The Freaks | Sally Face

Chapter 24: Blame

River's POV:-
As the boy's supported me out of the room, I continued to rethink everything that had just happened. I have just literally spoken to a lost soul, connected with her, experienced her life until she was tragically murdered by her husband. The whole experience was incredibly daunting and quite honestly made me feel really nauseous. I had to take a moment to breathe, I stopped the boys from walking when we were in the damp hallway of the fifth floor and slumped myself against the wall.

"You feeling ok dude?" Larry's brow frowns as his concerned look makes itself more apparent.

"Yeah honestly guys I'm fine.. just a really weird thing happened. I mean I just literally experienced death but not as myself, as someone else.. that's never happened before..." I rest my head against the wall, feeling the rough edges poke me slightly.

"Was it painful? Like did you literally feel the pain of it or was it like a mental thing?" Larry continues to ask me questions.

"Nah I felt the whole thing, was really nasty. Stacey was pinned against the mattress and the springs were the things piercing her skin. That's why the damn thing is covered in blood stains... poor thing was bleeding so much"

"That's fucked man. And you said her husband did that to her?"

"Yeah, it was really unsettling though. The way he spoke to her wasn't entirely human if that makes sense? It was really robotic and slow, deep and terrifying..."

"Shit..." Larry pauses and pushes back some loose long hairs that draped across his face. "But wait, can we all just take a second to realise our friend can fucking connect with the dead! That's pretty cool dude" Larry chuckles, attempting to make me feel better about what I've just been through.

I couldn't lie it was helping, Larry had such a funny way with words and his whole demeanour was such a different outlook on life and now... death. I mean, who in their right mind would believe me if I said 'oh yeah, I can see how people died?' No one that's who, no one other than my two best friends in front of me. Sal was unusually quiet, anything like this and usually he would be deep in thought or discussing the next step with Larry. I walk over to him, his body facing slightly away from me, was he anxious? I look down to his hands, them firmly locked into a fist as I could see his fingers digging into his palms. Was this a tick I wasn't aware of yet?

"Sal?" I speak quietly and look at Larry for some extra support. "You ok?"

"Yeah man, you're awfully quiet..." Larry places a hand on his shoulder.

"Yeah I'm good... Erm River, did anything else happen? Like what did Luke say to Stacey before he killed her?" Sal speaks, his voice cracking slightly.

"He called her a cheating slut, told her to rot in hell for what she had done and then chanted some weird sort of cult shit..." I feel a shiver down my spine after using the word cult.

"Cult shit? What do you mean?" Sal turns and his eyes widen.

"He said 'for we are the devourers of god' or something like that? Why does that sit wrong with you or something?" I raise an eyebrow, slightly concerned Sal was hiding something.

"No no..." he paused and avoided my gaze. "Hm, let's call it a night, we have school in the morning and we don't want our parents knowing we're snooping. Let's get you to bed babe..."

"Babe? Shit I knew you two were a thing now!" Larry chuckles but his expression drops slightly.

"Ok, let's head back down then..." I feel my chest sink. I knew full well something was effecting Sal deeply. Why wasn't he saying anything?

The three of us press for the elevator, silence filling the empty room as we descended back to our floor. As Sal and I got off on the fourth, we wished Larry home safely and waved our goodbyes. Sal walked me to my door and gave me a huge hug. Something really wasn't right.