Slasher Summer(3)
The gas station was self-service and stood in front of an abandoned-looking convenience store with dusty windows and a faded Coca-Cola sign. Even better for keeping a low profile. Carrie inserted her credit card, and as she filled the tank, she registered the tall, hulking figure of the SUV’s driver as he finished pumping gas. She shivered, despite the warm July sunshine on her bare arms. His height and hunching shoulders reminded her of Daniel.
The ranger’s narrow face turned, and pale eyes met hers. Carrie pulled the bill of her baseball cap lower over her forehead, afraid he would recognize her. As a teenager, she’d volunteered at a few lakeshore cleanups. The ranger grabbed the squeegee from the cleaning station and stoically turned back to wash his windshield, and her breathing eased.
Door chimes tinkled behind her. Startled, she spun around. An old man in grubby denim overalls stepped out of the convenience store, scratching his wispy white hair and squinting under the bright sun.
“You headin’ to Cedar Lake?” He eyed the full duffel bag riding in the passenger seat of her car.
“Yes, I am,” Carrie said. She didn’t see any point in lying.
The man spat onto the ground. “Whaddya wanna go there for? That’s where they’re holding that weird horror movie festival next week.”
“Oh, I’m not going into town. I’m heading to a cabin by the lake,” she said.
“Even worse. It’s real lonely in the woods. No internet or cell phones, and nothin’ but trees and crazy movie fans for miles around.” He clicked his tongue disapprovingly. “Nice girl like you won’t be safe. There are some B and Bs close by that I can recommend.”
Carrie hid a smile. This old man was straight out of central casting. The grizzled local, from all the slasher movies she’d watched in high school, who warns young people away from the deserted house or summer camp. Little did he know that she was local, too. She and the Cedar Lake High horror film club had once been those crazy fans.
“I’ll be okay. I’m meeting friends.”
The old man didn’t seem to hear her. “Russ!” he hollered to the ranger.
Panic surged in her chest like a rogue wave. “No, you don’t have to—”
It was too late. The ranger stuck the squeegee back into its bucket and ambled toward them, thumbs hooked in his belt loops. Carrie noted with alarm he was in his early twenties, around her age. That meant he might have gone to Cedar Lake High. She didn’t recognize him, and prayed to all of Mama’s saints he didn’t recognize her.
“This young lady’s headin’ for Cedar Lake cottage country. Keep an eye on her, will ya?”
The ranger looked Carrie up and down. She shrank back, resisting the urge to yank her hat down farther over her face.
The ranger nodded. “Sure will, Jeb.”
Carrie’s smile was starting to hurt her aching cheeks. “You don’t have to, it’s just a little weekend getaway.”
The ranger said nothing as he returned to his car, stony-faced.
As she drove away, she felt the ranger’s gaze boring into her back. Her pounding heart warned her she wasn’t getting away from anything. Instead, she was diving right into a hornet’s nest.
2
Patrick
“Do you like scary movies?”
The sinister voice hissed out of Patrick’s car speakers as he’d paired his cell phone for hands-free driving. Under different circumstances it might have sent a chill up his spine, but the ID on his phone screen, visible from its dashboard mount, gave the caller away.
“Hello to you, too, Jen,” said Mikey, leaning forward from the back seat.
The voice cackled, no longer so creepy. “Tiff wanted me to call. Says ETA twenty minutes. Someone needed to go back for her fucking hair dryer.”
“The hair dryer at the cabin will probably be from the eighties!” a girl yelled in the background.
Patrick cast a glance at Jason, who was riding shotgun. He was worried Tiffany’s shout might’ve upset him, but Jason had turned to the window as if they were passing an especially interesting cluster of trees. “We’ll be there in ten,” Patrick said.
“See, Tiff? Patrick’s not losing his shit because we fucked up his schedule,” Jen said.
“I built in a buffer in case one of us got caught in traffic.”
“Of course you did. All right. Later, losers.”
“Don’t call them losers!” Tiffany said.
“Fine,” Jen said. Patrick smiled at the exasperation in her voice. “See you lovely gentlemen in a trice. I anticipate our reunion with bated breath.”
Jen disconnected. Despite her usual sarcasm, she’d summed up Patrick’s feelings exactly. Anticipation with bated breath. One last meeting of the Jumpscare Society, before their old hangout got razed in the autumn.
Patrick had started the Jumpscare Society in his junior year of high school. His father had moved them from the nearby city of Fairvale after his sister Clare’s murder, thinking Cedar Lake was sleepy and safe. It had turned out to be too sleepy for his parents; his father escaped on countless business trips, while his mother treated her grief and boredom with the best rosé her husband’s money could buy.
Mom had been appalled Patrick would start a club dedicated to watching horror movies, especially after what had happened to Clare. She’d been ready to disown him when he and his friends had been invited to join the Rialto’s shadow cast, acting out Slasher for the fans who flocked to the theater on October weekends and three days a week in the summer.