“You know what we should do today?” Beth asked, peering up at the blue sky. We sat on our front porch, dried brown leaves skittering across the lawn. We’d been in school for over a month, Junie in eighth grade, me in tenth, Beth a freshman in college. I could tell Beth was getting restless. She never complained, but it must have been hard living in a town where everyone thought they knew you.
“What?” Junie asked. She’d taken to styling her hair like Brenda, though she wore less makeup than she had over the summer. The combination made her look her age for the first time in a while.
“Go to Valleyfair before they close for the season,” Beth said triumphantly. She tugged her keys out of the pocket of her cords and jangled them in front of me. “You in?”
“Sure,” I said, half smiling. She’d been teaching me to drive for the past week. I was terrible. “But no way am I driving in the Cities.”
“Fine,” she said.
After we let Mom and Gloria know where we’d be, we bundled into Beth’s orange Vega. It was a quiet drive. When we arrived at Valleyfair, seeing the roller coaster made me miss Brenda and Maureen, but I was making peace with the fact that everything would. The smell of Bubble Yum gum, which’d been Maureen’s favorite until she heard it was made out of spider eggs. Peyton Place reruns, which Brenda and I had watched religiously. Every good song that came on the radio. The whole world was a reminder that my best friends were no longer here, but it was also a reminder of how great they’d been. So I rode the High Roller and I screamed for Brenda and Maureen, half laughing and half crying.
Junie looked alarmed at my outburst, but Beth squeezed my arm and let me get it all out. It was funny, I’d never realized before how much alike the two of them looked, Beth and Junie. They had the same red hair, freckles, and wide grins, even similar curves despite the age difference. It gave me a burst of joy how much like sisters they looked, followed by a gut punch when I remembered that’s why Ed had picked them, because they’d reminded him of his first girlfriend, the one he’d murdered. That’s how the whole day went—ups and downs and ups. The three of us were wrung out by the end of it.
In the parking lot on the way to Beth’s car, a man with his family, a man who looked a little like my dad, like a Kennedy but in this case the famous one, glanced over and spotted our glum faces. He didn’t know we were good exhausted. He didn’t see that we were together, and we were fine.
“Smile, girls!” he said cheerfully. “You’ll look so much prettier.”
Junie’s mouth twitched, like it was automatic to show him that beautiful grin she’d worked on all summer, the one I hadn’t seen since the horror night in the cabin. I watched her, not knowing if I was more nervous that she would smile or that she wouldn’t. She’d been so withdrawn lately. Even today at Valleyfair she’d been quiet. I wanted to see her happy, but I didn’t want her to feel obligated to do anything for strangers.
Her lips tipped up, revealing her sharp, shiny teeth. “My sister’s friends are dead, and the people I thought I could trust, I can’t,” she said. “So I’ll damn well decide for myself when I’m ready to smile.”
I startled myself with a pure burst of laughter. “That’s my girl,” I said.
“Goddamn right,” Beth said proudly.
We linked hands and headed to the car. Junie was going to be all right.
There was only one thing left to do.
CHAPTER 57
Beth and Junie wanted to help us, begged to be included. It was Mom who convinced them that this was something Claude and I needed to do together and alone.
“You ready?” Claude asked.
I couldn’t believe I’d ever thought he looked like Robby Benson. I mean, he did, a little bit, but he was so much cuter. How had I never realized how attractive his dimple was? I leaned forward and kissed it, still shy about affection. It was getting easier, though.
“I’m ready,” I said.
He handed me the hammer and a nail. I pounded it in at an angle, just like Beth’s dad had recommended. Once that nail was driven deep, Claude handed me another.
We’d decided to seal off my tunnel entrance first. It had been my idea, then once Claude agreed, I almost chickened out. It felt so final, like we were turning our backs on our childhood, on Pantown.
Claude shook his head gently when I confessed my worry. “We’re turning away from the darkness, H, not our childhood. We’re gonna live our whole lives aboveground. That’s the new Pantown. The one Gloria’s sticking around for.” He smiled his beautiful smile, the one that warmed me down deep.