Harrison Woods is a 17-year-old girl attending Arbor Coast High, a boarding school in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Her dark past including her rocky relationship with her parents and her esteemed older brother's suicide are the reasons she landed herself at...
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Numb. That was how I felt.
My attempt to stop the pain 3 weeks ago had only worked momentarily. When I woke up in the hospital the morning after, I felt an overwhelming sense of misery take me over. And now, sitting at the kitchen table, I still couldn't escape that feeling even despite the changes that had occurred over the past few weeks.
Things between West and I had gotten drastically better since we finally made up. I had been so angry at him for yelling at Mike and for blaming me for everything, but at the end of it all, I broke down. West apologized for everything, and even I apologized for what happened to Jason. We were better now, and for that, I was thankful.
But then again, tomorrow was the day of the trial, and depending on the verdict, life would either take a turn for the best or continue on a downward slope.
For now, though, I couldn't think about tomorrow. I had to focus on today because today was its own demon. Any minute now, Jolene would be walking through the door and entering the safe house.
Jolene, also known as #16 in Otto's book, was coming to the safe house today to talk to me about her relationship with Otto and everything that happened between them. Being the only girl besides me to escape Otto, she was deemed an incredibly important person of interest in the case. Tomorrow, she would testify against him before I would, and that fact scared me shitless. Just the fact that I would be testifying against the man I loved tomorrow freaked me out.
Suddenly, I heard the front door of the safehouse open, and I looked up, my eyes meeting a woman's. She was around 30 years old with auburn hair and brown eyes. She was gorgeous, but she looked drained. I couldn't blame her.
She shot me an unconvincing smile before sitting down across from me at the table, holding her hand out towards me and saying, "Hi, I'm Jolene. But of course, you must know that already."
My eyes flickered down towards her hand, waiting for me to shake it. I slowly lifted my own hand to meet hers. As I pulled away, my hand shook uncontrollably and she just sighed. I hid my hand under the table and rested it in between my legs.
"I get it," she said. "I would be nervous, too. I mean, this whole case is pretty damn messed up."
I laughed nervously. "Yeah, yeah it is. I'm Harrison, but you must know that already."
Jolene nodded. "Oh I know. The police officers I met with told me about everything that happened. For awhile, I thought they were calling me to testify against Otto because he was successful in, well, you know. But then they told me that you escaped from him, too, and I knew I had to talk to you and share my own experience."
"Well, I'm glad you're here," I told her.
It was nice knowing that I wasn't alone. That there was another girl who had fallen into Otto's love trap and escaped. It made thinking about testifying just a bit easier knowing that Jolene would be testifying as well. Besides Otto's creepy book, Jolene's testimony was the only evidence that Otto was guilty of first degree murder.
