A pit.

“I thought so,” Parter said, very close by.

A strange hissing noise rose from the pit like steam escaping an overwrought radiator.

“That creature—it found us a long time ago, back when we was boys and we made our first mistake. It’s slept down there ever since. I think it’s even helped keep us concealed out here, I really do.” Parter chuckled. “Who knew all this time it was just waiting for someone to spill a little more blood?”

shamefulboy, whispered the voice in Jamal’s mind. He lowered the revolver and let it dangle loosely at his side. His arms prickled like they’d died in his sleep. yourfault

The thing was right. It was his fault. All of this—Dylan dying, KT dying, Kimbra dying—he could have stopped all of it months ago, could have made Dylan talk, could have stopped everything if he’d only asked—

He blinked and the pit had grown wider, was spreading, the walls of the trailer dangling where their floors had fallen away, the Polaroids fluttering. Without realizing it, Jamal had taken a step closer.

A new voice came from the pit. A younger, brighter voice, but Jamal recognized it all the same. It was Coach Parter, years ago, speaking to him now. “But don’t you like it, Cor? We made all this for us.”

“Christ, Parter, for us?” Another young man spoke, one Jamal didn’t know. He sounded appalled. “What do you think I am?”

“You’re a man like us,” said another boy, pompous and scared.

“There’s nothing wrong with this,” said quieter, younger Mr. Lott.

But the boy Parter called Cor was having none of it. “Y’all queers got the wrong end of things. Don’t you got any fucking dignity? Don’t you—”

A gunshot rose from the pit. A heavy thud of a body falling. A gasp of pain.

The pit had come right to Jamal’s toes. He couldn’t move as the wooden floors began to buckle under his sneakers. He didn’t want to move. Maybe it was best if he let things end here. He wasn’t sure he could bear to live in a world that could ache with a shame like this.

“Alshoth Bosheth Toloth.” Parter spoke with a deep voice that wasn’t quite his own.

It was over, Jamal thought. And just as well: he’d fucked everything royally.

But as Jamal watched the boards under his toes disappear, he saw a sudden small flare of light glint at him from deep in the dark.

It was an eye.

Horror brought his mind roaring back. He pushed himself out of the hallway a moment before the floor on which he had just been standing collapsed.

He turned in time to see Coach Parter reaching for the rifle in Mr. Lott’s hands.

“Hey, Coach,” Jamal shouted.

Parter glanced over his shoulder, hesitated.

Jamal didn’t. He lobbed the cocked revolver across the couch. The gun spun gently through the air, end over end, and landed at Parter’s feet.

It worked better than Jamal could have hoped. When the revolver struck the floor its hammer sprang into the chambered round and the spark of the bullet’s detonation ignited the gasoline that had soaked the gun’s other chambers. Five bullets fired at once, and because only one bullet had anywhere to travel the other four could only explode with a furious burst of shrapnel. The gun had become a hand grenade.