“Locked?”
I push myself to my feet and lurch for the door. No, no, no. We cannot be locked in this dark and terrible place. The knob does turn a little bit, and for a second I think I’m about to prove Jasper wrong. But the door sticks hard when I push, like there’s a bolt across the outside. Bam, bam, bam, goes my heart as I head over to the window next to where Jasper is still sitting on the floor. Panes of clear glass fill the window frame. I think of all the peeled-back screens in those other cabins as I put my hand flat against the cool glass. Not even cracked or dusty. Actually, the window looks brand-new.
Jasper looks up at me. My hand is still on the glass, his face half-sunk in shadow. I push up on the window, but it doesn’t budge. “That one’s locked,” Jasper says as he gets up to head to the other window on the opposite side of the room. It won’t move either when he tries to open it. Neither do the two in back. He peers closer to the last one. “I think they’re nailed shut from the outside.”
“Then we should break one,” I say, as Jasper comes back to stand next to me.
And this does seem like something the emergency-me could actually do. Shatter glass, scramble through broken shards. Run again through the dark and tangled woods.
But Jasper is already shaking his head. “Look.”
What I mistook for one of the thin, easily-torn screens on the other side of the window, I can see now, is actually much thicker wire. Like a chain-link fence. We are not just trapped in a cabin. We are locked in a cage.
“What the hell is this?” I whisper.
Jasper takes a deep breath, like he’s steeling himself. “Okay, there has got to be another way out,” he says, not answering my question. Maybe he is trying to think positive again. And I hope so because every single thought I have is dark and terrible and ends in doom. Our doom.
Jasper heads to the back of the cabin, poking his head into what looks like a closet. When he reaches overhead and pulls a string, a single bulb goes on. It leaves a slanted gold rectangle on the floor around his feet, brightening the cabin a tiny bit. I feel relieved, but only for a second.
“There’s electricity?” I ask. Should that make me feel better? Because it does not. “I thought this place was abandoned.”
“Yeah, that’s for sure weird.” Jasper waves me over to the closet. “But not as weird as this.”
When I get over to him, I can see what he means. There’s a bucket on the floor of the closet with a roll of toilet paper next to it. There’s even some hand sanitizer. A makeshift bathroom.
“They knew we were coming,” I say.
“Or they knew somebody was,” Jasper says, walking back to the front window. I stare at him, but he doesn’t look back at me.
“Who are these people?” I ask, though I already know Jasper doesn’t have a clue.
“Probably not the same ones who stab each other in the eye over marshmallow Peeps.” He turns to look at me when I come to join him at the window. “Right?”
Of course he’s right. It’s way too organized and well thought out.
“Wait, is that a person over there?” Jasper points to the cabin across the way, but all I can make out are shadows. “I just saw something move.”
I lean in and squint but still can’t see anything. Instead, something in the opposite direction catches my eye.
“Look,” I say, feeling a tiny surge of hope. “The police car is still here.”
“Yeah, but someone turned the headlights off,” Jasper says, and from his voice I can tell he doesn’t think there’s anything good about that. We both stare at it for a moment in silence. “Do you really think that Cassie might be doing meth?” he asks, eyes still on Officer Kendall’s car. “That meth is what all of this is about?”
“I have no idea.” I turn around and slide down the wall until I have taken Jasper’s spot on the cold and dirty floor. “Cassie’s done a lot of things lately that I never thought she would.” I feel annoyed at Jasper all over again. Because the Rainbow Coalition might have been the reason Cassie got started partying. But Jasper was why she kept at it. “I mean, all those parties she went to—maybe she did try meth. Well, you would know. You were with her.”
“Wait, you think there was meth at a party I was at?” he asks, then shakes his head, disgusted. “You seriously think I was the reason Cassie was doing drugs, don’t you?”