Chapter 14

Tuesday, May30

I watch out my window as rain pelts the ground, bouncing back up as if it’s trying to get home to the clouds. The drains outside my house are already overflowing, water drifting along the road, ripples reflecting in the streetlight.

The rain was needed. It was too hot and dry for such a long time. It comes down so heavy I can barely see beyond it. I wish it would wash away my guilt.

I ignore another message from Jesse, but I see it flash up on my screen.

don’t talk to anyone

The previous two read “I’m keeping an eye on u” and “this goes to our grave.” He sounds nothing like the friend he used to be. I can’t get my head around how fast he’s changing.

All I can think about is how he kept watching me and then cornered me at the fair. It was intense with George and Jesse. Even Luce, with her avoidance.

I feel like we’re all slowly falling apart. Will we have a two-way split soon? Me and Atlas. Jesse and Luce. College is coming up so fast, it would be easy to drift apart. That’s what’s coming anyway, right?

That’s what probably should happen. I don’t see how we can find a way to go back to how things were before Arthur. Half of me wants us to all go our separate ways, and the other half thinks that would only add to the tragedy.

Only Atlas and I will be in the same state. It’s a six-hour drive between UCLA and Berkeley, but still close enough to spend weekends together. He’s even planned the fastest route.

He will be over soon, but I asked him not to mention it to the others. After the way Jesse is treating me, I don’t want him in my house. I mean, he thought what yesterday? That I was going to confess everything to George outside the restrooms at school?

I open my closet and look at the bag of clothes at the back, neatly hidden behind my hiking bag and a pile of blankets. I know the others have gotten rid of their clothes, but I can’t light a fire without my parents getting suspicious. Throwing them away seems careless.

So I’m holding on to them, which seems worse, but I think I have an idea.

I hear the rumble of Atlas’s car as he pulls into my driveway. I step back and close the closet door. He would help me dispose of the clothes if I asked him. I don’t know why I don’t.

I glance out the window and watch him sprint from his car to the house. He lets himself in as always.

“I’m upstairs,” I shout as I hear the door open and close.

His footsteps thud up to my room. He’s brushing off his damp hair when he walks in. “Hey,” he says, coming to the window to sit on the window seat with me. “What’re you doing?”

“Watching the rain. Did you tell the others?”

“No, you said not to. I think Jesse is going to Luce’s anyway. They seem in their own world even more lately. I guess they’re making the most of the time before they’re in different states.”

Yeah, I suppose we can pretend that’s true, and that Arthur hasn’t changed everything.

“I’ve had three messages from Jesse today. He keeps checking in on me.”

“He’s worried.”

“I understand but it’s not helpful. He’s…different.”

“You don’t think we all are?” He clears his throat, rubs his jaw, and then looks up at me. “We’ll never be the same again, Marley.”

“Well aware of that. He’s different with me.”

Why can’t Atlas see that?

He smiles and sits back against the wall, looking out to the rain. He doesn’t believe me. Or he just thinks I’m being stupid and dramatic. Of course we’re not all going to have the same relationship.

We share a horrible secret, one that we could all ruin each other with. But we’d destroy ourselves in the process.

My phone dings, making me jump. Atlas laughs and nudges my leg. Not funny. It doesn’t take much to spook me now.

heavy rain is killer for the mud

I suck in a ragged breath. What?

As I go for a reread, the message disappears, and my eyes widen.

“Oh my god.”

“What?” Atlas asks, his voice sounding far away. “Hey, what’s wrong?”

“I just got a text, but it’s gone. It said ‘heavy rain is killer for the mud.’?”

“What? Are you sure?” He takes my phone but there’s nothing there now.

“I’m really sure.”

Killer for the mud. Arthur’s grave.

“Who the hell was it from?”

I finally blink as my eyes start to sting. It snaps me out of my trance. “Unknown number and I can’t see now. Atlas, someone knows!”

“Just calm down a second, we don’t know that.”

“What else can that mean? We have to go back!” I press my fingers to my temples, massaging a headache away. Doesn’t work. “W-we need to know.”

“It could be a trap, Marley. Let’s just take a minute.”

“What do you suggest, then?” I snap. “We can’t ignore this. What if the grave has been disturbed? If it has, animals could get to him.”

There’s something about Arthur being eaten by wildlife that makes my heart break.

Atlas pinches the bridge of his nose. “Okay, let’s think. We need to find out, I’m with you there. But if this person does know, we have to be careful.”

“It wouldn’t be Jesse, would it?”

“Why would it be Jesse?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he wants to scare me. He’s freaking out because he thinks I’m going to crack and tell someone. I’m not.”

“I know,” he replies, staring at the screen. “He wouldn’t do this. Think about it. Why push you when he knows you’re struggling?”

I shrug. He’s right, it wouldn’t make sense for Jesse to do this. He wants to keep me quiet.

“Who else could it be?” I ask.

“Do you remember seeing anyone else on the road that night?”

I try to think back, but it’s not a memory I want to relive. I’ve worked really hard to block it all out. “Only that cop car, but we took care of that. It drove straight past us. This is going to come out, Atlas,” I say, nibbling the skin around my nails. “We’re going to be caught, and it’ll be worse because we tried to hide it.”

“You’re getting ahead of yourself. Stop panicking and we’ll figure it out. We have to tell the others about this, you know that, right? We need to get them here.”

“I don’t want them here.”

“Marley!”

“All right!” I say, looking back out the window. “Call them.”

Atlas sighs and makes a call.

“You’re taking this personally,” he says, once he hangs up. “We’re all scared and trying to figure this out. I’ve argued with them too. They’ve snapped at me.”

“Is Jesse constantly checking up on you? Is your best friend ghosting you?”

“Just give them time to get their heads around this, okay?”

Neither of us says anything else, because we keep going around in circles. It’s exhausting and a total downward spiral. I can’t keep a level head, so I’m going to wait for the others and see how they handle it. At this point, I’m happy to follow their lead, because I have no clue what we should do.

It takes ten minutes, but they turn up in Jesse’s truck. The last couple of days, they’ve arrived at school in Luce’s car. They’re both here to sort out my latest drama. At least, that’s probably how Jesse is going to see it.

Why was the message only sent to me?

I’ve been going over that, and honestly, I have nothing.

I wasn’t the one driving the car. Why wasn’t the text sent to Jesse?

“What the hell is this?” Jesse asks, bursting into my room with Luce trailing behind.

Luce is the only one who looks scared. Jesse looks angry.

I hold my phone up, and he snatches it from my fingers.

“There’s no way of finding out who this is?” he asks.

“I don’t see how,” I reply.

“Maybe we should ask who it is,” Luce suggests.

Jesse turns to her. “I’m sure they’ll tell us.”

“Will you stop?” she snaps. “We’re all fed up, Jesse. Quit acting like you’re in charge.”

I’d applaud if I wasn’t so terrified about the text. She doesn’t often stand up to him like that. I’m proud.

Jesse straightens his back. No one says anything for a full minute, all waiting to see how he’ll react. He’s never usually like this. He doesn’t yell at us or treat us like crap.

“All right. I’m sorry.” He looks at each one of us. “I don’t mean to be an asshole, Luce, okay? I’m just trying to hold this together. We’ll be off to college soon, and everything will be fine. We just need to hold on a bit longer, and this message is seriously screwing with that.”

“Rhett?” I offer. “It was his dare, so it’d make sense for him to watch it through.”

“Would he wait around, though? The accident happened after Jesse reached the fork,” Atlas says.

“No, she’s onto something,” Jesse says. “He hates all of us, and this is exactly something that he’d use. Think about it—anyone else would’ve called the cops, right? Rhett is the kind of rotten-to-the-core person who would use this to get something he wants.”

If Rhett is rotten to the core for messing with us rather than going to the cops, what does that make us? I don’t ask Jesse because it’s unhelpful right now…and I also know the answer.

We are way worse than Rhett, or whoever this person is.

“How do we expose him?” Luce asks. “What does he want?”

“First thing we need to do is find out if Arthur’s grave really is caving in,” Jesse says.

“Now?” Atlas asks. “Because I’m not sure I can swing that. I’m meant to be home in an hour, spending time with my dad.”

“And there is no way I can see that grave again without throwing up,” Luce says, pressing her hand into her stomach.

Jesse sighs. “Marley, you have anywhere to be?”

“No.”

“Your stomach okay?”

No.

“Yeah.”

He nods. “Then let’s go for a hike.”