After the concert ended, with that thought still in my mind, Ben and I walked toward the exit together. I was so full of neon paint that a plane could see me from the sky. He stared at me for a minute, and for a second, I thought he was going to kiss me. He had this almost dreamy look in his eyes. I didn’t want to seem rude, but I played it off, taking a step back in case he suddenly decided to try it.
I wasn’t ready for that. Nor did I know if I really wanted it.
He stepped into my space, though, and tucked a strand of hair that had come loose from my ponytail behind my ear. “Can I call you again?”
I nodded. “That’d be nice.”
“I had a lot of fun, Rosalia.” Then he did lean in and kiss me, but on the cheek.
“It was definitely…different,” I said, taking another step back.
He grinned. “I’ll call you soon.” Then he turned and headed in the opposite direction.
* * *
I wasno pro at dating, but wasn’t the guy supposed to at least walk his date to the car? I didn’t mind driving myself. I wanted to and wouldn’t have gone unless I had my car. I didn’t like the idea of being stranded anywhere, depending on someone else to bring me where I wanted to go. But the least Ben could have done was walked me to my car.
The parking lot was dark, lit only by the eerie lights from the festival. Which mostly put the lot in shadow and not brightened it. The brightest thing around was me. Whoever was pointing the guns loaded with the paint seemed to aim most of it at me. The music still playing from the festival set the tone. Some kind of techno jam that seemed to come out of that haunted music box—like it had a possessed circus inside of it or something.
The movie Cilla and I had watched came to me in the darkness. I wasn’t sure if sandals were considered sensible shoes or not, but I was pretty sure I could run in them without tripping. I dug in my bag and kept a hand on my keys and the pepper spray. I refused to be the cliché.
A few guys weaved around a couple of cars, falling into step behind me. They were keeping their voices down and laughing. I wanted to turn around and look at them, but I didn’t. I was feeling paranoid, but I didn’t want to make it obvious.
After a few steps, they went in a different direction, and I sighed, realizing that I was being overly cautious for no reason. Except, the closer I came to my car, the darker it got. I was like a walking neon stick, and this area of the lot seemed emptier. No one else was around.
As my car came into view, I stopped for a second to pull my keys out, and as I went to hit the fob to open the doors, laughter echoed from behind me. Too close.
I went to pick up speed, but another guy came from the side of a car a few cars down from mine, meeting me. He looked like a glowing skeleton. His hair was slicked back, and his face was painted white and black.
“You need us to accompany you to your car?” he said, going around me, standing behind me.
I turned, finding four guys, all with glowing skeletons painted on their faces. I wasn’t sure if it was the same four guys that were behind me earlier or not. I didn’t get a good look at them. I couldn’t remember.
“No,” I said, and my voice came out much calmer than I felt. My heart was stuck in my throat. “My car is right there.” I didn’t motion to it, because I didn’t want them to know how close I was and have one of them beat me to it if they didn’t know which one was mine.
They were herding me in, making me move further and further into the darkness, which was where my car was. My back felt totally exposed and vulnerable.
Even though my hands were trembling, I kept a firm grip on the fob, knowing it was going to be a near or miss thing once I hit the button and ran for it. I could try fighting these guys off, but there were four of them and only one of me. Those skeletons were as scary as hell in the darkness.
Fighting, I decided, was going to be a last resort.
Seconds. I only had seconds to make a decision. Close enough to my car, I was going to mace them with the bottle pointed behind me so that it would get them instead of me. Maybe it would give me an extra couple of seconds to open my door.
Instead of letting them push me back, I stopped walking. They did too. We all came face to face with each other. I said nothing and neither did they. It was a strange place to be—I expected them to make remarks about how I looked, or something a little more sinister, like what they were going to do to me—but none of them did. This close, though, I could see how dilated their eyes were. They had to be on something.
In a burst of unexpected energy, I turned and started to run. I heard feet running behind me, gaining, and right before I made it to my car, I ran into a hard chest. The collision was so hard that I almost fell backward. Strong arms kept me in place, and before I could fight them off, I looked up into the man’s face, my mouth open and prepared to scream as loud as I could.
“Assanti,” I whispered instead. His name was like an answered prayer in my darkest hour.
“Get in the car,” he said.
I didn’t move. Couldn’t. My knees were too unsteady.
His grip on my arms grew tighter in response, and instead of repeating himself, he took my keys from me, opened my door, set me down on the passenger side, and then shut me in. Before he did, though, I noticed a car just like mine, except all black, parked across from me. Quentin and Abe stood against it, both of their arms crossed, watching the four men.
The lights in the car turned off, and I couldn’t really see anything except for the four skeletons, whose neon paint glowed as brightly as mine. I wasn’t sure if they realized it or not, but just as they had marked me in the darkness, they were marked.
I’d heard things about Assanti—none of them good. He was a scary motherfucker being the consensus.
