Believer

-chapter one: high school memorial-

You don't give much thought to death when you're young, it isn't the biggest concern in your life. Especially with high school in the equation, a teen's biggest worry is friend drama and exams. Yet, when someone close to you dies, it's as though the concept of death and everything surrounding it comes crashing down on you—and that is exactly what happened Mackenzie. With the knowledge of Vanessa Evan's murder being the all-around town, it was hard to ignore. The family allowed everyone to say a final goodbye to Vanessa, though they didn't have a casket—the family decided to burn the body after it had gone through countless autopsies after the investigation began. It felt wrong to bury her back into the soil that her mangled corpse was found on. But the funeral was more a memorial for people to pay their respects. Everyone in town went, it was rude not to in such a small community where the population was no bigger than 30,000.

But it all felt wrong to Mackenzie, something about how...theatrical everything was didn't sit well with her when someone was actually murdered in the same woods she would run around in as a child. Not only that, but it was as though Vanessa could even build up a crowd from the after-life. It was no secret to the residents of Castlestone that Mackenzie and Vanessa weren't the best of friends, they never have been. Butting heads since kindergarten, the two girls always seemed to be at each other's throats. It was a mutual hatred—your average teenage rivalry. Yet, Mackenzie had been dealing with the whispers all summer, the countless rumours flying around on who people thought had something to do with the murder of Vanessa Evans. That was one too many steps too far for her, to start theorising about a local tragedy. But Mackenzie never voiced out her opinion on the matter, with a temper as short as her own she only knew that it would backfire. So, she put on a dress, paid her respects to the dead girl, before returning to her normal life. Mackenzie had moved on from the death, it was tragic and unfortunate but life had to go on, yet it seemed like no one else agreed with her. Three months after her death and school just about to begin another academic year, Vanessa Evans was still the talk around town.

It was a chilly September morning when Tristan came barging into her room, a grin etched onto her lips, sometimes Mackenzie wondered if it was permanently scorned onto her face. For as long as Mack had known Tristan Young, little had changed about her. Sure, she had finally grown into her head and she no longer put her hair into pigtails. But she always kept her bubbly personality. It was no secret to the town that Tristan was the golden child. Smart, caring, positive, upbeat and always out to help others. It kind of sucked at first, Mack couldn't help but feel as though she was in the shadow of Tristan, but the girl was almost impossible to hate. Even if Mack wanted to, there wasn't a bone in her body that could hate Tristan Young.

Or at least that's what she thought.

The blonde came barging into her room with a small portable speaker held in her hands. Some pop song that had recently topped the charts was playing through, but Mack didn't give it much thought as she dragged the pillow to cover her face and hopefully muffle the noise. But her peace didn't last long when she felt the pillow being pulled from her grasp, along with the duvet, and a grinning Tristan obscured her view when she opened her eyes.

"I'm going to kill you," Mack muttered groggily, her voice dry and hoarse from just waking up. However, her threat when straight over Tristan's head as she giggled and shook her head. She took Mack's hand and started to pull her off the bed, until she was half hanging of with her feet desperately trying to find something to anchor herself to the bed. Though her attempts were pointless as she soon waddled down the stairs into her kitchen, a piece of buttered toast and a cup of coffee laying on the counter. Mack smiled and shook her head, knowing this was Tristan's way of saying 'sorry for waking you up before noon even though you have no choice'.