She told me

Chapter 8

The next day, surprisingly, Maya is in class. Unsurprisingly, Cory is next to her. His arm stays around her for the entire first lecture. I feel a pang of jealousy. When I found a dead body, I got threatened and then had to lie through my teeth to my parents.

I place my tiny notebook on my desk. Its empty except for the two names scrawled across the first page. The first two victims. I needed to try to figure out a connection between them because it was obvious that they weren't picked at random. While they were both killed the same way, that was where the similarity ended. The killer had lured Karen to the woods to kill her, judging from the amount of the blood I'd found there, and Miss Wilson had been killed right where she was. There had to be a reason for that. A reason I had to figure out.

"Lucas"

I look up at Miss Carter who sighs, "I know these past few days have been hard for all of us but I really need you to pay attention okay?"

Maya stands up suddenly, "Ma'am can I be excused? I need to visit the ladies' room".

Miss Carter nods and after Maya leaves pauses for a few seconds and then closes the textbook on her desk, "you know what, lets end the class right here, I don't think any of you are in the mood to learn anything."

Everyone including me, files out of the class with Cory being the first one out presumably to go find his girlfriend. I stand in the corridor for a minute trying to decide what to do next. I settle on going back to the study room. It would be a good place to try to get my thoughts together.

Before I turn the corner, I hear familiar voices. I flatten myself into the corner instinctively straining to hear the conversation.

"I'm telling you babe, it'll work".

"No Cory" that was Maya.

Cory presses on, "it will never bother you again, you just have to trust me".

There's a pause then I hear Maya whisper, "I can't believe you even brought this up, you know why I won't do it".

"It's not the same thing Maya".

There's another pause, "I think we should take a break Cory"

"Are you being serious right now?"

"As a heart attack" with that she walks past me and out of the building. Through the window, I see her get into a blue sedan with an older girl who I assume is her sister.

I start walking away from my corner cause right now I really don't want to be Cory's shoulder to cry on.

Suddenly, there she is right in front of me, grinning like she just won the lottery.

"Looks like someone has a little crush" Mia says, "too bad she has a boyfriend".

"I don't have a crush" I roll my eyes, "also shouldn't you be studying for next week's physics test?"

"I am" Mia says, pulling her hands out of her sweater pockets, "I just saw you drop this and thought I should probably not let anyone else find your love letters to Maya".

She opens the tiny book, "let's see how many pages worth...." she freezes as she catches sight of the two names, "what is this?"

"None of your business for one," I shoot back, taking the book from her.

"Lucas, come on, you don't know what you're getting into"

"And you do?"

Mia sighs, "look if you insist on doing shit like this, at least let me help you".

Of all the things I expected her to say, that was not it, so I'm struck dumb for a minute.

"Well?"

"Okay"

Mia sticks her hands in her pockets, "so what do you have so far?"

I look around, "let's go somewhere a little more private".

She nods, "study room?"

"Yup"

Once we reach the room, I close the door behind us. Mia sits down at the table, "okay what exactly are you planning to do?"

"I haven't figured that out yet, I just want to know who is killing people"

"It could just be a random serial killer. Maybe Karen and Miss Wilson were, I don't know, easy to murder".

I bite my lip, "the words random and serial killer don't really go together. There's absolutely nothing connecting Miss Wilson and Karen except for the fact that they both spent a lot of time at this school."

"So, you're saying this was personal?"

"It has to be, this isn't someone picking random victims, this is someone methodically picking off people in this school."

"And this person most probably has complete access to the school".

"Which means they're either part of the students or the staff".

Mia looks at me, "you think someone else is going to get killed, don't you?"

"Not if we figure out who's behind the killings and stop them" I pause, "just to be clear when I say stop them, I mean call the police".

I see a flash of something close to panic cross Mia's expression but almost immediately it is gone, leaving me to wonder if I imagined it.

"It's a decent plan" she says, "I guess we need to map out the murders first".

I grin, "I've already done that, made a board and everything".

"Great, where is it?"

"At my house, we could go after last period today".

"Works".

She drums her fingers on the table, "we're actually doing this, we're hunting a killer".

"You don't have to" I say softly, "you can walk away"

"Why aren't you?" she whispers.

"Why aren't I what?" I ask although I already know what she's talking about.

"Walking away?"

I force a smile, "this is entirely for self-preservation, we don't know how this guy is picking off his victims and as of right now, it is entirely possible that I'm on that list".

She nods, "makes sense".

"Why are you doing this?" I ask, genuinely curious.

"Well, I can't have my tutor die before my physics exam, can I? still got to keep those grades up".

I chuckle, "yeah, you'll definitely fail without me".

"Don't give yourself too much credit Hill" she shoots back as she walks out of the room.

My smile at her retort fades as I hear the familiar voice again, "physics is so boring, like literally why would I care about all those stupid laws".

"Cathy?" I say, "where have you been?"

As per usual, she completely ignores me, "I need a chicken burger with lots and lots of fries and maybe a milkshake on the side".

I sigh and gather up my stuff, preparing to listen to at least an hour's worth of mindless jibber jabber.