CHAPTER NINETEEN
BUNNY
“This way.”
Might as well add a bushy tail to my butt. I’m wide-eyed and shaking, following the voice up to the windows of the gift shop.
Please don’t get annoyed with me. I can’t help it. I’m in a trance I want to escape. But whoever or whatever it is has a pull on me. My brain is screaming to run home, but my legs are following orders and carrying me through the jingle of the door.
Artificial flavoring and packing tape hang in the chilly air. It’s one of the only spots that have running AC because Carl’s office is upstairs.
According to Razor, anyway.
Razor…
A brief flash of what I fled from spears through my mind, inducing this uncomfortable clamminess that makes the lighting even brighter.
“Up here.”
The haunting voice spikes another wave of adrenaline, looking around at the group of girls holding up T-shirts and others filling hand baskets with candy and trinkets.
I don’t want to.
But I am. For some reason. I’m taking it slow around the rotating display of keychains, following this supernatural order to the unguarded staircase in the back.
Slipping through the open doorway, a pungent odor punches through me, like decay coated in chemicals. My stomach knots and I gag, having to cover my nose and mouth over a stench, but apparently live decapitation is quite alright with my guts.
I shake my head at myself, gripping the handrail and stopping on the third step. There’s a toxic, aquamarine glow soaking out from beneath the door. It’s both beckoning me and telling me to turn around.
Stuck, my weight tugs back and forth, my right leg moving to the fourth step and tensing, ready to propel my body toward the mysterious light.
“I need you.”
My heart lurches, signaling my receptors to move the necessary muscles to make it up the rest of the stairs.
“Who are you?” I whisper-cry, reaching out to the doorknob.
“Please?”
Against my better judgment, against the voice screaming at me for being stupid, I turn the knob and push the door open.
I blink against the nauseating glow, quickly stepping inside the illuminated office and closing the door behind me.
“Always so willing.”
Always?
My chest caves in, the heavy insult pressing against my heart and polluting my veins with a burn that feels cold. I step forward, taking it one foot at a time, hesitantly getting closer to what looks like a fish tank hidden within two parallel walls—all while scoping out the vacant office.
It’s so quiet. But I don’t feel alone.
There’s a presence not only in my psyche, but one scratching at my back, begging me to look for it.
Looking away from the desk, I flick over to my right, standing in the direct path of the aquamarine haze.
It doesn’t even take me a full second to process the preserved flesh and orange coat floating in the tank.
Horror strikes me, my stinging eyes wandering farther down to the black and purple face, his mouth agape and his bloodshot eyes pinned open, like his very last moment was spent fighting for a scrape of air.
Carl.
Acid slips up my throat, burning my chest and thickening my saliva.
“That’s what he does, Roslyn. He’s not a symptom. He’s an entire disease you’re foolishly catching.”
Anger trickles into my spine, the drips merging with the sensation of being violently sick.
I swirl around, panning over the office. “I don’t know who Roslyn is. And if you’re speaking about Carl, then you’re right. So, it’s a good thing the plague disappeared before too many got sick.”
“Carl saved you.” The masculine whisper sinks into my ear, as if he’s directly behind me, angled down enough to deliver his voice right where he wants it.
I wince, shooting around to get my back to the desk, and as I do, a drum manifests inside my throat, seeing the same man in the same black and white shirt standing where I just was.
Terror rattles my throat, whining and pressing my hip bones into the edge of the desk, my hands splayed back and inching for a pen, or a letter opener, or just fucking something I can use in case I need it.
His milky eyes aren’t looking at me. They’re looking through me, a sliver of disgust quirking his gray lip up. “Why did you do this to me?”
Tears instantly rain down my cheeks, craning away as far as I can, my lips wobbling to hold in the sob drawing taut in my chest. “W-w-what? Who are you?”
“It doesn’t seem to matter,” he says quietly.
I haven’t noticed a single blink. Or a lapse of concentration on me. Not even a rise of his shoulders to indicate he’s breathing.
He’s not human. At least not anymore.
“Why wouldn’t it matter?” I ask, my tongue tight.
He stares, and for some odd reason, the cloudiness of his eyes sticks shards through my heart. “Because you’ve moved on.”
My brows dip, my lashes sticking together with the tears still draining down my face. “I don’t know who you are.”
“If I was important, you wouldn’t have forgotten, Roslyn.”
“I’m not Roslyn,” I shake my head, slowly straightening my back.
His tense face softens, and the first actual movement happens in his hand, his fingers twitching humanly. “What did they do to you?”
“Who?”
“The people you think are your friends.”
The subtle dig at my family cuts my eyes to slivers, the last of my explosive emotions trickling to my chin. “They didn’t do anything to me. Who are you to even assume that?”
He grins dully. “I’m everywhere all at once, acrobat.
I hear the things they say when you’re not around.
” Standing a little taller, as if he suddenly has confidence, he ties his hands behind his back and takes a single step closer.
“If you don’t believe me, why not go through the files locked in the bottom left-hand drawer of the desk? ”
He’s still not answering me. I’ve asked who he is several times and he’s deflecting.
Manipulation 101, welcome to class. Our first lesson is: DON’T FALL FOR IT. If only I remember that the next time Razor breathes near me.
“I don’t believe you. And I’m not gonna do that.” I shrug, feeling proud of myself for not falling small and caving in.
I guess I just, uh, needed practice with an apparition… or whatever he is.
“Hmm.” His bottom lip slightly folds in, his eyes finally slipping away from me as he walks toward the bookcase with his hands still clasped. “Then why are you the only one without memories?”
The only one without memories? … The only one without-
He’s screwing with me. He’s some manifestation of my insecurities or, like, a… I don’t know.
Now I’m looking back to the tank and wondering who did this and when. And the curiosity for the files this guy just brought up is tapping into my mind like it’d actually be a good idea to look.
“Ros? … Oh, that’s right… Bunny. How demeaning,” he finishes somberly, as if my name genuinely wounds him.
My eyes cut across the room, landing on him relaxed back against the large bookshelf, his arms folded loosely over his chest. “And what’s your name? You must have a good one.”
He grins upside down, the joy carving out small smile lines in his grayish skin. “Try and remember it for me… You did used to yell it.”
Disbelief drops my jaw, a sardonic laugh puffing off my tongue. “Yeah. I bet.”
Done with him, done with this, done with the permeating stench he seems to make worse, I move toward the door and sprinkle my fingers goodbye.
“Leaving me so soon?” he asks softly.
“It looks that way, doesn’t it?” Raising my brows at him, I get the door open and don’t spare another glance his way.
I leave. And my chest immediately breaks into little pieces. Because the possibility of him being the only that’s been honest with me hurts worse than the lies.
How… pathetic of me to be feeling this deeply over some words from a strange ghost, apparition, monster thing, but barely mustering a squeak while watching Razor…
I’m not bringing it up again. It seems like I’m exerting entirely too much effort into convincing myself to be gutted over it, rather than actually being torn apart.
Scrubbing my teeth, the day rewinds and starts, intentionally skipping around to my least favorite parts.
No one’s back yet.
I practiced what I was going to say during my entire walk home—in case Razor was already back. But the anxious mumbling and rampant thoughts were no use.
I’ve paced, showered, paced so more, drank two glasses of water, aggressively combed my fingers through my wet hair, and now I’m finishing up my nightly oral care without a peep in the trailer.
There’s, like, this weird sense of desolation with it. You know, I’m used to that and pretty okay with it now. But with everyone still gone… I just, I have this feeling thrumming my skin that, somehow, I’m in the wrong and that I did something bad.
Sighing, I get my toothbrush rinsed and dried off, then drop it into the cup with all the others.
I often catch myself fantasizing about having my own space, my own bathroom, each room full and decorated with the things I bought myself.
But really, the idea of not living with them, not getting to see them every day or say good night face to face, laces dread through each vein and pulls ridiculously tight.
I think that’d be best for them, though.
Me not being around.
I linger on the razor someone left on the bathroom counter this morning, my hand sliding on its own toward it.
It’s an impulse that never makes me regret it afterward. I don’t overthink or feel ashamed. It removes all the heaviness and lets me float.
For a little bit, anyway. I don’t remember ever doing it by itself. I’m usually touching myself beneath the needles of cold water. But that’s not really, uh, that appealing after the events that took place an hour ago.
Taking off with the razor, I adamantly walk over to the shower, prying the curtain back and grabbing the flathead screwdriver we have to use to crank the broken faucet over.
I’m not proud of how fast I’m able to get these open now.
I just want my mind to stop, for this feeling pervading my bones to go away. I guess you could say it’s my own form of drugs here, the way it alters my mind and makes me desperate for it when shitty shit feels exceptionally shitty.
They’re probably talking about you. That guy was probably right.
Whining silently, I set one of the blades on the sink and toss the rest of the pieces in the trash can. Why was I so willing to be brave toward Junior and a literal ghost, but I become this tiny coward with everyone else?
“Oh, my God, he probably really was right,” I whisper-whine, grabbing the rubbing alcohol from the medicine cabinet.
Closing it, I get a good look at myself in the mirror, visually tracing the prominent shadows underneath my stinging eyes. “Stop crying,” I mouth, and shake my head, like the parental disappointment will fuse together what’s broken in my brain.
Safe to say it doesn’t work. One blink and tepid streams are breaking free.
I’m not sure why. My throat isn’t tight, and my chest isn’t clogged. I just feel overly exhausted and needy for a distraction.
Once I get the blade cleaned off, I get everything picked up and hide the sharp edge inside my waistband, then head for my bedroom with my balled up dirty clothes.
It feels weird taking it to my room, rather than bringing it from my room. I’m carrying a dirty little secret, and for some reason, the idea of me being bad, going against what Razor said, is drying my tears and cracking a slight grin on my face.
I’m a bad girl.
That’s so stupid. But I am getting a little tickled over it, so I guess it’s not that lame if it’s inducing dopamine. Right? Or am I going insane?
I must be because I didn’t pee my pants while being cornered by an entity. And I’ve been too quick at forgetting about Carl floating around in what has to be formaldehyde.
Where do you even get that at? And how much would you need to fill an entire fish tank? That’s, like, well over two hundred gallons.
Carl was strangled. That I know. So… it’s not a wild guess that Razor had one of his blackouts and, uh… Yeah. I just, I don’t know where he would get chemicals like that. Or when. Or why they’d need those chainsaws in the garage.
The chainsaws.
How’d they get them? For what? How’d I forget about them?
Quietly trilling my lips, I get my bedroom door closed and start to zone out on the darkness, mechanically tossing my clothes into the hamper near the closet.
There’s a heaviness in the air. It’s dragging through my muscles, making me uncomfortable. I try to rotate my shoulders to shake the stiffness, but realization kicks in and the additional presence skates down my spine.
My eyes deglaze, shooting over to the large silhouette waiting on my bed, and a rush of novocaine spreads through me.
“Hi, Bunny.”
His soft whisper cuts through my blistering skin, abating my misery and kissing my worries.
This isn’t healthy. It can’t be.