1 Chapter 1

Looking through the notifications on my phone, I plop down on my couch in exhaustion. Fighting sleep I find myself mindlessly scrolling back and forth though old videos in my gallery, seeing old photos and goofy videos me and Chris of us laughing at stupid stuff or pranking people.

I slightly laugh remembering all the trips we used to take, over the summer we slowly grew apart since we were attending different uni's after we graduated.

Getting up a growl came from my stomach. "Guess it's time to eat then." Slowly but surely I made my way to the kitchen, my legs being exhausted for no reason. I ended up grabbing a hot pocket and making my way to my room. I continued to scroll through youtube and look at the black lives matter news. In the middle of the video about a protest, a loud 'deet. deet. deet' echoed in the air. It was an amber alert.

I quickly tapped on the notification and started to read it. 'A woman's home was found empty after a break in reported at 2:47 yesterday afternoon.' I mumbled the article to myself. 'The woman allegedly missing is Chris....' My mind raced as I was scared to read the last name, 'Smith....' Holy crap. Nonononono. It must be a coincidence, right? Maybe the last name got mixed up or, someone just has the EXACT same name as her.

I tried to calm my heart as it beats in my throat making me feel nauseous and woozy. There's gotta be a reasonable explanation for this. "Wait..." Remembering that she gave me a spare key, I quickly went to my kitchen to find it, knowing it would be hanging on the inside of the pantry. Almost bashing down my door I ran down the street looking at her keys to double check her address. When I got to her house there was tape around it and you could tell something not so pleasant happened here.

Sneaking around to the back of the house, I noticed some windows were broken. Thieves. Definitely thieves. Not wanting to cut myself, I decided to be modest and just unlock the back door. I opened the door slowly and looked inside while relocking it. Yeah no one's home. All I need is a photo. I walk over to her old school binders, "good thing they didn't want this stuff'' I grabbed her senior year photo book, and found her student id.

"What else could you want from the poor girl?" Shoot. More people began to gather outside and circled the house, my only way out was the attic window.

Shit...

I ran up the stairs as quickly as possible and went to the window, it was jammed.

Damn it....

The front door groaned and cracked as kicking and slams were applied.

What can I use....

Panicked, I hastily look around for anything to open it. Crowbar!

No time...

Quickly I placed it under the edge of the frame and pushed with all my strength.

come on....

With a snap the window slid open and popped at the top,

jump....

Looking down was never a good idea, but I wasn't going to break ankles today.

Thankfully she was always sneaking out past the town's curfew, so she made a good way out. A few old boxes with sheets and blankets, made it look like a simple pile of extra supplies. I placed my foot just past the frame to set it on the outside shelf lining, almost slipping.

Hitting the boxes, they creaked loudly, enough to alert them of my position. "She's in the back!" An older man yelled to the other 'protesters' of my "break in"

I have to get the hell out of here.