Diana was a sweet, thoughtful and slightly odd student, friends with four boys in a band, she was mostly destined to be another fond face to look back on in the yearbook.
However when a string of murders start to occur in their small Magdeburg town...
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Despite the smaller crowd due to Izzy's death, the band still played their best and got polite applause from the crowd, none of their schoolmates or classmates were there that night, obviously, but it was a decent response from an older crowd.
Diana threw a few water bottles at the boys and smiled brightly at them, "You did pretty great out there, proud of you guys."
Gustav was understandably silent and closed off the whole night, between Tom's laugh, Bill's excitement and Georg's jokes, Gustav's solemn dazed look in his eyes felt out of place. Despite his nonchalant almost dismissive demeanour just hours ago at the news of Lizzie's death, Gustav was quieter than usual, a frown was permanently etched onto his face. Seeing is usually bright, cheery smile completely absent from his face was painful but he had to go through this, distracting him wasn't a healthy option.
As the group parted ways at around 12am, Diana was felt walking with Georg since they stayed side by side, her parents would've preferred it is she walked home with Georg anyways especially with a supposed killer on the loose.
Diana's cheeks were flushed from the cool Autumn night, her nose pink and cold while her cheeks were a dusty pink, Georg's close presence, their fingers brushing against one another doing no favours. "It's kinda scary, the town's really quiet and empty huh? Never noticed how much we actually are surrounded in forest in this town...Gustav living up in the mountainous area must be even creepier huh?"
She mumbled in such a hush tone yet she felt like the older boy was paying attention to her every move, like his eyes were trained to follow her every flinch and huff as they walked. He nodded, his long air blowing into his face a little, his pale skin making the cool blush even more obvious than it was on Diana.
"Guess so, why? Are you really that freaked out by one death? I mean, maybe it's just some freak who wants attention." His tone both as cool as the breeze yet still genuine, his bright charming smile adding to his authentic concern.
Diana shrugged, she looped her arms in his, pulling him forward to walk faster, wanting to get to the safety of their homes as quick as possible and the perk of his closeness wasn't so bad either. She gulped slightly before answering, "Look it's more than just she died Georg, Lizzie was killed brutally it's...frightening."
She expected Georg to give her some kind assuring words and no more than that, after all what more could he do? However, Georg instead looked down at her with a his slight smirk and mumbled, "I live right next to you, do you expect me to not look out for you?" This was more than a 'relax' or any other dismissive assurance, it was a promise set in stone that Georg was stating to Diana. After 4 years of friendship, maybe she did mean more to him than she first thought.
~
When Diana got home, Georg had walked her to her doorstep and she saw him walk into his home right by hers and when he gave her that stupid dimpled smile and a small wave, all she could focus on was Georg's words and assurances.
God it was selfish, it was selfish to focus on a stupid childhood crush when Gustav was grieving beyond what she'd ever be able to understand and a girl her age having been killed in such a brutal way just a day ago, it was so selfish. It made Diana feel uneasy and it chipped away at the back of her mind when she got ready for bed, how her heart was beating out her chest over Georg all while there was a pit in her stomach, a looming darkness prodding into her brain as she tried to fall into a dreamless sleep.
It was around 2am when Diana was in her kitchen pouring herself a glass of water.
The suburban streets were empty and quiet, just as always, there was no reason for a single soul to be stalking down the town in the middle of the night. Some people may find it eerie or unsettling for a whole town to be asleep by 2am but largely, it was the case excluding a hand full of drunks and restless teenagers.
A sleepy town meant sleepy residents, sleepy residents meant a dead quiet street along the suburban neighbourhood.
With Diana's eyes heavy with sleep, she sipped her water as her eyes were half shut with tiredness, with every blink, her body just felt like putty and she was close to falling asleep upright.
That was until she saw a cloaked figure run out from the side of Georg's home, the figure walked out from the side of Georg's home that wasn't facing Diana. A jolt of panic ran through her body as her eyes widened and feet went cold, it felt as if she was frozen in place as she saw the figure running behind streetlights in an attempt to hide in the shadows, but with how close Diana saw the figure, she saw the figure clear as day, she blinked twice rapidly, as she craned her neck to see cloaked figure starting to walk further away.
When she blinked twice, her eyes became less hazy as the panic and disbelief woke her up but it was like in seconds, the figure was gone.
As if it disappeared into thin air but the inability to directly see the figure only seemed to make Diana even more panicked.
Diana wanted to run to Georg's place, just make sure he was okay but she heard no screaming, no breaking of windows, nothing. Dead silent. If she went into the Listing family house in the middle of the night and swear that she saw some cloaked figure, she'd be dubbed as a loony. Maybe she really was just being paranoid, she craned her neck further just to assure herself that whatever it was she saw wasn't there, it never was there.
Diana sighed and wearily went back to her bedroom, her bedroom faced Georg's but his curtains her closed shut which was the usual, she knew it wasn't smart to barge in, what could she even do? Call? The loud ringing would wake him and his parents up and just might as well be her barging into their home and preaching cloaked attacker.
She tried to sleep, she tried to close her eyes and calm herself down but every time her eyes closed all she could see was the cloaked figure, all she could feel was panic and dread, hoping that Georg would ring her doorbell to carpool to school.
