What To Do About Wednesday

by Jennie Marts

  “That explains a lot.”

  “He has a friend who traced the weird activity on my profile to these computers too.” She motioned to Fitz. “This is Fitz, by the way. He’s my…”

  “Boyfriend,” he finished for her. “Sorry about the tackle, dude. We thought…you know.”

  Brandon nodded then tenderly touched his cheek. “Yeah, I know.”

  “I think you’re bleeding a little,” Piper told him. “You should probably get some ice on that.”

  “Agreed. I was pretty much done here anyway. I’m going home.” He pushed up from the floor and headed toward the door, then paused and turned back. “Would you consider doing an interview for my paper?”

  “I think our coffee date was an interview.”

  He grinned sheepishly. “Could I at least text you if I have any other questions?”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  His shoulders drooped, and he lifted his hand in a half-hearted wave. “Okay. See ya around.”

  Fitz slumped against the wall. “Well, this whole idea has been a bust.”

  “Not necessarily. We know now your friend was right and whatever weirdness was going on with the dating profiles thing did start here. Which strengthens the connection to the high school, and makes me even more suspicious of those other two guys who asked me out.”

  “True.”

  She glanced up as she heard the faint sound of a door closing somewhere in the school. “We forgot to ask Brandon how he got into the school.”

  “It’s an old building. There’s probably tons of ways to get in. And who knows—there could be other kids in here now.” He pushed up from the floor and dusted off his jeans.

  A shiver ran through her.

  Her phone vibrated in her pocket, and she almost wet her pants. “Holy crap. This creepy school is getting to me. My phone just went off and scared the heck out of me.” She pulled it from her pocket and checked the screen. “It’s a text from my mom.” She read it aloud. “Not that I'm worried. I know you’re an adult. But Nola was wondering how things were going and if you were okay.”

  Nice. Leave it to her mom to blame her worrying on the dog. But, surprisingly, Piper wasn’t that upset. It was kind of nice to have her mom actually worrying and noticing what she was doing. Maybe her mom had changed. A flicker of hope lit in her chest.

  She typed back a quick message. “Made a quick stop at old high school. Following a lead.”

  “High school? Weird. Did you find anything?”

  “No. Another dead end.” Piper cringed as she typed the word ‘dead’. “Heading back. Home in ten.”

  “I’ll let Nola know.” Smiley face emoji.

  She smiled. “My mom is such a dork. I told her we stopped here but were on our way home.” She shook her head then glanced up to see Fitz watching her, a grin on his face. “What?”

  “Nothing. It’s just nice to see you happy. And you have a great smile.”

  Ugh. People were always telling her she didn’t smile enough, and she waited for him to offer the familiar advice that she should do it more often. But he didn’t.

  He didn’t say anything more about it. He just leaned forward and pressed a quick kiss to the corner of her lip. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Wow.

  Her lip tingled where he’d kissed it. She really liked this guy.

  “Good plan. I wasn’t a huge fan of this school when I went here, but now it feels downright creepy.”

  They checked to make sure the computers were shut down then turned off the lamp and left the library.

  Fitz held her hand, which was not something that had happened often while she’d actually been in high school, and her thoughts were full of memories of the few months in which she’d attended there.

  They passed several display cases on the walls as they made their way toward the gym, and she ran her fingers down the glass of one and peered in at the pictures. “Are you in any of these?”

  Fitz pointed to the next one. “I think maybe that one. If they haven’t changed it. Remember our soccer team went to state last year? They did have a team picture next to the trophy.”

  She let go of his hand to cup her palms on the glass of the next case. “I think I can see you.” She pulled her phone back out and tapped the flashlight app then shined the light into the case. “Yep, there you are,” she said, aiming the light on the team picture. “Nice legs,” she teased.

  “Thanks.” He grinned then held out his hand. “Let me see your phone.”

  She passed it to him, and he held the light up as he crossed to the next case. “They had a bunch of pictures of the seniors in this one. I think I was in one of those.” He peered into the case then pointed into the upper corner. “That one. How about you? Are you in any of these?” He shined the light over the array of pictures as they searched for snapshots of each other.

  The display was titled “A day in the life of...”, and had obviously been meant to get a cross-section of all walks of the high school’s life. There were pictures of kids at dances and in the cafeteria and on the steps of the school. They were cheerleaders, pictures of sports teams, and a shot of the robotics club.

  Piper caught her breath as the light panned over a photo of a group of kids all dressed in black. There were six kids, all clothed in Goth attire, and leaning against the stone wall on the side of the school. A spray of lilacs bloomed in the background so it must have been spring, and a hard fist squeezed her heart as she recognized Luna and Dragon.

  Who would want to hurt them? Why?

  She pointed to the picture. “See that one? With all those kids in black? The two in the middle are Luna and Dragon.”

  Fitz held the light on the picture. “Are you in the shot?”

  “I don’t think so.” She panned her gaze over the other kids, then another shiver raced down her spine as she recognized one. “Wait. There—that’s him! That’s the kid in the car. The one I told you about. From the night of the party.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m positive. Look at how his hair covers his one eye. Just like I said.” She closed her eyes, concentrating, then popped them open as the name came to her. “Slay. That’s it. His name is Slay.”

  Fitz raised an eyebrow. “Slay?”

  She nodded. “I know. Weird. But, I’m sure of it. That must be what freaked me out last night. Remember you said some funny thing about slaying a beast? My subconscious must have been trying to tell me then.”

  “But surely that’s not his real name. It’s got to be one of those fake names he picked for himself. Do you know his real name?”

  “No. I barely remembered Slay.”

  He sighed. “I’m glad you remembered, but how does this help or tell us anything? So, what if he went to the party? We still don’t know if that party has anything to do with anything.”

  “But it’s our only connection between Kyle and Luna.”

  “But now that Brittany is taken out of the equation, we don’t know if Kyle’s connection means anything.”

  “True.” She studied the picture, trying to remember. The boy in the photo stared back at her, his one eye piercing and his mouth curved into the slightest grin, like he knew something the rest of the world didn’t.

  A tingling jolt prickled across her skin, and a sudden coldness clutched her insides. “I’ve seen that grin before,” she whispered. “That’s Clay.”

  “Clay? That douchey guy who took you to the ice cream place? I thought he was just trying to get you in the sack.”

  “He was. Or that’s what he acted like. But he also seemed familiar to me. Like I knew his brother or something.”

  “Are you sure? How did you not recognize him?”

  “Because he doesn’t look anything like this now. Do you remember him from the coffee shop? His hair is light brown instead of deep black, and it’s shorter and cut in a totally different style. He was taller too. I’m sure of it. He must have had a growth spurt over the summer. P
lus, he acted differently, like with more of a smug superiority or something. I remember the guy I first met seemed angry, but also a little shy. It’s like he transformed himself into a totally different person.”

  “That’s what happens when you spend three months in a medical psych ward,” a voice said from behind Fitz.

  Time seemed to slow as Piper jerked back, her mouth opening as she tried to scream, but no sound came out, her eyes wide with terror as she watched the hooded figure step out from the shadows of the hall, a gun clutched tightly in his hand.

  Piper’s heart was racing, nearly exploding from her chest, as she stared at the guy who had asked her out to ice cream and put his hand suggestively on her thigh. “Slay.”

  He winced at the nickname. “Slay is dead. He was a fool. A trusting idiot. He died the night of Senior Sneak—at that great party Luna talked us into going to. You remember that party, don’t you, Piper?”

  She nodded, unable to tear her gaze from him and the gun in his hand.

  Fitz had turned his body protectively in front of hers, his arms held out in a fighter’s stance. She was gripping the back of his jacket, the material clenched between her fingers.

  “I remember it. In fact, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forget it. I was new to the school, too. I’d only been there a few months. My mom and I came to live here to take care of my grandma. I don’t know if you ever knew that. I don’t know how you would—since you never actually talked to me.”

  “I’m sorry. It wasn’t you. I was just in a bad place and mad at everyone.”

  “You have no idea what it’s like to actually be mad at everyone,” he sneered. “But I do. Thanks to you and your friends. I certainly do.” His voice took on a sing-song quality which scared Piper almost as much as the gun.

  “They weren’t really even my friends. I barely knew them,” she stammered.

  “Apparently, they weren’t my friends at all.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about or why you’re doing this. But you don’t have to hurt us.”

  “Oh, but I do,” he said, both condescending and disdainful, as if he were speaking down to a servant or disobedient employee. “Because hurting you is the only thing I’ve thought about for the past four months. It’s what puts me to sleep at night and gets me excited when I wake up in the morning.”

  “Why? I didn’t do anything.”

  He chuckled, but not in a funny way—more like in a homicidal maniac kind of way. “That’s what I thought too. Again and again I asked myself why. Because I didn’t do anything either. I barely talked to anyone at that party, and I just wanted to go home. But when I looked for you guys, I stumbled upon Luna and some boy I didn’t know in one of the bedrooms. I know him now, and I can guarantee that Kyle Hammond will soon never forget me.” He got a weird look in his eyes and a creepy smirk crossed his face, and the hair lifted on Piper’s arms.

  “He freaked out and chased me through the house.” Clay continued his narrative. “If only I would have run out the front instead of the back, I would have been okay. But I didn’t know the house. I got confused. I just wanted out, so I ran through the back door instead. A couple of Kyle’s buddies were out there. They were standing by the keg and already piss-drunk, and when they saw Kyle chasing me, they joined in. They didn’t know me either. They didn’t even know why Kyle was chasing me—it was like mob mentality—or at least that’s how my therapist explained it.

  “I saw all the trees behind the house, and I thought if I ran into them I could lose them or they would give up. But they didn’t. They just kept chasing me. Kyle and his friends were on the soccer team so they were used to running, but I wasn’t. I was used to sitting in my room playing video games, which was what I’d wanted to do that night. Except Luna convinced me to go to the party. It was the first time anyone had invited me to do anything.” He let out a harsh puff of breath. “I was actually excited to go. I thought I was finally making some friends. Some friends you assholes turned out to be.”

  Piper didn’t know what to do, didn’t know how to escape. But she knew if he kept talking, at least he wasn’t trying to kill them. “I didn’t know about any of that. Not until Kyle told us about it a few days ago. I’m so sorry you were beaten up. That must’ve been awful. But it doesn’t justify killing all of us.”

  “Beaten up?” he scoffed. “Is that what he told you? That they beat me up?”

  She nodded.

  “I wish they would have only beaten me up. I could have handled that—I’d been bullied and hammered on before—that I could have survived. Make no mistake, they did work me over pretty good. All three of them getting in punches and kicks. Once they caught me and got me on the ground, I knew I was done for, so I just curled in a ball and waited for it to be over. But something came over them. I don’t know if it was because they were drunk or just assholes, but Kyle was the worst. It was his idea to strip my clothes off, and it was his belt they used to tie me naked to the tree. By that time, I was half-conscious and bleeding and just praying for them to leave. I was actually praying to be left alone in the woods. And that’s what happened. After repeatedly threatening he would kill me if I ever told anyone about what happened that night—about seeing him with Luna and that they were the ones who beat me—they finally left. They left me there, naked and bound to a tree, all alone in the forest.”

  Piper’s heart broke for the boy who had gone through something so awful. But her head reminded her he was somehow blaming her—blaming all of them—for what happened, and he was intent on making them pay.

  He glared at her and Fitz, his eyes narrowing to small slits as he raised the gun and pointed it toward them as if for emphasis. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to be stranded alone in the woods, naked and strapped to a tree?”

  She slowly shook her head, the mere idea of it sending goosebumps over her skin.

  “I’ll tell you what it’s like. First of all, it’s cold. Like really freaking cold. And I couldn’t curl up and use my own body for warmth because my arms were bound behind me. And when your arms are held that way for too long, they eventually lose their circulation then they’ll burn and cramp. And you think if you just yell loud enough or long enough someone will eventually hear you and find you, but pretty soon you’ve screamed yourself hoarse and no one has come. Then the paranoia sets in, and you’re praying someone finds you and also terrified someone will find you naked and bound—maybe an animal who could tear at your flesh, or maybe a deranged madman who will do worse things to you than a few jerky teenage boys.

  “But through it all, you hold out hope for rescue. Because you know that you came to the party with three other people—three friends who will eventually come looking for you. Even if one or two of them flake out and figure you found your own way home—one of them—just one would have to care enough to try to find you, to spend the time to figure out if you made it home safely or what happened to you.

  “So, you hang there, and you blink away the blood that’s seeping into your eye from the cut on your head, and you pull and strain and tear your fingernails trying to free yourself from that tree.” He stabbed the gun in the air to emphasize each word. “You cry, and you scream, and you beg, and you believe someone will come. Until somewhere in that long, cold night, you stop believing and your mind makes a little break—a tiny snap, but enough of a crack that by the time a hunter eventually finds you the next morning, you’re barely conscious and have changed into someone else. Someone who has retreated so far into the back of their mind that they refuse to talk about what happened to them or divulge the name of their assailants. The hunter, his name was Floyd, he wanted to call the police but I told him it was just a prank and asked him for a ride home. He gave me his jacket. This jacket.” He gestured to the sweatshirt he was wearing, and Piper recognized the faint camouflage pattern she’d seen when he’d attacked her.

  “My mother begged me to tell her what had happened, to tell the police, but I refused. She took
me to the emergency room, and they hooked me to an IV and treated my wounds, but no amount of fluids would heal my mind. The doctor called it a ‘brief psychotic disorder’ brought on by a traumatic event, and they put me in the mental hospital. Then my ‘brief disorder’ turned into what they call a ‘psychotic break from reality’, which seems like a funny name since it wasn’t a break at all. I spent my whole summer in that hospital. That’s why I never came back to school. Not that any of you bastards ever noticed I was gone. I finally broke down and told my therapist what’d happened, but I never gave him the names of the boys or told him how much I blamed you all for leaving me there. The hospital was terrible. I despised every minute I was there, despised all of you for putting me there. But those months away gave me plenty of time to plot my revenge and work out the perfect strategy for my final retaliation.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry that happened to you.”

  “I’m sorry that I accidentally mistook your roommate for you. It really set back my whole plan. It was that stupid sweater and the way she was wearing her hair. But I won’t make that mistake again.” Spittle flew from his lips as he spat the words at her. Narrowing his eyes, he pointed the gun at her chest. “I went to that awful party with three people. And all three of you deserted me. Acted like I didn’t matter. So, that’s how I’m treating you. Like you, and your lives, don’t matter.”

  “But our lives do matter,” Fitz said. It was the first time he’d spoken since Clay had stepped out of the darkness. “Don’t punish Piper. She told me about that night, and she was just as miserable as you were at the party. She left and walked home before any of those things even happened.”