Bones
by Daphne Garrido
They weren’t supposed to be here.
Dinah was a dipshit.
She’d been facing off with this bitch on TikTok, in a battle of depraved self-flatulence.
This was the worst she’d gotten.
Dinah had always felt the need to be seen as more than just some normal girl.
Telling.
She’d been digging herself deeper and deeper, into this pathetic hole of validation-seeking behavior. It was dumb.
The whole descent had been painful to watch for Cady.
The two had been dating for almost six months now. They had a little getaway planned to celebrate.
Cady would have been more excited, but something intangible had been souring within the rhythms of the relationship.
Perhaps it had been the moments like this — dragged into a graveyard in the middle of the night — having traveled half-across the country, being made to hold Dinah’s phone while she did a stupid dance in front of some supposed vampire’s grave. Having been yelled at for completely ruining the first three takes by not holding the camera perfectly straight. Criticized for having feelings about Dinah’s manic over-reaction.
If she only weren’t so hot and rich.
Cady didn’t see herself a superficial person. Deep down she wasn’t.
Still, Dinah was really hot, and what was wrong with being happy to see a future of financial abundance ahead of her?
Part of her knew though — if Dinah wasn’t these things, if she’d not had such practical benefits, if it didn’t make her feel special to be with someone so utterly stunning — she’d already have left this dumb bitch.
She didn’t even pretend to love Bella, Cady’s sweetest dog.
There was a notification on her phone.
Oh god. Hadn’t she turned these off.
This dumb boy she’d been friends with was obsessed with her.
He was making post after post about Cady. She’d been enjoying the schadenfreude of it all. A train-wreck she couldn’t quite look away from.
She didn’t even like boys.
It was quality entertainment all-around.
She swiped that off the screen real quick, getting ready for the next shot.
Dinah was doing her hair — it had gotten messed up when they’d made out between takes. The same way they’d always make-up after Dinah had blown her top. Never really acknowledging the problem. Her searching for any way to not hold accountability.
It made Cady feel like shit, and she knew she deserved better.
She didn’t know why she put up with it, to be honest.
God, she wanted to take that trip this Summer though. Dinah was going to fly them to Cabo.
Or, at least, her parents were.
Cady felt like she needed it more than anything.
The rain had started as they’d been making their way back to the car.
Dinah hadn’t remembered her coat, and so pulled Cady into a mausoleum. She’d pretended it was because she wanted to make out some more. But Cady had known she’d just not wanted to get her hair wet.
She’d take what she could get — she supposed.
Dinah always had her starving for it. She liked being a tease. Liked being an asshole to bring the dark side out of Cady.
It wasn’t the healthiest dynamic, Cady could admit that to herself. But she knew she was looking for something different. Something powerfully passionate and almost possessive. Even if it didn’t make sense with the other things she’d wanted. Or at least, wasn’t possible with the way Dinah acted such a fool.
They had a good time regardless.
The rain stopped but they had stayed — invested at that point.
It was usually here where they would find peace. In the aftermath. Not to last long, but little eyes of the storm.
Cady was feeling very relieved.
She’d been relaxing there, with her back to a wall of urns.
Dinah was already up and about. Sex just didn’t mean the same thing to her.
She was looking for a place to do another dance video, and Cady was taking a break from pretending to give a shit.
“Holy fuck!” Cady heard Dinah shout from down the passage.
“Get over here, Cady!”
Fucking hell. She groaned, picking herself off the floor, pulling her pants back up.
She’d found Dinah in the crypt beside a lone sarcophagus.
Somehow, already pissed off.
“I need you to get a shot for me.” She’d said, her head down in her phone, not bothering to explain what it was she’d been so excited about ten seconds previous.
“Of what?” Cady exhaled, exasperated.
“Of this!”
Dinah spun around and grabbed a lever on the wall, with her clumsy touch it budged.
“I want to see what this does.” She’d said, trying to be cute.
If only Cady wasn’t so sick of her bullshit, or this wasn’t the dumbest fucking idea she’d ever heard.
“Listen babe. I want to go home. I’m tired, I’m sore.” Cady told her honestly.
“Come on! This will be the last one!”
She didn’t even give a shit. Cady wasn’t able to run around like this. She’d had an intestinal disease years back that did a number on her body. The damage was permanent. It was something she had to live with it. And she needed rest.
“Come on, baby!” Dinah begged, dropping into her more sultry registers.
Fuck.
“Last one” Cady relented, pulling out her phone.
“Here use mine. Your videos suck.”
Their iPhones were one generation apart. It was the same fucking thing.
Regardless, Cady took her phone.
Dinah gassed up the TikTok audience real good. Putting on one of her most beautiful smiles. Those she’d reserved for no one and nothing but her own vanity.
Cady knew to keep her whole body in frame.
It was a thirst trap gimmick that Dinah insisted on. She’d actually given Cady a training session because she was so unhappy with the first videos she’d helped on.
Turning, showing off her fucking amazing body. She’d reached up and teased the audience. Because of course she would.
Then she’d pulled it.
The lights in the room had dropped. There was a sound of scraping concrete.
Loud, abrasive — seemingly all around them.
Dinah screamed like a child.
This bitch was going to climb up there.
Cady had been harangued and cajoled. Dragged despite her every protestation. Following Dinah on an extended trip into the underground passage uncovered in the darkness, against her body’s every instinct.
Stopping constantly to shoot videos.
Dinah had been so unreasonably frustrated when her live stream was interrupted, as cell service cut out.
Cady had talked her down. Convincing her they could just record the videos and post them later.
But this was her chance — you see. Dinah had been waiting for a shot at finding some trivial nonsense to go viral and elevate her influencer status.
This was a big deal.
So, here she was, in all her glory, literally climbing onto the biggest sarcophagus Cady had ever seen — who’s own phone was propped up for the much-needed additional lighting this darkened chamber beneath the mausoleum needed — preparing to do the the Renegade. Her favorite stupid dance.
This was a new low. In a history of lows.
Cady had a feeling in her gut this would be the undoing of their relationship. Unsure if she could look at Dinah again with any modicum of respect, or herself in the mirror for being with this vapid, brain-dead, twat.
No matter how hot she was.
Yet, the dance began. And it was nothing if not provocative, as always.
She’d done it a few times already.
Cady had assured her they’d gotten it the first time around. But Dinah liked to have her shoot things at least three times, just to be sure.
It was on the fourth try she’d slipped.
She’d fallen straight on her ass. Then rolled legs overhead, right off the sarcophagus, to the opposite side as Cady.
It’d taken everything within her not to laugh.
She’d made that mistake before.
There was no sense of humor in this one about herself. No grace given to anyone, for that matter, in regard to looking fit.
Humility was not a word in their vocabulary.
She was callous and mean. And there was no place within her to admit herself as anything but the greatest gem of humanity which had ever existed.
Even when she did shit like this.
It was in this moment. Trying to hold the urge to laugh at this dumbass girl she’d found herself standing beside. When a giant stone slab on the top of the sarcophagus, already cracked and rotted from decades spent in this tomb, began to crumble.
Huge pieces fell.
The largest one tumbling over end into a nearby pillar.
There would be a chain reaction that started here. A sequence of moments and decisions that Cady would play back in her mind for decades to come.
Dinah screamed like a hyena.
Sounds like you wouldn’t believe — not only Dinah’s, but of destruction — began reverberating throughout the room.
Cady was moving towards the exit before she could think.
One of the most relieving moments of her life; when she’d seen Dinah on her feet, rounding the sarcophagus, moving that same direction.
She’d not have waited.
They’d made it to the exit of the chamber, chunks beginning to fall from the ceiling behind them, crashing sounds causing them both to look back out of instinct.
It was then Dinah noticed.
Cady had left her cell phone — still propped up — lighting the space.
There was the briefest and most bizarre of arguments which took place in the following moments.
Dinah, uncaring of the mortal danger, disregarding the fact that only very secondary videos had been shot on Cady’s far inferior phone, would demand Cady go and get it.
It was this moment Cady left Dinah, in her heart.
That was enough, she’d decided.
Though she probably didn’t need to throw Dinah’s phone into that chamber, causing her to scramble after it like her life depended on it, getting her pinned by falling rubble, screaming for Cady as she’d bolted the passageway to safety.
But it is what it is.
It had been months now since the incident.
Cady had been in recovery from the post-traumatic stress of it all. Doing her best to integrate the lessons learned as she went back to work. Facing new and crushing changes to the system which put her own financial livelihood all-the-more in question.
It was a stressful time.
She didn’t have much space to think on it all.
The relationship really hadn’t been the one for her. Cady knew that.
Just having space from that mad woman was setting her free in little ways.
She’d found some sense of peace alone again.
It was a bummer, to let go of all those cool things go, she’d so seen coming her way in that future imagined. It had all seemed so exciting. Lavish ideas of traveling the world in style. Freedom from the grind.
She was glad she’d not have to do that all with Dinah though.
Maybe she’d get rich some other way.
She’d just have to think on what that could possibly be.
It had taken time, but she’d gotten settled into her own place. Finding new rhythms, without Dinah’s constant presence driving her life into chaos.
She’d gotten a new phone.
That dumb boy was still posting about her.
She was starting to feel kind of bad for him though. Lately, he’d devolved into singing songs about her. Some of them were actually kind of sweet.
One of them had even made her cry.
No matter how much Dinah had written her own fate. No matter how bad she’d truly been for Cady’s peace of mind. No matter how poorly she’d treated her throughout. She’d still been super hot.
Cady would be grieving for a while, a process you can’t put on a timeline.
But she’d get over it.
Maybe she’d find a cabin on the beach to rent this summer.
