Page 23 of Devils' Day Party
My stomach drops, and I choke on bile as I click the first link that pops up.
The video begins to play, and I’m horrified to see that it starts right at the beginning, with me crossing my arms and demanding to know what Calix wants, with the soft tenderness in his face. “You don’t understand … for years, I’ve been wanting to tell you how I feel. It’s just … the crew, and Raz, and Barron …”
I skip further along in the video, watching his cool, pale hands undress me with reverence, watching as our mouths clash in a swirl of heat and desperate, clawing need. It gets worse after that, image after image of him entering me, going down on me, coming in me … I scroll past to the comments, choking on the vile hatred in them, the dark vitriol, the judgment.
A message pops up from Luke on the side of my screen.
I just saw the video. Are you okay?
I stare at her message for a moment, quiet and still on the outside, an explosion taking place inside of me.
Am I okay?
Fuck no, I’m not okay.
You spoke to my parents and didn’t tell me. How could you?
She starts to type a response, deletes it, starts over again.
Fuck you. Don’t talk to me for a while. I hit send, slam the lid closed on my laptop, and crack the window. I hop down, the icy wind blowing against my face, making the tip of my nose hurt. I’m shaking now, and I have the desperate urge to just get out, to be anywhere but here. The thing is, how can I run from something on social media? Even if that video gets taken down—it’s pretty goddamn sexually explicit so I’m assuming it will—people will have downloaded it, screenshotted it, shared it. It’ll be everywhere, always.
Always.
Forever.
Heartbreak clogs up my throat as I turn and look into the eyes of the Horned God, his outline painted on the inside wall of our carport. Seated in a throne beside him is the goddess, his lover. In one of her hands, she holds a chalice, representing femininity, and in his, he holds a knife, representing masculinity. I bet he never hurt you like this, I think, knowing that my moms probably put the outline up for the girls to color in.
On the ground in a wooden crate, there’s a whole rainbow of spray paint. Before I can think better of it, I grab one and pull the top off, spraying the mural with red that looks like blood. By the time I’m done, tears are streaming down my face that I can’t seem to stop. It’s like there’s a monster inside of me, making me do bad things, and I can’t fight it. Maybe I’m just too weak?
“Karma?” I turn to see my sisters looking out their window at me, staring at the damage I’ve just done to their art. Katie is already crying. Because of me. “Why did you do that?” Emma asks, looking at me like she doesn’t know who I am. Not the first time I’ve gotten that look today.
Without a word, I drop the spray paint to the ground and head for my mom’s car. She has a tendency to lock herself out of it, and it’s old enough that it doesn’t have a key fob or auto-unlock or anything like that, so she keeps a spare key under a small concrete statue of a goblin. I snag it and let myself into the shitty ’95 Taurus with too many miles, starting the engine and backing out of the driveway fast enough to wake the whole park.
I don’t care.
I just need to move.
I start driving, with no particular destination in mind, the windows rolled down, the breeze whipping my purple hair around my face. And still, still I wear the mask. Because if I had trouble taking it off before, I most definitely can’t bear to remove it now.
Even though I know I shouldn’t, I head back to the Devils’ Day Party, parking next to Calix’s dented Aston Martin, and marching through the woods to the bonfire.
Even though it’s now close to four in the morning, the party barely shows signs of slowing down. The whole clearing smells like weed and booze, sex and smoke. I storm right through it all and back to the train cars, looking for the Knight Crew.
When I find them, they’re all sprawled out across the seats in the rear passenger car. Raz has a girl on his lap while Barron sits in the corner, sucking on a bag of cough drops and sketching. Calix, meanwhile, holds a bottle in his hand and smirks while some girls dance naked around a much smaller fire just outside the door, wearing their masks and panties and nothing else.
