Meme Read online

  “The point is to end things,” Logan said, then he stared at me. “Not to be cruel.”

  “Really? ’Cause if that were the case, then I would’ve shot him,” I said, and I crouched down and brought my mouth close to Cole’s ear. “The point is to get the last word. That’s right. We’re killing you, Cole.”

  “Come on, Gray!” Logan bitched.

  I ignored him, kept my eyes on the dirtbag in the mud puddle. “’Cause you are a sick, sick fuck, Mr. Weston,” I said. “And you will never threaten anyone again. Hear me? We are smarter and braver than you ever were or could ever be.”

  Cole licked his lips and swallowed, panted, and looked up at me. Boy was pissed. So scared too. But he didn’t say a thing, probably couldn’t. Didn’t have control of his body by then. His arms gave up—Splash!—and he fell facedown in the water. That’s when he went into a spasm.

  Holly must’ve seen it all through the cracks between her fingers, because she turned off the headlights and the blackness got thicker. I could hear splashing and this low sound coming from inside of Cole. Honestly, hearing the water and that hiss and moan of his body was grosser than watching him die. I’ve killed my share of deer, but none of them made sounds that were as animal as what came out of that kid.

  Remember: A human is an animal.

  I used to think that was bullshit, that a human is a human, nothing else. I’ve wised up. I know now that a human is the most animal of animals. Think of our weird skin, hair, and nails. Our balls on the outside. Plus, humans have this need to kill anything that gets in our way. Doesn’t matter where we’re from. Asia. Africa. Europe. Vermont. We’re all killers. Even if the act of killing sickens most of us, we’ll still do it.

  Also the dying. When we die, we’re disgusting beasts.

  Cole thrashed in the puddle and I yelled, “We did this to you! Meeka too! Especially Meeka! You said you wanted to take us all out! We beat you to it, you fucker!”

  Cole lifted his head from the water and wheezed out, “I never said that.” Those might have been his dying words. If he had other ones, I didn’t hear them. He whispered them to the water, or to the cold air as he flipped over and slipped away.

  That was the end. Things got still and quiet and even darker. Clouds rolled in and blocked out the sliver of moon and made the night as black as I ever remember it being. I think it spooked Holly, and she flicked on the headlights again. We all got a good look at Cole on his back, half in the puddle, not moving.

  I stepped toward him and Holly got out of the car, so the music got out too. This depressing song filled the air, some chick wailing about her shitty life. Logan hadn’t moved from the hood and didn’t move until Holly put a hand on his back. That’s when he slid down and they joined me next to my Jeep.

  Holly took a deep breath, got all focused, and asked, “You’ve got the bungees? The tarp?”

  “I checked and it’s all in the back,” Logan told her, almost like it pissed him off that I was doing things right.

  “Should we call Meeka and let her know it’s over?” I asked.

  Holly’s eyes went so big, I could see the whites on all sides, and she said, “No calls! No phones at all except the old ones. How many times do we have to say this? You don’t have yours on you, do you?”

  “Of course not,” I told the nervous wreck. “I’m not stupid. Slipped my mind for a second. That’s all.”

  Logan had already pulled the tarp from my Jeep and was shaking it out. Looked like he was getting ready to pitch a tent.

  “Coveralls first,” Holly told him, and she fished them from the back. I know she saw the rifle. Pissed her off too, I’m sure. Who cares? That wasn’t important. Important thing was that Cole was dead. I put my hand in front of his mouth and nose, careful not to touch any puke. Cold. Still.

  “No breath. Worked like you said it would.”

  That meant it was time to move, be done with it. We each ducked behind my Jeep, changed into the coveralls, and tossed our clothes in a trash bag and then in Logan’s trunk. Then we rolled Cole up in the tarp and wrapped the bungees around it, tight as we possibly could so we could fit him in the roof box we’d bought with cash at a yard sale in New Hampshire. Logan put in 110 percent, made sure everything was extra tight, and I was going to make a joke about how he must’ve learned his wrapping skills when he worked at that burrito place, but even I wasn’t messed up enough to make jokes.

  What I was . . .

  No, what I am, is a hero.

  THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 3

  FIVE DAYS AFTER

  LOGAN

  THESE ARE THE THINGS I worry about.

  1. The body: It’s buried, and when we made the hole deeper, we found old bits of metal and tools from someone who probably farmed the land at least a hundred years ago. That was only halfway down. So I’m not worried that someone will dig it up by accident. And that Thule car top carrier is hard black plastic. It’s never decomposing. So I’m not worried the bones will find their way to the surface. I still think we should’ve cremated him in the firebox, though. It was Meeka’s final call, with the logic that if we do get caught, then none of us will be able to make up stories about what happened. There will be physical, biological evidence. Not to mention the phones.

  2. The phones: We each had old phones—two Galaxys, two iPhones—collecting dust. Basically outdated backups that we never used. We charged them up and erased all the content. As soon as we arrived at Meeka’s with the body, we gathered in the barn and laid the phones in a circle on a crate. Then we recorded our confession, each of us huddled over the crate, looking down. When we were finished, we put them in a dry bag from Grayson’s kayak. Then later I slipped them in the car top carrier and we buried them with Cole so that if anyone does ever find the body, we’re all implicated. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Now I’m not so sure.

  3. The temptation: What if one of us goes out there and digs the phones up? It was backbreaking work with four of us digging, so it’d be really difficult, though not impossible, to do it alone. Holly is a great athlete, so she might have the stamina, but would she have the time? Meeka was the one who wanted Cole buried there, so I don’t see why she’d do it. And Grayson? He’s proud of what we did. I half suspect he might want us all to be caught so he can brag about it. Which leaves me. I’d be a liar if I said I haven’t thought of going out there with a shovel. But the frost has hit harder than usual. It dropped to twenty-two degrees last night, and next week isn’t supposed to get too far above freezing. I’m not sure I’m up to the task. For now.

  4. The thing in the road: Something skittered away from my headlights when I was driving Holly home afterward. She didn’t notice it, and when I told her about it, she said it was probably a possum. But at the time, I thought it might be a kid. And as I replay the memory, it’s seeming more and more like a kid. A kid in a white jacket, zipping across the road and into the woods. I know that sounds crazy, but I used to sneak out of the house sometimes when I was young, to go exploring dark roads with friends. Maybe this white-jacketed boy saw the headlights and thought it was his parents searching for him. Maybe he saw my license plate, the make of my car. It doesn’t mean he witnessed the murder, but it’s still not a good thing.

  5. The future: Even if it was a boy and he did see something, I’m pretty sure we’ll get away with this. The plan hasn’t been perfect, but in this case, it only needed to be good. It’ll be weeks until anyone realizes Cole is gone. He hardly talked to his brother. In Cole’s words, he and Craig had “a holiday-only relationship,” and Thanksgiving is three weeks away. The sandwich girls at Subway might notice Cole isn’t stopping by anymore, but are they really going to tell anyone? Why would they? When someone does finally check out the trailer, they’ll see that Cole was a kid who spent a lot of time on 4chan and Reddit and who knows where else and they’ll follow his browser history and see all the dark stuff he was into and they’ll figure out that there’s probably about a thousand different fates he could’ve met. But will they actually suspect foul play? Without blood or a body, it seems unlikely. He was eighteen, no longer a minor, in charge of himself. Not to mention, an addict’s son. So who cares? They’ll move on.

  Five days Cole’s been in the ground and I’m trying my best to move on too. It’s Thursday, and the weekend is visible on the horizon. Halloween has come and gone and there have been no ghosts haunting us. We’re not in the clear yet, but we’re getting there. At school, I’ve been keeping an eye on the others, and they seem to be making it through okay. Holly is a bit wobbly, but she can always blame that on soccer, on a historic season taking its toll. But, really, what would we have to do to make a person take any of us aside and ask us if we’d murdered our former friend and buried his body in the woods behind one of our houses?

  We’d have to tell someone we did it. That’s it and that’s all.

  * * *

  • • •

  “Hey, Es,” I say as I turn the corner on my way to the gym and spot Esther Green closing her locker.

  “Logan the Legend,” she says in a deep voice.

  “Hardly,” I reply.

  “Come on. How much have you raised so far?” she asks.

  Not to brag, but she’s talking about the good I’m bringing to the world, a fund-raiser I put together that will provide micro-loans to help disadvantaged people get socially or environmentally conscious businesses off the ground.

  “Fifty-eight thousand, last I checked,” I tell her.

  “Hell yeah,” she says, and puts a hand up. Even though it’s totally a bro move, I high-five, and I love how small her hand feels against mine.

  “It’ll help a few people realize their dreams,” I say. It sounds cheesy, but that’s what it’s all about. When I started it as a project for econ, I thought I’d raise a few hundred dollars from relatives and give it to the local family center. But it’s taken on a life of its own.

  It’s even got a name: Logan’s Heroes, which is a reference to an old TV show called Hogan’s Heroes my pop-pop used to watch. Vice Principal Goldstein warned me that some Jewish people might find the name offensive, but I wasn’t sure why. According to Wikipedia, the show was about guys outwitting Nazis, and I’d think Jewish people would be on board with that. I mean, Cole thought the name was “So gay!” and if Cole didn’t like something, then chances were that the thing was fair and noble. He was the opposite of tolerant.

  Homophobe and anti-Semite: two more boxes on his résumé of evil you can check off.

  “You hit up any of those people in the Hollow for money?” Esther asks. “I heard there’s a guy who’s so rich, he has a private zoo!”

  “I’m exploring all options,” I say, though I have to admit I haven’t been soliciting amateur zookeepers. However, I make a mental note.

  “We blew all our ‘discretionary’ funds at Osheaga in Quebec a few months ago, but my mom read that article about you in the paper, and she wants to donate as soon as we have some extra cash,” Esther tells me.

  I’m used to people talking about that article. It was only in the local paper, but everyone read it. Fantastic exposure, even though I’d like to update some of the information.

  “That’s so sweet of your mom. But please tell her that I’m no longer using the Indiegogo site that’s mentioned in the article. She can go directly to LogansHeroes.org to donate.”

  “Roger that. My mom says, ‘That Logan kid is doin’ right by the young generation.’ Isn’t that something?” Esther remarks with a dramatic sigh. “Doesn’t mention her daughter as the future of this country. But Logan Bailey, that’s a boy who’s going places.”

  “To gym,” I tell her. “I’m going to gym.”

  “What about Becca’s? Hitting her party tomorrow?”

  “Now that I know she’s having one, I am.”

  She smiles. She wants me to be there, but that doesn’t mean she wants me. The rumors about me and Holly are many and confusing. We’re not a thing right now, but I can’t blame people for thinking we are. I know it makes other girls keep their distance.

  FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4

  SIX DAYS AFTER

  HOLLY

  I’M ON MY WAY TO BECCA’S PARTY with Meeka. Our lives will always be connected because of what we did, but she doesn’t care to talk about it. That’s what I need. Meeka drives past the Round Church, which is lit with floodlights. She points to a dog.

  “Fluffy fella there is the type I want,” she says.

  It’s a Bernese mountain dog, and it’s sniffing around the church garden while its owner sits on a bench checking his phone. They’re giant things, Berneses. Fuzzy and huggable and adorable. I understand why people like them, but all I can think about is how big a pain it would be to pick burdocks from their tails.

  “You must still miss Skipper,” I say. Skipper was her family’s golden who they had to put to sleep last year. Cancer of the stomach. So sad.

  “He was a good pooch all right,” Meeka says. “Old Diaper Breath.”

  “Diaper Breath, huh? There are a couple of guys I know who could go by that nickname.”

  “Fuck!” Meeka says. “Who? Not—”

  “Not Logan,” I assure her. “That boy loves his Altoids too much.”

  “Then who?”

  “Forget it.”

  “You can’t tell me there are at least two guys out there with diaper breath and expect me not to grill your ass on it. This is important information for girls to share.”

  “Fine. Noah.”

  “Fuuuck!” she howls as she pounds her fist on the wheel. The horn beeps and it surprises me how much it makes me jump.

  “I know, I know,” I say. “He’s too hot to have bad breath.”

  “I’ll bet he’ll be there tonight,” she says, and her eyebrows go up and down. “I’ll talk to him, get really close, and if I catch a whiff, I’ll faint. Fall right into a bowl of guac.”

  “No you won’t.”

  “Ya think?”

  It’s never wise to call Meeka’s bluff. Meeka rarely bluffs.

  “Fine,” I say. “Do what you want, but it means I’m not going to tell you who the other guy is.”

  “Diaper Breath numero dos?”

  “It’ll be your mission to figure it out.”

  Meeka puckers up. “I’ll be kissing a lot of frogs tonight, then.”

  I almost call her a slut, in a joking way, but then my chest seizes up.

  Cole.

  He used that word constantly. He’d always say, “Hey, if girls can call each other sluts, then I should be able to call girls sluts. And if black guys can call each other—”

  “It’s Caden,” I blurt out. “He’s the other one.”

  Meeka’s nose scrunches up and she says, “Booo. You’re no fun. And anyway, I’ve kissed Caden.”

  “What?”

  “Sure,” she says. “Freshman year. In the gondola. His breath was fine then.”

  “Well, maybe he’d had a tuna sandwich the day I kissed him.”

  “And when was this day?”

  I dip my head. Sheepishly I admit, “Yesterday. After practice. In the parking lot by the fields.”

  “He kissed you?”

  “More like the other way around.”

  “Holly!”

  I rub my eyes and say what I haven’t been able to say but have been feeling all week. “I needed to think about something else for a bit. Anything else.”

  Meeka’s head tilts. Her eyes are wide, taking all of me in. “You told me we would be okay,” she says, and she gives me her right hand.

  I kiss it because I know that’s what she wants. Because it makes me feel closer to her. And I nod.

  “We are okay.”

  GRAYSON

  I CAN’T BELIEVE I’ve known these kids for so long. Back to kindergarten for most of them, some of them even earlier. Five or six of them went to the day care that Mom ran out of our house, so they’ve seen me get my diapers changed. Not that anyone remembers that, but that’s the level of familiarity we’re working with for a lot of us. Connections run deep.

  As parties go, this isn’t bad. Becca doesn’t want any spills or smells in the house, so we’re out back. It’s cold here on the patio, but there are a few heat lamps that make it bearable. Lots of hotties out here adding to the heat too, sporting Patagonia vests and beanies. Nice.

  There’s a keg. Always a good sign. Problem is, it’s some craft shit Bornstein got from his cousin. Gose, it’s called. Tastes weird, like lemonade and dishwater. I hope it’s got a ton of alcohol in it, because if I’m not drunk soon, I’ll have to find a bottle of something strong and duck into the woods for a bit.

  These kids are all so happy. They’re laughing about every little thing. That shouldn’t make me mad, but I kinda feel like grabbing some random guy and punching him so I can wipe the smiles off everyone’s faces. What can I say? I’m a real asshole. At least sometimes. And some of those times, I deserve to be.

  “What’s up?” Paul Baker says as he crashes his Solo cup against mine.

  It makes the beer spill onto my hand. Cold, but I don’t care. I take a gulp and say, “Getting wasted off this, whatever this is.”

  “This!” he shouts. “This is the best gose in the country, son!”

  He pronounces it goes-ah, which could be the right way to say it, but it only makes the stuff sound even worse. “Still tastes like piss,” I say.

  “I don’t know. A ninety-four on BeerAdvocate. Pretty legit.”

  “You’re the expert.”

  Paul is the type of kid who will pull out his phone and check the ratings of movies, food, almost anything you’re enjoying. Or, in this case, hating. He’s got some old-ass Tumblr where he posts his own movie and TV reviews and other shit. Why? I don’t know. We’ve all got stuff to make us feel important.