The Last Secret You'll Ever Keep

by Laurie Faria Stolarz

  “What’s right?”

  “Our story will be done, and the heroine will have won.”

  “And if I don’t escape?”

  “Then continues our fun and the villain has won. We’ll run away together and spin our tales forever and ever. Tick tock, tick tock. Run, run away or you’ll have to stay. The villain of this story really loves to play.” He sits down on a boulder.

  It’s only then I nab the ring and slide it onto my finger.

  “Two minutes,” he reminds me, covering his eyes with his hands. He begins to count, like a game of hide-and-seek.

  I grip the stake in my pocket, suspecting he’s watching me from the spaces between his fingers. I can’t lash out now. And so, I turn away and run for my life.

  NOW

  54

  I grapple through the woods, swiping branches and brush from in front of my eyes, desperate to get back to the fence, wanting to find my car.

  But the brush is way too thick. I’m not on the same trail. The branches scratch my skin. One of them pokes my eye. I rub it, trying to absorb the pain, hoping to ease the blur.

  The lantern’s still on; I can’t see without it. Still, I’m tempted to let it go. It’s too heavy, way too cumbersome. Plus, it gives me away.

  I struggle through a grove of berry bushes, sure the two-minute mark has already passed. His first instinct will be to go for my car. I squat down, where I am, behind some bushes, click the lantern off, and wait to hear him approaching, hoping he’ll continue past me.

  It doesn’t take long. The sound of his body swishes among the trees. His soft grunt makes my insides shiver.

  Is he a few yards away?

  On the other side of these trees?

  I hold my breath, telling myself it’s all a big game, just another role-play with Charley. The metal stake is gripped in my hand.

  “Come out, come out, wherever you are,” he sings. “My hero couldn’t have gone too far.”

  I inch out, unable to see a thing. He isn’t using a flashlight or lantern. So how is he looking for me? Night vision goggles? Does he have them?

  I count to ten inside my head, wondering how concealed I am. Is he able to see any part of me—my shoes, my clothes, the outline of my hair?

  “Terra…” His voice sounds so close, just a couple of feet away. It’s followed by the cracking of broken twigs, the scuffling of dirt, and the crinkling of the plastic covering over his shoes.

  I picture his step and listen for his breath, able to hear his deep inhalation: the sucking of air up his nostrils. He sounds right at my side now. I clamp my eyes shut as if that will make a difference.

  And maybe it does.

  Because everything goes quiet.

  Even the crickets stop chirping.

  Where is he now?

  I start to stand up. My knee joint clicks. The sound shatters the silence, echoes inside my brain.

  “Well, well, well,” he says, freezing me in place.

  I drop back to the ground.

  “Look what we have here? A sweet little victim who’s oh-so-near? Does this really mean what I think it might? We’ll spin our tales every day and every nigh—”

  I cut him off, stabbing into the darkness, plunging outward with the stake, imagining the cloth dummy from self-defense class. So many nights I spent stabbing Rummy. And kicking sandbags.

  And dodging punches.

  And ducking from high kicks …

  Finally, there was a payoff. He lets out a grunt.

  I stand up and click the lantern on. I’ve stabbed him in the gut, through his T-shirt. He’s got a pair of binoculars strapped around his head, over the mask: night vision goggles.

  He goes to reach into his pocket. But before he can, I strike out with the lantern. The base clonks against the side of his head. His hands fly up to his face, and he turns to the side.

  With both hands gripped on the handle, I imagine the lantern like a baseball bat and slice through the air before he’s able to rebound, knocking his forehead. He lets out a wail and stumbles back.

  How far did the stake go in—three inches? Four?

  He motions to remove it, and I kick him—hard—aiming for his groin. He goes down on his knees, still trying to pluck the stake free.

  I kick him once more—this time, in the chest; the heel of my boot meets his ribs. The base of the lantern smashes against his face as I pummel him once more. He falls back, rolls onto his side.

  His eyes appear closed. I can’t tell if he’s breathing.

  I scooch to the ground, remembering his backstory—one that was ever changing, thanks to a reality he said was all too grim, way too dark. You don’t want to know was all he’d ever said of it.

  “Charley?” I call out. With one hand on the stake, I use the other to remove the goggles, to lift the mask and expose his face.

  Thin lips.

  A square jaw.

  High, pronounced cheekbones.

  A flash of dark curly hair, just like I remember.

  With trembling fingers, I lift his eyelid, able to see the steel-blue color of his eyes: the shade I haven’t been able to paint.

  I start to pull my hand away, but he grabs me—hard. His gloved hand wraps around my wrist. Still gripping the stake with my other hand, I drive the blade deeper into his gut.

  His eyes bulge. His mouth parts open. The grip on my wrist loosens, and I’m able to get up, to back away.

  His chest doesn’t move. I don’t think he’s breathing. I look toward his pocket, tempted to see what’s inside it, but I grab the lantern instead and move back through the woods, desperate to get away.

  NOW

  55

  I trample through the woods on a dirt-lined trail, using the lantern to guide the way. Sticks break somewhere behind me.

  I picture Charley running to catch me.

  Was his chest truly still? Could he have been holding his breath? Did he only pretend to be hurt? To prolong the chase? To continue the story?

  Finally, I reach the chain-link fence. My hand is still throbbing. What did Charley have in his pocket? Could he use it on me still? Has he already gotten up?

  If only I’d thought to take his night vision goggles. It’s so dark, despite the lantern. I’m barely able to make out more than a couple of feet in front of me.

  I stop a moment—to catch my breath, to listen for him approaching. It’s quiet again; there’s just the hooting of an owl. I snatch a rock from the ground, just in case, and continue to follow the fence around to the front of the salvage yard, and up to the street, to where I parked the car.

  There’s a spare key hidden beneath the bumper—my dad’s old trick. I go to retrieve it, scooting down, and searching frantically beneath the lip.

  My hands won’t stop shaking.

  My eyes won’t stop tearing.

  Where is it?

  On the other side of the bumper?

  I stand to check, suddenly noticing my tire has been slashed. I move around the car to check the others. The two front tires have been slashed as well.

  The road is completely desolate. I begin in the direction of where I came, still anxious about Charley, still wondering where he is—if he’s come to. I quicken my pace, my shin aching from where I hit it.

  What time is it?

  Where should I go?

  Finally, I get to the end of the street. Streetlamps shine over a post office, a convenience store, and the town bank. All of them are closed. Antique-style houses sit back from the road, farther down the street. All the lights inside them are off. No one’s awake.

  A clock on the front of the bank reads just after one. Is it even correct?

  I start to cross the street, to head toward the houses, just as a dark truck turns onto the road, making a screeching sound like a wounded animal.

  I stop short.

  The driver does too. Headlights shine directly into my eyes. I wave my arms, desperate for help.

  The door flings open. A guy gets out—tall, mediu
m build. It takes me a moment to recognize who it is.

  The sight of Garret is almost too much to take in. I drop the rock and feel a huge release inside my chest.

  Garret says something, but it’s all too much to process. His phone is in his hand. I grab it, turn it on, and dial 9-1-1.

  “Please come,” I tell the operator. “I think someone might be dead.”

  I think I’m going to be sick.

  I half think Peyton is still alive, still for real.

  “How can she not be?” I ask aloud, looking down at the mood ring. What if Peyton has one too? What if she used it to disappear?

  Garret doesn’t respond. At least I don’t think he does. Instead, he drapes something warm and heavy over my shoulders. It takes me a beat to realize it’s his sweatshirt.

  The operator asks me questions, but I can’t answer now.

  I don’t want to talk.

  I just want to sit on the side of the road and watch the flames go out one by one. And so that’s what I do—until I can no longer smell smoke, until I can finally breathe free.

  NOW

  56

  Six weeks later.

  In my room.

  I stand at my easel, painting a new self-portrait: an assignment given by Cecelia Bridges, the therapist Aunt Dessa recommended. I’ve been seeing her twice a week for a few weeks now. Our sessions are work; I’m not going to lie. But I haven’t even minded because I’ve been able to communicate through my art, which Cecelia encourages, and for now that feels more telling than words.

  My canvas has been prepped in solid matte black. But my intention is to create lightness. I’ve chosen two main colors to do that: gold and white (iridescent eggshell, to be exact). In the end, my piece will glow.

  I start at the very bottom and paint the strong roots of a hearty tree: roots that extend far beyond the canvas. I imagine they’re more than a hundred feet long, burrowed beneath the soil and made up of the generations before me, those whose influences have helped raise me up.

  I paint hands in the roots—palms that lift; fingers that stretch, leaving their prints in the trunk; and wrists that bend just enough to allow lessons to seep in, truth to unwind, and stories to flow. I specifically paint my parents’ hands, picturing my mom’s bony fingers and my dad’s crooked thumb. I also add my aunt’s swollen knuckles and the burn mark on my palm.

  A survivor’s hands.

  With able fingers.

  Strong wrists.

  And a network of rooted souls.

  The branches of my tree extend upward like arms reaching for the sun. I shade muscles into the arms: well-worked biceps capable of helping me up a twenty-foot chain and taut quadriceps for scaling the driest of dirt walls.

  The brain is a muscle too, at least that’s what I believe. I paint mine purple, perched on a nest of letters that spell out the words work in progress—because that’s what I am, with my paper heart and my phantom scars.

  I paint the heart red, smudged with my thumbprint, scattered about the ear-shaped leaves. You have to look closely to see the heart; otherwise, the prints look like flowers: bunches of them blooming like roses, sprinkled about the tree limbs—a heart in pieces like petals.

  Plus, tiny tree buds that spell out the word trust.

  And fallen twigs with shadows that resemble old vices. Extinguishers, knives, starry doorknobs, and bottles of maple syrup … None of these vices is gone completely. I’m human, so sometimes I creep back into the darkness to find them, but I do so far less, preferring to get my power elsewhere. My art—the paint; my canvases; every marker, pencil, and brush—has become my home, the one place where I can truly express who I am. And so, I spend time here, whenever I can, basking in its natural glow.

  NOW

  57

  After the dust has somewhat settled from the Storm of Peyton and its dirty aftermath, Aunt Dessa sits me down on the living room sofa and takes my hands, just like after I got back from the well. “I’m sorry,” she says.

  I bite my lip, not quite sure what the apology is for. Because I got taken again? Because she didn’t believe me the first time it happened?

  “There’s something I want to give you.” She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a long tan box. She snaps the cover open, revealing a gold necklace.

  “What’s that?”

  She lifts it out, letting the pendant charms dangle into her palm. The necklace is just like hers, except with the initials M and T.

  “Years ago, when I couldn’t find your mom’s necklace in the debris, I hired someone to search for it.” she says. “Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to locate all of it, but he did manage to salvage the M for Maeve. I had a jeweler refurbish it and create a T for Terra. Then I chose a chain just like mine and your mom’s.” She hands it to me.

  I hold the necklace up, my pulse racing. The ropy links glisten in the light.

  “You don’t have to wear it,” she says. “I just thought—”

  “I want to wear it.” I fasten the clasp around my neck.

  “Once upon a time, your mother never took that off. Neither of us did.”

  “And I won’t either.” I hold the M over my heart. “Thank you.”

  Tears well up in her eyes. “I’m sorry it took so long for me to get to this place.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “There’s something you should know—the reason your mom and I grew apart … It was my fault.”

  “What was?”

  “Your mother’s attack … I’ve always blamed myself for it. I was supposed to be watching her at that party. But I’d gone off with a boy.” She grabs a pillow and hugs it into her middle the way Mom used to do. “I didn’t even drive her home that night. She ended up running out, bolting from the party. Some guy—a stranger, someone whose identity we were never able to figure out—spotted her walking along the side of the road with torn clothes and crying. He gave her a ride, no questions asked. Even he was better than I was.”

  If I didn’t know better, I’d say it was my mother on the sofa, only inches from me now, all rolled up like a hedgehog, unable to look me in the eyes.

  “You shouldn’t blame yourself,” I tell her. “It wasn’t your fault.”

  Aunt Dessa snuggles the pillow tighter. “Everyone felt it was, including your grandparents. Including me. Your mother and I grew distant after it happened. Then, flash-forward twenty years, and all of that happened to you after the sorority party … I wanted to make it up to my sister somehow, to do things right and protect you the way I should’ve protected her. But then when I thought it was a lie, I couldn’t really handle it—couldn’t relate to someone who would make up something so horrific. In my mind, you simply had to be sick.”

  “And what about after the fire? Why didn’t you want to protect me then?” The questions form a lump in my throat.

  “By taking you in, I felt I was protecting you, at least on some level. It’s complicated.” She sighs. “But when my sister died, so did the possibility that she and I would one day be close again. It really has nothing to do with you.”

  For the past several years, I’ve felt it had everything to do with me. After the fire, investigators were able to determine how the initial spark had started. They tried to ask me questions: if I’d noticed the stove was on prior to going to bed that night; if my parents had ever forgotten to close the stove door; if there had been a rug, rather than a flame-protective pad, in front of the hearth … But I couldn’t answer a single question. Because the breath in my lungs had ceased. And I dissolved to a pile of dust. My knees gave way, and I collapsed to the floor, trying to process what the news of the fire meant: that I’d made a mistake, that I hadn’t followed my parents’ rules.

  And that my mistake had caused the flames.

  And that my mistake had caused the flames.

  And that my mistake had caused the flames.

  My aunt was there too, with the fire marshal. But after that day, neither of us would ever speak a word about th
e fire’s origins. “Just tell people it was an electrical thing,” was the last thing she’d said about it, which somehow made things worse. More shameful. Far more horrific.

  “Terra?” Aunt Dessa asks. She’s still balled up on the sofa, still snuggling a pillow close. “I’m sorry if I projected any of my sister stuff onto you. And I’m especially sorry if that made me seem distant.”

  It actually makes her more human … knowing she’s been battling guilt, like me, that she’s had a shame-labeled vault locked up inside her too.

  “Now that I know you were telling the truth about being taken,” she continues, “and that I chose not to believe you, I’m left blaming myself again. I’m so sorry—for everything: the silence, the mistrust, the clearing out of your room … I know that isn’t nearly good enough, but right now, apologies and promises to do better are all I have to offer. I hope you’ll accept.”

  “I do.” I nod.

  Aunt Dessa reaches out to take my hand again. For just a moment, as I look down at our fingers clasped together, I imagine it’s my mom’s hand—her fragile grip, her chewed-up nails, her freckled skin …

  “No matter how difficult our pasts have been, or how much shame we carry as a result, we all deserve to allow ourselves to be loved.” She squeezes my hand tighter. “That should’ve always been the number-one rule on our survival list.”

  I open my mouth, wanting to ask how she even knows about the list, but I stop myself from speaking because I’d prefer to believe the message was channeled by my mom somehow, that Mom’s here with me, holding my hand, answering my questions.

  “I’d like it if we could talk about my mother more.”

  “I’d like that too.” She curls back into her pillow. “I’m sorry I haven’t been more open to that.”

  I place the initial M up to my lips. “None of us is perfect.”