The top one is blue and unlabeled. Opening it, I see a scrapbook of sorts. Page after photocopied page of newspaper clippings, magazine articles, stories printed off the Internet. All of them are about the sorority house massacre. Some of the articles have sentences underlined in blue pen. Question marks and sad faces crowd the margins.
The other two folders are red and white. One is about Sam. The other concerns me. I know that even without opening them. The math is simple: Three Final Girls, three folders.
Sam’s folder is the red one. Inside are articles about The Nightlight Inn, including the one from Time magazine that traumatized me as a child. Lisa made notes in those, too. Words, phrases, and whole sentences have been scribbled in the margins.
In the back of the folder are two newspaper clippings, both of them missing dates.
HEMLOCK CREEK, Pa. — Authorities are continuing to investigate the deaths of two campers found stabbed to death last month. Police discovered the bodies of Tommy Curran, 24, and Suzy Pavkovic, 23, inside a tent in a heavily wooded area two miles outside of town. Both victims had been stabbed multiple times. Although there were signs of a struggle at their campsite, authorities say nothing appeared to be taken from the scene, leading them to conclude robbery was not a factor in their deaths.
The grisly crime has left many in this quiet town on edge. It comes barely a year after the body of a 20-year-old woman was found along Valley Road, a little-traveled access road used by employees of Blackthorn Psychiatric Hospital. The woman, whom authorities could never identify, was strangled to death. Police think she was killed elsewhere and later dumped in the woods.
Police say the two crimes are unrelated.
HAZLETON, Pa. — A man was found stabbed to death yesterday inside the home he shared with his wife and stepdaughter. Responding to emergency calls, Hazleton police found Earl Potash, 46, dead in the kitchen of his Maple Street duplex, the victim of multiple stab wounds to the chest and stomach. Authorities have ruled the incident a homicide. The investigation is continuing.
I press a hand to my forehead. My skin is hot to the touch. That’s because of the reference to Blackthorn in the first article. The name always makes me break into a nervous sweat. Although I can’t remember how, I know I’ve heard about those murders in the woods. They took place a year or so before Pine Cottage, in the very same forest. Why Lisa kept a news clipping in a folder devoted to Sam is beyond my comprehension.
A second read doesn’t make things any clearer, so I tuck the clippings back into the folder and put it away. Now it’s time for the white folder.
My folder.
The first thing I see upon opening it is a single sheet of paper. My name is on it. So is my phone number. Now it starts to make more sense. Now I know how Sam got my phone number to call me the night she was arrested.
Next are articles about Pine Cottage, fastened together with a pink paperclip. I flip the stack over without looking at it, fearing I’ll see another picture of Him. Beneath the articles is a letter.
The letter.
The bad one that made even Coop nervous.
YOU SHOULDN’T BE ALIVE.
YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED IN THAT CABIN.
IT WAS YOUR DESTINY TO BE SACRIFICED.
YOU NEED TO BE BUTCHERED.
Shock blasts through me. I start to gasp, but stop myself, afraid Nancy will be able to hear it. Instead, I stare at the letter, not blinking, those out-of-place zeroes like several sets of eyes staring back.
A single question stabs into my thoughts. The obvious one.
How the fuck did Lisa get a copy?
Another, more pressing question follows.
Why did she have it?
Behind the letter, also paperclipped, is the transcript of a police interview. At the top is my name and a date. One week after Pine Cottage. Neatly typed below that are the names of two people I haven’t thought of in years—Detective Cole and Detective Freemont.
Nancy’s voice rings out from the end of the hall, on the move, getting closer.
“Quincy?”
I shut the folder with a snap. I lift the back of my shirt, press the folder flat against my spine and shove it down the seat of my pants far enough so that it won’t flop out when I walk. I then tuck in my blouse, hoping Nancy won’t notice how it was untucked when I arrived.
The other two folders are dropped back into the filing cabinet. The drawer is shoved shut just as Nancy sweeps into the room. She eyes the boxes first, then me, rising from my crouch in front of Lisa’s closet.
“Your time’s about up,” she says.
She’s back to looking at the boxes. Both are only partially filled. One of them has a pair of Lisa’s jeans flopped over the side.
“I’m sorry I didn’t get more done,” I say. “Packing up Lisa’s stuff is harder than I thought it would be. It means she’s really gone.”
We each carry a box to the living room, me letting Nancy lead the way. When we say our goodbyes at the door, I worry she’ll attempt a hug. I stiffen at the prospect of her bony arms sliding over the folder jutting at my back. But apparently she’s like Coop when it comes to hugs. She doesn’t even shake my hand. She simply purses her lips, the wrinkles around them bunching.
“Take care of yourself, hon,” she says.
One Week After Pine Cottage
Good Cop and Bad Cop stared at Quincy, expecting something she couldn’t provide. Detective Freemont, that old bulldog, looked rough around the edges, as if he hadn’t slept in days. Quincy noticed he wore the same jacket from their first interview, its glaring mustard stain still intact. Detective Cole, on the other hand, remained a handsome devil, in spite of the bristle on his upper lip that wanted to be a mustache. Its edges flared when he smiled at her.
“You’re probably nervous,” he said. “Don’t be.”
Yet Quincy was very nervous. Only two days out of the hospital and she was in a police station, pushed there in a wheelchair by her exasperated mother because it still hurt to walk. Wheeled in at the request of the two detectives sitting across from her.
“We just have a few more questions,” Cole said.
“I’ve already told you everything I know,” Quincy said.
Freemont gave a sorry shake of his head. “Which is a whole lot of nothing.”
“Listen, we don’t want you to think we’re harassing you,” Cole said. “We just need to make sure we know everything that happened out at that cabin. For the families. Surely, you can understand that.”
Quincy didn’t want to think about all those grieving parents and siblings and friends. Janelle’s mother had visited her in the hospital. Red-eyed and trembling, she begged Quincy to tell her that Janelle hadn’t suffered, that her daughter had felt no pain when she died. “She didn’t feel a thing,” Quincy lied. “I’m sure of it.”
“I understand,” she told Cole. “I want to help. I really do.”
The detective reached into a briefcase at his feet and pulled out a file folder, which he placed on the table. Next came a metallic rectangle—a tape recorder, now set atop the folder.
“We’re going to ask you a few questions,” he said. “If you don’t mind, we’d like to record the conversation.”
Anxiety flickered through Quincy as she stared at the tape recorder. “Sure,” she said, the word emerging in an uneasy wobble.
Cole pressed the record button before saying, “Now tell us, Quincy, to the best of your ability, what you remember about that night.”
“The whole night? Or when Janelle started screaming? Because I don’t remember much after that.”
“The whole night.”
“Well—” Quincy paused, shifting slightly to peer out the window set into the upper half of the door. The door itself had been closed once her mother was asked to wait outside. The window’s square pane revealed only a bit of ivory-colored wall and the corner of a poster warning about the dangers of drunk driving. Quincy couldn’t see her mother. She couldn’t see anyone.
“We know there was drinking,” Freemont said. “And marijuana use.”
“There was,” Quincy admitted. “I didn’t do either.”
“A good girl, eh?” Freemont said.
“Yes.”
“But it was a party,” Cole said.
“Yes.”
“And Joe Hannen was there?”
Quincy flinched at the sound of his name. Her three stab wounds, still stitched tight, began to throb.