The Other Side

Chapter 16

As she turned the corner, she stopped dead.

There were police gathered in the hallway by her locker.

Lenore shrank against the wall.

What the hell are the cops doing here?

One of them, a tall, burly man with close-cropped hair, noticed her and narrowed his stare. Lenore swallowed and darted away, back around the corner.

If you had to list out all the people in Eden that didn't like her family, the cops would be at the top. They had set their sights on her Aunt Alice soon after the Harris twins went missing, but after she disappeared, too... They—and the rest of the town—turned their ire on the remaining members of her family.

Lenore, fortunately, had been too young at the time to be really dragged into their investigation, but she remembered the fearful tension that took hold of the house every time they showed up to ask more questions.

It had been years ago, but the feeling was still as fresh as if it were yesterday. She shuddered, trying to loosen the anxiety that had wrapped itself around her chest. She was overreacting.

And anyway, she tried to convince herself, why would they be here for her? These were small-town cops, hardly the proactive kind. The Harris case had long since gone cold and she had been too young to remember much anyway. It was more likely they were here for some assembly she'd forgotten about, or—

The bell rang overhead. Lenore swore under her breath. She still needed her books from her locker. She had left them there yesterday, but there was no way she was going to walk past the cops to go get them.

Cursing again, she ran off, empty-handed.

Her first class of the day was History, another class she shared with Victor. She hoped she'd run into him there and she might get a chance to speak with him before class started.

As she stepped inside the classroom, she scanned the rows for Victor's usual seat and her shoulders sank when she realised he wasn't there. Another flurry of anxiety rose up, and Lenore did her best to shove it down as she hurried to her usual spot.

Once seated, she turned and watched the door for Victor, hardly noticing the other students until a few took their seats nearby.

"What do you think the cops are here for?" one of them asked his friend in the spot beside Lenore.

Lenore perked up. So, the other students were just as confused by the cop's arrival as she was, then. Guess there isn't an assembly...

She kept her eyes on the door but left her ears open.

"Probably an illicit student-teacher relationship," his friend replied with a dopey laugh. "Cougars are super hot right now."

A third kid snorted. "Don't be dumb. The only cougars 'round Eden are the ones that sometimes pass through the woods."

"You think it's drugs?" the first one said, a low-voiced boy with hooded eyes. "I-I mean, I bought some weed from Reese last week..."

"They don't care about weed anymore, man," the third kid said.

"Maaaaybe," the second guy drawled, "they finally found the bodies of the Harris dudes."

Lenore winced. They shouldn't joke about that.

"Gross, dude," the third one said. "And even if they did, why would they stop by the highschool? There's nothing related to the crime here anymore."

"Well," the low-voiced one countered. "Not nothing."