When We Were 8

by catt dahman

  Jill’s mother touched her husband’s hand and shook her head in a warning and said, “Let’s brighten the mood, okay?”

  Jill’s parents and the three girls played a heated game of Monopoly, and Bill Havilland won as he always did. Jill pretended to sulk, and he harassed her. She accused him of cheating as was expected, and he cackled at her. It was the same as always. He was a clown. Afterwards, the girls went to Jill’s room.

  “It’s like it never happened,” Samantha said.

  “I guess it’s over. I don’t think about it like I did the first day and the second. I keep thinking that they were caught swimming and died on the rocks, like everyone says. I’ve heard it so much that I believe it now.”

  Jill had to give Cassie credit. That was true. “It was kind of an accident anyway. Most of it was,” Jill said. “I don’t know if I can forget it, though.”

  “I won’t forget. We did it. We took care of things. We’re strong together, and no one can mess with the eight of us,” Samantha said. She brushed her hair, and her pretty face formed lines as she grimaced. “After Lucy was hurt and we became friends, I felt stronger, but now….”

  “I feel invincible,” Cassie said, “and no one hurts one of us or else!”

  “We can’t go around…yanno….” Jill warned. “I mean that one boy hurt Angel. The other…if we hadn’t done anything, they’d have beaten us or done something far worse. They would have done something terrible, I know. It was self-defense, if anything.”

  “They might have killed Nelwynn. It was close anyway. It was really self-defense,” Samantha said. “What we did makes me less afraid of people who might hurt me.”

  “And we can deal some mild payback if we need to,” said Cassie as she smiled.

  “Do you feel different? Besides feeling stronger?” Jill asked.

  Samantha thought. She paused mid stroke with her brush. “I feel like we have to be smarter and braver. We have to make it all matter. You know Rex would have raped someone else. And someone else and on and on. We saved girls. It’s a responsibility in a way.”

  “I feel kind of guilty at times,” Jill admitted.

  “Get over it,” Cassie said and hit Jill with a pillow. A pillow fight and giggles followed, and after they were tired, Jill and Samantha crawled into the bed, and Cassie curled up in the sleeping bag as they talked about other interests until they fell asleep. There was not enough guilt or responsibility to keep them from sleeping well.

  Chapter 9

  Once, as they spent the night at Tiffany’s house, she brought up Rex and John Wisdom, and the topic made Jill and Cassie uncomfortable. Before they could change topics, Tiffany went on, “Rex and John got what they deserved, but remember it was Billy who pushed Angel down in the snow. And Tom was right in on it.”

  Cassie fumed, “I hate Tom Richter. My mom says he’s the one been poisoning my dogs and cats.”

  “What an asshole. How does he get by with it? He’s the same old jerk as always,” Jill said.

  Cassie nodded and said, “Billy never changed. Remember a few years back when he was the one who was at the lake with that kid, and they were drunk, jumping off the cliffs, and Billy caused that kid to fall and break his back and bust his head?”

  “I remember that. That boy is like a vegetable now, isn’t he? In some hospital?” Tiffany asked.

  “He was. He died last year,” Jill added. “Everyone says Billy bullied him to jump and may have pushed him, but who knows what happened?”

  Cassie grinned and said, “I have a great idea, but it’s going to take a lot of bravery. In fact, it would be fun to do, and I brought some of the stuff we’d need.”

  “Need for what?” Jill asked.

  “To scare the hell out of those two freaks, Billy and Tom. Payback for the misery they’ve caused. Two in the morning like clockwork, they head down my road, coming back from the bar where they managed to get in. Even though they’re too young, they get in.”

  “Bad payback?” Jill asked, worried.

  Cassie laughed, “I wish. No, just some fun payback where no one gets hurt but one they won’t soon forget.”

  Cassie outlined part of her plan, and Jill and Tiffany giggled like mad, listening. “And we’ve gotta do it because the rest are meeting us. Angel and Nelwynn are staying with Whitney, and Meg is spending the night with Sammie, and they promised.”

  Tiffany pouted and said “You had a plan and didn’t tell us until now? That’s not fair, Cassie.”

  “I didn’t tell you because we three are the stars of the show.”

  “Okay. It better be cool,” said Tiffany who liked being the star.

  “It’s a great plan. You’ll love it,” Cassie said, “and they’ll never forget it.”

  At midnight, they sneaked out of Tiffany’s house and rode their bikes to Cassie’s dirt road. Cassie’s mobile home was down a side dirt road, and they never glanced back that way although it looked out at them with blank, dark windows. Cassie preferred to ignore the fact she lived in the old, run-down trailer.

  Whitney and the other girls had already started work, shoving old boards and bits of metal, beer bottles, cans, and rocks beneath the leaves that covered the road. When the boys came barreling up the road, they’d run over the hidden trash, and the noise would scare them as well as ruin all four of Billy’s tires. That would be perfect payback for Billy.

  While the rest worked, Angel helped Tiffany, Cassie, and Jill prepare for their part. They were chilly in the fall air but undressed to their modest, white bras and panties. Angel pulled out some pilfered make-up from the theater closet and gleefully showed them the white grease paint.

  They helped each other lightly cover one another with the paint until they were pale all over, their skin matching the white of their underwear. Next, all the girls brought kitchen flour and took those bags from their backpacks to pour over the girl’s legs and backs. Tiffany had several plastic containers of talcum powder that they sprinkled over the paint to cause an iridescent effect.

  They couldn’t move around a lot for fear of losing their make-up, but each was totally white from hairline to feet. Jill struggled to stop rubbing her nose where the power and grease pain made her nose itch; she felt like sneezing and forced herself to stop thinking about it.

  Angel yanked her hair, ratting it, and making it stand out like something a witch would be proud of. “Stop twitching, Jill.”

  “My nose itches, and ratting my hair makes it worse.”

  Angle noticed Jill’s eyes were burning but said the effect was excellent.

  Angel took glow sticks, burst them, and flung them randomly onto the three girls, making them glow in a greenish-yellow light when hit by the moon shining between flittering clouds. Spots on the girls’ white bodies and hair shone perfectly, making Angel proud of her techniques.

  Angel dug into a bag and brought out strange looking things. Thin gauze and strips of a white sheet hung from a small, short belt, but it wasn’t a belt exactly. Jill, Tiffany, and Cassie were perplexed as to what it was.

  “What is that?” Jill asked.

  “The perfect addition,” Angel said as she swore while tying the light, little belt around Jill’s throat. The tendrils of fabric and gauze fell all about Jill’s shoulders and as far down as her knees. “Now, twirl around a little with your arms out beside you.”

  Jill frowned and twirled as she was told, holding her stark, white arms out. The tendrils moved around her arms, wrapping, falling, and adding drama to the costume.

  Tiffany clapped, delighted. “You look so creepy like a wraith! You look fierce.”

  “I feel naked,” Jill said.

  “It’s no worse than being in a swim suit. Besides, no one can tell it is you.” Angel darkened the wraith’s eyes with shadow, below and on the upper lids, and ran the black shadow across the girl’s lips. Their eyes and mouths would be invisible in the night and make the girls look monstrous.

  “Yuk,” Tiffany muttered.

  “Don�
�t lick it off. You look so scary now. I mean like zombies or something,” Meg appraised them. Each had the collar of fabric and blackened eyes and lips. “You look great.”

  The stage was set, the actresses were in costume, and they had only five minutes to spare. They had cut the time close.

  The three wraiths hid behind some large oak trees and waited, giggling nervously. Tiffany had to hold back from twirling and asking the other two to whirl because they looked so eerie and other worldly. The other girls ran to hide far from the road where they wouldn’t be seen but could watch the show they expected.

  They hoped that the boys would be terrified by the specters and then have to get out of the truck to see the tire damage while being scared to death by the ghosts prowling the woods. They would realize it was a trick, but it would be too late, and they would have no one to blame. It was perfect.

  At two o’clock, Billy’s truck came rumbling up the road. Jill, Cassie, and Tiffany ran gracefully from the trees and along the side of the road, raising their arms and leaping. They tossed their wild hair and made clawing motions as if they were coming to get the boys.

  Billy shrieked in panic as he saw the white, ghostly creatures, and they scared him and Tom badly enough to set them cursing loudly. Drunk, both boys thought they saw ghosts. Given time, the boys would realize it was a hoax, but the noise of cracking boards and rocks beneath the truck added enough of an audible scare for the moment; it all shocked and terrified the boys.

  Billy cranked the wheel hard, using all his strength to steer away from the ghostly figures and to avoid the wraiths, but the truck’s tires blew out, and he was driving too fast to begin with. Unable to regain control, they slammed into a trio of huge oaks that lined the other side of the road.

  Jill, Cassie, and Tiffany stopped their dance and ran until they were with their friends, giggling about the boys being sore and banged up, as well as furious enough to kill them, and then something unexpected happened.

  Jill, Cassie, and Tiffany felt a warm whoosh on their backs as the night lit up brightly. Flames exploded outwards and upwards and then burned hotly. The gasoline that Billy was carrying in the back of his truck was not in proper containers and not capped well. One slammed through the open back window of the truck, tipping over and spilling into the truck’s cab. It soaked the boys.

  And Billy was smoking a cigarette.

  Several more whooshes came fast, one after another.

  “What’s happening?” Nelwynn demanded.

  “It’s burning. What do we do now?” Jill asked, her voice panicked and fast.

  Cassie took charge, telling the others to follow her to her family’s house. Tiffany, Cassie, and Jill slapped on shoes and ran. They cut across a path and through a small soybean patch, their feet crunching the dead vines.

  In the barn, Cassie shushed them, saying they could talk afterwards, but they had to get clean, quickly. Using horse shampoo and other cleaners, the girls bathed in ice cold water, scrubbing away the flour, powder, and make-up. They had to help one another and let the other girls rub away the white goop.

  A boom of thunder made them jump.

  “Thank, God. Rain will wash away the extra flour we left. Rain sure saves us a lot,” Whitney said. “I thought the rain would hold off a while, and it’s good we had the full moon while we did.”

  “You and your weather reports,” said Angel as she rolled her eyes and wished the rain had come sooner and ruined their plans; this wasn’t what they expected. “My, God, they caught on fire.”

  “Talk later,” Cassie ordered, “and we didn’t cause that.”

  She helped Jill dress, and the others helped the other two girls. The former ghosts were wet and cold, but they were clean.

  “And maybe the rain will put the fire out so the guys are okay, right?” Samantha asked.

  Angel tilted her head. “Huh?”

  “That fire? Be real. They have burned up. Dead. Something made them burn. I wonder what?” Meg said without anything but curiosity.

  Angel frowned at Meg. “Well, we made it happen.”

  “We did not. We scared them. They drove into the tree. And I know damned well cars and trucks don’t randomly explode like that,” Meg said, stomping her foot. “We didn’t do that.”

  “They would have been okay. The fire is the problem,” Jill added.

  Cassie led them far around back to where they had left their bicycles close to the paved road. She thought she saw her mom and brothers watching the fire from the end of their pebbled driveway. Far away, they could hear a fire truck siren and the noise of an ambulance. With the thunder, the other sounds broke the night into frightening noises.

  Cassie led them to the woods where they peddled in the rain on the muddy tracks. They had to work to move in the mud and couldn’t talk much. There wasn’t time, anyway. Angel and Nelwynn went off their own way, and Whitney, Meg, and Samantha went another. Samantha gave the rest a half-hearted wave.

  “Let’s push the bikes and get the mud off,” Tiffany said. No one was driving on the streets near her home because the fire was too far away to be noticed, and most all of the residents were sleeping.

  “Do you think they died?” Jill asked.

  “I imagine so. It was an accident. We didn’t mean it,” said Cassie as she frowned and wiped mud off her bicycle.

  “Cassie, we said that the last time. We said it was an accident. I mean this was really an accident, but we did mess with the tires with that junk we put in the road, and we did scare them enough for Billy to yank the wheel,” Jill said.

  “It really was an accident. We didn’t cause a fire,” Tiffany said. ”We only caused a crash, and besides a broken arm or stuff like that, they’d be fine.”

  They stowed their bikes, sneaked into the house, quietly changed clothes, wrapped themselves warmly, and tried to guess what happened. They fell asleep wondering and telling themselves and one another that it wasn’t their fault.

  It was an accident.

  At lunch when the girls finally awoke, Tiffany’s father and mother talked about the wreck while the girls ate sandwiches and listened.

  “Those trash boys…drunk as skunks,” Tiffany’s father said.

  “Why was there trash in the road?” Ms. Davis asked since she heard there was trash.”

  Tiffany’s mother spoke, “They’re trashy people. They don’t keep that road up, and Old Man Wisdom sure doesn’t help them since his boys were killed. They hit the trash, and it ruined the tires and caused them to crash.”

  “Why did the truck burn?”

  “Idiots had uncapped gasoline cans in the back, and that one kid was smoking.” That is what I heard. It was their fault: gasoline and cigarettes. What idiots.”

  “Is the sheriff finished already then?”

  “Yep. It was pretty evident what happened. I can’t say the town will suffer any from losing two trashy boys….”

  “Shh, Honey, don’t say that. Even if it’s true, we shouldn’t say it.”

  They stopped talking after realizing the girls were listening. Tiffany’s father said there was a wreck and that two young men were killed; he left it at that. The girls didn’t ask questions.

  “So now we know,” Tiffany said as they sat out on the back porch and watched the faint drizzling rain from their comfortable deck chairs.

  “Their own fault. It was an accident,” Cassie agreed.

  “Except I feel guilty,” Jill said softly.

  “I know, but Billy did push Nelwynn.”

  “Tiff, that was years ago,” Jill said. “We keep having accidents every time we try any crazy pay-back plans. Maybe we need to stop paying people back.”

  “Maybe,” Tiffany said, “but not anyone good and innocent has been paid back. It’s been bad people. I think I can put this secret away in my head. Can you?”

  “Yeah,” Cassie said, “and now no one will poison my pets again. You don’t know how bad that feels finding your kitty dying like that. I don’t have a bit of sym
pathy. Jill?”

  Jill took a deep breath and said, “I understand, Cassie. But it was an accident, anyway. Just a terrible accident. And it’s over.”

  “It sure is. Over,” Cassie nodded, “already forgotten.”

  “What is?” asked Tiffany, smiling a little.

  Cassie chuckled and said, “Nothing I can remember.”

  None of them bothered to talk about the event again. It was put away in their minds just as secrets must be. And in a way, it was almost forgotten. But not quite.

  Chapter 10

  One day in their senior year, Jill almost fell into her seat at the lunch table and brushed her hair off her face, her hand betraying her nervousness as she pushed strands back. She stayed after her history class to finish an essay test that she felt she aced but was nervous about, and she had heard a group of classmates chatting in the hallway.

  For reasons she couldn’t quite define, the gossip made her concerned. Something nagged at the edge of her mind, and she hated to bring up the subject but had never been one to hold back when she was curious and worried. “Something strange was the big topic among some of the band kids.”

  At one end of the table, Whitney ate her usual high-protein lunch; she was the school’s track star with scholarships stacking up. She focused on breaking more records: her own or even a state record. She pushed herself, and if she seemed aloof at times, it wasn’t that she wasn’t interested in her friends, but instead, she was planning a way to shave off another few seconds from a run.

  Other than her running, she mostly spent time with Meg and sometimes Nelwynn.

  Tiffany, a cheerleader, was still high-strung, and truly was aloof, unlike Whitney. She stayed within her own circle of friends although she could snap a smile into place when greeting a classmate and show charm and feign involvement. She hid her deep fear of being alone and clung to Jill and Samantha the most.

  Samantha was the prettiest, sweetest girl in school and also a cheerleader, and despite her popularity, she was the one girl that others always went to with problems that she took to heart and genuinely tried to solve. She felt closest to Meg, Whitney, Jill, and sometimes to Cassie. But she loved all her friends. She pitied Nelwyn and Angel at times, and it was harder to love those she felt sorry for.