He saw us.
Yes! Yes. OK. He saw us, Indie. We were… Fucking A, man. Why me? Let’s just—
The tape stops and I look up to see Adam holding the player in his hands. “What?”
“Above your fucking paygrade?”
“What do you want me to say? I didn’t know what to do! I was twenty-fucking-five years old. I was still drugged! I didn’t finish my PSYOPS training. You know this. I kept telling you she needed someone else!”
“Just…” We all look at Indie. “Keep going. Press play, Adam. I need to hear the rest.”
—go back to that moment when Nathan appeared.
He was mad.
He was so fuckin’ mad.
He was yelling at us. Screaming at us. I got up and… I couldn’t see Maggie. I was looking for her. And then I saw her in the garden.
Yeah. She was in the garden.
But she wasn’t in her playground. She was by the shrubs near the big fountain. I started to go over there, but Nathan pulled me back and… I fell down.
Yeah. I was… we were all naked, you know. And I was trying to figure out what happened. So I was going towards the house when Nathan took a swing at me.
Yeah, he hit you hard. And then… then he and Adam were fighting. And then McKay was trying to pull them apart. But he was falling down.
You drugged us, Indie! Why did you drug us?
And then I heard Maggie crying. God. She was crying so hard, Donovan. Remember? Did you hear it?
I heard.
I ran over there. I tried to run over there. But Nathan caught me. He was shaking me and yelling at me. But Adam was there. He was fighting with him again. And I got to Maggie and I saw… Oh, God. She ate the berries! She ate the fucking berries! Why are there berries on that fucking bush? It’s only May!
I don’t know. I don’t fucking know.
She was screaming! Her mouth was all red. It’s my fault! It’s my fault! I picked those berries that morning and put them in the cupcake frosting. I told her they were delicious! I told her that, Donovan! Why the fuck did I put those poisonous berries in the goddamned frosting?!
Adam has her at hospital. He’s taking care of it, Indie. It’s gonna be… It’s gonna be OK.
Then Nathan was there. Screaming at me. He said… he said… “This is all your fault, Indie. You planted those bushes and I told you! I fuckin’ told you they were poisonous!” And it is! It’s my fault!
It’s not your fault, Indie.
It is! It is, it is, it is! And then…
What? What happened next?
No.
Tell me, Indie. I need you to tell me.
I… I hit him. I hit Nathan in the head with my foot. It was a spinning kick. I didn’t mean to… I heard something crack. Oh, my God. Where is Nathan? I broke his neck! I broke his neck! I saw him fall and his head tilted to the side and—
Don’t worry about Nathan. McKay is taking care of it, OK? It’s gonna be fine. Don’t worry about Nathan. This is all his fault.
I killed him! Oh, my God. I killed Nathan. And Maggie is dead! Ow!
I need you to sleep now, Indie. I just gave you more sedative. But I’m gonna tell you something right now, OK? I’m gonna say something very important and I want you to listen to me very carefully. Can you do that?
Mmm.
OK. Good. … OK. Listen to me. You’re not going to remember this. At all. You’re going to forget everything and—
The tape stops. Adam is still holding the player in his hands.
“What the actual motherfucking fuck, Donovan!”
I look up at Adam. But there is nothing left to say. They heard her. They know what I did. And they have to know why I did it. Both Nathan and Maggie died that day and… “Adam. She lost…”
But I can’t even say it out loud. Maybe I didn’t like Nathan. Hell. OK. Whatever. I can admit the truth now. There’s no point in denying it anymore. We all hated his fucking guts.
We were gonna… I dunno. Bribe him to just disappear, maybe?
Some threats if that didn’t work?
But no one was really gonna kill him.
“I’m sorry, man. But she was not going to come back from that. It was the only way I could—”
“Fuck you, Donovan.” We all turn to Indie. Her face is covered in tears. “Fuck you. You’re not in charge of what I get to know. You’re not allowed to erase me like that! You erased my daughter! You erased my boy next door!” She stands up and crosses the room to the window. Then she spins around. “Where the fuck is his house?” She looks at Adam. Then McKay. And then me. Because of course. I always knew she would blame me. I was the one in charge of her mind. “You erased his house?”
I look at McKay, willing him to take over. But he has his back turned to us, one hand pressed up against the wall near the door, leaning into it like he’s about to collapse.
“I think you need to leave, Donovan.”
“No. I’m not—”
“Leave! Donovan! Now!”
“Indie, listen to me—”
“Donovan. Get the fuck out.”
I turn to Adam, shaking my head. “No.”
“Just… Donovan. Don’t make this hard, dude. You need to go. Right now. We’ll figure this out and—”
“You need to go too, Adam.”
“What?”
Well… I didn’t see that coming.
“Both of you. Just… go. I need to be alone.”
McKay finally turns back around to face us. He’s scrubbing both his hands down his face. I wait for him to talk sense into her. To make her change her mind. To… fix this!
But he simply nods. “OK, Indie. We’ll go.”
“Not you, McKay. Jesus. You’re the only one who tells me the truth. You’re the only one I can trust. Just… them.”
McKay—who ten minutes ago I would have bet a million dollars would be gloating over this new development—shakes his head and frowns. “No.” He looks at me, then Adam. “We all go. Or we all stay. That’s how this works. You don’t get to pick and choose which of us is allowed to love you, Indie. We do things for you that maybe feel wrong. But we do them because they feel right to us in the moment. We’re just… doing our best. So if they go, then I go too. If you want to end this today, then that’s how this ends.”
There are many long moments of total silence. Then Indie sniffs loudly and drags the back of her hand across her face, wiping away the tears that are already dry.
Is she sad? I can’t tell.
Like… that is so fucked up. She is so fucked up.
And we did that to her.
“Fuck this.” Adam turns away and walks out, his boots stomping all the way down the stairs, the front door slamming behind him. A few moments later we hear his truck. Then the fading sound of tires on gravel as he leaves.