Don't tell me bye bye (mystery/ thriller)

Chapter 25

"She's coming back. Lou-Lou is coming back."

"When I heard who was moving into the house Jennie knew something was wrong, but I had to get away. She's known there's more to what happened but I wouldn't ever tell her. I can't tell her. I needed to talk to someone before I lost my mind into the dark again, so I tried to talk to Dad but he wouldn't let me. He never lets me talk about it even when keeping it to myself is decaying my insides."

"It's all come flooding back, every moment of what happened, what I did. And what I saw."

"I feel like I'm actually inside my nightmares, living them over and over. That's my punishment for what I did. I can tell myself one hundred times a day that it was an accident, that I was just a kid, but I keep being thrust into that moment of stupidity, the moment that's haunted me for the rest of my life."

"I can't wear this mask any more. I need to get this out, this secret that's been poison in my blood for over ten years. I just need to bleed out and then I won't feel like I'm going to burst into flames. But thinking about her, about her face. I can't even write her name...the guilt is crippling."

"We were in the woods by the tree that had fallen across the river. We called it the Magic Tree because it looked like it was hovering, and she used to tell us that it had gnomes living inside it. She was tying one of Lou-Lou's shoes and that's when I climbed up. I knew that if I was on the end of the tree she would have to come and get me back."

"I loved scaring both of them, and I remember the look on her face as she turned to Lou-Lou and told her to stay where she was and not to be scared, that she'd bring me back and I'd be in trouble with my mummy and daddy for being so naughty. She climbed up on the tree, sticking both arms out, wheeling them around as she tried to get her balance."

"I stopped bouncing when she was halfway across, and just waited for her to reach me. She kept saying my name, and telling me not to move or I'd fall in the river. I could see she was scared, but it was fun. It was like watching a dizzy tightrope walker."

"She reached me, and her face flipped from fear to anger, and the fun went poof when I realised how much trouble I was in. She grabbed my wrist and shouted at me, telling me that I was so stupid to put myself in such danger, that I could have been swept away by the river. She told me to follow her slowly, and turned away to walk me back down the tree. Lou-Lou's face was the same colour as the clouds in the sky, she was so terrified. I liked scaring her, and when I met her eyes, Lou-Lou shouted at me, knowing what I was about to do."

"I shouted 'boo!' like we were always doing, trying make each other jump; but she lost her balance and her arms wind milled around, trying to stop herself from falling in. As soon as I did it I knew that it wasn't a joke, wasn't something I could take back, that I'd done something stupid. World ending. Life ending."

"Her foot slipped and she fell backwards, catching her ankle in a twisted branch of the tree. I can still hear the sound of her bone snapping and reverberating around the trees. She screamed as she fell, and Lou-Lou did too, but I didn't make a sound. I just stood still and watched her swing under the tree like a rag doll."

"She hit her head on a rock that was sticking out of the water. Blood sprung from the gash on her temple, then it was washed away every time her head went under the surface. She was trying to pull herself up but she was hanging at such an awkward angle that she couldn't grab hold of anything. She'd pull herself up by her waist, reaching out to me and shouting for me to help her, but then she'd swing back down, her head, neck, and shoulders under the surface of the water."

"I crouched down and reached as far as I could, crying and screaming her name but she was so far down I just couldn't get to her. Eventually she stopped trying to pull herself up, and she was just hanging there, like a scarecrow caught up in a tree with the stuffing knocked out of it. That's when Lou-Lou stopped screaming."

"I stared at her body hanging in the water, knowing that I'd killed her. I stepped back across the fallen tree, and Lou-Lou shouted that I couldn't leave her in the water, that we needed to get her mummy or call a policeman. I knew I was in trouble, and I knew that if we told anyone I would get taken away. I needed to tell my dad so I got down from the tree and started to run home. Lou-Lou grabbed me as I tried to get past her, but I pushed her over and she didn't get up. I thought I'd killed her too, but she'd hit her head on the floor and it knocked her out."

"When dad drove us to the woods, Lou-Lou was gone. Dad walked over to the edge of the water and looked at the body, strung up under that dead tree like some kind of twisted modern art. He grabbed my shoulders and shook me, asking if anyone else saw what happened. Something inside me made me lie to him and I said I was on my own. I was crying so much he believed me."

"He went back to the car, and drove it as far into the woods as he could. He ran back with a dirty sheet under his arm, then waded into the water. He yanked at the limp body as if he were trying to untangle a kite from a tree. It was dark by this point, and I was so scared, watching my Dad handle somebody who I knew, somebody who I'd adored, not breathing, not Taeding right. I wet myself as I watched him, but I was too afraid to say anything, so I just waited, getting colder and colder as I waited for him."

"Before we drove her away, he said that we couldn't tell anyone what happened, that we would need to lie to everyone so nobody would find out, otherwise I would get taken away forever. He asked me if I wanted to live in a small room with bars on the windows and never see Namjoon or mummy again. I knew what he was doing wasn't right, but I didn't want to get sent away. I nodded and he told me to be brave, that he had to hurt me so people would believe our lie. He didn't even warn me when he landed the first punch in my chest.....