Eidolon

Chapter 2: What Happened to Heather Cole?

Over the course of the next two weeks, Alex's efforts to make good on the promise to her counselor were few and half-hearted. She might try saying "hi," or asking someone how they were doing, but beyond that, she was at a loss as to how to start a conversation with someone. Margaret had suggested she try sharing her interests with others, but her interests mainly consisted of horror stories, urban legends, unsolved mysteries, and paranormal investigation. (Margaret had suggested on more than one occasion that her mother's death may have left Alex with an "unhealthy preoccupation" with death.) She somehow didn't think that she'd have much success going around asking other students what they thought about the Dyatlov Pass Incident, or what their favorite Cthulhu Mythos story was. To most people her age, Alex's interests were eccentric at best, bizarre and morbid at worst. Had she been born in another decade, she might have fit in with the goth scene. As it was, she didn't fit in anywhere.

The counselor had also suggested she try joining a school club or two, but she really didn't want to commit her free time to something like that. None of the clubs offered at East Point High seemed enjoyable to her, anyway. She wasn't athletic at all, and had no interest in sports. She was too nervous speaking in front of people to participate in drama or debate clubs. She enjoyed drawing, and was modestly talented at it, but was too intimidated by the impressive paintings and digital art of the school's other students to join the art club. Her interest in the works of H.P. Lovecraft, Harlan Ellison, and Stephen King had led her to briefly join the literature club back in her freshman year, but she had quit after only a few meetings when she realized that all the other members wanted to discuss were teen vampire romance stories and Harry Potter. The only exception had been a particularly pretentious senior, who constantly quoted Shakespeare and insisted that everything else was just a rip-off of the Bard's works.

And so, the days went by, and Alex made no real progress with her counselor's little assignment. After a couple of weeks, however, something unexpected happened. Cynthia was absent for half the day, supposedly for a dentist appointment, although Alex knew full well that she was probably just skipping class. Alex was sitting alone at a table in the cafeteria eating her lunch. As usual, no one paid her much mind. No one tried to talk to her, but no one picked on her either. She was largely invisible to most of her classmates, and that suited her just fine.

Without meaning to, she soon found herself quietly eavesdropping on the table behind her. Normally, she would not have listened in on other students, but a particular name caught her attention.

"Have you guys heard about Heather Cole?"

Heather Cole. The sound of that name caught Alex's attention immediately, cutting through the background noise of the cafeteria like a pair of scissors. For several weeks, the mysterious circumstances of her death had been headline news. Alex had followed the case closely, intrigued by the story. Arcadia City was big, though, with a population of over one hundred thousand. When no further information turned up over time, most people quietly forgot about the incident. Most people, but not Alex.

"Who's Heather Cole?" a girl at the same table asked.

"She's a yoga instructor they found dead on the roof of a Weisman's," said the boy who had first spoken, sounding excited. "But here's the crazy part; police forensics say that she fell from a height of no less than sixty feet."

"So?" another boy said, sounding vaguely bored.

"So, I've been to that Weisman's. It's on Fifth Street," the first boy explained. "There's no taller buildings anywhere around, and no telephone poles or anything. There's nowhere she could have fallen from!"