The secret account

Bella’s POV “She’s not breathing.” I stared at the girl laying on the ground. For a few seconds, I couldn’t move. I couldn’t understand what I was looking at. Just hours ago, she had been laughing with us. We’d been sitting together, trying to figure out who was behind the account terrorising the whole school. Now she was laying on the floor, motionless. I reached for her hand, it felt cold. It felt weird seeing a dead body for the first time. I noticed her finger nails were gone, it looked like someone had deliberately taken their time to take them out one after the other. A shiver ran down my spine and I dropped her hand. Someone behind me also noticed the missing fingernails and started screaming. But I couldn’t scream. I could only stare and wonder who did this, and how much she probably struggled before this cruel being took her life. My mind kept replaying the last hours I spent with her before her death. She had been sitting across from me, laughing as she complained about how impossible our investigation was becoming. “I’m telling you, Bella. We’re missing something.” Those had been her exact words. I remember laughing. I remember telling her we’d figure it out eventually. I remember her looking toward the door for a few seconds, as if she had heard something. I never thought that would be the last time I saw her alive. Now, standing over her body, I wish I had paid more attention. Maybe she had known something was wrong. Maybe she had been trying to warn me and I had been too distracted to notice. I wiped my tears and forced myself to look around. We had been investigating the anonymous for weeks. There had to be something there, something we’d missed. My eyes moved across the room until they stopped at the desk. There was a notebook sitting open. Her notebook. I walked towards it slowly. The last page had several names written across it, some were crossed out. Others had question marks beside them. At the bottom of the page, there was one sentence. She knows. I stared at it. Who was she? And what did she know? I felt so confused because that was the book we used for our investigation. We had crossed out about five names from our suspects. There were still so many names left. I had never seen that sentence written in the book and I saw the book just hours before her death. I flipped through the pages, searching for anything we might have missed. There had to be something. This whole thing started as a silly investigation. Just five college girls investigating an anonymous account that had been releasing everyone’s secret it got a hold of. We would spend hours arguing over the possibilities, each of us convinced that our theory made the most sense. Sometimes we would agree on a suspect, only to cross their name out the next day when something didn’t add up But none of that mattered now. I closed the notebook and looked back at her. A few hours ago, we had been sitting together, convinced we were finally getting somewhere. We laughed about our theories and argued over which person was the most suspicious. Little did we know things were more serious than we thought it was. I decided to leave the scene because I started feeling weird. I stood up and suddenly, my chest felt tight and I couldn’t breathe well. I stumbled back knocking into the desk behind me. “No.” The word barely left my mouth. Someone grabbed me before I fell. “Bella look at me.” I couldn’t. It felt like I wasn’t controlling my body, I felt like an outsider in my own body just watching my reactions without having control over it. A sob escaped my throat, and I covered my mouth, trying to silence myself. Then the sirens started. That was when everything became real. Someone had killed my friend. And that someone was still walking around freely and unsuspected. The door suddenly swung open and two police officers walked inside. Everyone stepped away from the body and slowly began to evacuate the premises. Upon seeing the body, one of the officers immediately knelt down and began asking questions no one had answers to. I walked out of the room and sat just outside it. The words and conversations people were having were echoing in my head. I couldn’t focus and my hands were still shaking. I looked down and remembered the moment I had touched her. Her body felt cold, I wonder how scared she must have felt during her last moment on earth. That was the part that made me anxious. My phone suddenly buzzed, causing me to get startled. It was a notification from Ryan. He was texting me to ask how I felt and if I had left school. In as much as I felt really sad, I was happy I had my boyfriend here. I told him I was about to leave school and I'd let him know when I’m home. I booked a ride home and waited near the entrance, gripping my bag so tightly. The driver was only a few minutes away completing a ride and I was grateful I won’t have to stand there for long. A few minutes later, a car pulled up near the gate. I recognized the plate number and immediately started walking towards the vehicle. I checked the plate against the details on my phone again before opening the back door. Just to be sure. The driver and I exchanged brief pleasantries before I settled down into the car. I leaned against the window and closed my eyes. The ride home is usually always short, since my house was close to school. I didn’t want to think about what had happened. I didn’t want to remember the coldness of her hand or the sight of her lying motionless on the floor. I tried to force myself into taking a nap to escape replaying moments from about an hour ago, over and over again. My dorm room was only a short distance from home, but I couldn’t imagine spending the night there. I needed somewhere familiar, somewhere I could be alone without worrying that someone would knock on my door to ask me questions I wasn’t ready to answer. Tonight, I wanted my own bed, my curtains drawn and to sleep peacefully. So I decided to go home. I made a metal note that I wasn’t attending tomorrow’s lectures. I planned to sleep and doomscroll for the whole day. In about fifteen minutes we arrived at my destination. The car stopped just right outside my house. I paid for the ride, grabbed my bag and stepped out of the car. The moment I entered the house. I was greeted by the familiar silence of the living room. My mother sat on the couch with her laptop resting on her knees. She glanced up when she heard the door close. “Bella? What are you doing here ?” “I felt like coming home tonight.” No exchange of pleasantries, just straight up questioning. I felt furious but I hid it. She glanced at the clock. “You have classes tomorrow, don’t you?” “Yes, but I would not be attending them.” That made her look up properly “And why is that?” “I’m tired mom, I just need a day to rest.” She closed her laptop halfway. “You’re a university student, Bella. Everyone gets tired, but that doesn’t mean you can start missing lectures whenever you feel like it. You just sit in class and do nothing till the lecture is over. Quit making excuses for laziness.” “I understand.” There was so much I wanted to say but I held myself back. I’m used to this, so I already know how the conversation would go. And I wasn’t in the mood for that tonight. I got to my room and closed the door behind me. I dropped my bag on the floor, laid down and curled myself on my bed. I closed my eyes and hugged my self, I didn’t realize when I started crying.