Emma 9:48 pm:I’m so sorry, Lou.
Text conversation, March 20, 2019
CHAPTER 16
There’s a hand on my forehead, and then gentle fingers in my hair.
I’m flat on my back with my hands over my head. Ellis stands over me. His head is framed by blackened sky and white pinprick stars. He’s wearing white scrubs and a leather necklace. At the end is the crosshair symbol and a silver dog whistle. Whatever I’m lying on comes up to his waist. The word “altar” comes to mind.
The night sky and his face blend together. Every inch of my skin feels hot and overly sensitive except for my feet and hands, which are cold. No—numb. Something rough and stinging is tied around them. I twist my hands and gasp when rope burns lines into my skin.
“Ah-ah,” Ellis admonishes. “I know it’s tight. You killed Leah handcuffed and chained to a wall. We’re taking no chances.”
I shake my head, which is a mistake, because there’s still a water balloon where my skull is supposed to be.
It was me, but it also wasn’t. The thing stretched along my back wasreal. Right?
His smile is self-indulgent. Warm light moves across his face. It casts him as soft and inviting, like someone who would put his arm around you when you cross the street.
I can’t believe I wanted to fuck him.
We’re surrounded by lanterns like tiki torches, all strung together by a garland of twine and crosshair chimes. The lanterns form a long rectangle of flickering light that stretches from the deck to about halfway down the yard. Ellis and I are at one end.
At the other sits the box from the killing field.
Someone has brought it here from the woods and laid a path directly to me.
Warm light from the lanterns spills onto the wood. The changing shadows illuminate etchings on the metal bands. Dozens—hundreds—of circles, each split into four by crosshairs.
My heart thumps a drumbeat that gets quicker and quicker. Humming and the placidtock, tock, tockof the chimes fills my head. Goose bumps spread down my arms. Suddenly, I’m shivering, shaking because of what comes next.
But what comes next? I don’t understand. Why do I feel like I’m—
burning, burning if it touches you, the sound comes closer and you make yourself small to fit into the meager dark, the door descends and you watch him, the dream of bloody meat in your mouth—
Ellis pinches the inside of my biceps.
I flinch and look away. My eyes sting like I’ve been staring at the sun. The humming fades; the shivers and the fear remain.
Ellis. It was Ellis in the… memory? It felt like a memory.
He looks down at me with an amused expression. “I’m sure it’s difficult to focus right now, but I’d like you to try. It can be distracting. Wonderful craftsmanship, don’t you think?”
Even after clearing my throat, my voice is raspy. “What—?”
“The crate. They just don’t make them like that anymore.”
Again, I look at the box. The door that had revealed an inky darkness inside is now closed.
What’s gonna come out of that? Don’t you wanna see? Don’t you wanna know?
Don’t you wanna crawl inside and join all the delicious dark things that’ve walked in, beenpulledin before you—
I pull my gaze away. I didn’t notice the folding chairs set up like pews on either side of the lanterns. Ten, maybe fifteen in total.
Ellis taps my forehead. “Eyes over here, kiddo. It’ll suck you in if you look at it too long. Scramble your eggs…”
He trails off. The quiet stretches. He wants me to ask. The need to talk, to unfurl his knowledge for someone, drips from him like sweat. There’s always a reason behind awful people doing morally bankrupt things. It’s the same one again and again: they’re special and that specialness means they have the right, no, theobligation, to make the special decisions and to be considered the most.
