Fear Games

5. In Memoriam

EMERALD

Black. That was how that following Saturday morning started out, with everyone wearing black in order to honor the death of Kael's dear friend Freddy. I felt like it was pretty damn depressing to be wearing such a dark color for a funeral, but I understood why. This wasn't a beautiful moment. This was a time for mourning, a time to say goodbye to a dear friend, student, son. Even though no body had been recovered from the crime scene, they were able to take our first-hand accounts of watching Freddy die and declare him officially dead, especially based on the amount of blood they found. It was a terrible day, but we had to find a way to get through it.

For Freddy.

I stood outside the funeral home with Cinder, Kael, and Echo by my side. Despite everything we had been through, I was still kind of furious at Cinder for taking Colton away from me, but I knew it was stupid to let get in between our friendship. I just needed more time to be able to let it go.

My best friend reached out and grabbed my hand and said, "Are we really doing this?" She looked beautiful in her lacy black dress, which was almost identical to mine. Kael was dressed in a black suit, and their little sister Echo was dressed in a black top and skirt. We all looked nice. It almost made me feel bad that we looked good at our friend's funeral.

We shouldn't look nice saying goodbye to someone like this.

"I guess we are," I replied, taking a glance at her brother. "Kael, are you holding up alright?"

He just stared at the funeral home, like he couldn't pry his eyes away. I swear I didn't even see him blink. After a few seconds he said, "I just can't believe he's gone. He was one of my best friends."

"He didn't deserve what happened to him," I said. Now that everyone in the town knew about the Fear Games happening again, despite our Moms trying to keep it a secret, there was a lot of whispering going on about who the new killer might be. The police were told about Harlin helping the new Player, and his foster parents didn't seem at all phased. What I'd gathered from everything was that his foster parents weren't exactly the kindest people in the world, and Harlin eventually got sucked into the Game somehow. No one knew his exact motive, though. That was still being investigated. But at least everything was out in the open.

The problem with all of that was that the press were pretty much everywhere we went. Even now as we were standing outside the funeral home, there were at least four different vans from television stations here being held off by police, asking questions as people walked by. Thankfully they mostly avoided us, even though I knew they really wanted to get our opinions. Probably had something to do with the fact we were minors.

After what felt like eternity, our mothers met up with us. My mom put her hand on my shoulder. "You four okay?"

"As good as we can be," I said.

"Listen," Eden said as she pulled us together to form a circle. "I know today is hard on you guys. It's hard on a lot of people in this town, especially with news of the Fear Games getting out. But just remember that we're all okay and we're going to get through this together."

"I just wish Dad was here," Echo said.

Eden went silent and I could tell she was hiding something. I jus wasn't entirely sure what. She swallowed and said, "Daddy is going to be gone for a while, sweetie. It's just us now, okay?"

Echo looked like she was going to cry. Cinder said, "That's fine with me. Dad was a jerk anyway."

"Don't say that," Eden said. "He loves each of you dearly."

"Speaking of Dad," Kael asked, "why didn't Jax come to the funeral today?"

"He didn't feel that coming to your friend's funeral was in your best interest," Eden said. "Even though he's your half-brother, he doesn't necessarily feel like part of the family yet. So he let us have our time. Now, with all that out of the way, are you all ready to go inside and say your goodbyes to Freddy?"