The Stepsister (16 page)

I've got to slip away.

Jessie will kill me. Just the way she killed her friend Jolie. And then she'll come back with some lie. She'll come back to camp crying her eyes out. And everyone will believe her because she's such a good liar.

And she'll get away with murder—again.

Jessie broke eye contact. Emily had the feeling that Jessie had been reading her mind.

She knows that I know what she plans to do, Emily thought, struggling to think clearly despite her fear.

Look at her face, look at that grim expression, that fixed determination. She's planning how to do it. She's planning how to kill me.

Jessie turned away again and stepped off the path in search of wood.

Keeping her eyes on Jessie, Emily slipped behind the trunk of a wide tree, stumbling over its thick, upraised roots. Jessie bent to pick up more sticks, and Emily moved quickly.

She began walking quickly in the other direction, turning back to make sure Jessie wasn't following her. It was too dark to tell. She stopped. She heard footsteps crunching over the twigs and dead leaves.

Jessie
was
following her.

Jessie
had
read her mind. Jessie knew she was trying to escape.

Choked with fear, Emily tried to run. But the weeds were too tall, and it was too dark to see the stones and logs that littered the ground. She stumbled once, then slowed her pace.

Nancy, where are you? she thought.

How could you leave me alone in the woods with this crazed killer?

She walked quickly, kicking clumps of weeds and low shrubs out of her path. Suddenly she realized she had walked into the old cemetery. The crooked gravestones appeared much larger from this close vantage point.

She wandered in among the graves, thinking maybe she could hide from Jessie here. The ground was soft in spots. Her boots slid in the marshy mud, and for a moment she felt as if the ground were collapsing and she was about to slide down, down into one of the old graves.

A smell came up from the ground, a powerful smell of decay. Emily gasped and then tried to hold her breath. Her heart pounding, she held on to a gravestone for support and turned to see if Jessie was still following. She didn't see anyone. The gravestone suddenly made a creaking sound, tilted, and fell. She cried out and nearly toppled over with it.

“Oh!”

She backed away.

“I've got to get out of here.”

She turned, trying to decide which direction to go, and nearly stumbled into an open grave. Two shovels lay beside it on the ground, forming an X, their handles crossed.

Which direction, which direction, which direction?

The moon floated up into the navy-blue sky, an eerie ring of feathery gray clouds around it. The pale
light made the slanting gravestones seem to come alive, their shadows sliding and shifting.

Emily was squinting into the near distance, searching for the trail, when someone pushed her hard from behind.

Uttering a strangled, startled cry, Emily plunged forward into the open grave.

“Jessie—Let Me Out!”

T
he dirt at the bottom of the grave felt soft and wet, like pudding. Emily landed hard on her knees, sending a shock of pain up and down her legs. Then both hands hit, plunging into the thick, cold mud.

She stood up quickly, wiping her hands against her jeans.

“Jessie—let me out!” To her surprise she felt more anger than fear. “Do you hear me? Let me out!”

She could hear Jessie walking around the sides of the grave. She looked straight up, trying to see her. The eerie trails of clouds appeared to be draped around the full moon, making it look shapeless, stretched out, like a moon in a bad dream.

So this was it. Her fears about Jessie were coming true. Jessie was making her move, her final move.

I won't
let
it be her final move, Emily thought.

“Jessie—let me out!”

Emily stretched out her arms, stood on tiptoes, and grabbed the top of the grave. She tried to pull herself out, but the dirt was too soft. Clumps came off in her hands.

She dug her sneakers into the side of the grave, kicking the soft dirt free until she was standing on a low pile of it. This gave her a better grip on the top of the grave. She took a deep breath and leapt up—grabbing the graveside, using all of her arm strength to pull herself up and out.

Yes, yes.

She dug her knees into the side, scrambling up, pulling herself up.

She was almost out when the soft dirt gave way again, and she slid right back down to the bottom of the hole.

I won't give up, she thought. I won't give up.

But what was that disgusting smell? It smelled like rancid meat.

Emily looked down. The corpse of a rabbit, its fur eaten away by insects, lay at her feet. “Ugggh!” The rabbit must have fallen into the grave and starved to death.

Now I'm the rabbit, Emily thought.

She heard sounds above the grave, boots scraping against the ground. “Jessie—do you hear me?”

One more try at climbing out. She kicked more dirt onto the pile on the grave bottom. It was at least a foot high now. She stepped onto it, grabbed the top of the grave, and started to lift herself out.

Watch out, Jessie. This time I'm coming out.

She didn't see the shovel coming down on her until it was too late. Even as the metal blade of the shovel swung down onto her arm, she didn't realize what was happening.

She heard a loud crack, like someone breaking a celery stalk, and started to slip back down into the grave even before the pain arrived. The pain shot through her entire body, as if she'd been struck by lightning, and then stayed in the arm the shovel had hit, throbbing, throbbing.

On her knees in the dirt, she grabbed the arm with her other hand. But the pain was too intense. She immediately let go.

She tried to raise the arm, but couldn't. It wouldn't move. She couldn't swing it or raise it.

It's broken, she realized.

Jessie swung the shovel and broke my arm.

Now I'm helpless.

Now the terror swept over her, driving out her anger.

Jessie really does plan to kill me. And leave me in this grave.

Her entire right side throbbed with pain.

I'm trapped now. I can't climb out. I can't get away from her.

She looked down at the dead rabbit.

“No! Jessie—I'm coming out!” she screamed at the top of her lungs, screamed so hard it made her arm throb even more painfully.

The shovel swung down again, narrowly missing her head.

Emily threw herself against the side of the grave and looked up.

Another shovel swing. Another near miss.

And then, illuminated by the eerie, pale moonlight, a face peered down at Emily.

Not the face Emily expected.

Nancy's face.

“Nancy!”

Her sister glared down at her, her features frozen in grim determination, her eyes wild with hatred.

“Nancy—it's
you
?”

Emily suddenly felt so confused. Her fear mixed with hurt and surprise.

Holding the shovel in both hands, Nancy raised it high above her head.

“Nancy? What are you doing?”

Nancy stood frozen above her, the shovel poised.

“Nancy—answer me!”

Nancy glared down at her, her skin gray-green in the moonlight.

“Nancy—please!” Emily was so frightened, she didn't recognize her own voice.

Finally Nancy broke the pose. “I hate you, Emily!” she called down, her features cold, expressionless.

“But, Nancy—why?”

Nancy, still holding the shovel high, loomed menacingly above Emily, looking like a statue, a graveyard monument.

“Why, Nancy?”

“You killed Daddy!” Nancy shrieked.

She swung the shovel down with both hands.

Emily dived to the ground, and the metal grazed the top of her hair and then hit dirt.

“You killed Daddy!” Nancy repeated, her voice hoarse with hatred. “You killed Daddy! You killed Daddy! You killed Daddy!”

“But, Nancy—”

“You could've done something! You could've saved him! But you saved yourself instead!”

“Nancy, wait—please!”

The shovel came down again.

Emily rolled out of its path, landing on her broken arm, howling from the sudden explosion of pain.

“Nancy—wait!”

“You could've saved him! You lived and he didn't!” Nancy raised the shovel again.

“You took away the only two men I ever cared about!”

“What? Nancy, please—”

“Daddy and Josh! You took them both away!”

“But, Nancy, you and Josh—”

“Yes, that was me and Josh in the car the other night!” Nancy screamed bitterly. She lowered the shovel and leaned on it, glaring down at Emily with more cold hatred than Emily had ever seen in her life. “I tried to win him back. I saw you watching us—but I didn't care!”

“And—and it was you who killed Tiger?” Emily asked, her voice trembling as she began to realize the depths of Nancy's hatred, hatred that obviously had driven her over the edge.

“Of course it was me, you idiot.” Nancy was
grinning now, as if proud of what she had done. “Why should
you
have everything? Why should everyone love
you
?”

“But, Nancy, you made it look as if Jessie—”

“Jessie was the perfect suspect, wasn't she! Right from the start. It was so easy. When she accidentally tore the head off your stupid teddy bear, I knew you'd suspect her from then on. It was so easy. I turned off the computer, then told Jessie to go ahead and use it. I doctored the shampoo. . . .”

“And started the fire at school? And pushed me down the stairs at the concert?”

Nancy didn't reply, but her smile widened. And then it was gone, replaced by an even more terrifying look of fury. “You know what, Emily?”

“What?”

“It wasn't enough.”

“What?”

“It wasn't enough. You haven't paid enough.”

“No, Nancy.”

“You have to die, Emily. Die like Daddy.”

“No, Nancy. Let me out. I can help you. We can all help you.”

“I don't need help,” Nancy said slowly, pronouncing each word. “You need help.”

She plunged the shovel into the ground and swung a pile of dirt into the grave. “You need help, Em. I'm going to bury you now. The way you buried me.”

“No, wait—”

The dirt dropped onto her head. Emily backed up until her back was against the cold grave wall. She looked up helplessly.

Nancy, in the eerie gray-green moonlight, was frantically shoveling now, digging the shovel blade into the dirt, heaving the dirt down into the grave.

“I'm going to bury you, Emily! Bury you, bury you, bury you . . . ”

Six Feet Under

“N
ancy—please!”

The cold, wet dirt rained down on Emily. She wrapped her one good arm over her head and ducked her head low, trying to keep the dirt out of her eyes.

“Bury you . . . bury you . . . bury you . . .” Nancy was chanting as her shovel slid into the dirt, as she frantically worked to fill the grave.

“Nancy—I'll help you! Really!”

Wasted words. Nancy, still chanting, couldn't even hear them, Emily knew.

And then suddenly the dirt stopped falling.

Silence.

And then voices above her. Shouts. Sounds of a struggle.

Emily lowered her arm and hesitantly looked up.

She could see Jessie, looking frightened. And then Jessie moved out of view and Nancy reappeared, her hair wild about her face, as if displaying her rage.

“Ow!”

“Let go!”

“Drop it!” Jessie was screaming. “Drop it! Drop it!”

Emily realized they were fighting, struggling over the shovel.

“Let go! Get away from me!”