There’s total silence, and it occurs to me that finding my dream girl again might be harder than I thought. Hopefully Newman remembers what dorm we went to.
I hear Santos curse from across the room. “You’re fucking with me, right?Belle?”
I shake my head again, forgetting that it makes the room tilt. “Not a bell, a clock. And a candle. I liked him the best. That candle guy was the fucking shit.”
My roommate’s laughing at me, but I’m totally serious. “Fuck you. I had such a crush on that girl. She was perfect, except she was a cartoon.”
I hear Santos’s weight shift as he turns toward me. “Woah, wait up. Thecartoon one? Not even the live action one?”
“There’s a live action one?” I ask.
“Uh, yeah. Starring one of the most famous actresses of the last ten years or so.”
“Is she pretty? Cause dream girl is…she’s beautiful.”
Santos mutters another curse. “Yeah, man, if petite brunettes are your thing. They’re not mine, but I hope they’re yoursbecause you have a better chance at scoring a date with that actress than you do of finding your dream girl.”
“So you’re saying I have a chance?”
1
Josie
“That’s not enough blood, Tillie. Here, let me do it.”
As soon as I hear my eight-year-old brother say those words, I bolt up the stairs and round the corner just in time to see three Halloween costumes lying flat on the floor, covered in red splatters that I can only assume are food coloring. And they got some on the carpet, too. Fantastic.
“Does anyone want to tell me why you’re not wearing your costumes?” I ask. “And maybe also why you’ve covered them in fake blood?”
“It’s not—” Tillie starts, but Milo steps forward, effectively stopping her. He’s younger by two minutes, but Tillie hates confrontation almost as much as I do, so she lets him take the lead. And the fall.
“We’re Frank and Patricia Cartwright, two of the most famous serial killers in North Dakota,” Milo tells me, as though I’m a fool for even asking.
I begin silently counting to ten. I only get as far as four before saying, “Levi told me you guys were going as zombies. That’s why he had to take you to Goodwill to get clothes you could tear up.”
“We changed our minds after we watched the series about the Cartwrights on Netflix,” Milo informs me. “And before you ask, Levi wasn’t mad. He watched it with us.”
“Technically,” Tillie interjects, “he watched cartoons with us until he fell asleep and then we switched the channel.”
“Technically,” Milo agrees, using air quotes. “Anyway, that’s how we decided on the Cartwrights. Because they were twins, too.”
“And I’m the detective who caught them,” Iris pipes up in her still-sweet five-year-old voice. “But then they murdered me. That’s why my uniform had to get bloody, too, Josie. But don’t worry. It’s not s’posed to stain.”
I tug playfully on one of her pigtails. “Hate to break it to you, kiddo, but food coloring stains everything it touches.” I survey the room, and honestly, most of the red dye is on the clothes, so it could be worse.
And, of course, that’s when it starts to get worse.
“It’s not food coloring, Josie. It’s blood,” Iris corrects.
“Yep, but pretend blood is made out of food coloring. Now, come on. We’re almost late.” It’s two weeks before Halloween, but the kids’ school is having Trunk or Treat tonight. The back of my SUV is filled with enough candy to induce a sugar high in half the state of Maryland and all the supplies necessary to simulate a zombie apocalypse.All I need now is for my three youngest siblings to get moving. “Are your costumes dry?”
Milo touches his and his finger comes away clean. Good enough for me. “You’ve got one minute,” I tell them. “Suit up.” Iris and Milo nod, but Tillie won’t look me in the eye.
My older brother, Levi, and I have been guardians to our younger siblings—all four of them—for nearly five years now, so I know Tillie and I know her tells. She’s about to tattle on these two.I love a juicy confession just as much as the next gal, but time is ticking. “It’s okay, Tillie. We’ll clean up the mess as bestwe can when we get home. I’m sure #CleanTok has a solution for removing food coloring from rugs.”
“But it’s not food coloring. It’s blood.”
I open my mouth to correct her, but she keeps on talking. Tillie may love true crime, but she’d make a terrible criminal.
