Chapter 21 Patrick #3
Checking the back seat first—he’d seen too many horror movies not to check—he opened the door and scrambled inside, slouching as low as possible.
The sudden silence as he shut the door shocked him.
The interior of the sturdy SUV was like a church.
The only sound was his rasping breath as he grappled with accepting he might be the only one of his friends left alive.
He’d been in the cellar for a while, and Jason, Tiffany, and Carrie should’ve found their way back by now after that tumble from the ridge.
It was up to Patrick to step up and be the Final Girl, even though what he really wanted to do was vomit his guts into the footwell and then curl into a ball until morning.
The thought of Clare kept him going. If she were alive, she’d want him to do all he could to survive. And hadn’t he gotten this far? Without a flowchart or schedule or to-do list?
Jason would be proud of him for living in the present.
The thought of Jason possibly hurt or even dead filled Patrick with fresh determination.
He took a steadying breath. Time for a new plan.
This was what he was going to do. He’d wait in the car for ten minutes, and if none of his friends showed up, he would drive until he could get a signal and call 911.
That was the best thing he could do for everyone.
Jason wouldn’t thank him for sticking around and getting himself killed, too.
Patrick took out his phone to check the time. Another news notification had snuck in. The man killed with the meat cleaver had been identified as Daniel Williams, 22.
Patrick sucked in a breath. Could it be Carrie’s ex-boyfriend? He shook his head. Daniel was a common name.
But what if—
He pictured sylph-like Carrie holding a meat cleaver and almost laughed out loud. She wouldn’t be able to hold down a grown man and reduce him to pork chops.
Then another thought came, unbidden, sending a shiver of pins and needles through Patrick’s body.
What if Mikey—
No. It had to be a random murder, of a random man.
But Patrick remembered the feral look on Mikey’s face when he’d attacked Russ.
Mikey had always been infatuated with Carrie.
Could he have killed Daniel before coming here?
All part of his campaign to prove to her—and the world—that he could be a tough guy.
He might have charged at Russ, believing he was Daniel, because he was afraid he hadn’t finished the job.
Someone who’d killed a man with a meat cleaver wouldn’t be thinking logically.
The modus operandi implied a crime of passion, not reason.
That kind of irrational thinking might lead Mikey to put on a Slasher mask and take down everyone who might get between him and Carrie.
Patrick dragged a hand down his face, as if he could scrub away this train of thought. It was ridiculous. Anyone could be behind that mask. It was a cosplayer obsessed with the Slasher cabin and trying to pick them off, the way Timmy Thompson had in the films.
Patrick had always poo-pooed the pearl-clutching about horror movies. Movies didn’t make people any more violent than playing video games. It was all good old-fashioned Satanic Panic from middle-aged folks who wanted to blame society’s ills on things the younger generation were interested in.
Yet Patrick found himself reneging on his stand, terrified that Slasher had turned someone into—well, the Slasher.
The Slasher, he slashes, Freddy said in Patrick’s head again.
Not unless Patrick could help it. He scooched into the driver’s seat and fumbled Russ’s keys into the ignition.
The engine grumbled and died.
“No, no!” Patrick said. He smacked the steering wheel with the heel of his hand and twisted the key again.
If this had been a movie he was showing the Jumpscare Society, he’d turn to the person next to him and gloat, See?
Of course the car doesn’t start. Then he’d predict a masked face would come out of nowhere and press itself against the driver’s-side window.
Or an axe blade would shatter the windshield.
This was a sick joke. The tropes weren’t so funny when they happened in real life.
He tried to start the car one more time, his desperation so palpable he could taste it, heavy and acidic on his tongue.
The engine coughed like a cat spitting up a hairball and petered out into a whimper.
Patrick slammed the dashboard and called the car every swear word he could think of, including the ones in Spanish Jen had taught him.
He slumped in the driver’s seat, completely drained. He was out of plans. Out of ideas. No way to help his friends. Jen had been right. They should have headed for the highway and never looked back. But Patrick had wanted his perfect Slasher weekend.
He’d gotten his wish, in a way.
Utterly lost and bereft, he imagined this was what Clare must have felt at the end. Wheezing her last breath, body going limp as her vision faded to black. That final heartbeat of acceptance that she couldn’t fight any longer.
All that was left was flight.
Steeling himself, Patrick flung open the car door—
—and stumbled backward as a loud bang shook the night.