In memory of Nicole Lewanski

fucking
car
and race over to see her because there was something you wrote in that
document that scared the 
shit
out of him?”
Rad’s mouth opened, then closed again.
“Do you know they found your laptop?” I continued. “It was lying by the side
of the road, completely smashed to pieces. Freddy had it with him. Why would
he take 
your
laptop to Lucy’s place in the middle of the night? Why? What was so
important that it couldn’t wait until the morning?” I demanded.
He shook his head. “Audrey—”
“I need to know the truth, Rad. Right now.”
He stood there for a few moments, staring at me. It seemed an eternity before
he spoke again. “I wanted to tell you,” he said, his face crumbling. He sat down
on the step and sunk his head into his hands.
“Then tell me.”
He looked up at me. His eyes had a terrible bleakness to them. All of a sudden,
I was terrified.
“The letter—was there something in there about Ana?”
He nodded.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?”
He nodded again. “It was more of a confession than a suicide letter.”
A shiver went through my body.
“Tell me what happened.”
He took a deep breath. “I went to Ana’s house that day to confront her about
the rumor,” he began slowly. “That part of it was true. It was exactly like I told
you. She kept denying it, saying someone made it up. We got into a huge fight,
and she slapped me. I was furious—I called her a lying whore. She reached out to
hit me again, but I grabbed her arm and pushed her back. She tripped on a rug
and fell, hitting the back of her head on the edge of the coffee table. I rushed
over to her right away, but she wasn’t moving. I tried to revive her, but she
didn’t wake up. I checked her pulse. She didn’t have one. That’s when I
panicked. I was in shock. I mean, there wasn’t even any blood. But she . . . she
just wouldn’t wake up.”
I stared at Rad with horror, and a wave of revulsion washed over me.
“So I sat in the corner of the room for a while. I didn’t know what to do.

---

Then this weird sensation came over me, and what happened next was a blur.”
“Rad,” I stared at him, my eyes wide with disbelief. He turned away, looking
straight ahead.
“When I was about nine, my mother took me to England for my uncle’s
wedding. We went to Stonehenge, but it’s weird; I don’t remember ever going
there. Even when I look at the photographs now, it doesn’t feel real. Like it
happened to someone else.” He turned to face me again. “That’s what it was like
that day with Ana,” he said, his tone almost mechanical. “I picked her up and put
her in the bath with her dress still on. I ran the water. Then I found a razor in
one of the cabinets. I got behind her so I would get the angle right when I cut
into her wrists. I wasn’t sure if she would still bleed since her heart had stopped
by then, but she did. God, there was so much blood.” He shivered. “Then, I
dropped the razor into the bath and left.”
I closed my eyes. Cold, spidery fingers crawled up and down my spine. “You .
. . you cut into her wrists?” I whispered. An image of Rad, razor in hand, shot to
the forefront of my mind, and I thought I was going to be sick.
“Audrey.” He stood up.
I took a step back. “
No
!”
 
I screamed, with a ferocity that took me by surprise.
Rad flinched and took a step back. “Audrey, I—”
“
You cut into her wrists
!”
 
I shrieked. “You
 cut
into 
her 
wrists!” The bile rose in
my throat. I felt hysterical, out of control. My mind was spinning so fast I
couldn’t seem to hold on to the thoughts that flitted in and out. Was Ana already
dead when he put her into the bath? If she had been alive, wouldn’t that make
him a murderer? And the lie I told—what part did that play in this tragedy?
Nothing? Everything?
“How did you know Ana was already dead?” I demanded. “Are you a doctor?”
His raked his hand through his hair. “She didn’t have a pulse; I swear! She
wasn’t breathing—there was nothing I could do. They wouldn’t understand that
it was an accident. I just panicked.” He was scrambling now, eyes wild, ready to
grab at anything.
“You panicked?” I said, incredulously. “People call the ambulance when they
panic, Rad. They don’t stage a fucking 
suicide
.”
His eyes widened, and his hand shot out to grip the banister, as if he’d been
thrown off balance.
He stammered, “But you believe me, don’t you, Audrey? You know I had no
other choice.”
“You did have a choice. You could have told me the truth. You were a

---

coward,” I spat.
“You’re right—you’re absolutely right. I was a coward. If I could go back in
time, I would do things differently. I would have called the ambulance. Fuck, I
would have told you—I should have told you. Wouldn’t you do the same? If you
could go back, would you have told that lie?”
“That’s not fair, Rad. You can’t—” I started.
“I know that now,” he cut in quickly. “In the end, that was the thing that
unraveled me. That I left you thinking you were in the wrong when I had done
such a terrible thing. I wanted to tell you so many times, Audrey.” His eyes were
pleading when they looked into mine. “I love you so damn much. You came and
found me when I was in that shitty place, and you brought me back to life. I tried
to push you away, and you wouldn’t let me. Then when we grew close, I wanted
to tell you, but I couldn’t handle the thought of losing you again.”
I shook my head. “No, don’t you dare!” I said, gritting my teeth. My fingers
tugged fretfully at my rubber band, and it snapped in two, falling silently from my
wrist to the ground.
“Audrey.” His eyes locked on to mine. Those strange, beautiful eyes: one a
stormy gray, the other summer blue.
Like a jagged rock pitched from a slingshot, my mind traveled back to the
night I told that lie. I thought of Rad, his strong, gentle hands stained red with
Ana’s blood. Candela lying in the hospital bed, fighting for her life. Duck shoved
into the back of a police van. Now Freddy—poor Freddy. Another one for the
body count. And I had to add Lucy as well because you couldn’t separate the
two.
“Audrey,” Rad repeated. There was a desperation to his voice. “I’m so sorry. I
don’t know what to do.” He grabbed my arms. “Tell me what to do. I’ll do
anything you want.”
I broke free from his grasp and stumbled back. “I don’t want anything to do
with you,” I said weakly, my eyes watering and my voice trembling.
“I’ve put my life in your hands,” he pleaded. “Don’t you see? We have a fresh
start ahead of us in L.A. We can leave all this behind.”
All of a sudden, I felt an eerie calm settle over me. It was as though I was
standing in the eye of the storm, and everything had stopped. In that moment of
clarity, I knew I was just as culpable as Rad. I knew there was blood on my hands
too. We had become caricatures of ourselves, trapped in this nightmare; the entry
ticket for this grotesque carnival, my lie. I had cursed us from the moment the
evil spilled from my lips. Yet beyond the madness, the utter horror of Rad’s

---

confession, I couldn’t ignore the love that was there, pulsating with a life of its
own, pulling us closer and closer, blurring the lines. We could start all over again
in L.A., where no one knew us. I was stronger than I had ever been. I was strong
enough for the both of us. Then the clarity dissolved, and I was pitched back into
blinding chaos.
I sobbed violently, my shoulders heaving from the effort. I cried in a way I
never had before. I felt everything I lost compound into this cruel, unforgiving
moment. Rad put his arms around me, and I pushed back as hard as I could,
thrashing wildly at his hands, his face, tearing at his hair. With all my strength, I
pounded his chest with my fists, but still, he wouldn’t let go. After a while, my
arms grew limp, and I let him hold me.