It's a rainy October day, there's a thickness in the air. Tension. There was a death. A death in the mind of Toby. A struggling victim of schizo. A twenty-six year old man, who looks like he never sleeps, under his eyes lye bags as deep as the pits of hell. He heats but cant keep a meal down. There's just always a distant look in his eye. Like a distortion in his brain that keeps him from the real world. He's lost. He just cant seem to find a way out.
Toby gets home from his psychologist. HE continues his daily routine of showering at 3:00, calling his mother at 4:00, beginning dinner at 4:30, and watches t.v. till he falls asleep. Only to wake up at 6:00 a.m. and serve grimy food to sloppy costumers at the local dinner.
While sitting on the couch, board out of his life, he turns off the t.v. and lets off a long sigh.
"Why am I here?" he asks the shadows of his apartment. Exhausted with t.v. he goes to lock the front door. *Click* As he turned the lock, voices started whispering. Toby's used to it, he can't understand what they're saying.
Thinking nothing of it, he stats to see movements in his back room down the hall in front of him. He doesn't care. He continues to his bedroom where he wishes to sleep his night away. As he flips his bedroom light switch, he stands face to face with an old man. The man is in about his 70's, he's wearing a suit, completely black except for a red tie strapped around his neck, with a top hat to complete the look. His eyes? They were gone. Empty, dark, just not there.
"I've come back for you." the man said with a raspy voice and a smile that eerily lit the room.
"Just leave, I don't need you here anymore." With Toby's hands in his hoody, he grabs his pocket knife. "You've done nothing but make things worse."
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]]