Murder at School

Tazmin and Saffron

Without ending the call, I hid my phone in my pocket and slowly opened the door, hoping it was quiet enough for Tazmin and Saffron to not hear. I slipped in, apparently unnoticed, and saw Tazmin and Saffron guarding a stall, each with a knife in their hand. For a minute, I thought they were going crazy until I realised: Summer was in that stall.
I stood there, listening to them torment Summer, saying she has no escape; that it's her fault she has to die. Then Saffron spotted me in the mirror. "Hello, Christmas," she smirked, turning. "Don't mind us-all we're doing is plotting to kill you and your accomplice."
I stared at her, my eyes slits and my mouth slanted. "Summer?" I called, and she appeared out of the now open door, looking petrified. As she slipped over to me, Tazmin and Saffron watching her, I thought of what to say next.
"So why'd you do it?" I asked. "Why'd you get Emerald to kill Brooklyn?"
"I never understood why people actually answer that in books-the other person is always stalling," Tazmin said, clearly unimpressed with my attempt to get it out of them. "And whenever the murderer explains, they're always beaten straight afterwards anyway," she continued, and I lost faith that she would enlighten us with the truth. "But now I understand why. The murderer wants someone to know of their genius."
"You guys always thought of yourselves as gods-but your plan has so many flaws," I began, 100% stalling. "For a start, that letter that you already know about, well anyone who knows pig latin can decipher that! As for the whole 'kill us and keep your secret' bit; last year, Crystal tried that, and it failed miserably; this time, there are more of us, and they're probably calling the police right this instant." I finished, hoping Alex would hear.
"Don't compare us to Crystal," Saffron spat, dismissively. "She was weak, and besides, we're smarter than her!" The way she called Crystal weak made my tummy lurch: how can anyone be stronger than that? She nearly killed us!
"My question still stands. Why did you do it?" I folded my arms across my chest.
"Well, incase you didn't know, we disliked Brooklyn." I rolled my eyes. "In Chinese, she started flirting with my crush, and when we confronted her about it, she threatened to snitch on us."
"So? Is that it? You thought she should have her life taken away because she said she'd snitch on you? And how many times have you two snitched on people?" I ranted.
"It wasn't just that," Tazmin spat. "If the headteacher found out, we'd be suspended, if not expelled."
"Duh," Saffron added, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "And my parents said that if I'm ever suspended, they won't even help pay for university at all. Nor for my car, nor house, nor anything important."
"And as for me, my parents want to move up to Canada, and I'm the only reason why we haven't moved already. I don't want to have to move and have to adjust to the new school," Tazmin whined. Why bully her in the first place then?!
"Anyway, so we decided we'd just dispose of her, it's not like she was relevant here," concluded Saffron. "But unlike Crystal, we chose to get someone else to commit the crime so that we could have a perfect alibi."
"So you forced Emerald to, but how?"
Summer questioned, now looking more sure of herself than earlier.
"Oh no way, just threatened to tell you, Christmas, that she had a huge crush on your boyfriend."
"What?" I exclaimed, in full disbelief.
"Yeah," Tazmin began. "She admired you, you know. Something about standing up against us or whatever. But anyway she started hanging out with you and Alex and really enjoyed it. Of course, if you found out the truth, she was terrified that you'd assume that that was the only reason she did, and would turn against her for being a fake friend."
"But I would never, I mean she was-"
"Yawn," Tazmin interjected, rudely.
"Anyway, so we told her exactly what to do: take a scalpel, break off from the group saying something like 'I need the toilet' and wait for Brooklyn. Of course, the fact you went with the new girl only helped us look innocent, although it meant Emerald had to wait even longer. Maybe we should be thanking you?" Saffron smiled sweetly before throwing her head back and laughing, in an evil sort of way.
Tazmin picked up where her partner in crime left off. "So everything was going to plan, until Emerald became a nervous wreck. We went round hers to talk to her and saw she'd been texting you."
"So you killed her the next day, and took her phone so that no one could use your messages to her as strong evidence that you were to blame."
"That was pretty self explanatory, Christmas," sighed Saffron. "Thanks for stating the bleeding obvious."
"Of course, we didn't realise she'd written you a letter, until you waved it around for us to see," Tazmin added.
"Which sums your plan up," I said, innocently, smiling as sickly-sweet as I could. "Careless."
"How? How is that 'careless'?" Saffron screamed.
"Because there were constantly several independent variables. Loads of ifs, like what if Brooklyn didn't come to school that day? What if there was a teacher there? What if..."
"But she did and there wasn't," Tazmin butted in.
"But things were still left to chance, like Emerald. She could've done anything-she could've even gone to the police when you were unaware and spilled the beans about everything."
"Like write a letter in code to someone?" Saffron suggested. I nodded. That's exactly what I mean, idiots. "Yes, well-as you and your friend here are about to see, that really isn't a problem." And with that, the pair of them leapt forwards.