Chapter Text
It’s funny how often it ends up being the most mundane crap that sticks with her the most…in addition to the kind of stuff that one would expect to haunt her after that night.
She can’t go outside at night during a full moon or hear a wolf or coyote or whatever the hell at night without nearly giving herself a heart attack. That’s something that she isn’t surprised by, really, even as the rational part of her insists that it’s nothing, that everything’s fine.
Then again, ‘rational’ went right the fuck out the window around the same time that Nick did following the whole ‘skin bursting and turning into a flesh-eating monster’ thing. Which leads into the less ‘rational’ of what scares the shit out of her these days, the stuff that made her realize that she’s going to need more to deal with this than a therapist that her parents can barely afford and that she can’t tell the whole truth to; her dog growled at a car as it passed by one night, and she’d been so fucking sure that she was back in the lodge with Caleb Hackett about to charge at her, and she’d screamed because she didn’t have any silver, she couldn’t defend herself, he was about to rip her apart, and then she’d looked down at her dog, staring up at her with his head tilted curiously, and then her parents had run in, and she felt like a little fucking kid again when she started crying like a Goddamn baby.
Tracking down Emma is the easiest part. Turns out, she wasn’t bullshitting about having a ton of subscribers; she’s a little over halfway to a million.
Kaitlyn doesn’t know if she’s relieved or not to know that Emma isn’t really coping well with what happened either. On one hand, it means that maybe doing all of this will actually help everyone. On the other hand, if everyone else was faring better than her, then it meant they’re not having to deal with the same bullshit that she is.
Emma’s latest video is titled Taking A Break , and it was posted two weeks ago…the day they were all acquitted. The comments, naturally, are full of support for her. Kaitlyn doesn’t watch the video, but gleans from some of the comments that Emma didn’t really offer details on what happened at the camp.
Obviously, as an influencer, Emma doesn’t just have her phone number available to everyone, but she does use other social media that her parents also use, so getting her number through them is pretty easy.
There’s no tracking down necessary for Ryan, Dylan, and Jacob; Kaitlyn’s always had Jacob’s number, and the former two gave her their numbers after it was all over. She hasn’t really been contacting them other than checking in now and then, mostly because she isn’t sure what to say to them. Dylan and Ryan typically give short and sweet responses and then ask how she’s doing, and she responds just as concisely. Jacob never responds at all.
Finding Max and Laura is a real pain in the ass initially; to be frank, she eventually has to give up and ask Dylan what their last names are so she can look them up, and then getting their numbers is easy once she finds them on social media.
Abi and Nick have been…well, finding them on social media is easy, but their profiles give Kaitlyn pause.
Up until recently, Nick’s profile is full of pictures of himself with his friends and (presumably) family. Now it’s short, single-sentence status updates. Some of them are generic, like ‘I’m tired today’ or ‘Feeling a little better’. The ones that concern her say things like ‘Ever have nightmares so often you just want to stop sleeping?’ and ‘I think I’m done with steak for the rest of my life’.
Abi’s used to be full of carefully taken photos of some of her sketches, whether they be of landscapes or people. Now the photos are a little more haphazard, like she no longer cares how well it looks, and her drawings are…noticeably grimmer. She even posted the drawing she made for Kaitlyn after she and Nick were attacked. A particularly disturbing one is of someone looking out at a shady treeline, and it takes Kaitlyn a few seconds to realize the (all too familiar) monstrous figure almost perfectly shaded into the shadows of the trees, like one of those old ‘when you see it’ photos.
The one good thing about this is that it allows Kaitlyn to get ahold of their numbers with a renewed sense of ‘this might actually help us’.
She puts all of their numbers into a group chat, and then she takes a few minutes to figure out what the best message would be to start out with. Finally, she just lets out a sigh of frustration and decides to just be basic about it.
Kaitlyn: Hey.
Ugh. She’s practically rolling her eyes at herself. She doesn’t know what else to say, so she just waits for someone to respond, get the ball rolling, trying in the meantime to keep herself busy.
She studies for when she starts college, and after about an hour, her phone hasn’t dinged once. Not even anything from her high school friends, but she supposes that she can’t blame them for that. Still kind of dickish to not even try checking in, but whatever.
She puts a load of laundry in the washer, walks her dog, and when she returns, still nothing. She stares at her single text in the group chat, and it strikes her like a ton of bricks just how much they were all fucked over that night. How they may have survived, but that they might carry this with them for the rest of their lives if they don’t figure out what the fuck to do about it, and she sends another message without stopping to think about it.
Kaitlyn: I swear to God if nobody responds within the next hour my plan B is tracking your fucking addresses. I did it when I got stuck with shitty partners for a group project senior year, I can do it now. Fucking try me, dickheads.
Abigail: Hi Kaitlyn.
Okay, admittedly, that’s a bit faster than she expected. Also she hadn’t expected Abi to be the first to reply, and since this is Abi, she’s now obligated to calm down and not be mean.
Kaitlyn: Finally. How’re you feeling?
Abi: Okay, I guess. I’ve missed you guys a lot.
God, Abigail is sickeningly nice.
Kaitlyn: Can’t believe I’m saying it, but I missed all of you too. Yes Jacob, even you.
Jacob takes the bait after a second, but he certainly doesn’t say what she expected.
Jacob: no you didnt
She…really doesn’t know how to answer that. Insist that she does miss him? Will he even believe that?
Abigail: Of course she did, Jacob. She’s your friend!
Jacob: whats this about kaitlyn
Kaitlyn: I think I speak for all of us when I say that nobody else can really understand what we went through that night. Or what we’re going through now.
Emma: My therapist sure as Hell doesn’t.
Laura: Join the club, we’ve got straightjackets and accusations of faking it.
Kaitlyn: So think of this as a support group. I know that we all go through this kind of shit in different ways, but we can at least understand each other in a way nobody else can.
Max: Group therapy, nice.
Dylan: Why the hell not? So who starts? Should I start?
Kaitlyn: This is a group chat, not an AA meeting.
Yeah, this is already reminding her of that group project again. Kaitlyn is starting to get worried that she might need to try breaking out some stupid icebreakers or something when Ryan finally sends a message.
Ryan: Sometimes I dream about what Chris probably looked like after I shot him.
Fuck. Kaitlyn’s already got a lecture lined up about how Ryan didn’t have a choice, and she’s sure that Laura does too, but she forces herself not to, forces herself to not respond until he’s done.
Ryan: I didn’t look at him after I shot him. I know he must’ve turned back before we left, but I didn’t look. I couldn’t.
Abigail: Do you ever hear from Caleb?
Ryan: No. I doubt he wants anything to do with me, or any of us.
Abigail: You’re probably right. I haven’t heard from him either.
Nick: Think they’ll keep the camp going?
Ryan: I don’t know.
Emma: Even if they do, will you go back?
Nick: No.
Laura: We’d probably be shot on sight.
Ryan: By Travis?
Laura: Maybe. I was really thinking of Jedediah.
Dylan: I still have both hands when I dream, and when I wake up, I forget that I’m missing one until I try to use it.
Ryan: I’m sorry, man.
Dylan: Don’t be. You did the right thing. I just…
Dylan: I can still feel it sometimes. Phantom pain. It’s so weird to feel pain in my fingers when I don’t have them anymore.
Kaitlyn watches them all chime in here and there, just talking about the nightmares, how they’ve been coping, how bizarre it feels to be in college as if nothing happened to them.
As if their lives haven’t been irreversibly changed.
Eventually, though, the group chat falls back into silence as it gets later, and Kaitlyn herself eventually decides to try to sleep. It probably won’t work, but what will it hurt to try, right?
She gets into her pajamas, closes the curtains in her room, and lies down. Her dog trots in a few minutes later and curls up by the bed. As she rolls onto her side to reach down and pet him, her phone vibrates.
It’s a text from Dylan.
You didn’t say anything about how you’re dealing with all of this.
Kaitlyn stares at the text for a few seconds, wondering if it’s even worth responding to. She sighs and texts back.
Neither did Jacob.
Definitely not the best response she could’ve given, but she isn’t wrong, at least. Of course, saying it just brings her mind back to the way Jacob immediately said that she didn’t miss him. Not to mention he doesn’t usually text like a grandma. Not even he’s that dumb.
Dylan sends a reply.
Who’re the slackers in this group project now?
She glares at her screen. Dylan texts again.
Are you giving your screen the stink eye? I just got goosebumps.
At least he hasn’t lost his sense of humor. A smile briefly touches her lips, but it vanishes just as quickly as she reads and rereads the message about ‘slackers’. She isn’t sure what about the message bothers her so much, and eventually, she gives up trying to figure it out. She sends one last response, then turns her phone off and rolls onto her back, looking forward to a long night of half-sleep and the occasional nightmare.
Group projects suck anyway.