During my daze, somebody took a seat to my left, bringing the strong smell of cologne along with him. It nearly choked me in its tight grasp and was enough to jolt me awake.
"Quincy," he smiled.
I turned my head and met those infamous blue eyes. Taron Clemente.
His long legs were crossed and he stretched out his body along the pew with his arm snaking behind my head. Kingsley lifted himself from my shoulder.
"Hello," I greeted carefully.
"How are you?" He asked and looked at me through those thick lashes.
"I'm fine, how are you?" I countered.
He smiled wider and shrugged. "Very good...very good..." his words trailed off and I realised that without the heat of a party and the surge of kisses, we had nothing but awkward tension.
After a moment, he continued. "So, about Felix..." he began.
I raised an eyebrow and felt as Kingsley tensed beside me.
"Have you...you know, read the note?"
I nodded, yes.
"So you know that you're in it?'
"I do," I frowned.
"Well, are you alright? Has anyone come up to you about it?"
I furrowed my brows and the tips of Felix's ears tinged a light pink, obvious to see against the milky white of his skin.
"Are you expecting somebody to come up to me?"
He lifted his hands instantly in surrender, laughing it off forcefully.
"Of course not," he cleared. "I was just wondering."
I would have replied if not for the sound that interrupted. It was a loud bang and shouts that echoed through the church halls, coming from outside. By now, I'd assumed everyone had left. Obviously, that wasn't true.
I looked to Kingsley first, he pulled at his fingers, clicking them. A nasty habit, I'd noticed.
Then, I turned to Taron who got up slowly. "You should probably stay here, I'll check to see if it's alright."
I scoffed, "As if."
Together, we glided to the doors and opened them, instantly greeted by the smell of fresh rain as it drizzled on that underneath. Then, I saw a boy, one that I recognised.
His curly hair looked a whole lot messier today than the night at the gala and his pink lips turned down into a scowl. The dark skin of his face had tinged a red from the flare of anger that had erupted through his trembling form.
I'm sorry, Atticus. I slept with you because I could. That's it.
Atticus, the boy I'd found Felix with the night of the gala. His body was tense while standing next to a car, shouting into the rolled down window of the driver's seat. I couldn't see who was inside but it was tense. Atticus bent down to be at eye level with the driver, his arms crossed stiffly. From his crumpled features, I could tell he was holding himself back.
"You take that back!" He yelled at the car, pointing a finger now and narrowing his eyes.
Taron pulled me behind him and walked forward. I resisted the urge to roll my eyes at his need to protect, or rather control, me.
We neared the car and the anger that radiated from Atticus was clear and burning. What I didn't expect to see was who was in the car. Hadiyah Kammal.
She looked beautifully tragic. Her eyes were red around the edges and cheeks swollen with mascara running. Her hair had been pulled into a neat bun at the nape of her neck while soft tendrils cascaded down at the sides of her sharp face.
"What the fuck is going on here?" Taron called, the unnecessary swear made me wince. It was as if he was trying to be his father, forcing it in as a way to show some authority. He stepped between the pair and threw a glare at Atticus, Taron's abnormally tall height towered over.
"I'm being accused of some outrageous shit," Atticus pointed over Taron's shoulder and to Hadiyah.
"I'm not accusing because I know you damn well did it!" She retorted, voice equally as loud and piercing.
"Oh yeah? Have you got any proof of that, bitch?" Atticus took a threatening step forward, bumping into Taron's chest. Taron responded by placing two large hands onto his shoulders and pushing him away.
Taron ducked his head down to look Atticus in the eyes. "Let's calm down, yeah?" He urged in a dark voice.
I turned my head and met Hadiyah's gaze. Her eyes were heavy with tears and I felt my face soften. Now she'd lost Kingsley and Felix, she didn't deserve it.
"What are they arguing over?" Kingsley asked from beside me but I didn't dare ask.
The air was tense around us and I didn't want to break the scene in front of me too early.
Atticus shook his head back and forth lazily, his fists clenched and eyes trained up into the sky. His chest heaved with breaths to calm himself and it seemed to be working.
Slowly, as if I were a deer in front of prey, I tiptoed to Hadiyah's window. She still faced forward with a blank look on her face while letting her tears fall freely.
"Hey," I began and my heartbeat wildly. "Are you alright?"
Unlike at the party, this time when I talked to Hadiyah, I was being genuine.
Hadiyah opened her mouth to answer when Atticus beat her to it. "She told me that it was my fault Felix killed himself."
I ignored his calls from behind me and placed a shaking hand onto the girl's shoulder. She looked up at me with glassy eyes and my knees wobbled. The emotions today were at an all-time high and dealing with them was painful.
"Y-yeah," she stuttered. "I'm alright."
Then, a hand grabbed my shoulder, pulling me around to face Atticus.
"I know you!" He roared. Something in my chest cracked, he remembered me.
"You were the one from the gala, weren't you? The night when Felix mysteriously 'fell' leaving the whole back of his head bleeding out." He bared his teeth at me. "That was you, wasn't it?"
For once, I was speechless. This wasn't a conversation I was ready to have, especially caught so off guard. His brown eyes, almost black, bored into mine and I felt him crawl into my thoughts, poisoning them. Time seemed to slow as he waited for an answer; an answer I didn't have.
"This bitch is blaming me for the death but it was probably you who's to blame," he bit out and Taron shoved him. It was harder than he had last time, causing Atticus to stumble backwards, winded.
"Take that back!" Taron snarled. He rose to his full height over my cowering figure and I couldn't help but feel pretty pathetic behind him.
"No." Atticus crossed his arms over his puffed out chest, doubling a glare right at me. "She's in the note, it's so obvious."
"That means jackshit," another voice added. It was Arlo. She must have seen the commotion and joined us.
"I wouldn't be surprised if she killed King-"
Taron stepped forward with his arm back ready to punch. With my heart in my throat, I grabbed onto Taron's elbow and pulled him back. Even if everyone had left by now, the last thing I wanted was a fight at Kingsley's funeral. I wanted even less to be in the middle of it. Death would've been angry.
Atticus stumbled back a few more steps and his lips pulled into a thin line.
"Piss off," Arlo yelled over to him.
"Who put a penny into you, hello kitty?" He called cruelly and this time it was my turn to be pulled back.
My skin burned with the anger that had festered dangerously inside me since meeting Kingsley. My nails dug into the palm of my hand and I gritted my teeth. The drizzle of rain fell onto my skin but not even that diminished the anger. Not even when Taron murmured calming words in my ear or when Kingsley put a hand on my shoulder did I calm down. I couldn't. The beast had been released from the cage and even if all my anger wasn't targeted at Atticus, I was seeing red now.
I would have broken free from Taron and Arlo's grip if it wasn't for the sound of a car starting behind us. Hadiyah's face was still void of emotion but she'd wiped the makeup away from under her eyes.
She reversed forcefully and swung the car around carelessly. It all happened too quickly as she changed gears and drove forward, straight into Atticus. He descended to the floor, groaning from the collision and clutching at his shirt.
Nobody said a thing.
"Fucking hell," I breathed and that pushed us into motion.
Arlo and Taron ran to the boy on the floor whose eyebrows furrowed from the pain. A sick part of me deep down thought that he deserved it but I repressed those thoughts and slipped into the passenger seat of Hadiyah's car.
I stared at her face that hadn't made a move. Her eyes remained forward, hands on the wheel and the soft sound of the car radio tumbled from the speakers.
"Oh my goodness," she sobbed, catching it in her hand.
Something happened at that moment. She broke. Her body crumpled as she folded her legs and buried her face into the car seat. Hadiyah sobbed into the leather, wailing loudly above the sound of Arlo on the phone outside to an ambulance.
"I- I didn't mean it," she cried and put her hands over her face. "Oh my gosh, I've killed him. I c-can't believe I did that...I- Oh my gosh."
I reached over and rubbed circles along her arm, hoping it was somewhat comforting. "It's okay, I understand."
"He said all those things about Felix and I... I'm so stupid. I can't believe Felix cheated on me with him and I didn't even notice and then he said-. Oh my-"
"Shhh," I whispered reassuringly. "It's going to be okay, don't worry."
"Quincy," She broke into another painful sob. "I ran somebody over in my car! How is this going to be okay?"
She shook like a leaf and I didn't know what to say. There was nothing to say.
She threw her hands back onto the wheel and for a second, I thought she was going to hit him again while he was down. But, she didn't. She lightly hit her forehead against the leather wheel over and over again while the sobs caused her body to heave. Retching and convulsing, she doubled over as if a creature was crawling its way through her body and out from the throat.
"Was it me?" She whispered while catching her breath.
My eyes had turned glossy as I stared at the girl in front of me hopelessly.
"Was it me?" She screamed, snapping her body to face mine in the passenger seat. "It's my fault that they're gone. First Kingsley, now Felix. There's a pattern."
She spat her words and I flinched as they vibrated around the car. My mouth was left agape and as the distant sound of the ambulance neared, we cowered.
"They all think I'm a slut whose boyfriends would rather be dead than with me," she hiccuped. "I didn't want any of this to happen. I loved them, honestly, I did and-"
"You're not a slut," I comforted. My voice sounded scratchy and my hand shook as I reached over to place it over her's on the wheel. "And I know they loved you too, even if they didn't show it."
Her breath hitched and soon the ambulance pulled up beside Atticus. The large vehicle shimmered with bright colours and the blue lights on top continued to flash even as they cared for Atticus, who looked a little worse for wear. They hauled him onto a stretcher and his face screwed up into that of pain. With every movement, he winced harshly as a line of sweat formed on his forehead.
"Before Felix admitted to killing Kingsley in that note, the police were going to put the blame on you, I thought you should know," Hadiyah muttered after we watched them wheel Atticus into the back of the ambulance.
My ears perked at the news.
"It's because you're not apart of the upper class and the rest of the suspects were. The stupidly rich and stuck up families in the city were begging for answers, scared their children might've been next, so they had to think quickly. Offering up the poor, government-draining, nobody would've satisfied them. So, yeah... it was going to be you, it was the easiest choice."
It wasn't a shock. We'd already guessed this and the prospect that our police department might have been corrupt wasn't hard to wrap your head around. They worked in favour of the rich, not thinking twice about families like my own.
But still, I couldn't be angry about it. The city families, parents of Easton boys and close friends to wealth could do whatever they wanted and I'd always known that. There was no point in feigning innocence within a matter I'd been familiar with since birth.
"Charlie said they would."
"Yes, well, Charlie's smart," Hadiyah began but was interrupted.
A plump woman with chin-length black hair and an intensely yellow jacket that read 'POLICE' knocked on the window of Hadiyah's driver side. With her hands nestled at the top of her jacket, she held a scowl while gesturing for Hadiyah to lower the window. She did.
"You the one who was driving?" The policewoman asked, her accent thick.
Hadiyah nodded grimly, her grip on the wheel was so tight that it turned her knuckles a ghostly white.
"I'm gonna need you to step out of the car."
Hadiyah nodded curtly and put her hands on the handle to leave but before she got out, she turned to me.
"You'd do best to listen to what I say, alright? Even though Felix is dead, even though they have written proof, even though they have all the reasons to close Kingsley's case. They will not. The Montgomery family are persistent and, believe me when I say that it'll take a little more than a confession for them to believe that their beloved son could've ever done anything wrong. The second they get the chance, they'll blame it on you again. Do not give them the chance." She paused and shut her mouth, thinking deeply before looking at me again.
"You need to get your head out of your ass and stop fluttering about. Find sufficient evidence against Felix because, without it, you're right back to square one. Without it, you're just digging your own grave, Quincy. And soon, you'll have to lie in it."
Then, she left.