The Dead Girls Club (ARC)

by Damien Walters

  There might’ve been signs of a struggle at her house, but that last night we weren’t there. We were here. The fine hairs on my nape rise. You don’t need flickering lights or doors slamming shut, the parlor tricks of a poltergeist, to be haunted. The true ghosts are made of deed and word and live deep inside the marrow and bone.

  She begged me to help her. And then her eyes closed.

  My own snap open. “Stop it,” I hiss, my voice loud and ragged. The photo is a weight in my pocket. I slip it out, shove it under my purse on the passenger seat.

  She begged me.

  I shake away the thoughts, jam the car in drive, and pull away as the first drops of rain strike my windshield.

  * * *

  With Ryan still out like a light, I slide out of bed, throw on leggings and a long-sleeved T-shirt, and grab my keys and purse, bagels and cream cheese on my mind. No rain today, but no sun either. A drowsy sort of day. I’m near Panera Bread when I turn toward Gia’s instead. It’s not the best idea, I know, but I’m so close and it’ll only take a few minutes. What’s the harm in driving by? If Ryan wakes and sees I’m not there, he’ll text me. I can tell him Panera was crowded. Won’t even be a lie. Not on a Sunday.

  The neighborhoods in West Annapolis are nice, most of the houses old but heavily renovated. Modest yards. SUVs with roof racks for kayaks and paddleboards. Cedar swing sets peeking over wood fences. An A-frame at the end of Gia’s street has a shiny blue-and-white FOR SALE sign in the yard. I drive slow, gaze panning left and right.

  I recognize Gia’s house from her Facebook photos. They’ve placed two Adirondack chairs, stained deep blue, on the front porch, a small table between. A hanging basket of flowers. Garage doors closed tight. No cars in the driveway. Front porch light still on. I drive to the bottom of the street, turn, and make another pass, driving even slower. Even though I’m not doing anything wrong, I feel conspicuous. Guilty.

  I park by the house for sale. Great idea number two. Why not make it three? Mouth dry, I act casual as I get out of the car and walk up to the front door. Peek in the window. The furniture inside is staged, so the owner’s already moved. To anyone who might be watching—and this neighborhood seems even quieter than mine—I’m interested in the property. After making a show of looking over the fence into the backyard, I take to the sidewalk.

  My heart beats double-time. I feel like a stalker, but I’m not. I’m investigating. I slow my steps, eye the neighborhood. I should go back. Get in my car. But no one’s around.

  Fingers taut, I approach Gia’s house. Two steps lead to the porch. Four to the front door. While it’s solid wood, there are narrow glass panels on each side. No curtains. Inside, a long hallway leads to a kitchen. To the left, a living room. To the right—

  Behind me, a door shuts with a heavy thud and I jump. I don’t see anyone, but it’s warning enough. Tonguing sweat from my upper lip, I make myself walk a normal pace down her steps, away from her house. Once I shut my car door, I giggle. Good one, Heather. Very clever. Maybe I should’ve knocked on her door, said I was in the neighborhood. Checking out old friends. Accidentally, of course.

  I rub the end of my nose with the side of my index finger. This peeking around does me no good. What can I hope to learn? Her taste in furniture? An accidental meeting, though … that could work. A way to get in front of her. To actually talk. To feel her out, so to speak. And no, she might not want to talk to me, but it’s at least worth a shot. Since we live so close, I should be able to manage something. Just not here. This was a fool’s game.

  My phone chimes with a message from Ryan: MORNING. I text him back with a quick AT PANERA, WANT ANYTHING SPECIFIC? I’m waiting for his response when a shadow falls across my lap and three raps sound on my window. I drop my phone, biting back a yelp.

  The man beside my car is in his midfifties. Short gray hair, slim build, navy-blue polo shirt. Narrow chin, deep brackets around his mouth, dark eyes. My instinct is to gun it, peel away from the curb fast, but I lower my window.

  “You lost?” he says, without a trace of kindness. A smell of aftershave lotion, the kind with a ship on the bottle. My dad used it when I was little.

  “No, but thank you for asking.”

  “I saw you looking at the house.” He nods toward the FOR SALE sign. “And walking.”

  Neither are questions. Did he see me on Gia’s porch?

  “I’m in the market for a new house, closer to work,” I say. “This neighborhood is one I’ve been thinking of. I have friends who live here.”

  He clears his throat, or maybe it’s a scoff of disbelief. “The realtor’s number is on the sign. If you want to see it, all you have to do is call.”

  Whatever would I do without you, Captain Obvious?

  My phone chimes again. “It was nice to meet you, but I need to take care of this.”

  He taps the side of his fist on the car window’s ledge and steps away, leaving me barely enough room. My stomach is fluttery, my fingers trembling.

  Fuck you.

  Fuck.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  THEN

  “What if you had to eat a bug? What would you eat?” Gia said.

  We were in the house, sprawled on the basement floor, and it was almost as dark as the first time we’d sneaked in, on account of the rain. We’d been lucky and made it inside right before it got bad and had been smart enough to take off our shoes so we wouldn’t track in mud.

  “That’s disgusting,” Rachel said.

  “A ladybug,” Becca said. “They’d be crunchy.”

  Gia and I cracked up, while Rachel made puking sounds.

  I said, “An ant. A teeny, tiny, baby ant.”

  “But if it’s so small, you might not be able to chew it,” Becca said. “It might crawl back up. Or come out of your nose!”

  Rachel shook her head. “I’d never ever eat a bug, no matter what.”

  “You have to pick,” Gia said.

  “Fine,” Rachel said. “I’d pick a cricket.”

  “They’re huge,” Gia said.

  “Yeah, but some people eat them,” Rachel said.

  Gia rubbed her chin as if she had a beard, and said, “I pick Heather to go next.”

  I already knew what I was going to ask. “What if you had to move someplace else? Where would you go?”

  “Alaska,” Rachel said. “To see penguins.”

  “Penguins aren’t in Alaska, dummy,” Becca said. “They’re in Antarctica and you can’t live there. It’s all ice.”

  “Oh,” Rachel said, and her face got all sad-hurt.

  “I’d live someplace warm,” Becca said. “Like Florida.”

  “But they have flying cockroaches,” I said.

  “So?”

  “What if they flew in your hair and got stuck?” I said.

  “I don’t want to what if anymore,” Rachel said. “Becca, can you tell the rest of the story now?”

  “Yes, tell the rest,” I said. I’d tried to get Becca to tell us—or at least me—more, but she wouldn’t.

  “Please,” Gia said, her hands clasped together under her chin.

  Becca leaned back on stick-straight arms.

  “Come on, Bec,” I said.

  “Yeah, come on,” Rachel said.

  Becca grinned slow and wide, like a Cheshire cat. “O-kay. I can’t tell you the rest—I told you it was long—but I can tell you some more.”

  She stared at the ceiling, her mouth working for what felt like forever before she said, “The people decided to dig the Red Lady out, but when they dug the hole, it was empty, remember?” She waited for us to say yes. “They left it like that and no one talked about her. Like nothing had happened. But they all had dreams, remember that, too?”

  Again, she waited for us to respond.

  “Good. So the dreams stopped, but everyone felt like they were being watched all the time, no matter where they went. Then they started hearing their name whispered. At first they thought it was a neighbor or something, but no on
e else was ever there. One night a woman woke up and thought it was her son, but he was asleep. The voice kept saying her name, so she followed it outside, thinking maybe someone was hurt. The next morning a neighbor found her in the hole, dead, mouth full of dirt.”

  “Gah,” Rachel said, covering her mouth.

  I tugged on my lower lip and ran my tongue across the back of my teeth. I wondered if the woman was dead first or if the dirt killed her.

  “But the worst part?” Becca said.

  “What?” Gia said.

  “They found a long, smeary trail of blood on the ground leading to the hole. They buried the woman and filled the hole back in, but that night, the man who found the woman heard the voice, too. He went to look and bam, gone. They found the hole open and him in it the next day. No matter how many times they filled the hole, it kept happening. And even though people knew they shouldn’t follow the voice, knew it was a trick, they couldn’t help it. It was like they had to go, and when they did they ended up dead. They tried tying each other up at night, but it didn’t help. They’d find piles of rope where people should be. They tried putting cotton in their ears, but it didn’t work either because they were hearing the voice only with their minds.

  “One man packed up his family and left. For two days, nobody heard the voice, but the morning after that, they found the man’s wife in the hole, cold and dead. The next night, his son, and the night after, the man.”

  “She wouldn’t let them leave,” I said.

  “Right. Every morning someone else turned up dead until everyone was gone.”

  I clapped. I shouldn’t have been happy, but they shouldn’t have buried her alive. And Becca was right about the women who were supposed to be the Red Lady’s friends. It didn’t matter if they were scared; you always helped your friends.

  “So that’s it? Everyone died?” Gia said. “Then what? Did the witch go away?”

  “I didn’t say it was the end of the story,” Becca said. “It’s the end of this part.”

  “Wait,” Rachel said. “If the witch didn’t have hands, how could she have put the dirt in their mouths? She wasn’t even alive anymore, was she?”

  Gia grunted and clutched her belly. At my frown, she said, “I have cramps.”

  “Ugh, I have my period, too,” I said.

  “Me three,” Becca said.

  We all looked at Rachel.

  “I don’t have mine,” she said. “But I can tell it’ll be any day.”

  “That’s so weird, right?” Gia said. “That we all get it the same time?”

  “Nah, my mom and I get it close, too,” I said. “She said it happens when girls are around each other a lot.”

  “I hate it,” Gia said.

  She’d had it the longest, since she was eleven. I’d had it for six months, Becca a little longer, and Rachel only two months ago. Afterward, her mom wanted to have the talk with her. Talk about embarrassing. We already knew about sex. My parents had told me when I was nine because I’d heard a kid at school talking about a vagina kiss, so I’d asked what it was. All our parents would’ve had heart attacks if they’d known we’d found a magazine in the field last year and knew a lot more than anyone had told us.

  “I want to use tampons,” Gia said. “But my mom said no.”

  “My mom said the same thing,” I said. “She said I was too small inside.”

  “I used one of my mom’s once,” Becca said. “And you can’t be too small, because babies come out and—”

  “You did?” I said. “You never told me.”

  “I didn’t have any pads left. What was I supposed to use?”

  “What did it feel like?” Gia asked.

  “Kinda weird at first, but it was gross when I took it out. It smelled like raw hamburger.”

  “That’s what pads smell like anyway,” I said.

  “Yeah, but it was different,” Becca said.

  “Hey, I think it stopped raining,” Rachel said. “Want to walk around?”

  “Not if it’s muddy out, no,” I said.

  “Want to watch a movie?” Gia said. “We rented Dick Tracy from Blockbuster.”

  “Please be kind,” I said.

  “And rewind!” Becca finished.

  “I’m serious,” Gia said. “And maybe you can tell more of the story after?”

  “Maybe,” Becca said.

  But when the movie credits rolled, she said she had to go home, so I went with her because it was close to dinnertime. Halfway to my house, it started showering again and she grabbed my wrist.

  “It’s only rain,” she said as I tried to pull away.

  “I don’t want to get wet.”

  “We’re already wet!” She jumped in a puddle on the sidewalk, the way we did when we were little, splashing water everywhere.

  “I’m getting soaked,” I said, peeling my shirt away from my body. As soon as I let go, it stuck to my skin again, a soggy lasagna noodle at the bottom of a pot.

  “So go home then,” she said.

  “You won’t be mad?”

  “Uh-uh.” I couldn’t tell if she was serious or not, but my hair was plastered to my back and my socks were a sopping mess. When I got to the end of the street, she was still outside, face turned up to the sky, all of her blurry, but not so I couldn’t tell she was happy.

  * * *

  It rained the rest of the week. Becca ate dinner with us Friday night and ran home after to change her shirt because she spilled spaghetti sauce on it. While I was waiting for her to get back, a neighbor brought over my mom’s Avon order. Mom asked if I’d borrowed any money from her wallet, which I hadn’t, and then she sent me out to ask my dad for some. He was taking pictures of a crunched bumper on his car where some-asshole-hit-it-in-the-parking-lot-and-didn’t-even-leave-a-note. Becca came running up the sidewalk at the same time.

  “Hey, girls,” my dad said, lifting his camera. “Say cheese!”

  We linked arms, and right before Dad snapped the picture, Becca grabbed my braid and pulled it forward. My mom was tapping her foot when I brought her the money, and she shooed us upstairs so I could pack for spending the night with Becca.

  When we got to Becca’s, her mom was upstairs and didn’t even come down to say hello. I’d never tell my mom, though. She’d get upset.

  We went down to the TV room in the basement; the living room was all fancy furniture and a big glass case of creepy antique dolls. If you looked at them the wrong way, their eyes followed you. Becca said they’d been in her family for a long time, but she couldn’t wait to smash them to pieces. I’d help her, too.

  After we watched Full House, we put on MTV and danced around until her mom yelled to turn it down because she had a headache. Becca turned it super low and said, “She can’t even hear it up in her room, no matter how loud it is.”

  Her mom had never been the chaperoning-on-field-trips kind of mom. But if she gave us a ride somewhere, she’d never minded if we told ridiculous knock-knock jokes like knock-knock, who’s there, Europe, Europe who, no, you’re a poo or sang along to the radio. I wasn’t sure when she’d stopped letting us, but the last time I’d ridden in their car there was all this silence, so big it hurt my ears.

  Becca rubbed her side and her shirt lifted, revealing three scabbed lines like healing cat scratches, but she didn’t have a cat.

  “What are those?” I said, my voice low.

  “Nothing,” she said, pushing her top back down fast.

  I tried to grab for her shirt, but she shoved me away, hard enough I had to pinwheel my arms to keep from falling.

  “Stop!” she said.

  “Sorry, sorry.”

  She tugged her ear. “It’s nothing. I scratched myself the other day. It’s not a big deal.”

  “Then why are you acting like it is?”

  “I’m not,” she said, turning so I couldn’t see her. “You are.”

  “Do they hurt?”

  She blinked at me a few times, then went upstairs, walking the way my mo
m did when she was late for work. She was getting out mint chocolate chip ice cream when I went up.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Okay,” she said, but she didn’t sound okay at all. I wasn’t sure if she was mad about the scratches, but I didn’t want to ask and make her even more mad at me.

  We were only there for a couple minutes when Becca’s mom thudded down the steps. We hurried but weren’t finished scooping the ice cream, then Becca dropped the scoop in the sink and had to rinse it off.

  “What are you girls doing?” Mrs. Thomas said, leaning against the doorway, holding an empty glass.

  “What’s it look like?” Becca said. “We’re getting ice cream.”

  “Don’t eat all of it. I might want shome, some, too.” When she spoke, her mouth was trying too hard to make the right shapes.

  I moved as close to the counter, as far away from her, as possible. I wanted to run back down to the basement, but Becca was between me and the door. And anyway, I’d never leave my best friend like that.

  Becca and I kept hurrying as her mom pulled a bottle of wine from the refrigerator. After she filled her glass, the wine sloshing near the top, she petted my hair. I hated when people did that without asking, but I held still, even though my hands were shaking.

  “You’re a good kid, Heather,” she said.

  “Thank you, Mrs. Thomas,” I said, the words barely above a whisper.

  “And sho polite.”

  When she let go of my hair, I exhaled long and slow. Becca shoved the ice cream container, lid only half closed, toward me, and I put it in the freezer.

  “Are you girls watching television?”

  “Come on,” Becca said, nudging my foot.

  “I’m not finished talking to you.”

  “Our ice cream’s going to melt,” Becca said.

  Mrs. Thomas laughed, the sound like a glass dropped on pavement. “Go then,” she said. She took a couple steps forward, moving in a zigzag rather than a straight line. Wine crested the edge of the glass and ran down her hand.

  “Let’s go,” Becca hissed, and slammed the basement door shut behind us.

  I tensed, waiting for her mom to yell, but she didn’t. We sat between the coffee table and sofa, ate our ice cream, and didn’t say anything. Her mom banged around in the kitchen, opening and closing cabinets, before thumping up the main staircase.