Page 48 of Lake Hollow Curses

We don’t move. We don’t get up to drink or eat. We drift off at times to sleep restlessly. I’m worried about the dark days ahead. The return to life, not normal life… nothing can be ‘normal’ again, the moments when we’re by ourselves and some memory strikes a blow. The truth laid bare isn’t healing. It’s going to hurt while we process it all.

I can see in Cal’s eyes the deep pain of life altering betrayal. The kind only a trusted and loved friend can deliver.

Carlotta Marlow tried to find the person responsible. She spent the last couple years of her life poking at the past. She was so close to learning what Charlie had done. Until he stopped her. We should’ve taken her warning more seriously, but who can accept they’ve grown up with someone capable of cold-blooded murder?

We kept telling ourselves, if there is someone responsible, they would’ve been caught. Never believing they’d cover their tracks so well, convince everyone in their life so effectively of their harmlessness…

Charlie Gibson played us all. Lake Hollow didn’t see the monster in one of their own.

The cabin descends into darkness, but we don’t move to turn lights on, only shifting now and then. The hurt whispers of disbelief among us, as we hold onto each other tight. When the screen door is knocked on, and Ceily bustles her way in with bags of food, I finally unfold myself from the couch. “You shouldn’t have,” I say to her quietly. No, she really shouldn’t have, but it’s sweet of her to bother.

Keenan comes in behind her, flipping a light in the kitchen on. “This is from Pops… all of it.” In other words, highly edible. Remi lets out a brief cry of relief seeing her friends. She gives Keenan a bear hug, saying, “I can’t believe it, I just… Keke, I can’t…”

No one has an appetite for food that is stowed away in the fridge. Ceily prays over us, telling us that Father Chris is on the way. For once, I won’t fight his council. I need something… something to tell me we’ll survive this. That the pain won’t eat us alive. “In the Lord’s name we pray.”

Chapter Thirty-four

Grady Marlow

News travels fast in Lake Hollow. It always has. It makes me physically sick to think of all the bad deeds that were hushed andnottalked about. Covered up, like an ugly scar to be hidden from everyone.

My aunt’s words keep running through my head…“Make your story bigger than just yourself, choose courage over comfort, life has a way of working out, and first it hurts then it changes you.”

I’d never seen my father shed a tear until he came to the door of Wilder’s cabin, when Father Chris was leaving. My stoic, tough father fell apart in front of me. I held him up as he cried a lifetime of tears. Over his sister, over the hidden realities, even over me. He tells me if Gibson had hurt me, he would’ve been behind bars for strangling him to death.

Skip and Natalie James hunker down next door after being alerted by the police about what had happened. Her unclewas livid, fooled completely by Charlie’s ‘good guy’, ‘helpful’ behavior. Natalie cried, we barely understood her through the sobs,“Mitchell knew, he knew something was wrong with his brother.”

Before leaving Wilder’s cabin for their own, Natalie told us Mitchell had been securing things in a storage unit on his father’s airstrip that he wanted the police to see… row boats one with WPL etched into the sides, the love letters in Carlotta’s dresser mentioning some of Charlie’s behaviors that both David and Lala were concerned were like Daniel’s, even a receipt he found for gas in Lake Hollow three days before Charlie said he was back in town.

There are no consolations.

The Gibson I should’ve been suspicious of wasn’t Katie. Her heartbreak over seeing her brother kill Sara, her inability to tell anyone before she shared the same fate… it is tearing me apart. Did she think no one would listen, or was she terrified he’d kill her, like he ended up doing anyway?

Wilder is right, there won’t be good answers to all the questions we keep coming up with. Charlie didn’t hold onto the lies this long to spill now. He won’t answer honestly.

My hand runs down Remi’s back as she is curled on Cal’s lap. She’s been staring at the wall of Wilder’s hallway with a shocked look on her face. “Baby, can I get you anything?”

She says softly, her voice tired sounding, “Sorry if I acted crazy earlier… it’ll happen again.”

No need to explain. I get it. Cal sighs before saying, “Rem, please don’t apologize.” The agony in his voice, tugs at my heart. “You have us. We’re not leaving you… or each other. We’re here.”

We’re here.

The next day passes in a blur of grief, more questioning by the Sheriff’s office, the FBI, and a steady stream of people we grew up with. Carter Kelley arrives armed with alcohol andanger, repeatedly telling Cal,“Never liked that pompous fucking asshole. There was always something sneaky about him.”

The town is mourning again over the deaths that were murders. Stories are all expounded on… it’s all guessing. It’s storytelling at its finest. We’re informed by Ceily that the St. James' prayer circle is a hive of gossips.“It’s not considered tongue wagging if it’s a prayer request,”she says, rolling her eyes. Word comes to us that Charlie is denying any part in the past drownings or Carlotta’s death. His parents believe his every word. We didn’t expect anything else.

Natalie keeps in contact with Mitchell Gibson. He’s retreated out of town with his parents, staying with them in another state. He asks her not to relay updates about his brother to us, but Natalie is onourside. With the victims of Charlie. Her cousin, Remi, is her only concern.

National news picks up the story, eager to point out that I’m involved in the whole mess.“Management for Romantic Ruin is not announcing a cancellation or delay in their tour plans at this time.”

My plans to leave are indefinitely on hold. It would be easier to tear my beating heart from my chest, than leave. My only concern is the people I love. I plan to ensure I do whatever I can to see Charlie get justice, if you call prison enough punishment for countless lives taken justice. That will come when he meets his maker.

Chapter Thirty-six

Remington James

Idon’t understand how heartbreak gets romanticized, for me it’s a kind of death and I’m being forced to keep living.

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