BRUTAL !

CHAPTER TEN:
"The call is coming from inside the house"

A SHOT RANG OUT from outside and Kitty shrieked up, stiffling her cries in the elbow of the arm that still gripped the knife. She felt like she was a child again, hiding out in her room when her parents would fight, but now the fear was way worse, deadly even.

And she was less scared for herself than she was for Nate. He never should've come here in the first place. If he had stayed in New York, like he always had, she didn't have to fear to lose him again.

She had lost him years ago, back when he went with his father and never came back home. But she was fine with losing him like that, if it meant that he was alive, that he was safe. And that she still had a brother somewhere in the world, even if he couldn't be more foreign to her.

She shrieked up once more, when her phone rang, indicating the call of an anonymous number. Kitty knew exactly who it was, but she still took the call, tired of hiding out and waiting for something to happen or someone else she loved to turn up dead.

"Hello, Kitty." His voice said, almost softly, when she answered the call. "I knew you wouldn't leave me hanging."

Without her having any control over it, a sob broke from her lips.

"It's okay." Ghostface smugly cooed. "You don't have to cry. I'm calling to show you something."

Kitty didn't answer. She didn't want to satisfy him by hearing her voice. She didn't want to play no more.

"The videos on Charlie's laptop." Ghostface continued unfazed. "Did Nate ever tell you what was on them?" Silence. Ghostface laughed. "I figured."

A click rang through the phone and with some chattering, a recording sprang to life.

"You wanna tell me what a Ghostface mask is doing in your closet?" Nate.

"Why are you going through my stuff?" Charlie.

"You recognize those voices, don't you Kitty?" Ghostface whispered, pausing the video. "Do you want to hear Nate's secret? The reason why he abandoned you and your Mom?"

He didn't wait for an answer before the click rang through the line once more and the video continued playing.

"Answer me. Why do you have this?" Nate's voice rang through the phone.

"You're worried about me now?" Charlie scoffed, completely unimpressed by the worry in his younger brother's voice.

"I'm worried about Kitty."

"What about her?" Charlie asked in a low voice, daring Nate to continue.

"She worships you. If she sees you messing with this slasher-movie bullshit, she's gonna think it's cool."

Charlie's laugh echoed through the line. "I think she already does."

"She's eight. She doesn't get it." Nate muttered between clenched teeth.

Charlie sighed. "She's not as dumb as you think." He paused for a second before he added. "You don't have to care so much. You're leaving, right?"

"We're really doing this again?"

"I mean, why not? This is your last summer here, right? You'll come back for Christmas, maybe, if you feel like it. Then after that—"

"You make it sound like I'm abandoning you."

Charlie laughed, humorless. "Aren't you?"

"That's not fair."

"No? You're moving on. We get it. You get to go have a life. Me and Kitty? We get to stay here. In this stupid, boring, forgettable town. Not everyone gets to leave, Nate."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Nate's voice rang out sharply, daring his brother to go on.

"Just saying. Some of us have to get creative if we don't wanna disappear."

"You need to stop talking like that. It's fucking weird."

"Maybe it's just expected."

Nate let out a short, bitter laugh. "Jesus. You are so full of shit."

"Am I?"

"Yeah. You are. You talk like you're some big deal—but you won't actually do anything."

Kitty drew in a sharp breath, trying to stiffle the sob that was daring to break from her at her brother's words. Nate had known. He had known all this time.

"You think so?" Charlie muttered softly, almost like it was a real question and the answer was entirely depending on the next words from Nate's mouth.

"Yeah, I do. You wouldn't have the guts."

There were a few seconds of silence. Then Charlie spoke again.

"Maybe you're right." He paused and Kitty could hear steps descending: Nate was about to leave the room. "Don't forget about us, Nate."

He stopped walking and Nate's voice rang out, a bit further away, quieter. "I won't."

Kitty could almost hear the smile in Charlie's voice when he answered. "Yeah. You will."

The video stopped and Kitty felt like she could finally breathe again.

"Bad news, huh?" Ghostface muttered almost sympathetically, but the sheer happiness in his voice revealed something much more sinister. "So caring, both of them, always looking out for their sister, so much even that they forgot to look out for each other. Poor Charlie... Nate could've prevented all of it. All those murders, Charlie's death. If he had simply said something. Too bad." he laughed sarcastically. "Do tell me, Kitty, do you still worship Charlie? Do you have the same guts he had?"

Kitty frowned, pulling the phone away when she heard movement in front of the door.

"History repeats itself, Kitty." Ghostface laughed and the line broke, just as Nate's scream rang out through the house.

"No!" Kitty cried, almost falling over her own feet as she climbed out of the bathtub.

"Anyone hiding, killer or not, you have five seconds to show yourself!" If she wasn't mistaken, that was Sidney Prescott's voice calling through the house, with a gunshot following her warning.

Kitty opened the bathroom door slowly, Nate's warning still ringing through her head, as she stepped into the hallway.

Whatever he had done, whatever he had known, she would never just leave him to die. Not here in this house, not like this. They had to fix a lot, before it was too late.

Kitty loved Nate with all her might. And she had taken entirely too long to realize it. All the wasted hope and grief she had poured into the phantom Charlie had become. All those nights she cried herself to sleep in Charlie's bed, wrapped up in his old shirts, dreaming of the way he used to ruffle her hair and tease her—She should have been dreaming of Nate.

Nate had left her too, but for far less selfish reasons than she had always assumed. It wasn't because he couldn't bear to see her. It had been the unsolved guilt and regret he had taken upon himself that night in Charlie's room.

She had spent a decade mourning Charlie, idolizing him, missing him. But it should have been Nate. It should have always been Nate.

She felt sick.

Kitty now knew that Nate had known, but he had known it all this time, ten years of guilt building up in his chest and gripping his heart like a curse.

The weight of it crashed down on her. Charlie had been her hero. She thought he was invincible, larger than life. She worshipped the memory of him, clung to it like a child holding onto an old stuffed animal, torn at the seams but too familiar to throw away.

And Nate? Nate was just... Nate. The one who left. The one who chose to go. The one she let go.

She should have seen how much heavier his shoulders had been that last summer. She should have called him more often, not given up so quickly when he pulled away. Should have begged him to come back. Maybe then he wouldn't have felt so alone.

Her heart broke as she thought back to that fourteen-year-old boy, sitting on the sofa beside her, police sirens ringing through the air, the house being bathed in blue and red light.

Their parents were out, probably being shown the body of their dead son. Kitty didn't know it then, didn't understand what anything of it meant. But Nate had known, head thrown back into the cushion, his eyes lingering on the ceiling, his heart hammering like it was trying to break from his chest.

Like he was afraid that if he looked anywhere else, if he let his gaze drop for even a second, he would break.

But then he did. His eyes flickered down to her. His little sister, curled up in his lap. She still had the ghost of a smile on her lips.

And she asked, so softly, so innocently—

"Are they picking up Charlie?"

Nate couldn't bear to tell her. He swallowed it down. The tears. The rage. The guilt—God, the guilt. He shoved it all into the deepest, darkest part of himself, knowing it would crawl back up his throat eventually. Knowing that when it did, he wouldn't survive it.

But not tonight. Not here. Not with her looking at him like that.

So he forced a breath through his shaking chest, forced his fingers to smooth over her hair, like nothing was wrong. Like he wasn't breaking apart.

Like he wasn't already counting down the days until he left this place forever. This haunted house. Charlie's haunted house.

His chest ached. He wanted to tell her the truth. Oh, how he wanted to just tell her the truth. He couldn't. So he lied, knowing that she would find out soon.

"They're bringing him home." he assured, lips pressed to the top of her head when Kitty closed her eyes.

Nate dreaded the moment the door would open and his mother and stepfather would come back, both distraught, his mother's hands stained with Charlie's blood that Kitty would have to see when she shrieked up on the couch at their loud voices. The haunting memories, she would never be able to forget. Nate dreaded it all, but stayed unmoving.

For now, it was just him and his sister, probably for the last time.

Kitty stumbled through the hallway, her mind replaying the memory of the night Charlie had died over and over again. She remembered the warmth of Nate's kiss on her head, the touch of his hands in her hair, the calm she had felt before the storm had broken out.

Now she craved the warmth of Nate's arms more than she had ever missed Charlie's.

God, when had been the last time she had hugged him? She couldn't even remember. She had to make sure that that hadn't been the last time. Couldn't allow for him to go without giving him time to fix it.

Kitty choked down a sob. He couldn't die without knowing that she still loved him, that she had never stopped loving him. Not after all of those years she had spent waiting for his return, for a sign of him caring.

She begged that he knew.

He had to know, right?

He had to know that she still believed in him. That he was still her brother, no matter what she had told him, no matter what indifference he assumed from her.

It did not matter, made no difference to the way she looked up to him, to the way that even if she knew she had said the opposite, she would have waited forever for him. Neither her love nor hope faltering, even if he would have never decided to come home.

Kitty turned the corner and almost had a heart attack, when she ran into Sidney.

She was holding a gun in Richie's direction, who spotted a fresh wound on his leg. Kitty hadn't even heard the shot.

"Kitty," Sidney sighed in relief. Of course she couldn't know for sure, that Kitty wasn't the other killer, but the trembling and crying girl didn't really make a threatening figure. Not even with a knife in her hand.

Sidney lowered her eyes at the weapon, keeping a close look on it, her insticts telling her that the girl wasn't the one to be afraid of.

"Are you okay?" Sidney's voice softened, though she kept her grip tight on her gun.

Kitty shook her head, choking down a sob. "Nate he's—"

"Downstairs. He's alive just unconscious." Sidney stated calmly.

"What?" Richie cried from the closet, a hand still pressed to the wound in his leg. "No shot for her? She has a fucking knife! You're seeing that, right?"

Sidney ignored him and kept her eyes trained on Kitty. "Go!" She ordered, nodding at the steps behind her.

Kitty nodded and quickly descended the stairs, her breath hitching at Nate's unconscious body lying at the door. The knife clattered to the floor as she pulled him into her arms, searching for where he had been hurt.

Upstairs, Sidney was saying something to Richie, that she couldn't make out. Then a door was thrown open and Ghostface appeared on the threshold.

Kitty screamed.

"Holy shit, it's Ghostface!" Richie called loudly.

Sidney pushed the masked figure back, effectively loosening the grip he had on the knife. They pushed back and forth, both trying to overpower the other before they finally reached the banister and fell down into the entryway with a loud thud, Sidney's gun clattering to the floor.

"Kitty! Richie! The gun! One of you get the gun"

Richie was already struggling to walk down the stairs. "Kind of hard since you shot me in the leg"

Kitty softly pushed Nate back, crawling forward and reaching for the gun, when all of a sudden—

"Yes! Yes!" Richie called happily as Sam had gripped the gun, holding it away from her body and at the masked Ghostface on the floor.

"Shoot him!" Sidney ordered.

"Baby, blow his fucking brains out!" Richie's voice cried out.

Kitty froze, sitting on the floor, looking up at the man she had met at Sam's boyfriend only days prior.

And then it hit her.

It was an image, a memory she could barely hold onto. She had been seven years old, maybe even younger, lingering in front of the door to her brother's room, while Charlie was glued to his computer screen, engrossed in one of his late-night forums.

She remembered the conversation he had.

"God, that would be fucking sick!" Charlie's voice echoed in her memory.

Another voice laughed. He was chatting with someone, a video call. She couldn't see his face, Charlie's body blocking her view.

"And then?" The voice from the chat giggled. "Then we'd blow his fucking brains out. Slasher style, you know?"

Her heart skipped a beat, and she nearly lost her last bit of strength, as the realization crashed over her.

Charlie had noticed her, from a hurried breath she had taken at the foreign boy's words. He had turned around in his chair, a smile playing on his features before he had reckoned her to come closer and introduced her to his friend.

"This is my sister." He had said and Kitty's eyes had followed his gaze to the Computer, the face of a boy of Nate's age grinning at her. "Her name's Kitty."

"Cool." The blonde boy had smiled. "Like a KitKat huh?"

He had been friendly, nice even. Now the words send shivers down her spine, echoing through her memory, through the Computer screen, and directly into Charlie's room.

Kitty closed her fists, as the two images aligned themselves in her head: The blonde boy on the Computer screen, no older than fourteen, grinning at her like he had never seen a more fascinating thing, and the grown man that was descending the steps, not even the beard could hide who he was, his eyes carrying the same sick shimmer they did back in that night, looking like her like she had been displayed in a museum.

Kitty closed her eyes.

That night in front of Charlie's laptop haunted her, because she had been too daft to remember the most important thing: That was when she first met Richie.

———

A/N: sorry that I lied, but here is the new chapter lmao :)

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