CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
[37]
song: abandoned mansion by dr. dog
"What are we waiting for?" Kiara asks as JJ and Pope approach the backyard.
Cassie sat beside her on one a thick branch of the big tree at The Cheateau, their legs dangling over the grass, the golden string lights glowing above their heads as they strung from the tree to the house.
"John B." JJ says, tossing his empty beer can in the trash as he walked past it. "And Sarah."
"Where they at?" Cleo asks, as Cassie leaned down to help pull her up onto the branch too.
"Topper decided to press charges." JJ was clearly fuming. "They got John B."
"He's in jail?" Kiara asks, surprised.
"But Sarah says she's got a plan, or something." He huffs, then rubs his forehead. "I don't know."
"That's two for two." Pope says, gesturing at Cassie.
"Yeah, you two could've been cell-mates." JJ says.
She scowls at him, scooting over to give Cleo some room to sit. "Funny."
The night sky loomed over the group as they waited. That distinct smell in the air that told them a storm was coming, humid and sweet. The crackle of heat lightning bursting in the air miles away.
Cassie told Rafe she'd stay out of trouble, just to ease his mind, or better yet, keep him from doing something stupid again. She told him she was going to help them figure out a plan, and then hang back as they went on to South America.
And she felt bad lying to him. When all he was doing was looking out for her. Especially when it felt so good to have someone who cared enough to do that. But despite all her guilty thoughts, she knew she was doing the right thing by her friends. She owed them that.
"My parents are gonna kill me." Kiara muttered, scanning The Chateau with worried eyes.
Cassie turned and looked at her. There was nothing she could say that would bring the girl any comfort. No 'they'll understand' or 'they won't even notice'. Kiara had pushed it and pushed it with her parents, and it was only a matter of time before they took different measures.
Pope came and handed the girls his leftover fries from dinner, Cleo grabbing the to-go box from his hands and passing it to Cassie beside her. "What's his problem?" She asked, nodding towards JJ who sat down on the porch step alone.
Pope glanced at him, then turned back to the girls. He looks at Cassie and Kiara specifically. "Any ideas?"
Kiara shakes her head. "I haven't talked to him." She says annoyedly.
Cassie looked at her. It was obvious on her face that she wanted to, she wanted to talk to him about last night, but JJ was too stubborn to admit he was in the wrong. All it took was for him to understand that Kiara wants to be there. She wants to help. But she wasn't raised by the same people who raised JJ and Cassie. Her parents care where she disappears to, and who she hangs out with. And that came with its own pros and cons.
"He's been pouty all day." Cassie shrugs. "Just leave him alone. He'll get over it."
"I just wish he would listen to me instead of getting so snappy the second things don't go his way." Kiara says frustratedly. "I feel like I'm walking on egg-shells around him. Like I might slip up and say something that leans too Kook and he'll freak."
Cassie wasn't blind to the fact that Kiara and JJ had been spending a lot more time together. She knew JJ liked Kiara, and she also knew he'd never acted on those feelings. Too stubborn to admit it.
"Sometimes I forget you two are siblings." Kiara says. "Seriously."
"Me too." Cleo adds, gesturing to Kiara in agreement.
"You're so level-headed, and thoughtful, and—" Kiara starts, rambling on with her hands. "And he's so impulsive. He refuses to just take a second and breathe and think and it drives me actually crazy."
Cassie looked at her, thinking for a moment. She weighs her options before speaking. "Do you think maybe..." she shrugs casually. "You should talk to him and like— express that calmly and—"
"No." Kiara shakes her head with a frown. "I didn't do anything wrong. He can come talk to me."
Cassie knew that was coming. "Right." She nods, turning to Cleo where they exchange knowing glances.
"Hey." Sarah's voice follows the sound of the back porch door. She smiles at everyone as she comes down the steps. "Thanks for waiting, um. Look who decided to come home."
Cassie hops off the tree branch as John B follows after Sarah down the steps. A series of 'heys' and 'welcome backs' echo throughout the group.
JJ stayed at his spot on the porch as they passed him.
"I have something I want to share with you guys." Sarah says, after the group gathered around her. "I can get us down to the Orinoco."
"Are you serious?" Pope says.
Sarah nods, excited. "Yeah."
"Okay... and how's that gonna happen?" Cleo asks.
"My dad's gonna let us use the plane." She answers.
"Ward? Your dad?" Pope says.
Cassie glances at JJ, who was slowly making his way to the circle, hesitant. He looks at John B, then to Cassie. All three of them uneasy, unsure.
"We lay low tonight, and then we can head out in the morning." Sarah nods.
"Okay, that's a lot to process. Your dad. Actually helping us." Pope says.
"I talked to him. He'll do it." Sarah says.
"So we trusting Ward now?" Cleo looks around the group.
Kiara nods. "Trust Sarah."
Cassie watches as JJ shakes his head, and turns to leave.
"But wait, I also just— have one more thing to say. Um—since we've gotten back. From the island. I've done some things that I regret. A lot." Sarah says, nervously fumbling with her hands.
John B clears his throat after a moment. "Yeah, I— I feel like we've all done a few things that we regret."
And then JJ scoffs, and Cassie whips her head towards him with a searing glare.
"Poguelandia, guys." Sarah says. "It's all I've been able to think about. We were all together on that island and that was a good thing, and I don't want to ruin a good thing."
Cassie found it hard to recall the island as a good thing. When she remembered those six weeks. She remembers malnourishment, and headaches, and being filthy all the time, and starving, and exhaustion. She remembers the dreadful and consistent thought that she was probably going to die on that island.
And so she pushed to remember the good moments. Few and far between, but good. The good moments where they were all slap-happy, and spent their nights clutching their stomachs with laughter. The good moments where they turned their daily tasks into games to keep up morale. And they took score on who caught the most fish that day, and the winner didn't have to help clean the guts off.
Those little things that they did for each other to bring comfort. Even when they were all equally as scared. That's what a family does.
"And I... I just wanna know," Sarah starts, but looks at Cassie for a moment. "Are we still all in? Are we still all together?"
Cassie felt the question pressing into her chest, and though Sarah asked everyone, it was intended for her.
"Because I am." Sarah says.
Kiara starts to nod. "Yeah." She says quietly, and pulls Sarah in for a hug.
Sarah came down the line, embracing everyone in a quick hug. Something she did frequently, her own way of showing her love for others. But this was different, these were individual apologies.
She stopped in front of Cassie, looking at her with just the slightest glimpse of concern in her eyes.
Sarah knew, or at least had a good guess, as to where Cassie stood with Rafe. Better than anyone here. It was a small secret that they held together. But it was last night, when Sarah saw her brother with Cassie, that things really clicked. That this was more than just Cassie's ability to distract Rafe away from the Pogues so they could get the cross. Or Cassie's ability to ween information off of him.
"All in?" Sarah asked her.
Sarah didn't understand it. She didn't understand it the first time, and she certainly doesn't now. And when she looked at Cassie, she wasn't angry, she was worried. Concerned. She wanted to understand. She wanted to make sure this wasn't the result of loneliness or addiction like it was the first time.
Cassie was all in. She felt it. She felt this drive to protect each and every one of them to the best of her ability. To be there when they needed her. These were her friends. Her family.
But she had half a heart somewhere else. A half a heart that would never fully accept the other.
And she wasn't willing to give up on either halves, all she could do now was try and bridge the gap that divided them.
And that started with being fully and completely honest with them.
Sarah was still waiting for an answer, and now everyone's gazes were on Cassie, everyone's mind buzzing with the same ideas, same questions. Whose side was she truly on?
"Can I—" Cassie looks up at everyone. "I need to tell you guys what really happened at Singh's."
Sarah wasn't expecting that response, she turns, glances at John B, and then back to Cassie. "Okay." She nods, her eyebrows upturned in worry.
They gathered around the bonfire, which had been burning all night and was now more of a pile of glowing ash as oppose to an open flame. The frogs croaked, and the sound of waves hitting the fishing dock filled Cassie's long silence.
She felt everyone's eyes on her, waiting for her to speak. But thinking about it all again, after she'd spent so much time trying to forget it, made it hard to find the right words. She'd pushed down these as a means to protect herself.
No one rushed her, no one urged her to spit it out, they all just waited, and eventually, JJ came and sat next to her on the log she sat on.
"They took me to his house after the plane crash." Cassie starts, after a deep breath. "And there were— every ten feet there was someone standing there with a big gun. Ready to kill me if I stepped out of line. And then so I get there— and they shove me upstairs and lock me in a room until Singh was ready to talk. Meanwhile, I'm bleeding out 'cause my arm got stuck on something when the plane went down, and—"
Cassie stops, wanting to stay on track.
"I told you guys all he did was ask me about the cross. And then he got Rafe there, asked him about the cross, and that was that." She says. "But he was never after the cross. He was after the El Dorado. And he needed the diary. The diary you and your dad got from Mr. Sunn's house." Cassie looks up at John B.
He was confused. "How do you know about that?"
"Because I was there. I—" Cassie needed to backtrack for this all to make sense. "Singh wasn't going to let me leave that house alive unless I gave him that diary. And obviously I had no idea what he was talking about, I had no way out of that—"
"Wait, he threatened you?" Kiara says, eyebrows narrowed.
Cassie nods. "And you guys. And my grandma. I mean— he knew everything. He even knew where I lived in Waco. He has eyes and ears everywhere, I don't know—"
"Why didn't you tell us?" Kiara asks.
"I told him I'd get him the diary. That was the only way I could get out of there alive, but—" Cassie takes a breath. "He said I couldn't tell you guys. That you guys might— beat him to it? I don't know. I was just so scared I would've agreed to anything."
John B looked like he'd been thinking. "So you were there when his men came and shot at my dad and I?"
"What?" Sarah says, just as surprised to hear this as everyone else.
Cassie nodded. "His guys were already there, and we had no idea. We show up and they—"
"Wait, wait, wait—" Pope starts. "Who's we?"
Cassie blinked a few times, trying to say this in a way that would cause the least reaction. "Me and Rafe."
To which an immediate series of groans, and 'what the hell?', and 'are you serious?' echoed throughout the group, but most notably, JJ was quiet, only taking off his dirty baseball cap.
"Guys, shh." Sarah urged them to get their complaints out of the way so Cassie could explain herself.
She took another breath. "Rafe was apart of the deal with Singh, alright? I couldn't have done this by myself, I—"
"Why didn't you just tell us?" JJ looks at her, his eyebrows narrowed.
Cassie flung her arms out, confused. "Because it could have put you in danger, JJ. I don't know—"
"She literally just explained that." Kiara says at the same time.
"They held us both at gunpoint at Mr. Sunn's. That bruise I had on my lip all those weeks ago? That was from one of his guys." Cassie continues.
Everyone had sunk into their seats, trying to process all this newfound information at once.
She looked to John B now, a painful knot in her throat. "So when your dad took off with the diary, they had, um—" She pauses, then rethinks her sentence. "It was me. I told them who— who he was and that he had the diary."
You could hear a pen drop.
John B was still, in his most unreadable stature where he just stared at her. Almost like he was expecting her to continue, to explain herself more.
"You sold him out?" JJ says, making sure he heard that right.
Kiara snaps her head towards him. "She didn't have a choice?"
Cassie kept her eyes on John B. "I'm so sorry, John B."
"You couldn't have like— lied or something? Told him it was someone else?" JJ shrugs.
"And then what?" Pope says, looking to JJ like he was an idiot. "He finds out she lied, and then what?"
JJ wasn't hearing it, still trying to make sense of it all. "And Rafe? I mean— what is going on with you? You don't think he'll drop you again the second he gets a chance—"
"JJ!" Sarah snaps at him.
"Seriously?" Kiara says at the same time.
He shakes his head, and stands up. "No. You know what— this is insane."
"Yeah, obviously." Kiara says. "None of this is normal. None of us should have been dragged into this, but we did and we are—"
"Big John could be dead for all we know!" JJ retorts.
Pope lets his face fall into his palms. "Oh my god." He mutters.
"And you're blaming your sister for that?" Kiara had stood up at some point too, the only one bold enough to face-off with JJ in a yelling match.
"Guys," John B starts.
No one seemed to hear him. "I'm not blaming her, I just think there was a better way to go about it—"
"Yeah, 'cause you're so good at taking the high road." Kiara says, sarcastically.
JJ scoffs. "I can, and have gotten us out of every situation, no harm done—"
Kiara choked out a laugh. "Clearly not! Since Cassie was literally held at gunpoint. Are you dumb? Like seriously, I'm asking."
"Guys!" John B raises his voice, and everyone jumps at the sound. "It's fine."
Cassie drew her attention from JJ and Kiara back to John B. "It's fine?"
John B took a second, then shrugged. He was unsure, but he understood. "This is no one's fault but my dad's. Singh would've found him one way or another. He got himself in way too deep."
"I should've told you earlier. I don't know, I was just—" Cassie sunk into her seat. "I was scared you'd all get the wrong idea. That— you know, I wasn't..." Cassie took a deep breath. "I'm all in. Okay? All in. Always."
This made Sarah smile, a big, bright smile that felt almost out of place given the past conversation, but a needed one.
JJ came down from his initial reaction, scratching his forehead, trying to be patient. "We are in way over our heads here."
"Okay, if JJ can admit it then it must be really bad." Pope says.
JJ lets out a breathy laugh. "Jesus."
"No, he's right." John B agrees. "We gotta be on our A-game tomorrow. P4L or nothing."
Kiara makes a face, and then eventually started laughing. "So corny."
They all decided to spend the night at The Cheateau together. In the spirit of camaraderie, or as JJ so dreadfully put it, their last night all together before one of them inevitably got lost in South America.
It was games, and music. For a long while they sat in the living room on the floor, as Pope tried to explain some new and complicated way to play dominoes. Only for everyone to just start lining them up along the floor to start a fall chain, despite Pope's desperate pleads that the game was 'fun once you understand it'.
Cassie was still not ready to talk to her brother about last night, or Rafe in general. She wasn't ready to talk to anyone about it, though the question weighed on them every time Ward was brought up and they discussed the logistics of tomorrow morning.
"No, it's not one person, it's a band—" Cassie said frantically, as Cleo held the phone up on her forehead and played a game.
Pope nodded along as he spoke, "But like one of them is really famous."
Cleo looked clueless as the others tried to give her hints as to what it was she was trying to guess on the phone. "Who?" Cleo asked.
"That'll give it away." Cassie says.
Cleo looks at her. "Isn't that the point—"
"Stevie Nicks." Pope blurts out.
Cassie looks at him in surprise. "Hey!"
"Who?" Cleo was even more lost now.
"Just pass! Just pass!" Pope waves her on to continue.
"How do I pass?!" Cleo shrugged, overwhelmed with everyone's sudden panic as the timer started to beep.
Cassie laughs as she watched Pope grabbed onto Cleo's wrists, where she held the phone to her forehead, and tilt it back. "That's how you pass." Pope instructed, then tilted the phone forward. "That's when you get it right."
But her laughter turned into more of a quiet hum when she saw the way Pope looked at Cleo, and the gentle tone his voice took on when he spoke to her.
Glancing out the window, she saw JJ and Kiara on the back porch, sitting beside each other on the couch. And John B and Sarah had disappeared a long while ago. Cassie suddenly felt like she was in the way of something.
"I'm probably gonna head to bed." Cassie announces, as she stands up from the ground and stretches.
"Are you in John B's old room?" Pope asks.
"Yeah all the girls are. Minus Sarah."
"Okay. Night." Pope responds.
"I'll be in later." Cleo smiles at her.
Cassie walks into the old bedroom and shuts the door behind her, sitting down on the quilted duvet, and turning the lamp on. A wave of sadness had washed over her as she listened to the murmurs of continued conversation throughout the house.
As the night settled, everyone broke off into their pairs, and Cassie was the odd one out. And she always would be in this context. No matter how she tried to spin it, or convince herself it could happen, there was no universe in which Rafe would be sitting in that living room playing games and laughing with them. And she just had to accept that.
She called him. Hoping the sound of his voice would bring reassurance to her thoughts, that it'd remind her of what she was risking. But he didn't answer.
She went to sleep, setting the alarm on the table beside her to wake her up at seven so she had enough time to pack a bag and change her clothes.
Her grandma, of course, was clueless to all of this. Cassie had only seen her in passing the past few days, the both of them too busy for Cassie to sit her down and explain. And she honestly wasn't sure what reaction she'd have. If she'd lock her in her room and never let her leave, or if she'd brush it off like any other average teenager activity. Her grandma was very off-and-on.
But Cassie had learned it was better to ask for forgiveness than permission.
She'd finally found herself asleep when she heard panicked yelling, then loud footsteps, and as she frantically flung herself out of bed to see what was going on, Pope swung the door open.
"Fire!" He yelled.
Cassie didn't have time to assess the situation, catching glance of the rising flames that caught onto the curtains in the living room.
The fire was starting to engulf the whole house, and Cassie was out of the room before she could truly process what was happening, just following after the herd.
"Get out! Get out!" She heard JJ yell, then watched as he latched onto the doorknob, and quickly retracted his hand at the heat. "Shit!"
Sarah ran in the other direction, towards the back porch, only for more flames to erupt in her path. "Sarah get back!" John B yelled.
"Window! Go through the window!" Pope yelled.
The air was hot. No one could breathe, it was taking on faster than any of them could have prepared for.
John B quickly slid the window open, and punched out the screen. Helping Sarah out first, then Pope, then Cleo, Kiara, Cassie, JJ, then himself.
"Come on!" Kiara urged him to get away from the flames as John B turned to watch his house crumble.
"John B!" Sarah yanked on his arm, pulling him off the porch.
As flames engulfed the structure, casting an eerie glow against the darkened sky, Cassie stood frozen.
She could feel the heat radiating from the blaze, searing her skin even at this distance. It licked at the edges of her senses, an ominous reminder of the uncontrollable power at play. That even if they called for firefighters now, nothing was going to save this house.
Amidst the chaos, Cassie found no solace, no glimmer of hope to cling to. In the flames that consumed The Chateau, she saw only the cruel indifference of fate, the relentless march of change that spares no one and nothing.
Cassie was overwhelmed with sadness for the memories lost within those walls. Each flicker of light seemed to illuminate fragments of a life now gone. Cherished mementos, precious belongings, now reduced to ash and rubble.
It was barely six in the morning when the fire stopped burning, and all was left was a pile of ash and glowing embers. The Cheateau was completely gone, taking everything inside it.
They sat in the grass together, covered in ash and dirt, watching as a beam that had been dangling there for hours, finally fell.
"Whoever's up there does not like you, bro." JJ spoke for the first time in what felt like hours.
"Let's just go." John B says, standing up and dusting off his hands on his shorts.
Everyone looked around at each other, unsure that this was the right way for John B to process this. "Don't you want to—" Cassie stood after Kiara helped pull her up off the ground. "Say goodbye, or something?"
"To what?" John B says. "There's nothing left to say goodbye to."
Sarah looks at Cassie with a frown.
"Sarah, when did you say the pilot was getting in?" John B asks.
The rest of the group hesitantly stood. "Probably like an hour?" Sarah responds. "I mean, my dad says once he's here we can leave whenever we want."
"As much as I would love to just ghost my parents again, I can't." Pope says.
"Pope, we're talking El Dorado, here. You can't just slip out the back?" JJ responds.
"Great advice." Kiara says.
"I mean, it always worked for me." JJ says. "How to avoid unpleasant circumstances 101. If there's a problem, don't wanna deal with it, turn that face and keister around and walk away."
"Oh, is that how you got that bruise?" Pope says. "Turning around and walking away?"
JJ gives him a look. "I just want you to be there."
"I will be there." Pope says. "I'll meet you at the airstrip in an hour."
"I'll meet you there too." Cassie says. "I need to get the car back to my grandma and grab a change of clothes."
"I Gotta pack some stuff and break the news to my parents." Kiara says, then looks at Cassie. "If you wanna meet at mine I can give you a ride."
Cassie turns a gives her a nod in thanks.
"One hour, guys." JJ says. "Not a second later."
On Cassie's drive home, she called Rafe again and got no answer. There was a bit of irony in the idea that he was so hung up on her not answering his calls that he called the cops, and here he was. She tried not to let herself worry. She knew he was probably busy dealing with his father, and what was she going to say to him anyways?
'Yes, I knew I told you I was staying out of it but also, I'm getting on your dad's plane to go to South America.'
Perhaps it was best she applied her ask for forgiveness, not permission rule there too.
She packed her backpack full of things she thought necessary. The kinds of things no one else would think to bring, but wish they had. Bug spray, advil, chapstick, sunscreen. All the things she wish she had on the island.
She laced up some old hiking boots she found in the garage as tight as she could, doubling up on socks so that they'd fit. Beige shorts and a denim shirt big enough that she had to roll the sleeves up to her elbows. She felt like Laura Dern in Jurassic Park.
There was something so peaceful about getting ready. And it was because she had absolutely no clue what she was getting herself into. There was no way this was going to go smoothly, but she was choosing to live in oblivion. She'll just do what she was told, help where she was needed, and hope everything falls into place.
Her grandma met Cassie in the driveway and took the car to her parks and recreation meeting, to which Cassie told her she was gonna sleepover at Kiara's for a few days, because 'she was going through some stuff and Cassie wanted to be there for her'. So the big backpack on her shoulders didn't raise any questions, and Cassie didn't know how long she'd be gone so the 'few days' addition was key to not getting caught. Ideally, they'd be there and back within twenty-four hours. But that was never going to happen.
Walking to Kiara's she wondered what Rafe was doing. If Ward had told him he was allowing Sarah to take the plane. If Rafe thought this another one of Ward's bullshit attempts at righting his wrongs. And it was, but Cassie didn't mind this time because it worked out in her favor.
She wondered if he'd be angry when she got back. Or if he'd even care at all. If he'd even notice, or if he'd tear up the whole island looking for her. She wondered if they'd ever get to a point in their relationship where this wasn't something she felt herself thinking.
It wasn't fair to project her own insecurities onto him. But it wasn't like he hadn't had his fair share of slip-ups. These insecurities had to come from somewhere.
Approaching the Carerra's, Cassie waved to Anna and Mike, who were sitting beside each other on the front steps.
"Hi, guys." She greeted awkwardly. "I'm so sorry— about the other night. I don't know what happened, things just escalated so quickly and I—"
"Cassie," Mike stops her. "It's okay."
Cassie examines their faces, this sinking feeling that she'd just interrupted a conversation on something apparently very sad. She nods slowly. "I— yeah." She says. "Is Kie here? We're going, um, we're meeting everyone at—"
Anna stood from her place at the stairs, and took a few steps down, closer to where Cassie stood by the fence. "She's not here." She says.
Cassie couldn't help but give her a strange look. The energy was off. Their demeanors were off. And it couldn't have only been about the other night. "Oh, she's not?" Cassie says. "Sorry, I'll— where is she?"
"Cassie, we've thought about this for a long time, and we've talked about it with her," Anna starts.
Cassie recognized this look on their faces. This look where they both knew whatever they were gonna say would be bad. It made Cassie immediately anxious, she instinctively glanced behind her. Like at any moment someone was gonna pop up from behind her and grab her.
"She's gonna stay away for a while." Anna continues.
Cassie looked at Mike, and then to Anna again. "What? I don't—" she was shaking her head, trying to come to terms with something she knew was out of her control.
Anna started talking slowly, and calmly, like she was really trying to ensure that Cassie understood they were coming from a good place. "We saw what it did for you, and we want the same thing for our daughter, okay? We just want her to be safe, and back to her happy self—"
Cassie felt like she'd been punched in the chest. She was so taken aback she physically felt herself stumble. "You sent Kiara to Kitty Hawk?"
Mike, who remained sitting on the stairs, let his head fall between his knees. Cassie kept her wide-eyes on Anna, begging her to tell her that wasn't the case. But she didn't say anything. Their silence was answer enough.
Cassie was back on the sidewalk in a matter of seconds, fumbling for her phone in her pocket, her hands so shaky she thought she might drop it on the concrete.
Anna called after her. "Cassie, it's for her own good, please don't—"
Cassie had never lost so much respect for someone in such a short amount of time. "You guys have no idea what you just did to her. No idea." She spoke to them pointedly, her words were laced with anger, but underneath it all, she was scared.
a/n
filler chapter i'm sorry :(
but here's a gift! :
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5ZHRRK5UvuIt6PR3d2zA2D?si=uEGNR3pHRCejWKGJzIXbCw&pi=u-Lf4cpqDBR5Gz