"Al right, here give her this when she wakes up. It'll help with the pain." Jess handed Sal the medicine. She still had the hockey stick in one hand but was not holding it for 'just in case'. She had let Chad and Sal move Kris over to the couch.
"What are these?" Sal asked her as she looked at the medicine label.
"My mom's a doctor, relax it's nothing but a pain reliever."
"Alright, tell us how you are doing this?" Chad was getting impatient.
"Do what? I don't even understand what you are talking about?" Sal had filled her in on their theory.
"Oh, c'mon don't bullshit us, she is dying and you need to fix this." He yelled at her.
"Lower your voice alright. I only let you in because of your friend. You are kind of a douche bag, listen to yourself. I am writing a fiction, not your life story. I don't even know any one of you. This is crazy. You are taking a story way too seriously. Get a grip." Chad was quick to start an argument with his impatient and Jess seemed equally annoyed and suspicious at him.
"Just tell us what have you written next, just tell us the story and we'll be on our way." Chad, quite rudely, said to her just as Kris woke up.
"I haven't written anything after that." She told them.
"What!?" Chad angrily yelled at her.
"I am having a writer's block, that's why haven't been online lately."
"You--" Kris interrupted Chad before he completely loses his temper.
"Can I talk to you for a second?" She tried sitting up. Sal took Jess to other side of the room, before things get even more tensed between her and Chad.
"You have to calm yourself, I can't have you go crazy on me. We need her help you have to stop pissing her off." She took his hand as he sat beside her.
"Kris, I am scared. I lost Adam and I couldn't help him. I cannot lose you too. I'll do anything to save you. I don't like this either, it's just I don't know what else to do." He just hugged her not knowing what else to do.
"I am sorry about him, after Adam we are all a little scared and he's just a guy crazy in love. He's not such a bad guy really." Meanwhile Sal tired fixing the damage Chad's temper had done.
"Look I get that okay. And I would help you if I could but I can't. This is stupid, you must know that." Jess said to her.
"Just tell us what were you planning to write. Maybe we can figure something out." Chad said, now trying harder to be calm and polite.
"I really don't have anything, I am literally stuck."
"Alright what's your...process?" Kris asked her unsurely.
"I don't know, it just comes to me. I don't really sit with a pen and paper and start writing. I can't force an idea out."
"Well, you are gonna do exactly that now. Here!" Chad handed her a pad and pen and made her sit on the lazy-boy. Jess sat their confused and startled.
"Is he deaf?" she asked the girls.
"Look just try, please." Kris asked her and Jess reluctantly sat to write. An hour passed by nearing midnight and Jess had nothing. The three of them just did what any anxious person did. Sal was pacing back and forth, Kris lied back on the couch and Chad impatiently fidgeting sat next to Jess watching over her the whole time.
"This isn't gonna work." Jess broke the silence.
"Why?"
"Why?! Can you work when some loud insensitive jerk is constantly checking up on you." She angrily looked at Chad. He stood up rolling his eyes to sit next to frightened Kris.
Time passed away quick, they kept switching places and Jess sat at the dinner table a little far from the three of them but still close enough to keep an eye on them. She kept checking her phone in hopes of getting a call or text from her parents. She secretly texted Sam as well but to no reply.
"Jess.... Jess..." Around two in the morning Jess fell asleep after fighting hard not to. She slept while writing at the table. Kris tried to wake her up gently as to not scare her off. Sal and Chad kept taking short fifteen minutes naps in between.
"Huh?" Jess woke up panicked feeling abnormally hot.
"Why are you sweating? You okay?" Kris asked her. Jess grabbed a glass of water placed nearby.
"Did you write?" Sal joined them woken up by the noises.
"I... I don't know." Jess replied flipping through the pages from the pad scattered all over the table and floor.
"Are you okay?" Sal felt something wrong.
"I don't know." Jess replied massaging her forehead, she felt like thousand needles piercing through her head. She closed her eyes only to saw an unknown shadow walking towards her.
"Did you have a nightmare?" Kris asked her as she went through the mess of papers she had made.
"What did you saw?" Sal asked.
"I don't exactly remember." Jess answered.
"Okay, just relax. Take your time and try to think what you saw?" Kris sympathetically rubbed her shoulder.
"There was lots of blood, something or someone was chasing me and... and it was dark. I heard some weird voice, in my ear. I felt someone, some presence. Jess told them trying to remember everything she can. She frustratingly grabbed all the papers and got up.
"Did you write anything?" Sal asked her.
"You know what, since you three came; you've been making my life a freak show. It's only been what... three hours and look at me. I am having that nightmare again." She was clearly frustrated, she again looked at her phone hoping to see a reply or a call.
"Where is rude randy?" she asked them.
"I don't know, I fell asleep, woke and he wasn't here. Maybe he is freshening up." Sal told them
"Did you write anything or not. Just give us your notes and we'll be on our way." Kris asked Jess.
"I don't remember. It happens sometimes, I keep my diary close by all the time just in case and edit the stuff later." She told them. Chad joined them running down from upstairs.
"Where the hell where you?" Jess asked him.
"Just washing I used the upstairs bathroom, hope that's okay?" He looked at the girls looking at him weirdly.
"Did you write anything?" he asked Jess.
"Yeah... I mean maybe. Where is my diary? Spock!" Jess called out.
"Who's Spock?" Chad asked.
"My dog. He tends to hide our stuff when we are not looking." Jess told them.
"Let's look for him, spread out." Chad suggested and everyone followed looking around the house. Jess grabbed the hockey-stick back up. She saw Chad's dirty shoes messing up her house before running out to the yard. All she could think at that moment was how her mom is going to kill her.
"Spock?" Kris went to look upstairs as Sal and Chad went to the basement. Kris did not like the idea of her being alone to find a dog in this big house. Her fear of dogs was getting the best of her. She looked around the three rooms upstairs mustering up the courage every time as she opens a new door.
"Spock.... Spock?" Jess called out for her dog in the yard. She heard her dog's barking near the garden gnomes.
"There you are." She ran to him. Spock playfully ran around her, she looked at all the dirt he had all over his body. She saw what he was playing with in the dark. She turned on the flashlight on her phone to find her crisped and burned diary.
"What the hell?!" She picked up the cover to analyze it. "My story?" It looked like a rushed job, some pages were half burned. She tired reading whatever little words were still readable trying to make sense of the rubbish. She saw pages from previous chapters that she recognized quickly, she did find some new pages.
"I did write..." She said to herself. She had no recollection of writing or what she had written. She tried making sense of them, when Spock whimpered in fear and hid behind here.
"What's wrong?" She rushed her hand through is white soft fur to calm him. He angrily growled and ran to the basement window barking at something.
"Spock, Shh. Mr. James is going to complain again, shh." She ran after him leaving leaving the papers behind. She tried shushing him, grabbing his collar. Spock aggressively looked into the window growing but Jess didn't see anything.
"Spock, go to your house, now." Jess commanded and he obeyed her. Jess went inside and ran straight to the basement. She had gripped her hands tight on the hockey-stick, ready to hit anything that comes at her. She slowly walked down the stairs. She hated the basement, it was dirty dark full of spiders. She saw the dim bulbs her dad never replaced, turned on. She saw footprints near the stairs, footprints seemed like made from blood.
She moved to the boxes where the blood led her, her trembling finger gripped tighter around her weapon as she moved with courage thinking twice about her life choices. She just jumped in taking deep breath only to find Sally lying on the floor bleeding from her shoulder.
"Oh crap." Jess quickly dropped the hockey-stick and rushed to her aid.
"Oh my god, what happened?" Jess looked for something to cover her wound, to stop the blood loss. Sal tried talking but only cry of pain came out. "Just breath okay? Who did this?" Jess checked her wound, covering it with a nearby cloth. Sal's trembled fingers pointed to Jess's back, her eyes full of tears as she laid back crying in pain.
"What?" Jess followed her fingers, only to get hit in the head by a shadow.