Page 13 of Are You Scared, Krowe?

I'm rattled, unable to focus on the canceled game because all I can see in my mind's eye is Toby tied up on that stake where we left New Girl last night.

She's missing, nowhere to be seen, and Toby's dead. It's not a coincidence, no matter how Jackson tried to convince me it was. I can't imagine that Gianna was strong enough to overtake Toby, but maybe he tried to go for seconds, and she fought back.

Maybe she was pissed and waited for him to come back so that she could take him out, and then she tied him up to send the rest of us a message.

I can feel something coming. It's in the air, in the chattering of the crows, the wind that whips around me as I drag in a breath full of smoke, letting the nicotine flood my veins.

The cherry of my cigarette blooms red, the only bit of color in an otherwise dark night.

There's a pale full moon, but it keeps slipping behind clouds, leaving me standing here on my front step in the cold night.

Mom and the girls went ahead of me to the fair, and Dad hasn't been home since he left this morning. I guess he's got his hands full trying to figure out how to explain this murder.

My phone went off all day, until I eventually shut it off.

Everyone is scared... everyone except Jackson, who whips into my driveway with his music blasting, completely unbothered by the fact that we saw one of our friends dead earlier today.

"Come on, fucker!" Jackson yells out the window to me as I drop my cigarette on the ground, stomping it out beneath my sneaker. "We're late!"

Coach is going to have our fucking ass for being so late, but if there's ever a time he may let it go, I have a feeling it's after one of our teammates was murdered. They canceled the game in the wake of it, but we're still all gathering to 'pay tribute'.

I turn his music down when I slide into the passenger seat, chewing over the words I want to say.

"Oh, come on," Jackson moans. "That's a good song!"

"Have you heard anything new? My dad's been out all day, so I feel like there's got to be something, right?"

"About Toby?" Jackson shrugs, glancing in the rearview mirror and putting the car in reverse. He drives us backwards far too fast and shifts into drive without even taking his foot off the gas pedal.

"Or Gianna."

Jackson turns to glare at me.

"I thought we agreed not to talk about her. Remember? Nobody knows we even know her."

"It's not like there's anyone around." I roll my eyes. "I mean, come on. You aren't the least bit..." I consider not saying it. Jackson's going to give me shit for saying it, but I don't care about my pride right now. "Scared?"

"Scared?" Jackson cackles as if that's the funniest thing he's ever heard. "Scared of what?"

"Anything." I shake my head, pushing my hair out of my face again. "Everything. Toby's dead. What if she's coming for us?"

"She wouldn't come for us," Jackson smirks. "I don't think she was all that into it last night."

"Can you be serious, for like, five minutes?"

Jackson turns to face me very dramatically. "Serious face. Go ahead."

He's patronizing me, but it's fine. I need to talk to someone, and my best friend is the only person here right now.

"The way I see it, there are two options. She survived and killed Toby, in which case, we're probably on her list. I mean, I'm the one who drugged her, and you put your whole fist inside her."

"Felt fucking amazing." Jackson smirks.

"I'm just saying, compared to that, what Toby did was innocent. I mean, he just fucked her pussy a little. Barely even took two minutes before he blew his load in her, and if she's that mad at him for that, maybe she's plotting revenge against us too?"

"You watch too many movies." Jackson chuckles, but when he speaks next his voice is high-pitched, mocking. "Kids these days. Rotting their damn minds with horror movies and violent video games. And don't even get me started on the music..."

When I don't laugh at his sarcastic mockery, he sighs. "Fine. That's one option. What's the second?"

"That she's dead somewhere, Toby's murder was unrelated, and we're responsible for her death."

"That's the better option, honestly. We probably should have killed her before we left last night. It’s the only guaranteed way to make sure she keeps her damn mouth shut."

He doesn't blanch under my shocked stare. Instead, he shrugs.

"I know we technically can get away with it without killing her, but there's a chance it will follow us if this comes out. Pay-offs and coverups will help in case she talks. But you know who doesn't talk at all?"

"Who?"

"Dead girls."

"Christ, Jackson. You're fucked."

"Oh, come on. It's the truth, you know that. We'll be better off if she's dead."

I open my mouth to tell him that he's sick, that murder is a step too far and wishing her dead is wrong.

Instead, all that comes out is a scream.

There's only half a second for me to see the figure right in front of our car. I don't make out any of the facial features, whether it's a guy or a girl.

All I know is one second they appear there, and then there's a distinctive thud as a body crashes against the windshield, bouncing up onto the hood.

Jackson overcorrects, slamming the brakes too late and sending us in a tailspin that pushes us into the next lane, down the embankment, and into the cornfield.

My head slams against the dashboard as we come to a stop, and I get one glance at the cornfield lit up in the high beams, smoky and hazy, before everything slips into black.

I wake to the sound of the horn blaring, though Jackson's body is no longer pressed against it the way it was before my eyes shut.

His door is open and I'm alone.

It takes a minute before I can pull air into my lungs enough to move, and then I manage to lift my head. It's throbbing, and when I touch the spot that’s the source of the pain, my fingers come away bloody.

"Jackson?" I call, slowly gathering myself to be able to move.

I'm grateful to discover that all my limbs seem to work, and I'm not stuck. My door opens easily, and I practically drop onto the ground in my attempt to get out.

I can smell burning rubber, hear the hiss of what is most certainly a cracked radiator. Jackson's going to be pissed.

But then I remember why we crashed in the first place.

We hit something.

Someone.

Pulling myself to my feet takes effort, but I manage to drag myself up, and each step I take toward the road gets steadier.

There's someone standing in the middle of the road, and for one moment, I consider hiding, waiting for help to come in case it's the person we hit. That doesn’t' make sense, though, because there's a body on the road, too.

"Jackson?"

He doesn't turn as I approach, doesn't give any indication that he even heard me.

"Jackson?" I try again, drawing up to him. He doesn’t turn to face me, his eyes fixed on the ground, the body I can't see. Fear builds in my gut with each step I take, and I don't even want to know who we hit. But I can't not look. What if they're alive? What if I can help save them?

There's no saving the person on the road.

He's lying on his stomach. The glow of headlights from a stalled car feet ahead of us illuminate everything enough for us to see that it was indeed a person we hit.

Blood is everywhere, in a pool beneath him, and there's no way his arm isn't broken at the angle it's at.

But the most damning thing is the way the gauzy headlights illuminate the halo of his brain matter scattered across the pavement.

His skull is crushed, sunken in like it's collapsed on itself.

I don't need to check his pulse, because there's no way he survived that.

I also don't need to check his face to see who it is.

The letterman jacket tells me that, like it's some sick sort of irony.

Right above his number, stitched in gold thread that's saturated in blood, is his name.

"I killed Rhodes." Jackson says. His voice sounds far away, detached and cold, like he can't process it.

And maybe he can't.

Rhodes grew up with us; everyone in this town did. He's been our best friend for years, the rational to Jackson's unhinged. And we hit him.

A swell of vomit pushes its way through my stomach, and I drop to my knees, unable to contain it. Something wet and squishy slips beneath my palms, but I can't pay attention to it, because I lose everything.

I've never had such a violent vomiting spell, but once it comes on, it doesn't let go. I'm useless to do anything, tears burning my eyes as I look up and find myself face to face with the carnage of our friend's body.

Jackson tries to talk to me, but I can't hear anything over the sound of my vomit splashing against the road as I throw up the burger I had for lunch, which apparently didn't digest well.

Chunks of it come out of my nose, suffocating me as I'm reduced to a pathetic, sniveling and choking little bitch.

It's approaching headlights that finally catch my attention, and I manage to cease vomiting long enough to watch as the car slows to a stop. I hold my hand up to try and shield the savage gleam of the headlights, which are making my throbbing head ache all the worse.

At least you have a head to throb.

"What the fuck?"

"Jackson?"

"Krowe? What happened to him?"

"Oh my God! Rhodes!"

There are so many voices, so many people crowding around us. I hear screaming, crying, panicking. But I can't make out any of it.

"Call my dad." I beg, searching the crowd for faces I recognize.

Someone wraps an arm around me, pulling me to my feet, which seem even less steady now than they were when I first climbed out of Jackson's car.

I recognize the scent of the shampoo, but it makes vomits swell within me again and I push her away before I can cover her in my bile, since that’s all that’s left in me.

"He came out of nowhere," Jackson says. "He wasn't there, and then he was..."

The sound of a phone ringing to busy cuts through the night, which is suddenly quiet as we all wait for someone to answer the phone. But nobody does.

"It's okay." My sister says. "It was an accident. It's okay."

An accident.

But was it? First Toby and now Rhodes?

The crunch of tires on broken glass alerts me to another car approaching, and fear rockets through me.

They're going to see what we did.

"Ethan?"

I recognize that voice even before I look past the flashing red and blue lights to see the sheriff car.

My father's right-hand man , Rick, is staring at me as he approaches, his hand on his hip like he's ready to shoot first and ask questions later.

But then he gets a look at the body on the pavement, and his face goes slack in horror.

"Fucking hell."

"We didn't mean to!" Jackson says. "He came out of nowhere."

When I turn to meet Rick's gaze, I can tell he's waiting for me to back up my friend. I nod, because that's the truth.

Rick runs a hand down his face and blows out a dramatic sigh.

“What the fucking hell is going on in this town? Missing girls, murdered football players. And now fucking manslaughter?” He shakes his head like he's trying to figure out what to do.

I'm not sure he even knows the protocol here, considering that he's fairly green. He hasn't lived here all that long.

Normally, he would be the one who waits for my father to make decisions about what to do.

“Where's my dad?” Sadie asks, glancing behind Rick like she expects that he may get out of the car and begin to walk toward us at any point.

“At the festival; he went earlier today after the call about the kid in the cornfield.

He's been there all day trying to get everything ready for tonight. I wager it didn't make any sense for him to leave and then go back.” He scratches his head. “You really oughtta go get checked out, you know? You don’t look so good. None of you do.”

I don't bother stating the obvious, which is that our friend’s brains are splattered across the ground.

“Do you need anything from us?” Someone asks. “Like a… statement or something?”

“Fuck if I know,” Rick shakes his head again, illustrating his complete uselessness. “Just go on, get out of here. I’ll radio back to the station and see if I can't get someone to come help me scrape this boy off the ground.”

I don't object. If I don't get out of here soon, I'm never going to get the sight of the inside of someone's skull out of my head. I don't fight the two people who shepherd me to the back of the pickup truck, lowering the tailgate before telling me to hop in.

It takes a lot of effort with all of my energy depleted from the vomiting fest, but I manage to crawl into the back and curl my knees into my chest, trying to process what the fuck is happening.

A few more people climb into the tailgate to sit in the bed with me, and I lift my head to see them.

A startled scream slips out of my throat when I catch her staring at me.

The paint is running down her face, just the way it was the last time I saw her, melted by sweat and tears and rubbing off on the ground we pressed her against.

Gianna.

She smirks, slow and sinister, and then she's gone.

I blink, ignoring the questioning looks from my friends.

I'm imagining things.

The stress of the day is manifesting in weird ways. I've seen two of my best friends' bodies, and it's taking a toll on me.

"You okay, Krowe?" Someone asks.

"Good." I nod, because what the fuck else am I going to say? The bitch we left out to dry up last night is tormenting me?

Rick smacks the tailgate and lifts a hand in parting.

"Be a little more careful this time. Don't get into any accidents on the way, right?"