She didn't trust them. They were lying, and she knew it.
'Safe haven' her ass. How could these people not see that this was some sort of concentration camp?
True, they kept her and her family safe from the monsters that lay in the eerie fog beyond the stone walls. True, they didn't give them uniforms.
But that didn't mean that she didn't notice the disappearances of the other juvenile girls and boys her age.
No one else did. She thought them to be stupid.
Her family rolled their eyes, denying the obvious evidence that she had presented over and over. Her friends were on the fence. Some thought that the disappearances were messing with her. Some thought her claims to be true.
One night, when she and her younger sister were going to be taken, she had it. She was going to leave, with or without her friends.
She would leave the brainwashed, ignorant people at the camps.
She didn't know exactly where, but she was going to leave the wretched place long behind her; a thing of the past.
When Jane Madarang's neighbor Natalie kills herself and leaves behind cryptic instructions, it's up to Jane and her classmates to unearth deadly secrets.
*****
Natalie Driscoll is dead.
She threw herself out a window and left her neighbor Jane to unravel their town's darkest secrets. Following Natalie's instructions leads Jane to three other high school students who all have something to hide. The four of them must carry out Natalie's final errand while solving the mysteries written in her diary. But the secrets they unearth may be far more dangerous than what they ever imagined.
Content and/or trigger warning: This story contains scenes of suicide, violence and murder that may be triggering for some readers.
[[word count: 100,000-150,000 words]]