Dead Girls Society

by Michelle Krys

  “Jesus,” Lyla mumbles.

  Nikki’s jaw hangs open. I give them a moment to digest this.

  “I thought it was just a fluke,” I continue, “but then I got a text.” I pull out my phone, open to the message, and pass it around the group.

  “What does this mean?” Lyla asks.

  “It means I was punished for getting in a boat instead of letting the gator eat me.”

  “So are you kicked out of the game?” Hartley asks.

  I shake my head. “No. That’s the weird thing. I got an invite. It was in my locker this morning.”

  “Why would the Society want you to keep playing if they think you cheated?” Nikki asks. “They didn’t make me keep going. After the hospital, I didn’t get anything.”

  “Maybe because you technically completed the dare, you just didn’t stick the landing,” Lyla says, trying to make these pieces fit together in a way that makes sense. “I mean, I went after her. She didn’t call for help.”

  I don’t mention I had no intention of swimming back on my own before the gator made his appearance.

  “Well, it doesn’t seem fair,” Nikki says.

  “We don’t make the rules,” Lyla answers.

  “They do,” I say, feeling heavy. “And we don’t have a choice in the matter.”

  Distantly someone coughs and a fax machine hums to life.

  “Maybe we can get out if we can’t play,” Farrah suggests. “Maybe we just need to break something.”

  “Easy, Tiger,” Hartley says. “Don’t get any ideas.”

  Farrah blows out a breath. “So what do you suggest we do about this?”

  “I think it’s time we call the police,” I say. “They think the car was an accident right now, but I can show them this text. Maybe they can trace it, and this can all be over.”

  “No,” Farrah says. “We’ve talked about this already. No cops.”

  “That was before my car exploded,” I protest.

  “Think it through,” Hartley says. “The Society has been smart about everything, so what are the chances they used a phone you can trace?”

  “Besides,” Lyla adds more gently, “it’s not like the text references the car. It’s a weak connection at best.”

  “But—” I stop. They’re right. They’re 100 percent right, and it makes everything so much worse. “This is getting really crazy,” I say. “I’m scared.”

  Admitting it out loud makes me realize how true it is. I used to think I liked being scared. Ethan and I have watched countless gory horror movies together, and I never once closed my eyes. But this is different. This is real life, and it isn’t fun or exciting or thrilling. It’s raw terror. Life poised on a knife-edge, never knowing where the blow is going to come from next, who is going to get hurt.

  “We’re all scared,” Lyla says, putting a hand on mine. “We just have to stick together.”

  The bell rings, and Nikki shoots out of her seat. Everyone begins to disperse.

  “Wait! What are we doing about tonight?” I ask.

  Hartley pushes off the wall, a humorless smile turning up her lips. “It’s like you said. We don’t really have a choice.”

  Mom’s against the charity event. Big surprise. She lays out her case as if she’s arguing in front of a judge: It’s too much. It’s too dangerous. I’d be missing my evening treatment. I shouldn’t be out late on a school night. Besides, don’t I have homework?

  I listen to her patiently, chewing on my salted ribeye steak, and when there’s finally a break in the conversation, I argue as if I’m a criminal on death row: It’s not too much—I won’t dance, I’ll sit down if I feel too tired, and I’ll call her with updates every hour if she wants. Every half hour, even! The nurse can do my treatment before I go. I’m finished with all my homework, and the history midterm isn’t due for three weeks. Besides, it’s just one night. I deserve to have some fun every now and then.

  And then I bring out the big guns: what is life if I just spend it cloistered inside the house?

  It’s a cheap shot, but it worked to get me into school.

  And it works now.

  Mom sighs heavily and sets down her fork, and I abandon my dinner to run around the table and squeeze her neck so hard she makes exaggerated choking noises.

  “What are you going to wear?” Jenny asks, now that the battle’s done.

  “I’m borrowing something from a friend.”

  “Who?” she asks, suspicious. She knows as well as I do how limited my pool of friends is.

  “Farrah. Why?”

  “Oh my God, Farrah Weir-Montgomery?” Jenny squeals.

  “How do you know her?”

  “Please. Everyone knows her. Can I come too?”

  “No,” Mom and I say at the same time. Jenny pouts.

  But Jenny’s enthusiasm is infectious. I can’t believe Mom actually said yes. I’m going on a date!

  A few weeks ago I thought I’d die in my bedroom without ever experiencing any of the normal things teenagers get to do. And then that invitation turned up in my in-box. Next thing I knew I was sneaking out of the house at midnight, kissing a boy, and going on a date. Ever since the mysterious Society came along, my life has changed for the better.

  Minus the car.

  I suddenly feel guilty that I’m going to be sneaking out of the house in six hours to play a game that’s already cost Mom so much.

  “Hey, Mom, do you want to watch a movie tonight?” I ask. “I miss just hanging out.”

  “Oh,” she says, clearly surprised. “I was going to deal with rental car stuff, but…I can do that later.” Her whole face brightens. “And that reminds me. We got something in the mail today from your dad. He says hello. Sent us a bit of cash too. Isn’t that nice? Couldn’t have come at a better time.” She beams.

  “Really? Can I see it?” Jenny asks excitedly.

  I work to rearrange my face into a happy expression. It was the only way I could think of to give Mom the money from that first night at the warehouse without raising a bunch of alarms. Now I feel bad about how excited she seems at the contact from Dad. How excited Jenny seems.

  “Sure,” Mom says, getting up from the table and returning a moment later. “I thought he was in New York, but it was a Louisiana stamp. Maybe he’s going to stop by soon?” She passes her the envelope I picked up from a convenience store a few days ago.

  Jenny takes it, her eyes traveling over my sloppy attempt to forge Dad’s handwriting, and understanding slowly dawns on her face. She glances up at me, and I look away sharply, clearing my throat.

  “So, Jenny, you wanna join our movie date?” I ask, changing subjects.

  There’s a long pause.

  “Nah, you guys do your thing. I’ve got stuff.” She tosses the envelope at me so that the sharp edge hits me in the chest, pops up from the table, and disappears to her room.

  “Don’t mind her,” Mom says. “You know she just misses her father.”

  I nod and try to force a smile.

  “So, what movie?” Mom asks brightly.

  Lyla is waiting for me promptly at quarter to twelve. She’s tense at the wheel, staring resolutely at the cracked parking lot while I climb into the passenger seat and drag my purse into my lap. Her blond hair is pulled into a high ponytail that looks moderately painful.

  “Did something happen?” I ask.

  She forces a smile and shifts into drive, pulling out of the parking lot. “No, nothing new. I’ve just been thinking about our conversation in the library today.”

  “And?”

  “And I really think it’s best if we just keep our heads down and do what they say.”

  “But I think we can still figure out who’s behind this.” I swivel to face her with my whole body. The Quarter whirs by outside the window, a flash of color and light. “I know you don’t want to talk about it, but that first night, at the warehouse, everyone got weird when I asked them what the Society had on them….”

  Lyla looks away. />
  “If it can help us figure out who’s behind this, please tell me. I won’t say anything to the other girls if you don’t want me to. I just…feel like I need to know.”

  Lyla works her jaw, fingers gripped so tightly on the wheel that her knuckles turn white. Just when I think she’s going to refuse, she speaks.

  “She died.” Her voice is hoarse and gritty. “My sister. She was depressed, I knew that, but I didn’t really know how bad it was. The week before, I asked her if I could borrow her sweater and she told me I could keep it. It was weird—I mean, she loved that sweater. But I didn’t realize…They say it’s a warning sign. When people start giving away their stuff. It was a warning, and I missed it.”

  She swallows hard.

  “That night she had her music on really loud. We got in a big fight about it, and I said some things I regret. You know, when you’re in the heat of the moment and you say the one thing you know will push the other person’s buttons just to see them react?” She shakes her head, the ends of her ponytail grazing her shoulder. “I had an awards banquet that night, and when I got home, there was an ambulance in the driveway. Mom went crazy after. I never told her what happened—that I’d said the thing that made her do it.”

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I say gently, horror and sorrow filling every bit of me. “You can’t think that way.”

  Lyla shrugs. “Anyway, that’s what the Society threatened me with. Telling Mom I was behind my sister’s death.”

  “But you aren’t!”

  “Doesn’t matter. My mom’s so fragile. She had to be hospitalized when it happened. She spent over a month in the Pavilion, and she’s only just starting to get better. Even now she sometimes stares off into space, and I get so worried….Something like this could send her over the edge. I can’t lose her. She’s all I have left. My dad’s a total write-off now. After my sister died, he started putting in all these crazy hours at work. He’s just checked out.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say after a long beat. There’s nothing else to say.

  It all makes sense now. Why Lyla left school and a promising basketball career last year, why she’s back now.

  “Who else knew?” I ask.

  “See, that’s the thing,” Lyla says. “No one. I never told a soul.”

  “Did your sister have any friends? Anyone she might have called?”

  “No,” she says without hesitation, and I remember what she said before about her sister being bullied so badly she had to be homeschooled. “Well, she did have one good friend, but she ditched her when things got hard.”

  I frown. Finally, finally, someone opens up, reveals her dark secret, and it doesn’t get us any closer to finding out who is behind the Society.

  We reach the old warehouse with ten minutes to spare. Farrah’s BMW is parked out front, but when we go inside, she’s nowhere to be found.

  “Farrah?” I call, moving deeper into the dusty room. My voice echoes on the high ceilings.

  Lyla sits down on an upturned crate. “Maybe she had to pee.”

  I sit too. The jar is here, sitting in the center of the floor like an offering. I’m tempted to take whatever dare is hidden inside and burn it. But who am I kidding? I’m not that brave.

  Two more minutes pass, and no Farrah. It’s so unlike her to go off on her own in the dark, and I start to worry. “Don’t you think we should just make sure she’s okay?” I ask.

  Lyla shrugs. “She wouldn’t do it for us, but I guess, if you want.”

  “Just a quick sweep,” I say.

  Lyla pushes up and heads toward the stairwell at the back of the room. I start to follow, but a noise from a darkened corridor catches my attention. Lyla’s footsteps clomp above my head. I pull out my cell and open the flashlight app, holding it out against the lurking shadows as I creep forward. Something clatters in a room to my left, and I leap away from the door, heart racing.

  Someone is in there.

  I hesitate, then reach for the handle and whip the door open.

  It takes me a moment to process what I’m seeing. Which is Hartley. And Farrah. Making out.

  Hartley presses Farrah into the wall of a small storage closet. Farrah’s skirt is bunched up her thighs, which are wrapped around Hartley’s waist, and she’s got her fingers tangled into Hartley’s spiky hair.

  They break apart when they see me, and Farrah quickly readjusts her skirt and wipes her lips.

  “What are you doing here?” she demands, when I should be the one asking her that. But I’m too stunned to do anything. Farrah and Hartley? I start to wonder if I hit my head really hard, if this is all just a dream and I’m asleep at home.

  Footsteps echo down the hallway. Farrah leaps out of the closet, and Hartley follows, smiling smugly. There’s lipstick smeared around her mouth. Farrah sees it.

  “Wipe your mouth!” she hisses.

  “Now you’re shy?” Hartley teases. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so pleased.

  The footsteps draw nearer.

  “Hurry!”

  “Yes, princess,” Hartley mutters, wiping a hand over the evidence.

  Lyla jogs up, panting for breath. “Oh, good. You found her. Hey, Hartley. I didn’t know you were here too. What were you guys doing?”

  “Looking for the Society,” Farrah pipes up brightly. “No sign.” She levels a warning look at me before pushing past us toward the meeting room. Everyone else follows. Hartley lags behind, grinding her lighter so hard it’s a wonder it doesn’t shatter in her grip.

  I replay every antagonistic conversation I’ve ever heard between Farrah and Hartley and realize the startling truth: Farrah doesn’t hate Hartley. She loves her, and she doesn’t want anyone to know.

  It’s her big secret. What the Society is using against her.

  When we reach the main room, Farrah unceremoniously pulls our next dare from the jar. We circle around as she reads aloud:

  “Go to the Rheem Manufacturing plant. Further instructions await you.” She drops her hand.

  “I guess I’m driving again?” Lyla says, breaking the tense silence.

  Everyone nods. Everyone except Hartley, who has abandoned her lighter and is now tapping away at an ancient cell with a worn skull-and-crossbones case and a giant crack down the screen. Leave it to Hartley to make texting look badass.

  “Hartley?” Farrah says tersely.

  She slowly drags her eyes up, an eyebrow cocked high. “Yes, princess?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, are we bothering you? We were just discussing getting to the plant. But by all means, finish texting.” Farrah crosses her arms. “Who are you even talking to, anyway?”

  “Jealous?” Hartley asks.

  Farrah’s cheeks flush. “No! God!”

  I look at the floor. It’s weird watching them argue, now that I know they’re some sort of secret couple.

  “That’s what I thought.” Hartley shoots out the door, and Lyla trails behind her. I start to follow, but Farrah grabs my arm.

  “About what you saw—”

  “It’s okay,” I interrupt.

  “Not, it’s not,” she says through her teeth, then flicks her eyes at the door. “If anyone found out, I’d be ruined.”

  I roll my eyes. “Farrah, it’s 2016. No one cares if you’re a lesbian.”

  Farrah laughs humorlessly. “It might look like the world is all full of rainbows and gay pride parades, but it’s not like that for us in the real world, okay? My grandmother’s eighty-four years old and a staunch Republican. Last year when we were at the club having brunch, she asked the manager if we could be moved to another section because she didn’t want to be served by a gay guy. If she knew about me, she’d disown me.”

  I don’t know what to say. To Farrah, this secret is as weighty— as potentially destructive—as Lyla’s. Revealing it would change her life dramatically.

  Farrah misinterprets my silence and continues. “And it’s not just my grandmother. Hartley has a criminal record. My dad would freak if he k
new I was with someone like her. It would ruin his campaign. Just promise me you won’t tell anyone.” Her fingernails dig into my arm, and she pleads with her eyes.

  “Okay, okay, I promise.”

  She lets go of my arm and starts toward the door. I hesitate, thinking of Ethan.

  “But, Farrah?” She stops short. The moonlight fracturing in through the door makes her dark hair look gilded. “If you care about her, don’t let her slip away. She’s not going to wait around forever.”

  “I don’t love her,” she says. A crease forms between her brows, and a corner of her lip turns down, then she turns for the door.

  No one talks in the car, and not even the radio on full blast can dispel the thick tension in the air. Every passing minute I keep almost saying something, then chickening out, until it reaches a point where it would be more awkward to talk.

  We finally reach our destination: a sun-faded brownstone that stretches three stories high and half a city block wide. The name RHEEM MANUFACTURING is stamped across the front in chipped block script. The huge parking lot is empty and tapers off into bulrushes and train tracks.

  We climb out of the car and begin a cautious approach. Farrah pulls a tube of lip gloss out of her purse and slicks it over her lips with quick, practiced strokes as she eyes the shadowy windows. I realize now that it’s probably more a nervous habit than a vain one.

  “Does anybody see anything?” Farrah asks.

  But no one answers. Obviously we’ll have to get closer to find the instructions.

  “Maybe we have to free-climb the building?” Hartley suggests. She hikes up her jeans as she strides across the blacktop, only to have them fall halfway down her ass again.

  “Doubt it,” Farrah says. “We already did a dare involving heights.”

  “I guess the rule book forbids doing that twice?” Hartley says.

  Farrah rolls her eyes.

  “Maybe it’s like a face-your-worst-fear type of thing,” I say, hoping I’m wrong.

  Hartley’s in the spirit of the game now and adds, “Maybe we have to go through a meat grinder or something.”

  “Oh my God, Hart!” Farrah says.

  Lyla makes a disgusted face and puts up her hands. “Okay, enough guessing. Let’s just…go inside and see.”