Slash or Pass (Final Girls)

by Tylor Paige

This book is for all you Whorror Babies who’ve asked your partner to buy a Ghostface mask for… reasons. I see you boo. I got you.

Don’t talk to anyone. Don’t look back. Just run.

My bare feet slid in the thick mud of the forest. I was tired, but terrified. I had to listen to Kansas, my only remaining friend, and move.

I couldn’t see more than a foot in front of me in the pitch dark of the night. I was relying on him to see us through, despite him being just as beaten and abused as I had for so long. We were tired, our bodies and minds, but this was our one and only chance to escape. We had to keep moving.

I knew what he was thinking. We’d already lost Constantine; he couldn’t lose me too.

While he was only eleven, like me, he always seemed older. Kansas was smart and cunning, and I trusted him with my life. Without him and Constantine, I’d be dead already. I had to get back up.

No. Kansas was mine.

Oh, she had no idea how many secrets I kept.

The walls were brilliant maroon, and everything on the wall was black, creepy, or both. “It looks like The Addams Family moved in,” I teased her as she pointed out a few items. “Good! That’s the aesthetic I was going for.”

Eisley and I knew better than anyone that being outside in the dark was dangerous. You never knew what was out there.

“I know people don’t really get it, but⁠—” “Who cares? I love your videos. And if it’s paying for you to live your best spooky life, more power to you.”

There was so much more to it than that. I was already hers. We both knew that. I’d been hers since the day we’d been taken by the Family and tossed in a room together. We were so little, but I knew even then that I’d do anything for her.

I didn’t like asking about the gifts men gave her as much as she didn’t like me fucking other women.

My eyes traveled up her legs. She wore the same skimpy goth dresses and skirts she had in school. She looked way too sexy for a girl who didn’t like to be touched.

“You know what it means. Tell me, are you still pretending that you don’t want me as much as I want you?”

It wasn’t fair. We’d escaped the Minister. Constantine didn’t. And for that reason, we weren’t allowed to be together. She couldn’t be with anyone at all, not just me, knowing he died trying to save her. This was her eternal punishment for not going back. We could have saved him.

We had escaped. Constantine didn’t. She was right; but little did she know, there was one part of her story that wasn’t true.

This was why we were being punished. The Mother had said it was normal. How could it be though? There was so much of it!

“I hear that Eisley has become a woman.” Something about the way he said that word sent chills down my spine. What did that mean? I was a girl. Eleven. I remembered because that was the one thing they’d let us celebrate. Birthdays were important here.

This wasn’t new to either of us. We’d spent most of our teenage years in this awkward limbo of desire and doom. But, like all the other times, our need would pass and we’d move on, as if we weren’t longing for more, knowing it would never happen.

We just couldn’t find our footing. Last night, we fought, then she had her nightmares. She was still upset about my scars, and I was upset about her little poison garden she had in her backyard. We were one passive aggressive comment away from exploding.

“It means, you only want to know who I’ve fucked so you can guilt-trip me. You promised you’d save yourself; I didn’t.”

The two went back and forth, and tried to draw me into their jokes, but I couldn’t relate. I had to work for both my spot in school and the ability to afford it.

They seemed like decent guys, but I still hated them for their family’s wealth. Wealth I deserved.

Oh, darling. We didn’t have enough time to dive into that.

“I should have remembered. Now I feel even worse.” She put her head in her hands. “His birthday. God, I’m so stupid.” “You’re not stupid. It’s easy to forget.” “How old would he be now?” “Twenty-two, I think.” I pretended to not remember for sure, but I knew I was right. “He was a few months older than us.” “That’s right.” She nodded, and her eyes took on a distant look. “I remember. They served us cake.”

Bitterness boiled in my belly. Birthdays were the only things celebrated in the Family. It was a disgusting show, and if we knew then what we knew now about why they did the parties, we wouldn’t have been so eager to participate.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, but I ignored it. I knew who was texting this late, but he’d have to wait so I could tell him everything. And he could thank me later.

“If you let me collar you, you’d get so many treats.” He put his hand against the door, pinning me against it. My heart stuttered as he pressed me into me. “What do you say, are you a good girl?”

Over time, once the police were done with it, kids started using the church, the place I’d lived for the first twelve years of my life, as a make-out spot. As the original owner of the land was dead, no one could stop them from trespassing, so why not?

I was half a mile in when the large building took shape. From a distance, it was as I recalled when I saw it for the first time. It was a small church building with a large cross on its steeple. That was it. A church buried deep in the woods. Nothing… sinister. What a fucking lie that was.

Years ago, this had been our prison. Me, Kansas, and Eisley were in one room, and countless other children were separated into others. Today, they had laughed about them. These stupid rich kids. They didn’t give a shit about what their families did to us. Their kids were happy at home, safe, warm, and well-fed. These very ones.

They laughed and talked about Eisley as if she weren’t a person. Less dead. It would be them, that was less dead, not her.

“You fucking psycho!” she screamed, pointing at her fallen phone. “I’m live right now, and they’ll catch you, even with your mask.” I picked it up and put my fingers over the cameras. I raised it to my face. She was live, but no one was watching. How sad.

Why hadn’t they mailed it? It seemed so unprofessional. And creepy. Someone who knew about my traumatic childhood and wanted to use me to make money had been on my porch. Had they looked through my curtains? Checked out my backyard? Did they try the doorknob? The possibilities were endless, and I hated every dark thought.

I should have taken my meds. The little alarm rang in my brain, telling me I was wrong for not doing so, but I ignored it. I hated the pills.

I opened it and reread it carefully. It was all there, including my shaky, childhood signature. Someone had found my wedding license to Constantine.

“The Minister has decided. The three of you will be bathed. The three of you will be dressed. And two will be married.” I woke up with a jolt on the couch. The words she’d left unspoken screamed in my head. And one will be murdered.

My mind went blank as I stared at her screen. There, smiling, laughing, and clutching the necklace with his wedding ring on it, was a handsome man with black hair and blue eyes. He was talking to someone slightly off-screen and then turned to face the camera. Constantine.

Little Eisley was all grown up.

My cock throbbed as images flashed in my head of her in her little goth kitchen, brewing tea and talking emphatically about whatever cutesy little baking thing she made that day.

She’d grown up to be so fucking beautiful. So sexy. And smart. She knew what she had and used it to make money. I’d seen her bank account and the house she lived in. She was making a killing as a cam girl. A ...

When I’d first seen her pop up on my phone while doom-scrolling, it was a pleasant surprise. I’d always maintained that I’d come back for her, but to observe from a distance like this was… hot. I felt almost like a voyeur, watching the videos of her doin...

She was a minx, a tease, and the sexiest thing about her was that she was still a virgin. I co...

“Who is this?” she demanded. “Is that how you speak to your husband after all these years?”

“I always knew you’d be pretty, beautiful even, but sexy? God damn, Eisley.”

My heart tore at the crack in her voice. She’d waited for me, despite thinking I’d been dead for the last ten years. If she was being lied to about who I was, it’d crush her. Thankfully, it was me. The boy she’d spent five years in solitude with. The boy who protected her, held her when she cried, and eventually helped her escape.

This wasn’t the first time I’d been here. I’d seen every inch of her house. I’d come and memorized where every room was for this very moment. I could tell exactly where she was.

“Are you my ex?” she asked. “Because last time I checked, we’re both wearing our rings.” At

I shoved her panties down and ripped her thighs apart. Her hands went to my mask, but I glared at her. A low guttural growl came from my throat, and she dropped back down onto the pillow and released me. I adjusted the mask slightly lower, but kept it off my face so that I could eat her beautiful pussy as much as I wanted to.