Chapter Text
Sometimes she hated her life.
Ashley went numb.
What she had just done was unacceptable.
But Ashley felt there was no other way out — and there never had been.
***
Ashley loved to draw. Most often she drew the world around her. She never drew people — they always turned out lifeless and flat. Ashley realized she simply didn’t know how to draw them, so she stopped trying.
“Isn’t Ashley a boy’s name?” Billy settled down next to her, leaning against a rock and peering into her open sketchbook. Today he seemed calmer than usual.
A dense forest was already visible on the page.
Ashley just pushed the page closer to him, letting him take a better look.
“My father always wanted a boy,” the truth slipped out too easily.
Billy raised his eyes to her face.
“Your dad’s not the best, huh?” Ashley bit her lip. The truth always hit harder. But for the first time, she saw understanding on his face, not a mocking grin or anger.
“So why do you draw? There are cameras now, after all,” Billy said, studying the page again as if trying to spot something extraordinary.
Ashley didn’t take offense at his smirk or his question.
“Painting helps let my feelings out,” Ashley shrugged, studying Billy’s face. And yet he was still just a boy, her peer. Around the Marrowbone children, Ashley always felt younger, even sometimes around Sam.
“Do you draw people, or just flowers?” Ashley didn’t draw people. Not until recently, anyway.
“No,” the answer came out hesitant and quiet.
How could she admit that her sketchbook was filled with just one person?
Drawings where Billy was vibrant, whether with anger or joy. Ashley wanted to believe she was seeing the real him.
***
Ashley wasn’t as patient as her friend Ellie, so just a week after being firmly turned away, she stood in front of the Marrowbone family’s gate, insistently pulling the bell’s rope.
An infuriated Billy stormed out of the house and chased her away.
Ashley pedaled away, realizing she hadn’t managed to leave with dignity.
Her tear-stained face didn’t quite match her inner notion of pride.
It stung — a lot.
***
Ashley never touched her father’s newspapers. They weren’t interesting, and they had consequences.
Her father believed that intelligence didn’t suit a woman. Ashley thought her father should do less thinking.
The lines from the news column burned into her eyes — she could still see them even when she closed her lids.
Billy never talked about his father. She’d only overheard their former surname in passing.
Ashley didn’t believe in coincidences.
***
The Marrowbone house always seemed gloomy to her. This time, the feeling was magnified many times over. Ashley tried to tell herself it was just her overactive imagination.
She pulled the rope — no one came out. Filled to the brim with anxiety, Ashley glanced around furtively, then, at her own risk, climbed over the low fence.
She peered into the curtained windows and wiped her damp palms on her pants.
Her heart thundered in her throat.
***
A knock and voices from the attic made Ashley freeze for a moment. A faltering whisper. Ashley swallowed — the voices had changed. Unhuman, yet now quite familiar.
Ashley raced up the stairs.
“Billy! Jane? Sam?” She pressed her ear to the door. “Are you in there?”
The voices fell silent.
“Ashley? What are you doing here?” Billy’s voice was full of displeasure and worry. It cracked, as if something dark was approaching — something that even scared Billy.
Ashley exhaled. A locked door separated her from them.
“Who locked you in?” Ashley didn’t understand a thing.
A crash from the roof was like a thunderclap on a clear day. A moment stretched into eternity.
“Doesn’t matter! There’s a crowbar in the kitchen! Bring it, please,” Billy’s quiet voice was laced with desperation — full of despair.
As if, in an instant, it had become despair itself.
Without arguing, Ashley dashed downstairs.
The crowbar. She needed to find the crowbar. Of course, it wasn’t where it should be, and the noises from the roof grew louder and more terrifying.
She tried to break the lock. It didn’t work on the first try.
Before Ashley could even sigh with relief, Jane grabbed her hand, and Billy came running with little Sam in his arms.
The last thing she saw was a blurred silhouette with black eyes.
***
Ashley fell behind her friends as they sprinted ahead. A rifle by a tree caught her eye.
She glanced once more at her friends’s backs, driven by fear, then grabbed the weapon, hiding behind the nearest tree.
***
Crouch. Pull the trigger. Shoot. Pull the trigger. Pull the trigger. Crouch. Pull the trigger. Shoot. Crouch.
Simple, right?
***
Ashley was an ordinary teenager in an ordinary small town.
And today, she had committed her first murder. She didn’t like it at all.
Billy’s hands tried to warm hers.
“It’ll be okay,” Billy swayed from side to side, whispering into the top of her head. “Everything will be fine now, for sure.”
With cold clarity, Ashley realized: if she could go back in time, she would do it again.