While they chanted, I latched my fingers to the windowsill and pulled my nose over the bottom ledge. Inside, a group of boys sat in folding chairs listening intently to the boy at the podium. I dove back under the window to hide from view.
I knew about the weekly meetings of fraternities and sororities. I’d heard about them. The memory felt fresh, but I couldn’t remember how or why, when I tried to place it.
Squatting outside of the Beta Psi house, I felt like a sitting duck, so I left my post there and rounded the building to wait on the side. Pizza boxes and beer cans piled waist-high around me. I leaned against the cool brick, loitering at the corner so that I could see the moment anyone from inside the house left. I pictured the Beta Psi T-shirts again and prayed to the gods I didn’t believe existed that I’d be right. That they would be here.
I felt at home in the shadows. My fingers found the knife blade in my hoodie. I turned the hilt over and over again in my hand, wondering which ones would scream when I found them and which ones would go wide-eyed but wordlessly. The images formed in my mind like a delicious fantasy to be savored.
Meanwhile, the night ticked on and I lost track of how much time had passed. Five minutes? Ten? Fifteen? I was as still and immovable as the house. As I waited, I began to hum softly and then the song came back to me. Each line in bloody succession.
“Hide and seek, hide and seek,” I crooned as though in lullaby. “In the dark, they all will shriek.…” The words left a smile.
The song formed and re-formed itself in my head, weaving me into a trance. “Seek and hide, seek and hide, count the nights until they’ve died.…” Until the door to Beta Psi opened. The first few boys trickled out, laughing and calling into the dark after one another. The hairs on the back of my neck bristled. My grip tightened around the thin knife hilt.
“Hide and seek, hide and seek,” I hummed the words softly, observing.
And then there he was. Short One. He was walking out with California, a backpack slung over one shoulder. I held my breath, waiting. Were the others inside? Would Circus Master, with his devilish, lopsided sneer, be making an appearance or were there only these two?
As Short One and California turned left out of the gate, I realized I had to make a decision. At a spot still within the house’s shadow, I hopped the fence into another fraternity’s yard. Trees dappled the moonlight, shifting and stirring to create eerie shapes on the ground. I kept my eye trained on the two boys like a sniper rifle.
They chatted easily between each other as they strolled down the sidewalk and I felt the heat creeping up again, rising in me like fire up a stake. The more I saw how unperturbed they were, the more I wanted to watch them burn. California jumped up and touched a lamp at the top of a post. On the next one, Short One tried to copy and missed.
Two out of five, I told myself. Two out of five wasn’t bad. I waited for them to pass the fraternity whose lawn I now found myself occupying and then I exited the identical iron gate and fell in step behind the pair. Two out of five was good, I tried telling myself again. My heart rate sped up.
I would follow them until they turned off somewhere unpopulated. Somewhere like where they’d taken me. My vision swam with red. I studied the back of Short One’s neck and imagined the silky feel of his blood coating my fingers.
Easy, I warned internally. I had to be careful. Couldn’t mess up. If I messed up, I might not get another chance. I might miss the other three. And that would never do.
To calm myself, I sang the song in my head. Seek and hide, seek and hide, count the nights …
We turned left again at the end of the road and I recognized the twinkling lights of the dormitory buildings sparkling in front of us. The window of opportunity was shrinking. Now was the time. I was sliding the knife out of my pocket and tightening my fist around the hilt when a squeal came from the direction of one of the sorority houses and a streak of tan legs and blond hair shot across the street and wrapped its way around California.
My scalp tingled. I seethed through my teeth and quickened my stride.
Go. Away, I willed the girl. Stupid girl. Stupid, stupid, stupid girl. Instead of going away, she linked her hands with California’s and fell in step with him, smiling and tucking her hair behind one ear. She talked easily to Short One as well, a melody of words I couldn’t quite make out.
Meanwhile, the boys had now halved the distance between themselves and the dorms. My empty hand clenched, nails bearing down into my palm.
“Think,” I commanded myself quietly. Think, think, think. The need for revenge and for that revenge to come tonight buzzed in me like an addiction and sent my skin crawling.