❛ BACK FROM THE DEAD. ❜ // 𝑆𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝐹𝑎𝑐𝑒 𝐴𝑈

❲ Settling In. ❳

[ Xavier's POV ]

I had just arrived to Nockfell while we- meaning me and my family, were out to find a hotel or an apartment around. The only still functioning building we heard of was called The Addison Apartments. It didn't have a nice reputation, but when we asked, it was almost as if everyone was too scared to tell.

But, nonetheless, in about 10 to 15 minutes, we had finally arrived at the infamous building. As I stepped out of the uber we got, I took a quick glance at the overall building.. and honestly, just seemed like a normal apartment to me. Though as per the research I did about this building, it certainly has changed it's appearance now. White painted walls, a red carpet laid out at the entrance, security guards at the entrance as well. It didn't seem half as bad as we thought.

Upon entering the apartment, the atmosphere was.. unusually cheery. You know that kinda feeling where everything feels too down for the atmosphere to be bright? Yeah, I got that kind of vibe in there. Though, ignoring the feelings aside, I observed the interior design of the building. And not gonna lie, not bad at all! The walls were lined with fine marbled tiles, which were in an off-white color. The lights were bright enough to illuminate the entire ground floor's hallway.

My parents registered a room at the fourth floor. Well, I thought we had agreed with the fifth floor.. but whatever, fourth is alright too. All of us hopped onto the elevator, which also seemed pretty brand new - like it's never been used. "My, the janitors must work hard here!" My mother exclaimed, to which my father agreed too. "Yeah, seems like they clean this building spotless. Imagine what the rooms would be like."

I simply ignored my parents little talks and appreciation of the building. I still had that feeling lingering at the back of my head, almost like someone or something is just.. well, telling me to leave. Or maybe that's what I wanna do..

Eventually, after about a good two hours of unpacking our luggage, my mom finally spoke up. "Hey hun, why don't you greet the neighbors hm? Me and your father will finish the rest of the unpacking." I thought of insisting her to let me help them, but seeing how she quickly got back to unpacking made me think otherwise. I just sighed and walked out of our apartment room before closing the door behind me and reading out our room number.

"402.."

After saying the number, it just felt as if I had cursed myself for a quick second as a sudden chill went down my spine. God, I wanted to get out of this apartment.. quickly. But I couldn't, or else my parents would get worried sick. I fiddled with the strings of my hoodie as I further observed the hallways of the fourth floor. They were similar to the designing in the ground floor, so there wasn't much worthy of notice.

After a while of going through rooms - some locked, some opened, most people were great, some were high, others didn't give two fucks. I just took the biggest sigh as I was about to enter the elevator. Though, I saw one of the janitors working at the end of the hallway. The guy had short, curly brown hair and was wearing a janitor's uniform. I was at the first floor, so I decided to, y'know, why not go say hi before going back to my floor?

I walked over to the janitor as they made eye-contact with me beforehand, causing me to instinctively wave my hand towards them

"Hey there! You seem to be one of the janitors here?" I asked after greeting him.
The man nodded quite cheerfully, "Of course! You need something?"
"Oh no- you seemed to know a lot about this area and I was wondering if there's anyone here that's like.. around my age maybe?" I asked him as I took a glance at his name tag. 'Rytes'..
Fortunately for me, he nodded, "Actually, I have a son about your age.. You could try talking to him maybe?" he began to dig his hand into the pocket of his uniform, "Here! It requires a key-card to get down there. I have other copies too, so you can keep this one."

I nodded and thanked him as I took a glance at the key-card. I mean, It was a normal looking key-card. I entered the elevator and inserted the card to go to the basement and waited for about a couple minutes till it finally reached the basement.

As the elevator doors slid open, it revealed a rather modern looking basement. Instead of tiles, the walls were simply painted with an off-white color to go in contrast with the building itself. There were many racks of different items, as well as a lost and found box next to it. A drier was also there with a basket full of dirty clothes to be cleaned.

I walked over to one of the doors which had a tag on the side, ‘Janitor Rytes' Room’ and opened it to see a room with the same layout as all the other rooms in the apartment. I peaked my head in to see if someone was there, but there was no one at all. I welcomed myself in as I looked around the room, I saw two doors which I obviously thought either one of them to be the Mr. Rytes' son's room.

I knocked at the door of one of the rooms. “…” Nothing. I almost moved over to the other room till the door I knocked at finally opened with a pair of blue eyes looking at me with curiosity.

“Need anything?” he asked with slight annoyance in his tone. Well, atta way to greet someone..
“Uh.. your dad told me to greet you here.. I'm one of the new guys at 402.” I informed him.
His eyes almost widened after hearing my room number as he glanced back at the inside of his room. “Oh uh.. yeah, come in..” he said as he moved to the side. Well, that was quite off.

I slowly opened the door to look at a series of posters of multiple fandoms I was familiar with. There was a ton of anime posters such as Bungo Stray Dogs, Danganronpa, some horror games too. One being ‘Identity V’ or whatever along with many other posters. I heard the sound of bed creaking before I looked over to the source of the sound.

The boy, who had shoulder-length blonde, curly hair, had laid down on his bed whilst watching TV before making a small, yet the weirdest comment ever, which grew my concern about my feelings of this building.

“So, you living at the infamous serial killer's apartment?”

(Word count: 1,156)