Page 48 of Dead of Summer

ORLA

There was never a body. That was always the problem.

With no body there could be no closure. Not for Orla, anyway.

Not ever again. There was always Alice. She was everywhere Orla went.

In the halls at school. Every time a car passed her house at night, sending its headlights though Orla’s curtains.

And most of all in the water, her legs and arms moving below the swells, her hair tangled up with the seaweed.

Orla thought she could escape her by moving away to New York.

But she saw Alice there too. Waiting on subway platforms as Orla’s train sped by, eyeing her on the periphery of parties, drink in hand.

Sometimes Orla would approach, cautiously, only to realize that it wasn’t her.

It was someone else. Someone who really didn’t look anything like her at all.

After a while Alice’s presence almost became a normal part of Orla’s existence. Her friend’s ghostly appearances reminding her of her guilt. It was part of the reason Orla could never let go, never fully relax. At night her heart would pump with fear. She’s dead , she would remind herself then.

But now Alice is standing right in front of Orla. So stunningly beautiful and alive that Orla feels like she is dreaming. She is wearing a dress that looks almost exactly like the one she wore that last night. The sequins shimmer like liquid as she steps out of the corner toward them.

“I can’t believe you’re real. How are you real?

” Orla starts toward Alice, her body flooding with relief.

This is her chance to fix everything. She can still make things right.

Her eyes sting with tears. “All this time I’ve lived with you inside my head, praying there was some way that you made it, that you were okay.

And look at you here, alive.” Tears are spilling down her cheeks as she reaches out to embrace her best friend.

But Alice’s face doesn’t soften at her remorse. Her body stiffens and she looks Orla dead in the eye.

“Are you sure of that, Orla? Or do you want to make sure you’re okay? You want me to tell you I forgive you? I don’t.” Orla draws back, stunned. “And David, of course. Lucky little rich boy almost got away with murder, huh?” Alice says now, walking toward them across her rotting bedroom.

“Alice—” David starts, putting a hand up as though to stop her from continuing. But she merely looks at him, amused.

“You had plenty of chances to come clean about that night. You could have told the reporters the truth. Wouldn’t it have been better for you to face the consequences?

Maybe you could have saved yourself then, disconnected yourself from your father, David.

But the both of you were so selfish. It took me so long to trust anyone again. To find another friend.”

“You have to help me,” Alice said when Orla came to, a throbbing pain behind her eyes as she took stock of where she was. Still on the yacht, lying down on one of the long sofas the men had been hanging out on. She looked to the floor, where the nearly empty bottle of gin was tipped on its side.

“I need to get out of here,” Alice said, sounding far away.

Orla’s eyelids were still so heavy. She forced herself to look in the direction of her friend’s voice.

Alice stood in the doorway at the far end of the room in her sparkly dress.

It was torn at the bottom, Orla noticed, a jagged rip that went up one side and exposed her leg.

It was then Orla realized that Alice wasn’t talking to her.

She was talking to David who stood just in front of her, his arm stretched across the doorway blocking her path.

“He’s Dad’s friend. You can’t just leave.”

Alice had lowered her voice then. It shook with fear. “No, David. He is messed up. Please.”

“What did you think was going to happen?” David sneered. “You said you wanted this. You were flirting with them all night.”

Orla shoved herself up onto her elbows. Her head hurt like it had been split in two as she tried to focus on them. Wanted what?

“No, I—I thought they were going to help me. They said they were going to take me to New York, take my art around to some galleries. I thought it was just drinks. A party. I didn’t realize.” Her voice was growing desperate.

“Alice?” Orla’s voice stuck in her throat. They didn’t hear her. Her body was slow and heavy as she pulled herself to stand. The gentle movement of the boat sent her careening into the wall. She moved along the side toward the doorway. David was still blocking Alice’s path.

“These guys are sick,” Alice said, starting to cry. “They say I owe them.”

“This was your choice,” David repeated, unmoved. Orla hadn’t ever heard him sound that way, like all the emotion had been drained from him. Later she told herself that he was drunk, too, that this might just have been his way of responding to too much alcohol.

“If you don’t help me get out of here, I am going to tell everyone that your dad did this to me. He can’t get away with this.”

“No, you’re fucking not,” David murmured. His voice had become disturbingly calm. Now Orla was running with shaky footsteps toward them.

Alice registered Orla there, and a look of relief spread across her face just as David’s hand came down on her shoulders.

“What are you doing?” Orla cried as David drove Alice back into the guardrail.

“Don’t you ever fucking threaten me.” His newly broad shoulders flexed menacingly.

“David! Stop!” But it was too late. Alice was falling over the side. There was barely a splash as she hit the water. By the time the two of them got to the edge, there was no sign she’d ever been there at all.

“Alice,” Orla called out, filled with instant, horrified regret.

“What do we do?” she’d cried to David. “We have to go find her.”

“She fell,” David had said, not moving.

“What are you talking about, David?” Orla looked at him uncertainly. “Alice,” she screamed then, panicking. “We have to find her.” She’d shoved David in the chest. Why was he not moving, not reacting? “What are you doing?”

He was frozen, looking out at the water.

“Alice?” Orla had screamed. She’d pointed the flashlight down into the water, and that’s when she saw Henry Wright in his little boat.

He was holding her friend’s dress. At first she thought it was Alice.

But then he turned his face up toward her, white as a ghost in the beam of the light, and Orla could see that all he had was a scrap of empty fabric. It shone from his hands.

Geoffrey had boomed out at them, “David? What are you doing here?”

“She fell,” David said, the lie so smooth and confident it had knocked the wind out of her.

Geoffrey’s mouth twitched as he did some mental calculus. Orla felt as though she could see him planning, projecting all the possible outcomes in front of him, and his face settled into something of a satisfied smile as he lifted his phone to his ear and stormed from the deck.

“Oh, David didn’t kill me,” Alice says now to Orla. “But you thought he did. And you covered for him.”

“I thought we paid you to stay far away.” David is sweating now, his face turned down in an angry scowl.

Orla spins toward him, sputtering in disbelief. “You knew? All this time you knew she was alive?”

“Dad’s men found her. She’d somehow made it to shore.

They helped her start over,” he says, staring at Alice and ignoring Orla.

In the light of the fishing lamp, Orla can see the sweat gathering on his forehead.

“They helped her mother, too, in agreement that they leave it alone, and that they never come back .”

“Helped is a strong word for what you did,” Alice says. “You helped yourselves. You paid us all off.”

“You’ve been here all along, haven’t you?” Orla thinks of the paint inside the crawl space and the flashing lights she was sure she was hallucinating.

Alice smiles in admission.

“You signed an agreement,” David says, his voice rising into a whine. “It’s legally binding.”

“I planned to keep to my NDA. I really did. I’d just come up here to lurk from afar. But my plan changed when Faith told me about Gemma going missing. Then I knew I had to intervene. I couldn’t let you get away with it a second time.”

“You’re crazy. Totally fucking crazy. I should never have helped you.” David is holding his phone to his ear. “Pick up, pick up,” he mutters angrily.

“Where are you going?” Orla cries, pulling the phone away from his ear.

“I have to find my dad.” He shoves her off him and she falls hard into the corner, cracking her head on the low eave.

“No one wants to end up in prison for grooming children. No money can protect you there. But you don’t think you can go to prison, do you? Not David Clarke,” Alice says.

Orla pulls herself up from the floor in time to see Alice give him a rueful smile. “Oh, Geoffrey is long gone. Ran off on his yacht. See for yourself.”

Orla glances through the open door to the rounded hall window. It would have once framed a view of the mooring but is now completely empty, the waves illuminated by a crescent moon. David looks like he might be sick.

“Left you to take the fall, didn’t he? I guess Daddy doesn’t want to get caught doing something naughty.” Alice taps her chin. “It all feels familiar somehow, doesn’t it?”

“You shut up,” David roars, pointing his finger in her face. Alice blinks but seems unfazed by this outburst. Orla can tell that Alice is relishing this moment. Orla always knew her friend was talented and kind, but she realizes now that Alice is also so incredibly brave.

“What are you going to do? Warn him that I am here? And that I know what he’s done with little Gemma?”

“David? Is all this true?” A new voice comes from the doorway.

“Faith?” David calls out to her. “Are you okay? God, why are you soaking wet? What happened?” He says it in a tone that implies he thinks he might still be able to salvage this situation for himself. “We should go back to the house, get you cleaned up.”

Orla looks on in disbelief as he reaches his hand toward Faith.

But Faith is staring at David as though they’ve never met.

“Henry Wright brought me here. Turns out he’s not the villain in all this.

But you know that already, don’t you? That poor man.

All this time I thought you were protecting your father but you’re in on it all too.

How many girls have you recruited for him?

Was it just Gemma and Alice or were there more? ”

“You have to give me a chance to explain. Because what you are suggesting is just wrong.” David’s voice rises sharply. He takes a step toward her. The floor creaks dangerously. “The girl, Gemma, she needed help. Please, I need you to believe me.”

“You’re right, she did need help.” Faith’s lip quivers. She stands there a moment looking between them all, trying to decide what to do. Her shoulders finally drop and she stretches her hand toward him.

“Thank you,” he breathes. “I promise I can explain everything.”

But as David starts toward her, Faith moves to the side of him and it becomes clear it isn’t his hand she is reaching for. Alice steps around David and her fingers entwine with Faith’s.

“Elena,” Faith breathes, pulling her into an embrace. “I was so worried.”

Orla watches from the corner of the room, stunned. “You two are friends?”

“Best friends,” Alice says, giving her a sly smile. Orla draws back, wounded. How could those words hurt her still? Like she was fifteen again.

David’s lips part at Faith in outrage. “You little traitorous bitch. After all I did for you,” he sputters, turning to Alice. “And you , you didn’t even know how good you had it. I’m going to bury you for good this time.”

David begins to stomp toward the door. He has almost reached Orla when a violent crack rattles the floor.

He wobbles for a moment, his face contorting in a spectrum of shock and disbelief as the floor begins to splinter below him.

David looks at Orla and his mouth opens in surprise.

Everything has always gone his way until now.

There was nothing his father couldn’t fix. Except this.

A scream rips from Orla’s throat as the floor gives way, crumbling below them. There is a deafening crack followed by a burst of dust as the center of the house collapses and swallows them up.