We All Remembered Her Smile

f i v e

         It was a few days after that long night. Maria's funeral was tomorrow and the town's small recovery from Harmony had sunk back to where it started. Lonely, quiet, cold. It was disturbing, again. Everyone was scared, terrified of seeing something they shouldn't, fearing death around each corner.

         For Maria's funeral, I had a loose black dress that went just above my knees. I wore tights, black dress shoes, and curled my hair. I pulled it half up half down, with a few disobedient baby hairs framing my face, and put a black bow where it was tied in the back. My parents dressed as proper as they could and we made our way to the funeral. Two deaths in one month, my best friend, and my best friends brothers girlfriend. Maria was the kept to keep to herself. Not introverted, just a closed book. Harmony never liked her, I never knew why, she always just called it her vibe.

         During the funeral things were quiet. After the funeral things were quiet. No one knew what would be next, if someone was next, or if things would be solved. We all missed the old Lakeside. Where our town would be happy, and smile. Where no one was killed every other day.  Where kids would roam the streets, riding bikes, teenagers would go to the mall and hang out with their friends. All of that that was gone, my best friend was gone. Maria is gone, and we don't know who's responsible. We can only hold on to hope at this point.

         The next day I went home with Jacob. Though he'd just lost his girlfriend, he seemed okay to talk and hang out. He let me look through Harmony's things, there was pictures of us, and a few from years ago of us and Megan. Megan was her little sister, she died of cancer when we were much younger. She looked just like Harmony, her features just changed to be unique. She was funny and kind, like her sister. I missed them both.

         About fifteen minutes later, Jacob walked upstairs to check on me since I'd been so quiet. I haven't gone to talk to him since I got to the house.

"Are you okay?" He asked, concerned.

I nodded, "yeah," I picked up my bag, "thank you for letting me come over today," I slowly stood up, "but I should go home, you probably need time with Maria," he looked down. I paused, closed my eyes feeling like an idiot and sighed a bit, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't of said that, I need more time, I'm sure you do too. My mind isn't straight, I bet yours is a mess."

He nodded, "I understand, do you want me to walk you home?"

I shook my head, "I'll be fine, I go—" he cut me off and looked into my eyes, it sent shivers down my spine.

"Are you sure?" He asked, "With this killer out, its dangerous."

I nodded, "The last thing we need is two of us getting hurt, I'm sure I'll be fine."

He eventually gave up and let me go alone. I walked for ten minutes and eventually got to my house. I went in and ate dinner in silence with my family, then head up to my room. I'd turned on the T.V. again to see cartoons, but soon that was interrupted by the News Channel. I saw another dead body, this time a boy. This was one of the boys staring at me the day Harmony went missing. The day that she had died. Engraved on his arm was "he saw, he followed; he paid for it." I looked at Harmonys phone again, and wondered if I had known too much. The one person who knew I had the phone was Jacob, and I trusted him with everything.
I looked at the phone, and looked through the messages again. The one before the mystery number was from Jacob. I skipped past it, then there was another. It was from the dead guy on T.V., Lio. It was four days before she died.

Meet me in the woods tomorrow at the tree house. (L)
How'd you know about the tree house? (H)
Harmony, you know he has people watching you, whenever the chance.(L)
Lio I never thought you'd be one of the people to do this to me. (H)
I'm not going to hurt you, and some of us aren't doing this by choice. Your brother is making most of us do it, I'm sorry. (H)

I stopped reading for a moment, realizing it said "your brother". I thought of Jacob, in disbelief. It all connected now. The fact that he didn't care much for Maria's death, he wanted to walk me home so badly, he would talk about, a lot, how Harmony was perfect. She had the perfect hair; the perfect smile. And he could never compete. We thought it was a joke, but assuming it wasn't now, it was of jealousy. He killed Harmony, or got someone to, he was the cause of his girlfriends death because she knew too much, she was probably helping him. And now Lio is dead, and he had texted her just now about meeting her. I continued to connect dots in my mind. I assumed the unknown text was from Maria.
I hid the phone in my drawer again. I didn't move afterwards. I sat at the end of my bed and stared off, I don't know what I was staring at, but I was staring.
I couldn't take everything in, someone I thought I was close with, and considered family, and psychopath. Someone I almost let walk me home. Was he planning on killing me? I don't know. He knew I had Harmonys phone, he probably knew I had looked through it, and he probably knew that I knew something I shouldn't. He knew I knew it was him.
For the next few days, I avoided him at all costs. I'd take new ways to school, new ways home. New ways to my classes, and sit as far as I could from him in any class we'd have together. Which was a huge mistake, that I wish I wouldn't have made. I knew too much.