Just pray.
I doubt I can pray her back to life... and even if I could, I wouldn't. Not after how it ended...
"Yeah." I nod. "I'll do that."
"Good." Dad waves a hand through the air. "Cause I need your help in there. Faith Methodist had that scandal a few months back with that pumpkin patch incident, so I'm expecting a bigger turnout than ever tonight for midnight mass. We only have a few hours 'til the congregation is lining up for donuts and coffee, so let's get in there and get set up, hmm?"
It's not a question; those are my marching orders... ones I know not to question.
The church is eerily quiet when we let ourselves in. Dad goes about setting up, turning the coffee maker on in the kitchen area and queuing up his power point. I follow him at first, casually keeping an eye out for anything we may have missed in our haste to clean up last night.
Brant and I scrubbed the security footage, which the police shockingly haven't asked for yet. I guess having a reputation as an upstanding citizen means they were willing to take my word for it when I told them that she left without me. I texted her strategically, a series of messages expertly designed to make it seem like I was concerned about her and that I didn't support her going off on her own.
Of course, they'll hopefully never see those texts since we broke her phone to pieces when we got back to the church last night, after we left her body to sink in the lake, and I threw them out in the burn barrels along with all her clothes and shoes, hat and purse. I scrubbed every trace of Nikki's presence out of this church; Brant made a list using Chad (against my better judgement) and we checked it twice to be sure we'd gotten everything.
In a few hours, the church will be full, and the crime scene will be so contaminated that they don't stand a chance at connecting her to me.
"Go get the decorations from the cellar." Dad says, leveling me with a gaze. "Your hovering is stressing me out."
I don't need to be told twice; anything that gets me away from my father for a bit is fine with me... even if the cellar still creeps me out.
Hundreds of years ago, the church used to bury people down there. They say there are still dozens of bodies beneath the dirt, like the town's founders who were buried beneath cement to keep grave robbers from stealing the jewels they were buried with.
I always hated it in the cellar as a kid, when I'd get sent down here to collect stuff for my father. When I was a kid, I imagined the bodies breaking through the ground like zombies and feasting on my flesh. Now that I'm older, I know that's ridiculous and impossible, but it doesn't change the fact that I still get a sense of foreboding every time I touch that doorknob that leads down to the cellar.
This time, though, I don't get a chance to feel the foreboding, because the doorknob sticks, refusing to turn when I twist the handle. It doesn't budge, not even a little, and I throw my shoulder at the door like that may make a difference. It doesn't.
The door is locked.
In all my years, this door has never been locked... there wouldn't be much point to it, since all we keep down there is out of season decor and old clothing for the annual charity drives. I don't think we even have a key to this door. It's why I drop to my knees, lining my gaze up with the small keyhole, peering through the darkness like I can see the tumblers and manage to disengage them.
There's nothing to be seen— no locking mechanism, no tumblers, nothing.
"Damn it." I slam the door in my frustration, taking a second to regroup before deciding to try again.
It's as I'm squinting, one eye closed and the other pressed to the keyhole, that I see it— a flash of white.
It's so bright it blinds me for a moment, and so quick as it seems like it rushes toward me that I fall backwards on my ass, breathing heavily and rattled to my core. But as I stare at the door, I hear the small pop of the lock coming undone, and then the door creaks open just the slightest bit.
I hold my breath, waiting to see if someone comes out, but there's no one there. Of course.
I'm jumpy because I'm afraid of going to prison for life. Realistically, that wouldn't happen. I thought about it a lot last night while I waited for sleep to come take me and even if they manage to find her before the gators do and somehow link her to me, I can't see myself being convicted of anything more than manslaughter. A good lawyer can negotiate that sentence down to a few years at most, and the right judge— AKA Brant's dad— could ensure fair prison conditions.
I still don't want to get caught, of course, but if I do, it will be okay.
Deciding that hitting the door must have knocked something loose inside the lock, I get to my feet and toe the door open with my boot. There's no one, of course, on the other side, but when I pull the string hanging from the bare light bulb overhead and nothing happens, I curse my bad luck.
I'm still cursing my bad luck as I flip the flashlight of my phone on and shine it down the steps, panning it quickly across the bottom of the stairs to be sure there are no zombies waiting for me.
I take the steps slowly, careful to step around the weak spot on the bottom tread and turn toward the stacks of boxes. I have to swallow the lump in my throat when I see my mom's handwriting, the thick lines of a marker and a loopy cursive that list the occasion on the outside of each box. She's been gone for more of my life than she was alive, but I still miss her.
There are seven boxes plus the nativity scene; it takes me five trips back and forth to get it all upstairs.
It's on the final trip, when I'm dragging the manger awkwardly up the steps, that I hear it.
It's just a whisper from somewhere in the abyss behind me, but it's distinct.
Nick.
