This Was A Bad Idea

chapter 18 - resolve

It keeps coming back. In sharp bursts, rolling over me like the salty swells of ocean waves.

 The old memory from two days ago, the memory that wasn’t mine. I’ve been rolling it over in my brain like a piece of hard candy, sucking on the edges, trying to break down the outer edges and reveal the molten core.

It’s all I can think about besides what just happened, the fact that I actually told someone, the fact that I was auctually able to be out to someone my age. And it’s only my third week in this town. I thought something like this would happen months later. 

But then again, I never expected a girl to go missing in a tunnel that might be linked to something much worse than anything I can imagine. 

It’s still imprinted in my brain, like the fire permanently seared it against the edges of my skull. Charred it, molten and seared like burnt meat. Like burnt skin. 

It was from the point of view of a girl. There was a party- a bunch of kids with their hands cupped around metal cans and fingers curled around joints and lighters. A scene that’s as deeply unfamiliar to me as the surface of the moon.

Something fell to the ground, a lighter. I remember the scene focusing on the hollow thunk it made once it made contact with the ground. Lighters aren't meant to catch on fire if they just drop to the ground. Yet…..the entire tunnel unfurled with flames, the smoke curling into people's lungs, charring their skin.

And I remember I saw a girl. She wore a white button-down. Her hair was the color of Carmel. Her eyes had been a flush of blue, an entire ocean residing in those hollow orbs. And I knew her. Her name was Michelle. Her lips had formed a name- Hailey. The girls name, who’s memory I somehow latched onto. I was Hailey. Michelle had caught on fire, a tongue of flame latching onto the back of shirt. Her eyes had latched onto me in those final moments like a hand tugging at my wrist. I remember her lips moving before the fire caressed her face. She was trying to say Hailey. 

Then the fire reached me- reached Hailey. 

The memory had then sputterd out like an ember caught underneath the sole of a boot. 

But in those short flashes- I recognized the tunnel. The walls were cleaner, not scratched with as much graffiti. I saw the ladder- it wasn’t stained with rust. It had been the same tunnel where Sam disappeared through the back wall.

Something had happened in that same tunnel, something bad. 

I ended up back in my room, the light leeching in through the sky, staining the curve of darkness as the sun wrung its way through the clouds. It was nearing 6:45 am. My parents were still asleep- they got up for work at 7. I had just made it. 

But then I realized what I have to do now. 

I practically run to the lunch table, my sleep-deprived brain stuck in the murky edges of gray. I had physically been in my classes, sure. But my mind was anywhere but school. I was trying to form a plan. A stupid, half-assed plan. But a plan nonetheless. 

Xen and Elliot slowly trickled up to the table, propping themselves up on the sun-bleached benches. Xen gave me a small, knowing smile. They had texted me earlier this morning to make sure I got home okay. 

“Uh, I have news.” I blurted out. Xen raised an eyebrow. 

“Remember what happened like two days ago? Something else happened when they made me go back into the tunnel. The day when we found that boy.” The words are slamming through me faster than I can collect them. “I got like, a flashback. A memory.”

I explain what happened. What I saw. Hailey. The fire. Michelle.

There is a very loud silence.

“Orion, are you alright? Did you hit your head extra hard this morning or something?” Elliot asks softly.