“Margot, are you okay?”
Lucas appears beside me and places his hand on my arm, slow and delicate. Like he’s afraid I might break. I can feel the moment he sees it, too: his tightening fingers, the intake of air.
The back of Levi’s neck, all marbled in bruises.
“Oh shit,” he says, letting go of me before pushing both of his hands through his hair. I turn to look at him just in time to register the color drain from his skin. “Oh shit, oh shit.”
“What is it?”
Sloane jogs up behind us before coming to an abrupt halt, her eyes bulging impossibly wide. Nicole just behind her, her face ghost-white.
“What’s going on?”
I hear Trevor’s voice next, more irritated than anything, and twist around to see a handful of people trickling in behind him, too nosy to stay put on shore. I step to the side, mechanically letting him through, and watch as he follows everyone’s gaze before registering the body lying limp in the mud.
“What is this?” he asks before turning to look at me, his voice picking up an octave. “What happened?”
“I don’t know,” I say, finally finding my own. “I just … found him here.”
“What do you mean you just found him here?”
“I just found him,” I repeat. “I came out here and I … I tripped. I thought it was a root, or a branch, or…”
I stop, shaking my head, shock settling over me. Making me numb.
“Butler,” Trevor says, turning back toward the body before nudging Levi’s side with his shoe. We all flinch as it sags back into the mud, almost like we expected him to spring up and pounce. “Butler, get up.”
“Trevor—” Nicole starts, but he ignores her, pushing the torso with his foot again.
“Butler, get the fuck up,” he says, louder. “He’s passed out.”
“He’s not passed out—”
“Yes, he is,” Trevor says, nudging him harder. The toe of his shoe pushing deeper and deeper as he tries to rouse Levi awake. We’re all still, too afraid to move. To breathe. Just like last night, watching Trevor and Levi fight in the dark. Like if we just stand here, statue-still, we might blend into the trees and disappear.
“Butler!” Trevor yells, kicking his side, and before anyone can even realize what’s happening, he charges toward Levi and grabs his shoulder, rolling him over so he’s flat on his back.
“Trevor, what are you doing?” Nicole screams, lunging forward, but Sloane holds her back before she can get too far. “Don’t touch him! He’s dead.”
I look down at Levi, that word—dead—hovering above us like a storm cloud, blotting out the light. We all knew it, deep down. We all thought it, feared it, but nobody else had been brave enough to actually say it out loud. Now, though, it’s impossible to deny: Levi is dead, and he’s been dead for a while. The entire front of his body is covered in thick brown mud. It’s in his eyelashes, his nostrils, his mouth, his hair.
I have a sudden flash of Eliza again, the way she must have looked splayed out on the ground beneath that old burnt building. Maybe it’s the position of his limbs that suddenly reminds me of her, both of their bodies lifeless and limp like marionettes simply tossed to the side.
“Fuck!” Trevor screams, the sound of it echoing around us, making me jump. I hear a few birds flap in the distance, too startled to stick around, and I’m suddenly so jealous of their ability to just leave.
“We need to call the police,” Sloane says, quiet, before shooting a look at Trevor. “Nobody else touch anything.”
“God, I’m fucked,” Trevor mutters, pacing now, his hands pushed into his hair. “I’m so fucked.”
“Trevor, he’s dead,” Nicole repeats, disbelief in her voice and fresh tears springing up fast in her eyes. “Do you not understand that? He’s dead.”
“I’m the president,” he snaps back, flinging around so he can finally face her. “This happened on my watch. This piece of shit drank too much, couldn’t handle his liquor, and now I might go to jail for it?”
“Nobody’s going to jail,” Lucas whispers, trying to calm him, though his voice sounds anything but certain. “It was an accident.”
“That wasn’t an accident,” Sloane snaps back, her voice suddenly too hard. “You saw his neck.”
We’re all quiet, thinking of those bruises that looked eerily like fingers. Almost as if someone had been holding him down.