Final Cut, page 18
I trail off. I’m meandering toward the truth, little baby steps, and I know that once I’m there, I can’t turn back. But if I’m being honest with myself, it’s already too late. It has been from the moment I set foot in Pine Springs—from even before, when I packed up my car and drove, white-knuckling the wheel and speeding straight into the mouth of the beast.
I feel Cameron’s stare, and I meet it.
Hands off the wheel, sailing headfirst into the darkness ahead.
“This movie isn’t the only reason I’m here,” I say. “I’ve been talking to Cal ever since I turned eighteen. And I was starting to think he might be innocent.”
22
It didn’t happen right away. That night, the letter. The taste of bile and alcohol thick on my tongue.
Have you forgotten me already?
I don’t know what I expected—an explanation. A plea for forgiveness. A clear and undeniable reason why everyone else was wrong, and Cal wasn’t the monster they told me he was.
But Cal’s letter didn’t mention the murders at all.
Instead, he told me about himself. About us together. How, when I was a baby, he used to take me for beignets every Saturday morning—how he’d make me laugh right when I took a bite, so I’d blow powdered sugar everywhere, and then we’d laugh even harder. He told me that I loved to catch fireflies in our backyard and watch movies with him—The Wizard of Oz, Matilda, things I probably liked for the bright colors and music more than I actually understood them. We watched them in his shed, the one he’d converted into a theater. The one where three people died. But back then, it wasn’t haunted. It was a sanctuary.
He told me all of these things, and then, at the very bottom, there was this:
I don’t know what your mom has told you about me. Whatever she decides, I know it will be best, because she’s smart and capable and good—even if it means I’m lost to you forever, or at least until you get this letter.
And that’s when he told me how to add myself to his list of approved phone calls, if I wanted.
I really hope you do, Hazel. Because I’d like to know you.
Love,
Dad
For days, I did nothing—just let the letter fester on my bookshelf like a rotten secret. I shouldn’t, I thought. I couldn’t. This man was a killer, probably a manipulator, and talking to him would be the worst kind of betrayal against my mother, who had never done anything but protect me as best she could.
But then another, darker thought crept in. I believed Cal was a killer, a manipulator, a father who wanted nothing to do with me—because Mom had told me so.
What if she was wrong?
I wrote the letter quickly, scrawling out my phone number and email and nothing else. I tossed it in the mailbox when Mom was at work, watching it slip through the open mouth and past the point of no return.
After, I honestly tried to forget about it. It wasn’t hard, either. Weeks passed without a response, and I started to think that Cal had changed his mind. He’d written the letter fifteen years ago, after all.
Then, on Thanksgiving Day, my phone rang with a number I didn’t recognize.
“The first time we talked, he seemed so … normal,” I say now, as they all watch me in stunned silence. “He wanted to know what I liked, how I was doing in school. Other than that, we mostly talked about slashers. He was so excited when I said I loved them.”
My stomach twinges with the obvious irony of that statement, but still. I remember a little rush of warmth as I heard the pride in his voice. The excitement at this thing we shared.
“We never really talked about the murders at all,” I say, with a jolt of shame. “We only talked, like, once a week, but … I just liked getting to know him, I guess. For so much of my life, I hadn’t had a father, and then here he was. An actual living, breathing person.”
“Did you ever visit him?” Nina asks.
More shame, hot and sharp. I shake my head. “Talking to him on the phone, it was easier to forget where he was. Like I could pretend he was just on a business trip, or something. I know he wanted me to visit, though. He asked a couple times, but I told him I didn’t know how I’d get there without Mom finding out.”
It was technically true, but I could still hear the sadness in his voice as he accepted my excuse. Eventually, he stopped asking.
“Why did you think he was innocent?” Cameron watches me with those bright, scrutinizing eyes, and I hate that I still can’t tell what he’s thinking.
“At first, I tried not to think about it. But then the more I got to know him, the more I just … didn’t think he seemed capable of it. And I know how that sounds.” I look down, away from Cameron’s stare. “But I couldn’t stop thinking about it. Then, when I saw the audition for Swamp Creatures, I started wondering more and more about coming here, seeing where we lived.…” I take a breath, lifting my eyes again. “I tried to ask my mom, once, if she thought Cal could be innocent, but she shut it down so fast.”
I wince at the memory of that day outside the frozen-yogurt place, the hard look in her eyes like a slammed door.
“And I was really upset, I guess, so when Cal called me later that day … I just asked him. Straight up, I said, ‘Why did you do it?’”
The silence on the other line was something I could feel. A physical, textured thing, rough around the edges—kind of like the one I’m getting now.
I take a breath. “And then he told me, ‘There are a lot of things people got wrong about me, Hazel. I thought you would have known that by now.’”
The words are like a ghost possessing me, chilling me from the inside out—and in their eyes, I see exactly what I feared I would: confusion. Pity. He didn’t even say he was innocent, but poor Haze wanted so badly to believe it that she did.
“Maybe that shouldn’t have been enough,” I say quickly. “But he was so…” I grab at the air like the word might be there, the right way to make them understand. “It wasn’t like he was mad that I asked him—it was like he was hurt. Like I was his last hope that anyone would ever know the truth, and I’d just crushed it.”
And the other thing that crossed my mind that day, the one I don’t say out loud: if Cal really was guilty, then what did that say about me, the girl who’d been answering his calls for the past six months?
“Do you think he could have been trying to manipulate you?” Nina asks carefully, like she knows it’s something I don’t want to hear.
It stings, how right she probably is. Since coming here, I’ve found plenty of proof that Cal is as guilty as they say: those pictures of Susie, the threatening note, the camera Skeet says he found in his desk. But I’ve also heard firsthand about the dad who took me out for beignets at the diner. The teacher whose students loved him. The man who might have fallen victim to a bungled investigation.
And the truth—the slick beating heart of it—is that I still can’t rectify the infamous Pine Springs Slasher with the Cal I talked to on the phone: the man who lit up like a kid about his favorite movies and wanted nothing more than to share them with me.
“Maybe,” I say. And then, after a moment, “I don’t know. But when I found out that I’d gotten this movie…”
Cameron nods with an understanding that reaches deep into my core, making me shiver.
“You had to see for yourself,” he says gently.
I hold his gaze for a moment, taking in his quiet acceptance. He’s still on my side, even after all of this.
“Yeah,” I say. “I did.”
Lucas takes a small step forward, loosening his guarded posture ever so slightly.
“Do you still think Cal was innocent?”
I look at the three of them—my friends, I think, because something tells me they still are. They’re still here, watching me like I must have all the answers, and I have the sudden fear that I’ve only doomed them. That they’d be safer on the other side of this door.
Then I look at Cameron again. My cheeks flush as I think back to what he said just before we kissed—how the best way to die in a slasher is by insisting on being alone. He gives me a small smile, like he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
I stand taller, trying to project the badass strength of a final girl, even though I’m not going to be one—because no one else is going to die. Not if I can help it.
“I don’t know for sure,” I say. “But Cameron and I have been doing some digging, and we might have found some proof.”
We fill them in on all of it, now: the pictures of Susie and the note stashed in Skeet’s yearbook, both seemingly evidence of Cal’s guilt; but also the bracelet, the camera in Cal’s desk, things only someone close to the murders could have known.
“We think whoever’s doing this has a connection to Pine Springs,” I finish. “And we think—” I glance at Cameron, hesitant, and he nods. “We haven’t ruled out that this person might have had something to do with the original murders, too.”
The room goes silent as Nina and Lucas swallow everything I’ve just thrown at them. Nina sits down on the bed, the springs squeaking quietly beneath her.
“They really tried to kill me with that lamp, didn’t they?” she asks, haunted.
Lucas speeds for the door.
“Whoa,” Cameron says. “Where are you going?”
“There’s a killer running around this motel.” Lucas’s face is red with urgency. “We need to get Officer West to call for backup.”
I get the impulse to argue, but Lucas is already fumbling with the dead bolt, and I know that he’s right. Maybe we can’t trust the cops to see the truth about Cal, but if the killer is here, then they have to protect us.
Nina helps Lucas unlock the door, and we walk out into the parking lot. The hot night air seeps under my clothes, reawakening my barely dried sweat as I glance around the shadows. Still no sign of West. An uneasy feeling squirms inside of me as Lucas strides toward the cop car and taps on the window.
“Hello?” Lucas presses his face up to the glass and then turns to us with a worried expression. “He’s gone.”
“Maybe he went to the vending machine?” Cameron offers hopefully.
But the prickling at the back of my neck keeps me rooted to the spot.
The trunk of the cop car is slightly open.
Something like a whimper crawls up into my throat, but I force it down.
“Haze?” Nina asks, worried.
I don’t respond. I approach the trunk, feeling like I’m sleepwalking.
A small, dark trickle drips down to the bumper.
“Oh my God,” Nina breathes behind me. “Oh shit.”
It’s like I’m watching myself on a screen—someone else’s hand reaching out to grip the underside of the trunk. Someone else pushing it open.
Someone else seeing Officer West’s body, the gash in his throat soaking his uniform red.
23
The Movie-Screen image blurs, stuttering. I shut my eyes, hoping that when I open them again, the camera will have cut away, the scene changed.
But it doesn’t. West is still crumpled and bloodied in the trunk, because this isn’t a fucking movie. This is my actual life, and the killer could still be here in this parking lot.
The killer. I whirl around, but there’s no one else here—just Nina, her hands pressed over her mouth, and Lucas, leaning on the nearest parked car to keep from crumpling to the ground.
“Haze?” Cameron walks up. When he sees the body, his face pales. “Oh God.”
Nina breaks into action first. She punches her phone screen and holds it up to her ear, one fist pressed to her lips as it rings.
“Hello?” she says after a moment. “Hi, yeah, I’m at the Pine Springs Motel with the Swamp Creatures cast, and there’s—” She turns away from the car. “There was an officer stationed here, Officer West, but he’s…”
Nina keeps talking, but her voice fades as I stare at the body, unable to tear my eyes away. I’ve always been like that with gore in the movies. Wanting to see every detail, to appreciate the twisted art of it. I realize how absolutely fucked that is, but I still can’t look away.
Because now I notice the camcorder in the officer’s hand, his lifeless fingers curled deliberately around it like someone posed it there, their own terrifying sculpture.
Slowly, I reach for the camera and pry it from West’s grip. His arm falls limp, and my stomach lurches. When I click to view the videos, there’s only one. The thumbnail is a dark room, making it impossible to pick out any details.
I press Play.
The video comes to life, the camera shaky as it starts. It pans from darkness to a shape—dirty sneakers on a wooden floor—and then up: jeans, chair legs. Someone sitting in the chair, bound to it by cord around their waist. They’re squirming, and now I can hear them murmuring as the camera pans slowly up.
“Please,” I think they say, but it’s hard to tell. They’re gagged.
My heart judders as the video stops on the person’s face: Kyle the PA, his sandy hair falling long and scraggly over his terrified eyes. He tries to speak again through the gag, but the camera pans away to a piece of paper gripped in a gloved hand, a message scrawled in dark, violent ink.
Time is running out, Hazel.
My stomach drops to my toes.
“Jesus,” Cameron mutters. And then, “Wait, pause it.”
I do, freezing the frame on the bloody message. I see it at the same time Cameron does: there, in the background, a rifle is propped up against a wooden wall. One that, just this morning, was pointed directly at us.
Cameron’s breath catches.
“This is Skeet’s houseboat,” I say. “It’s him.” I reach into my pocket for my car keys. “Come on.”
“Wait, Haze, this is definitely a trap. We can’t go.”
“He has Kyle,” I tell him, my voice cracking. “We have to.”
I turn and march toward my car, wild determination building with every stride. Maybe this is a trap, but I can’t let someone else die. This ends tonight, even if I have to go alone.
“The cops are on their way,” Nina says, coming over as she hangs up her call. She freezes when she realizes I’m leaving. “Where are you going?”
“It’s Skeet,” I tell her. “He has Kyle in his houseboat.”
Her mouth drops open, stunned. “What?”
I unlock my car.
“Wait, you’re not going there by yourself,” Nina argues. “The cops are already on their way. We can call them and send them there instead.”
I throw the door open.
“Haze,” Nina presses.
“We’re already running out of time,” I tell her, climbing in. “Call Carpenter back and tell him to meet me at the swamp. But I’m going.”
My hand quakes as I start the engine.
Someone yanks on the locked passenger door, making me jump.
“Let me in.” Cameron knocks on the window, a mirror of this morning. “I’m coming with you.”
I grip the wheel, even though the car is still in park. I don’t want to go alone, but if Cameron comes with me, then I’m literally bringing him into a serial killer’s clutches. Every second feels like a tick I can hear in my head, counting down to another murder.
I unlock the passenger door and let Cameron inside. Nina’s on the phone again, Lucas hovering nearby, and I roll down the window so I can hear her.
“Skeet Bergeron’s houseboat, yeah,” she says, glancing my way. “You guys know where it is?” Nina pauses as whoever’s on the other line—Carpenter, probably—answers. She lowers the phone and looks at me. “He says we should all stay here and lock ourselves in while they go to Skeet’s.”
Like hell I will.
Silently, I nod.
“Okay,” Nina says into the phone. “Thank you so much.”
She hangs up and then gives me a look.
“You’re not staying, are you,” she says. It’s not even a question.
I shake my head. “But you and Lucas should. It’s safer.”
For a moment, Nina is silent, frowning in thought. Then she steps up to the car and opens the back door.
“Wait,” I start to protest, but she cuts me off.
“First rule of slashers is you stick together.”
I close my mouth. I could argue, but she’s right. Splitting up might be even worse. With a small, shaky exhale, I nod, and Nina climbs into the back seat.
“Lucas, come on,” she calls.
He stands hesitantly for a moment, blinking in the headlights like a deer. Then he scrambles over to the other side of the car and climbs in.
“I hope y’all know what you’re doing,” Lucas mumbles, closing the door behind him.
Me too, I think as I pull the car into drive. But I don’t say it out loud. Instead, I grip the wheel and straighten my spine as I think of Skeet waiting in the swamp. Of Kyle, terrified that every breath might be his last.
I drive us into the night.
INT. HOUSEBOAT – NIGHT
TWO HOURS AGO
La bête doit être nourrie.
The beast must be fed. Mawmaw gave Skeet the warning in both languages, pinching his cheek and handing him a caramel from deep in that bottomless purse of hers, warm and sticky enough to pull teeth. She’d laugh to herself, pleased at the play on words. Bête is French for “beast,” but there’s also the Cajun saying, pauvre ti bête, “poor little thing”—perfect for the ruddy little boy who probably would’ve stolen those caramels anyway. Skeet never spoke much Cajun French, except the phrases Mawmaw used here and there, but he didn’t need the language to see the warning in her eyes. La Bête Verte feeds on naughty children, and he’d come for him, too, if he wasn’t careful.
A crock of bull, Skeet thinks, as he settles into the creaking cushions of his futon. Too small a bed for a man his size, bad on the back, but it’s worth it, being away from it all. What Mawmaw didn’t seem to know is that the real beasts are out there, lurking among the people. Hiding teeth behind closed-lipped smiles, licking their lips at the scent of blood.
