Ashes, Ashes

12 - The Body

My legs went liquid, and for a minute I just stood and stared and waited for my brain to catch up. It was an optical illusion, I thought, just like the twisting shadows the night before. It was a trick of the light, and once my eyes focused, I'd realize it wasn't a spray of blood at all but something simple and obvious and innocuous. 

But my eyes refused to see anything but what was in front of them, and I moved forward, stiff-legged and afraid. I could barely hear through the rush of my pulse in my ears, that faraway ocean noise of blood rushing from my head, my fingertips tingling with the onset of panic. 

I nudged open the door with the toe of my shoe and waited for my eyes to adjust to the gloom. 

At first I thought maybe someone had left a pile of clothes in here, like maybe they had been changing and just left the old clothes behind. But that wasn't right. The shape was all wrong, for one, the lumps and folds in the wrong spot. 

And there was blood. So much blood. 

It puddled in red-black pools, splattered seemingly at random across the tile walls, dripping down like crimson egg yolk. And in a tangled mess in the middle of the floor, lying spread-eagled among her tattered clothes and the sticky pool of blood, was Liza. 

Her body looked like someone had been at it with an axe. Her skin had been split open in places, something pinkish visible in the gashes. But that wasn't the worst of it. The worst was the tangled loop of intestines spilling out from her burst-open gut, pulled out and spread all around her like uncooked sausages, pale and pink and oddly translucent. 

I staggered backward, retching into my hand, and then I couldn't stop myself; I doubled over and puked onto the tile floor. My vomit splashed against the ground and it smelled sweet, like Tennessee Honey, and the odor made me throw up again, my stomach heaving until I was just spitting up yellowish foam. 

I had a crazy urge to go to her, to do something -- anything -- to try to help however I could. But I knew just looking at her how pointless that was. You don't survive with your guts hanging out like that, not with the walls painted with your blood. I might just be a pharmacy tech, but I've spent enough time in a hospital to know that nobody could survive that. 

She'd been here a long time, too, I thought. Long enough to go cold, or else her guts would still be steaming in the cold. 

That made my stomach churn again, and I stumbled backward out of the bathroom, slipping on the well-packed icy path and falling. Pain rocketed up my ass, shooting straight up my spine, and I scooted backward for a few feet before I could manage to get my legs back under me. I turn and ran, slipping in the snow, my breath hitching from some combination of exertion and terror. The cigarettes I'd smoked last night burned at the back of my throat, a nasty reminder. 

Richard was outside, pawing through a stack of firewood and frowning, and I wanted to call out to him, but I couldn't figure out how to say anything. 

How do you just announce something like that? How do you just blurt it out? 

(Hi yes 911 please send help I think my friend took some pills) 

This couldn't be real. Liza was fine, and now she was split open like roadkill on the side of the highway and I didn't know how to tell the others because I couldn't even accept that this was happening, it didn't make any sense. 

(Yes sir please hurry she won't wake up she's getting cold should I warm her up somehow should I find a blanket should I do CPR what am I supposed to do please hurry) 

What was going on? What the fuck was happening? 

And where was Parker? 

Richard looked at me, brow furrowing hard, and his gaze trailed down my jacket where bits of vomit still clung. "Logan...?"

"The bathroom," I managed. "The girl's room. Just go. Please go look." 

Maybe it wasn't real, and they'd come and it would just be a bundle of clothes after all, or some animal that had gotten torn open somehow, and I just thought it was Liza in the darkness, maybe I was still just really drunk, maybe I was still asleep. Something. Anything to make sense of what I'd seen. 

"Logan what the hell, dude -- " 

I gave him a weak look and walked past, pushing through to the inside of the cabin and flopping down a low bunk, staring at the floor. My stomach churned weakly, like live fish were swimming around in it. 

I may not have been the fat kid at sleepaway camp anymore, but I was still the coward terrified of a public bathroom. The only thing was, there was something way worse than a spider waiting for me in this one. 

Dawn and Abby were crouched at the hearth, packing up wadded newspaper around a nest of logs. Without turning to look, Abby asked me, "Hey, Logan, do you know where the hatchet went? We wanted to split this log a second ago and Richard couldn't find..."

My throat made a clicking noise. I bet I knew where that hatchet went alright. 

Abby turned quizzically to look at me. 

At the same time, Richard's voice broke out, a scream that carried long and high across the campground and sent birds fluttering into the air. 

I guess he'd gone to look in the bathroom after all.