wrong turn

interrogation

The room was small, cold, and smelled faintly of disinfectant.

A single fluorescent light flickered overhead, making shadows dance on the walls.

They sat me down at a metal table, handcuffs still biting my wrists.

The detective didn’t smile. Didn’t even blink. He just slid a file across the table.

Inside were pictures — the apartment, the body, the envelope — all pointing to me.

“Do you know this man?” he asked. His voice was low, measured.

I shook my head, my throat dry. “No… I don’t. I — I didn’t touch him. I didn’t…”

He leaned forward, eyes narrowing. “Then how did your fingerprints end up on this?”

I wanted to scream, to tell him the truth, but my words stumbled over themselves.

I wanted to tell him about the stranger, the delivery, the envelope… but who would believe me?

They kept asking questions. Over and over. Same questions, phrased differently, like they were trying to break me.

I tried to remember every detail — the smell, the footsteps, the envelope — but my mind felt like mush, my memory slipping through my fingers.

And then I realized something terrifying:

Someone had planned this.

Someone knew exactly how to make me look guilty.

The stranger wasn’t just a man I met that night.

He was a trap.

And somehow… I had walked right into it.

The hours in the interrogation room bled into each other. Time had lost meaning. Every tick of the fluorescent light above felt like a hammer striking my skull. My wrists ached, my back hurt from sitting on that cold metal chair, and my stomach twisted in knots.

I replayed that night over and over in my mind, trying to find the moment I could have done something differently. But no matter how I twisted it, no escape presented itself. The stranger had thought of everything. Every detail. Every step.

It wasn’t just the envelope.

It was the path I took.

The shortcut behind the library.

Even the time I left the house.

I remembered the way he had watched me — calm, deliberate, like he already knew exactly how this would end. That single look made my blood run cold now. I shivered despite the warmth of the room.

The detective’s questions kept coming, slow and methodical, circling me like a predator.

“Do you know anyone who might want to harm this man?”

“Have you been involved in anything illegal recently?”

“Are you hiding something from us?”

I shook my head each time. Each answer seemed to make him lean in closer, eyes sharp, searching for a c***k in my composure.

When they finally left me alone, I slumped forward onto the table, pressing my forehead to the cold metal. My mind raced. If I was going to survive this — not just in court, but in life — I had to think. Fast. And I had to think clearly.

I started with the stranger.

Who was he? How had he known I would take the envelope? Had he followed me before? Was he watching me that morning when I left the house?

I didn’t know, but one thing was clear: he wasn’t acting randomly. This was personal. Or at least, he had a plan, and I was now a piece on his board.

I remembered the apartment — the way the shadows moved, the smell of metal and burnt wood, the faint echo of footsteps that seemed to linger even after he had disappeared. And the envelope — small, brown, utterly ordinary… but containing the seed of my destruction.

I had to retrace everything.

When they finally released me on bail, I went straight back to the library’s back alley. The weeds were taller now, overgrown as if trying to hide the secrets of that night. My shoes pressed into the cracked cement as I scanned the area, every shadow making me flinch.

There, on the edge of the alley, I found it. A small scrap of paper, crumpled and wet from the rain — almost unnoticeable. My heart hammered. I picked it up carefully, trying not to tear it further.

It was a note. Just three words, scrawled in sharp, almost frantic handwriting:

“DON’T TRUST ANYONE.”

I stared at it, cold fear coiling in my chest. Someone had been watching. Someone had been planning this. And now, I had to figure out exactly who, before the courtroom decided my fate.

Because if I couldn’t prove my innocence…

I would spend the rest of my life wondering whether I was ever free at all.