Lies In The Dark

When Emma Stopped Being Emma and I Started to Suspect Everything

As we left Emma's house and headed back to the mansion, the air inside the car felt heavy, tense. It wasn't just the weight of what we were going back to—it was the unspoken suspicion that was gnawing at me, eating me alive, and apparently, I wasn't the only one.

Kayden sat in the passenger seat beside me, arms crossed, staring out the window. Poppy was in the back, scrolling on her phone in her usual detached way, but I could tell by the way her fingers hovered just a second too long over the screen that she wasn't really looking at anything. Miri sat beside her, nervously chewing on her bottom lip, glancing between the rest of us like she was waiting for someone to crack.

No one spoke. Not at first. Not until Kayden sighed and broke the silence.

"Does anyone else feel like..." he started, his voice trailing off, like he was trying to find the right words. "Like something's off with Emma?"

I gripped the steering wheel tighter. Of course, Kayden was thinking it too. We'd all noticed it—the way Emma had been acting, like she wasn't really herself. But none of us had said it out loud yet. Until now.

"Yeah," Miri said quietly, finally looking up from her nails. "She's not... I don't know. She's not handling this the way she normally would."

Poppy looked up from her phone, her brows furrowing. "She's probably just freaked out like the rest of us."

I glanced at her through the rearview mirror. "It's more than that, Pops. Emma always has a plan. She always knows what to do. But now... it's like she's slipping, like she's lost control."

Kayden nodded, his jaw tight. "Exactly. And she didn't even try to talk her way out of detention today. She just... let it happen."

"And that's so not Emma," I added. "She always sweet-talks her way out of stuff like that. Always."

Silence fell over the car again, but this time it was thicker, more loaded. The suspicion was creeping into all of us now, and I could feel it growing like a storm cloud hanging over us.

"Do you think she...?" Miri didn't finish the question, but we all knew what she was asking.

I shook my head, my throat tight. "I don't know. I really don't. But it's weird, right? Like, I can't stop thinking about it."

Kayden was the first to break the uncomfortable quiet. "It's not just Emma though, is it?" His voice was rougher than usual, his fingers tapping impatiently on the window. "Look, I'm not saying she's innocent or guilty. But can we be real for a second? It could be anyone. We were all there, and we were all drunk out of our minds."

Poppy shifted uncomfortably in the backseat. "You think one of us did it?" She looked between us, her face scrunched up in disbelief.

Kayden glanced back at her, his jaw clenching. "I don't know what to think. None of us do."

I swallowed hard, my grip on the wheel tightening. He wasn't wrong. As much as I wanted to believe it wasn't one of us, the truth was... we were all there. We all had the opportunity. And that thought terrified me.

Poppy let out a sharp breath, shaking her head. "This is insane. We've known each other for years. We're friends."

"Friends or not," Miri muttered, staring out the window, "someone killed Lara. That's a fact. We can't just ignore that."

I could feel the tension mounting again, the silence pressing in on us. It wasn't just suspicion about Emma anymore. It was all of us.

Kayden cleared his throat. "Look, I don't want to accuse anyone. But we can't rule anyone out either. We need to be smart about this."

Poppy snorted. "Yeah, because playing detective is gonna go real well."

Miri shot her a look. "Do you have a better idea? We have to figure this out. We can't just sit around and wait for the cops to pin it on someone."

"I'm just saying," Poppy said, shrugging, "maybe it's better if we don't go around suspecting each other. It's just gonna make things worse."

I bit my lip, keeping my eyes on the road. I wanted to believe that. I wanted to believe that none of us could be capable of something so horrible. But every time I thought about Emma's strange behaviour, every time I replayed her getting detention in my head, I couldn't help but wonder... what if?

"Emma's hiding something," I said quietly, breaking the silence. "I don't know what it is, but I can feel it."

Kayden nodded. "I think we all can. But like I said, it could be any of us. We can't focus on just one person."

We drove in silence for a while after that, the weight of Kayden's words settling over us. He was right. We couldn't just focus on Emma. But that didn't stop the suspicion from gnawing at me, digging into my chest like a claw.

When we finally pulled up to the mansion, my stomach twisted into knots. The once grand building now looked more like a haunted house, its dark, looming presence sending a shiver down my spine. It was the same place we'd partied, laughed, and celebrated in only a night ago—but now, it felt like a crime scene. Because it was.

We all got out of the car slowly, no one rushing, no one speaking. It felt like we were walking into something dangerous, something we couldn't come back from.

"I don't know about this," Miri murmured, hugging her arms around herself as we approached the front steps. "Going back here... it feels wrong."

"We have to," Kayden said, his voice firm. "We need answers."

Poppy didn't say anything, but I could see the apprehension on her face, the way she was gripping her phone tightly, like it was the only thing keeping her grounded. I felt the same way.

I couldn't shake the feeling that something terrible was waiting for us inside. But we had no choice. We had to go in. We had to figure this out—because if we didn't, the guilt, the suspicion, the fear... it would tear us apart.

We stepped into the mansion, the eerie quiet settling around us like a blanket. Everything was just as we had left it—empty bottles scattered across tables, the faint smell of booze still lingering in the air. But the room felt different now. It felt haunted by what had happened here.

"We should split up," Kayden suggested, his eyes scanning the room. "Cover more ground."

Poppy raised an eyebrow. "What is this, Scooby-Doo?"

Miri snorted, despite the tension in the air. "Yeah, great plan. Let's all split up and get murdered one by one."

Kayden rolled his eyes. "It's not like that."

"Maybe not yet," I muttered under my breath.

We all stood there for a moment, unsure of what to do next. Finally, I sighed and stepped forward. "Look, we need to search the place. Maybe there's something here that can tell us what really happened."

Kayden nodded, and we all slowly dispersed, the air thick with suspicion and fear. As I started to walk through the mansion, my mind raced, the echoes of last night replaying in my head.

I couldn't help but think about Emma again. About the way she had been acting. About how everything was slipping out of her control. And the more I thought about it, the more the suspicion grew.

Because what if she wasn't just slipping? What if she was hiding something?

What if she was hiding everything?