Of the Trees Read online

  “What—”

  “Jessica is dead,” Cassie interrupted, her voice hard. Laney sat up, the blanket falling off the bed. Her eyes were wide, and her mouth fell open. She swallowed visibly and licked her lips.

  “Huh? How?”

  “How should I know?” Cassie spat, shoving the note she picked up off the floor at her friend. “I found these from Mom’s shift last night. See, look, DOA.”

  “Which means?”

  “Dead on arrival!” Cassie shouted. Laney flinched. “Get up, we have to find my mom.”

  “She’s not at your house?”

  “She’s back at work.” Panic and fear clogged Cassie’s throat. It was hard to take deep breaths. She turned to rifle through Laney’s clothes, picking out things at random and throwing them on the bed. Laney moved slowly behind her, stripping out of her pair of pajamas and picking up the jeans. “I’m freaking out. I need to get to her.”

  “It doesn’t say Jessica,” Laney murmured, tugging the zipper of her jeans up. “Just J. Could it be someone—”

  “I don’t know,” Cassie admitted through a dry throat. “But what if it’s not? We were there. We saw her. I need to get to Mom. She’ll tell me. Are you ready?”

  Laney nodded, reaching over Cassie to her desk and grabbing a set of car keys. She pulled a sticky note too, scrawled a message about donuts on it and left it on her bedroom door in case her parents came looking for them. Cassie took off for the stairs, bouncing with impatience.

  “Cassie, wait,” Laney called, coming to a stop at the bottom of the stairs. Cassie turned, impatient and angry. She needed to be moving. “What are you going to say?”

  “To my mom?”

  “Yeah, her. And, well, to everyone. If it really is Jess, which we don’t know that it is, what are you gonna tell them?” Laney clarified, shifting a bit on her feet.

  Her perfectly normal, not cut up feet.

  “I’m going to tell them that I was with Jess, that I tried to get her to leave, that she stayed with that carnie Jude and that he most likely killed her!” Cassie’s voice rose in pitch and intensity as she spoke, the words coming faster and harder. Laney gritted her teeth and stared her down.

  “You don’t know he did anything. You don’t know it was Jude.”

  Cassie’s jaw dropped as she stared at her friend. “He’s one of them, isn’t he?”

  Laney stared at her, her features rearranging to a dangerous look. “Who?”

  “Corey,” Cassie answered in a whisper. “It’s the same one, the one from the carnival. He doesn’t look the same, but he is.”

  Cassie hadn’t been sure before but as the words exited her mouth, she knew they were the truth. A dull, rising horror sparked at the acknowledgment. A confirmation deep in her gut whispered and taunted.

  Yes, yes you’re right. He’s one of them.

  “Are you going to tell them Corey was there?” Laney asked. Her voice had a dangerous edge to it. Something broke in Cassie.

  “Yes! Dammit Laney, what is the matter with you?” Cassie yelled. “Jess is dead! And we were there. We saw her. I knew, knew, it was wrong to leave her, but I freaked out and left, and now she’s dead.”

  “It’s not your fault,” Laney said softly.

  “No, it’s not,” Cassie breathed, her hand tightening in the front door knob. “It’s his, and I’m going to tell anyone who will listen.”

  It was cold outside, the morning light thin and weak. It made the world look muted, like a fine mist was covering everything. The bright blue truck parked on the curb of her house drew her attention. Her stomach clenched when she noticed the boy walking from her house toward the truck. She went to call out for him, and then he picked his head up, turned, locked eyes with her, stiffened and turned back to the truck.

  “Ryan!” Cassie called out, watching as his shoulders pulled tight. He walked away from her, making a path toward the beat up Dodge making clouds with the exhaust. He turned when she called out again.

  “I just wanted to return your phone,” Ryan said, shifting on his feet, refusing to meet her eye. A crushing defeat welled in her chest. Jessica was dead, she was almost completely positive of that fact. Then something else, something less terrible, less earth-shattering, but still awful flashed in her mind.

  He knew.

  She looked from Ryan to the cab of the truck where Jon was hunched over the front wheel. Jon shrugged in guilty acknowledgment. He told Ryan about last night. Jon saw, he must have. He watched as Blue Eyes ran his hands all over Cassie. She felt dirty and exposed, the urge to cry warring with the rearing desire for a shower.

  “Wait, Ryan!” she called out, adding “please!” when he kept walking. She ran the short space of her yard to him, leaving Laney silent on her front walkway. She reached Ryan and tugged on his shirt sleeve to get him to look at her.

  “Look, I’m sorry,” she started, but he interrupted.

  “It doesn’t matter. I just thought … ” He shook his head.

  “We never said,” Cassie said, knowing, honestly, that wasn’t the point. She tried to look him in the eye, but he turned, avoiding her. “I mean, we didn’t ever talk—”

  “Were you not here?” he snapped, finally turning to glare at her. She stepped back at the intensity of his look. “Just the other morning? Were you not here, too? Did we not kiss? Because I thought that meant something!”

  “It did!” Cassie insisted, staring up at him. “But you never—I can’t read minds, Ryan!”

  “It’s fine,” he said, turning from her again. “You’re not interested, I get it.”

  “No, you don’t get it!” Cassie said, pulling on his arm once more and spinning him back to her. “I am. I have been! Last night was … It was dumb, a mistake. I was drinking and it just … It just happened!”

  Ryan snorted, looking to the ground and hanging his head. “That’s not what it looked like.”

  “Looked like?” Cassie asked, her brow wrinkling in a puzzled frown. Then a dawning horror washed over her features, and she stepped away from Ryan. “You took pictures?” she roared, glaring at Jon. Jon shrugged again, swallowing visibly.

  “He knew I would have never believed it otherwise,” Ryan said.

  “You absolute ass, Jon!” Cassie screamed, angry tears welling as the unwanted memory of warm hands washed over her. She hugged herself tightly, never feeling more exposed and vulnerable.

  “I have to go,” Ryan said, backing away from her. “See you later.”

  “Yeah, sure,” Cassie bit out, swiping at the moisture forming in her eyes. “Later.”

  She was livid, angry at Jon, at herself, at Ryan for never, not once, putting it into words that he wanted to be the one pinning her to trees. Not even now, not even the acknowledgment of jealousy, just the cold accusation that she should have known.

  And she did. She did know. That’s why she stopped, why it felt so wrong, but it didn’t matter. She couldn’t say those things to him now. Now, it was all screwed up.

  “He kissed you?” Laney asked softly, her arm coming around her as Cassie got closer. Cassie nodded, dropping her head on Laney’s shoulder.

  “A couple weeks ago,” Cassie murmured, watching Jon’s car bounce off the curb as he pulled onto the road.

  “You never said,” Laney remarked, cautious. Cassie shrugged.

  “Neither did he,” Cassie said, her tone unmistakably bitter. “He just kissed me and left it. I thought maybe last night, at the dance, but then his hand … ” She looked up, staring at her friend in horror.

  “His hand! I didn’t even ask!”

  “It looked okay,” Laney reassured. “Bandaged, but he was moving it.”

  Cassie nodded dumbly and let Laney lead her to the car, all argument between the two forgotten.

  The hospital was a nightmare. Cassie had always hated the place, the smell of antiseptic scented urine, the brightness of the lights and the trying-too-hard feeling of the paintings tha
t were bolted to every wall. Everyone was always walking fast, skirting around you, something urgent and serious needing attending to. She couldn’t understand what drew her mother back, shift after shift after overtime shift, eating sandwiches from vending machines and drinking day old coffee.

  It was worse today. There was a news van parked by the emergency room, flashy letters painted on the bright white side. She couldn’t believe they knew already; it felt bizarre that anyone knew, bizarre that Jessica could be dead when only hours ago she was dancing by a camp fire.

  But no, Cassie mentally chastised herself, you don’t know. It might not be her.

  Laney was quiet. She was quiet the entire drive, short as it was, turning the radio off and just staring hard at the road in front of her as she drove them down the back roads. Cassie wasn’t up for speaking herself. Everything, everything in the course of nine hours, had gone to shit. Ryan saw pictures of her letting some guy—some bizarre, bold, overly aggressive guy—feel her up. Jon had taken them. Jon, her friend. Jessica might be dead. And if she was, Cassie knew she’d never be convinced that she didn’t have some part of the blame in that.

  The waiting room was a swarm of people. Some were pressed against the triage window, some looked like they actually were in need of medical attention, but a suspicious number had cameras and tablets and looked like they were trying to get a shot of the interior of the emergency room. Cassie tried to get the attention of one of the triage nurses, hoping to get someone to flag down her mother, but she didn’t need to bother.

  Cathy Harris poked her head into the waiting room, her gaze zeroing in on her daughter. Cassie rushed toward the door she held open, dragging Laney behind her. The door shut behind them with a soft thump and Cassie turned, pleading internally for her mother to look confused. She was, but not in the way Cassie wanted her to be.

  “How did you know?” Her mother asked softly, regarding Cassie in concern. Cassie’s stomach dropped.

  Cathy Harris steered the girls to a small break room, the only occupant an older nurse Cassie had met once before, but who’s name she couldn’t remember. The chair felt cold and hard as Cassie fell into it. She felt her head swim with grief and pressing hard with her hands against the side of her face did nothing to contain it. She brought the note she had found at home—now all crumpled up and smudged from being clenched in her fist—out of her pocket and dropped it on the table. Cathy stiffened, looking from the table to the girls and then sighing.

  “Girls, I’m so sorry,” she murmured.

  “It’s really Jess?” Laney asked, her voice cracked as she said the name. Cassie could feel the heat of tears well. She swiped impatiently at her face, gritting her teeth as anger boiled up. Her mother nodded, and words erupted from Cassie, uncontrollable and swift.

  Cassie could feel herself rambling, could tell her words didn’t make much sense, but she couldn’t stop herself. She told her mother about the party, about the circle in the woods that dipped low, like a basin, in the forest floor. She told her how the kids from St Paul’s were there, only she didn’t think they were from St. Paul’s now. She explained about Jude, about how she remembered him from the carnival and how she suspected the others there were really carnies, too. At this, her mother’s eyebrows rose high on her head, and the old nurse in the corner stared at her speculatively. It sounded crazy, paranoid, Cassie knew that, but with a certainty she was beginning to fear, she knew it was true.

  “And you didn’t recognize them at the dance?” her mother asked.

  “No, they were masked.”

  “And when you got to the party, by the fire?”

  “I thought I did, but it was dark, it wasn’t until later … ”

  Laney had been annoyingly silent, sitting off to the side and picking at her thumbnail. Cassie kicked, glaring at her friend to contribute, but when Cathy turned to Laney, asked her what she thought, Laney had merely shrugged.

  There were police, somewhere outside with Jessica’s parents, and the older nurse suggested Cassie talk to them. Her mother looked worried. Cassie sucked a deep breath through her nose and pleaded, needing to tell someone who could do something, needing to help in any way she could after spectacularly failing her friend last night. She felt the sting of tears as she thought it and swallowed hard to force them back.

  The police took her to a small waiting room. There were two officers, both male. One was older, his hair thin and graying. The other was closer to her father’s age. He tapped his leg nervously against the side of the table they sat at, and Cassie couldn’t help but wonder if it was nerves after seeing Jessica’s body, or maybe just a bad morning for too much caffeine. Her mother sat with her, Laney to the side. She told them what she told her mother.

  “He was at the town carnival,” Cassie said after she was done describing Jude. She spoke to Officer Gibbons, the older of the two officers who seemed the most calm. “I thought he would have left town then, but I guess he didn’t.”

  “And these other kids, you say from St. Paul’s?”

  “They said from St. Paul’s,” Cassie emphasized. “I don’t know. I think a couple of them I recognize from the carnival, too.”

  “Cassie,” Laney interrupted in a small voice, speaking for the first time in half an hour, “You don’t think it’s possible that maybe the fact that you were drinking messed you up a bit?”

  Cassie felt her jaw drop as she whipped around to look at her friend. Laney grimaced, shrugging her shoulders in a helpless kind of way. The cops held identical expressions: raised eyebrows, pursed lips.

  “I’m sorry, I just think it’s relevant, that’s all.”

  “So, there was drinking?” the nervous one prompted. Cassie felt as though she had been hit in the chest.

  “Yeah, some,” she admitted. “But I know what I saw. It was Jude. She called him by name! It was the same guy.”

  “Honestly Cass, I think it has something to do with what happened between you and Aidan. You know, against that tree. I think it freaked you out a bit,” Laney whispered. Cassie felt her face go red with equal measures of embarrassment and rage even as the name threw her. Shame coursed through her as she realized that she hadn’t even known the boy’s name before now. But, of course she knew who Laney was talking about. Blue Eyes. She turned and glared at her friend, only to find Laney’s gaze trained on her sneakers.

  “Who’s Aidan?” her mother asked sharply.

  “It has nothing to do with that!” Cassie sputtered, looking back across the table at the police officers. “Although, yes, he’s one of them, too. I saw him that night as well. So did you! And so did Jessica! And now—”

  “Who’s Aidan?” her mother and Officer Gibbons interrupted.

  Cassie gritted her teeth and before she could answer, Laney supplied, “One of Corey’s friends. He and Cassie—Well, they … ” She waved her hands about in helpless admission. Cassie was burning with such fury that she had trouble speaking.

  “Nothing happened. He was pushy and grabby, but nothing happened.”

  “You were pretty freaked out when you asked me to drive you home,” Laney countered quietly.

  “So you left,” the police officer supplied. “But Miss Evans and this Jude were still there?”

  “Yes, dancing.”

  Officer Gibbons jotted something down, seeming to make his mind up. He stood up, the chair creaking with his shift in weight. “We have some more interviews to do. We’ll check into everything.”

  Cassie felt as though school had ended, and class was dismissed. Both officers left the room and an uncomfortable silence swelled around them.

  “I think I should take you home,” Cathy said, her voice quiet. Cassie didn’t have the energy left to argue. All her anger was fluctuating, first toward Laney and then toward the carnies and then when she realized why, remembered that Jessica was dead, her lifeless body encased in black plastic somewhere in the basement beneath her feet, she just wanted to go home, too.


  Laney mumbled her goodbye after refusing a ride home from Cathy. She jingled her car keys in a defeated sort of way, and Cassie didn’t even look back at her as she followed her mother to the parking lot.

  “Can you just tell me one thing, Mom?” Cassie asked after they were safely cruising down the backroads toward their home. Her head bobbed lightly against the cold window pane that she kept it pressed to. It had started to rain, and drops of water splashed onto the glass, traveling sideways down the window as they got caught in the wind. Cathy looked briefly from the road to her daughter.

  “I think there’s a lot we are going to have to talk about when we get home.”

  Cassie nodded in silent agreement, pulling her lower lip through her teeth. She spoke softly and slowly, not sure why it mattered, but somehow sure that it did. “What happened to Jess’s feet?”

  She didn’t miss the way her mother’s hands spasmed on the steering wheel, or the way the skin all up her arm tightened, trembling with the sudden pull of the muscle. Her mother drove quietly for a moment, her expression torn.

  “I don’t really think—” She broke off at Cassie’s gentle sigh, looking to her daughter once more. “I’ve never seen anything like that before,” she said instead, swallowing hard. The rain picked up, pounding down on the car in a frantic rhythm. Cassie twisted in her seat, watching her mother. “They, her feet, were swollen and bruised. I’m not sure what caused it.”

  “Like she was hit or something?” Cassie asked, her brow scrunched as she tried to picture it, tried to picture how injuries like that could happen. Cathy shook her head.

  “No, not hit,” Cathy said, pausing. She licked her bottom lip, pulling the fleshy bit into her mouth before releasing it with a deep breath. “They were edematous, but not solely from bruising. There were no fractures, some lacerations on the sole, but no—”

  “Mom, in English, please,” Cassie pleaded, only able to make out a few of the words her mother was using. Cathy Harris sighed.

  “Her feet were a mess. Not the rest of her, just her feet. They were bloody and three times their normal size, and if I didn’t know that she was with you, last night, dancing, I would have sworn she was forced to walk a thousand miles barefoot and dropped dead from exhaustion. I’ve never seen anything like it. Her poor parents.”