Calla stared at Vincent, absorbing every detail—the golden flecks in his eyes and the anxious crease between them; the soft layer of stubble on his jaw; the slope of his neck and the slight curl of his hair, desperately in need of a trim.

I'm going to lose him, she thought.

Calla was resigned to that fact. She could see the end, could feel the final, shuddering breaths of what lay between them. In its own way, this felt like death. Like the burning away of something old and decayed.

And from the ashes, she wasn't sure what would rise.

"I killed Tracy Smith," she said into the frigid, dark air, her words a cloud of white against the looming headlights.

Some distance away, Cooper started choking on his own spit.

"You..." He gasped, bending at the waist to catch his breath. Once the coughing had subsided, he straightened. "You went there? You couldn't, like...ease him into it?"

"Ha, ha." Vincent glared at the both of them. "Very funny. I know you think this is some kind of joke—"

"Vincent," Calla said, cutting him off. She wasn't smiling. "I'm not joking."

He threw her an exasperated look. "Right."

"I killed her," Calla repeated, trying to think of how she might be able to explain the situation properly. "I took a knife from the kitchen and followed her upstairs at the party. And I killed her. That's what started all of...this." Her grip on the edge of the headstone tightened.

Vincent gave her a long, hard look. She didn't budge an inch. Eventually, he whirled on Cooper. "What kind of sick fucking joke—"

"This isn't a joke," Cooper repeated. The look on his face was one of utter torment. "Think for a minute. Just...think. And let her finish."

Vincent jammed his hands into the pockets of his letterman jacket. His breath had started to come more quickly, fogging in front of his face at an alarming rate.

Calla tilted her head back and stared up at the starless sky, the pit in her chest expanding, swallowing her whole.

"Cory saw what happened," she continued. "It...inspired him to do the rest. He was completely delusional." She closed her eyes and sighed, her breath warm against the ice in the air. "That part has always been true. He killed the others. He wanted to make a game of it, between the two of us. And then at the end, he wanted to kill the both of you, too. I obviously didn't allow that to happen."

She opened her eyes. Vincent had not moved. It was hard to tell in the darkness, but she thought he looked rather pale.

"I don't think this is going so well," Cooper muttered.

"Aren't you going to say anything?" Calla asked, peeved. "You've been digging and digging at this, begging for the truth. Well, there it is. Unfiltered. Unedited."

Vincent zipped up his jacket with shaking hands. His next question was a whisper, barely audible. "You...you killed Tracy Smith?"

"Yes," she said, without hesitation.

Cooper had started pacing between the headstones, his hands practically superglued to his hair.

"Why?" Vincent choked out. He wouldn't look at her. His eyes had latched onto a point just over her shoulder.

Calla could have lied, could have tried to frame herself in a better light. Because Tracy was a bully was one excuse that came to mind. That might've made everything easier to understand. But they'd already come this far. She wouldn't soften the blow for him now. 

"I don't know," she said with a careless shrug.

Vincent flushed, as if her words angered him. "You don't know?"

She rolled her eyes, frustrated. "No, Vincent. I don't. I have no idea why..." Why I am the way that I am. She tried again. "Look. It happened. Okay? Tracy is gone, and there's no bringing her back."

He shook his head. "This is..." But he didn't have the words.

"I started this," Calla continued, enunciating her words clearly, so there would be no misunderstanding. "And I plan on finishing it. That is the truth."

Vincent did something unexpected then. He laughed. The sound was all wrong coming from his mouth. Cold and mean. "Cory's dead, thanks to you. It's already finished."

"You really believe that?" she asked, angry now. Maybe it was his laughter that had sparked her temper. She tried to reign it in. "Think about it, Vincent. Use that brain of yours. Another girl just died, and you think this is finished?"

"You're telling me you're not responsible for that, too?" he snapped, the words so much colder than the air in her lungs.

"She didn't kill Venus," Cooper broke in quickly. Vincent's head whipped in his direction. "She didn't," Cooper repeated, his eyes gleaming in the dark. "It's a long story. But there's another killer out there. We think it's the same person who killed Rachel."

"Rachel?" Vincent's anger drained away, giving way to surprise. His eyes landed on her headstone. "But Cory—"

"—was infatuated with me," Calla finished for him. "Why the hell would he kill my best friend?"

Vincent didn't appear to have an answer for that. 

"Cory insisted he didn't kill her," Calla pressed. "And now someone else is dead. This isn't over."

"How could you keep this from me?" Vincent asked, his voice strained—broken. But his eyes weren't on her face. They were on Cooper's. Betrayal hung in the air between them.

Cooper flinched. "I—"

"Forget this." Vincent retreated a step, and then two. "This...this is insane. You're both insane," he croaked, turning on his heel and vanishing into the darkness.

"Vincent!" Cooper called, his voice breaking. But Vincent was gone.

"Let him go." Calla leaned back against the headstone and stared up at the black clouds high above. "Just...let him go."

Cooper rounded on her. "Let him go? That's your brilliant idea?"

She blew out a long breath. "I warned you about this, Coop. I told you this would break him."

"Then we have to un-break him," Cooper insisted. She heard the crunch of frozen grass beneath his feet as he approached her. "You have to fix this."

"I can't fix this."

His hands gripped her shoulders, his fingers digging into her skin. He shook her. "You have to fix this!" he shouted, his breath in her face.

Calla let him shake her, her gaze steady as she watched him. He panted, his grip on her painfully tight. "You have to fix this," he repeated quietly, face flushed. But the fire had gone out of his eyes.

His hands fell, gliding down the length of her arms before coming to a stop at her wrists. "We have to fix this." His forehead dropped to her shoulder. A ragged sob shook his frame, taking her by surprise.

His fingers still encircled her wrists. She stood there, stiff, as he cried against her shoulder. She'd never been good with grief, had never fully understood it. But that didn't mean she was totally inept. She'd comforted Vincent the day his father had nearly caved in his jaw. And she'd comforted Rachel, back when her best friend had fallen apart over the loss of her dearly departed cousin.

Calla could do that again. Right here, right now. But she knew it would be a lie. And more importantly, so would Cooper.

So she made no move to touch him, to offer physical comfort. It would do little good. Instead, she let it run its course—the grief of a broken friendship, the shock of an uncertain future. The night pressed against them, cold and unforgiving.

Eventually, Cooper lifted his head. His touch vanished all at once; he took a step back, putting space between them, and buried his fingers in his hair. His eyes were heavy and red with tears, but she felt confident that, at least for the moment, he'd cast aside his grief.

"How did we get here?" he asked quietly, his voice surprisingly steady. The shock was starting to settle in.

She stared at him, at a loss. "I think we've always been here."

She wasn't sure where the words came from. But it felt right. Their paths had been fated to converge long before the cat and the oak tree.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Where do you think he went?"

Calla pushed away from the headstone. "I think I have a pretty good idea."

He looked at her warily. "You're not going to tell me. Are you?" She shook her head, and he sighed. "Of course not." He gazed up at the sky, shadows dancing across the planes of his face. "I want to go home."

She almost offered to go with him. She wanted to go with him and put this disastrous night far, far behind them. "I can't. Not yet."

"I know."

They stared at each other. Companionable silence stretched between them. Finally, he asked, "Do you need a lift?"

"No." Her eyes drifted across the sea of headstones. "I don't think he's far."

He nodded once. "Whenever you're ready, I'll be waiting here."

She turned to go.

"And Calla?" 

When she looked over her shoulder, she found Cooper staring at her with the oddest expression on his face. "Just...be careful with him. Okay?"

She smiled grimly before disappearing into the night.

# # #

Calla found Vincent standing at the edge of the creekbed, his hands shoved in the pockets of his letterman jacket.

She watched him from the trees, hovering just out of sight. She'd known that home would be the last place he'd run to. And really, there weren't many other places for him to go. But this place—the place they'd retreated to when they could think of nowhere else—had called to her. And apparently, it had called to him, too.

The walk to get here had been brutal in the dark. Not even the light from her phone had helped all that much. And now that she was here, she wished she'd never come.

Bracing herself, Calla stepped out of the trees and onto the embankment. It was muddier than it had been on their last visit; she carefully picked her way to the rocky shore, making enough noise along the way so that she wouldn't startle him.

Vincent didn't react. He didn't so much as turn when she finally made her way to his side. He stared ahead at the dark stream of water, the stones beneath their feet slick with vegetation.

"Cooper?" Vincent asked at last, breaking the silence.

Calla folded her arms around her waist. "Waiting back at the car."

Vincent nodded, as if he'd expected this. Several moments passed. Calla didn't mind the silence. Vincent stood at the edge of a precipice, and now had to decide whether or not to make the plunge.

But if he does, will he survive the fall?

"I don't know how to feel anymore," he whispered, his words swept away by the steady rush of water.

Calla looked at him then. The clouds had started to dissipate, chasing away the worst of the oppressive darkness. She could just make out the raw terror in his eyes—and the desperation.

He shook his head, scrubbing a frustrated hand down his face, through his hair. "I can barely stand to look at you." He closed his eyes. "If I do, I still see you. But now..."

Now you see the monster, too.

Calla sighed. "Vincent—"

He moved quickly. His arms snaked around her waist, pulling her close. One hand rose to cup the back of her head, fisting painfully in her hair. And then his lips were on hers. Demanding. His tongue swept inside her mouth, trying to elicit a response from her.

She reacted to him as she always had, leaning into his touch, her hands splayed across his chest. She opened herself to him, sighing softly against his lips as heat raced along her skin. He groaned, low and deep, in the back of his throat.

Fire. She was on fire—the world was on fire. The kiss seared her throat, her lips, burning bright and hot and fast, consuming them both.

Vincent broke the kiss as suddenly as he'd initiated it. He leaned back, searching her face. The clouds had parted; moonlight bounced off his skin, his hair. "What...what do you feel? Right now?" He swallowed thickly. "Do you feel anything?"

She tensed in his arms. Uncertainty, sharp and poignant, rose within her. Lie, the thing inside her urged. All you have to do is lie.

It would be so easy to tell him slivers of the truth. After all, it wouldn't be a lie if she told him that she felt as if she might burn to ashes every time he touched her, every time he kissed her. She'd given him everything she could give right here, on these very banks. That had to mean something.

But a different sort of truth laid within her. A truth that was cold and cruel and inescapable.

What do you feel?

Empty. She felt empty, right down to her bones—beneath the fire and fury and the mask. And she feared she always would.

Calla closed her eyes. Her fingers fisted in his shirt. "Vincent."

His hold on her tightened. She felt the press of his lips against her forehead, felt him tremble against her. Can we stay like this? she wanted to ask. Can we pretend for a little longer? I'm a very good liar. Maybe I'll even be able to fool myself one day. Then I can give you a different answer. A better answer.

But Calla was tired. So very tired. She didn't want to play pretend anymore.

Vincent pulled away. Cold air crept back into the space between them. "Come on." He took a deep breath. "It's time to go home."