Chapter 3

I blinked my eyes open in what seemed like both one small second and a lifetime later, with nothing but orange surrounding me. My eyes adjusted, and I saw a hazy orange fog floating calmly above me. Beyond that, I could see stars and that massive orange blood moon hovering overhead.

My brain gave me a pulse of pain as I struggled to sit up. I could immediately smell burning rubber and coppery blood in the air as the accident came barreling back into my memory all at once. A sob ripped from my throat, but it ended in a sputtering cough tinged with blood as I toppled onto my hands and knees, my hands sinking into the grass as I crawled. My skin was covered in black soot, and my dress was torn to shreds.

When my ears popped, the sound exploded around me suddenly. I could hear the crackling inferno of the fire blazing in the distance and a cacophony of whimpers from every direction. I was in the middle of a barren field that used to be crops, and all around me were my old classmates, scattered like leaves in the wind, nursing all sorts of horrible wounds that told me some wouldn't be waking up again. I saw so much blood that I was ready to vomit.

My throat was so thick with smoke that I coughed and gagged as I crawled around, desperately looking for Maddie. I needed to find her. I needed to find her and the guys immediately. Then we needed to get a phone because I must have lost mine in the chaos. In the distance, I saw the bus, torn to shreds, with tendrils of smoke leaking from it. I couldn't say what compelled me to do it, but suddenly, I knew I had to get to the bus. The urge was overwhelming and all-consuming.

So I crawled hard and fast, pain radiating through my body. I tried to see past the stinging in my eyes and feel past the aches in my joints or the oozing cuts littering my skin. I pulled myself closer to the crumpled pile of metal. So far, I hadn't seen any dead bodies, but it was pretty hazy out there. I heard plenty of screaming in the air surrounding the crash. I was somewhat glad I couldn't see completely; there had to be dead bodies scattered around the crash.

I made it to the bus and realized that it was only the back end of it. The rest was completely torn away, and I could see it a little farther down the road, lying on its side with the engine smoking. I frowned at the chaotic scene. I didn't think we'd been going nearly fast enough for this severe of a wreck. But those bats... It was like they came out of nowhere and targeted the bus specifically.

Ripping my way into the broken cabin, I shuffled torn seats, purses, and personal items out of the way. It was like crawling my way through the apocalypse. It was dark inside, and without the light of the moon to guide me, I was running on instinct. The smell of gasoline was pungent, and something dripped from the roof. I didn't want to think about what it could be. Frantically, I searched. I moved with tunnel vision, ignoring my own wounds, to find Maddie and the guys. I wasn't prepared in the slightest for what I found as my world tilted on its axis.

I screamed in rippling agony the moment I spotted Jason's lifeless gray eyes staring upwards, his jaw slack, and his throat hemorrhaging blood. He was half covered by a torn seat, and a piece of metal stuck right through his abdomen. He was gone. There was no life left in his face. I was screaming as I fought to get to him, shoving things out of the way and repeating his name over and over again, as if he'd pop up and tell me he was okay.

I threw a sheet of what used to be the roof off to the side but staggered back, slicing my hand on a jagged edge of metal. Norman was there, covered in blood and three feet away from Jason. His neck was bent at an odd angle, and his green eyes, which not twenty minutes ago were glaring right into mine, were lifeless.

Oh, god, oh god, what do I do? Don't fucking leave me!

I managed to find the strength to pull myself up and over the last few seats and immediately gagged, spitting off to the side, when I saw both Freddy and Michael lying there, only five more feet away from where Jason and Norman were. They were dead; there was no question about it. Nobody could survive wounds like that. All four of my oldest friends were gone. It was gruesome. It was wrong and unnatural, something no one should ever have to see in their whole lives. I screamed so loud, I didn't even sound like me anymore.

This couldn't be real. It had to be a nightmare. Maybe I fell asleep on the bus, and soon I'd wake up back in Sunset Hollow, everyone safe and unharmed.

But it was real. I could feel it in my bones; all of this was happening. My friends were dead. I was hurt; I didn't know how bad, and... Maddie! Where the fuck was Maddie? !

The world began to spin as my body locked up. Every single sound for miles dissipated in seconds. It was like time slowed, and all I could hear was the thump, thump, thump of my heart. It beat like an ominous drum, pulsing in my ears. What felt like liquid cold rushed over my whole body, filling my veins with ice. Fog from outside the bus rolled through the broken windows like water, as if I were somehow pulling it inside. It swirled around the floor of the bus like undulating waves, crawling up the seats and around my legs and torso

I stared at the four people who had always held my heart, tears streaming down my cheeks. I couldn't accept it. How could they be gone? These boys who'd turned into men right under my nose. My first loves are my most solid enemies. How could they just not… be anymore?

A strange calm fell over me. Eerie. Slow. Cold. It was like I was suddenly detached from my body and my emotions. The fog wrapped around me tighter and thicker. Even though I was inside the mangled bus, a sudden wind blew around me, whipping my hair around my face, and in the distance, I could hear the crash of thunder. Through the orange-tinged fog, bright flashing lights lit the night with electric green as I stared at guys' corpses.

Then I grew angry. I could feel the rage filling me up as I cursed the universe or whatever god decided this was supposed to happen exactly one year to the day that my world fell apart. Some force compelled me to move, and my body jerked forward as if pulled on a string as I made my way to Jason first, staring into his sightless eyes. Reaching down, I cupped his cooling cheek in my palm for two slow heartbeats, my icy breath whooshing from between my parted lips.

Words flew through my brain—words I didn't recognize in a language I didn't know. They were clear and insistent, and so I spoke them aloud.

" Idcirco praecipio tibi ut vivere! "

I screamed the words through the whipping, swirling wind. Thunder crashed, nearly drowning them out, and lightning slammed into the side of the bus, rocking it like waves.

I did the same to Michael, Norman, and Freddy. I touched their faces, and the cold fled my body and seeped into theirs. I chanted those words over and over again, and each time I did, lightning struck the ground inches from the bus.

It was just a touch. I shouldn't have; they were dead. I should have been screaming. I should have been stumbling back out of the bus and waving down an ambulance. Instead, I was caressing the dead, saying our last goodbye, which I'd never really fully be able to do.

As my fingers left Freddy's cheek, the coldness in my bones intensified. I felt frozen and slow, so I staggered backwards, toppling over onto what was left of a bench seat. My head hit the wall of the bus, and my eyes rolled to the side, where I spotted a pale hand sticking out of a pile of torn metal. I grasped the hand with the slim fingers that were all too familiar, and it was ice cold, unfeeling, and dead. I squeezed my eyes tight and repeated the words one last time, giving it all I had until my body felt like giving up.

I knew I was dying then. I knew it better than I knew my own name. So I finally looked down, brought my palm to my abdomen, and pulled away fingers covered in thick, warm blood. I should have been afraid. I should have felt something. Anything. But I only felt cold.

As my mind began to wander and my consciousness waned, the last thing I could remember with perfect clarity was the orange fog that continued to pour into the bus like water, filling it up until I could no longer see the corpses of my oldest friends. The world went silent before it all fell away.

One Year Earlier

"I have to be there, Mom; all my friends are expecting me to show up. I'm the only person in my school who never shows up for this stuff. Besides, I'm almost eighteen. I think that's plenty old enough to go to one small Halloween party." Gripping the back seat of the car, I leaned forward, begging as if my life depended on it.

"Absolutely not, October. We've already talked about this. I don't want you out on Halloween, and that's final. When you do turn eighteen, you can do what you want, but until then, you follow my rules." Mom turned her head slightly, her expression stern, and told me without words that we'd reached the end of the discussion.

I sat back into the leather seat with a scowl, my arms crossed over the fabric of my cheer uniform. Annoyance bloomed in my chest and simmered just like always. It was like she wanted me to resent her. Literally everyone at my high school would be at the party. It was being held at the old barn on Mill Street. Maddie had been practically on her knees, begging me to go with her. The guys would be there too, and we had a lot to talk about, like where our relationship was headed and such. So many secrets to finally spill...

I'd done some things that I wasn't proud of, but I wouldn't apologize for following my heart. I refused to be sorry for stolen kisses and secret touches. The only thing I was sorry for was not being completely transparent with the guys. I needed to be straight with them, and I'd thought this party would have been the perfect time to do so, but apparently, my parents didn't care.

Our friendships were changing. If I were being honest, they'd been changing for a while now, but it was time we figured out what to do about it. There were four of them and one of me. It was all so confusing, and someone was bound to end up getting hurt. Probably me.

I didn't know how to tell all four of them that I'd kissed each of them separately behind their backs without meaning to. Okay, maybe I did mean to, but I hadn't meant to lie about it. It was a surprise every time it happened. I never set out to hurt anyone, and you honestly couldn't pay me to choose between them because I loved all four of them equally. I finally knew that all these feelings I'd been harboring for Jason, Michael, Freddy, and Norman were real, and they were mutual. I loved them, and deep down, I was pretty sure they loved me back. But would that love disappear when they found out?

When Jason came over the other day after school, he only had one thing on his mind. He'd been wild. The moment my door shut, he had me against the wall, his mouth devouring mine as his fingers slipped between my thighs. It caught me off guard, but I'd fallen into it yet again, like a spell weaving around my heart. But I'd pushed him away after a few heavy heartbeats. I just couldn't stay into it without feeling sick of myself. I hated lying to them and to myself. I was sick of keeping secrets, and it was time I just let it all out on the table. If they didn't want me anymore, then so be it. At least I'd know I tried.

I was pretty sure I'd scared Jason when the waterworks started. I completely understood his wide eyes. I mean, who the fuck breaks down like a hysterical baby after a makeout session that heated? I did, apparently, and he hadn't known what he'd done wrong.

I couldn't turn it off, even as he demanded to know what was wrong. He'd always been a sucker for girl tears, and the babbling mess spilling out of my mouth like word vomit had him freaking out. I'd only told him half of it, not the full truth. I'd told him about how I had feelings for Norman, but I didn't tell him about all of them. I didn't tell him how Norman was the one to take my virginity. I decided not to describe the way his best friend's tongue and fingers had made me feel things I'd never felt before and how I still ached to do it again.

Jason didn't seem too upset. He'd been almost okay, as if he expected it, and gave me a small secret smile like he knew something I didn't. I was worried he might get mad and call me a slut for harboring feelings for both of them. I knew for a fact that there were others who wouldn't hesitate. But he'd chuckled darkly before tackling me to the bed and demanding that I place my lips against his immediately. He'd nipped at my neck with little scattered love bites that made me blush and tingle down to my curling toes.

I needed to just stop being a baby and finally tell the guys how I really felt about them before they heard it from someone else's mouth. It had to be me. I had to tell them the whole truth about what happened. Even if they didn't feel the same way, at least it would be out there in the open.

"Dad, I can't stress enough how much I really need to be there. Please… You guys don't know how important this night is to me. Why don't you ever let me go out during Halloween anyway?"

Was I pouting? Yes. Did I sound like a six-year-old and not an almost eighteen-year-old woman? Maybe. But their superstitions were getting in the way of my life—of actually living my best before college next year.

Dad looked over at Mom, his brows furrowing as he took a deep breath and released his death grip on the steering wheel. I watched him actively calm himself down and force a smile that was more of a grimace.

"Sorry, pumpkin, but the answer is still no. It'll always be no. One day, you'll understand why we do the things we do. We just want to keep you safe, and Halloween isn't the safest night of the year. Maybe we'll pop in a movie and say, Oh, I don't know, Hocus Pocus ? Your mom can make us some of her famous hot apple cider, eh?"

He smiled over at Mom with the same wide stretch of his lips he always reserved just for her, like she was the only star in his sky. Mom kept glancing back at me with hopeful ice blue eyes that matched my own , pleading with me to drop the subject and give in.

"I don't want to stay inside on the spookiest night of the year and watch a movie with my parents when I could be with my friends instead. Why are you guys always saying no to everything I like to do?"

I was fuming. I just wanted to have a normal teenage life, to go out and have fun once in a while. "Why won't you let me go outside when the sun goes down? Other girls get to go to the movies or hang out with their friends. Other teenagers go to parties on weekends. What is so damn bad about Halloween that we can't even celebrate it?"

"Now isn't the time to talk about this. You'll know when you're ready to know these things. Everything we do has a reason," Mom said, reaching back over her seat to swirl a piece of my dyed blonde hair between her fingertips. Crinkles appeared on the side of her eyes. I believe they were called crow's feet, along with a soft, sad smile when I finally looked up at her.

"We love you, October," Dad said as he reached over to clasp Mom's other hand. He placed a gentle kiss on her knuckles.

He took his gaze off the road for a split second. Just one second to meet my eyes in the rearview mirror. One second was all it took to shatter time and make it stand still.

Mom was suddenly screaming, "David! The road!"

I could feel my own eyes widening in shock and my pupils expanding in stark fear as the car headlights bounced off the silhouette of a tall man standing in the middle of the road. The car swerved to avoid him as Dad jerked the steering wheel to the right. The painted lines blurred as we launched off the road and careened down a ditch, feeling every bump and jolt. I could hear my mom screaming in the front seat. All I could focus on was the old oak tree we were heading towards at full speed.

Mom glanced back at me with terrified hopelessness in her bright gaze, just before a loud, crunching noise filled my ears. The last thing I could remember was my head slamming against the side window and seeing the spiderweb cracks in the broken glass smeared with blood. My blood.

That was the day I lost everything, including myself.