Page 65 of Firefly Effect

“There are still too many similarities between kills, namely the dead firefly pressed onto their bodies.”

I gasp. “Wait. What? That’s never been mentioned. How did I not know?”

Lincoln rubs his eyes with one hand. “Our class was privy to additional information to help them try to solve the case. But I probably shouldn’t tell you any more.”

Normally my curiosity would get the better of me and I would demand all the details he knows, but I’m not sure I want to hear anything else. It’s been fourteen years, and I still get the same queasy stomach every time I think about seeing Carley lying there.

“We got off track. I’m sorry, Evie.” He sighs. “Why don’t we go back to your story? You were just getting to the part where you entered the woods to see the fireflies.”

I take a deep breath and close my eyes, forcing myself back there. “Carley and her brother brought mason jars that night to trap the fireflies.” Guilt radiates in my chest. “Foster handed me his jar, and I just… caved.”

The memory stings just as much as it always has. I’ve never stopped wondering what happened to Carley’s wrongly accused brother. Other than that one damn poem I know he had to have written, I can’t even find proof that he ever existed.

My cheeks flush as I hesitate to tell him about my silly childhood crush on Foster. For some reason, it feels invasive for him to know now. I was young and so damn naive to let one hot guy convince me to make a boatload of terrible decisions in one night. I will forever pay for those choices.

I wish it had been otherwise. Disobeying Patrick’s orders wouldn’t have changed Carley’s fate. But at least I wouldn’t have spent the rest of my life feeling responsible for everything that happened that night and after.

I continue with all the details that I can recall, from my uncle’s warning to stay on the trail to the peer pressure that led me into the woods anyway. Then I get to our search for Carley, her scream, then…

I shudder and look back at Lincoln, more remorse compounding in my chest. “I’m sorry.”

His forehead creases, and he leans forward. “Why? Why are you sorry, Evie?”

I blow out a breath, wracking my brain for an answer I’m not even sure is there. “I… I don’t know. The details are disturbing, I know.”

“But it’s what you experienced.” He gives me a sympathetic look. “You have nothing to be sorry about, you hear me?”

Something about his tone and his conviction makes me suck in a breath. “Yes.”

My eyes dart between his, and in that split second, I get it. I get why Lincoln Reed does what he does. How he can help people put the ghosts of their pasts to rest. Because that’s what it feels like I’ve been trying to do my entire life—put my ghost to rest. And while I always assumed that ghost was Carley, I’m wondering now if it has really been someone else. Someone who isn’t a ghost at all, as far as I know.

Foster’s disappearance has haunted me almost as much as Carley’s death—for the sake of not having any type of closure, at the very least. I never got to talk to him about losing Carley. I never got to make sure he was okay after he was locked up for months while the authorities sorted out the details of the case. The fact that the justice system would even allow that is inexplicably heinous, in my eyes.

My only solace has been that he must be out there somewhere, if he can write poetry as beautiful as the one piece I found.

He must have changed his name. I’ve never thought of that before, but it’s possible considering there’s no other trace of his existence. Maybe he was worried the person who killed Carley would hunt him down. Maybe he saw something that night… after I left…

As this new realization dawns on me, I open my eyes with a gasp.

“Evie?” Lincoln is walking toward me, my blurred vision robbing me of the clarity of his perfect form. “Evie, are you okay?”

A heaviness presses down on me, forcing me to sink back into my memories from that night. It’s the first time I’ve allowed myself to thoroughly rifle through these images from years ago, ones that used to fill me with dread. Now I feel nothing but safe as I make my way through the dark woods with fireflies dancing around me. In fact, with this whole new sense of clarity, I’m almost eager to go there.

I take in everything now, including the heavy, humid air and other compounding elements that add to my sensory experience. What may have been overload at the time is only a beautiful symphony. I stomp into the woods, unafraid, determined, the fear of losing my way or disappointing my uncle completely absent from my mind.

“Evie girl.”

I hear the nickname given to me by my uncle, but I turn to find Foster there, his dreamy eyes filled with concern.

“We need to find her,” he tells me, his voice sounding like he’s underwater.

Everything goes into slow motion as Foster turns to dart back through the woods. I begin to run, and that’s slow motion too. I can’t keep up, my limbs struggling to move like I’m drunk off Tennessee Fire.

A streak of bluish-white light streaks past me, one of those damn ghost fireflies teasing me with its chase to find a mate. But this time, my eye follows the movement and widens at what it sees. The streak of light goes up, down, and back around, crossing over itself then curling in, before bouncing out and down into another shape.

It reminds me of the last Fourth of July, when my parents dropped me off at Uncle Patrick’s on their way to a weekend-long party, and he and I played with sparklers all night long. We made up a game almost like charades, drawing words with the sparkling lights then making others guess them.

Only this time, there was no confusion over the words drawn in the air. One by one, the streaks of light spelled out a familiar phrase, a rhyme that I’d heard my friends recite whenever they went into the woods.

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