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TWENTY-THREE

I jolt from the memory, gasping, my heart pounding as if I’m sixteen again and running through that forest like the demons of hell are on my tail.

Not demons.

Just my best friend.

One of them, at least. The other lay dead in a clearing.

I rub my hands over my face.

There was no near-death conclusion to that tale, where I reached safety just as Patrice grabbed for me. She never caught up with me that night. I’m not even sure how hard she tried, because after I glanced over my shoulder once, I never looked back again.

The police found her wandering through the forest, raving about Sam and Roddy. Her injuries seemed self-inflicted, including the cut on her collarbone, as if she’d tried to emulate Roddy’s suicide.

I don’t remember a lot of what happened afterward, only that I was interviewed over and over by the police.

Was I ever tempted to fudge the truth and be absolutely clear that Patrice killed Heather so she didn’t escape justice? Yes, but I told the truth.

I repeated what I heard shouted in the woods. I also told them thatthe voice had been hoarse, and so I couldn’t say with absolute certainty it was Patrice. I told them what I heard Heather say.

“N-no. It’s me. It’s just me. I—”

She did not indicate who she was speaking to. I did not see Patrice in that clearing with Heather. Before her death, Heather never spoke Patrice’s name. She only said those three words.

I don’t understand.

Twice I heard someone in the woods, but I saw only a shadow. When I ran for help, I stumbled over Patrice. The knife was lying beside her. She reached for it, and I ran. I heard her rise. I looked back and saw her, and I didn’t look back again. I just ran.

In the end, all the séance stuff was ignored. Three girls playing a slumber-party game, that was all. If we heard voices, it was other kids goofing around. There was no “bad trip”—an analysis of the mushrooms proved they were just regular grocery-store fare.

Three teenage girls who’d clearly watchedThe Crafttoo many times. Three teenage girls who’d been raised during the Satanic Panic. All that nonsense burrowed into Patrice’s brain and made her think she’d been possessed, and she’d murdered her friend just like Roddy Silva once murdered his girlfriend.

Susceptible teen girls. Hysterical teen girls. Blame hormones. Blame movie nonsense. Blame Patrice’s family history of mental illness. Her mind snapped and, really, people whispered, it was better if it stayed snapped so she never truly realized what she’d done to Heather.

For the next two months, I stayed home, rarely leaving my room. No one expected me to finish the last few weeks of school—they just gave me whatever grades I had and let me skip exams. Then it was off to Toronto. Dad “just happened” to get a job transfer… which I suspect he applied for. My parents let me change my name and whisked me across the country in hopes it would help me get past the tragedy and the horror of what happened.

And Patrice? Well, she was never getting past it. A court foundher not guilty because of her mental condition and remanded her to a high-security psychiatric institution.

After that night in the forest, I didn’t see Patrice again. My parents made sure of that. I had to return to Edmonton to testify, but she wasn’t in court. She wasn’t in any shape to be in court.

What happened that night?

Twenty-two years later, I still don’t know for sure. Most days, I’m convinced it was exactly what everyone said—Patrice suffered a mental breakdown brought on by the first séance and her subsequent belief she was possessed. After Anton told me that he and his friends were responsible for the “haunting” that first night, it seems even more obvious that everything else could be explained by a psychotic break.

Then there are the nights when I remember something—Patrice’s eyes, her expression, her voice, those shadows in the woods, thatfeelingof something wrong—and I wake up, wondering how the hell I bought the “she just snapped” explanation.

Snapped and gutted her best friend?

There’d been more to it. I have always felt that, as hard as I’ve tried to believe otherwise. That’s why I let myself fall into this bullshit of trying to contact Anton. Because after what happened in that forest, I cannot shake the conviction that there is life after death.

So what do I believe? That the deranged spirit of Roddy Silva possessed Patrice and reenacted what he’d done twenty years before?

Am I even sure it was Patrice who killed Heather? Her hand that wielded the knife?

Of course it was. It had to be.

Shadows in the forest. The crack of twigs. The rustle of dead leaves.