Haunted by the Past (Original)

Chapter 18

Just as I was walking past Wayne's locker, he saw me and grabbed my arm, pulling me out of the flow of excited teenagers headed towards the closest exit out of the school. I only just caught myself in time before I hit into the locker next to his.

"Jesus, what the hell, Wayne?" I pulled my arm out of his grip.

"You know what," he glared.

"Do I?" I raised my eyebrow inquisitively.

"Tell me you're not meeting that creep," he narrowed his eyes.

"By that creep, you mean Meredith's brother?" I questioned.

"So he says! We don't actually know its him!" Wayne crossed his arms and leant against the wall of lockers. "And even if it's really him, what do we even know about him other than he's some computer freak that hacks into private group chats?"

I shrugged, "He thought it would be weirder to contact us using Meredith's account."

"That's what I'm talking about! What kind of freak logins into his teenage sister's accounts!?" Wayne exclaimed.

"One whose said sister is fucking missing!?" I defended.

"I don't like him, Dani," Wayne's nose flared.

"That much is clear," I humored. "All he wants is to find his sister. Alive. So do I."

"But do you have to do it with him?" Wayne stressed. "You want to look for her tonight? Great, I'll go with you! Tell me where!"

I stared at Wayne. The whole Meredith situation had him completely and utterly freaked out. He spent much of his childhood watching his mother date douchebag after douchebag. Something happened with the last one. Something that resulted in police intervention. He never talked about it, but judging by his bandages following the event, I suspected he unleashed on the bastard. I knew he had developed an eye for scum, but when Meredith got taken so suddenly, every unknown became an enemy. On some level he blamed himself for not noticing the horror that stalked Meredith as if he had a chance of stopping her kidnapping.

"Wayne," I sighed. "We're not looking for Meredith. Well, not directly anyway."

"What's that supposed to mean?" he frowned.

I glanced around to see if anyone was paying attention to us, but everyone else was in a rush to get the hell out of the school as soon as possible. In a quiet voice, I clarified, "We're breaking into the school tonight."

"Nice. Smooth," he nodded.

"It's better than walking around forest shouting 'Meredith' and actually expecting her to respond!" I snapped.

"What do you think you're going to find that the police didn't!?" he argued.

"I don't know, but they could've missed a connection between the victims," I explained.

"So you're not just breaking in. You're also going digging around their private records," Wayne scoffed. "If you get caught, you're going to get suspended! Or worse! You might as well kiss all your dream colleges goodbye!"

"That's funny, coming from you," I mused.

"We all know you have the most potential in our little group and we all have high expectations of you to not fuck everything up, especially not for that freak," he emphasized while pointing at me.

"Thanks for your concern, I'll be fine," I rolled my eyes and walked away.

"Don't fall for that bad boy shit, Dani!" Wayne called out to me. "He'll mess up your life!"