Keeping Secrets
Chapter 1 - Part One
As of yesterday, it had been a year. An entire 365 days since one of my closest friends, Delilah Lawrence, had mysteriously disappeared one night, leaving me and our best friend Isis clueless, and struggling to find out how something like this could ever happened. Up until the horrible day they had found her dead almost two months ago, part of me tried to think that maybe someday, she would turn up again in our small town. That maybe she had just ran off on some paradise vacation with her dream boyfriend or whatever, and would come back with hundreds of stories and adventures to tell us about. Now I know not to have hopes like that.
“Charlotte, I need you to take Alice to school today!” I hear my mom call from downstairs as I’m leaving my room. My ten year old sister is sitting at the kitchen counter, chugging the milk that was in her cereal bowl. Ever since I’ve gotten my driver’s license, I’ve had to have adjusted to taking on way more than I have ever wanted to for this family.
“Hurry up, Isis will be here in a few minutes,” I say, taking her empty bowl out of her hands and two the sink. Alice hops off the counter stool and shuffles into the living room to get her backpack, and she answers the door when Isis arrives.
Isis is pretty close to my height, which isn’t very tall. Her naturally dark brown hair goes to a little above the middle of her ribs, it’s usually straight, with loose and natural looking bangs cut across her forehead.
“So it’s been a year,” Isis says quietly from the passenger seat as we leave my driveway with Alice in the back seat, on the way to her school.
“Yeah…” I say plainly, taking it all in. It still hasn’t been discovered who is responsible for Delilah’s death, which is clearly a murder now. Isis and I have been questioned multiple times, just like we were when she went missing. Police officers and detectives have been investigating our high school often now, and it terrifies me to think any of these people could have been responsible for that awful night.
Everyone seems to remember the day at school. Delilah was always popular with tons of friends, and of course some people who despised her. Well, even I noticed that she comes across as somebody who’s pretty different than who she is once you get to know her. Anyways, no matter how they felt about Delilah, everyone was absolutely shocked from the night she disappeared.
“Are you okay?” Isis asks me as we sit down at lunch, our other friend Audrey comes over to join us.
“Oh yeah, I’m fine,” I say. “Did you ever notice that more of Delilah’s friends kind of lost touch after she went missing?” I ask quietly.
“Yeah…” Audrey replied. It’s like…she was what held everyone together…”
It sounds reasonable, honestly. So many people here at school kind of let their social lives revolve around Delilah. As I was thinking, I saw something – or someone, that made me stare like I did every time.
“Lotts, are you sure you’re fine?” Isis asks, referring to me with one of my common nicknames friends gave me. I turn inward to the table to face them.
“He always has to hover around us! Did you see that look?” I whisper.
“Who?” Audrey asks.
“Logan!” I hiss, pointing to the guy who just brushed past us. “He probably hates us now. After what happened with him and Delilah and –”
“Shhhh, Charlotte, you know we try not to talk about that!” Isis exclaims quietly, her eyes widening. I shake my head as I think of the incident that happened when Delilah was…still alive… I can still remember how it started, and my mind flashes back to the very first day it all began.
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