Brain worm...
Teagan’s death could have been prevented. Not in an after school special bullshit where if only someone had listened Tori Spelling wouldn’t be playing a part she was way too old for. No. That would suggest that someone in authority cared, noticed Teagan enough to track these last few weeks and turn this into a made for TV drama only good for mocking over ice cream and stolen Mike’s Lemonades.
No one cared for Teagan except us. No one knew had happened except us. We should have stopped this, made someone pay attention.
“What should we do with her…it…Tea-oh God!” Vicki dropped to her knees, splashing the riverbank mud onto Teagan’s wrist. In the dark, the heavy, wet drops looked like blood. Bile rose in my throat.
“We bury her.” Lara’s voice was soft as she leaned across her sister’s body.
“But have to go to the police, don’t we?” Vicki choked out a breath. “That’s what we do in this k-kind of situation, right?”
A gust of wind cut through the wet fabric of my jeans. “They didn’t exactly cover this in the Senior Handbook.”
Vicki glared. “Well, what did you expect a sub-heading of ‘What to do when your friend-’”
“We bury her.” Even the crickets stopped chirping. Lara used the damp fabric of her shirt to wipe away the mud.
“We bury her,” she stared hard at me, “and then we make them pay.”