Chapter 57
AFTERMATH
For a few hours, the world stays small. White walls. Beeping monitors. A kind nurse. A matter-of-fact doctor. My worried father. And Jude beside my bed, his hand never leaving mine. By the time the sun comes out, however, the whole country has turned its head.
In the days that follow, a media frenzy like no other descends upon our town. When you consider the pieces involved, of course it does. A teen rescue mission. The return of missing victims. A misidentified body. A deranged suspect connected to a thirty-year-old cold case.
The story is larger than life.
And that’s without the supernatural parts.
Police interviews feel more like interrogations.
Officer Jake is furious.
We were foolhardy and reckless, everyone agrees.
But in the end, we brought the missing home.
Minus a few.
Lawyers are involved. Social workers, trauma counselors, and victim advocates, too. Reporters are ravenous. Some of them, downright aggressive. Pour on the podcasters and the true crime junkies, and Foggy Hollow becomes a veritable windstorm of controversy, speculation, and breaking headlines.
Teen Heroes Discover Missing Classmates Before Authorities
From Missing Person to Suspect: Cold Case Takes Stunning Turn
Declared Dead, Found Alive: Ivy Winslow’s Case Raises Troubling Questions
A watered-down version of the truth emerges.
Simon Vandenberg survived his family’s infamous disappearance thirty years ago.
Or perhaps he didn’t merely survive, but killed them all.
For three whole decades, he lived in isolation in the forests surrounding the Vandenberg estate—right under everyone’s nose.
He became increasingly unstable and began abducting individuals, holding captives in remote locations, moving them periodically to avoid detection.
A group of teenagers followed the clues, tracked Simon’s movements, and discovered his hideout.
The confrontation that followed ended with Simon dead, his body swept away in the Blackwillow River.
Captives were recovered, but there were several fatalities, too, and the misidentification of a body, a scandal blamed on decomposition and the presence of Ivy Winslow’s clothing.
The six missing teens who survived could only give fragmented accounts, consistently describing a single captor who remained in shadow.
They were kept in darkness, mostly unconscious. Drugged, no doubt.
Thankfully—to the relief of everyone—Simon Vandenberg operated alone.
What was decidedly less clear was his motive.
Why was he kidnapping teens?
What was he trying to accomplish?
We pretend not to know. Nobody would believe the truth anyway, or how very close he got to accomplishing it.
Though we are minors, our names are leaked to the press. I suppose with such a bright spotlight, anonymity is impossible. A family spokesperson releases a joint statement to the public on our behalf, requesting privacy.
The request is ignored.
Ivy and Jude are harassed worst of all.
One, a female Lazarus. The other, the Vandenberg heir with a familial connection to the culprit.
Gossip news and online forums have a heyday discussing inherited mental illness, hidden family scandal, and a dark and twisted legacy.
Conspiracy theories crop up on Reddit. Many of us receive messages from strangers.
In an ironic twist of fate, Twig and I become immensely popular fodder for supernatural podcasts everywhere.
The lawyers tell us to wait it out.
We don’t give interviews.
We decline to comment.
Most of us, anyway.
Lola Hayes is all too eager to talk. Or rather, her mother is eager on her behalf. They don’t give a crumb to the major media outlets. Apparently, those outlets don’t pay money. But they are happy to make a deal with the tabloids.
Teen Survivor Speaks: “We Never Saw His Face.”
Victim Reveals Life Inside Foggy Hollow Horror
Most of it’s made up. None of it’s accurate. But with the attention shifting to her, we don’t care to correct or corroborate.
Eventually, the story runs its course.
The news vans leave.
The dust settles.
And we are left to pick up the pieces.
Funerals are held.
Foggy Hollow mourns.
Four of our classmates are gone.
Lainey Sikes.
Griffin Tate.
But also, Caleb Briggs and Brady Keller.
Their deaths remain unconnected. A separate tragedy overshadowed by the sensational story of a deranged man in the woods and a group of teen heroes. But they will be revisited. Once the quarry thaws, the search for their bodies will continue.
Only they won’t be found.
One more mystery in a long line of mysteries to plague our town.
I think about them often—the way they died, the way they were pulled into the water. Is this what happened to my mother?
I can’t stop replaying it.
The clock exploding.
The rowboat, spinning across the pond.
I keep having dreams—the same recurring nightmare I had when I was eight playing in reverse. Clara Green, reappearing in pixels.
She came back for me.
This, I know.
My mother came back and for five long years, she was held against her will. Right here, in Foggy Hollow. On the other side of the veil.
I found her.
I lost her.
And I was scarred in the process.
The gash on my palm.
The marks on my wrist.
Jude has his own.
So do Twig and Naomi and every other person Simon tried to sacrifice around that pond.
They can’t see them, though.
That ability belongs only to me and Jude.
Nobody can feel them, either.
The marks have gone dormant. They haven’t glowed or burned—not so much as even a twinge since I woke up in the hospital. I’ve pressed my finger against them on more than one occasion to see if the air might crackle, but nothing ever happens.
I try to convince myself that this is a good thing.
There are monsters in the Overlay.
Real live demons on the other side.
It’s probably best to keep them where they belong.
There is one mark that went away, however. One mark I will be happy to never see again.
The curling veins of darkness on Jude’s chest.
The ruby amulet shattered, liberating my love and his life, allowing me to touch him without worry or fear.
It’s a freedom I don’t think I’ll ever get over.