Page 85

But it’s not wrong.

“Hugh didn’t carry me,” I say again, a little louder.

Something rests against my skin, something metal on my chest, something sticking in place. Something wet. Something smells something . . .

Chapter 81

Tress

I crawl on my elbows through the kitchen, black spots spraying my vision. I cry for Hugh, cry for help. I call for Brynn. I call for Maddie. I even call for Gretchen. No one comes.

I struggle to my feet, pulling myself up with a chair, and lurch to the door.

Chapter 82

Cat

The smell of the girl

is everywhere.

Red. Death.

Spots in the room

with the swinging boy

down these steps, a drop

I lick and taste

her last / best

Felicity / FELICITY

a puddle of her, in this room

with chairs

Felicity / FELICITY

a smear, by that door.

A beckoning, below.

Felicity / FELICITY

Chapter 83

Tress

Piles of people. Hands and arms and legs. Slick skin, pale faces. Hot breaths, warm and vacant, fill the air. There is no more laughter. All are silent.

Hugh, in his throne, suddenly small, bleary, barely there, a question not asked yet on his lips. Ribbit, naked, collapsed on the floor, the zigzag scar on the back of his calf bright and angry, fresh like only yesterday. The clock ticks, backward, the only thing moving in the room.

I’m down again, more blood out than in, crawling over people, but they are wrong, too small, hands and faces and feet, and the boy in the concert T-shirt is too young to be here, is only a child, who thought I was his mother in the stairwell; why are we all children again?

On the stairs, the clock stops.