Beyond the Pain

Chapter 20

AFTER MY ENCOUNTER WITH EVE and learning about the fence, I wanted to uncover Evergreen's secrets more than ever. There had to be some interesting information in those file cabinets or else she wouldn't have been so defensive about them.

Also, for the following week or so, Susan seemed to pass by the rooms I was working in more often than before. I used to only see her during break times and on rare occasions while I was cleaning, but now she checked up on me multiple times per day and wasn't even being subtle about it. Perhaps Eve had asked her to make sure I wasn't snooping around, which, if anything, proved my point; if she didn't want me to snoop around, it had to be because she had something to hide. But I had to have exemplary behavior until Susan got off my back, which I was impatient for her to do.

I wasn't the only one who noticed Susan's new obsession with me; the other Cleaners noticed it too. It would have been hard not to. For multiple days in a row, Susan was never far from where I was, like a subliminal message. She never missed meal time, which she frequently had done in the past, and would also ask me questions about my day during lunch and dinner, which she had never done before. The fact she wasn't even bothering to ask the others any questions made it even more suspicious.

One evening, as Ash and I were cleaning the kitchen with Ben, she even barged in and looked around frantically until her eyes landed on me. We all stopped working and stared at her with question marks in our eyes. She straightened her clothes and cleared her throat.

"You missed a spot there."

She pointed at a random place in the room. The three of us looked in that direction, but everything seemed fine and clean. When we turned back around, Susan was rushing out the door, closing it behind her. We were very confused, to say the least. She had never acted so on edge.

"Well," Ash said. "That was...weird."

"I guess we can add 'weird' to Captain Sue's long list of aggravating qualities," Ben said while raising both his hands.

Ash and I high fived a hand each while still looking questioningly at the door.

What had just happened? I had never seen Susan that way. She only had two emotions: calm and annoyed. Even when she was annoyed, she expressed her annoyance in a controlled manner. I'd never seen her erratic. She had obviously been looking for me because she only calmed down once she saw that I was peacefully working in the kitchen. Maybe something had happened, and she thought I was behind it. But no one at Evergreen would dare step out of line. Maybe she had just forgotten to check up on me in a while and ran to make sure I was still behaving, though it seemed unlikely that she would get so worked up just for that reason. There had to be more behind it. I wracked my brain for the rest of the time we were cleaning, trying to determine what could have caused Susan to panic, but it was to no avail.

We finished cleaning the kitchen, and as Ash and I walked towards our room, we passed in front of Eve's office. A theory sparked in my brain. Susan had been following me because of what had happened in Eve's office, so whatever Susan's reason for barging into the kitchen was, it might have to do with Eve. Why else would she be specifically looking for me?

When we reached the door to our bedroom, Ash walked in, but I didn't follow. I had to find out what Eve was so protective of.

"Earth, to Lily," Ash said, one eyebrow raised. "Why are you standing there like a statue? Are you coming in?"

"I just..." I just have to sneak into an Evergreen person's office to look at the documents they keep locked away in the hopes of finding something that could get them arrested. I couldn't tell her that. I was reckless enough to break the rules, but not stupid enough to involve Ash in all of this. "I'm thirsty. I'm going to get a glass of water. I'll be right back."

Ash gave me a nod and jumped on her bed.

I closed our bedroom door and went straight to Eve's office. Nobody inside. Not a soul in the hallway. It was now or never. I rushed to the file cabinets. My heart was pounding in my chest. My breaths were short and quick. I pulled on one of the drawers, then another, and another, but they didn't budge. They were still locked. There had to be a key somewhere.

My search was interrupted by the sound of footsteps coming from the hallway. I had to get out of here. I sprinted out of the room, only slowing down once I reached the hallway and was walking towards the kitchen.

After a few steps, Susan appeared at the end of the hallway.

"What are you doing?" she asked sternly. "You should be in the bedroom at this time."

Yes, I should have been in the bedroom at that time. It was the logical place for me to be and it was also closer to Eve's office. Why hadn't I gone to the room?

She walked towards me with her hands on her hips. Her eyebrows were raised, and she had a tiny satisfied smile on her lips. She looked behind me for a second, before putting her bossy gaze right back on me.

"I was just going to get a glass of water."

Her smile disappeared, and she let out a disappointed sigh. She must have been hoping to catch me red handed so she could tattle to her beloved Evergreen masters. She gazed at me with her authoritative look that I disliked so much, but I held her gaze. It was a staring contest that I was not going to lose.

"Very well," she exhaled. "I'd like some water as well. I'll come with you."

Even if it had been an excuse, I did want some water. My mouth had dried from the stress of lying.

We made our way to the kitchen in silence and didn't break it once we got there. She didn't take her eyes off me the whole time. Even when we were drinking, I saw her staring at me in my peripheral vision. Was she taking stalking lessons from Thomas?

On our way back to our bedroom, just before Susan opened the door, she turned to me.

"Be careful," she whispered, before disappearing into the room. I didn't even have the chance to ask her to explain herself. I wasn't sure if her words were a warning or a threat, but, either way, I felt like I needed to listen to her.

Once inside the room, I gathered my things and went straight to the bathroom to take a shower, but also to avoid Susan.

I stayed in the shower for as long as I could, scared that Susan would be waiting for me outside the door. Fortunately, she wasn't. When I got out, she was on her bed behind the screen that separated her space from mine. I couldn't see what she was doing, but that meant that she couldn't see me either. I could finally release the tension in my shoulders and relax.

She kept an eye on me for a few more days after that, but she gradually left me alone. I had been perfectly uninteresting on purpose, so she had nothing to report back to Eve about me.

But now that she was off my back, it meant I could get back to my search for clues. And I was going to make sure not to get caught from now on.