Lacuna(1)

Chapter 8

"This is going to be so fun." Cara stood to admire the group's work. "I love camping. Time for vodka and peach rings til I puke."

"Admirable goal," Pip said. "Do you two want to grab the rest of the food from the car? We'll lay out our sleeping bags and put up the sides."

Pip's car was in the tiny concrete parking lot about two hundred yards from their chosen spot. Lauren and Cara headed off that way through the trees, leaving Pip and Evelyn to find entertainment.

"Want to explain your brooding from before?" Evelyn picked up one of the sides that would not stick to the velcro.

"I wasn't brooding, that's just how I look," she sneered, narrowing her eyes at Evelyn.

"Mhm," Evelyn hummed unconvincingly.

"Did you know that Andie could have been buried here? Right under us in fact," Pip stated, the mention of Andie forced her to tense up, clenching her jaw. Evelyn didn't know exactly where Andie was buried but knew it wasn't there.

Once the final pieces had been placed, the sound of branches breaking underfoot grew louder, and Evelyn heard the guffawing that meant the boys had finally arrived. Ant, Zach, and Connor had all made their way into Evelyn's view as Lauren and Cara followed. Connor, carrying a cooler with the help of Zach, had walked directly in a branch.

"You okay?" Lauren laughed.

"Fine," he grunted. "My mom's always telling me that I should branch out more." A silly smile spread across Evelyn's face at the stupid joke.

"God, your puns get worse every time," Cara said. "How are you ever going to get a girlfriend?"

"How are you ever going to get a girlfriend?" he retorted.

"With my hot bod and twinkling personality, obv," she said, donning a silly high voice and flicking her hair.

"Mm, Pip has decided to grace us with her presence. Guess the teacher didn't have any more homework to give her," Ant chuckled.

"Ha," she said flatly. Shocking, not the first time she'd heard that joke. "I'm already getting withdrawal."

As Ant ran to help Lauren do one of the simplest tasks of this whole set up, Zach walked over to the rest of the group.

"While the lovebirds have their time, shall we open the beer?" Zach asked.

Something felt off. Evelyn felt as if someone was watching her—or them. Evelyn was two bottles in and barely felt anything due to this unease. The rain that had come by was the only thing keeping her at bay. Evelyn also used Ant's ghost stories to try to distract herself.

"And the birthday girl," he said theatrically, "is finishing off the whole bag of peach rings and drinking some nasty red concoction that looks like blood."

"Shut up," Cara said, stuffing another handful of peach rings into her mouth.

"She tells the handsome guy with the flashlight to shut up. And that's when they hear it: a scraping sound against the sides of the canopy. There's something or someone outside. Slowly, fingernails start dragging through the side, ripping a hole in the canvas. 'You guys having a party?' a girl's voice asks. And then she tears through the hol and, with one swipe of her hand. slits the throat of the guy in the green hoodie. 'Miss me?' she shrieks, and the surviving of the friends can finally see who it is: the rotting zombie corpse of Andie Bell, out for revenge-"

"Shut up, Ant." Pip shoved him.

"That's seriously the dumbest thing I have ever heard," Evelyn stated.

"Why's everyone laughing, then?"

"A murdered girl isn't fair game for your crappy jokes."

"But she's fair game for a school project?" Zach interjected.

"Zach, you just got murdered in this story, hush," Evelyn spat.

"I was just about to get to the part about Andie's secret older-lover-slash-killer," Ant said. As Pip shot him a blistering look, Evelyn widened her eyes. Pip hadn't told her that she found that out. Pip was never supposed to find out about them. The rest of the bickering between the groups was lost and faded as Evelyn went through the events in her head— the words Andie had said to her.

You're a good secret keeper, right?

Evelyn turned to look outside, trying to distract herself from Andie's echoing words. The flash of a light within the trees. She waited for another flash. Nothing. She squinted to try and find someone but there was nothing but tall trees. There it was. A tree moved, shifted to the left.

"Guys," Pip said quietly, a sign Evelyn wasn't the only one who had spotted it. "No one look now, but I think there's someone in the trees. Watching us."

The familiar figure brought her back to the place she didn't want to be, never wanted to be again.