The Wallflower Effect

Chapter 8: Finding Hearts.

It was 11:30 at night, and I had been answering the questions of the officer, who I'd found our was named Lieutenant Jackson Hale, for hours. I hadn't seen Eathan, Gage, or my parents. In fact, I had been alone in this cold, emotionless room for hours. Almost as disturbing as the distant, surgical way Adira Scott's heart was ripped out of her chest, was the set up of this place. The walls had this chipped eggplant paint,  the sterile metal table and two chairs, of of which I was sitting in, gave the place an eerie feeling. You'd think a police station would feel safe or comforting, but it was only unsettling. Right now, I longed to be in a pair of sneakers, running so fast in the forest that image of the glazed-over eyes of the dead Adira Scott would leave my mind.

But I was stuck here, talking to five different police officers, telling the same story to all of them, forcing me to relive it every time. And not one of them had a word of comfort to offer me. In fact, they all looked at me like I was a piece of meat- not like that, but like I was just an animal in a cage. And they all wanted to poke me to see what I'd do. Eventually, the first one who'd initially talked to me at the scene, The detective in charge, Hale.

"And how are you doing, miss Castro?" He questioned me with critical eyes, closing the door behind him with one hand while he held some file or another in the other.

"Use your imagination. Anything you can think up is probably close enough." I bit out sourly. I'd just foud a body of someone I knew, with her heart cut out no less, and he had the guts to ask me how I was doing? Well, I was just freaking ready to wear pastels and host a bake sale!

"Of coarse, I'm sure this is hard on you." He smiled, a bit apologetically, if I was correct.

"I know it's hard on me. I want to know how Eathan and Gage are handling it. I've been asking about them since I got here." I asserted once again.

I was suspicious. He was acting differently. I noticed things, and he was acting differently. At the place where... at the game, he'd acted hard and authoritative. Like he'd seen too much, and none of this was news to him. Now he was acting... polite. Normal. He was treating me like I was a human being, not a 'person of interest,' as he'd called me. That was the polite way of saying he didn't know weather I was a murderer or not yet. I suppose he'd made up his mind, because something had changed in the hours I 'd been here, in this sad little interrogation room.

"They're fine. They went home hours ago." Detective Hale informed me. It was news to me. I thought they would've been here as long as I had.

Of coarse, I would be worried about Eathan and Gage and they would be gone. I bet they'd only been here for an hour instead of five, like me. I wondered if Eathan had asked about me. Every time I was with him, I felt better. I could use some feeling bettter about now. And I needed to talk to my best friend. I needed someone.

But it looked like I had no one. Adira sure as hell didn't have anyone. But someone had a piece of her, and that scared me. Someone was out there, and they had killed her. And that meant that since I had found her, the things I could tell the police might help catch whoever had killed her. And I was coping with that all by myself. I just needed to get out of here. I couldn't stay in this horrible place anymore.

"Then why am I still here?" I demanding, putting my elbows on the table and narrowing my eyes. I wanted to just get out of here, and he had kept me in this little room for a long time, and he was keeping me from getting out. I think I was titled to treat him with a bit of hostility. God knows I took enough out on myself.

"Because you found the victim's body, and they didn't. We didn't have nearly as many questions for them as we did you. Also, their parents answered their phones. Yours didn't, and we can't let you go because you're a minor. We only just got ahold of them, they're waiting for you outside." He shared.