“I know you’re not asleep. Open your eyes.”
Slowly, Tombs opened his eyes, turning his head ever so slightly. Tree pulled the trigger.
Click.
Tree saw a vicious smile spread slowly across the psycho’s face as the panic overtook her. She kept pulling the trigger, but nothing.
Click. Click. Click.
How could this be happening again?
Tombs raised his eyebrows in delight. “Safety’s on, little girl.”
With that, he hit Tree with a pillow he had been hiding under his blanket and knocked the gun out of her hands. She saw now that his restraints already had been unlocked; his arms were only resting in them, not bound by them.
The gun slid across the floor and out into the hallway. Tree chased after it, bending down to grab it, but Tombs was too fast. He yanked her off the floor and threw her up against the wall, his hand around her neck.
He found the knife in her waistband and pulled it out with glee. “This is a real nice surprise, you coming to visit me like this.”
He held the blade to her throat, then ran the tip of it up and down her cheek.
His fetid breath on her face, he pressed his body against hers, and his hand slowly squeezed her neck, cutting off her breath. All of it repulsed and angered her. A burst of adrenaline surged through her. She swung her knee between his legs as hard as she could.
Tombs lost his grip and fell away, roaring in pain. She ducked and rolled just as he swung the knife, burying it in the wooden door where she’d just been pinned.
Tree tried to run, but Tombs was too fast. She felt his hands grabbing her, flinging her across the hall like a rag doll. Her body slammed against the fire hose cabinet, shattering the glass. It rained down on her as she writhed in pain, desperate to escape.
“Whoo! I like you. Damn shame. You’re a feisty little shit, ain’t ya?” Tombs ripped the knife out of the door and turned back to face Tree, laughing.
She was trying to crawl away from him, but every bone and muscle in her body was on fire. Her hands and knees were covered in shattered glass.
“That’s right!” he taunted her. “Crawl, little girl. Crawl!” He watched as she struggled to her hands and knees. “Don’t worry. I’ll make this one real quick for you.”
At that precise moment, the alarm on her wrist went off. The countdown had reached zero.
Tree looked up at Tombs through the pain and gave him a great big smile. She saw the swagger fade from his eyes as the power surged and every single light blinked off. Two seconds later, they came back on, but Tree was no longer lying on the floor in the pile of glass.
Tree stood up slowly behind Tombs, raised the gun, and yelled, “Hey!”
Tombs spun around and jumped away from the gun.
“Safety’s off,” Tree said. “Thanks for the tip.”
She pulled the trigger twice. Blam. Blam.
The shots sent Tombs back against the wall, and Tree watched as he crumpled in a puddle on the floor as the first police sirens blared into the drive outside.
24
Back at the Kappa house, Tree lit the red candle on the cupcake Lori had made and placed it between her and Carter.
They were sitting on the rug beneath the window by her bed. The moonlight was pouring in from outside, and the candle was the only other light in the room. Tree realized in a sudden rush of joy that this was the only party she’d ever wanted and the last one she would have asked for prior to today—or prior to sixteen todays, depending on the method of counting.
“So,” Carter said. “This has to be strangest birthday you’ve ever had.”
“You have no idea.”
“Did you ever figure out how Tombs got free?”
She shook her head. “No. No one knows.”
“He’s like Houdini.”
“I guess.” Tree picked up the cupcake and peeled off the paper wrapper.
“What are you going to wish for?”
She thought about it for a second or two, staring at the glow of the candle. Then she looked across the flame into Carter’s eyes.
“Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” he asked. “Isn’t that kind of a given? Might want to aim a little higher.”
Tree smiled. “Nah. Tomorrow’s good enough for me.”
Then she closed her eyes and blew out the candle.
25
Tree’s eyes fluttered open as the bell in the tower tolled the hour.
She felt a little groggy, but after what she’d been through, groggy was something she could live with. Pushing herself upright, she froze as the panic of an unspeakable horror flooded over her.
She was in Carter’s room.
The trombone player was being yelled at in the hallway, and her phone began to play the birthday ringtone. She sat up, gasping.
Carter heard her and scooted out from under the desk.
“Oh, hey. You’re up! I wasn’t—”
“Carter?”
“Yeah,” he said. “I’m surprised you remember my name. You were…pretty wasted last night.”
“No. This can’t be happening.” Tree repeated it over and over. “This can’t be happening!”
She saw Carter frown, clueless as to what she was talking about. This was the nightmare. She didn’t know how to go about losing him every day and having to get him back.
“What?” he asked. “What can’t be happening?”
“I killed him!” she shouted. “I stopped it!”
“Who?” Carter was growing more alarmed. “What are you talking about?”
Tree was sobbing now as she leaped out of bed.
“What’s going on?” Carter asked. He turned around as she started pulling on her pants. “I mean, you were probably just having a bad dream or something. It happens to me all the time when I’m drinking.”
Tree ran out the door while he was still turned around to offer her privacy.
It would be better not to have to face good-bye.
* * *
—
Lori was seated at the vanity just like always as Tree threw open the door to their room.
“She finally rolls in.”
Tree didn’t even respond. She was sobbing, maybe borderline hysterical. On the walk across campus, she’d come to grips with the fact that she might have suffered a mental break. She might need to institutionalize herself.
She immediately began pulling clothes from her drawers and closet, tossing everything in a pile on the bed.
“Going somewhere?” Lori asked her.
“As far away as possible!” Tree was nearly shouting, but she didn’t know how to control these feelings.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’ll tell you what’s wrong! Me! I was wrong! I thought if I stopped running, I could beat it! But it’s never going to stop!”
“Tree, you’re freaking me out.”
Tree jammed as many clothes as she could into a giant duffel bag and started wrestling frantically with the zipper.
“Tree, look…”
She turned around and saw Lori holding that goddamned cupcake. Candle and everything.
“Happy birthday!”
Lori held the cupcake out to her, but Tree was in no mood. She turned back to wrestling with her luggage.
“Thanks,” she said, unable to constrain her sarcasm. “But I finally ate it last night.”
Tree froze the instant she said the words. “Oh my god,” she said in a whisper. “I died in my sleep.”
“What?” Lori asked.
Tree turned around to face her. Suddenly, it all made sense. “You killed me. You poisoned the cupcake, but I never ate it before last night. Remember? Threw one away, dropped it on the floor during the blackout. Never actually got it into my mouth until last ni
ght.”
Tree frowned as she started working things out. She talked herself through it, right there with Lori listening.
“So you had to find another way. Then Tombs fell right into your lap. He was the perfect scapegoat. You had access to him at the hospital. Did you drug him first?” she asked.
Lori said nothing, just kept rolling her eyes at Tree, quietly shaking her head. But Tree knew. And she could prove it.
“You did drug him, didn’t you? That way you could unbuckle the wrist restraints. You knocked him out and changed him into that all-black killer’s outfit and put the baby mask right on his face. Then you could just leave the hunting knife in the bed with him. You knew he’d wake up and escape. Everyone would just assume Tombs killed me. But it was you, wasn’t it? You were the one killing me.”
Lori laughed a little too loudly. “You’ve totally lost your mind. You actually think I’d try to poison you with a friggin’ cupcake?”
“Prove it.” Tree took the cupcake out of Lori’s hand and blew out the candle. She held it up to her roommate’s face. “Go on, Lori. Take a bite.”
“You really are crazy.”
Tree shrugged. “We’ll take it to the police. I’m sure they can tell us what’s in your little birthday treat.”
Tree headed for the door but didn’t get very far. Lori grabbed a fistful of her hair and swung her into the wall. Tree’s head hit hard. The cupcake flew out of her hands onto her bed, and she crumpled to the floor in a daze.
Lori slammed their door and locked it. “You stupid little whore,” she growled.
“I know I’ve been a bad roommate, but isn’t this a bit much?” Tree asked. “What the hell?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Lori. “Maybe because you wouldn’t stop sleeping with him.”
Tree frowned, trying to understand. Then it dawned on her. “Gregory?” she asked, dumbfounded.
“He just kept choosing you over me,” Lori said. “Guess all he wanted was a cheap slut like you.”
“Wait. You’ve been killing me over some stupid guy?”
“Oh, that’s not the only reason. You’re a dumb bitch, too!” she roared. “But what I really want to know is, how did you figure it out?”
“Because you’ve killed me before,” Tree said.
Lori smiled like a crazy person and said, “Then I guess I’ll just have to do it again.”
Tree ran for the window, but Lori grabbed her from behind and tried to rip her fingers into Tree’s throat. Tree rolled her back over Lori’s bed and threw her off into the corner bookshelf. Lori leaped up and tackled Tree at the knees. Tree flipped over, and Lori wrenched her head by the hair and started savagely bashing Tree’s forehead against the floor.
There was a loud knock on the door. Lori stopped her assault and simultaneously covered Tree’s mouth with both hands.
“What the hell’s going on in there?” Danielle called through the door.
“Everything’s fine. Tree just fell. She’s okay!”
Lori pressed her hands so hard across Tree’s mouth and nose that Tree couldn’t breathe. She was trying to scream, but Lori was committed and ready to finish the deed.
Tree jerked her head from side to side to steal some air, but she was fading. To the left, Tree spotted the upturned cupcake lying about an arm’s length away.
“Whatever, clumsy hos!” Danielle shouted through the door. “Better see you at the meeting today!”
Tree reached for the cupcake while Lori was busy yelling back to Danielle.
“We’ll be there!” she shouted, then turned back to Tree.
Tree was ready. She punched Lori in the throat, hard. Lori’s hands came up, her mouth wide open as she gasped for air.
Tree jammed the cupcake directly into Lori’s gaping mouth. “Eat it, bitch!”
Lori was hacking and coughing, choking and crying. She was shrieking through a windpipe choking on poisoned cake as she tried to spit it out and scoop it clear with her fingers.
Tree could only watch as Lori stumbled backward in front of the window. Looking up, Tree saw the chandelier. In a flash, she used the last of her strength to jump up and catch hold of the crossbars. Then, yelling like a banshee, she swung through the air, kicking Lori in the center of her chest and sending her flying out their second-story window.
It took a moment for Tree to hear the sickening thud and a piercing scream from Emily, the girl on the front porch with the headphones. Tree limped over and looked out the broken window. Below her on the porch was Lori’s crumpled body. Emily was holding her headphones, still screaming. Tree turned and slid down the wall next to the window.
Danielle was already back, pounding on the door. “What the hell was that?”
Tree was too winded to yell back. Softly, she just said, “Lori…ate…my birthday…cupcake.”
Then she rested her head on the window seat and passed out cold.
26
That afternoon, after the police reports and the reporters and the coroners and the Instagrammers, Tree sat next to Carter at the counter in the diner on the corner. They ate french fries and watched wall-to-wall coverage of the scandalous campus story the local news had decided to call “Kappa House: A Tragedy in Pink.”
Tree had texted Carter about what was going on early in the day. It was a little weird for him, she realized; he’d only known her for a few hours, and she’d known him for sixteen days. Each day was the same day, but the point was that Tree had all these intense memories of Carter that had never happened, as far as he knew. Right now, for instance, he kept referring to things he’d already told her about in a different loop—like the time he accidentally threw his grandma’s show cat, Benny, into the dryer with a load of wet towels. Carter started in on the punch line that cracked her up the last first time he told it.
“Benny survived with a chipped tooth and a torn ear—”
Tree jumped in to finish, “But he never walked a catwalk again.”
“Oh my god!” Carter’s laugh was contagious. “I can’t believe you know about Benny!”
Tree tried not to spill all the beans. There were things he’d shared with her in confidence, or in the heat of the moment as they ran from psychopaths, that she’d decided just to keep tucked away. If he ever wanted to share them with her again, she’d “know” them then. If not, well, she could keep a secret.
The good news was that Carter could, too. After her interview with the police detectives, she’d texted him to beg for safe (a.k.a. media-free) passage out of the Kappa house. To her delight, he’d come through with a friend’s hockey gear bag that was big enough for her to be zipped up inside of. Carter carried her out to his car with a bag of Tide Pods in hand, telling the reporters at the news vans it was laundry day.
No one batted an eye.
Danielle was back in the spotlight of the continuing coverage of “A Tragedy in Pink.” She was wearing her favorite yellow sports bra and black yoga pants, and the longer Tree watched, the more certain she was that Danielle had a big career in small-market news. This was Danielle’s first interview, and she was killing it.
“I always knew there was something wrong with Lori,” Danielle explained to the in-studio anchor and the viewing audience at large. “She never wore makeup. Never posted any cute selfies. And she literally owned a pair of Crocs. All the signs of a psycho killer…”
Carter elbowed her as Danielle turned around to yell at two girls standing in the shot behind her, weeping over Lori’s tragic death. Without missing a beat, she shouted, “Hello? I’m trying to get interviewed here.”
Tree shook her head. “Oh my god, she is such a tool.”
Having quieted the unrest of being upstaged, Danielle continued apace. “Anyhoo, Lori’s little plot was super lame. Poisoning a cupcake? Really? We’re Kappas. We don’t eat cupcakes.”
As
the affiliate cut to commercial, Tree’s dad called.
Yeahhh! It’s my birthday, and I ain’t gotta pick up the phone!
She smiled at Carter, who shook his head every time that ringtone played.
“Hey, Dad.”
She could tell he was panicked, and it was kind of sweet in a way. Ever since her birthday (for the past sixteen days), she’d been more receptive to building bridges with her dad over the tricky parts instead of just ignoring him altogether. Tree assured him she was just a little scratched up and promised they’d see each other soon.
“I love you, too. Bye.”
Carter turned to her after she hung up with her dad. “So, uh, now that your bedroom is officially a crime scene and all…where are you planning on crashing?”
She raised her eyebrows and smiled. “Is that an invitation?”
“You sure you want to wake up in the dorm room again?” Carter asked.
Tree smiled. “Only if it’s yours.”
Carter nodded. He seemed to be deep in thought. “Only, of course, you’ll have to sleep in Ryan’s bed.”
A huge grin spread across Tree’s face. This was one of the parts of Carter she loved most. “Of course,” she agreed.
He laughed at his own silliness and then blushed a little and stared down at his shoes. “Yeah. We can, you know…”
His voice trailed off, and Tree realized that this was one of those things. She’d slept in his bed and changed clothes in front of him for sixteen days in a row now. He’d only experienced that once.
“I almost forgot.” Carter reached into his pocket and pulled out her bracelet. “You left this little guy.”
Tree looked down and got a little lump in her throat. As she stared at the bracelet in his hand, she realized that this was the last time it would happen. Besides Carter himself, forgetting her bracelet in his room had been the most constant aspect of the last sixteen days. Even when she’d remembered that it was there in his room, toward the end of the run, she’d always left it behind. It was how Carter came to find her on what he considered day one of their relationship.
Happy Death Day & Happy Death Day 2U Page 12