That night, I waited until my parents went to bed to sneak out. I knew they'd never let me leave if they thought I was going to meet Macy, especially since the police were already breathing down my neck, so I turned my TV on, locked my door, and crept outside to my car.

I felt bad about deceiving my parents, but I knew I would feel worse if I didn't meet Macy.

I pulled up to Mulberry Park at 11:55 P.M.

Macy's voice echoed in my head as I got out of the car. Do you still remember where it is?

Macy and I found "our place" the summer before sixth grade. Some older boys had scared us away from the playground, which they were using as their battleground for one of their many games, and we'd gone running into the woods.

With the sound of their taunts behind us, we ran as fast as we could. I was pretty sure a few pebbles hit me in the back, which had just propelled us further into the woods and farther away from the other kids.

We didn't stop until we were so deep in the woods we could barely see any sunlight between the trees.

I'd always been the more athletic between us and even though I'd kept running, Macy had stopped to catch her breath. When I heard her call my name, I turned to find her staring, mouth open, at something I couldn't see.

As usual, I followed Macy's lead and jumped off the path.

I'd heard rumors about Mulberry's secret parks for as long as I could remember. They were built back when Hanover was just a small city. When they were abandoned, the forest grew around them. Most people were aware of the parks, but I'd never heard of anyone finding one.

But that day, Macy and I had found it on our own. We never told anyone. We knew that if we did, it would be quickly overrun by every other kid in the area. We wanted to keep our secret playground all to ourselves.

For weeks after hooking up with Seth, Macy had begged me to meet her at the park—but I never showed up. I hadn't set foot there since before our fight. And now here I was, years later, trying not to brain myself on any branches.

I stumbled in the dark, tripping over a rock, and caught myself on a tree trunk. I probably should've thought this through better; I hadn't been to our place in so long, I wasn't totally sure where I was going.

Just when I was considering turning around and heading back to the car, the forest opened up suddenly, spitting me out into a clearing. I stepped out of the treeline, my eyes wide.

The playground was just like I remembered—but even more magical than it had been when we were kids. Since I was last here, the forest had grown even more around it, with trees shooting up and around the slide and branches jutting through the fencing.

I had never thought of this place as dangerous when Macy and I used to hang out here, but when I noticed the way the slide tilted and how the metal chains of the swing rusted angrily at the top, I frowned. This place was just asking for a lawsuit.

I looked at my phone. 12:01. Macy was nowhere to be seen.

Leaves crunched under my feet as I walked across the clearing. The wind picked up and blew through the playground. The only thing I could hear louder than the roaring wind was the swing set creaking angrily.

This place was really creepy. How had we never noticed that before?

I opened my mouth to call Macy's name, but I heard a splash, followed by a scuffling sound coming from the other side of the play set. As I approached the slide, I licked my dry lips. My ears were straining to pick up anything over the howling wind.

"Macy?" I called out, immediately regretting it. The scuffling stopped, and I heard something. A voice...or something like it.

I paused next to the slide and peeked around the edge. It was too dark to see anything back there, but there was something...

Suddenly, something exploded out of the darkness. I screamed as a tall, long legged figure slammed into my side, sending me spinning. The ground rose up to meet me as I fell and I barely caught myself on the edge of the slide before I slammed my face against the plastic.

The figure stopped a few feet away and turned to face me. There was a flash of silver in his hand, and I screamed again. I let go of the slide and scrambled backward, searching for a rock to defend myself with.

He was wearing all black: jeans, boots and a jacket with the hoodie pulled low over his face. Because the moon was behind him, I couldn't see his face, but I knew he was staring at me; his gaze felt sharp and calculating.

"Don't," I said, holding up my hand. "Please."

The figure cocked his head curiously. Something about the movement was familiar, but I couldn't place where I had seen it before.

He took one step closer to me but stopped when I flinched. He raised the knife in his hand as if he was going to give it to me. The blade was slick with blood.

My stomach rolled. "What did you do?"

He didn't move, but his hand began to shake. I opened my mouth, but he turned before I could speak and took off into the forest.

I stayed on the ground. My chest heaved as I sucked in air, trying to calm myself down, which was a pretty futile effort. I was coated in a thin layer of nervous sweat and felt like I had just run a mile.

"Oh my God," I said. "What the hell was that?"

As if in answering to my question, there was a gurgling sound from behind me. Thinking it was just the pond, I didn't move right away. After a moment, I heard it again, and I slowly turned around, peering into the darkness of the trees.

Something else was out here with me.

"Hello?" I called out nervously. I couldn't see anything from where I was sitting and, shakily, I forced myself to grab the side of the slide again and pulled myself up.

You just got knocked down by some crazy dude, a voice inside my head screamed. Why aren't you running?!

I need to find Macy, another voice answered.

WHO GIVES A CRAP ABOUT MACY!? The rational part said back. HE HAD A KNIFE!

Yeah, exactly.

"Macy?" I said, squinting. "Is that you?"

I pulled my phone from my pocket and opened the flashlight app. Swinging it around, I didn't notice anything at first. I was in such a hurry to find where the noise was coming from, I almost swept right by it.

Poking out of the darkness was one black boot. Swinging my flashlight, I took a step forward. A part of me recognized that the body lying in the grass was bent at an awkward angle, and another part of me just saw red. Red hair, red shirt—no, that's a white shirt covered in...

"Macy!" Her name tore from my throat before I could stop it. I lunged forward and dropped to my knees next to her body.

She was on her side, her hair strewn across her face, one arm crossed over her chest. The other was bent at an odd angle behind her like it had been yanked from the socket. She was soaking wet, water droplets still clinging to her waxy skin.

"Macy?" I whispered. She shivered when I touched her arm and let out a panicked garble of sound I didn't quite understand. "Where—what—" looked down at her, but I couldn't make out enough through the darkness, and I couldn't help her and use my phone for the flashlight at the same time. "Hold tight. I have to move you, okay? I'll try not to hurt you."

Macy made an awful noise that I hoped was consent. Her boots were slick with water against my hands as I dragged her out of the treeline and onto the grass behind the playset.

Once I was able to see her in the moonlight, I wished I couldn't. The scene came to me in snapshots and pictures. I wasn't entirely sure what I was seeing, but I knew it was bad.

She wasn't moving anymore, was barely breathing, and I could see only tiny patches of white shirt that hadn't been touched by the blood. There seemed to be more bruises than Macy had skin; an array of awful looking colors stretched across her body.

The rational part of me said back up, take a breath, call the police. Don't look. Don't look. You don't want to see. But I couldn't stop seeing.

Her shirt was ripped along her stomach, revealing a horribly disgusting gash that was still leaking blood. I pressed the shredded pieces of her shirt against the wound, trying to staunch the bleeding. With my other hand, I reached down and tilted her face toward me.

Her face was a mess of cuts and bruises, her green eyes rolling wildly in her head as she stared up at me, panicked.

"Oh my God," I whispered, my eyes watering. "Oh, Macy, what happened to you?"

I wasn't sure if she could hear me talking to her. She seemed pretty out of it, her entire body trembling. I dialed the police, but the call wouldn't go through. I didn't want to leave her by herself, but I had to do something. I couldn't just let her die here.

"Macy." She flinched at the sound of my voice. "I have to call the police, alright? I'll be right back."

As I started to rise, Macy's hand shot out.

"No," she gurgled, holding my wrist. Blood leaked from the corners of her mouth. Her eyes focused on me momentarily. "Don't leave me...please."

Macy clumsily laid her hand on my arm. I realized that there was something in her palm and peered at the object as I took it from her. Curled around her finger was a silver chain, the clasp broken, a ring dangling from it. The ring was instantly intriguing. It was obviously old, no longer shiny and spotless, with a flat, circular top that had a full tree embossed on it.

"My pocket," she mumbled. She had that wild look in her eyes again as she used her now free hand to pat the pocket of her pants. I felt for whatever she wanted me to find this time and came up with her cell phone and keys.

"What do you want me to do with these?" I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

Macy jerked her chin up and grumbled, "Keep them."

"These?" I held up the keys and her phone in one hand, the ring in the other. She nodded, and I shoved the items into my pockets. "Macy..." I leaned closer to her and pressed my hand against her cheek. "What happened to you? Who did this?"

Instead of answering my question, she whispered, "He's coming for you."

My blood went cold.

"What? Who's coming for me?"

"He's going to kill you." She stared at me, her eyes pleading with me to understand. "Secrets—his secrets..."

Her eyes went suddenly glassy. When she coughed again, I felt blood on my cheeks.

I didn't want to see this. I wanted to close my eyes, count to ten and open them to find Macy sitting in the grass in front of me, looking at me like I was crazy. I wanted this to be some terrible dream I'd wake up from.

"Oz," she groaned, arching her back. I curled my body around hers, holding on tight, trying, uselessly, to protect her. Blood from her stomach wound continued to spurt out, and I could feel it soaking the front of me. "P-please..."

"I'm so sorry," I murmured against her hair. Tears fell down my cheeks, cutting through the blood. "I'm so sorry, Macy. I'm so sorry. Please—"

Her body jerked in my arms and then, finally, went still.

Without letting go of her, I fumbled for her hand. My fingers skidded across her palm and stopped at her wrist. I waited, holding my breath, my eyes shut as I felt for a pulse.

But the steady thump-thump-thump of her heart never came and with my hand against her waxy, cold skin, I could no longer deny it.

Macy Stinson was dead.
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