During dinner, Ryan was the perfect guest. I couldn’t help comparing him to Joe. Both were polite to my parents, but Ryan tipped the scales in his favor. Behind Joe’s smile was always a twist of words or hidden meaning, a trait that Kat and her brother shared. I recognized it only after a while and I think that was where my resentment for him started. My parents never noticed, at least as far as I knew. I had been so blinded by the need to fit in that I took all of his annoying and rude quirks, molded them into a ball and locked them away deep inside me until they festered away, leaving a shell of a person behind. The distance from Kat and Ryan’s presence in my life both acted as a cleanser for my soul, scrubbing out the rotten parts. I wasn’t sure what type of person I would be at the end of this, but the sooner we confirmed what really happened to Joe, the sooner I’d be able to find out.
I checked the clock enough times that eventually it seemed to stand still, minutes stretching into hours. I watched everyone eat their burgers after I had scarfed mine down. I tried to send a signal to Ryan to hurry up and eat, but he seemed content to talk to my family. He’d said he didn’t get home-cooked meals. And, with the separation that his parents were going through, he probably wouldn’t have one for a long time. I’d invite him over every single night for the rest of the summer if he could cut the conversation short for tonight.
“What is your problem?” Madison said from the chair next to me.
“What?”
“You keep bouncing your leg, it’s annoying.”
“I’m keeping the mosquitoes away. Get over it.”
Madison scowled. “Mom, I think Cara wants to go make out with her new boyfriend.”
“He’s not my boyf—” I snapped.
“Madison!” my dad warned, cutting me off. Her eyes snapped to his. “I’ve had enough with the attitude, young lady. If you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t speak at all.”
Madison breathed heavily through her nose and glared at the table.
I met Ryan’s eyes, finally getting his attention, and stared pointedly at his burger.
He nodded, understanding my hint, and picked up his half-eaten burger, polishing it off in a few bites.
A tear trickled down Madison’s cheek and she swiped at it, still saying nothing. She looked like a bomb ready to go off. I had more important things to do other than watch that disaster.
“Can we be excused?” I said, breaking the silence. “Ryan wanted to show me this game.”
“A game?” Mom asked.
“A computer game,” Ryan said. “I’m trying to convert her into a gamer.”
“A computer game?” My dad repeated.
I playfully rolled my eyes. “He won’t stop talking about it. I bet him twenty bucks that I’ll hate it.”
Dad chuckled. “Ryan, I think you’re going to lose.”
Ryan winked at me. “We’ll see about that.”
The sound of a scraping chair against the deck made me jump. Madison hopped off the chair and stormed inside.
Mom sighed. “Go ahead. But keep the door open.”
Ryan and I went inside, dropping our plates in the sink.
“Can you clean up?” Mom asked Dad when they entered the kitchen behind us. “I’ll go in this time.” My parents worked harder each day to break through to Madison, but obviously it didn’t have much of an impact.
“We’ll be in my room,” I said.
“Door open,” Dad said.
“I heard you the first time,” I called back.
Once we were in my room, I raced for the desk, flipping open my laptop. I entered the website address into the browser and waited.
Ryan sat on the edge of my bed.
“It takes a minute,” I said, anxiously tapping my fingers on my legs. I looked down, not wanting to stare at Ryan, and froze. A bra strap stuck out from under my bed.
Ryan followed my gaze and I lunged for it, plucking the intimate piece of clothing from the floor. I opened my closet and shoved it in the hamper. I moved the errant strands of hair out of my face and looked around. Why didn’t I think to clean my room? I was hyper-aware of the thin layer of dust on all the surfaces, the bowl of half-eaten cereal on my nightstand from breakfast and every other minutia out of place. I had been so focused on Ryan coming over that I didn’t think about his coming into my room!
“It’s up,” Ryan said, completely oblivious of my freak-out. He sat in my chair, his back to the rest of my messy room.
I went to his side. He opened another browser and typed “World of Demons” into the search bar. He clicked on a few links and a hideous green demon face filled the screen.
I wrinkled my nose. “What is that?”
He minimized the game. “If your mom comes in.”
Ryan was better at this than I was. I totally forgot the excuse we’d made up for what we were doing. My brain had been focused on what we would find in Joe’s inbox.
He turned and looked up at me. Our faces were close, too close. I stepped back, giving him some personal space.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asked.
“Yeah. Absolutely.”
He hesitated. “You can’t unsee this.”
“I’m aware.” I wished I would be able to unsee Joe’s body. No email could be worse than that.
He typed in the password. I almost asked what it was, but I refrained. If I had Joe’s password, I might be tempted to do my own digging. That wasn’t the best idea. I knew how unstoppable I’d become. It was for the best.
Ryan pressed enter. “Here we go.”
The inbox revealed over a hundred unread messages.
I leaned forward, my elbows dug into the top of the desk.
“Looks like a lot of junk,” I said.
“It looks that way. But I want to be thorough.” He clicked on each one, skimming the message before moving on to the next.
My body buzzed with energy. I stood up with the need to keep moving. Then I sat down on my bed, desperate for Ryan to find something.
A few minutes later, Madison’s door opened and, between the time I turned to the door and back to the screen, Ryan had pulled up the game. Mom walked by on the way to her own room.
“Good call,” I said quietly.
We waited for her to come back down the hall, then, after hearing water from the kitchen sink, Ryan clicked the browser again.
He clicked on the next page and continued. The words blurred together and my mind went into overdrive. My mind shifted between wanting to know and not wanting to know.
That is until one email caught my attention. I slowly got up from the bed and took a closer look. Joe had received an email the morning of his death and the subject line read, “YOU’RE DEAD”.