I let the police officers bundle me in the car, even though I was yelling for them to let me go find my friends. There were other patrol cars going past us down the dirt road, but they wouldn't know where to look. Surely I could show them faster.

Levi is alive. Levi is alive!

The thought raced through my mind, pounding at the confines of my skull and demanding that I shout it out over and over. The officers nodded and stuffed me in the back seat with an old blanket for the cold. It stank of old piss and cigarette smoke. I huddled in it, all the same, listening to the garbled voices spewing information and coordinates from the dashboard radio during the short drive to the station.

I caught a few words that made sense: this is, victim recovered, Federmann Farmstead, no other, bringing her. "Does that mean they found Alicia?" I asked. "Is she all right?"

"Please remain calm, Brooklyn, we're going to the station," the young officer told me I had forgotten his name twice already. The other officer, the driver, was Officer McIntosh. I wasn't about to forget his name. Todd's name had nearly tumbled from my mouth when the officers had arrived until I saw that one of his cousins had been dispatched to get me. One of the hazards of living in a small town.

"But does that mean she's alive?" I insisted. Isn't that what they would say if she was alive? If they had only found a body, they wouldn't bring her in so fast, I reasoned. Dead bodies were left lying around for photographs, DNA samples and to be ogled at by a fleet of detectives.

"Just relax. It sounds like your friend is alive, but we won't know how she's doing for a while."

The driver grunted. He turned right (without using his turn signal) onto Cherokee Street right past the mental institute where my mom was working. Pressure squeezed my chest and throat.

"Did someone call my mom?"

When I had reached the KOA, I wound up going straight to the pay phone. I couldn't bring myself to find out if anyone was on duty or to knock at the campers and ask for help. What if they were straw people? What if they grabbed me and tried to take me somewhere?

I had found the phone under a yellow light and called 9-1-1, and then tried to explain what had happened and where I was. I didn't have any money for another call and I knew from experience that the mental institute didn't accept collect calls. Heartless asshats.

"Did someone call my mom?" I asked again.

The time I spent waiting for the policemen to show up had been the loneliest moments of my life. I had abandoned Alicia to be kicked and beaten by Todd. I ran away right after seeing Levi, again leaving a friend to be beaten or killed by Todd. I was the lowest, scummiest coward alive. I hid in the shadows of the KOA toilet, terrified that rats would swarm me, that Todd would come for me or that the next news I had of my friends would be of their deaths. What if I never saw Alicia or Levi again? And it was my fault? I needed my mother like never before.

We made it to the station parking lot and Officer McIntosh opened my door. He gave me his hand to help me out and I wondered if he would be so friendly if I had told him it was his cousin who was out there, beating kids with chains and getting stabbed for it.

Another car arrived and I spun around at the sound of my name being shouted.

"Alicia," I gasped as her pale face and blond hair filled my vision. She threw herself at me, wrapping her arms around my body and the smelly blanket, but almost as soon as she did, she let me go. Taking my face in her hands, she kissed me.

This kiss, my brain registered, was not a 'thank God' peck on the cheeks or forehead, or a closed mouth smooch of exuberant relief. It was a desperate kiss of hide and seek, of baring soul-scarring secrets. Her lips raced over mine, moist and urgent. It was a kiss of 'I would fight to the death to try and save you, but no one will save you from me.'

I was too surprised to do anything but hold on.

"Alicia," I said, breaking it off as soon as I could. "I...I thought he killed you. Are you all right? Shit, shouldn't you be in the hospital?"

She seemed perfectly fine. Not even muddy or bruised. "I faked it." She chuckled. "I'm all right, I faked everything."

Faked not being surprised when Todd showed up? Faked grabbing a chain that should have broken her wrist? Faked hissing like a freaky animal?

"How...." I shook off the uneasy voice telling me this was wrong. I would deal with it later. "Listen, you won't believe it; Levi is back, I saw him in the woods. He's alive!"

No reply. She stared at me, shaking her head.

An officer cleared his throat. "Let's go on inside, girls," he said uncomfortably.

"Alicia, he's alive!" I repeated through my silly grin and tears. "He was there!"

"But how? That's not possible. Did he tell you what happened? Where he went, where Sean is? What did he say?" she asked. I couldn't tell if she was shocked or scared.

"No, he didn't have time. Todd jumped us and Levi had a knife-" Sharp fear pricked me at the memory of my friend appearing from nowhere, carrying a knife and sending the rats scurrying. For the first time a grain of doubt was seeded in my heart. If my friend was real, then the straw man that Todd turned into was real. And the knife I reached straight through was real. Or....Oh, God, I was going to fall.

Alicia slapped me.

"The hell?" I asked.

"You left me alone! You ran off and left me to face him alone! You are such chicken shit! We were supposed to stay and fight together."

"Says the girl who took off when Sean and Levi were taken," I shouted back. I might feel like a sack of manure for leaving her, but she had turned into a snarling banshee and I had panicked.

She slapped me again. Not a 'you stole boyfriend' girl locker room tap or an 'I can't believe you called me a slut' smack to the cheek. This was a 'If I'd used a closed fist, you'd be out for the count' hit to the jaw. My head snapped sideways.

Recovering, I reached for her. I jerked her hair downwards and brought up my knee to crunch her nose, but she twisted and elbowed me in the gut. Pitching forward off balance, we hit the pavement.

We fell in a messy, tangled pile, all notions of self-defense thrown to the wind. It was a girly fight, down and dirty and intensely more satisfying than rehearsed punches, kicks and blocks from a safe distance. We scratched, insulted, yanked and grappled - hurting each other where we knew the other was the most vulnerable.

Policemen were shouting and pulling us apart. Someone lifted me by the waist and carried me, kicking and cussing to the station. Someone else was restraining Alicia by her arms and marching her along.

"Get these two in separate rooms. I need some parental authority here now!" a man yelled.

I was put in a small room overflowing with furniture left over and forgotten about since the 80's. A woman came in for my statement, asking questions and jotting down cheerfully the fact that I was not sexually molested, that the ground had been muddy, that Todd had probably followed us to the house carrying a heavy chain and wanted to take me somewhere. And that my missing childhood friend had showed up to knife my attacker in the middle of the woods after rats had rushed us.

My mother burst into the room not long afterwards, flushed and flustered.

"They just got a call to me! Are you all right, Brooklyn? Dios mio, look at your face!" She hugged me, petted my hair, studied my face and tried to kiss my cheeks at the same time. I hugged her back.

"I'm sorry, Mom. I'm sorry!"

"What did you think, going out there alone with Alicia. You are crazy! Why would you do something loco like that?"

Her Spanish accent was thicker than usual and the way little mistakes and Spanish words snuck into her sentences told me she was very upset. I cried into her nursing blouse, sniffling to not get snot on it.

"Did they tell you I saw Levi? I saw him, I swear it. I know that sounds crazy, and totally weird, but he's alive and he's out there right now. He can come home and tell us where Sean-"

"Brooklyn, let me see your eyes," my mom said. "First you tell me, did that man touch you or hit you? Did he make you take any drugs or did you and Alicia do some drugs?"

"No! Did you hear what I said about Levi?" It had to be true. I couldn't bear it if my mind had somehow tricked me.

The door opened and my mom jumped to her feet. A man in a rumpled shirt with a blue Superman tee showing through it came in the tight space.

"Mrs. Hadder, Brooklyn, I'm Detective Campbell from Little Rock in charge of reopening the missing persons case for the Walters brothers. I've been told that Brooklyn saw Levi tonight. Do you think you could tell me about it?"

I nodded, but picked up my glass of water to gulp it down first. He was skinnier and nerdier than I thought detectives were allowed to be, but he was better than the lady taking my statement. I explained basically what happened once again up to the point when Levi told me to run. I stopped for another drink of water. My mom was crying quietly beside me. "Levi was alive when I left him with Todd. It was really him."

The detective stopped taking notes. "OK. What next?"

"I went to the KOA and I called the police. That's all. But I figured out that it was Todd who kidnapped the Walters brothers and he also killed his friend and that girl in the lake. Todd did that. You have to find him, you have find them both; Levi might be injured."

"We have men and women out there right this very moment." He clasped his hands together over his paper. "I have some more questions about Levi, but let me just inform you that it wasn't Todd McIntosh who committed those other crimes."

"He has an alibi, doesn't he? His cousin who works here gave him an alibi," I said interrupting.

"Not just his cousin, but a whole lot of people. I pulled his file already, it's little stuff. When the two young people drowned in the lake in 1977, he was present at a party."

"And for Levi and Sean?"

"He was in the holding cell here for a DWI. From five in the evening until the next morning."

I shrugged. Levi would tell us who really did it. "So what did he want with me?" As soon as the words left my mouth, I realized how dumb they sounded.

"Brooklyn, I can list a hundred reasons why a grown man would want to kidnap a teenage girl and none of them are pretty. Do I need to elucidate?"

"No," I whispered. I had several ideas of what could have happened to me. A strange shaking was taking hold of my body. My head was floating and I had to lean on my mom. When was the last time I had eaten?

"We will find Todd and bring him in for questioning and prosecution if necessary. Now, about Levi. I want to think very carefully. You said it was dark and you were in the woods. Out of the blue, you saw your friend who has been missing for five years. He had a knife and he attacked the man trying to abduct you."

"Yes. He was my age and he had changed, but it was him." My voice was faint and tremulous.

"This is an incredible story. Are you absolutely sure that it was Levi Walters, and not someone or something else?"

I couldn't answer. I wasn't sure of anything anymore.

**** Thanks for reading! Brooklyn has told everyone what she thinks she knows, but is that what really happened? Leave a note or hit the star, it's greatly appreciated to know how you feel about this chapter! <3 ****