Maybe

- o n e -

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Sadie | ﹖

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━━━━━

3:58 PM

━━━━━

i might kill you.

who is this? i don't think

anyone has any right to send

death threats to me.

ok ellie, now you're just

being stupid

check the #

...

oh

omg, i'm so sorry!

i'm not normally the type of

person to send death threats to

random people...

that's what a murderer would say

don't contact me again

☏

        Sadie put her phone down, pensive. She considered blocking the number so she wouldn't contact them again, or doing something to prevent that from happening, but she decided to just turn off her phone. She didn't know why, but she had a feeling that this would be the start of something. Something good, maybe, because everything that was going on at the moment had not been so good.

        Her mom was miserable because the restaurant across the street from hers was getting more business. Which, in turn, made Sadie miserable because her Mom was so busy with work and she felt like she was getting nothing done when she sat inside all day.

        Her brother, Caleb, climbed up the stairs to her room and peeked inside. "Come play with meeee," was all he said, and as quickly as he came he was gone. She could hear his six-year-old stomps as he clobbered back down the stairs.

        Well, she could be doing that.

        But that sounded like less fun than sitting in her room. She loved her brother, sure, but after a while he could get... exhausting. Her mom adopted him, so he didn't look like the rest of them with his jet-black hair, pale skin, and shockingly blue eyes. His Korean heritage stood out in Sadie's boring brown-hair-brown-eyes family. And even though they didn't look the same, they were about as brotherly and sisterly as you can get, being ten years apart from one another.

        Maybe I'll see if Ellie's available... But as soon as the thought popped into her head it was gone again, dismissed and replaced by something emptier. Because Ellie had gone to sleep-away camp for the summer with all of her new friends, and had left Sadie alone. Plus, their friendship had ended on a low note.. hence the whole I might kill you business.

        She was joking, okay!

        And per Ellie's words, there's 'no reception in the woods.' and they're supposed to 'like, not use our phones at all! How crazy is that?'

        Sadie didn't like this new version of Ellie, the one glued to her phone, who complained about everything, who said 'like' every two words and suddenly became very worried about her appearance and more specifically, what other people thought of her.

        They used to have the best times, trekking through trails and jumping from rocks into the nearby lake, yelling as they flew into the water.

        But now they had 'grown up.'

        But how can they have grown up if Sadie didn't feel any different?

-

        Sadie's mom arrived home later than normal, which left Sadie to entertain Caleb, make him dinner, watch his show with him and do her best to get him to bed at a reasonable hour - today he was in bed at 9:30, complaining about wanting to get tucked in by Mommy instead of his annoying older sister.

        Or the one who played with him for six hours. But sure. We'll call it that.

        As per usual, she thanked Sadie for taking care of her wonderful little brother, went to check on him, then came back downstairs to eat the dinner Sadie made and gripe about Morrisons.

        Ah, Morrisons. The restaurant across the street, with the annoying owners who were way too nice and who were stealing all the business, and remember when we used to like it there. Sadie sat and listened, feeling the most unlike herself she'd ever had.

        She missed Ellie. The real Ellie. The one who she could talk to for hours and never seem to get bored, who she could rant to. It was scary losing her.

        Even scarier? That this was the real Ellie.