Nethania

Chapter 38: He's a Sus

AVIA

"NO, I won't leave this place, Dad, I'll stay here," I hissed, walking back and forth in front of the couch. My hand was on my waist and my feet couldn't stop from stepping forward.

I couldn't settle down as long as they allowed me to stay here again.

[Your mother is the one who is insisting, Avia. Talk to her... Give me the phone, I'll talk to her... Here... Avia? It's me, your mother. Why are you keeping a distance from us? You don't like staying here anymore?]

I sighed. "It's not that I totally don't like staying there, but I have reasons to stay here for any longer. I'm glad that I saw you again, but we have something to settle here. I'll go back home once this problem is solved."

[All right, I'm relieved. I'll wait for you here, dear. Bye, see you soon]

"Bye, Mom."

I ended the call and placed my phone it on top of my side table. I sighed and sat on my bed. I pulled my hair into a ponytail. A smile formed on my lips because I'm happy to hear from them that they didn't force me to go back home right now.

"Did they allow you to stay here?" Hilary asked as soon as she sat on her bed beside mine. She was wearing pajamas and was ready to have a good sleep. "I'm kinda afraid of him when he's mad."

I gave her a small smile. "Don't worry, he knows you. He won't get mad at you okay," I replied. I held her hand and beamed at her.

"Ahh.. finally we'll have our classes back. How I miss going to class. Let's sleep, girls. It will be a long day tomorrow," Hannah sleepily announced and dropped her body on the bed and slept immediately.

What a sleepy head. She was so tired for the entire day that I didn't remember what work we did to make her that exhausted. Perhaps people get tired of doing nothing sometimes.

"Let's go to bed," I mumbled and released my hair from being tied.

"Yeah, I'm sleepy too," Hilary said and laid in the bed.

I turned off the light in the lampshade and went to bed. I rested my whole body in bed, facing the ceiling and waiting for the ambience of sleepiness that would visit and give me a good night's sleep. It wasn't that dark since there was a little light coming from the moon through the window. My eyelids never felt tired and all I could think of was our discussion about Nethania and the story behind her suicide case.

Honestly, I couldn't believe what I read and these things were confusing my mind, especially when Austin theoretically shared that Nethania didn't mean to kill herself, yet someone murdered her. Like, geez... was it even real? My jaw dropped as I said "Wait, what?" to him. At first I didn't believe it, but as I was pondering Austin's and Nethania's words, it slapped me with the ideas that Austin might be saying the truth.

As minutes went by, I felt my eyelids become heavy. I closed my eyes and I didn't know that I fell asleep.

"Avia! How many times do I have to tell you that you should look out for Avelyn?" Dad yelled at me when she found out that Avelyn, my younger sister, was almost kidn*pped by a random car.

I grunted. "She's already fifteen, Dad. She can manage herself."

"No, tho she's growing up, you should look out for her often. We couldn't afford to lose her."

Geez... It was always Avelyn that had the biggest share. It was only her that was protected all the time and only her that was loved in this mansion.

"Avelyn!" My Mom shouted from Avelyn's room. I went back to my room when I was told to look for her for the entire night.

It was 2:00 AM in the morning when we rushed to Avelyn's room.

"What happened here?" Dad yelled.

Mom was crying over Avelyn's dead body. She was bathing in her own blood. Her white bedsheet and pillows became bloody red. I stiffened at the sight of my dead sister.

"Avia, I told you that you should look out for your sister!" Dad thundered, pointing his finger to me. He left me standing behind the door, unable to move and speechless.

I sniffled. "I-I didn't mean to, Dad. I-I did look out for her, but—"

"You irresponsible child! Look what you did!"

My eyes straightaway opened wide as I woke up from a nightmare. I sat on my bed while breathing hard. I felt like I ran several miles that made my heart tired and almost ran out of oxygen. I was always having this nightmare. This nightmare is always robbing me of a good night's sleep. I knew it was already in the past, but I felt something was wrong and unsolved.

I scratched my head irritatedly and went back to sleep again. Hopefully, I will not have that nightmare again.

ALEXANDRA

ARGHH.. the past two days were tiring as hell. I was busy making reports about the students' welfare and safety. Guarding them with my colleagues was fun, until the event of foundation day came to ruin our solemn service. We've been bombarded with a lot of paperwork since the security protocol of the school has been tightened.

We were in our classroom, waiting for our class to start. How I missed hearing a lecture. I was sitting in my chair when I noticed that Vino wasn't present in class. It's 10:00 in the morning and I guess he was really absent from the class.

I turned my body behind me to face Austin. "Austin, where's Vino?" I asked when he saw me looking at him.

"I don't know where he is. We're not that close. Try asking Avia," he replied.

"Okay." I nodded and faced the front again. Where could he be? I didn't know, but I just felt something was wrong with Vino. I didn't suspect him, but there was a part of my brain telling me that I should look out for him. I remembered him sneaking around the hallway a few minutes before the alarm rang during the incident of the publication staff m******e. I wanted to interrogate him but we were needed to assist the investigation of the authorities in the publication office. After that, I was always looking out for him. To me, he may not be the killer, but he could be a possible accomplice. Hmm...

Since our teacher wasn't in the room yet, I went to Avia's place. I felt Hannah's piercing stare following me, but I ignored her anyway. I didn't have time to entertain useless things.

I stood in front of her with authority. "Why is Vino absent from the class?" I queried with a high tone. I caught her attention. She stopped talking to Hilary and stared at me.

"What? Are you looking for Vino?" she answered me with a question. Her poker face made my blood boil. I didn't know, but I became irritated talking to her.

I raised my eyebrow. "Yes, I'm looking for him, where is he?"

"He's absent."

"Why?"

"It's none of your business."

"Are you kidding me?" I blurted out, widening my eyes in anger. I could have grabbed her collar for talking to me rudely.

She smirked. "Not kidding you. We didn't know why he was absent. He didn't tell us why or what his reason was. If you're determined to know his reason, go find him in their dormitory," she answered with a raised eyebrow and flipped her hair like she was just talking to an ordinary student. Didn't she know that I was the head student here?

My peripheral vision caught Hannah leaning closer to Avia's chair while staring at me with narrowed eyes. "Why are you looking for him? Crushing on him? That's fishy girl," she joked, then giggled. Her eyes were twitching at Avia and Hilary.

"You freak, I'm merely asking where he is. Then you judged me that quickly? You don't know what my reason is. Why—"

"Then what's your reason?" Hannah interrupted me while her eyes were sparkling in mockery.

I grunted. "It's none of your business!" I quickly turned my back on them and swaggered down the aisle, heading to my seat.

I didn't believe them that they didn't know where Vino was. He is their friend, and they don't have a clue where he is.

Our class went on for the entire day. Half of my thoughts were thinking about Vino, and I didn't cringe about it. He was suspicious to me. Everytime I looked at him, he was acting weird. Yeah, I know some people are being weird sometimes, but I felt wrong about Vino Asherdan.

The last subject ended, and Vino never went to class. His friends were only saying "he's absent" to our teachers in every class whenever they called out his name for the recording of attendance. Hannah was looking at me with a great suspicion while rolling her eyes.

I walked alone along the pavement. Locking and securing the classroom at the end of the day is my duty. Aside from being the head student, I was also elected as the class president of our section. Am I so diligent and active to be in this kind of leadership?

I guess it is just the natural me.

It was almost 6:30 in the evening and here I was, still walking on the pavement, heading to our dormitory. As I was passing one building, I saw a shadowy figure of a man who hid at the back of the building. I sneaked closer to it while holding the strap of my bag tightly. I was several meters away from the edge of the building. I swallowed the lump in my throat as I stepped closer and closer to the building.

It was getting dark and my heart began to race and pound hard as the dragging sound I heard from the back of the building became louder and clearer. A part of my mind was stopping me from doing what I was planning right now, but my eagerness to discover fuelled my curiosity to find out.

I halted when the dragging sound stopped. I refused to step my foot forward. I leaned sideways and peeked with my left eye only. Only to see what's going around my area.

I gasped when I saw a man in his complete uniform stained with a dark red liquid, which I presumed was blood. His hands were bloody and traces of blood were also visible on his face.

My heart began to beat hard as I processed the visual information I received while observing the situation. I swallowed the lump in my throat again. My pores began to squeeze out sweat even though the chilly wind was blowing hard. He was facing his back to me, so I was having difficulty recognizing his face.

My jaw dropped when he looked sideways, turned around to look behind him. It was a good thing I immediately hid my face when he gazed around. When I felt that it was safe to observe again, I peeked and saw him sideways, much clearer and I recognized him now.

I clenched my fist. I glared at him. I want to seize him for what he has done. After all this time, he was the fox in sheep's clothing.

My brows knitted. "Is that Vino? What's he doing here? And why was there a red stain on his shirt? He was absent, right. Then why was he wearing a uniform? My suspicion about you is true after all, Vino Asherdan Sileste," I talked to myself, whispering.

It was clear that I saw Vino's face! It was really him and I swear! I inhaled and breathed out heavily when I thought of something that I could consider as a suicidal act of the day.

While he was still here, I confronted him this instant to stop his wrong-doing right now.

When I stepped my foot forward, my eyes widened when Vino ran as fast as the wind. He disappeared in my sight within a second. I turned around and went back to the front part of the building to see if he was running on the pavement, but I didn't see him. I got confused and ran back to the corner edge again. I saw the white sack he left. The sack was stained with blood. I wonder what's inside of the sack.

I wanted to see it. I wanted to discover what it contained.

I lifted up my foot and began to step forward. The closer I got to the sack, the colder the wind was blowing and the harder my heart was pounding.

I stopped at the moment when I heard and felt someone was making a chopping sound on a tree near my place. It was getting darker and darker, but I could still see a figure clearly.

My attention wasn't focused on the sack right now. I was staring at a distance where I heard a chopping sound.

As I crept closer to the suspicious spot, the sound of crushing leaves beneath my foot filled my ear.A figure appeared gradually and became more visible to my eyes.

My heart stopped beating for a second and my chest constricted. I could barely move my feet away from my spot. "Is that Nethania? Freak! It's really her! I must run away now!" I shrieked inside my mind.

She was standing beside a tree, holding her long pointy knife which was beaming in the dark. She was hitting the tree beside her, like chopping it while glaring at me and showing her sweet psychotic smile to me.

My body hairs began to rise up out of terror. My feet became jelly and I was unable to move. I could hardly feel my breathing. My heart pumped hard to the extent that I would explode!

Piercing and glaring eyes...

Her smile was thrilling and psychotic as ever...

A beaming knife was flashing before my eyes...

"Hi there fella! Wanna play with my knife?"

Freak! I must escape this place immediately! I'm in a great danger!