Pretty In Scarlet

February 16th, 2009: Eleven Hours, Eleven Minutes Dead

Ninety minutes passed before her body was found by Lorraine.

Piecing together the facts as a flurry of police officers and staff milled around her room, the sirens she'd heard had been a fire alarm from Pearson Hall, the dorm where the younger girls resided. A headcount after the evacuation had left some concerns about Nikki's whereabouts. Because Lorraine couldn't recall whether she'd left for the week or not-and because the fire was in a dorm across the quad, the search hadn't begun in earnest until a missing grade five girl from Pearson was located in the library.

Nikki watched angrily as Professor Ross clucked his tongue in dismay from beyond the caution tape swiftly slapped into place. She averted her gaze as Lorraine broke down crying in the hall, telling anyone who would listen that she should have somehow known this had happened. She huffed at the police officer who blamed her CD collection for her "suicide". She winced as her parents were called, hugging her arms to her chest as she heard her mother crying over the line.

Never once did she question why she was still in the room, staring at her ashen face and the awkward angle of her head as they cut her down. Maybe it was denial of some kind. Maybe, deep down, she was hoping it was all a nightmare, that eventually her alarm would go off and end it.

And then, her parents arrived. With them, the gravity of her situation settled in, like a bitter winter's night seeping into her bones.

Nikki shied away into the farthest corner, mindful of an officer flipping through her journal (He's reading my private thoughts!). Her father entered first, scanning the room for... what? A body? It was already gone. She was already gone, strapped to a gurney in a thick black bag.

But I'm still here.

Her father was stoic, as he'd always been in times of trouble. Her mother, though...

"Oh, Nikki!" she sobbed, collapsing to the ground. "You promised me. You told me you weren't... weren't..."

I wasn't, Mom! Nikki wanted to scream. Only, no one could hear her now. No one would know the truth. Okay, maybe I was, from time to time. I was tired of feeling awful. Tired of failing everyone. But I was trying. I wanted to live!

As her mother wept loudly against her father's chest, Nikki slid to the ground and hugged her knees. I wasn't sure how, Mom. But I wanted it so badly. Right until he took it from me.

Her father demanded answers from everyone: the police; Headmistress Logan; the teachers. How did this happen under the supposed watchful gaze of such a pristine school? How had no one missed her during the evacuation? Why had they not searched for her right away?

"She was a clearly troubled young woman! We left her in your care! Why was her life worth less than another student's?"

Her father was fierce and ferocious. He was looking for an enemy, someone to fight with. A way to fight for the dead daughter shoved in the back of a coroner's van.

Her mother was sick with guilt. Nikki watched her intently, longing to hug her, to somehow be not dead. Her hand stretched out to comfort her, tumbling through her as she cradled Nikki's pillow to her chest.

"This is all my fault," she whispered over and over. "You begged me to go home. I'm so sorry, baby. This is all my fault..."

Even as the nicer officer assured her that mental illness was no one's fault, that she had done all she could, Nikki knew her mother would bear the weight of her death until her own last breath. She'd give anything to undo that final phone call, to absolve her family, to reveal the truth of her final moments.