Deadly Secrets

Chapter 43: Healing the Sick

If Mondays were hard before, this one was absolutely strenuous.

The night before went by in a daze, spurred by the slap of Simon's call. Zara didn't know where he was, what he was doing, or why he had left. Not even the call gave away anything, except for one thing.

The fear in his voice.

It was completely out of character for her grandfather to just disappear the way he did. It wasn't bizarre that she didn't see him for a couple of days at a time, because his job often got him at strange hours, but she always bumped into him. Eventually. But now, there was no sign of him having returned to the apartment, his bed had remained untouched, just as everything else in his room.

He said he would return in a couple of days, but how long would that be? Three days? A week? The ambiguity of the statement left her scratching her head and a call to the police at the forefront of her thoughts. But as she dialled and deleted the number repeatedly, it occurred to her that if her grandfather really was in danger, then getting the law involved would make matters worse, for all parties involved.

Not only that, but if the police opened up an investigation for a missing person, they would have to start snooping around in her own life, unearthing all the crimes she had so desperately tried to bury in her past.

She had no one to talk about this—Aurora had left only an hour before to return home, and had left Zara to deal with the situation on her own. Could she talk to Max about this? Of course not. They had only just started getting closer, and he wouldn't understand. None of her friends could really understand, they would probably think that she was overreacting, like that fateful night of the burglary.

Zara would let this play out on its own. If by the end of the week Simon didn't show up, she would flush her inhibitions down the toilet and go investigate on her own. That voice in her head told her to wait, so she would.

That didn't stop her from mulling it over the next day.

Zara went through her classes on autopilot. The teachers would explain concepts on the board and she would write them down without even paying attention to what they were. She would be present in a conversation, but not really take part of it, preferring to just let their words go through one ear and out the other. Zara didn't even care that Robert threw her dirty looks whenever they crossed each other in the hallways, followed by lesser ones from his new recruitments.

Nobody seemed to notice her change in demeanour, or at least that's what she thought.

"I'll need you to see me after class," Mr. Lawrence said, watching Zara pack her belongings from behind his reading glasses. She pursed her lips and zipped up her backpack, plopping back down on her seat to rest her head on it. It wasn't even comfortable—she was trying to avoid the curious glances the other students gave her, including her friends. Saffron patted her shoulder before he left the room, followed by a giggling Aurora and a grinning Orion.

Busted, Orion had mouthed just before he disappeared into the crowd.

Asshole.

Her teacher stood up and closed the door, muting the cacophony of voices that arose from the previous stillness. Zara could still see various heads bob by through the glass in the door, and she longed to be amongst them so she could go home. It had been a very long day and she certainly was not in the mood for a lecture from an English teacher.

Mr. Lawrence returned to his desk, finished adjusting the stack of papers, then moved to sit on the table in front of Zara's. He pulled the chair out and rested his feet on it. "You can wake up now."

Zara groggily lifted her head, her teachers sudden proximity making her slightly uncomfortable. She made sure to keep the bag on the table, a barrier which kept her nerves intact.