12. Githany #2
She grabs the magically mended board and sprints into the night. My footsteps are silent as I race after her. She takes off into the forest, away from the camp.
Why didn’t I run for help? Where am I going?
I break into a clearing. The moon is bright against the still surface of the lake. Its reflection shatters as my younger self, wracked with sobs, throws the board into the water.
A shriek that raises goosebumps along my arms tears from her throat. She dives in.
Too much time passes without any sign of me.
No bubbles.
Animal sounds return. A shooting star passes overhead.
Two ripples signal something is happening.
A blue light shimmers beneath the surface.
I would have once believed something so unusual must be magical, that it belonged to a mermaid or siren of some sort.
I realize now that magic and monsters are not the same thing.
An arm shoots out, fingernails digging into the soft dirt of the bank.
My younger self’s other hand clutches the board.
My blue-skinned body looks foreign as twisted arms drag me onto land.
I drop onto my back, spitting up water and returning to my usual skin tone.
Voices reach me from beyond the woods. Flashlights wave through the dense trees.
My body shudders and then convulses. I’m still seizing when the first camp counselor reaches me.
The sight of my thrashing body is the last thing I see before I’m sucked into the darkness and spit back out of the door.
Black Bear Cabin slams in my face.
What the fuck was that thing? It tore me open. It crawled inside me. The memory of the blood gushing out as it brutalized my face brings tears to my eyes. The sound of my jaw cracking as it wrenched it wide will stay with me forever. Touching my own face reassures me that I’m still in one piece.
No wonder I blocked out that memory. An experience so horrific I couldn’t bear to relive it. I was so young.
Something slinks beneath my skin. I’m hyperaware of the sense that someone else was watching that memory. From inside me. Did that thing stay in my body all these years? What has it been doing all this time?
There are new doors now. Ones that were most definitely not here when I went inside. They’re numbered from one to thirty-four.
Dread drains into my limbs. “What’s behind the other doors?”
“The truth,” Madness answers.
“What if I don’t want to know?”
“It’s not your choice.”
Door number one swings open. I’m sucked inside even more abruptly than the first. The area is familiar.
It’s a walking trail next to the neighborhood playground.
A group of teens are passing around a notebook and a bottle of beer.
There are no lights on in any of the surrounding houses.
It must be late. The fact that half of the group is wearing pajamas further confirms it. They’ve snuck out to have some fun.
Someone scoffs when the bottle is empty. They part ways, waving to one another. One girl catches my eye. She’s older than she was in the cabin, but her pale hair and beautiful face are unmistakable. Kristy.
A rush of anger heats my blood. If she had never brought that damn game…
Kristy breaks off from her companions, heading down the trail alone. Someone is standing on the edge of the forest, partially hidden behind a tree.
My stomach churns.
It’s me.
When I jump on her, I look all wrong. My skin is tinted blue-grey. My eyes are wild and black. My nails are far too long and sharp.
Kristy screams as I pin her to the ground.
My younger self smiles with a mouth filled with teeth that do not belong to me.
The next few moments are nothing but blood, guts, and screaming. My nails slash across her torso, freeing her organs from their hiding spots. My teeth turn red as I clamp down on her face.
The concrete turns black with the spill of fresh crimson.
The last thing to stop moving is Kristy’s left ankle. It twitches three times. Then she falls completely still.
What the actual fuck.
“That never happened.”
“It did.”
“No, no. It was an animal attack. They told us on the news. They went hunting for a mountain lion.”
Madness remains quiet, forcing me to confront the truth spilling across the walkway before my very eyes.
My younger self rises, cracking her neck in a manner that bends it too far to be normal. She wipes the back of her hand across her bloodstained mouth and disappears into the trees.
“That wasn’t me.”
The body left behind is a mess of insides and death. The white nightgown Kristy wore is now torn and stained.
A wave of recognition barrels across my thoughts. The ghost, the one who grabbed my arm—is Kristy?
An invisible jerk at my center sends me tumbling back out of the door. I don’t stand right away. All the doors are still there. One through thirty-four.
“What’s behind the rest of the doors?”
“It is much the same.” Madness almost sounds saddened.
“The other girls from the cabin?” My breathing is quick and labored, gathering in knots at the base of my throat. “But there were only fourteen. Who do the other doors belong to?”
Door number two opens. I flip onto my hands and knees, scrambling as far away as possible. The other doors loom, counting upwards and towering over me. Each door I pass slams open.
I make it all the way to door eighteen before I get caught. I’m dragged inside, my fingertips burning as I try to slow the momentum.
The sky is alight as I fall to the grass.
Bursts of purple and gold fireworks shoot across the horizon.
Voices can be heard shouting, “Happy New Year!” in cheerful unison.
I’ve landed outside a New Year’s Eve party in a very affluent neighborhood.
The man that exits the lit-up home and climbs into the truck is wearing sparkly glasses with the year spelled out.
The date makes this memory just six years old.
The girls from my cabin had already been dead for years by now.
The man is average-height, with short brown hair and a youthful face. There’s a dark spot on the left side of his cheek. A birthmark.
Oh no. I know who he is.
There’s always a cute camp counselor. Someone the girls can’t help giggling over. The counselor that’s good at all the camp sports and activities. The cool guy.
I don’t remember his name, but he was there that night. One of the first few to find me on the bank.
He waves out the window, cheering once more before speeding down the street.
My surroundings blur as I’m shot forward in space and time. The road I land beside is empty of cars. Only one pair of headlights moves closer. The silver truck and the man from the party.
If something is about to happen, it can’t be by me. Surely I have an alibi for New Year’s Eve.
I wrack my brain to remember what I was doing that night. This specific year…
My memory is turning up blank. I blacked out that night. Just as I have so many other nights.
So. Many. Nights.
My thoughts drift back to all the doors waiting for me in that dark room.
I would know if I had done something terrible all those nights. Wouldn’t I?
My throat becomes unbearably tight. Movement rustles the brush as a small herd of deer break from the tree line and race past the truck.
He slams on his brakes. The screech of tires on pavement tears through the silence of the night.
The deer pass by, disappearing into the forest on the other side.
The fireworks have quieted. The only sound is the faint crunching of hooves against the forest floor and the muffled music coming from inside the truck.
The back of my neck prickles. While the man stares after the deer, my gaze drifts to the place where the herd emerged from.
They were running from something.
That all-too-familiar horror that’s been lingering in my stomach since I arrived in the room of doors morphs into a biting, gnashing thing in my gut. Am I sensing…it? Her. That thing that lives within me.
Is she the reason it feels like a storm of jagged teeth is trying to gnash out of my chest?
The feeling intensifies when she steps out of the trees.
The man remains oblivious.
“Drive!” I shout. “Get out of here! She’s coming!”
I’m coming. It’s my body, my face, just twisted and dark.
“He cannot hear you,” Madness reminds me.
“You’re still here?” I pull my gaze away from the monstrous me to seek him out.
“You will always find me in the dark.” A shadow presses against the top of my shoulder.
“I don’t want to watch.”
“It is necessary that you do.”
The thing cracks her neck again. My voice pitches. “Why? Why make me watch them suffer?”
“You won’t be able to let go until you know every truth.”
Without warning, the thing sprints forward, leaping with animalistic grace before landing in a crouch on the hood of the truck. The metal bucks and dips beneath her.
The man’s eyes veer toward her. His fear is immediately evident. I imagine she’s smiling. The way she did with Kristy. All those sharp teeth on full display.
“It’s not really me,” I want to say. “I would never.”
I almost believe it. Even as this other me punches her fist through the windshield.
“I couldn’t.”
Her hand collars his throat. He’s jerked forward, his body taking the rest of the shattered windshield with him.
“I would never.”
She slams his back down on the crushed hood.
“I’m sorry.”
I can only cry as she rips off his handsome face. Eyes are torn from their sockets. Teeth wrenched from wailing gums.
She ignores the rest of his body, focusing all her efforts on the same spot.
Her unnaturally long fingers dig deeper into his facial cavity as he thrashes.
The sounds coming out of him are awful. Cries so pitiful and broken.
Like a fawn lost from its mother. They do not sound right coming from a grown man. The weight on my chest intensifies.
I close my eyes, waiting for those noises to stop.
The last sound is a wet gurgle. The silence of the night takes over.
When I open my eyes, she’s staring my way. She looks more like me than before. Me, but dipped in blood.