The Shuddering

that if he was to be named after anybody, Tom Sawyer wasn’t a bad kid to have as a namesake.
    Jane was the one to step out of their embrace when Lauren came into view. She could feel Ryan’s gaze on the pair of them, sure that Sawyer’s girl was staring a hole into her spine. Jane flashed a smile at the pretty stranger standing next to her brother, sidestepping Sawyer to greet the girl she truly had no desire to know.
    “April?” she asked. Jane wrapped her arms around the girl in a casual hug, surprised at how small April was. Ryan and Lauren cast raised eyebrows at each other over April’s shoulder as they watched the exchange. Their shared glance made Jane feel awkward, but she was determined to be as welcoming as possible.
    “So good to meet you,” Jane told her, sounding a little too excited. She took a backward step, feeling as plastic as possible. “I like your coat,” she said, unsure how to continue. How’s it like to be with the guy I still think about? “God, sorry, this is Lauren.” She motioned for Lauren to come over.
    “And this?” Sawyer asked, standing threateningly close to Jane’s half-frosted chocolate cake.
    “That,” Jane said, stepping over to the island to save the cake from an early fate, “is not finished, so don’t even think about it.” She swept it up and moved it out of the way, placing it on the counter beside the sink.
    Jane was quick to notice the way April was looking around the place, sure she had expected some tiny two-bedroom shack in the middle of the woods.
    “Sorry,” Jane said, offering April an apologetic smile. “It’s…not really a cabin, I guess.”
    “Why are you apologizing?” Sawyer asked.
    “Because it’s embarrassing,” Ryan cut in. “This whole trip would be far more comfortable if we had rented a tar-paper shack.” He glanced at Lauren. “Complete with outhouse, so you have to go outside in the middle of the night.”
    Lauren rolled her eyes at him.
    “Don’t you think they should make a movie like that?” he asked her.
    “Like what?” Lauren asked. “A movie about an outhouse?”
    “Exactly. And every time one of the characters goes outside to use it, they end up being killed by a werewolf.”
    “A werewolf?” Sawyer bit back a laugh. “What the hell, why a werewolf?”
    “Lauren loves werewolves,” Ryan told him.
    “I’ll give you the grand tour,” Jane told April, too nervous to enjoy the back-and-forth banter.
    “Sawyer doesn’t need a grand tour,” Ryan told her. “Sawyer needs to come outside and unload his crap.” He nodded toward the door they had entered through. Jane watched the boys shuffle back out onto the deck. Looking back to April and then Lauren, she lifted her shoulders up to her ears with a smile. Boys.
    “So, Jane looks good,” Sawyer confessed, leaning against the back bumper of his Jeep as he lit up a smoke. “For being married, I mean.” He knew it wouldn’t come as a surprise to Ryan that Sawyer had checked his sister out; Ryan was, after all, theperson who’d supplied him with updates about Jane for the past ten years, something Sawyer was sure would creep Jane the hell out if she ever found out. Sawyer had tried not to ask about how Jane was doing for a while, and he actually held out for a good few years, but not asking had stilted conversations with Ryan to the point of embarrassment. Ryan was the one who eventually caved, giving Sawyer the occasional scoop without being asked: Jane was getting married; Jane was getting divorced.
    “Yeah, well…” Ryan joined Sawyer against the Jeep’s bumper, his hands buried in the pockets of his coat. “April’s more attractive than I imagined.” A droll grin spread across his mouth, and Sawyer laughed with a shake of his head.
    “Yeah?” he asked, smoke curling past his lips. “You thought she was going to look like Oona?”
    “Hey, Oona’s majestic.”
    Sawyer pushed away from the bumper and walked a few steps ahead before turning to face the cabin, taking a long drag off his cigarette. “So the old man is really selling this place?” he asked. “Why don’t you just buy it? You’ve got the money.”
    Ryan snorted at that.
    “Spent it all jet-setting?” Sawyer asked. “Let me guess, you’re already a quarter mil in debt?”
    “I wouldn’t buy this place if it was free,” Ryan confessed.
    “You know that’s bullshit.”
    Ryan shifted his weight from one foot to the other, his arms coiling across his