The Prom King: A Murder Mystery ✔

Chapter 2: Grief

Everyone was screaming, trying to reach Chase while Mr. Hansen told everyone to step back to give him some space. He quickly looked for a pulse several times, but couldn't find one. Mr. Hansen immediately called 911 to get an ambulance to the school. I stood motionless in front of the stage. No tears, no whimpers, just confusion. How could Chase just pass out like that? It seemed ridiculous.

Once the paramedics arrived, they confirmed Mr. Hansen's examination--Chase was dead.

***

It was the following day. I was lying on my bed, looking up at the ceiling with swollen eyes, when I heard a knock at the door.

"Come in."

The door squeaked open. It was Jonas. He came by so often throughout the years that we had given him a key to the house. As he entered, I noticed his eyes were bloodshot, his face was pale, and his hands were clammy.

"Hey," I said, "You okay? You don't look so good."

Jonas stood above my bed, and suddenly broke down into sobs. I immediately got up and gave him a hug. He buried his head into my shoulder and continued to cry.

"How could someone do this?" he asked in a terse whisper.

"I don't know, Jonas," I replied, tears forming once again in my own eyes. Clearing my throat, I looked up at him and said, "We will find out who did this, Jonas. We'll do it together--for Chase."

Jonas nodded his head and wiped his eyes. "What does your dad think about all this?" he asked.

My father was a detective in our city's police department. Ever since my mom was killed five years ago, it was my father's passion to chase down criminals and bring justice to the victims. Jonas and I were hoping to get some information from him today about Chase's death.

"I'm not sure. We'll have to ask him when he gets home," I replied.

Coincidentally, we heard the front door open and close from downstairs. Jonas and I quickly ran down the stairs to talk to my dad.

My father was a tall man with dark brown hair and eyes. He was pretty fit for his age, but he could never resist a bowl of ice cream.

"Hi, Dad," I said as I gave him a hug.

"Hey, sweetheart, how are you?" he said with a solemn voice. He knew it would be awhile before Jonas and I got over our grief.

"We're okay. Jonas and I were hoping you had some info about what happened to Chase."

Dad sighed. "Well, normally I don't give information about these things, but since Chase was your friend, I think I'll let it slide," he said with a smile. I grinned back at him.

"It appears that Chase was killed because of a severe allergic reaction to something. We won't be sure of what until we get the autopsy report. We still need to finish interviewing everyone who was at prom that night. Until we're done with those, we won't have a suspect list. That's about it. Sorry if you were hoping for more, kiddo."

"That's all right, Dad. I know we'll figure it out."

***

The school had announced that it would be closed until they found out how Chase died.Most students wouldn't come in otherwise. That helped Jonas and I come up with our suspects.

We were in my room the next day trying to narrow down a list of suspects and trying to find a motive for someone to kill Chase. The only problem was that Chase was perfect in everyone's eyes.

We got a huge whiteboard set up to write down everything we could think of.

"Ok, Jonas, what do we know?"

"Well, everyone at the prom has to be a suspect, right?"

"Right," I said as I wrote "prom" on the board.

"Next, we know Chase died of an allergic reaction. What was he allergic to?"

"I think he was allergic to nuts, but I know that everything Chase ate was nut-free ."

Jonas pondered for a moment. "What if Chase ate nuts unintentionally?"

"But how would he do that?"

"I don't know. Maybe someone made a mistake labeling something as 'nut-free'."

"Then we'll just have to go talk to those who were in charge of the food at school."

"Let's go!" he said.

We grabbed our stuff and hopped in the car hoping to find some answers.

A/N: Hello, wonderful readers! I hope you are all enjoying the story so far! Don't forget to vote and comment! Also, if you have any cover ideas, I would love to see them!

'Til next time,

-shalom900