Page 49

Things are coming to a head. I’m going to either die out here trying to run, or the authorities will capture me and drag me back to prison. When I swung the blade I caught Porscha’s throat, and I made a fatal error not chopping her up right there.
What’s one more murder to add to the list? I could save us all the suffering. But when I looked into her cold green eyes, I saw a type of peace she doesn’t deserve. Once Porscha’s dead she no longer has to answer for what she’s done. I don’t need her reasons when I’ve seen her madness.
Jo deserves the right to know what’s real, and I can’t save her from the truth this time. It’ll come out, and the new victims deserve closure too.
“Isn’t prison supposed to make your heart hard?” Fake Porscha gripes as she appears again, and the apparition seems annoyed. “Letting her live isweak. She destroyed your life. You’re going to let her get away with that?”
“Now that she’s caught, they’ll eventually find me too. My time has run out. Death Row is waiting, and I’m tired of playing the game. Maybe I’ll be enough of a problem that they’ll move my execution date up to be done with me. Is that something that happens?”
She’s quiet, and when I look over, Fake Porscha is gone once more, alone with my thoughts. I listen but I can’t hear anything. No voices of agents, no barking of dogs, just the breeze blowing through the trees.
I’m tired, and I’m okay with the end I can see coming. I knew my freedom would be short-lived.
When there’s nothing left to do but rehash the scene with Porscha, I carefully climb down. My leg protests, but I have to move. Sitting here won’t bode well no matter the outcome, and if Porscha supposedly walked down the highway and got caught why can’t I do the same? Seems better than wandering aimlessly away with no sense of direction.
I don’t walk on the pavement; I choose to walk a few feet off the road and take my time. When I slashed Porscha’s throat, fear took over, and I decided to make a break for it instead of waiting around to see what happened next. Thankfully the rain let up some time ago so I’m not getting soaked as I wander off.
Vaguely, I recognize where I am. It might just be an illusion, but the mile marker ahead gives me some idea of where the road took me. I chuckle to myself, the sound echoing in the quiet around me.
Back when Jo and Vinny were my shelter amidst all the crimes I committed, they would occasionally drive out here. I only went a handful of times, and it was always to use a cabin that belonged to Vinny’s family. I remember he called it small but I thought it was the perfect size. It ended up being close in size to the house he bought senior year, and we never went back.
But I grew up in foster care from age twelve, and it taught me one thing about new places: always have an exit plan. So even though I loved and trusted Jo and Vinny, I knew I was the traitor amongst us three. I made myself memorize the route just in case something happened and I needed to leave. Luckily, nothing ever did.
Without Fake Porscha lurking at my side, I really do start to talk to myself. “I guess I can go half a mile further and head towards the cabin. I bet someone will find me. It’s a couple more miles in, and I barely remember what it looks like. I suppose I could just pick any fucking cabin to die in front of.”
I’m more worried about my leg. It’s a throb more than an ache now, and while I learned how to ignore pain in prison, this is bad. I know I need a doctor to check the wound and see what the damage is, but that can wait until I’m arrested. Might as well enjoy the perks like good healthcare if I have to go back inside.
Muttering to myself as I walk, I’m sure I look truly fucking crazed. At least with Fake Porscha I feel semi-normalwhen I talk to myself, but now there’s no one here to take away the burning loneliness. It’s just me and myself, walking down the side of the highway waiting for the inevitable.
If I had a way to, I’d contact Jo and Vinny. I don’t think they ever opened my letters, given their initial responses to seeing me again after so many years, but that’s okay. Maybe, if they kept them, they can read them when I’m gone. I like to think that the weeks together in Florida again caused their curiosity with me to grow. It could be enough to quiet the anger and betrayal they still feel to read the words I wrote. It’ll never be enough compared to what I’ve done, but it’ll be better than trying to speak to them when bars and guards divide us again.
When I reach the mile marker, it feels like hours have passed. I’m cold to the bone and I realize I’m shivering as I turn and start down the lonely road to the cabin. Phantom sirens keep playing in my head now, and I glance around expecting to see flashing lights. Would they ambush me? Take me out like Bonnie and Clyde?
Eventually, somewhere along the road, I hear a car. My mind can’t distinguish if it’s behind me or coming towards me, and as I blink and look around I realize I wandered out into the middle of a field. So much for hiding.
It’s a blue SUV, and I watch it slow down as it approaches me.
The game is over.
But when the passenger door flies open, it isn’t an agent who steps out. It’s a head of strawberry blond hair, the woman from my dreamsandnightmares shooting out of the car rushing over to me.
Relief washes over me when I recognize Jo, and I can’t help but smile—just before my body gives out. She catches me quickly, steadying me as another set of footsteps rushes over. Itry to lift my head, but I can’t. The last thing I see is her hair, soft and familiar, before my eyes slip shut.
Her voice is the final thing I hear, fading into the edges of my fading consciousness: “I knew we’d find you here.”
Chapter 17
It was Jo’s idea to drive up to my family’s old cabin. I know it’s still in the family, even if no one has used it in the last decade. I was the only one old enough to come all the way out here fifteen years ago, and my parents never used the place. Nowadays all of my siblings have their own lives elsewhere, so I’m not specifically concerned about running into a member of the family on the drive out.
I guess Alastair really did memorize the road like he once told me, because we found him wandering towards it. He was hardly recognizable at first, but once I pulled close to him it was obvious.
“I did what I could for his leg,” Jo breathes, pacing back and forth near the couch. “I don’t know what else we can do.”
My eyes follow her, watching as she paces around the cabin. There’s a bedroom we’re ignoring in lieu of all of us staying here in the main room, Alastair asleep on the couch. I helped Jo cut the leg of his pants where the blood had stained the fabric. Even asleep he groaned when she prodded it. I wonder if this is Porscha’s handiwork – the wound looks bad, and he needs to be seen by a professional.
Honestly, I expected him to look worse after missing for this long. Most people are presumed dead after a few days letalone weeks and months, but the FBI never gave up and neither did we. His face is thinner than before, and there are heavy bags beneath his eyes. Minor cuts and bruises mar his skin but the wound in his leg is nasty. My bet is it came from Porscha; If he tried to cut her throat, it’s no surprise she tried to take him down too.
Jo pauses, tugging the blanket she threw over him back into place. He’s wounded and looks a little thinner, but he doesn’t have the vertical cuts or healing scars like Jo bears. It makes me a little bitter staring at him, wondering how many of Jo’s wounds are truly his fault versus Porscha if he survived weeks alone with Jo’s mother.