I honestly thought that last post might be the last post. But nah, I’m back, right on schedule. Don’t @ me idk how this happened.

Yes I do.

Saturday night Georgia banged on my bedroom door until I opened it. My mom must have let her in.

She said, “Bitch get up.”

I was lying on my back, staring at her upside down.

“Get. Up.” She grabbed me by the arms and tugged me off my bed. I landed, cursing, in a heap on my floor. I think I told her to fuck off.

“No, you fuck off! Look, I get it okay? You and Mad had something once in a lifetime. We all know she was your goddamn soul mate. We know. But — ” her voice cracked. “But you don’t get to do this alone. Because if you do it alone I have to do it alone, too and I don’t want to. So you’re going to get up, and take a shower, and you’re going to come with me because we’re having a wake and you have to be there.”

I just sat on my floor and sobbed. Like the embarrassing hiccuping snot everywhere mouth making weird shapes kinda crying.

And then I got up. We went to the Circem Street house, where everyone else was waiting for us.

So then I’m standing in the doorway, and all my friends are staring at me and no one has any idea what to say. But then Warren Fucking Miller offers me a 5th of McNaughton’s, and I took a big long drink. And Tilly patted the seat on the couch next to her. And I guess… like it’s not okay. I don’t feel better. Grief fucking sucks dude, it’s like a performance I can’t stop doing, like it just rolls on through whenever it wants and I have to sit there helplessly and let it do it’s thing.

Cuz see Georgia was right — Madelyn and I were once in a lifetime. No one is ever going to know my story like she did. We were supposed to go off to college and grow and change and fight and make up and get old and lame. I was supposed to be in her wedding. I was supposed to be her kid’s cool, irresponsible aunt who always let them drink at holidays.

But Georgia was right about this too: I don’t want to do this whole grief disaster alone, and it turns out I really don’t have to.

It also turns out that while I was hiding out in my bedroom for an entire week, the Circem street house gang started patrolling town. A group goes out every single night with Feather Dog to hunt whatever needs hunting. Sophie and Iph have cleared out a bunch of hauntings. Even more kids from school have started coming around. They greet me in the halls, say hi at the grocery store. They want to know if we need extra people to go out at night. There might be a curfew but Black Lake has never seen so many kids sneaking out.

Tilly never leaves my side unless she absolutely has to. She spends most nights at my house, and if her parents have anything to say about it, Tilly hasn’t let on. I imagine that once your daughter knows you were involved in a local girl’s death, you sort of lose your ability to make her adhere to your rules.

Madelyn’s death was ruled an accident. They’re saying she was going to run away, but before she left she decided to take a late night dip in Black Lake and drowned.

I still see the cult members around town. They think they’ve gotten away with murder — and before you start with any you don’t technically know they murdered her bullshit — it was murder, okay? Some things you just know.