The Darkness

Chapter 8.

"Mum,

After you left I found Niall in his room looking at old photos- probably of dad. He seemed fine and normal so I told him I was going for a walk and asked if he wanted to join me. As usual he declined my invitation. I thought he'd be okay because he has been doing so well lately about the whole dad thing. Since you weren't home I decided to take a shorter walk and as I was making my way back up the street to the house I saw an unfimilar car driving parked in front of our house. It was a small black towncar with dark windows. As soon as I saw it, I ran to the house. I found Niall upstairs, in his bedroom. His pill bottle was open and his arms were bleeding. I ran outside to yell for help and I noticed something: that black town car was gone.

I am writing this note and leaving Mullingar because I am scared. But there is one thing I need you to know and I need you to believe me... I DID NOT KILL NIALL!

-James"

"Niall took pills?" I ask.

Maura only gave me a nod in response.

"Do you mind if I look at pictures of Niall from when he was a baby to the pictures of his, uhm... dead body?"

"No, of course not."

She gets up and goes back into the office. Maura returns a short minute later with dusty photo albums and a few files.

"Here." She says handing them to me. "I think you should get going so you can hide the pictures from your aunt before I drop her off."

I get up and walk towards the door," Okay thank you! I'll try and get them back as soon as I can."

"Okay, bye." She said as she shut the door behind me.

I get into the car and put everything into the passenger seat. The drive home is quiet but I can feel Niall in the car. I pull into my aunts driveway a couple minutes later. I get out of the car and walk to the passenger side so I can get the the albums and files that belong to Maura.

"Need help?" A familiar voice ask.

I jump at his sudden pressence. "Uhm, sure." I say handing Niall my school bag and a few files. I grab the photo albums and lock the car. We walk around to the back end of the house because the back door is always unlocked. Niall opened the door for us and we walked upstairs into my room. 

I walk over to my dresser and open the bottom right drawer and pull out a few clothes on the top. I gently place the photo albums down on top of the remaining clothes. Niall hands me the files and I place them in a photo album and take the clothes that were sitting on my lap on top of the albums to hide them.

"You aren't even going to look at them?" Niall questions.

I hear a car door shut. "Uhm no. I mean, yes I will look at them, but not now when my aunt could be home any seco-". I am cut off my aunt screaming, "Kenzie, I'm home!" I look at Niall and I smik at him. He rolls his eyes as he fades away.

*~*

Later in the night after my aunt has gone to bed, Niall and I are sitting on my bed, he is sitting criss-cross-applesauce at the foot of my bed facing me and I'm sitting at the head of my bed with my back resting on the headboard. We're just talking. "Hey Kenz, do you want to look at some of the pictures?" Niall randomly ask.

"Sure." I get off my bed and walk to where Niall and I had placed his memories.

I open the album that is labeled '1996-2000'. Niall's smile grows as I keep fliping the pages. "Awe, look at how cute baby Niall was." I cooed.