Chapter 22 – The White Rose – Holly Hayfield

Lilith and I went back to my place after my mother picked us up. My mom called me rather than the other way around. She had received a call from Angelica concerning my ankle monitor. My mother wasn’t angry when I explained things to her. She just asked me to be more careful in the future.

At dinner we had pizza and a movie. I wanted something that would distract Lilith from the Malorie situation. More than that, I wanted to distract myself from it also. I didn’t want any of it to be true. Lilith was showing me that distracting her was going to be an impossible task.

Malorie was the only thing on Lilith’s mind. When we crawled into bed that night I tried creating a chill atmosphere with some casual girl talk. Instead, Malorie’s mystery was all that Lilith would respond to. It was aggravating. She showed such little interest in me as a person that I actually found myself going ahead with the Malorie topic.

Just being able to freely talk to someone my age over the weekend was a nice change of pace. Seeing Lilith smile as she spoke about her theories alleviated my loneliness for the time being. It was probably pathetic how quickly I caved. I just wanted her to like me. Was that a good enough reason to entertain her mystery fantasies?

Sunday morning followed a similar pattern. At breakfast that was what she wanted to talk about. Even when my mother came into the dining room Lilith was still talking about Malorie. I had to give her a swift kick in the leg under the table so that she’d shut up. Luckily my mother thought we were just talking about someone from our school. Lilith’s insensitivity didn’t end there.

My mother took us to see a movie in the afternoon. Inside the movie theater Lilith was still coming up with new theories. She couldn’t wait until afterwards to tell me about. Finally I snapped and asked her to stop talking during the movie. She started texting me instead as if that were somehow better. She was a handful.

Late that night her aunt arrived to pick her up. She actually looked disappointed to be leaving. In the hopes that I’d finally be able to distract her I lended her three volumes of the book she liked.

“I’ll text you later.” Lilith said, “Wait, actually, I’ll call you instead. There’s still a lot I want to talk about. We can talk later, right? What time do you go to sleep on school nights? Actually, can you just meet me during lunch tomorrow? Or maybe we can meet some time in the morning…”

“You can text me anytime. Just don’t go overboard, okay?”

“Okay.” She said as she walked out the door.

She ran over to her aunt’s car and waved at me as they drove off. The warm and fuzzy feeling in my heart was undeserved. The feeling of friendship was undermined by the mystery of Malorie’s disappearance. Was I actually Lilith’s friend now? Or was I merely a being of convenience to her?

I wanted so desperately to be close to her that part of me no longer cared. As long as she stood by my side the details didn’t matter, did they? If that were the case then I could help her chase mysteries as much as she wanted. We shared common interests. Maybe this mystery could serve as a springboard for us to become closer. By the time we learned the truth about Malorie I would really be Lilith’s friend.

The first storm of texts I got from Lilith had arrived by the time I got out of the shower. Of course, she was talking about looking into which teachers Malorie had in her schedule. She wanted to see if she could find anything out using the old yearbooks in the library. Was I a disgusting person for going along with this? Was it sad that I eagerly awaited her responses to my texts? Lilith wanted someone to talk to about Malorie. I just wanted someone to talk to.

The next morning I felt unusually drowsy. Lilith ended up texting me all through the night and even into the morning. By sheer force I had managed to change the topic a few times, although it always went back to Malorie. Still, it was like having a real friend and for that I was grateful. The exhaustion from staying up late wasn’t so painful when I thought about what I was gaining. I was quickly accepting my fate of being Lilith’s sounding board.

Getting to my locker early in the morning was difficult as usual. Only this time I was so worn out that I was resting against my locker with my eyes closed while waiting. I managed to open my locker once the hallway traffic lightened up. Lilith sent me a text at the same time I opened the locker. Now Lilith was asking about the next time we could speak in person. I began typing out my response as someone from behind me shut my locker door.

“Not right now Casper.” I said without looking away from my cell phone.

I began opening my locker back up only to have it closed again right in front of me. I spun around to yell at Casper, but it wasn’t her.

“My girlfriend wants to talk to you.” This mysterious girl said.

She was definitely another girl from Naomi’s group. I didn’t recognize her though. Her black surgical mask had a white rose on it. This stranger was bold to be standing so close to me. Normally someone this close would feel uncomfortable. Strangely enough I didn’t feel uncomfortable from her.

The way she intimately stood in my personal bubble with her hand still on the locker behind me reminded me of Val. As I stared into this girl’s deep blue eyes the gears of recognition began to wind up in my head. Her hair was dyed snow white. She had a long pixie haircut with one side shaved. Her frame was athletic and slightly boyish. Then I realized.

“Ugh, you’re one of them now.” I said.

“Let’s just say I had one hell of a weekend.” Sam said, “The boss wants to talk to you. Can you come with me?”

“’The boss’, don’t call her that.” I said.

“Why not…? The other girls do.”

“Because I was hoping that you’d be more than that. You were my first friend here.”

“And I still am. Nothing has changed between us, has it?” She asked.

She put a hand on my cheek and smiled beneath her black mask. That mask was going to take some getting used to. It was even more disturbing to see the white rose on her mask after seeing it on Malorie’s diary. It was a popular symbol so it wasn’t a huge surprise seeing it on even on Sam’s mask. The white rose was used even outside of gothic art.

It was distracting to see while trying to focus on Sam. It was like I couldn’t escape thinking about Malorie even when Lilith was away. Sam didn’t move away as I reached up and removed the mask. Once she saw what I was aiming for she voluntarily helped me take it off. She kissed me on the forehead now that the mask wasn’t in the way.

“Naomi wants to talk to you.” She said.

I gave a half-smile.

“For the first time ever, I’m glad she does. There’s something that I want to talk to her about also.”

“Let’s go.”

Walking to the Old Science Wing with Sam was different than walking there with Casper. For one thing Sam wasn’t constantly looking over her shoulder to make sure I didn’t run. Instead we walked shoulder-to-shoulder, side-by-side. She casually linked arms with me and smiled while doing so. The ghostly white hair was far-out, but she was still as princely as before. We walked into Naomi’s lair together.

The general vibe of Naomi’s hangout was uplifting now that they had all the lights on. It looked like her deal with Ms. Sampson was working out. Naomi wouldn’t have to fear her hangout being shut down as long as they she kept quiet. That was going to make my proposal to her that much harder. She had something tangible to lose.

Would she care about Malorie’s mystery enough to support me and Lilith? It wasn’t like I was doing it purely for Malorie. This entire situation was my excuse for staying close to Lilith. Any interest I had in Malorie’s fate was secondary. I wanted to know the truth of course. At the same time part of me felt that ignorance was bliss.

“Holly, come sit down right here in front of me. Thanks for bringing her Sam.” Naomi said.

Naomi signaled over to her girlfriend holding a glass of clear liquid and plate of food. I wasn’t interested in going through that charade again.

“Let’s skip the nonsense. I came here to talk to you about something.”

“Oh…?” She asked as she drank from her teacup.

“Can you ask your girlfriends to step outside for a few minutes?”

“Why would I do that?”

“I’ve got something I want to show you.”

I took off my book bag and pulled out the item I was preparing to present to her.

“This is Malorie’s diary.” I said, showing Naomi the cover, “Lilith believes she was the girl we saw in the underground.”

Naomi put down her teacup, stood up, and looked at Casper.

“Cassie, take everyone into the room across the hall.” Naomi said seriously.

“What’s up boss?” Another girl asked

“This is something that stays need to know. Remember how I said I made a deal with the vice principal? Holly is out here risking that deal right now. I want everyone to get out. If even a peep of this were to get out of this room…”

Casper got up from her chair.

“Come on everyone. Let’s give the boss some space.”

The girls looked curious. They went out one-by-one like Naomi ordered, but they dragged their feet. They looked back as they lingered out the door, hoping to hear something. It was too serious to let anything dangerous slip out. Once they were gone Sam went over to shut and lock the door. She turned out the light. The only remaining light was coming from the mostly covered windows. The room looked much like it did originally.

“Where the hell did you get that?” Sam asked as she walked back over.

“Lilith and I went to the Noelle household over the weekend. It turns out that Malorie has been missing for roughly ten years. That’s around the same time that the Art and Theater club was shut down.”

“Malorie, she was the one with her name written all over the boards in the Discipline Hall, wasn’t she?” Naomi asked.

“Not only that, Lilith discovered something else. Remember that picture of the Art and Theater club that the vice principal showed us?”

They both nodded.

“Lilith found another copy of it in an old yearbook from the library. When Ms. Sampson showed it to us she was covering up an important girl in the photograph using her finger. That girl was Malorie.”

“So what, you’re saying that the vice principal knew who the body was before we even told her about it?” Sam asked.

“That’s what it looks like. If the body is authentic, that is.” I said.

“How would she know?” Naomi asked, “If she knew the body was down there then why didn’t she get rid of it herself. Why risk someone finding out that it was down there?”

“Wait a second.” Sam said, “Maybe she did ‘get rid of it’ in a sense. Malorie has been missing for years, missing since Ms. Sampson herself was in the Art and Theater club herself. What if…” Sam started to say.

The epiphany that Sam was having was something that Lilith had helped me realize over the weekend.

“Becoming vice principal was her way of hiding the body.” I said.

Sam and Naomi both looked at me in horror. This realization was a dangerous one. It meant that Ms. Sampson was party to a conspiracy. The fact that she was privy to the fact that the body was down there was one thing. The fact that she would try to keep said body hidden was another.

Jacob was worried sick about his sister’s disappearance ten years ago. It was possible that she never disappeared. It was possible that she was murdered. That was the realization that Lilith was ranting about over the weekend. It was the same realization that Naomi and Sam were having now.

“It can’t be.” Sam said, “I refuse to believe that. That can’t be what really happened.”

“Why can’t you believe it? If that body is authentic, and it really is Malorie, doesn’t this idea make the most sense? I had to listen to Lilith theorize about this all weekend. It’s possible that Ms. Sampson isn’t just party to a conspiracy. She could be party to a murder.”

“Shit.” Naomi said, “Shit. Shit. Shit. This all sounds too convincing. Why else would she try so hard to keep us silent?”

“Because we still don’t know if what we saw was a real corpse.” Sam said, “All of this is a massive, massive accusation without hard evidence to support it.”

“That’s the same thing I said to Lilith. It’s just that now I’m having a hard time shaking the feeling that she might be right about everything.”

“So what do we do now? We can’t exactly go up and start asking people about this.” Naomi said.

“Actually, that’s why I wanted to come and speak to you. The basement was so clean that we realized someone had to be taking care of it, remember? If the conspiracy theory holds true, then it may have been Ms. Sampson that had the elevator sealed off in the first place. She couldn’t risk having other students finding what we found. There has to be another way into the basement that isn’t the elevator.”

“You mean a secret passage way?” Naomi asked, “That sounds like something out of a movie.”

“There has to be. I want to look for it.” I said.

“That’s a bad idea.” Sam said, “Ms. Sampson is no doubt going to be keeping an eye out on us. Who knows how many teachers she has involved? Also there are cameras inside the school, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“I know. That’s why I think we should use your girlfriends to scout for us.” I said.

“That’s still risky. That means letting more people in on the secret.” Naomi said.

“They don’t have to be told everything. They just need a general understanding of what we’re looking for.”

“And that is…?” She asked.

“A staircase, I believe. It could be another elevator, but I feel like that’s less likely. An elevator can be easily heard. Whoever was down in the basement before us had been slipping in and out unnoticed for years now. If there is a subtle way of doing that it has to be a staircase.”

“Fine,” Naomi said, “But if we join in on this plan, we want in on the other plan.”

“What other plan?”

“The thing that I originally brought you here to talk about, your student council plans.”

“Those aren’t my plans. Those are Val’s. I thought you weren’t on the best of terms with her?”

“We aren’t, but I’m not offering to join myself. I just want someone from my group on the inside.”

“Why?”

“Are you kidding? The possibilities are limitless! The most important reason is insurance. Last year we were always butting heads with the members of the student council. The student council president last year was a prudish senior that was way too serious about everything. She was always harassing us, snitching on us, and constantly getting in our way. With someone on the inside…”

“You wouldn’t have to worry about the student council.”

“Bingo… I’m offering my help for yours.”

“We do have an extra position available, but I don’t know if Val will go for it. It’ll take some convincing. Besides, we still have to actually win the student council election.”

“Tell Val that if she accepts my alliance then she has all the votes I can muster up. That includes me, my girlfriends, and all of the girlfriends I’ve had that aren’t part of my crew. What I’m asking for in return is small by comparison.”

“I’ll try to convince her. In the meantime you’ll need to decide who you’re going to present to Val as our fifth member.”

Naomi smiled.

“I already have.”