Chapter Text
Riley had been thinking about doing this for a long time, never too seriously. But if it wasn't serious, why had she been researching effective ways to do it? Why had she rehearsed her lies? Rehearsed what she could say to the team to be on their side?
And then Chess walked in with Kate, a cloudy look in her eyes, and Farrah almost fell down the stairs and her words slurred together. And then Kate and Farrah got into a fight, and everyone was storming out of the basement… The problem was, Riley knew they could be great. She knew that if she could just… cut out the tumor, so to speak, the team would thrive. So she made an executive decision.
Washing the blood off the knife was therapeutic. Chess had screamed so loud that Riley had to twist the knife deeper to get her to shut the fuck up. The look on her face had been upsetting, to put it lightly, but Riley was doing it for the greater good of the team, so she shouldered it and moved on. Farrah was easier, her reactions slowed from intoxication, but also more difficult because where Chess had been confused and betrayed, Farrah was afraid . Farrah looked up at her, down at the knife, and back up again and backed up into the shower and called for help and shrieked loud enough that Riley was shocked nobody came running. Part of her felt bad, again. But a larger and much more terrifying part of her just felt powerful.
Riley set the knife back into its spot and scrubbed her hands clean, and as the red disappeared down the drain, so did her guilt. This was for the best.
The police came, and searched the house for hours. Mattie got a light slap on the wrist for drinking. Nobody said anything; Cairo had convinced everyone to keep their mouths shut.
“We’ve all been suspicious as hell tonight,” Cairo had said and then called them all out for it. Riley almost felt bad when Cairo insisted that it wasn’t any of them, and she truly wondered who the hell had killed Clark, but she was more than happy to play along with the plan. It was for the best.
At least, that’s what she had thought.
When school started the next week, Kate and Annleigh were nowhere to be seen. The Tigers groupchat had been silent. Riley sat through her classes, taking notes diligently and studying every moment she wasn’t thinking about the team, and waited.
When Kate returned to school, there were dark bags under her eyes. She walked sluggishly, like there were weights chained to her ankles. Riley had Spanish with her—used to have it with Chess, too—and watched her closely for the first couple days. Kate didn’t touch any of the assignments Señor Guerrero passed out. Most days she didn’t even get out a pencil. She would just sit there and stare at the wall, or at the empty seat next to her until the bell rang.
Riley tried to approach her soon after that, to offer some words of support. The sooner everyone could get over it, the sooner they could start to practice again.
“Kate! I wanted to talk to you,” Riley started as she quickly paced over to her. “I know it’s been a rough couple of weeks—”
“Riley. Please, save it,” Kate replied in a tired voice.
She pressed on anyway. “I wanted to offer some sup—”
“Shut up.”
Riley pursed her lips. “You know, Kate, I think you would feel a lot better if you could just look on the bright side of all of this.” Kate, who had begun to walk away, suddenly whipped around.
“The bright side? Of my best friend dying?”
“Well, when you put it like that…” Riley’s conviction only faltered for a moment, but Kate took it in stride.
“Spare me from your shitty inspirational quotes, Riley,” she snapped. Riley glanced over at Señor Guerrero for help but he was very wrapped up in grading his papers and trying his very best not to get involved. “Just shut the fuck up and stay the hell out of my way.” Riley opened her mouth to reply, but Kate was already leaving again. This was the first time Riley realized that maybe, just maybe she had made a bad call.
Annleigh was almost the complete opposite of Kate. Riley had the same lunch bell as her, although she always sat with Cairo and some other girls, and Annleigh had always sat with Clark and some other people who were part of her acapella group. From what Riley saw of her, she was constantly smiling and reassuring everyone that she was doing okay, that she knew God had a plan and trusted that He would guide her through it, or something along those lines. Riley hadn’t believed in God for a long time, but if Annleigh’s faith was making her feel okay and getting her to see that things were better now, then Riley was overjoyed.
It took her almost two months to see that Annleigh was anything but okay.
Riley had stayed after school to talk to the principal about changing the school’s mascot, or at least the cheer team’s, in order to have a fresh start. She’d been shot down and now was walking through the empty halls to go to her locker and then out to her car. She wasn’t expecting to hear quiet sobs coming from the girl’s bathroom on the third floor. It was unmistakably Annleigh; Riley had listened to her cry that night in her basement for quite a while. So, Riley stepped into the bathroom and called out, “Annleigh?”
The crying stopped immediately. “Riley?”
“Are you okay?” Riley asked, taking a step towards the locked stall.
“Yes, of course! Yeah.” Annleigh’s voice was scratchy and wet. She had never been a good liar.
“...Are you sure?”
“Riley, please don’t ask me again,” Annleigh whispered and her voice cracked. Riley frowned. Annleigh hated Farrah, she was always having to worry about her, and sure whatever happened to Clark sucked, but she had been fine for weeks now! “Can you, um, could you… not tell anyone about this?” Annleigh sniffled.
Riley’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Okay.”
She drove home in silence, trying to figure it out. It took her a disappointing amount of time to realize that Annleigh had been pretending to be okay the entire time.
A couple of weeks later, Riley and Cairo were hanging out in Cairo’s room. Cairo hadn’t come over to Riley’s house since the “sleepover from hell” as Cairo had taken to calling it, on the rare occasion that they talked about it. Frankly, Riley was okay with that. Her parents were always kind of assholes to Cairo.
In reality, they were supposed to be doing homework, but Cairo was scrolling through Instagram and Riley was watching a video of the Jackson High Jaguars from last year. It was Friday, so it wasn’t like they were in a rush to get everything done, although Riley knew if they were at her house, her parents would absolutely be making sure she and Cairo were working.
“Have you heard anything from Kate recently?” Cairo asked. She had been opening her mouth like she was about to say something and then closing it for the last several minutes. Riley pushed the screen of her laptop down halfway.
“She’s in my Spanish class, but no, she hasn’t been talking to me. Why?”
“Just... worried about her.”
Riley laughed. Cairo, worrying about Kate? Sure. “What, do you miss her trying to pick fights with you?”
Cairo shook her head and pursed her lips. “I guess so.” Riley fell silent. That wasn’t the answer she had been expecting. She went to open her laptop up but stopped when Cairo went on. “It’s just, so fucked, you know?”
Riley looked down. “I know.”
“It’s like, I try to imagine losing you like that and it’s terrifying. And I don’t know how in hell Annleigh is coping. Like, I know I call her a brat all the time, but if something happened to Lena I’d probably lose it. The same with Brad.” Cairo’s younger sister was annoying, Cairo was right about that, but she was still a constant in both of their lives. Riley couldn’t find the same bright side to keeping Cairo’s boyfriend around.
There were the beginnings of some complete realization taking form in the back of Riley’s mind. That maybe she’d been wrong about all of this. But she shoved the thought down.
“I mean…” Riley paused and reconsidered what she was about to say, but Cairo was looking at her expectantly and so she continued, “I’m kind of surprised it’s affected you very much. You hated Chess and Farrah. And they were the reasons everyone on our team hated each other… Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise.”
Cairo’s face quickly went from shock into anger. “Riley, how the hell can you say that?” she snapped. “Yeah, I hated them, but I didn’t want to see them dead. I’ve known Chess since preschool, and Farrah was fifteen! Annleigh basically turned off all her emotions except happy, and Kate’s not answering my— anyone’s texts and calls, she’s practically a zombie. Nothing about this is a blessing!” Riley wanted to curl in on herself and disappear. “You can’t say shit like that in front of anyone on the team, okay?” Cairo suddenly insisted. “They’ll think you did something.”
Riley shook her head. “Cairo, I would never. You know me.” The weight of the lie was crushing on her shoulders.
“ I know you,” Cairo repeated. “ They don’t. The police don’t. They’re still looking for the killer and at this point they’re under enough pressure that they’ll take any suspect.” Riley stared into Cairo’s eyes, at the fear she saw there, and hoped that she couldn’t see through Riley’s lies. If anyone could, it was Cairo.
“Okay, I won’t say that again,” Riley said softly and Cairo’s whole body relaxed.
The rest of the night, all she could do was try to convince herself that she had truly made the right choice.
Riley stopped answering Cairo’s texts soon after that. It only took a few weeks more for Cairo to stop sending them. It hurt Riley, more than she thought it would, but she couldn’t get caught and Cairo could see through her too much.
She didn’t know what would be worse: going to prison, or Cairo hating her.
Riley watched as everyone on the team still alive kept falling apart around her. It was early in November when it all came together, for better or for worse. She had been making a deal with the principal about reorganizing the cheer team, having Eva transfer to Giles Corey, getting Reese out of the tiger suit and onto the team, and they’d finally worked it all out. Riley was in high spirits, and hopeful that just maybe they could still go to regionals this year.
She turned a corner and stumbled backward, barely catching herself. “Kate? Are you okay?” Riley asked. The junior’s eyes were wet, her face red and blotchy.
“Just peachy,” Kate said in a cold tone as she crossed her arms tightly. “Why don’t you go tell Cairo to leave me the fuck alone? Maybe she’ll listen to you.”
“What did she…” Riley started, but Kate was already storming off down the hall. She watched her, contemplated going after her, and decided against it. She turned to keep walking up to her locker and froze when she saw Cairo looking back at her. “Cai, what happened?”
“I was trying to apologize,” she answered flatly, staring after Kate, but Riley knew her well. She could hear the slight wavering in her voice, a telltale sign she was upset.
“For what?” Riley asked, taking a step closer, which seemed to shake Cairo out of her daze. She scoffed and shook her head.
“Don’t pretend like you care.” She didn’t even look at Riley as she walked by.
When Riley was angry, or sad, or feeling something terrible that she couldn’t force away, she would go to Cairo. Cairo understood her. But Cairo wasn’t an option. So Riley got in her car and just drove. Thank God her parents were out of town again—they would tear her apart when she got home late, otherwise.
She got on the highway and drove until she saw a billboard advertising some new antique shop. Riley couldn’t describe it in words, but it felt like she had to go there. There was something heavy and cold in the air around her and without thinking she took the next exit. Sitting in the parking lot, the chill turned into fire, and Riley had been thinking about turning around and going home but there was something calling to her inside that store and it would not be ignored. She stepped out of the car.
Entering the antique store, Riley was greeted with a musty smell and an elderly woman’s cheery voice. “Welcome! Anything you’re looking for in particular?”
“Just looking around,” Riley replied, observing the trinkets and oddities that decorated the interior of the building. She wandered around, peering at the jewelry and figurines, the teacups and paintings.
And then she saw the book.
It was like electricity. Riley made a beeline for the thick tome. Her heart pounded in her ears as she drew closer, something static buzzing on her fingertips. Instinctively, she reached out and opened the book and stared at the page that had revealed itself to her.
A spell. A ritual. To bring back the dead.
“How much for this?” Riley asked the old woman in a shaky voice.
“That?” The woman looked down at the dusty book and then up at Riley’s face. “Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?”
“No.” Riley brought the book with her up to the counter where the woman sat. “But I need it.”
Her face was sad, and understanding. Her eyes bored deep into Riley’s soul. It was haunting. “Five dollars and fifty cents.”
“Deal.”
Riley hadn’t ever thought of something like this before, and she wasn’t very serious about it. But if she wasn’t serious, would the five dollars and fifty cents have been worth it? Would she have stared at the book on her nightstand for hours, just contemplating it, almost every night? Would she have collected all the components that the ritual called for and hidden them in her room?
And then, just like before, everything fell apart.