Britta guffawed. “Oh, bless your heart, Jordy. I’m the best shot in this whole dang camp. I can kill those fuckers with my eyes closed. And you know it.”
Jordy put his hands up. “Can’t argue that, Brit. All I’m saying is Willow is gonna look good in whatever she wears.” He nudged my arm again. “I gotta head out. You be careful out there, alright? I’ll see you later?”
“Sure,” I mumbled, studiously avoiding eye contact with him.
“That boy has it so dang bad for you,” Britta said, eyeing Jordy’s departure. “You could tell him to jump and he’d ask how high.”
“Jordy has it bad for everyone,” Ella said pointedly. “No need to single Willow out.”
“Thank you,” I said firmly, looking at Britta. “We’re just friends—I don’t like him like that.”
Britta’s lips twisted into another sly smile. “Is that ‘cause you like someone elselike that?”
“What? Who?” Realizing her meaning, I flushed hot once more. Slamming my spoon down, I growled, “Could you stop? I already told you,that’s disgusting.”
“Fine,fiiiine,” Britta drawled, making a face. “I’m just messin’ with you, is all.” Straightening, she slapped her hands down on the table. “So about our shoppin’ trip—you ready to ride?”
“Don’t forget to run it by Leisel first,” Cassie warned. “Especially if you plan on taking a vehicle. And make sure you’re back before dark or—”
Britta groaned loudly. “Jesus Christ on a goddang cracker, Cassie, I know the rules.”
“You ever wonder why they didn’t name more schools after women?” Britta pointed a freshly sharpened machete at what remained of the building’s overhead lettering. RONALD HOPKINS HIGH SCHOOL, it read, give or take a few missing letters.
We’d been driving for most of the day, stopping at places that looked promising, only to pull away empty-handed. Now we were thirty miles or so from camp, and about to call it quits when we’d happened upon a school.Recalling my high school drama club, and the vast number of costumes they’d kept in storage, I’d suggested checking it out.
“Or why hurricanes and storms were only named after women?” I replied, swinging Britta’s beloved baseball bat from hand to hand.
Britta grinned. “Nuh-uh, I’m keepin’ that one—that’s a dang compliment. We’re the hurricanes, sugar, and all them storm chasers better take cover.”
Returning her grin, I gestured to the graying sky. “Speaking of storms. Logan’s knees never lie.”
Britta glanced up just as the first droplets of rain began to fall. “Best make this quick then,” she replied, gesturing me toward the school. “Ladies first.”
The glass entrance doors had been shattered, and we ducked easily through their gaping holes, stepping onto a floor littered with broken glass and debris. Like most man-made structures, nature was in the process of reclaiming this building as her own—bursting through the cracks in the walls, in the floor, and through the rotted ceiling tiles above.
The main office loomed just ahead, its interior window streaked with dried blood. A Creeper stood just inside, its mangled face staring blankly through the Plexiglas, its head and arms twitching.
Britta pointed and snorted. “I’m hopin’ that’s what my high school principal is doin’ right about now—twitchin’ like a dyin’ fish. Mr. O’Shea—that fuckin’ dirtbag—he used to wear these dang tap shoes, clickin’ his way down the hall so that the whole school would know he was comin’. Click-click-click—Lord, did I hate that man.”
Laughing, we moved down the hall, passing classrooms filled with toppled-over desks and ransacked shelves. Faded posters wallpapered the once colorfully decorated rooms while graying skeletons sat like Halloween decorations in various states of decay.
“What’s up with Eddie’s knees, anyway?” Britta asked. “He looks too young for his bones to be hollerin’ so loud.”
“He played football growing up, so that didn’t do him any favors,” I murmured, peering inside the damp and decaying remains of the school library. “But I think it’s mainly because he always carried the heaviest bag out on the road. And you’ve seen how many weapons he carries.”
Laughing, Britta shook her head. “Boy’s got more blades than a butcher.”
“More scalpels than a surgeon,” I added with a grin.
“More swords than a sea-roving pirate!”
“More knives than a ninja!”
“… do ninjas have knives?”
We staggered down the hall, howling with laughter. And, god, it felt good to laugh so freely, so deep from the belly, and without reservation. I hadn’t laughed this hard since… since Lucas.
“Well now, I’ve seen some crazy shit, but this might take the cake.” Britta bent down in front of an open locker, gently fingering the flower-covered vine growing within. The vine, peppered in pink and white blooms, had somehow found its way into the locker from the wall behind it, growing through a busted seam in the metal.
