping cup into the bowl of wet ingredients before shoving it back into the flour.

  “It’s too much,” she murmurs. “This is all too much.” She plops more powder into the batter. “First Daniel. Then Andy. Now you say Fritz… And the shed!” The measuring cup clatters onto the marble as her hands, shaking, hang in the air like she doesn’t know what to do with them.

  Tate rushes toward her. She tries to embrace her, but Mom shrugs her off. “No, no, this is all my fault.”

  “Your fault,” Charlie says. He gulps from the bottle still clenched in his fist. “Do tell, Mother.” He smiles, wolfishly, as whisky glosses his lips.

  Guilt fills Mom’s eyes as clearly as tears.

  “I built our lives around victims of murder,” she says. “I taught you about them, held Honorings for them. And now, here they are, all over our backyard. Andy”—pain tightens her expression—“Andy was killed here. And god only knows what happened in that shed. So maybe… maybe it was karma, for the way I chose for us to live.”

  There’s a beat of silence, all of us absorbing this strange theory. I’ve never heard her speak of karma without the context of her parents—the guns they made and were unmade by in return.

  Charlie belts out a guffaw. “I’m sorry, but that’s insane.” He laughs some more until, abruptly, his smile evaporates. “If you’re going to blame yourself for anything, how about you start with what you missed.”

  Mom’s eyes grow wide. “What I missed?”

  “Dahlia says Fritz has a murder den under our shed. Shouldn’t you have known that something was going on? Shouldn’t you have seen something?”

  “Hey,” Tate says. “We never saw anything either. We… we were here for years, as close to it as anyone”—tears clump like mascara in her lashes—“and we had no idea.” She shakes her head, continues in a whisper. “We had no idea, Charlie.”

  “That’s… that’s not the same,” Charlie says, but for a moment, he seems flustered. He rubs the back of his neck, then reaches for Tate’s hand, squeezing it once before letting go. “No, it’s… it’s not the same, Tate.”

  He slams his gaze onto Mom. Drinking his whisky, he glares at her over the bottle. “We were kids,” he adds when he swallows. “Mom was the adult. If anyone should have known…”

  He trails off, his implication heavy in the air.

  Mom gapes at him in horror. Then she spins toward her bowl on the counter, stabbing at the clumps of flour with a spoon.

  “Ah, great plan,” Charlie says. “Cookies will solve everything. What do you think—should I offer the officers some of your previous concoctions? Nothing works up an appetite quite like photos of dead women.”

  “Charlie,” Tate says sharply, swiping away her tears. “You’re being cruel.”

  “Oh, come on.”

  “You are. And I know you’re scared, but—”

  “I’m not scared,” he says, voice rigid.

  Charlie and Tate stare at each other—wide, wordless moments—and I see something pass between them, a messag
e relayed in the silent shorthand they have with each other. It always annoyed me, their invisible words I never learned to read, but right now I’m grateful for it, grateful for Tate, especially, the only one who can crack through Charlie’s meanness like it’s nothing more than the thinnest layer of ice.

  “Well, I’m fucking terrified,” she tells him softly. “So could you please ease off everyone? What’s happening out there is no one’s fault. No one’s in this room, anyway.”

  Charlie looks at the bottle in his hand. Then he raises it to his lips, gulping it down like he’s dying of thirst. As he turns to face the window, Tate glides into place beside him, the tension between them instantly dissolved. Now, sharing the same view, the two of them lean together. It’s almost imperceptible, how they’re propping each other up, but I know that if one of them were to move, the other would stumble.

  I ache for that. For someone to keep me standing. Which means I ache for Andy.

  Without thinking, I take a step toward them, bend toward Tate as if to lean on her other shoulder. But then I see a freckle of brown paint on her jaw, and immediately, I recoil.

  How could I forget? While I was descending into the room beneath the shed, she was dipping a brush into paint. While I was tracing Andy’s footsteps, crouching over the same chest he once split apart, she was building our woods, tree by tree. And when I illuminated those women, shining a light on their branded ankles, their strangled necks, she was staring at death, too, preparing our brother’s miniature grave.

  They’re oddly accurate, Elijah said of her dioramas—and it’s a sickness really, how committed she is to getting them right. I think of her studies in the passageway, the sketches manic, obsessive, edges overlapping like—

  Like the photos beneath the shed.

  My body jolts at the comparison, one I haven’t registered until now.

  I look at Tate again, watching as she nestles closer to Charlie, resting her chin on his shoulder. Together, they stare at the woods outside, at the police scattered between the trees.