Page 17 of Five Survive

She put her phone down on the grass over there, a white glowinghalo around it as the rest of the world fell to darkness. She fumbled for the button on her jeans, unzipped, and pulled them down with her underwear, strapped around her ankles.

She squatted.

Sometimes it was difficult to pee when she thought about it too hard. So she thought about something else, thought about how good it would feel when this night was finally over. Thought about whether her dad had managed to find one of the ready-meals she’d left him tonight, or if he’d passed out before he could. It wasn’t enough. Nothing she could do for him was enough. There was a ghost in Red’s house, and it wasn’t her mom. Dad needed help, proper help, and you needed money for that. But Red would take care of that for him soon; that was the plan. She just had to see everything through. Not that she could see anything right now, apart from the outline of her phone.

A snap in the trees. Red’s eyes flicked up. It was dark, too dark, just black shapes among more black shapes. But there, right over there, something moved in the trees.

“Hello?” Red called, her voice hollow, her eyes alive, sorting through shadows.

Perfect.

This was the absolute worst way to die. Mid–squat-pissing behind a tree while Maddy’s axe-murderer charged at her from the front. Dignified till the end. No, the worst way to die must be suffocating, no, no, actually, the worst was on your knees, two shots to the back of the—all right, all right, let’s finish up here.

There wasn’t anyone in the trees. Red knew that. She did. The only people were the ones she knew of, behind her on the scrubland. It was just a rat, or a bat, or a raccoon, or maybe a vampire. But it didn’t matter because she was finished.

Her legs shook as she straightened, pulling her underwear and jeans back up, fastening the button and zipper in a hurry. She lurched for her phone and held it up, the flashlight her weapon against the night.

“Aha!”

See, no one in the trees. Told you.

But even so, Red decided to run back to the others. Oliver would probably say she’d been too long already. Her ponytail flickedagainst the back of her neck and she could hear her heart in her ears; was that from the running or because of the axe-murderer? The light swung forward and back in her hand, flashing along the road. Red stumbled over a rock she hadn’t seen, swearing as her ankle buckled beneath her, trying to bring her down.

“Red?”

Red held the phone up. Arthur was just ten feet in front of her on the road, walking toward her, his glasses reflecting the light.

“You okay?” he called. “We thought we heard you yelling.”

“Oh, yeah I was,” she said, panicking and quickly double-checking that she’d done up her fly before Arthur could see. “Just shouting at the axe-murderer.”

“Well, I hope he’s having a good evening,” Arthur said as they finally met on the road, turning on his heels to walk back together.

“He’s having a great time, skulking through the trees, watching girls pee.”

Arthur snorted. He pushed his glasses up his nose, a sudden awkwardness in the movement of his arms. “I was going to cover my eyes and call out before I got close, by the way,” he said, like it was important she knew that. “So I didn’t—”

“—see me peeing?” she asked.

“Exactly. I don’t think we’re quite there yet.”

And what did he mean by that? Wherewerethey? As far as Red knew, they were just awkwardly flirting, neither of them very good at it, and in a few months he’d move on with his life, like everyone else. Probably get a nice college girlfriend he could take home for Thanksgiving.

“Red?”

Crap, she hadn’t been listening. Had he said anything else?

“Yeah?”

“You know, in all this time, I’ve never asked you,” he said. “Why did your parents call you Red?”

“Oh, well, that’s easy,” she said. “Because of my natural bright red hair color.” She reached back to tug at a strand of her dull blond hair.

Arthur smiled, shook his head.

“And the real reason?” he asked.

“It’s not Red, it’s Redford,” she said, eyes on the RV as their steps brought it closer. Did Red imagine it, or was the RV steadily lowering on one side? They must have changed the tire. “I was named after my grandpa. Redford Foster.”