The blurred face looms over me.
“Oh my God … did I kill you?” a voice cries out.
For a confused second, I think it’s possible. Maybe I am dead.
Then my muddled, sluggish thoughts start connecting into logical lines. I wouldn’t hear words if I were dead. Though maybe dead people still hear words?
I move my head toward the voice, and my vision swims. Feeling water dripping into my eyes, I realize it’s blood. Slowly I lift my heavy, aching head. When my eyes steady, her face comes into focus.
And I’m stunned.
“You’re alive,” I say, with amazement.
Melody stands above me with the tennis racket in her hand, her eyebrows torqued in worry. “Are you okay?” she asks, bending down to my level. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know it was you.”
Trying to sit up, I groan without even meaning to. “Where’s Lainey?” My words come out slurred, the sound of my own voice blasting my head with pain.
“You don’t know?” Melody squats beside me. Her face appears upside down, her features in a disarray, her chin becoming her forehead, her mouth above her eyes, like some kind of Picasso painting. “I was hoping that you might have found her.”
“No,” I say. I try to sit up again, but my head goes woozy and I slowly lie back down. “Why? What happened?”
Her eyes narrow. “What do you mean, what happened? You don’t remember?”
“I … don’t know.” I lick my dry lips. “All I remember is waking up in the shower.”
“In the shower?” she repeats, with confusion.
“Yes. And when I came back to the lodge, there was … blood.” The word comes out hoarse. “And I saw the knife in the basement.” I try to sit up again, but my head spins. So I lie back down, staring at the ceiling in misery. “Did I do it?” I ask, the words trembling. Tears mix with the blood in my eyes now, stinging them. With effort, I turn to look at her exhausted face. “Did I hurt you guys? I had the knife. I could feel it.”
The confusion on her face turns to horror. “No,” she says, the word charging out. “No. It wasn’t you. It was him.” She grips my arm. “That’s why I hit you. I thought you were him. I thought he was coming back.”
“Oh,” I say. Unexpected relief floors me, leaving me almost giddy. It wasn’t me. I didn’t do this. I knew it. I knew I couldn’t have done this. “But … who’s him?”
Melody leans her chin in her hands, her elbows on her knees like a tripod. “I don’t know. He was wearing one of those”—she makes a circular motion toward her face—“mask thingies … you really don’t remember?”
“No.” I wipe the corners of my eyes as the heat kicks on, dry air filling my nostrils.
“Where did you go, then?” she asks, looking me up and down. I know I look a sight. But she doesn’t look much better, her hair straggly, the neck of her T-shirt ripped, and a nasty, bloody gash ripped through the calf of her jeans. “I can’t believe you don’t remember anything,” she muses, almost to herself.
“I must have gone into shock or something,” I say, sitting up slowly onto my elbows. I lean onto the uninjured one. “It’s a long story. But after I woke up in the shower, I went out trying to find you guys. And ran into some … trouble along the way. How about you?”
“I was just running away from him.” She motions toward the door. “But after a while, I didn’t see any of you, so I came back to see if you were back. And …” Her eyes shine with desperation. “I think he took her, Alex. I think he took Lainey.”
“Who, though?” I ask again. “Did you recognize him at all? Did it look like Chris? Or Eric Myers?”
“I’m telling you, I don’t know,” she answers, brusquely. “He was wearing that thing, that ski mask thing, I don’t know what you call it.”
“A balaclava,” I say, dejected, laying my aching head back onto the floor.
“Yes, that’s right,” she says, nodding. “A balaclava. How did you know?”