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They never went to Steve’s house after everything.
Nancy could never look out his window without remembering. (She could never look at him without remembering.) She could cuddle up next to him on her parents couch, kiss him in his car, or smile at him across the diner table, but she could never set foot in that bedroom ever again. She could never look at that diving board or swim in that pool without her brain going fuzzy and distant and remembering the strange little girl’s words.
“Gone. Gone. Gone.”
To be completely honest, Nancy could never go swimming after everything.
The frequent visits to the pool with her mother and her brother and her sister and her best friend stopped. Not just because Barb was dead not here, but because Nancy started panicking every time the smell of chlorine flooded her nose. So she smiled and shook her head when her mother asked her if she’d like to grab her bathing suit and come to the pool with her and Holly.
“Gone. Gone. Gone.”
All she could think of was the dead girl in the pool after everything.
She knew she should be the dead girl in the pool after everything.
“Gone. Gone. Gone.”