“It’s Jennie,” I whispered.

The voices weren’t encouraging me to think about history. They were saying, Your story. Your story. They wanted me to tell the story of my death, the death that should have just occurred.

Violet flinched at the sound of heavy footsteps coming up the staircase, accompanied by loud male voices. The police had probably arrived, and they were now inside the house, on their way to find us. “Is she saying we need to play the game again?”

“Yes, sort of,” I said, trying to understand what Jennie was demonstrating. The white bear floated higher as the beige dog was lowered, and then the white bear was angled on its side as if lying down, taking the position that the dog had held. Then both stuffed animals fell back into the chest. “I think she’s suggesting that I—”

Fists pounded on the other side of Violet’s bedroom door. “Open this door!”

Trey’s alarmed eyes shifted from the door to me. “Whatever she wants you to do, just do it!”

“Open up!”

“Okay,” I said, trying to ignore the barrage on the door. “We should hold hands or something. Just like when we played the game the first time. I think the game always requires everyone’s participation.”

Without any resistance, Violet, Mischa, and Trey linked hands. Mischa and Trey, on either side of me, each reached for one of mine. I closed my eyes and tried to remember exactly how it had felt to be on the Simmonses’ roof, when I’d been certain that I was about to die. I tried to imagine what it was like having all of those scenes from my life play inside my eyelids.

Then I took a deep breath, knowing this would be my last chance to save my life. “It was a cold day in April, and McKenna Brady had just attended the funeral of her friend Mischa’s parents with Violet Simmons, Henry Richmond, and Trey Emory. McKenna had arrived at the funeral with the intention of bringing Mischa back to Violet’s house later that afternoon to make her play a game. The purpose of the game was to trick evil spirits that had overtaken Mischa’s body into abandoning it by making them believe that McKenna was about to die. To do this, Violet was going to aim a gun at McKenna and shoot her, if necessary.”

I was cutting corners, but I could hear a metallic clanging noise on the other side of the door, making me think that whoever was out there was trying to break the lock.

“But when Violet raised the gun, Henry jumped in front of McKenna and blocked the bullet. Moments later, Violet’s father arrived home unexpectedly after a vacation, and was shocked by what he saw occurring in his living room. He chased McKenna up to the house’s rooftop, and she climbed over a railing and descended a dangerously steep peak to try and escape him.”

I hesitated, knowing that if I told the story accurately from this point onward, Violet would know that Trey was responsible for her father’s death. But I had only seconds remaining, and couldn’t risk this game not working out of fear of offending her. So I continued, “Trey had followed Mr. Simmons and McKenna up there, and he surprised Mr. Simmons by shoving him from behind. Violet’s father fell forward, over a railing, and when he reached the place where McKenna was clinging to the shingles, he knocked into her. Together, they fell off the edge of the roof.”