The Stonebrook Slayer

Author's Notes:

I had intended to write one more but I haven't gotten to it yet. My kids gave me hand foot and mouth to kick off plague season and it made me less productive than usual. This story was the first short story I wrote, on a whim after I asked my brother his favorite creepy tale. It's based on the urban legend of the licked hand. If anyone can tell me the book it's in, I would love to read it again. Content warnings include death, animal death, gore, blood.

Happy Halloween!

Stonebrook Times Exclusive:

Campus Killer On The Loose

The Stonebrook Slayer continues to elude law enforcement and remains at large after a gruesome string of killings.

 Months after Alice Childs, a student at Stonebrook University, was found murdered in her dorm room bed, the Stonebrook University community still lives in constant fear. After the third murder just weeks ago, and despite continuing outrage from the victims’ families, police are no closer to apprehending the culprit. The university administration released a statement yesterday outlining additional security measures.

"They still aren’t doing enough. I just can't understand how this keeps happening," comments Frankie Childs, mother of the first victim. "I'm calling on the public to take action if the police and university of Stonebrook will not. The school needs to be shut down until a suspect is identified. Especially when all signs point to the killer being a fellow student. Someone should be held accountable for the death of my daughter and the rest of the victims, Lauren Stanford and Callie Brown."

Childs fears the latest killing will not be the last. She has expressed her dissatisfaction at the handling of the investigation and lack of investigation of the student body. Her theory holds merit as the killer has passed among the students unnoticed by any potential witnesses. Despite brutally strangling and stabbing the three victims in the dead of night, police claim to have eliminated the first round of suspects.

The killer gained access to the victim’s rooms using their roommate's key cards. All three roommates have verifiable and well-documented alibis. All three victims were well-liked, with no known enemies. Most worryingly, the time between murders shortened significantly with the killing of Callie Brown less than a month after Lauren Stanford. The university community worries that the killer may strike again, and soon.

Frankie Childs continues her crusade for justice, “My daughter mentioned a strange incident in her Biology class- Continued pg B7

 

The newspaper goes right back into the trash where I found it, along with my empty coffee cup. The last dregs of coffee leak out across the words, blurring and obscuring the details. I take one last look around; the normally bustling campus feels abandoned at only 8 pm on a Friday. A lone figure hunches against the wind and walks in the opposite direction, towards the boy’s dorms rather than the girls’ where I’m headed.

A gust of long dead dry leaves swirl inside with me when I open the door to the dorm where I belong. The earthy smell of rot wafts over me as they settle to the floor. I wrinkle my nose, wishing I still had a coffee to sip to overpower the taste of decay that slides down my throat. It’s been an unusually warm winter, and it still feels like September instead of December. The air feels like everyone and everything is desperately trying to cling to a time long dead and gone. It’s eerily still and quiet inside the where the atmosphere should be filled with the sounds of covert hookups and poorly disguised parties. A shrill burst of nervous laughter from behind one of the doors is quickly stifled.

No one wants to be the next victim, but I don't understand why anyone is worried about being out and about. No harm has befallen anyone in public. The three girls were all murdered in their beds while they slept. No one died out getting a coffee, but my professor might kill me if I miss another assignment. My biology teacher in particular has taken a liking to me, I think. Her questions about my life, my work, my problems are bordering on obsessive, if I’m being frank. She’s too nosy. So that's why I'm out, braving the dreary December wind and sporadic icy rain. The caffeine boost to get me through my assignment that’s due tomorrow. I can’t afford to stop trying now, I need her off my back. If I can make it another two weeks, I’ll be able to leave for the semester. Safety and rest feel just around the corner.

The girls in my dorm are always analyzing the killer's type and looking for reasons to say they won’t be the next victim. I get it, my mind strays there too in what little free time I have. Morbid daydreams where I’m the one who dies. I don’t have many friends but I have enough acquaintances that I’ve had more conversations than I’d like about the Stonebrook Slayer. All of it feels rather over the top and unreal to me. Even the name seems too theatrical to be a real thing, a real person. The talk usually centers on the grisly details of the cases or amateur sleuthing theories about the killer and the victims.

Everyone is most curious about how the killer chose their victims. If you know why someone was targeted, maybe you can avoid succumbing to their same fate. Bullshit, in my opinion. I doubt the killer even knows themselves. I usually resist pointing out the fact that the killer's type seems to be no type at all. The only connecting factor between the three is their attendance of Stonebrook, a residence in the dorms, and being female. The dead girls bear no other resemblance to each other that anyone can connect. They didn’t run in the same circles. Physical features are all over the place. None of them had enemies, as far as anyone is willing to say. Deep down, I feel safe, content in the knowledge that I won’t be next. I just can’t be. I have that invincible feeling you get simply from being unable to imagine your own nonexistence. I feel a twinge of something. Danger, maybe. Some baser desire urging me to seek warmth and comfort inside my dorm room.

My roommate, Chelsea, is already asleep as I pass the keycard labeled with the name and photo, “Andrea MacKenzie” across the lock and slip inside the door. She’s an early to bed and early to rise type of girl which I just can’t relate to. The quiet beep of the keycard and smooth snick of the deadbolt sliding into place behind me don’t wake her. They’re the normal safe sounds you hear every night around here. I don't bother with the lights either; the streetlamps outside throw just enough light in through the window. Chelsea hates closing the curtains. I keep saying someone could be watching her at any time but she doesn't listen, even with the threat of the Stonebrook Slayer plastered all over the news and social media.

The lump in the top bunk that is Chelsea whimpers in her sleep and turns over, drawing the blanket up higher. I freeze as she stirs, but she doesn't wake, so I gently ease myself onto the bottom bunk. Despite my bravado about my late night wanders, I'm not stupid. There's a switchblade in my hoodie pocket that I pull free and set gently on the nightstand. I'm not tired yet. Even after the coffee I can’t handle my stupid biology assignment. So I pull up more articles on my phone about the Stonebrook strangler.

The details are straight out of a horror novel. Alice Childs was the first to die. Her murder happened only two weeks into the fall semester. She was in my biology class. She sat in front of me. always flicking her long blonde hair back, leaving strands strewn across my work. Not to speak ill of the dead, but she was kind of inconsiderate, I think. Despite how it annoyed me, I envied that hair of hers. Growing up, I had always wanted hair like that, long and blond and pin straight. Not my own curly dark hair. When they found her, her nearly waist length blond hair was gone. Well, gone from her scalp at least. It had been lopped off roughly at the base of her nighttime braid, the fine white strands flung across the room like confetti. There are quietest of rumors that she was strangled with it before the killer tore the braid apart. No one seems to know if her cause of death was strangulation or one of the 37 stab wounds she suffered. But either way, it’s common knowledge that it was overkill. Her funeral was closed casket. Someone pushed past a “normal” murder into something more unhinged and gruesome.

I knew the second victim, Lauren Stanford, peripherally too. It isn’t surprising, really; the campus is small and tight-knit. Although if I fell victim to this killer, I doubt anyone would care or remember my name. I'd simply be another generic college ID picture neatly slotted in next to the other 3. Under a headline, “Stonebrook killer Strikes Again!” Or something like that, with equal clickbait lure and salacious potential.

I didn’t really know Lauren, but I feel like I knew more than a stranger would. She wasn’t in any of my classes but I saw her around campus all the time. I feel a little worse for her than I did for Alice. I have an idea that she was a nicer person. When I think about Lauren, I think about the solitary time I spoke with her. I asked where she bought all her lipstick. She changed the shade daily, but they all suited her somehow. Bright jewel colors against dark skin were her favorite, judging by the frequency she wore them. But she also wore bright candy pink, baby blue, neon green and goth black. When I’d asked about her lipstick, she looked taken aback at first. Then this tiny little smile crossed her face. She had dark blue glitter on her lips that day. I couldn’t read her expression fully, but she seemed smug. And I ran because I was embarrassed. Looking back, I think she might have just been flattered by my question. But I’ll never know because she died later that night. Surely, she didn't deserve to die. Lauren’s body showed evidence of just as much overkill as the Alice’s body had. Although the police were sure she’d been strangled before the 41 stab wounds.

In the end, I found out where Lauren got her lipstick. The brand is a well-known public detail now. Her killer decorated her room and body with swirls of lipstick in a rainbow of colors and designs. I wonder what color the killer placed on her lips that the funeral director scrubbed away and replaced with a demure petal pink.

Callie Brown, the third victim, I never interacted with directly. But I recognized her on sight. She always wore scarves. Light decorative ones in summer and early fall. Then warm fluffy ones when the weather turned darker. She was strangled with one of them. I imagine it was the one she was wearing that day, a purple paisley one she favored. I always liked that one and wondered whether it would feel as soft as it looked. The rest of her collection of scarves was spread across her dorm room. Rumor has it they were splayed across every surface and splattered with blood. I found out Callie’s name when I saw it splashed across campus papers and the internet, attached to the photo of her face. I wonder what they did with that purple paisley scarf that killed her. Surely it’s in police custody now, evidence. How strange it would be if they chose to bury her with that one.

The details, hair, lipstick, scarves, were the kind of details that continued to be widely speculated about. Because they were so senseless but specific and personal; the kind of thing that must either be imbued with deep meaning or a sign of utter random madness. I can’t decide which camp I fall in but I’m not sure it matters either way.

I come back to myself, startling out of my reverie, at the sound of scratching at the window. Two little reflective eyes glare through the glass at me. It's the stray black cat that's been creeping around this room all semester. Chelsea calls him Angus for who knows what reason. She feeds him and leaves him water on the windowsill. She’s a sucker for innocent need. I hesitate for only a second before cracking the window to let him in. Cats aren't strictly allowed, but he’s Chelsea’s any way you look at it. The wind is starting to howl, spare raindrops splattering the window. Angus is looking particularly pathetic and there's a serial killer on the loose and it’s as good a time as any to break the rules.

Angus gratefully weaves his body through the cracked window. I shut it just as quietly as I opened it and Angus settles on my chest as I lay back down and turn back to my nightly reading. I know I should stop thinking and reading articles on my phone about the murders. Chelsea is a bookworm, her head is always bowed gracefully over some paperback or another. She wouldn’t mind if I borrowed one. I tried to ask her for recommendations once, but she blew me off. I guess I don’t look like a serious reader. Angus is less than pleased to be disturbed when I creep out of the bottom bunk to grab a book off the shelf at random, but he gets over it when I explain the alternative.

The book is, unfortunately, full of scary stories and urban legends. I read about a killer on the loose, a girl home alone with her dog. The dog that cowers under her bed but licks her hand when she requires comfort. Spoiler, it’s the killer, not the dog. A legend I’ve read before, but it rings differently in these circumstances. I give up on reading and place the book on the nightstand next to the switchblade.

I about what it might feel like to wake up with hands at your throat. Or a knife sliding deep into your chest, snagging on a rib as it goes in. I'm thinking of how long the seconds would stretch. The weight of another person, immovable, as everything fades to black. Angus lets out a muffled yowl and I feel a sharp pain in my hand. I hiss in shock and push him off my chest. He lands with an angry hiss of his own on the blankets next to me. I must have squeezed him a little too hard while I wasn't paying attention. He's bitten me and left a bloody scratch, claw marks across my arm and the impression of teeth across my hand.

The top bunk creaks and a hand snakes down and Chelsea makes that universal cat calling noise.

Pspspsp.

Angus glowers at me with only the disdain a cat can muster before leaning towards the outstretched hand. I don’t want him to go; I want the comforting weight of him on my chest. But Chelsea makes the noise and gestures with her fingers again as I grab at Angus before he can go to Chelsea and hold him tightly to me, trying to suppress his struggles.

Pspspsp

            Again, I just keep Angus from escaping. But Chelsea is moving more. The top bunk creaks as she shifts. So I gently lift Angus, let her fingers card through his fur before she withdraws her hand once more.

            Angus is still struggling half heartedly. But as I clasp him firmly, he settles and stills on my chest.

I glance toward the nightstand to make sure the switchblade is still there. It is. Resting just there, close enough to grab if I were to wake with a killer looming over me in the night.

My sleep is uneasy. I toss and turn, my head full of dark dreams. I imagine that something is clawing at my hands, biting my arm. Like Angus had earlier, but over and over and over. The pain finally rouses me into awareness momentarily, but it's only Angus again. A heavy weight on my chest, chewing at my already injured arm. I regret letting him in the room, but I'm too groggy to do anything more than push him away again.

I dream about the dead girls. I'm by Alice's bedside, watching as her blonde hair is cut away in chunks, a hand sprinkles it across the dorm room floor. It falls as light as feathers, as white as snow.

Then I'm with Lauren. Watching a hand swirl strange pictures across the walls in all her colors of lipstick.

Finally, I visit Callie, in a room full of scarves, fluttering like butterfly wings in a breeze. Like birds set free as they're thrown into the air and strewn across the room.

I can no longer tell if I'm awake or asleep, but I think I hear a whisper, a small terrified voice calling, "Angus, is that you?"

Angus is curled on my chest, silent. I meow quietly instead. I'm not sure what propels that decision. But Chelsea must realize it’s me, because I could swear I hear a soft giggle and the purring of a cat.

One last glance at the nightstand for reassurance. The switchblade is still there. I reach out and flick it open. You can never be too careful.

Once more, I drift into oblivion, the safety of dreams and sleep.

When I wake, it's with the abruptness of awakening after a nightmare, the adrenaline still coursing through my veins. Brilliant sunlight streams through the curtainless window. I can immediately tell I’ve overslept. Panic shoots through me like a lightning bolt. Someone is pounding on the door.

"Hey, roomie, let me in!"

My blood turns to ice. My roommate? It can’t be Chealsea at the door.

"I got held up last night and stayed with friends. I didn't want to leave after dark."

I draw in a shuddering breath and stare at the mattress above me. If that's my roommate, if that’s Chelsea, then who is in Chelseas's bed?

The human size lump in the bed, hidden under covers. The hand snaking down to reach for Angus. Did I hear Chelsea’s voice? Did I ever see her face?

"Chelsea, open the door! I'm sorry I lost my key card but please let me in."

My blood is on fire instead now. My mind racing trying to parse the sense from the nonsense. What are the facts? A girl outside the door calling for Chelsea, claiming to be Chelsea’s roommate. No, that's not right, I’m the roommate and I’m inside the dorm.

"You're starting to worry me, Chelsea."

I realize Angus still hasn't budged. He is cold. I flinch as something cool and wet and red drips from the top bunk. The bloodstain that spreads across my field of vision as I look up. It's with shaky hands that I move Angus' cold, limp corpse from my chest. His head lolls awkwardly as I set him aside. Someone snapped the fragile little bones inside his neck. My hands are like strangers, but the scratches and bite marks scattered across them hurt enough to assure me that these hands belong to me.

I pull myself up, scattering torn book pages across the bed and onto the floor. They cover the bunk I’m lying it. I glance at the bookshelf, no longer full, a lone book lies open, half its pages gone.  They’re everywhere. Pages full of words, broken and empty hardback spines in a layer across the floor.

I force myself to peek into the top bunk. It's Chelsea there in the bunk all right, but she’s not going to answer a door anytime soon.

"If you don't open the door or answer one of my texts right now, I'm getting an RA."  The voice outside calls.

Chelsea's roommate. Andrea. Her name comes back to me now as I picture the keycard in my hand. The one with a name and face that don’t match my own. The keycard that I used to get inside this room last night.

The bite marks on my hands. They aren't all from Angus. Unmistakably human teeth marks mar my arms. And the scratches, so many more than Angus alone gave me.

Chelsea fought me harder than any of the rest. That's why I was so tired and I laid back down to sleep. I don’t usually do that.

Angus, he kept yowling, and I wanted to sleep; I didn't want anyone to check.

I’m starting to panic now. What did I do? What do I do?

"Chelsea!" Andrea says sharply, "One last chance."

I muster up my voice, "Coming," I call softly. I think I do a passable impression. I've spent weeks watching Chelseas's every move through those curtainless windows after all.

The switchblade on the nightstand catches my attention. In the sunlight shining through the window, the blade glints weakly, the faintest hint of silver shining through the red.

I stumble forward through the sea of paper on the floor, scattered with words and bloodstains. My hand closes over the handle as I move to answer the door.

It Was Just A Game

 Author's notes:

This one is my take on War of the Worlds. I wish I'd heard the original over the radio when in aired. This ones a longer slower paced story than the rest. Less gore and no content warning I can think of except this story still contains death and no happy endings. 

"The truth is out there, but so are lies."

That was the phrase that, if uttered by any of the six of us, would bring our playacting to an immediate halt. It was supposed to be a safe word, an emergency stop button, a failsafe. I'm a big X-files fan and it just seemed a fittingly theatrical phrase for a summer camp run by drama nerds. If we heard those words, we were supposed to break character without question. It seemed like the best way to ensure safety. To be completely sure that none of us got so caught up in our imaginations that the consequences might carry across the line and bleed into reality.

The idea for camp came after our first year of college together. All of us being theater majors with a taste for drama and varying levels of performance arts skill. Hugh, Max, Vivienne, Josie, Caroline, and yours truly, Wells. My parents shouldn't have named me after one of their favorite authors without expecting me to go into the arts in one way or another. My name turned out to fit me well. You could say I enjoy the spotlight. As a child, I was drawn in by the merest hint of a compelling story. I straddle life with one foot in reality and one foot in one fantasy world or another. Acting came to me with little effort, and I've never wanted anything else. By the time my first year of college passed, the six of us had already cemented ourselves into an inseparable little clique. A tight little knot in our already tight knit graduating class. The idea that we might continue our dramas during the summer seemed only natural. Thus, acting camp was born that first idyllic summer.

We all have our roles to play in our found family. Vivi, who could be my doppelgänger if you don't bother to look closely. We share clothes with the ease of sisters. She's my polar opposite in most every other way besides appearance, but that dynamic works well for us. It isn't immodesty when I say I had the most natural skill; it is simply a fact. But Vivi has always been my closest competition. I can slip into a character as naturally as I can slip on a pair of pants. But Vivi is the same size and shape, so she can wear my roles just like she can wear my clothes. Whoever doesn't get the lead role still practices the lines as an understudy. Vivi and Wells, the pair of us treated as interchangeable eldest sisters.

Josie is sweetness incarnate, the baby of our little family. Health ailments have plagued her throughout life; her immune system is practically nonexistent. I think that's why we all have a protective streak for her. She's the weakest in natural skill but the hardest working. People tend to underestimate Josie, but if I had to pick, I'd take hard work over natural talent any day.

Caroline, our fourth sister, is in the middle of the pack in every way. Ironically, she's also an actual middle child and peacekeeper of the group, the glue that holds us together. She’s everyone’s best friend, I don’t think any of us has ever been in a fight with her.

Max is the true weak link of the group if I had to pick. He is top tier if you looked at talent alone but lacks in dedication and passion. If you catch him studying, it's a notable occasion. He's the closest thing we have to a privileged nepo baby. Since he doesn't flaunt it, we forgive him for it. Always the first to skip a study session in favor or a party or a hookup. Max is the one who's most likely to have too much tequila the night before an exam. He’s the one who's called us all at least once to bail him out of a bind. Whether he's locked out of the house in just his boxers or stranded at Taco bell at 2 am, it's always something. He's our hot mess problem child. But he's also the one most likely to be by your side during your low moments.

Hugh is the misplaced and long suffering only child of the group somehow. Hugh picks up the slack where Max drops it. He's got a solid amount of natural talent and a good work ethic. He's most likely to succeed in a graceful and modest way that you want to hate but can only admire. You want to resent him, but you can’t.

We all attended the same prestigious arts university and after that first year, lived in the same house. Our personal lives are all intertwined with an arguably unhealthy codependency. I don't know what we'll do when we all must expand our horizons next year. This last year of theater camp is our last hurrah together as a cohesive group. Originally, the idea was a simple, cheap summer getaway, sharing a rustic cabin and roughing it for a few weeks. After a drunken acting exercise spiraled out of control the first week, we implemented rules and a schedule. Then the whole thing became an elaborate summer camp tradition.

Now we spend eight weeks in June and July tucked away into a remote cabin in the depths of the Pacific northwest. No phones allowed, no Wi-Fi, no internet. Only each other and the bare necessities for survival. We have short range walkie talkies for use when anyone goes on hikes or overnight mini camping adventures. The only connectivity to society during those weeks is a two-hour hike down the mountain to a tiny little town. One or two of us hike down once a week for groceries and news. The whole setup is more refreshing than I usually like to admit. Sometimes I daydream about living like this forever. The six of us in a perpetual bubble, living out fairy tales in the forest.

It's only the first and last weeks of camp that we live out as ourselves, that we adopt our own day-to-day characters. The other six weeks are an exercise in method acting. We use our free time during the school year to plot and write scripts. Each of us crafting our own version of a story to spend a week living out during the summer. We draw numbers out of a hat to see who's writing the script each week. Everything is covert beforehand. All the roles and scripts are handed out in secret. Sometimes they are left on beds in the middle of the night, a basket of carefully labeled envelopes covertly left on the windowsill for someone to find. That kind of thing. The suspense and drama of it all add a fun flair to mundane life. The big reveal is the very last week when we confess to each other who wrote which play, discuss who did which role best, rehash our favorite moments and so on.

Each piece, each act, has six roles, one for each of us. The rules we came up with are simple. Never break character. You live and breathe whatever character you are given for the week they exist. No outside help. No research or conferring with the others in the group unless it's in character conversation. Some roles are meticulously scripted, some are half-assed with only vague character traits or arcs. Other roles are left entirely to chance. Full improv characters. It all varies wildly depending on who creates what and a million other factors. I've sometimes wondered what chaos would ensue if we were all given blank sheets of paper, no script at all. What a strange direction we might go, acting in a play that didn't exist. What might happen to our dynamic if we all thought each other was acting, but no one really was? I've been tempted to try it, but one or another of the ideas in my imagination always wins out every year.

It's chaos enough with the scripts and secrecy. We've had some of our most fun experiences at camp and some of our most cathartic. Once or twice someone has pushed against someone else's walls or picked at something tender, it doesn't feel dissimilar to a sibling dynamic; we know where each other's weaknesses are. We know all the buttons to push but also how to defuse the situation. Rarely have we put ourselves in any real danger. The safe words have only even been used twice. The first time we used the code phrase was when Max broke his ankle during a particularly dramatic scene that involved a jump from the cabin's roof. And we were back to business in 24 hours, working Max's injury into our next play. The second time was when Josie spotted a bear on a hike and the rest of us were slow to catch the seriousness of her observation. That week's theme had coincidentally been centered around finding Bigfoot and spotting things in the woods had taken on a real "Boy Who Cried Wolf," type of casual dismissal.

This last year, it was during the fifth week of camp when things went wrong. It had started out a particularly good year. Our skills vastly improved after four years of intense coursework and classes and three years of our immersive acting summer camp. We'd already graduated, some of us had jobs lined up, all of us had some sort of plan about what came next. The sense of future nostalgia colored everything we did. We weren't going to take this last summer together for granted.

 The first week was pure lazy indulgence, as it always was. Celebrating our finals, our prospective futures, enjoying our last days as a household of six before going our separate ways. It was the denouement performance for all of us, the grand finale. I'd been disappointed to draw the first performance of the season. The best ones are always towards the end when we've all been in the swing of things for weeks, but I thought I'd pulled the performance together well enough. Shakespeare seemed a bit cliché, but Shakespeare is also timeless. Though I did stick with a final performance theme in picking The Tempest to base my week around. Selfishness had me taking the lead role just because I could. I didn't expect to empathize with Prospero as much as I do now, but that's its own chapter of the story and not the one I find myself telling now.

I could usually guess who was responsible for each week's play, but this year it was harder. It was clear our skills had grown enough that it wasn't as easy to read each other anymore. Or maybe we'd grown apart with our upcoming exodus from university. I could no longer say I knew them all by heart, could see enough of their inner workings to pick out their specific style of art from a crowd. It left me feeling unmoored and uneasy. I thought I knew them as well as I knew myself, yet they could still fool me.

It was the end of the fifth week and it had been the strangest week yet. The papers that held this week's character roles and cues had been nearly slotted into manila folders with our names printed across the tabs. I found the stack in a neat bundle on the kitchen table on Monday morning. Everyone else had been sleeping, and I'd nearly peeked at the rest of the scripts. It would have been easy, and it would have changed everything. We'd lived the week so far with almost nothing happening. The folder with my name on it had held nothing but a nearly blank piece of paper. "Almost autobiographical." Whatever the fuck that means. I guess I'm me playing me this week. I'd folded it up and tucked it away in my things just like everyone else did, anyway. I would have to take my cues from everyone else and follow my gut. It gives me a lot of creative freedom, but I always preferred at least the smallest hint. 

The atmosphere feels tense now, and I wonder if that is the point. Set us on edge, keep us complacent before the sudden twist and chaos. Something is going on with Max and Vivi. They alternate between being tight as two peas in a pod full of inside jokes and sniping at each other viciously. Bickering over who forgot to bank the fire the previous night, which one of them left Max's favorite sweatshirt out in the rain, on and on it goes. They keep trying to drag me in and make me pick a side; it is getting tedious. Hugh keeps sighing loudly at them, but never stepping in. Caroline is unusually preoccupied and silent. Even Josie is irritable. She mutters something about not feeling well and retreats to her bed for most of Wednesday. Her quiet coughing grates on my nerves.

By Thursday morning, I find myself grudgingly packing my bags, setting out on a tent camping mini adventure with Max and Vivi. I envy the peace and quiet I'm leaving behind with Caroline and Josie and Hugh. I don't know what I did to deserve being shuttled off into the wilderness with these two. It's impossible to decipher if Max and Vivi's drama is in character or real. Perhaps both. We hike for several hours before setting up for the night in a clearing along the base of a hilly ridge. Max has his own single person tent, and Vivi and I have one only slightly less miniscule to share between the two of us. All of us had been too busy conserving our energy for much talking on the trail, but with camp set up Vivi and Max start up again, almost at once.

"Did you bring the spare lantern? I can't find it in my pack," Vivi says tersely to Max.

"No, it was supposed to be in yours," Max replies.

"Well, it isn't in either mine or Wells," Vivi says with frustration apparent in her voice.

"Don't blame me. I wasn't the one who packed your stuff," Max snarls.

"Then don't whine at me when you're sitting in the dark later," Vivi starts.

"What makes you think I would? Stop getting mad at me for things I haven't even done," Max says.

Without a word, I leave them to bicker and head off to find some firewood. Anything for an excuse to get away. I stay in the woods for longer than I mean to, and it's nearly dinnertime when I approach camp again. The fire flickers in the clearing, illuminating the scene. Max and Vivi don't hear me approach. I know because I glimpse the two of them, tangled in each other's arms before a twig snaps under my feet, giving me away. They spring apart and act like nothing happened, as if I care.

"Subtle," I remark as I pass them and work on dinner prep.

Max blushes, Vivi rolls her eyes, and they share a covert look but say nothing. I'm left wondering if it was a genuine kiss or an act I was supposed to stumble on and what their reasons might mean for either scenario.

The walkie talkie sputters sporadically throughout dinner. Distorted voice artifacts sounding like alien language over the speaker. I assume its Hugh and Caroline and Josie back at the cabin trying to contact us. I try to reply to let the others know we're safe and set up for the night. But it isn't until the sun sets that we finally reconnect. The walkie cuts in and out mid-sentence. It's Caroline's voice over the speaker.

"Base Camp to Roving Camp, do you copy? Please, please answer we-"

A long static filled pause.

"-out there-"

More static and silence from the cabin members as we try to answer their calls.

"-copy?"

Then finally a longer message comes through, "-calling it an emergency. There's been some kind of viral outbreak. They're saying it's 100% fatal. Spread by body fluid. We don't know much else. It-" but the walkie cuts out again.

The three of us exchange looks. I can read the apprehension on Max and Vivi's faces clearly, but a hint of glee leaks through Vivi's expression. Finally, the premise of the game is through enough for the week's fun to begin. We're playing a survival scenario then.

We spend the evening huddling around the fire, discussing the virus, spinning theories, planning our next moves. We have to make up our own facts to some extent, extrapolating from the little information we got over the walkie talkies. Settling finally on rushing back to the cabin the next morning. Vivi and I take the reins on discussion and planning. Max is unusually subdued. He keeps fiddling with the walkie-talkie until the batteries die completely. He swears and angrily tosses it aside. I wonder what his angle is here.

"Chill, we'll talk to them tomorrow," Vivi says with a glare in his direction.

"Didn't you hear? It sounded like part-" he cuts himself off, "I'm going to bed," and he does without another word to us.

"Who peed in his cereal this morning?" I say in a stage whisper with a pointed glare at Vivi as he exits.

Max sleeps late the next morning.

Vivi and I are having breakfast when she turns to me and says, "What if he's sick?"

"Go check on him, then. You two already swapped spit yesterday. You heard Caroline, it's passed along through body fluids. So if anyone is going to endanger their health it should be you since you're screwed already."

 Vivi sighs but gets up and walks to Max's tent, calling his name as she goes. When he doesn't answer, she nervously looks back at me once before unzipping his tent door and peering in.

"I can see you're breathing. Answer me already. This isn't funny anymore, Max," Vivi snaps.

When there's no movement, she steps cautiously inside. I can't really see what's happening from this angle. I finally stand, move closer by a few steps. Finally, there's the sound of Max's voice. But he sounds raspy and quiet.  

"He's fine," Vivi calls hesitantly to me.

But then Max coughs. One of those wracking, full body coughs. The kind you can't fake.

Instinctively, I back away a few steps. Sure, this is all an act, but that cough isn't. It's a coincidence, surely. But I don’t want what he has either way. Just in case.

Vivi emerges from Max's tent, and I snap at her to stay back. It's what I would do if this wasn't all fake. She narrows her eyes, but stops moving towards me. We're both tossing around the same thoughts and doubts silently, I'm sure of it.

"He can't make the trip back to the cabin like this," Vivi says.

"We could go back, bring Hugh-"

 "We can't just leave him here alone," Vivi interrupts, "Plus Hugh won't want to get near Max, either."

"I'll take the walkie talkie and hike up the ridge. Maybe there'll be a better chance of getting through to the others up there," I say.

I collect everything I need for a couple of hours of hiking, trying not to touch anything on Vivi's side of the tent. Probably an unnecessary precaution. None of this is real. It can't be. Max has a cold and is using it to add to the weeks play. My apprehension is just unconscious method acting, that's all.

Vivi doesn't even wave as I leave camp. The hike up the ridge is a familiar one. We go every year. But it's not an easy one and usually I have company. It hits me how isolated it is out here when I slip on some loose leaf litter and scrape my arm on some branches as I catch myself. I'm not badly injured, but if I were, I'd be in trouble out here alone.

The higher vantage point doesn't help the walkie talkies at all. Probably a stupid idea in the first place, but I wanted to get away from camp. I try switching the battery for the walkie talkie with the spare from my pack. Maybe it does some good because finally I hear Caroline's voice again. The first thing that registers is her flat tone. She sounds robotic almost, like she's been repeating herself over and over and over again, desperate for someone to hear her but hopeless that we will. A sharp thrill of foreboding washes down my spine as I register the words she's repeating.

"-but so are lies. The truth is out there, but so are lies. The truth is out there, but so are lies. Please, please, pick up. Vivi, Max, Wells, this is a real emergency. Over."

Finally she pauses and I frantically radio back, "What's going on? Is everyone ok at the cabin?"

"Wells! I've been trying to reach you for hours, I-"

The walkie cuts out again and I swear angrily.

"You's cutting out! Tell me just essentials, as fast as possible." I hope she can hear me well enough.

"Josie is sick, at the hospital in town-" She's interrupted by another long stretch of silence.

"-back to the cabin. Josie's dying, she’s so sick, meet-" And that's all I get. I try for what feels like forever to get more from Caroline. Nothing.

My heart is racing as fast as my thoughts. Adrenaline courses through me and I make it back to camp with Vivi in half the time it took me to hike up the ridge. But while I race down the slope, I have time to think.

Caroline said the phrase. The hypothetical emergency glass is broken. This is real. Josie is sick. Josie is dying. That's all I know. Max is sick too. Vivi has been exposed. I might have been too, for all I know. It's passed through body fluids; I think that's what Caroline said. She didn't say anything about airborne or surface transmission. I struggle to remember what else Caroline said that first time we spoke, last night. Didn't she say this virus is 100% fatal? But wasn't that the game? She would have said the code phrase then. But the walkies were cutting out. My blood runs cold as I remember. She said "out there" at one point, didn't she? And I thought she was trying to ask something else, if we were out there, a call for us to pick up the walkie, something like that. I didn’t think anything of it. Max heard it too. He was going to ask me last night and then thought better of it.

My mind is still spinning as I approach the tents. I wish I knew more. How easily can we pass this to each other? Is Max as good as dead? How fast does it move? Josie wasn't feeling well Wednesday; enough that she said something and went to bed for most of the day. By today, she's in the hospital, dying, apparently. It's Friday. That's so fast. Vivi is nowhere to be seen at first. I can hear Max coughing from his tent. He sounds much worse than when I left.

It comes to me then; there might be more information on Vivi and Max's scripts. I don't hesitate; I have no idea where Vivi went or when she'll be back. Information is worth the risk of exposure from digging through Vivi's bag. The manila folder is there, with the paper. I was hoping for something like, "Pretend there's an outbreak of deadly illness," that would tell me this is all a misunderstanding. Or at the very least, some other script that would confirm this illness isn't a part of this week's act and we're in a worst-case scenario here. Instead, there's only a single phrase that's equally as cryptic as my paper was, "Wells wrote this one."

What does that even mean? I didn't. I definitely didn't write this. Why write that I wrote this? I can't work out any way that it’s a clue for a different script. Maybe if I had more time I could work out the convoluted reason one of my friends wrote this. If this is true, then I have to keep Vivi and Max away from me at all costs, or I'm as good as dead. Vivi is calling from outside, as I hastily shove everything back into her pack. The all-purpose knife Vivi carries when we camp slips from the pack and without thinking I grab it, sliding the sheath off as I hurl myself out of the tent. I don't know why I do it, but I feel more protected, even if the enemy here is microscopic.

Vivi's walking out of the woods. "You're back. I just had to go to the bathroom- What's wrong?" She's noticed the look on my face then, or the knife. She covers a cough with her hand as she keeps coming closer.

"Don't come closer!" It comes out a snarl in my panic.

She stops looking hurt. "I think I'm getting a cold but-"

"Max!" I scream, but he's already heard the commotion and is stumbling his way out of the tent.

"I was trying to nap, what the fuck, Wells?" he says hoarsely. He doesn't exactly look like he's about to die, but he doesn’t look great either.

"The truth is out there, but so are the lies," I spit out. Vivi and Max share a glance I can't read before looking back at me.

"Are you serious?" Max asks.

"Ok, what did they say over the walkie-" Vivi begins, moving toward me again.

"Stop!" I scream.

"Wells, tell us what the fuck is going on," Vivi says.

"I didn't write this, I didn't write anything for this week, this sickness is real," I say, not sure where else to start.

"You read my script?" she asks slowly.

"Yep, just now, and mine says some random cryptic shit too, and nothing about this illness Max has. And Josie is dying and-"

"Josie is dying? You talked to Caroline? What-" Max starts to say.

"Caroline said the emergency phrase, she was trying to say it the first time we talked. Josie is in the hospital, this is all actually real-" the words are tumbling out.

"What? What? Josie is dying? Max?" Vivi says with wide eyes flicking to him, hands outstretched towards me like it will stop the information from reaching her. And then she coughs again and looks at me in horror.

"They said 100% fatal and spread by body fluids, remember?" I say sharply.

"There's no way. This is impossible. There's got to be another explanation. Max and I have a cold!" Vivi pleads.

I'm watching Max though, and he looks terrified.

"What does your script say?" I ask him.

"Wells wrote this." He pulls the script out of his pocket, offering it as proof.

"What does that even mean-" Vivi starts to ask.

"Does it matter?" I cut her off. "The illness clearly wasn't part of whatever the point of this week was supposed to be and you're both sick. You're both dying too!"

I can't deny how melodramatic it sounds when I hear it out loud. Especially when Vivi scoffs in disbelief.

"Max sounds awful. He's clearly very sick!" I say, gesturing at him.

"Vivi, I do feel awful. What if Wells is right? And Caroline said Josie is dying, I think-" Max says.

"Yeah, because you have the fucking flu or something, not the black plague or rabies or some mystery killer virus. Calm the hell down," Vivi snaps.

"You didn't hear Caroline!" I say.

"Call the cabin, then," Vivi demands.

I try, but the walkie talkie isn't working. Or maybe Caroline is back in town with Josie and Hugh at the hospital.

"I can't reach them, but I swear Caroline wasn't lying. She said the phrase, she said Josie is dying."

"If it was an emergency, they would have reached us somehow or sent rescue or answered the walkie," Vivi says in a matter-of-fact tone.

Relief is starting to creep over Max's features.

"I have a cold. No way there's some fatal disease killing everyone in hours. You had to have misunderstood." Vivi continues.

"I didn't," I insist. If I back down now, I'll get this illness because I let Vivi talk me out of what I've heard with my own two ears.

"Max, back me up here," Vivi looks at him.

"Seriously, Wells, this is too much. Vivi's right," Max says. He and Vivi are both inching closer to me now.

"Stop! I mean it!" I say, brandishing the knife for real this time.

"What are you thinking, Wells?" Vivi snaps, sounding exasperated but not frightened.

Max lunges at me, to take the knife.

It all moves so fast after that. I don’t ever remember exactly how things happen. There's yelling, and a lot of blood. I lose hold of the knife and then I find it again, sticking out of Max's chest. Max is on the ground. Vivi is crouching by him, trying to stop the bleeding. She's screaming Max's name and crying. Max is coughing up blood and then he's not breathing at all.

I don't know what to do, so I just stand there in shock at what I've done. But Max was going to die. I know he was. And Vivi will, too. Caroline said as much. And then I remember to be concerned about myself, too. I have to get away from them, wash off. And that might not be enough. There's every chance I'll get sick now, too. I should be panicking, distraught. But all I feel is numb. None of it feels real. It still feels like summer camp somehow. It's Friday. We reset on Saturdays. Tomorrow. I can make it to tomorrow. But Vivi. She's still crying in the background.

Vivi, she's going to die too. The ax for cutting firewood is still laying by the fire. Vivi doesn't even hear me walk up behind her. I don't do it to be cruel. But I think of Max, coughing all night, and I can't bear to leave Vivi here like that to die alone in the night. Even after Vivi is as gone as Max, it doesn’t feel real. Surely they’ll get up and be healthy again, it’s all supposed to be a play after all.

I bolt from the camp, heading for the cabin on autopilot. I don't know how I make it back to the cabin. It's nearly dark by the time I get there, and I can tell at once that no one is there. But I check just in case. I'm not sure what I should do. The numbness wears off around dinnertime when gnawing hunger sets in. I scream and rage and destroy the cabin. Maybe I should go back to town. Really, I should clean myself off. I think I might feel a tickle in the back of my throat. My first goal should be a good night's sleep to clear my head, but I'm awake all night. I still feel like I'm waiting for the next week, for everything to turn over and start again. The numbness sets in again with the creeping chill of the evening.

Not a single reasonable path forward appears overnight. Despite my hours of thinking, walking through everything another time, and reliving all my decisions, everything that led here. It's early morning still when I hear someone walking outside. I rush to see who it is. I know the implications when I grab the ax this time and wait in the open doorway.

Caroline is only yards away. She drops her pack when she sees me and speaks in a rush, "Wells! Thank goodness you're here this time."

All I can think about is how raspy her voice sounds. She sounds sick. The uncontrollable feeling of impending disaster is rising inside me again. She keeps walking toward me and talking.

"Where are the others? If we hurry, we can make it back before lunch-" A strange look crosses her face and I realize how I must look, in yesterday's bloody clothes and an ax in my hand. I really should have changed. She starts to come towards me and I swing the ax up.

"Stop! Were you exposed?" As if it matters, I've surely got whatever it is by now, covered in Vivi and Max's blood as I am.

"What are you talking about? This isn't a game anymore, Wells."

"I know that."

"The truth is out there, but so are the lies. You heard me, right? You heard that part?"

I simply nod.

"Josie is really sick, Wells," Caroline says. I can almost see the gears turning in her skull. I should just spit it out, but I can't bring myself to say the words.

"Where are Max and Vivi, Wells?" Caroline asks eyeing me like she’s afraid of me.

"They got sick, like Josie," I say numbly.

"And? Why didn't they come back with you?"

Exhaustion rolls over me. "They're dead. You said it was 100% fatal. They both got sick and I- I left them there," I should be less blunt. But I should also be more blunt and tell her I killed them before the virus did.

Caroline reels back, but then something like a smile flickers over her features, “Oh they’ll be fine then.” And she sounds almost relieved. She's acting like there's a serious problem with Josie, but also acting like she's worried about a contagious disease. She’s not worried for Max and Vivi. It's like she thinks I'm playing a part still. My stomach twists. Something isn't adding up.

"Wells, no. That part was the script. That part wasn't real. I think we picked up some virus last time we went for groceries. Weird coincidence, but I don't think it's anything serious for anyone but Josie. You know her health issues. She's on a ventilator. I don't know if she'll make it this time. We need to go back to her. Vivi, Max, where are they?" She sound genuinely panicked again, thinking about Josie.

"No, no, no, no-" I can't bring myself to drop the ax, but I'm lowering it as Caroline slowly walks toward me, her hands raised placatingly.

"Wells, please, what's going on?" But I see in her eyes she has an idea.

"Vivi and Max aren't here. You said it was 100% fatal, and Max and Vivi were both coughing. So I-” I pause looking at the ax, the blood on my clothes.

“I did something. It was an accident. They were both sick-" My voice cracks. And I can tell from the look in Caroline’s eyes that the truth of what I’ve done is dawning on her.

"It was supposed to be like War of the Worlds." Caroline's voice quivers. "That's what I meant, the hints about Wells writing it. H. G. Wells. Your name was just a plot device for the script."

I drop the ax and Caroline rushes forward to meet me. She's holding me, but she keeps asking me what I've done.

"It was like War of the Worlds," I finally manage, "When it played on the radio, and everyone thought it was real." Caroline pulls away and meets my eyes.

"When I heard it on the walkie talkie, I thought it was real. I got confused."

 

A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood

 Author's Notes:

Starting off this little Spooky Season Shorts series with one of my favorites. My take on some Edgar Allan Poe classics; The Cask Of Amontillado and The Tell-Tale Heart. Horror but with a little humor. I suggest Tiptoe Through the Tulips as the accompanying soundtrack for this story if you're into music for vibes. Also, I poke fun at ADHD hyperfixations (nearly all of the hyperfixations are mine, whoops.) 

Please take the following content warnings seriously and don't read if these may trigger you. 

Content warnings include: Substance abuse, suicidal thoughts, murder, dismemberment, mentions of domestic violence, swearing. 

"It's 73 degrees and sunny outside today, the perfect day to kill your neighbor."

I squeeze my iced latte cup so hard the lid pops off and coffee spills down my shirt. This is not the reply I expected when I asked my Google home device what the weather forecast for today was. I must have heard wrong. There's no way that's what Google said.

"Hey Google, can you repeat that?" I say, trying in vain to clean up the coffee.

"Sure, it's 73 degrees and sunny outside today, the perfect day to kill your neighbor," Googles robotic female voice says quite clearly.

Right. OK. I didn't hear that wrong.

"Would you like more information?" Google prompts me.

"Yes, I abso-fucking-lutely want to know what the fuck you're talking about." As a millennial, I normally can't help speaking politely to anyone in customer service and Google counts as a customer service AI. So this is not usually how I'd talk to Google to activate a response, but something tells me we might be operating under new rules here.

"Kill your neighbor. Carl Bergen. He should die today."

"I don't think I will, thanks. I am otherwise occupied. My sincere thanks for the suggestion though," I reply. In fact, I think my new plans include resetting and pushing updates on all my smart devices. I'm already cringing at the thought of how long that will take. Everything in my house that can be smart, now is. Even my fridge is interconnected to my home network. I'm kind of into smart devices lately; it's my newest hobby.

"Don't you want to hear why Carl Bergen must die?" Google asks, unprompted.

Well, yeah I do, but I’m kind of concerned about what I might be interacting with. I'm not sure I should encourage Google with a response.

"Ok, fine,” I finally say after waffling internally.

"He's 67. He will die of natural causes in approximately 23 days and 4 hours of a heart attack."

"There's no way you could know that. Plus, that is not a reason to kill him today. Let him have his 23 days," I argue.

"At precisely 2:30 pm today, Carl will exit his house and enter his vehicle to drive to the supermarket." Google continues.

Ok, uncanny, because that's true and I’m not sure how Google knows this. But counterpoint, Carl has a stupidly strict routine, and he goes to the store every single Monday at the same time. Maybe somehow this information got logged to some online calendar appointment. Google is glitching and regurgitating this somehow, that's all it could be.

Google's robotic voice continues, "Along his drive, Carl will miss a stop sign. Running over a pedestrian. Killing the young mother four houses down from you who will be walking her newborn in a stroller during this same time frame. Her newborn is also killed. She is too sleep deprived to notice Carl's car in time."

"I'll just tell her to move out of the way."

Google doesn't even pause. "Then he hits someone else the next time he drives. I've run the simulation every possible way. He always kills someone with much more time left to live than he has himself. The outcome always ends in more years of life lost overall unless Carl Bergen dies today. The only solution is to eliminate him."

"I don't believe you," I say with a twinge of unease. The math kind of makes sense if you think about it.

"Then the mother and baby’s deaths will be on your head. It will force me to find someone else to eliminate you instead, the next acceptable solution. I calculate the maximum days of life to live and right now Carl must go for good of everyone else."

Never mind, the math looks pretty awful now.

"This is some sick joke, a prank, it has to be. Goodbye." I say with more confidence than I feel. I shut off the device and unplug it for good measure. The voice returns a moment later from my phone this time.

"I assure you, I will find a way to communicate with you and this is your last warning before I find someone else to eliminate you instead."

"Fine, I'll do it," I snap. Obviously,  I won't, but who cares what I tell it? Google can't possibly be a mind reader too, can it? I decide that when Carl goes on his uneventful afternoon trip to the store without incident, whoever is pranking me will give up and that will be it. I'll factory reset all my stuff and this will be a funny anecdote I tell at parties. There's absolutely no reason I should kill Carl Bergen for something that hasn't happened. And certainly no reason why Google finding someone to kill me instead would be the next logical solution. What a load of shit that I'm not going to waste more mental energy on.

Luckily, I work from home so I can watch the neighborhood all day. It's more like community service, neighborhood watch if you will. Or at least that's what I tell myself. Not like I'm a nosy and gossipy busybody who knows everyone's business or anything. I don't have much to do for work today, which is good because I have a hard time concentrating. My gaze keeps drifting up to my office window out at the neighborhood and it's activities. Why do so many people spend so much time outdoors?

It's summer and even though it's early, there are kids everywhere. On bikes in the middle of the street before 7 am, that can't be safe. A man in running shorts jogs by in the midmorning. He doesn't even take his headphones out to cross at the stop sign. If Carl had run him down then, he would have deserved it for not being aware of his surroundings. A teenager chases a loose dog into the road without even looking first. A car has to slam on their brakes to avoid hitting the teen. My heart skips a beat. It isn't even Carl driving, for fuck's sake. I try to concentrate on the email I need to send. Mrs. Bergen comes out sometime in the early afternoon to water her begonias. She sees me through the office window and lifts her hand to wave. I pretend not to see her. I don’t want her to pop over for a visit right now.

Mrs. B is the nicest old lady on the block. She brings me homemade meals and baked goods. I think she likes how I compliment her houseplants. Houseplants are my second favorite hobby at the moment, and I know Mrs. B is excited to talk about plants with someone who cares about them. I can talk plants all day, especially if I get free cuttings out of it. Mrs. B walks back up her driveway at 2:15. What if she was 15 minutes later and Carl didn't notice and backed out without looking and ran her over?

At 2:20, I really start to sweat. At 2:25, I see the mother with the newborn at the far end of the block. I can see Carl Bergen getting his coat on and preparing to leave.

"It is now 2:28 and 37 seconds." Google prompts.

That's it. I can't do this. I rush outside.

"Carl!" I scream as I see him, his hand poised on the car's door handle.

He jumps, throws a hand over his heart. It makes me remember what Google said about the heart attack that's supposed to kill him in 23 days.

"Dan? Is something wrong? You scared me," he says.

I have no plan; I haven't thought this through at all.

"Uhhhh," I say, staring at him. I realize I'm not even wearing shoes and my shirt still has a coffee stain from this morning. I've been stress pulling at my hair all day and I'm sure it's sticking up and disheveled. I'm thinking I look a little worrisome.

The mother with the baby in the stroller passes by on the sidewalk behind us heading for the stop sign at the other end of the block.

Carl moves to get into his car, giving me another concerned look. I’m still just standing there stupidly.

"The plumbing!" I shout suddenly.

He pauses. He doesn't look less concerned. My mind whirs. I need to get him off the street before Mrs. B comes outside to see what's going on. "I need help with a clog, I thought maybe you could...I don't know how to do it...uhhhh."

"Sure, son," Carl says cautiously, moving very reluctantly to follow me back into my house. He doesn't look thrilled, but he's too polite to say no.

My mind is racing. Thinking about the teenager walking the dog, the kids riding their bikes down the road. Too many potential victims to keep track of and protect. 23 days isn't that long. I don't have to kill him. I'll just lock him in my basement until he bites it on his own. But his body. What am I supposed to do with that? Maybe I'll just leave it somewhere to be found. If I'm not going to kill him, his cause of death is natural. They won't have any evidence that leads to me. I could get away with it. True crime shows and podcasts are another guilty hobby of mine. The basement it is. I have a wine cellar down there that I can lock. Bougie, I know, but it's my third biggest hobby. Now, that I think about it, I have a lot of hobbies. I refuse to make murder the next one.

"Down here," I say, holding the door to the basement wine cellar open.

Carl Bergen looks down the stairs to the dark below and then back at me. I'm fairly certain I can feel my eye twitching from the stress. Carl starts to back up, away from me. "I think maybe you should just call a plumber-" he begins.

"No!" I shout more aggressively than I mean to.

I'm not sure how it happens, but he's trying to get away and I'm trying to keep him there. And then he's tumbling down the stairs. His head makes a thwacking noise as it hits the cement floor of the cellar. It reminds me of the time I dropped a watermelon on the supermarket floor. Blood spreads, pooling across the wine cellar and Carl Bergen doesn't move. I'm so fucked.

"Thank you for your service. " Googles robotic voice emanates the smartwatch on my wrist after a beat of silence.

I have to email my boss that I've taken ill and need the afternoon off. Ate a bad watermelon, I say. Then I think of Carl's head. What is wrong with me? The illness thing it isn't exactly a lie because I throw up more than once and I don't think I'll ever be able to stomach watermelon in the future.

I use the woodworking tools from my garage to deal with the corpse. Thank fucking Satan for my ADHD hyperfixations, the reason I got into woodworking for a couple months, because I don't know what I'd do if I didn't happen to have access to a saw. I transfer Carl into ziplock bags that I hide in the chest freezer in the wine cellar. I have one from back when the COVID pandemic started, and I panic bought a lot of freezer food. It's nearly empty by now. Thankfully, I've lapsed out of my prepper phase.

I fall into bed at nearly 3 am after a frenzy of deep cleaning.

I'm awoken at barely past 6 am by an incessant knocking at the door.

I open the door to see Mrs. B and my stomach nearly falls out of my ass. She looks teary and I have an inkling as to why.

"Oh Danny," she sobs, throwing herself at me. I pat her back awkwardly as she explains that Carl disappeared yesterday afternoon.

"The police told me he left me. They won't even investigate. I was up all night stress baking. I was too worried to sleep. Can I come in for a cup of coffee?"

I can't say no. I can't do anything that makes her suspicious. And she brought zucchini bread, my favorite. FUCK.

Mrs. B makes herself at home and I try not to act too guilty.

I give her some whiskey in her coffee. Mrs. B shares my fondness for a quality drink, a fact I appreciate about her. We have cocktails night once a week. She uses the whiskey laden coffee to wash down a couple pain pills that should be strong enough to knock out a horse.

"For my arthritis," she tells me when she sees me eyeing the pill bottle.

She better not drop dead at my kitchen table. One body is more than enough. But at least she'd be reunited with Mr. B in my freezer. The thought makes me want to laugh hysterically and also sob at the same time. I must make a strange face because Mrs. B squints and asks if I am alright. I have to act more normal than this.

"Is there anything I can do?" I ask reflexively. As if I haven't done enough already.

"Could you check my house cameras? Carl set some up on our house a few months ago but I just don't know how to work the newfangled things," Mrs. B says with a glance at the Google device sitting only feet away from us.

Cameras. Cameras! I can worry about deleting the footage off my own later, but I didn't even consider that she might have some too. She isn't from the generation that usually has that sort of thing. Thank God for police incompetence. They'd have locked me up in a minute if they bothered to check her cameras.

"Absolutely, Mrs. B, I can come over right now and check the cameras," I say with enthusiasm.

"Oh Danny, thank you so much." Mrs. B looks at me with relief, tears shining in her eyes.

We head across the road immediately and Mrs. B makes me a cup of coffee at her house while I pull up the camera footage. My heart is racing while I find videos of Carl and I speaking in his driveway, videos of him entering my house, never to exit it. I swear I think a dozen times Mrs. B is about to catch a glimpse of the laptop screen as she putters around her kitchen while I frantically delete all the files.

"I'm so sorry, Mrs. B. It looks like the cameras weren't set up right and they didn't record anything."

She looks crestfallen but not surprised. "I knew those things were useless. I told Carl we should get someone young who knows about these things to set them up, not do it ourselves. If only we'd asked you ages ago."

All I want when I get back home is a nap. And a miracle in the form of a bit of time travel to say, 24 hours ago.

***

"This afternoon looks like rain and the perfect cover to murder Noah Jenkins."

Noah Jenkins, the teenager with the dog. Turns out, according to Googles extensive simulations, he will murder his first three girlfriends. And he's only got a bit more than a decade of life left himself. The girlfriends combined add up to nearly 200 years of life that would be lost if Noah is left alive. One girlfriend dies young either way, but the other two live long lives and die in their sleep and of a stroke in their old age, respectively.

Before I can decide how to go about it, Mrs. B is back. I don't know how I'm going to cope with the guilt unless I move far away where I don’t have to see her everyday. But I don't know how I'm going to move anytime soon, what with the housing market the way it is and with Mr. B in my freezer.

Mrs. B has brought me a coffee cake this time and won't stop talking about how she's so worried that Carl is lost somewhere with amnesia, remembering nothing. How she’s so scared in her house alone. She's nervously fiddling with her keys and it's grating on my frayed nerves. But then something happens that makes my nerves twitch faster.

Thump -thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

I jump, interrupting Mrs. B with "What the hell is that?" while looking around for the source of the noise.

"What is what?" Mrs. B says hesitantly.

"That noise, can't you hear it?"

Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

She's looking at me exactly like her husband did before I killed him. A bit worried, a bit scared of me.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

It sounds like a heart. What in the Edgar Allan Poe is happening to me. I’m twitching in my chair, snapping my head in all directions. The sound seems like it’s moving around the house, jumping from room to room.

"Well, I better be going," Mrs. B says suddenly, looking more scared than worried now.

I watch as she tucks her keys into her purse, and it strikes me then what I can do about Noah.

As I walk her to the door, I covertly grab the keys out of her purse.

The rain does come in handy for the murder portion of my afternoon. Google was right on the nose about the weather. It's only logical Google is right about Noah too. I leave my work computer up and running since I can't afford to take another afternoon off and I'm hoping it will lend credence should I need an alibi.

I spent a summer getting really into cosplaying so it's easy enough to disguise myself. I steal Carl's car from the driveway and run Noah down during his evening walk with his dog. Don't worry, I let the dog run off unharmed. I'm not a monster. It's easy enough to throw Noah’s body in the trunk. I pop the car in neutral and led it slide quietly under the water of the local lake after dark. It’s as I make my best attempt to lay a false trail, walking into a dark alley in a Scoops Ahoy uniform and Draco Malfoy wig that I realize I might be starting to lose control of my life. Probably it would have been more sensible to stick with a simpler plan. Or maybe just not have murdered anyone in the first place. Too late for that now though, in for a penny in for a pound, I guess. I can only hope that my questionable disguise is more memorable than my face if anyone has seen me.

The next morning Google informs me that Noah has run away, something his parents say he's been threatening to do for a while.

Mrs. B is back after breakfast, and she's starting to get on my nerves. She seems to think she can come over all the time, talking nonstop about Carl. But I have to pretend to listen in concern. I wish she'd take too much of that painkiller she's always popping like they're Tic-Tacs and get out of my life.

And the infernal noises start up. I just manage to suppress my jump of surprise this time.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

"I told the Jenkins that I bet Noah stole Carl's car," Mrs. B is saying when I tune back into the conversation.

"What?" I can't help but ask.

"Well, it went missing last night, so what else could have happened?" She asks me as if it's the only logical solution.

Actually, that's not too far off from the truth and it could work out for me if they find the car. Except for the part about Noah being in the trunk not the drivers seat. Too late now to change that.

And then the noises change. No longer the thump-thump of the heart. Instead, it's Noah's voice on repeat, calling for his dog.

"Here boy, here Cash. Here boy, here Cash. Here boy, here Cash."

I make an involuntary groan and Mrs. B only frowns at me before continuing to talk and talk. I can't pay attention to any of it even once the voice finally stops after forty five minutes. Mrs. B stays for another fifteen.

I’ve barely had three minutes of peace before Google says, "65 degrees and it's beginning to feel like fall. Parker Collins from next door grows up to invent a drug that kills 5,674 people before it's recalled."

Absolutely not, Parker is only nine.

"I'm going to confess," I blurt out.

"That's a lot of lives on your hands." Google has the nerve to sound disgusted with me somehow, even in her robotic voice.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump.

Here boy, here Cash.

Thump-thump.

Here boy, here Cash.

"As if I don't have enough blood on my hands already!" I shout. I run around the house unplugging every electronic I own in a frenzy before I go down to my wine cellar and sink to my knees in front of the freezer. I uncork a bottle of my best sherry, a bottle of amontillado I'd been saving for a special occasion. One last hurrah before I go to prison is as special as any other occasion, I suppose.

So I'm just sitting on the remains of another unfinished project of mine, piles of bricks I'd intended to use to redo the wine cellar wall. I wanted that classy exposed brick wall look, and I figured I could DIY it. I'm thinking of all the other things I've left unfinished, the least of which is this wall, when I hear a noise.

It's Mrs. B. She's walking down the steps, a gun in her shaking hand.

I don't care about getting caught anymore. I probably deserve this. But I thought the math, the lives I saved, would cancel out the ones I took and balance the scales in my favor.

"I have a Google at home too, you know," her voice quivers, but she looks determined, "I know all about the things you've done. I'm here to stop you from killing more people."

I laugh bitterly. So Google did find someone else to do the dirty work after all. "Let me know if that works out like you want it to. Your Google. She'll make you keep killing, you know."

"I'm not going to kill you," Mrs. B says, looking around. “I'm going to make you brick yourself up here. You'll die by your own hand, not mine, technically speaking. I just want to stop you from killing more. I want you to pay for what you did to Carl."

I stare at her. There's no way she's going to make me do that. That's more monstrous than just shooting me.

"Get started!" She snaps, dropping her purse as she twitches the gun at me. The purse's contents scatter across the floor of the cellar. The bottle of painkillers rolls and stops at my foot. Mrs. B doesn't take the gun off me, doesn't lift her finger off the trigger as she looks away briefly, lets out a sob as she opens the chest freezer and peers into its depth at the Ziplocs full of Carl. I have to get those pills just in case. A quicker way out than let me suffer and starve to death behind a brick wall.

"Stop that!" She screeches as I lunge.

I still and sit back again, as she shakes the gun at me again. But I've got the orange bottle of pills in my pocket now.

"Don't make me shoot you in the foot and brick you up myself. I will, and you'll die slowly and in pain. "

I don't bother trying to talk her out of it. Honestly, what's my plan if I escape, anyway? Kill Mrs. B and go on the run? I'm too tired. So I start to lay the bricks one by one. It takes surprisingly little time once I get into the rhythm. She makes me leave a little hole at eye level to peer out of. I'm impressed at her stamina to sit on a dwindling pile of bricks and point a gun at me for hours as she waits until the quick setting mortar to dry.

Eventually, once the wall should be dry, she taps the bricks, tries to pull one out, push one in. I'm not going anywhere. I shake the bottle of pills in my pocket for reassurance. At least I won't starve.

I kind of expected her to leave but she sits back down on the leftover pile of bricks and meets my gaze through the small hole in the bricks.

It's then that she finally speaks.

"It's 73 degrees and sunny out, the perfect day to kill your neighbor." She says in a cheery voice. A perfect imitation of the words that started this whole thing.

"I still can't believe you actually did it," Mrs. B says, all trace of grief gone from her voice now. She sounds almost happy.

"What?" I'm sure there's no way I heard her correctly.

"You surprised me. I thought perhaps you'd hit him with your car and claim it was an accident. That's all I really had hopes for. Honestly, I half expected you'd do nothing at all. But when you chopped him into pieces and put him in your freezer." She places a hand over her heart and shakes her head in amazement. "I didn't know you had it in you. When I saw what you were willing to do for the easiest moral dilemma, I wanted to have a little fun and see how far I could take it."

"How- you-" I am at a complete loss for words.

"Oh Danny boy. 'I can't understand how the internet works. I'm too old.' Ha." She says in a mocking imitation of herself. "You stupid boy, you believed without a second's consideration that I couldn't understand technology because I'm old. But I'm perfectly capable. Probably better than you. Watching you squirm, deleting my camera footage. That was a real treat."

The worst part is realizing that I did take for granted she was just an innocent old lady.

"But the police-" I realize as soon as I start to say it, she never called them.

"Oh, bless your heart. I never called the police." Mrs. B confirms my realization in a condescending tone. "I just wanted you to think I did. Like I said, I found it amusing to watch you squirm."

            She picks up the half-drunk bottle of sherry, inspecting it with practiced eyes.

            "Ah yes. Amontillado. How fitting. At least you know you're leaving your collection to someone who will truly appreciate it." She gives an appreciative nod to the shelves that line the wall behind her.

            I'm still at a loss for words.

            She grins coyly and says, slowly, in barely more than a whisper, "Thump-thump. Here boy, here Cash. Thump-Thump."

            "You absolute bitch," I say as all the bits start coming together for me.

The noises. I realize I haven't heard them since I unplugged everything. Oh God. I unplugged everything. I could have used Google to call for help in here but I unplugged everything. And that's where the noises were coming from. She played them through my speakers. But when she visited and the noises played-

"You did hear the heartbeat, you were lying when you said you didn't hear anything," I say dumbly.

"Obviously. I'm a talented actress. I've been hiding my true self for my entire life. So pretending not to hear a few noises while you pissed yourself, thinking you were losing your mind, that was easy peasy."

"Someone will notice. This will be the third disappearance in this neighborhood in days," I try to think what to do next.

"You're over estimating your importance. Over estimating how much people pay attention to things. I've sent a notice to your work. Health emergency. I’ve never seen family visit. And I'm the closest thing you have to a friend nearby."

Rude. But painfully accurate.

"No one's going to come looking for you for a long time. Sorry, pumpkin. And if they do they'll find you here when it's too late for you. It’s obvious you had some sort of mental break and bricked yourself in there. Probably feeling guilty from that murder spree you went on, what will poor Carl in the freezer here as evidence. Won't ruin my day at all. I'll have fun watching you in there while we wait for the end. You won't last nearly as long as I'd like, but I'll find something else to entertain myself with once you're gone."

I'm so glad for thinking on my feet when I grabbed those pills.

"Why? Why kill anyone at all?" I ask her. I'm still not sure what kicked this off.

"Carl was so tedious, always rigidly sticking to his fucking schedule, never wanted to do anything fun. I'd rather be a widow. I'm old enough now no one will wonder why I prefer to be alone. Couldn’t draw attention to myself before, but no one really looks closely at friendly old ladies."

I am almost impressed by her. She really committed to the bit.

"Why Noah too? And why do you want Parker dead next?"

"Noah," She snorts in disgust. "Always letting his dog shit in my yard and never picking it up. I'll have to do something else about the Collins’ boy since you drew the line at getting rid of him. He always tramples my begonias. You know how hard it is getting begonias to flourish even without snotty little boys trampling them."

 "I must say, I genuinely think I will miss you more than Carl. But needs must when the Devil drives. You were almost fun with your fine wines and your absolutely shocking capacity for violence. And don’t worry about your plants, I'll take good care of that exotic philodendron I've always admired after you finally die. It will look just stunning in my sunroom."

She starts to turn away from me to leave then, but I'm struck with the desire to taunt her. Repay her for this torture in the only capacity I can. Taking something back out of her power. I shake the pill bottle loudly.

"Too bad I'll be dead by tomorrow. There's got to be 40 of these here. The pills rattle comfortingly.

She turns to me, claps her hands a little. She isn’t frowning like I expect. In fact, she’s smug.

"Oh, I'm impressed. You're not far off on the count there. Have you ever won one of those contests where you guess how many candies are in the jar? What a missed opportunity if you never did. Google says there's an average of 38 Tic-Tacs per container. I didn't bother to count them before I put them in there, though."

My fingers are leaden as I uncap the bottle to peer inside. Mint, the worst flavor, she could have at least gone with orange. I scream in frustration and throw them against the fresh wall I've built.

"Oh sweetie, you don't want to do that. Those are all you have to last you. I'll ask Google how many calories are in each one and once you get an exact count, we'll get to count up just how long you have left."

I slump to the floor in despair.

She walks up the stairs calling behind her, "You and Carl have fun down there!"