THE DAY OF.

Everett Clarke likes the woods.

She's grown up in constant companion of it, the Clarke Household standing tall and proud near the forests.

The Clarke Household is neither here nor there. But still, it's hard to miss, really. There's Cairnview, where the Clarke girls spend most of their time, and there's the outskirts - that's where the Clarke Household is. It's a tall, sprawling house, old and aged and vintage; chipped paint and elaborate woodwork, what their mother usually describes as 'Victorian chic'.

Evaline hates it. Julian loves it.

Everett is somewhere in-between. The Clarke House is all she's ever known, and she's okay with that. Well, that and the woods.

God, she loves the woods.

She thinks that it gives their home some much-needed character, and gives her some much-needed entertainment. And alone time.

The woods was the first place Everett had discovered on her own. All her other "special places" had come from Eva first; the little abandoned horse cabin, the loft they made on the top floor with the high ceiling, the creaky treehouse that had belonged to the previous generation of Clarkes, the old bookstore shop on the corner of fifth. All of those places they had either created together or started with a "Hey, Evie, I found this crazy cool place."

But the Clarke's forests - Everett's forests - this is hers. Hers only. She's never brought Eva there, or Julie, or Matthew. It's her place. Her alone place, where she's gone to cry, to escape, because she was bored.

Tonight, it's the latter.

A cigarette hangs between Everett Clarke's dry lips, as casual as some people might sport a charm bracelet. As it is, cigarettes are her favorite kind of accessory. That, and a little, gold coin necklace from Eva.

Her long fingers reach up to clasp the skinny cigarette and she takes a long drag. The wind ruffles her hair, making the lemony-blond strands float above her like a faint halo. Halo. She nearly snorts at the thought.

Everett Clarke is anything except angelic.

Well, angelic and sporty - unless you count cycling. That Everett can do. That Everett enjoys doing. She can count the things she likes to do on one hand - cycling, smoking, fucking, coke (the cola and the drug) and talking.

Oh shit, and the woods.

Everett mentally shrugs. Two hands then. She's never been good with math.

Everett starts to hum softly, thinking about the day as the autumn leaves crunch under her boots. She quite hates herself, she thinks. She hates herself, and she hates her sister, and she hates Matthew, and she hates Elizabeth, and she hates Anya, and she hates Julie.

She hates them all.

Herself, the most.

Why? Because she is a terrible person. She has fire at the tips of her hands, and her breath is sarin, because the cigarettes she smokes are the bones of her loved ones and her lipstick is their blood. This is who Everett Clarke is. She is a bomb waiting to go of, and she will take everyone with her.

She is a kamikaze.

That's what they call her anyway - the Kamikaze girl. When she was given that name in sophomore year, she wore it like a crown. She held her head high and walked the fields not as if a bomb were strapped on her back, but as if she was the bomb. She had - has - the power to bring everyone down with her. And they knew her name. They knew her. She wasn't Evaline's shadow, or Evaline's younger sister, or Evaline's twin, or that other Clarke girl - she was Everett Clarke. Kamikaze girl.

Julie loves the name. She had laughed, the first time she heard it, grinned and flipped her hair. "Kamikaze girl!" she exclaimed, absolutely delighted. "How exotic. Such a shame you're not Japanese."

"Oh yeah," Anya had added. "I should've been Kamikaze girl. This gal's got Russian roots. I would say Julie's the most deserving heritage-wise, you know with the french and filipino - but she's way too sweet." Anya popped her gum. "So like, me. Small but a total bomb. Kamikaze. Anya. Perfect."

Julie had gasped. "Hey! Kamikaze could totally suit me."

To which Everett had raised a brow. "Your name is fucking Julie, Julie. You're like a cookie brand. A damn cookie. Cookie's are no kamikaze."

"You guys suck."

"Aw," Anya had cooed, swinging an arm around Julie's waist - too small to reach her shoulders without awkwardly tiptoeing - and said, "It's okay, Julie-bear. We love you, sweet as saccharine and all."

And that was that. That was them.

Anya - the tiny, Russian marionette. Julie - sweeter than honey; and Everett - Kamikaze girl.

A nostalgic smile glazes her face at the thought. She misses how the three of them used to be, thicker than thieves, closer than sisters, tighter than jam (Julie had came up with the last one). They hadn't been popular back then. They were a little weird, a little off, kinda crooked - but their broken pieces happened to fit perfectly together.

Somewhere between freshman year and the summer before junior year, they had lost each other. And now, as rising seniors - their last summer together before the year of college this and college that - they were lost to each other.

At least, that's how Everett felt. Of course the three girls (les trois petite filles, as Julie's father called them) still hung out, it just didn't feel the same. They no longer felt right. It was as if they had fallen and chipped themselves too many times that their pieces no longer fit. They didn't fit.

Everett takes a drag of her cigarette, sighing. She whips out her phone, about to text Julie and Anya. She'll say sorry. She'll ask what happened. She'll ask to talk. Because if there's one thing that Everett Clarke craves more than her sister's pathetic validation and a truck of coke - it's her friends.

She's about to, when she hears something. Her hand settles on the pepper spray instead. Eyes narrowing, Everett grips the can tightly. She takes slow, measured steps in the direction of the sound. A part of her knows that the smart thing to do would be to run away, but she's never claimed to be smart. Anyway, she thinks, the worst thing that could happen to her would be death - and it's not like her life's terribly fantastic anyway.

As Everett's mind reels and spins, thinking what new adventure and story could be behind that noise - but nothing prepares her for what she sees. Nothing prepares her for the truth.

There, swallowed by the darkness of the night, faces illuminated by the moonlight - are the two people who mean the world to her.

One, her sister.

Two, her best friend.

One, Eva's bloody arms.

Two, Julie's lifeless eyes.

One, the knife in Evaline Clarke's hands.

Two, the muddy dress Julie Moore was wearing earlier that day.

One, her sister - more alive than ever.

Two, her best friend - dead dead dead.

Everett Clarke does not scream.

She runs.