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Back Surrender Your Sons Save as PDF
Chapters (43)
  1. Author’s Note with Content Warnings
  2. CHAPTER ONE
  3. CHAPTER TWO
  4. CHAPTER THREE
  5. CHAPTER FOUR
  6. CHAPTER FIVE
  7. CHAPTER SIX
  8. CHAPTER SEVEN
  9. CHAPTER EIGHT
  10. CHAPTER NINE
  11. CHAPTER TEN
  12. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  13. CHAPTER TWELVE
  14. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  15. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  16. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  17. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  18. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  19. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  20. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  21. CHAPTER TWENTY
  22. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  23. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  31. CHAPTER THIRTY
  32. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  33. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  41. CHAPTER FORTY
  42. EPILOGUE
  43. Acknowledgments

“No, it’s Vera Lynn. It’s a different record…” Bill’s jaw tremors as a realization consumes him. “Someone’s in my watchtower.”

As the ghostly woman sings, the temperature in the room plummets.

Briggs vaults himself from behind the table, and Molly, Darcy, and I face each other with a panicked jolt. Someone else is looking for Ricky’s tapes. Someone other than us is in Bill’s watchtower—but they changed the record that’s playing?

Something’s wrong. Very wrong.

In under five seconds, the South Pacific Gulch becomes a maelstrom of running. Briggs leads Archie and a half-dozen gray-shirts in a charge toward the courtyard. The Reverend and Bill follow at a slower clip.

“BENNNNNNNN!!!” someone cries outside. The voice like a lion’s roar blows through the Gulch with a gale-force wind, shaking my ribcage and sending me into a sprint. My mind switches off; all my body understands now is running toward the mystery. “BENNNNNN!!!” the voice shrieks again. Already having weaved past the Reverend and Bill, I close in on Briggs at the double doors. The sound of Briggs’s name forces him to run double time.

“Who is that?” Bill demands, frightened into a hush.

“I don’t know,” the Reverend says. “Ben, get out there!”

Briggs batters open the double doors with a linebacker’s shoulder. The flimsy wood strikes the sides of the building with a shocking clang, and a herd of Nightlight staffers hustle into the open courtyard. Molly, Darcy, and the others follow, but I have to reach the watchtower first. My terrier-sized body zigzags between the towering men, none of whom can be bothered to stop me. We all have the same urgent mission.

A low, internal whisper rings through my head: Where is Drew? He isn’t at lunch.

The music grows disquietingly louder as we hit fresh air. The next sound isn’t Briggs’s name again, but a piercing scream. The watchtower comes into view, and a boy falls. The following sound is like a car crash, a collision of wood and weight. The ledge of the bird’s nest buckles under the pull of a long rope, and Drew Schreiber’s body strikes the ladder on his first plunge, pulverizing two of the slats.

A chorus of screams erupts—I can’t tell one from the other—but we are united in instant grief. Drew, the Missing Model, swings by his neck from the watchtower as gentle, soulful music dances out of Karaoke Bill’s radio station. I’m the only one to approach close enough to notice: the golden boy gazes down, his eyes half-open like someone who is just a bit sleepy—a child saying goodnight before he can’t stay awake another second.

The initial screams soon silence, and his body metronomes through the air.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

UNDER THE NOOSE