"NO!" Melanie tried to pushed her away. "Oh you want to fight!? You'll pay if you do!" Rhonda grabbed her by the throat and pushed her sideways. "Stop it...!" Melanie gasped for air, trying to keep from going over the side as Roxanne had.
"It's your call, Haddix; you can either be stabbed or fall to your death. The choice is yours. Or, we can do both," Rhonda raised the knife high and started to bring it down, Melanie desperately grabbed her wrist in midair and strained to keep it above her face. She was slipping backwards from the forced of Rhonda's grip, however, and knew she was going to fall out of the chair anyway in a minute. "Please, God, don't let me die here!" she mouthed to the Almighty.
"God can't save you, Haddix. Rick is mine, and you're paying for taking him from me!" Rhonda roared, forcing the knife ever closer to Melanie's face. Melanie knew it was now or never to save her life. She quickly swung her legs up and started frantically pushing against Rhonda's chest, which did drive her back a little bit. "You're not getting the edge on me, Haddix!" Rhonda strained against Melanie's feet, pushing the knife ever close, "This is the end...!"
"NO!" Melanie pushed her feet into Rhonda's chest with all her strength. It was then that the ski lift jerked to a sudden stop, and that, plus the force of her push, sent Rhonda tumbling backwards-right out of the chair and down into the abyss below them. "OH MY GOD!" Melanie gasped in horror, clapping her hands to her mouth, listening in shock to Rhonda's scream echoing down the chasm, but not daring to look down, "OH MY GOD, WHAT HAVE I DONE!?"
Stunned, she sat frozen in horror until the lift reached the top of the mountain. "Honey are you all right!? We got the alert you were being..." the attendant at the top tried to say, unlocking the lap bar. With a sob, Melanie pushed past him and started running down the ski slope, tears running down her face. All she wanted now was to just get away from the resort, and the horrible memories that had started piling up there.
"Melanie, it's Rick, can I please come in?" came his worried voice from outside her hotel room.
"No, I want to be alone right now, Rick!" she cried, sobbing hard into her pillow.
"Melanie, it wasn't your fault..."
"I killed her, Rick! I'm not worthy to be with you!"
"Marti, give me your room key," Rick mumbled outside. The room's door swung open. "Melanie, I know how horrible you feel," he approached the bed slowly, "I know you don't like to see people hurt, even bad ones. But she had a knife in your face; if you hadn't fought back, it would have been you at the bottom of that cliff."
"I still killed her, Rick!" she wailed in grief, "My whole life, I've been told to respect human life and never harm anyone! Now I have a murder on my name! I'm a killer!" she raised her head and stared in horror at her hands, "I can't live with myself knowing I've done that!"
With a sob, she slumped back onto the pillow and cried harder. "Melanie, listen to me," Rick seized her head and turned it towards himself, "It...was...self...defense. She intended to kill you; everything you did was fully justified. You're still the same sweet, innocent girl I've fallen in love with, and I know God forgives you as well. Understand!?"
"Well...yeah, I guess so," she nodded softly, wiping at her eyes, then choked up again. "But Carol and Roxanne are still dead because of me!" she howled, burying her face in her hands, "If I hadn't been playing detective since I got here, they wouldn't have targeted Carol, and if I hadn't been bent on trying to get Roxanne's mind off her sister's death, she'd never have been on that ski lift chair with me! Even if what happened with Rhonda wasn't my fault, those are! I'm a disgrace to myself and...!"
"Stop, please!" Rick pulled her into a hug, "You know that's not true, Melanie! God, you know that's not true! Carol's dead because of that psychopath who waited in the bathroom for her, not you, and it's only Rhonda's fault that Roxanne's dead! You've done absolutely nothing wrong all week, you hear me!?"
"I guess...I don't know!" she sniffed, "I just want to go home and climb into bed for a week, and forget this whole trip ever happened!"
She buried her face in his chest and sobbed hard again. "It's all right, Melanie, it's all right," Rick patted her gently on the back, "Everything's going to be all right."
He pulled back for a moment to give her a kiss, then hugged her close again. "You going to be all right now?" he finally released her.
"Yeah, I think so now," she nodded, grabbing for a tissue on the nightstand and blowing her nose.
"Would you like me to stay with you a while?"
"Yes, Rick, please stay," she nodded again.
"OK, I'll stay right here by your side as long as you want," he sat down on the bed next to her and put his arm around her. "Your friends are still outside; can they come in?" he asked her, planting another kiss on her forehead, "They've been worried sick about you too."
"Yeah. Guys, you can come in," Melanie called towards the door. It swung open, and the other girls all rushed in. "Are you OK, Melanie!?" Marti swept her up into a hug of her own, "I was so scared for you when I saw Rhonda draw that knife...!"
"I thought I was a goner too, Marti. I tried to save Roxanne, but everything moved too fast..."
"You did what you could, Melanie, so don't feel guilty," Sydney told her, deep concern on her face, "You want anything? Anything we can get for you or do for you?"
"I just want to go home, Sydney. I've had enough up here, and I don't want to play detective anymore."
"Thank you, God," Emily whispered in relief at the foot of the bed. "Oh, sorry," she apologized when Melanie gave her a strange look, "It's just...well, you know how I am. But I'm glad you're all right, Melanie," she sat down next to her and gave her a sympathetic look, "I know we've fought a bit this week over your curiosity and everything, but I like you a lot as a friend, and I'd hate for anything bad to happen to you."
"You're a great friend too, Emily. And I don't want to see anything bad happen to you or the others going forward. Sophie," Melanie turned towards the hotel owner's daughter in the doorway, "How soon till the roads are cleared?"
"The county's still plowing; probably another two of three hours. I can let you know. I've got to go back to work now, but I'll pass along the information when it's confirmed," Sophie told her, "Feel better soon, Melanie."
"On your way, stop by Room 211 and tell Patrick I want someone on guard at this door until Melanie and her friends leave; no one comes in without screening," Rick asked her.
"Will do," Sophie left the room. Melanie exhaled in relief. "Almost over," she sighed, slumping her head against Rick's shoulder.
"We'll get through it," Marti dragged a chair over to the left side of the bed, sat down in it, and took hold of Melanie's left hand. "It's going to be all right, Melanie; we're with you to the end of this."
"I'd appreciate it if you guys would sleep over again tonight when we get back home; I don't think I want to be alone tonight," Melanie asked her.
"No problem at all, Melanie," Sydney dragged another chair over to the right side of the bed and took hold of Melanie's other hand, "We'll stay with you as long as you want company, today, tomorrow, whenever, we're here."
"Yeah, we're all here for you, Melanie," smiling, Emily, with no other chair readily available, sat down on the bottom of the bed, "You're not alone, and you won't be alone."
"Thanks," Melanie broke into a grateful smile, "I may have said it before, but the three of you are the best friends a girl could ever ask for-and you're the nicest guy a girl could ever ask for," she turned the smile to Rick, "Thank you for all your kind words, Rick."
"Just keep telling yourself it's not your fault, Melanie," he kissed her on the forehead again, then pulled her close, "I'll be there for you when you get back to Shadyside too, don't you worry about that. Just relax, and don't worry."
"I love you, Rick Lewis," she told him, snuggling into his side.
"I love you, Melanie Haddix. Keep showing me your beautiful smile," he started stroking her hair again. Melanie exhaled happily and closed her eyes. She felt relieved that no one held Rhonda's death against her.
For what seemed an eternity, she sat there, leaning against Rick with her eyes closed. No one else in the room spoke, and it was quiet in the hallway, giving Melanie a much needed sense of peace. Rick continued stroking her hair, and Marti and Sydney would occasionally give her hands a squeeze, but otherwise it was still around her. Finally, the silence was broken by a cough from Emily. "Sorry. Well, it's about five now," she turned to the clock on the nightstand, "If the roads are even remotely passable, we ought to get going now while the getting's good."
"Um," Sydney rose up out of her chair while keeping her hold on Melanie's hand and stared out the window, "I can see the plow truck up the road, but they're not quite here yet. So probably another fifteen minutes to a half hour, Emily."
"Well, we should probably start packing up then; if we..." Emily was cut off by the most horrifying of sounds: an explosion on the other side of the hotel. "Oh no!" the brunette gasped, toppling off the bed in shock, "Oh no, don't tell me they're using explosives to kill people now!"
"That sounded like it was the main offices...Sophie might have been...!" Marti was too horrified to finish the sentence. In a flash, everyone in the room rose up and bolted for the door. Melanie grabbed her high tops off the floor and slipped them on before rushing after everyone else, terror sweeping through her. If another friend was now gone...
She raced up the hall, screeching to a stop with everyone else in the back of the large crowd gathered around what had once been the north side of the hotel. A large gaping hole in the wall stood there now, with hotel staff members sifting through the debris. And it was in fact now that two of them grimly bent down and picked up from amid the bricks...
"Sophie...!" she whimpered grimly. The other blonde was limp and bleeding, and clearly not breathing from what Melanie could see. Moments later, the man holding her head put his hand to her chest, shook his head, and waved for a sheet. Melanie could take no more. With a soft gasp of grief, she turned and ran as fast as she could towards the hotel door, her hands over her mouth to keep from throwing up. She had to get away from the hotel, before anyone else was killed...
It was snowing hard again outside, limiting Melanie's visibility in addition to the gathering darkness, but she didn't care. Her eyes flooding with tears, she ran hard across the parking lot, into the woods, across several now empty ski slopes, and didn't stop running until she was too tired to go any further. She collapsed to her knees in the middle of the thick woods she'd stopped in, threw up, and started sobbing uncontrollably in grief. She was freezing cold with only her Lawrenceburg varsity jacket for warmth, but she couldn't go back, not when she had brought this on Sophie and everyone else. She had to get away to save them...
"SHE WAS SEVENTEEN!" she screamed in anguish at the snow-filled sky, "SHE HAD HER WHOLE LIFE AHEAD OF HER! CAROL AND ROXANNE AND EVERYONE ELSE HAD THEIR WHOLE LIVES AHEAD OF THEM! THEY WERE GOOD, CARING GIRLS; WHY DID THIS HAVE TO HAPPEN!? I'VE BELIEVED IN YOU MY WHOLE LIFE, I'VE DEDICATED MYSELF TO FOLLOW YOUR WORD; HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN UNDER YOUR CONTROL!? HOW COULD YOU LET THE DEVIL GET AWAY WITH DOING THIS!?
There came a sudden crunching of footsteps in the snow behind her. Melanie turned and screamed to find that there were several ominous figures in black from head to toe behind her...and in front of her...and on either side. "How could the devil do this?" snickered one of the largest figures, stepping forward from the group, "Because we do his work and do it well. And the devil says to finish you as horribly as we can."
He lunged towards her. Screaming again, Melanie ducked him and turned to run. She managed no more than a few steps, though, before the figures converged on her and grabbed her. Her arms were pinned roughly behind her back, and huge hands started choking her. She gasped desperately for air. "I've got to be brutal here whether I like it or not if I want to live!" she told herself, and thus delivered a hard kick backwards that made her captor howl and release her. Melanie repeated the kick on the figure choking her. He released her too. She dove rapidly to the ground under the legs of the other figures and took off running as fast as she could...
...when suddenly, the ground gave away to nothing underneath her. With a loud cry, Melanie fell down through space for what seemed an eternity, finally landing with a hard crash on a rocky surface. Instantly, the most horrific pain imaginable ripped through her leg. Melanie gripped hold of it with an agonized yell. It was badly sprained, she knew, and at the worst possible moment. She'd made a horrific mistake running out here on her own...
She heard the figures coming and looked up to see they'd gained ground on her rapidly. Gasping, she stumbled to her feet and tried to run again, but her leg gave out almost immediately, and she fell flat on her face into the snow, too injured to walk, let alone run. Seconds later, the figures were on top of her and were grabbing at her again. "NO, LET GO OF ME!" she shrieked, struggling to get away and praying she was still close enough to the hotel for someone to hear her, "HELP, SOMEBODY, PLEASE...!"
A hand was clamped over her mouth to silence her. It was a split second later that she was hit hard on the head, and everything went completely black...