Here's a Secret Nobody Knows

Here’s a secret nobody knows: I know who killed them all back then.

It was way back, I think. When we were all little kids, just out of school. We were riding the highest high of all highs; rich, cocky, dumb, and certain of our own immortality. We were young. Too young to drink, too young to drive, definitely too young to die.

But well. Death waits for no one.

There were five of us. You, me and the rest. There’s no point mentioning their names. Wouldn’t want to throw you out of joint again and they’re all dead anyway. It’s not like they care. Let’s just call them A, B and C.

Okay? Okay.

Summer vacation had just begun, if I remember correctly. We’d just graduated and determined to enjoy our last summer together before we had to split our little group up for uni. We weren’t sure exactly how to enjoy it, was the thing. We were bored. That’s where it all started. Never let yourself get bored, dear. Boredom is evil. It leads to terrible things, terrible ideas, terrible choices that ruin your life. Never let yourself be bored. That’s my advice.

But back to the story. I’m not sure who suggested it exactly. Might’ve been A, might’ve been B. Might even have been C. Who remembers that kind of thing? I certainly don’t. Anyway, they suggested it. You agreed right away, I remember that much. I was a bit hesitant, but I did too. The other two, whoever didn’t suggest it, were less willing. Created some dissent in the ranks, as it were. Kicked up a bit of a fuss. We convinced them, though, eventually, and off we all trotted, hell-bent on taking on one of the hardest hiking trails in the country.

Naturally, no one considered the fact that none of us had any hiking experience whatsoever. Nonsense, why would we? We were undefeatable. Ain’t no dirt path gonna take us down, am I right?

It was a quarter, maybe a fifth, of the way up that it started.

The killings I mean.

A went first, obviously. Why is it obvious? Well, why else would she be called A? Please don’t ask stupid questions, you know I hate those. Just let me tell the story.

Now, where was I? Oh yes, A. We found her body quite early on, I do believe. An hour or two after her death. It wasn’t particularly hard to find, I must admit. We just woke up one morning, went to fill up our water bottles and bam! There she was. Right there in the river, one arm around a rock like she was giving it a hug, never mind that her blood was all over it. At that time, we assumed she’d slipped, not being the shiniest crayon in the box, if you catch my meaning, but now that I think about it, she probably had her brains bashed out against that very same rock right? Probably bent over to get some water and then found someone send her careening into that rock face-first. Wonder what she thought in that moment. Her expression must’ve been hilarious.

We buried her, of course. What else could we have done? If we hadn’t we would have had to call the police station, answer questions, cancel our amazing, enjoyable, glorious hike… No, no, no. Far too tedious. Better to just put her in the ground, pretend we never saw her, and keep walking.

Next, as you may have guessed, was B. Now that one was less easy to catch. We found him shoved into the stall of a public toilet we’d come across. This was around five, maybe six days into the hike, and all of us had got understandably sick of doing our business in the forest. We weren’t savages. Naturally, when we came upon civilized utilities, we made eager and enthusiastic use.

Presumably, sometime in the night, B had felt nature’s dulcet call, and wandered off to the toilet with no hesitation. The next day, when we were waiting around, impatient to set off and finally realized we should probably check the toilet, well, there he was. Stuffed into the stall, all nice and tidy, blood dripping down the side of his head. Whoever was doing them in sure loved bludgeoning, huh?

Can’t believe I didn’t see it back then.

Anyway, we were less certain of what to do about that one. There were only three of us left, if you’ve been keeping count. Just you, C and I, and C was wobbly about the whole thing right from the beginning, if you recall.

It was blatantly clear by then that someone was doing this on purpose. One is an accident, two is a coincidence and three is enemy action, right? Well none of us wanted to be number three and find out.

Even so, we put B in the ground too, and carried on. Someone convinced us it would be a good idea. Can’t imagine who.

C was the last, although I’m not sure why I still have to say this.

Perhaps for clarity’s sake.

Anyway.

Somehow, C lasted quite a while. All the way up until we’d reached our last leg of the journey home. Clever guy he was. I always knew he’d outlast us all. I’m pretty sure the fact that he held out so long is the reason I-

Well, never mind.

No matter how long he lasted, it wasn’t forever. He came to us often, especially right after he’d been alone somewhere, claiming to have heard someone following him, that someone had tried to push him off a rather steep slope, et cetera. We just passed it off as paranoia. Not sure what else he was expecting from us, to be honest. We had our own skins to save.

Eventually, he turned up too, bright and early, right there in his sleeping bag with the insides of his head splashed out across the floor, like our murderous friend was particularly frustrated when they dealt with him. I understood, really. If I were trying to kill someone and they held out for weeks, despite my… ahem tender affections, I’d be irritated too.

We buried him too. We didn’t really have a choice at that point. A and B were already in the ground and if anyone found out, we’d both be accessories to murder, regardless of who’d actually done the deed.

Luckily, like I said, C had managed to hold out pretty long. Just enough that the murderer didn’t have enough time to plan and carry out another murder before we were out. I assume this was why we didn't encounter anything else on our way out... In any case, we both survived.

Now, it isn’t as though this all went unnoticed when we returned to the real world. A party of five kids of some fairly significant people went hiking but only two came back? No way that didn’t catch some attention. We were answering questions for days, about how A had sobbed saying it was too hard and left, how B had vanished, texting us about how her was leaving too, how C had gone ahead of us wishing for home… it was a good thing we’d worked out our stories before we came out, I’ll tell you that much. Whew. Almost as tense as the actual experience.

After that though, it wasn’t that hard. It was ruled a cold missing persons case, their parents visited a few times and we had to sob and sympathize accordingly, but other than that, it wasn’t too bad. Really. It was almost too easy to just put it all behind us. They sent us to therapy and college was coming up, afterall. A few corpses in the face of the rest of our lives? I know which one I chose.

It wasn’t until years later that I thought about it all again. ‘Years later’ meaning ‘now’ of course. It’s only now that I’ve been able to think objectively about it all and see all the things I missed back then.

Damn, I was really dumb back then, huh? It seems so obvious in hindsight.

So, that pretty much concludes this letter I think. I just wanted to chat about it again. I hear you’ve been doing well recently huh? Just wanted to remind you.

So here’s a secret that nobody knows: I know who killed them all back then and it. Was. You.