Chapter 27
Rose Turner. Rose Turner. Rose Turner.
Edie repeated the name to herself over and over as she stood backstage waiting for the last supporting act to finish up.
Everything so far went according to plan, Cassidy’s misremembrances aside.
Heather delivered clothes for tonight’s appearance to the villa and brought two professional stylists to manage their hair and makeup.
Edie and Cassidy looked the part that she meant for them to portray, and every change she spoke into the ether manifested with ease.
There remained only one thing left to do.
She thought of every memory she had of Rose from their first meeting to the last thing they’d said to one another on the island, but with every passing hour the memories became foggier and muddled.
It seemed that every memory involved Cassidy instead of Rose now, and the idea of a woman named Rose Turner lacked depth, like a coin handled so often that the features flattened and disappeared.
Edie worried that Rose was no more real to her than an imaginary friend to a child, perhaps even less so.
Of course he’s going to be here for this.
James gave both women a cold hug as the audience whooped and applauded the three of them for existing.
“You’ve been keeping yourself busy,” he said into Edie’s ear.
She winked as they pulled away from one another.
The spotlight they shared blinded Edie and prevented her from seeing past the row of people at the guard rail, but the crowd sounded smaller than it had at any of the other shows on the island.
When James greeted the crowd, their cheers quieted, and then surged again when he asked them how they were all doing.
He reached into the pocket of his pants and produced an index card.
“Before we bring out the final headliner, we wanted to say thanks to some of the people who helped make it all happen. For those of you who somehow haven’t heard, Cassidy Burns helped tremendously in the selection of the musical acts.
Rumor has it,” he said, slipping into a conspiratorial tone, “that she’s the reason One Direction reconciled in order to be here this week. ”
The crowd cheered as Cassidy shrugged her shoulders. The cameras zoomed in on her so the whole audience saw her raise her eyebrows and smirk on the giant screens as if to say, “I’ll never tell.”
“And Edie Lee herself helped to curate many of the brands and events that made your Island Xperience what it’s been. Give it up for these ladies!”
The crowd broke into whistles and excited shouts again. Edie brought the microphone to her mouth.
“We’re not—” she stopped, waiting for the crowd to quiet down. She didn’t want to give James the chance to finish whatever speech he planned. “We’re not the only ones who need thanks.”
James’ smile remained plastered on his cheeks but didn’t reach his eyes. He dared her to say something contrary to his word.
“James has been very busy working the festival on social media, hasn’t he?
” she asked. This produced more cheers and more fake easiness from James as he took a bow.
Cassidy didn’t look nervous at all, but the heat from the lights and Edie’s heart pounding in her chest made the microphone shake.
She steadied herself by wrapping the fingers of both hands around it and took a deep breath.
“But we couldn’t have done any of it without our friends, because they really make the whole thing worth it. So, I want to introduce my friend …”
Edie’s mind went blank. What was the name she’d been repeating all day?
She felt the gaze of everyone on the island, including James and Cassidy.
Both waited with piqued curiosity as though neither of them knew what she was about to do.
She searched in the wings beyond them, hoping to find the face of the person she wanted to name, but saw only disinterested stage hands.
It felt like ten minutes had already passed in an embarrassed silence, though it must have only been a matter of seconds. Edie unwrapped her left hand from the right and peered down, but to her dismay her palm was empty without even the smudge of permanent marker.
“… but I can’t.” Edie finally finished. “Because this place has taken something from me. It’s taken something from all of us!”
A murmur rose up from the audience and she saw the people in the front row exchange glances.
“I came with someone who is missing, and so did Cassidy, and I bet a lot of you did, too! But the island and James have taken them from us. So maybe we should take something back.”
She turned to face James fully. Behind him, Cassidy stepped out of the spotlight and was looking around like she intended to make an escape from the situation.
“Give us our friends back, James.”
“I don’t have as much power over you as you think,” James said, hands held at his side.
“James Oliver was a liar and a cheat,” Edie shouted into the microphone. The sound boomed out into the night and feedback rang in her ears. “But now he doesn’t exi—”
James smacked the mic out of her hand, and it landed with an explosive thud that rang feedback through the night.
Edie flinched, and only then did she register the silence of the crowd.
Beyond the spotlight she saw a front row full of dark, passive faces with their eyes fixated on her.
It was like she was right back in the basement of the cabin.
Except now her fear and confusion were broadcast on giant screens and Cassidy was nowhere to be found.
“You watch your mouth, Edie,” James said. He didn’t need to amplify himself she could hear him with ease over the hush.
“I’ll say whatever I want to say. Or are you scared, James? Are you scared I’ll do the same thing to you that you tried to do to me?”
“I haven’t done anything to you. I’ve barely even thought about you. You’re not worth my time.”
“I know the tunnel was your doing,” Edie insisted. “You tried to kill me once and I survived, and then I made all of this happen,” she swept an arm out over the audience, “because I figured out the rules. I’m getting off this island whether you like it or not.”
“What makes you so sure?” James asked. His voice remained neutral.
“Because I said so. And you know what? So did you. So, you’re not getting rid of me that easily.”
James laughed. “Oh, you mean I said this?”
Behind him, the screen flipped from the live feed of them onstage to a video of James. Edie could just barely see the image from where she stood, but the familiar audio blasted through the speakers.
“Hey guys, I just wanted to thank everyone who helped make this whole experience one of the best I’ve ever had,” James’ voice came.
“James, don’t, we look like shit.”
“How are you doing this?” Edie asked the James standing in front of her. He said nothing.
“Edie and Cassidy have been communing with nature or something and aren’t camera ready, I guess, but I still want to thank them for joining me and becoming my island friends, because Edie is going to die tonight.”
“I guess you and I remember things differently,” James said, and still his voice was calm.
A pair of meaty arms grabbed Edie around her middle and she shrieked. With both arms pinned to her sides all she could do was writhe.
“Or maybe you shouldn’t trust everything you see on the Internet,” James said.
“Fuck you, James! Fuck you!” Edie shouted as her faceless captor carried her backward and off the stage. “You’re nothing! You’re dead! Do you hear me?”
The musicians and artists backstage ignored her screams but watched as the man carried her away.
“And now, The Gits!” Edie heard James say into the mic. The audience roared back to life.
“Let go of me!” Edie shouted, but even if the bustling figures in black could have heard her over the screeching of guitars and Mia Zapata’s vocals they would not have cared. Edie knew this because as she crossed their paths, they stopped to let Edie and her warden pass but did not intervene.
Backstage at the steps leading to the ground, Edie kicked out her legs and hooked a foot on the handrail. Using it as a pivot point, she threw her body. The man lost his balance and loosened his grip. Edie twisted, using her ribcage and shoulders to pry his hands away.
Both fell hard to the steps. The edges bit into Edie’s thigh and hip and her elbow scraped hard on something metal.
She fought against the throbbing pain and managed to get her feet beneath her before the man did.
His uneven fingernails swiped at her ankles as she leapt over him and landed awkwardly.
Without looking back, she sprinted to the gates separating the public from backstage.
Under other circumstances, she might have questioned her ability to jump over the gates, but now, guided by adrenaline and instinct, it didn’t matter.
She cleared the gate like an Olympic hurdler, but sandals offered no grip on the sand-covered concrete.
Her front foot slipped and she landed hard in a half splits on her back knee.
She cried out in pain again but continued forward with the momentum of her fear and panic.
People milled about near the food stands and restrooms but no one noticed as she ran past them. Edie cast a glance over a shoulder, expecting to see the stage crew or James or Cassidy, but found that no one pursued her. She slowed to a jog and tasted blood.
It’s happening, she thought. I’m disappearing. No one can see me because I’m disappearing.
But for now, she heard the blaring of music behind her and smelled the combination of salt and fry oil on the air, which meant that she was still on the island and still had a chance to go down fighting.
She found the tiki torches lining the beach with the hot tubs.
They came up with no resistance, and Edie carried one in each hand, lifting their flames to the thatch roofs of the villas and the canvas walls of the tents she passed.
An orange hue followed her, and embers rose with smoke to join the stars in the cloudless sky.
The scent of campfire and burning plastic rode the breeze as the fire fed itself, leaping from building to building.
Edie stood tall as her vengeance burned bright on the warpath behind her, but she knew that with every passing minute she came closer to capture.
Let them come. Let them try, she thought. And the longer she walked alone, the more her confidence in herself returned. She had the power to bring down this island and all the evil on it.
The closed restaurants and bars remained open to the air and smoke and Edie’s retribution, and although the barbacks stood empty, the sticky puddles of liquor remained. Edie touched her flamed to the wooden shelves and watched with pure satisfaction as the blue flames spread with ease.
She set her sights to the north. There, in the woods, was where all this began.
Smoke veiled the path through the center of the island, stinging her eyes and throat. The fire glowed in the black clouds above her, and still she marched alone.
Near the middle of the island where the two coves met, the smoke parted and shadows emerged from the dark. They stood in a silent line, waiting for Edie’s approach. Seeing them made her heart drop into her stomach, but she held her head high and raised the torches like the staffs of a goddess.
“Edie!” someone called. The voice sounded familiar, but Edie knew better.
A shadow approached her, stepping away from the group and walking along the sandbar between the coves like an army captain meeting to discuss terms of war.
As the figure neared the light from Edie’s destruction to the south, their features came into focus.
They wore a slip dress and tattoos covered their arms, but their face remained obscured.
“What are you trying to do, Edie?” the thing that was not Cassidy asked.
“I’m getting off this fucking island.”
“By burning it down?” It chuckled as though speaking to a misunderstanding child.
“Someone is going to see the smoke and the fire. This isn’t something you can control.”
“You have no idea what we’re capable of.”
The thing took a step towards Edie. She swept the torch in her right hand at the thing as a warning. The flame flapped through the air and then came to stop in front of—not Cassidy as she expected—but Edie’s own face.
“Maybe you’ll believe it if you hear it come from your own mouth,” the Not-Edie said in Edie’s own voice.
Edie screamed and jumped backward, but instead of loose sand, something solid caught her and pinned her arms down. She dropped both torches and screamed.
“No! No!” Edie kicked her legs, jamming the heels of her feet hard into the shins of whomever held her, but she may as well have been kicking at the bars of a cell. “This isn’t real! None of this is real!”
“Say what you want, it won’t change a thing,” Not-Edie told her.
Edie writhed as her captor carried her to the edge of the water. Not-Edie walked beside them.
“You could have left things alone and made your mark on the world, we would have given you that, but not now. Now, you’re going to die and no one in the world is going to know, because they won’t remember you. They know your face, this face, and that’s all we really needed from you.”
The cool water hit Edie’s feet and then climbed up her legs as the three of them descended into the ocean.
Edie continued to scream and squirm. The bare arms around her own slicked with salt water, but their grip held.
She kicked, but now the ocean gripped her limbs, slowing them down and making her struggle to escape less effective than on the shore.
Not-Edie’s head floated above the water as the waves lapped at Edie’s face. She lifted her mouth to the sky, taking in gasping breaths as tears came to her eyes.
“Don’t worry,” Not-Edie said, lifting a wet hand to Edie’s cheek. “It only hurts until it doesn’t.”
Instead of taking the last breath she needed, Edie screamed. Salt water filled her mouth as the shadows carried her beneath the surface of the water, cutting short her final cries.
Then only stars and silence remained above the darkened island.