Murder

Chapter 5- Investigating

"Gab! Gab! Get up!" Fia says, shaking me. I shoot straight up.

"I am not!" I yell."

"Calm, calm," Fia whispers. "You were mumbling and shaking. Are you ok? You were talking gibberish."

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine. There's just something I need to do later," I reply. There's nothing else I can say. She'll never let me follow through with this if she knows what I'm planning.

"Well ok. Do you want some help?" she asks.

"Maybe, when the time comes. Not currently. Thanks though," I say. I can't tell her what I'm doing.

"Well, uh, do you want some food?" she asks. My stomach is empty. I haven't eaten in a while.

"What kind of food?" I ask.

"Foody food," Fia says. Gee, that helps so much. She's strange sometimes.

"Maybe a little," I say. I don't want to eat, but I probably should. I think its been three or four days since I've last eaten.

"Follow me." Fia stretches out the word me, like it has ten e's.

I follow her down the stairs and to her pantry, or as our group likes to call it, her food closet. "We have so many foody foods in the food closet," Fia says. She goes into the pantry and pulls out some bread. "You want toast?" she asks.

"Of course. Toast is amazing," I say. She puts some toast into the toaster and goes into the fridge.

After a while of rummaging through she pulls out orange juice. "Would you like some OJ?" she asks.

"Why yes I would. Thanks." If Julia was here she'd call it Justin. His nickname is OJ. I don't remember why though, there's a long complicated backstory to it I think. I've been having trouble remembering things lately. The toaster went off and Fia got out some butter. After she hands me my plate of toast and my cup of orange juice we sit at her table. I look at the toast, and immediately become disgusted. I don't know why, I like toast. But I can't seem to bring myself to eat it. Fia must've seen my discomfort.

"Gab, you haven't been eating for a while. I've noticed. You need to eat. You can't starve yourself like this. It's not going to help anything," Fia says. I'm well aware of what I'm doing, I don't need to be told. I know it's not going to help anything. But I can't control it. "Eat it," she says more sternly. I pick it up and take a few bites. "You haven't eaten in days, Gab. Eat the whole thing. Please," she begs. I don't want to disappoint her. I keep eating, but I really don't want to. Fia smiles. It's a small smile but it's still a smile. If it makes her happy, I'll try to eat. "My parents aren't working today, they're at the grocery store. I hope they don't come back when you're still here. They'll kill you, and then me," she says once she's done eating.

"Nah, your folks'll think I just needed to get out the house again. They might understand." I have horrible grammar, I know. I'm just too lazy to fix it, and I really don't care. Her parents will probably kill us for me being here without their permission, especially since I snuck in late last night, but I don't want her to be nervous.

"I don't know, they won't be too happy if they see you here," she continues.

"I'll leave once you want me to leave," I say. Maybe that'll make her less nervous.

"Well I don't want you to leave, but you're going to have to in about an hour." An hour. I can work with that.

"Okay, well we can do something in that hour. What do you wanna do?" I asked.

"I have an idea. Follow me." Fia runs upstairs. I quickly follow. She pulls out two notebooks from her bookshelf. "One for me, one for you. We can write stuff in them, if you want," she said. This is perfect. I can start what I've been wanting to do for a while. I opened the notebook and titled the top of the page. 'Day 1 of investigation. Two days since Russ was found. Nine days since he was taken' I wrote. I looked over at what fia was writing. It's her homework. She's writing a poem about a balloon. Two completely different things. Two completely different -yet still very similar- people.

A car door slams. "Oh no! They're home earlier than I thought! What are we gonna do?" Fia is shrieking.

"Chill. I'll seeya around. Thanks for the notebook. I'll take good care of it," I say.

"Wait, what? You can't leave they'll see you!" Fia says, nervous.

"Nah. I'm gonna slip outta' your window, just like when I came here. It'll be alright. They ain't gonna know I was here. Bye. I'll text you later," I say. She seems stunned.

"Uh, bye. Thanks, by the way," she says. I'm halfway out of the window.

"No problem. Thanks for opening the window." I'm on the roof. I jump off and run into the woods that run along the edge of her backyard

After a while of walking, I'm back at my house, contemplating whether or not to go in. If either of my parents are drunk, or mad, it won't end well for me. "What do I have to lose?" I ask myself. I take the chance and walk in. "Why don't you shut up you son of a-" my mom screams.

My dad interrupts her. "Because if I don't talk I have to hear you talk!" he screams. I try to sneak upstairs. But I don't have any success. "What are you doing here?" my dad sneers. His words are slurred, his blue eyes dull, brown hair disheveled. He's drunk.

"I do live here, you know. I can be in the house," I spit back. I turn away. He reminds me too much of Russ, but Russ would never hurt me. He wouldn't leave bruises or scream at me for existing, not on purpose. I continue upstairs, ignoring them, just like always.

I'm upstairs and I can't help but pause at Russ' room. It's dark and messy, just like it always is. I go inside and turn on the light. He's got a load of video games and consoles, classic and new. He's got just about everything. Correction: had. I keep forgetting. I wish it was that easy to forget forever, but the memory always comes back. I turn the light off and leave, it's too painful to be in here right now.

I continue to my room at the end of the hall. It's painted almost identical to Russ' room. The walls are mainly gray, but where Russ has a thick navy blue stripe, I have a thick red stripe at the top. And between the red and the gray, there's a thin white stripe. My room is decorated with music, his is decorated with wolves and hunting. I quickly get changed into jeans, a loose black t-shirt, my jean jacket, and my converse. I grab my bookbag, fill it with my notebook that Fia gave me, the picture of Russ and I, my phone charger, an extra pair of clothes, a knife -can't be too cautious anymore, might as well carry something for self-defense just in case- my wallet, my laptop, and a book. This should be enough to keep me out of the house for a little while. I continue downstairs, hoping to avoid my parents on the way out.

"Why the hell are you here? We don't want you here!" My dad screams at me. I guess I'm not lucky enough to avoid them.

"Just leaving old man. Calm down." I keep my voice steady. If my voice isn't steady, he gets the satisfaction of knowing he intimidates me. He walks towards me. There's a loud thud, and I'm on the ground with a throbbing stomach. It hurts awfully bad. I lay down, unsure of what to do. This has happened a lot, but I always seem to make it worse by getting right back up. The next thing I know, there's a steel-toed boot on my temple. He kicks and kicks and doesn't stop. I get up, grab my book bag and run.

I can't keep running, my body is throbbing too much from the pain. I'm at the docks. It's weird how I keep ending up back here, considering it's where Russ was found, I should want to avoid it at all costs. I do, but I need to start here. I need to start where he was found. I'm going to investigate his murder.