Night Logic

"The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window."

I was sprawled across the futon on the back porch, but I could hear Kirby's voice loud and clear. Which was why I was out there in the first place.

Usually I spent all my time holed up in my bedroom with the door shut. Earbuds in and whatever I happened to be reading open across my lap. When my mom knocked, usually at the end of her shift at Denny's, I pretended not to hear. She got it. Not all that long ago, she'd been a boy crazy teenager herself. And she still knew every Beyonce song by heart.

Here's the thing though: my music was never actually turned on.

Besides being incapable of listening to music while doing. . . well, anything. . . I pretty much hate any movie made after The Shining. The same goes for books. As far as relationships go, I've been stuck at the boys-are-gross phase since I was 9. I guess I'm not your normal teenager, however broadly you want to interpret that term.

This disappoints my mom. Hell, it disappoints me.

I also happen to care about my little sister. I mean, all teenagers love their siblings, even if they don't show it. But usually they only grudgingly acknowledge that oh-so-awkward fact. With Paige though, I never bothered to hide how much I love her.

I suppose that's why I was streaming Rear Window on a Saturday night in July with the sound turned down. I wanted to keep an eye on Kirby. Or at least an ear.

As for Kelly, she didn't faze me but on the other hand, she was new in town and would do whatever Kirby told her to. In another year—maybe even another month—she would make her escape. Plans were literally in motion. Kelly's mom had signed her up for Pop Warner cheerleading try-outs next week. The kid spent hours everyday doing round-offs and handsprings and cartwheels.

Kelly was a natural flyer. With her tiny frame and her waist-length blonde hair, she was also a natural beauty. Paige wasn't a natural anything, at least not in the Inferno otherwise known as fifth grade.

Kirby, on the other hand, was perfectly unnatural. She was the kind of kid who gives you nightmares.

In the living room, Kirby's voice fell to a stage whisper and I had no doubt Paige and Kelly were on the edge of their seats. Or their sleeping bags.

. . . and the flames licked the night sky, their heat hungry not for air but for darkness, for evil. As the old man writhed and twisted in pain, his screams echoed out across the forest.

I rolled my eyes. Why was there always a fire? Not just in Kirby's stories, but in everything gothic. Which is why I liked Dracula so much. No fires, just pure, concentrated evil. I never had much patience for shades of gray. Old monsters, old morals. The whole idea of a bunch of vampires playing baseball like they do in Twilight seems ridiculous to me.

In the other room, Kirby was wrapping things up. I was getting tired of babysitting Paige, even though I knew she needed my protection. I'd seen the texts. Once they settled down for the night I could head upstairs. I doubted I'd sleep but at least it would be more comfortable. Plus mom was due back any minute now.

. . .years later, Skylar returned to the site of the ruins. Silence engulfed her. Where there had been nothing but destruction, trees had begun to grow again. Where death had reigned, a single red rose bloomed in the same exact spot where the old man had killed his one true love.

The red rose was a nice touch, I had to give her that. Paige would love that. Kelly was probably lapping it up too. I was a little surprised Kirby hadn't gone for the jugular and tried to scare them out of their minds, but she was subtle like that.

She played a long game. That much was more than clear.

“That was so good,” Paige breathed. “You should totally be a writer.”

“It really was,” Kelly agreed. “I loved when the old man's twin poisons him and takes his place before his daughter gets back from digging up the grave.”

“Do you want to hear another?” Kirby asked, preening a little.

There was a pause.

“My mom's picking me up at 8—“ Kelly's voice trailed off.

“I'm kind of tired too,” my sister agreed.

It was an unexpected show of solidarity. Ever since Kirby had befriended Paige two years ago, my sister had rarely defied her on anything. After years of going it alone at recess, she was just so grateful to finally have a friend. So beholden.

When Paige brought Kirby home after school for the first time, she dutifully sat through multiple episodes of Drake and Josh. Normally Paige was a kid who didn't watch TV. Occasionally, we would stream Netflix together while we waited for mom to microwave some mac and cheese for us but that was it. Most of the time, when I wasn't in my room, the two of us would hang out on the back porch, me with a book and Paige with her sketch pad.

“How about Truth or Dare?” Kirby wasn't about to give up, apparently.

“Okay,” said Kelly.

“Okay,” echoed Paige.

Neither of them sounded all that excited. I glanced at the grandfather clock wedged into a corner of the porch. It was an abomination, a Shop project I'd failed, but it worked. It was just after midnight. The Witching Hour. There was no moon and the stars weren't out. A perfect, pitch-black night.

“Truth or Dare?” Kirby demanded. No one had put her in charge, but then who else was going to move things forward.

“What's the question?” Kelly asked.

“You don't get to hear the question until after you pick,” said Paige. "Haven't you played before?"

Kelly ignored her. “Then you go first."

“No,” Kirby interjected. “You go first.”

Kelly hesitated. “Dare,” she said, just when I had decided she wasn't going to play after all. Aside from my sister, Kirby was still her only friend. Maybe that would change but it hadn't yet.

“Dare.” Kirby seized upon the word. She lowered her voice then, so low I couldn't hear what she said. Did she know I was listening in on the other side of the wall? I strained to hear what Kirby was saying but it was no good. For whatever reason, she had decided to give her instructions in a whisper.

It made me wonder if she'd wanted me to hear the story. That was the thing about my sister's best—my sister's only—friend. For some reason, she seemed to like me. To want my approval. And the funny thing was more I hated her, the more she craved it.

More than once that night, I'd come to close to telling Kirby the truth. That she wasn't ever going to get my approval. That she should consider herself lucky I didn't rat her out to my mom. Or to her dad. Or the police.

At some point when I was remembering what I'd found, the three of them moved from the living room to the kitchen. I heard cupboards opening and closing. I heard the metallic clank of the silverware drawer being pulled open. Followed by a spoon hitting against a metal bowl.

So they were making something. A twinge of fear shot up my spine. Where was my mom? It had to be way after she got off her shift.

I told myself it was Kelly's turn in the game, not Paige's. Still, Kelly was a good kid. When she wasn't around Kirby.

In fact, I probably liked her more now than I ever would. She was probably the closest she'd ever be to a kid like Paige. A kid like me, or even Kirby. Once she started cheering, once she'd met more friends, she wouldn't need to hang with the misfits anymore. With her heart-shaped face and wide smile, she would inevitably become one of the Pop-Tarts, as Paige liked to call them. She would ghost Paige first, then Kirby, and by next spring she would pass them in the halls as if she had never known their names.

I didn't hold it against her. School wasn't any different than any other social system. It was, in its essence, an oligarchy. The pretty, smart, athletic kids at the top. Everybody else on a lower rung. And at the very bottom, the few loners who would probably stay where they were for the rest of their lives, unless they happened to be the next Elon Musk.

Without realizing it, I'd risen from the futon and edged into the living room. It was an Armageddon of open chip bags, a half-empty package of Oreos, and a couple of empty pizza cartons. I spotted a sparkly, stuffed dragon on Paige's sleeping bag and felt embarrassed for her. Then embarrassed for myself for being so judgy.

From the kitchen: no more clanking, only murmurs.

Was that good or bad? I thought back to when I'd stumbled across Kirby's phone on the kitchen counter that afternoon. It should have been locked, but it wasn't. I shouldn't have looked, but I did.

I waited a while longer before I decided I couldn't risk it and took a few steps toward the kitchen.

Did I hear . . . someone crying? My heart started beating in my chest.

I felt in my jeans pocket for my phone and realized I'd left it behind. Should I go back for it? Was I being paranoid? Kirby was just a kid, after all. A kid who told stories about girls named Skylar who found red roses sprouting up from the ashes.

Then I remembered what I'd seen on her phone. Took a few deep breaths. Braced myself against the wall and inched forward.

Someone was definitely crying. Not Paige. Not Kirby.

Kelly. It wasn't a no-holds barred sobbing that meant all was lost. More like a muffled weeping. As if something—someone—had broken her.

I was a few feet away from the doorway that opened onto the kitchen. Suddenly, silence. Even Kelly stopped making noise, as if she—they—were listening.

I'd been quiet, stealthy as a damn cat, but that didn't mean they hadn't heard me. Or not heard me. After all, they knew I was in the house. Shouldn't I be moving around, streaming TikTok videos, chatting online, making myself food, or doing all of the above?

Not that any of them, even my sister, thought of me as a person who would do these things. I was the geeky Goth girl. The raven-haired, rail-thin waif who never ate and wore too much eyeliner. The 15-year-old with even fewer friends than Paige.

Which is to say zero.

I was about to go back to the porch when it started up again. I desperately wanted my mom, as if I were a little kid. I strained to hear her car pull into the driveway but the only sound was Kelly's weeping punctuated by the occasional sniffle.

More deep breaths. Still, it wasn't until I heard the metallic scrape of metal on metal that I stepped over the threshold and said as coolly as possible: “Just what do you think you're doing?”

I had tried to use Mom Voice. It came out more like Mouse Voice. But it was enough to get Kirby to put down the scissors.

Either that or she was done.

Kelly's long blonde locks lay scattered across the linoleum. They were covered with every imaginable condiment. Ketchup and mustard, mayonnaise and oil, gobs of crunchy peanut butter. I wrinkled my nose at the faint scent of pickle juice.

But it was the sweet, thick scent of honey that stayed with me. When I looked down at the mess of colors on the floor all I could think of was a child's finger-painting. When I looked up at Kelly, I saw that her shorn hair stood in uneven spikes tipped with yellow goo. She was going to need another go round with the scissors.

Her face was streaked with tears. “My. mom,” she said in staccato bursts of despair, “is going. to kill me.”

“Why didn't you wash it out?” I asked, stunned. In a flash I saw it all: the dare to cover her perfect hair in gunk, in the worst concoction Kirby could whip up. It would have been all right, too, if not for the honey. Or whatever else she snuck into the bowl. Super Glue, rat poison, who knew.

“I tried,” Kelly moaned. “We tried. It wouldn't come out. At all.”

I'd always thought of her as a pretty girl, beautiful even, but without her lustrous yellow hair, she looked like any other kid in the fifth grade. Not ugly, not by a long stretch. But her teeth, I realized, were just a little too big for the rest of her face. And her eyebrows were darker than I'd realized. Was it possible Kelly dyed her hair? She was only a kid. But then why were her eyebrows almost black?

I closed my mouth but I wasn't quick enough. Kelly saw me seeing her. Which launched her into a fresh round of crying jags. Paige, my gentle, generous Paige, placed her hand on Kelly's back and rubbed it in small, soothing circles.

“It will grow back before you know it,” she said, repeating what my mom had told her the year before when she'd gotten her way about bangs and immediately regretted it.

Kelly sniffled forlornly.

I turned toward Kirby. The scissors lay open on the counter, glinting under our cheap retro chandelier. She stared at me, chin lifting. Defiant. Triumphant.

I thought of Kelly's cheering tryouts next week. It wasn't that her choppy hair would wreck her chances, though it definitely wouldn't help. But Kirby and I both knew there wouldn't be any tryouts at all. Kelly's thin sheen of self-confidence had dissolved.

“She picked Dare,” Kirby explained matter-of-factly. “She could have picked Truth and avoided all this.”

I wanted to smack her. Instead I said, “I saw what was on your phone.”

Kelly looked up, anxious. I wasn't the only one who knew what was on Kirby's phone.

“It was a joke,” Kirby said.

My sister stopped rubbing Kelly's back. There was something—some invisible current coursing between the four of us. Some tribal mean-girl language Paige didn't speak but understood nonetheless. “What was a joke?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“Nothing,” Kelly agreed. “Just some stupid thing Kirby was kidding around about.”

“What stupid thing?” Paige persisted. Was it that she didn't like being the odd one out, as she'd been more and more lately. Or something else, some sixth sense?

Kirby cast a sly smile in my direction. “It was for a story I was writing.”

“The story about the old man?” asked Paige.

“No.” Kelly had stopped crying. “It was, uh, for a new story.”

Kirby's smile broadened so that her braces shone in all their metallic glory. “It's your turn,” she said to my sister.

“No,” I said as firmly as I could. “Game over.”

At that, Kirby's laughter pealed across the kitchen. “Truth or Dare?” she asked Paige, as if I hadn't spoken.

Paige glanced at me, at Kirby. She didn't want to play. That much was obvious. But she didn't want to piss off her best friend either. And best friends always trump big sisters.

Her eyes flicked to the floor, then back to Kelly's asylum-esque hair. “Truth.”

Kirby did a slow blink. “Who was your father?” she asked. “And why didn't he ever come in to town? And why did DCF come here last year, right before he disappeared?”

“That's three questions,” I interrupted. “Don't say one word, Paige.”

Paige, never one for extensive eye contact, was looking down again. “Dare,” she said, her voice small. She reminded me of one of those fuzzy caterpillars when it curls into a ball. Don't hurt me.

Kirby wasn't having it. “You can't change once you pick.”

“You go to hell,” said Kelly. “Let her change.” She spat the words.

“No,” Kirby said stubbornly. “It's too late.”

“No,” said Kelly. “It's not too late.”

I had to hand it Kelly. I didn't think she had it in her. Maybe she'd get a Pixie cut. Maybe she'd make cheering after all. The entire J.D. Branson Middle School would be her oyster. Still, I glanced out the door, willed my mother's Chevy to appear. She had probably stopped at the bar on her way home.

Kelly slid off the stool she'd been sitting on and rose to her full height. It wasn't much but she carried it well, even in Scooby Doo pajamas. “If you don't let her change,” she said, “I'm telling my mom what you wrote. What you wanted me to do. What you searched on my tablet.”

Silence settled over the kitchen and night sounds filled the room. We're probably one of the few places left where *crickets* really means crickets. Further off, coyote howls rose to a crescendo. I waited for Paige to say something but she seemed remarkably uninterested.

“All righty then,” Kirby said. “You win, Kells. Dare it is.”

Kelly winced at the nickname. Paige focused her gaze on a spot beyond Kirby's left shoulder. “What's the dare?”

I held my breath. How bad could it be? What could be worse than stripping an insecure 10-year-old of her greatest beauty?

“You have to go into the backyard,” Kirby said. “Into the woods.”

There was almost a collective sigh of relief. The backyard wasn't awful. The edge of the woods—not terrible. Not terrible at all.

“One hundred yards in,” Kirby went on. “No flashlight.”

“Okay,” I said in a rush. A football field into the thick woods behind our rental wasn't great, with or without a flashlight. But if I didn't stop Kirby she'd have Paige chanting spells to raise the devil next. “Let's get this over with.”

Did she expect me to acquiesce so easily? Even now, I think back to that moment. Could she have foreseen what would happen? She didn't live near us and when she came over after school, she and Paige rarely ventured past the sad excuse for a patio my mom had created out back.

“We?” said Kirby. “There's no we. She goes alone.”

“She goes with us,” I said as if Paige weren't right there in the room. “Or she doesn't go at all.”

Kelly was at my side. “Ditto.”

Sure, Kelly was 10 and she looked like she'd escaped from juvie. But for the first time in my life I felt like someone had my back. Like I had a friend who wasn't related to me. Pathetic, I know.

And maybe worse.

It was cool outside, not cold. Even as my eyes adjusted to the gloom, I could hardly see where the lawn ended and the woods began. We lived on the edge of town so we didn't have any neighbors, at least none within shouting distance. Behind us, the kitchen lights looked warmer than they felt. As if mom, Paige and I were an actual family, not just three random people thrown together by circumstance.

Which was exactly what we were. That was our secret, the one we carried with us from town to town, year to year, state to state. Who knows, maybe that was why I so desperately loyal to Paige. Because blood doesn't run thicker than water. There's nothing good, nothing redeeming, about blood. Blood is the genesis of violence, of death, of everything ugly in this world. Water, on the other hand, is rain, renewal, a cleansing that washes the dirt from your life. Over and over and over again.

Kelly and Kirby were ahead of us by about 15 feet. Another few seconds and they'd be at the border where the trees take over. The tips of the pines rose far above us, immense as cathedral spires. Beside me, Paige was already shaking. Meanwhile, my flipflops kept slipping on the wet grass and I wished I'd thought to change into sneakers.

“I'm not going to let you go in there alone,” I said.

“I know.” Her voice was shaky too.

“We're all going,” I said. “That was the deal.”

In the blackness, my sister's pale pajamas shone just a little. She slowed down her pace and we fell further behind. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“What were you talking about?” Her voice was low, a little more controlled. “Back in the kitchen.”

I didn't answer her. Up ahead, Kelly and Kirby walked in sync. The low murmurs of their voices floated back toward us. On a nearby branch, an owl hooted.

“Everybody knew about whatever it was,” Paige was saying. “Everybody but me.”

“It's not important.”

“Was it about me?”

“No.”

“Something bad about me?”

“No.”

“Do you swear?”

“I swear.”

“Do you swear on Jesus?”

“I do.”

“Say it.”

“I swear on Jesus.”

She sighed but didn't press the point. “Okay.”

“Okay.”

It felt like a prayer, our little back and forth. A litany of dark denial. Would I ever tell her? I doubted it. Some things, you're better off not knowing.

Kelly and Kirby had stopped at the edge of the yard. My skin felt cold. Even my bones felt cold, as if the night had seeped into my marrow. As if I'd never get it out again. I know this now: some things you can't wash clean.

I didn't slow down when Paige and I caught up to them, only strode on into the forest. The three of them stood behind me, unmoving. Watching. Waiting. “Come on,” I called back over my shoulder. “Or are you still scared of monsters like little kids?”

At that, Kelly and Paige took a few tentative steps forward. Kirby trailed behind. All bullies are cowards at their core. All killers. Because what I'd told my sister was a lie. Kirby hadn't been texting a story to Kelly. And Kelly hadn't been texting something cute back.

They'd been planning my sister's murder. For months. Or Kirby had, and Kelly had pretended to go along with it. Times. Dates. Places. Methods. Back and forth. Back and forth. When I'd rifled through Kirby's backpack that afternoon, the journal had been right there at the bottom, beneath a shiny plastic bag labeled Beach and a steak knife hidden inside a rolled-up t-shirt. A journal filled with monsters, imagined and real.

I strode further into the forest, calling back to the three of them to follow. They weren't far in, but they were far enough. To reach the yard, they'd need to run for it. Without flashlights, they'd stumble over the enormous roots that jutted out of the ground. They would fall. Maybe scream. But no one would hear them. For it to work, all of them needed to enter the woods.

When I reached 100 yards, I knelt and pressed my palm onto the dirt. It was coming.

“Where are you?” Paige's voice. Closer than I would have liked but as long as she was near me, she'd be all right.

“Over here,” I cried out and in seconds, she was by my side. Kelly, too.

It was coming faster now, loping toward us with unimaginable velocity. I'd never seen its face or even its body. But I'd felt its breath at my back on the nights I came to the forest. When the world of light and love and belonging weighed on me too heavily. When I wanted only one thing: to sleep in dark, unbroken night.

Darkness knows darkness. It follows its own rules, its own logic. Night logic. I can't pretend I understand. But neither can I plead ignorance.

“Where's Kirby?” asked Paige.

“She's coming,” I told her.

Kelly said nothing. Beneath us, the ground heaved. In the distance, the branches of trees crashed as something of immense height pushed its way toward us.

Paige grabbed my hand. “Can we go back now?”

“Yes.”

Tree branches snapped and fell hard not 10 yards ahead of us. The air echoed not with roars but with the footfalls of a beast. A sleek, dark, intuitive beast whose pelt merged with the night.

“Now!” I shouted. "Run!"

I reached for Kelly's hand and she took it. Without another word, the three of us ran toward the distant square of kitchen light. We stumbled, fell, lost and found each other until we emerged onto our overgrown, weed strewn lawn.

When we regained our footing, I pushed the two of them toward the house. “When you get inside,” I told them, “lock the door.”

“What about you?” Paige asked.

“I'll be right behind you,” I said. “Be ready to open the door the minute you hear me, okay?”

Neither of them answered me. Neither of them asked about Kirby. They were already running.

I backtracked to the edge of the yard and peered into the forest. What lived in its depths? What bounded through the gloom between good and evil? And what would become of a girl who would murder a 10-year-old? Did I hear breathing? Some ancient, buried thing fumbling toward freedom? I turned and jogged toward the sickly yellow light I called home.