The Things You Will Never Know

Chapter 2

Hey! I apologise if this chapter seems a little boring but this is the 5th time I've rewritten it and I don't think it's going to get any better 😭 I was also on the verge of not continuing this story because even I was getting confused by my plot lines but I finally managed to write out a plan for the rest of the story and I think I'm good to go now so yay.

Anyways, enjoy!

PRESENT DAY

Leaves and twigs snapping under our feet. Branches cutting into our skin as we run, the scratches barely registering to us. Occasionally one of us stumbles, our feet getting caught in tangles of tree roots that stick up from the forest floor. We don't stop. We grab on to each other and run faster than we ever had before.

Max's hand slipped from my own at one point, the blood covering our fingers making our skin slippery and hard to grip onto. Reece was there to grab him though and Christian took hold of my other hand, using it to pull me along whenever I fell behind.

None of us wanted to find out what would happen if we stopped running.

I shudder at the memory as I stand looking out of the huge window in the library, gazing across at the Town Square and to the forest beyond it.

It's so strange, the connection I have to those four boys. I trust them more than anyone else in the world and we share a secret so terrifying that we're forever bonded by the trauma. And yet...I don't really know them. We're not 'friends' so to speak. I don't know anything deeper than what's on the surface, the stuff I've learnt through observation over the years. Even then it's not much, because they've always been just a little too far out of reach. They're the type of people that everyone else watches and wants to be, especially Christan and Reece, but they're still a mystery. They reside in the shadows, allowing everyone else just to catch glimpses of who they are but nothing more. They might be popular but they're still one step above everyone else. They let you in just enough so that you're left wanting more, and then you're caught in their orbit, waiting for the crumbs that they pick and choose to throw to you.

The only way I can begin to describe what I mean is like when you see someone in a crowd that stands out more than anyone else. They're intriguing and maybe they flash you a smile, maybe they make you feel like you stand out to them too. But when you try to get closer, to get a better look, they're walking away. Even if you try to follow them through the crowds, you can't catch them. All you get is little glimpses of them from behind and you're left just wanting and wondering...

I hate myself every day for walking away from them. It hurts to think of all the times I could have been there with them and them with me. I had them. I had them and I let them go.

But I did it for them. I did it because it was safer that way. Because I love them. Because I can stand being alone, forever on the outside, as long as they get to live their lives, safe and free.

I sigh and move away from the window, turning my back on the forest. Still, wherever you go in this town, the forest will always be there, just in the corner of your vision, on the edge of your conscious thoughts, reminding you of its presence.

Sometimes I plan to move away from here as soon as I can. I imagine going to live in one of the big cities, far far away from this cursed town. But other times it seems impossible. I do love this place...sometimes. It's my home. And that's why so many other people stay, despite the danger.

I make my way over to the section of the library dedicated to local history. It's a place I'm very familiar with. This whole library feels like a second home sometimes. Shelves upon shelves in this section are full of books and records and archives, yet none of them give any real answers. Speculation, myths and legends are a-plenty and I've read them all a hundred times over, or so it feels. Still, I've never figured out what really lurks in the shadows of this town; Or, what causes all the bad shit to happen here.