Kill Me Sweetly

Chapter 25

            Spinning around I saw Sam and Natalie both standing there staring at me with weird expressions on their faces; like I was about to grow horns or something. Shaking the thought away I held out the plate of brownies to them saying, “Look what I got, and they’re still warm so you might want to eat up.” The two of them just continued to stare at me, green and brown eyes full of distrust.

            I set the brownies down asking, “Okay what’s up, because on a normal night those brownies would have been gone already.” Once again all they did was just staring at me and watch all of my moves like I was some sort of animal display. Deciding that two could play at this game I collapsed onto my bed with my arms behind my head staring back over at them.

            The silence stretched on for minutes until I saw Natalie make a fast move and something landed on my lap. Picking it up I shook out the crinkles and read out loud, “The Masked Shadow, Our Town’s Savior, Does it Again,” folding the paper down so I could see them over the top I asked, “What, I agree with you guys, she’s cool, still don’t know why you’re acting so weird though.”

            Finally Sam spoke up, “Not the damn article, look at the picture Josey.” Staring back down at the article I saw a small picture of me that was grainy and had poor quality, the only thing that was clear was the mask on my face. When I didn’t say anything Sam stated, “That’s your mask, the one you took from Natalie like a month ago.”

            Trying not to panic I looked at the picture and said, “Yeah it kind of does look like that mask huh? That’s weird.”

            The paper was ripped from my hands and Sam shouted at me, “Of course it does because that is your mask! You’re the Masked Shadow aren’t you Josey?” I opened my mouth to deny it when she cut me off saying, “Don’t even bother denying it, all of the evidence is against you. The Masked Shadow is a teenage girl that is our age, with a mask that looks a lot like yours. In that picture you can tell that she has short black hair even if the quality is shit. I have woken up countless times to find you missing. Then the Masked Shadow showed up after you came to this school.”

            Damn, they really did their research on grilling me out here. Throwing my hands up in the air and standing I said, “Fine, I’m the freaking super hero of this town, but I don’t see why you two are pissed at me, I’ve been saving hundreds of people’s lives for the past few weeks, don’t you think it’s cool?”

            This time Natalie spoke up, “Well we did about two hours ago when we figured it out but here’s a question; where the hell did you learn all of this stuff? You must have had some kind of training to be able to take down guys two times your size, then in the articles it talks of different weapons that you have on you when you take people down. Knives, a flare gun, grappling hooks, you even have bracelets that apparently deflect knives aimed at you.”

            Shit they got me there, opening my mouth I quickly said, “Yeah I had some martial arts training and the gadgets are keep sakes from my, um, family.” That so didn’t sound convincing at all and it was obvious that they didn’t believe it either.

            Crossing her arms Sam asked, “So the orphanage gave you permission to take martial art lessons? What sort of orphanage would do that? And the gadgets are from your parents? Wasn’t your mom a teacher and your dad a plumber? Why the hell would they have knives and stuff and give them to their daughter before the age of ten since that’s when you ran away?”

            I must have looked like a trout since my mouth was hanging wide open at that; why can’t people just believe the lies I tell them? What the hell should I say now, only the truth at the moment would make the most sense and if I tell them that I’m an assassin here to kill someone living in town then they would so run me through with a shovel.