Death by Facebook (4 page)

Subject:
My Hawaiian Vacation

Amy,
I don't know how to tell this to anyone at all, but I will try with
you. After all, I owe you after you told me about your uncle and
that sleepover. Things are really weird here now, remember what I
told you I had found out?

Immediately,
she put aside her laptop and reached for mine again. It took a few
minutes to reboot it, but another beer occupied that time. She
opened up my Facebook again, and began searching. Looking for “Older
Posts” she fished for several minutes until she found a Wall
post between my brother and I. He had said something there, thinking
the Wall was private, when of course, it is not at all.

Benjamin
Franklin Turner:
“
Good
to hear you got yourself a wife-to-be Her picture looks strangely
familiar to me though. You know I gotta tell you something. I don't
know how to do it, so I'm just gonna say it. We had a sister, Janet,
and your fiancé looks a lot like I remember her, before we all
got taken away. Both Janet and you were really young at the time,
but I was 10. Maybe you should talk to her about it. You know,
before...before you have your wedding night and all. Sorry, but I
felt like I should tell you. You would want me to right?”

I
had forgotten that, probably like I forget those things I don't want
to deal with. I was in love with Janet. Frank must be wrong. Hell,
I hardly knew Frank anyhow, he might be looney tunes himself. I took
a few days to answer him, but I finally did, and this is what Janet
was reading now.

Jimmy
Turner:
“
Look
Frank, I love this girl! She is the best thing that has ever
happened to me. No way she can be my sister! But, you know...if she
was...well, I wouldn't care! Not too much. Cause I love her man! I
love her and that can't be wrong, can it? I know it sounds weird,
but if I love her, it doesn't matter right? Besides, we've already
slept together and it was frickin awesome! I ain't giving that up
for some rumor.”

Janet
seemed to take a long time reading that post. In fact, I think she
might have just dozed off. It was late, she had been drinking all
day, literally, and maybe she was just too stressed out to stay
awake. But, after a few minutes, she rallied and went back to her
laptop and her unfinished email.

“
Amy,
you are my best friend! We have both been through a lot. And, now,
I need your words, your friendship. I have done something I cannot
undo, even if I wanted to, which I don't. Swear to me you will
forever, upon ever, keep what I am going to tell you a secret. OK?
I'm waiting for your reply. I'll be up all night...Janet”

Janet
hit the Send button, finished off another can of beer and stood up to
make her way to the bathroom. Before she could get the door closed,
Amy wrote back.

To:
Janet Ashbury

From:
Amy Gingerhouse

Subject:
RE: My Hawaiian Vacation

Girlfriend!
I got you covered to the grave! Your secret is my secret! So,
what? Did you do it? Really? Was he unreal? Come on, I need all
the juicy, nasty details! It's cold here in New Hampshire girl! I
need a hot story!

~Amy

Janet
came back to the table looking a little pale. Quickly turning and
making it into the bathroom I heard her throw up again. I wanted to
tell her to lay off the beers if that got to be an inconvenience for
her, but apparently it wasn't going to be. She opened a fresh one
and washed away the taste.

Stumbling
a bit over to the rattan couch and stretching out there I watched her
closely. Maybe it was me, being all dead and such, but she looked
different. Different like something had changed, deep inside her,
something permanent. Her face looked more determined than I had ever
seen it. She put her booted feet up on the armrest and closed her
eyes to think.

So,
I joined her. I focused on my love, my bride to be, my best friend.
She was thinking about the night before, when she had talked me into
hiking to the crater. It was playing in her mind like a late night
TV show, slow but interesting enough to keep your eyes open. I could
hear it like it was happening all over again...

“
Come
on Jimmy, I swear it'll be fun.” She said it with a twinkle in
her eye that told me she was serious about that promise.

“
Janet,”
I was protesting. “It's pitch black out there, cold and you
want to go hiking across a restricted area to the edge of a
boiling
lake of lava
?”

She
looked at me with a blank gaze for just a second before pouting her
lips and swinging her hips. “I want to do it, there, by the
lava.”

I
didn't quite pick up on that for a moment. “Do what baby?
It's gonna be a long...” Looking at her while I said that I
finally figured it out. “Do it? You mean like get it on?”

She
walked up to me with a saunter that answered my silly question with a
thousand yeses. Her hands found my neck and brought my face close to
hers for a kiss. I closed my eyes, then felt her move away.

“
Come
on baby, get your jacket. We can share my flashlight.”

I
opened my eyes, a little hungry for that kiss. Like a puppy dog
chasing a bone I did as she told me, following her out the door.

We
were both dressed for hiking, having just finished a short one over
to the closed for renovation Volcano House. She looked up at the
stars once clear of the street lights. There were rivers of stars
sparkling brightly. The Milky Way looked to be a cloud stuck in the
darkness, the only one anywhere close. Our breaths were foggy
reminders of how cold it could get in the tropics with a little
altitude.

“
Slow
down Janet, how far is this crater?” She was almost jogging
ahead in the dark, flashlight scanning for the trailhead sign.

“
Two
miles. We can be there in forty-five minutes to an hour. I checked
it out earlier.” She stopped to wait for me to catch up to
where she was leaning against the sign: Hale'ma'uma'u Crater Trail.
“The restricted area sign is just a precaution. We can walk
right up to the edge. They even have a viewing area there, with
railings.”

I
remember those railings for some reason, but followed along in
Janet's memory as she continued her daydream. We practically jogged
along the trail.

That's
where I must have met those guys with the headlamps on their heads
the first time. They were all hiking out as Janet and I were going
in. It must have been almost midnight by then. I thought it funny
that their headlamps were turned to red, but one of them, I think it
was Pat, said it was because the Park Rangers would spot normal
flashlights. The comedian, Dave, said it was a $1000 fine to be
caught where we were all standing there, talking. They had pointed
up to the crater ridge, some 1500 feet higher and a mile away.

“
They
sit up there with infrared scanners, looking for people trying to
sneak up to the lava pit.” Pat said with a bit of adventure in
his voice. If not for that I guessed, they wouldn't be having as
much fun.

“
I
doubt there's any overtime in their budget for that,” the guy
Everett had said.

“
I
don't know about that,” John said. “Rescues can be
expensive.” He had looked at both Janet and I real hard. “You
guys be careful out there. Keep an eye on the wind. If it looks to
be shifting, the plume can get you in a moment.”

“
The
plume?” I asked.

“
Yeah,”
John continued. “The smoke, the steam coming up off the lava.
It's caustic. It'll burn your skin and your lungs in seconds. Not
to mention it's hot as hell too.”

The
airline guy, Tim, was watching us closely I remember. First Janet,
then me, then back to Janet. He seemed to be sizing us up. “Go.
Have fun kids!” he said. “I would if I were you,”
he smiled.

I
watched them march off, telling jokes too loudly and laughing like
people do when they've had a few too many beers. Or maybe laughing
like people who have just cheated death. I thought about that for a
moment and how similar those two sounds had always seemed to be.

Janet
pulled my arm and got me back on the trail. “Come on!”

The
trail was well worn from many years of tourist boots before the big
AREA CLOSED signs had gone up. We practically ran the last half
mile, Janet throwing off layers of clothing as we got closer. By the
time I got to the concrete viewing pad she was naked and standing
right up against the railing, facing me.

“
Right
here baby! Come get me!” Janet's beauty was a bit eclipsed by
the insanely radical movement of the plume behind her. It was a
dancing mix of orange and gray, twisting and falling, then plunging
upward with a ferocity that made me shudder.

Despite
my best misgivings I started to strip as well, thinking about the
stories I would tell about sex and the volcano.

At
this point my own memory was matching up with Janet's daydream pretty
well. But, after shedding the last of my clothes, I seemed to forget
how I got from being horny to being dead.

I
do remember walking over to Janet. She had now turned her back to
me, holding on to the railing and shaking her booty like some of
those dancers I had seen in Germany. The roar of the volcano was the
only thing that could keep me from hearing my own lust boil inside.

“
Come
on Jimmy,” she called out loudly, above the din. “Take
me like an animal, by a volcano, in the
restricted
area
!”

It
was coming back to me now. I do remember coming up close to her.
The plume was only yards away, a vertical waterfall of poison rushing
up to the sky in some perverse denial of gravity.

She
was wiggling her butt left and right and I was trying to grab her
hips. Just as I caught her firmly in both hands and thrust my hips
forward to meet her, she surprised me, that much I remembered.

Janet
was remembering as well. She was still on the couch of Cabin #94,
and she was crying now, her hands up to her face. I stayed focused,
though, focused on her thoughts and it soon became clear.

As
I had grabbed her hips, she had turned quickly and grabbed my arm. I
looked up at her, wondering why she was pulling me so hard to her
side? Then I got worried, that I remember. Worried that she was
playing too roughly near the edge, that we might both stumble in a
place you don't really want to stumble. Her other arm had me now and
she was pushing, pushing hard with all her strength, pushing me
against the railing.

I
was totally shocked - at the fact that the railing she had been so
seductively posed on had given way so easily, like it was rusted
away. In a second, even less, I was moving too fast to stop myself
going over. I felt myself falling and I looked up at her, afraid we
had both been foolish and gone through the railing, but she wasn't
looking at me. She was clawing at the edge, holding on against the
momentum she had used to push me...