Chapter 6

What was Jane doing out wondering the streets in the middle of the night? She was supposed to be too sick in bed to get visitors. Ariel watched her take a look around before swiftly crossing the street and vanishing into the bushes on the other side. She didn't move like she was sick. Infact she almost looked like she wasn't sick at all. This didn't make any sense.

Ariel quickly climbed back inside and got dressed, sneaking back out her window and down to the ground using the rose trellises her mother tended. She followed the direction Jane had gone, straining her eyes to try and see where her friend had gone. She crept through the shadows for what felt like hours before she spotted movement again, but was disappointed to see it was not Jane. Instead it was just a stray dog.

She returned home frustrated and climbed back into bed without even changing. She managed to get some broken sleep after that, but her mind was a whirlwind of questions. Breakfast was once more a shake, but she didn't have work today. Instead she drove around the neighborhood, trying to figure out where Jane had gone.

Ariel had driven past her friend's house a couple of times, but all of the curtains were drawn closed and none of the cars were in the driveway, not even Jane's. This did little to settle the torrent in her mind.

Around noon she decided to stop at the diner for some lunch, the burger and fries really helped a lot more than she thought it would. At first she just kept to herself, but the whispered conversations going on around her were too loud to ignore. They were talking about a break in at town hall and the library, and of the wild animals spotted just outside town.

They didn't seem connected, but the two things happening at the same time was strange. Ariel pretended not to hear any of it, just finishing her food, then paying and going on her way. After that she went to the library, as it was the easiest and safest place to go. For a building that had been broken into, there was very little evidence. No police, no broken windows, not even a broken door. It didn't look like it had been broken into.

It was quiet inside, and it brought a strange sense of unease as she stepped over the threshold. She walked passes the front desk, acting as though she knew exactly what she was looking for and went to the fiction section. She walked down the rows, her eyes absently scanning over the books until something caught her attention. The spine of the book simple said 'wolves', and it was a well worn book. She was apprehensive as she stood there looking at the book, the finally took it out and slipped it to a random page.

Ariel was not sure what she had been expecting, but this was a book all about wolves. She leaned against the shelf and thumbed through the book, reading absently. When the soreness in her body became too much and her attention could no longer stay focused, she replaced the book on the shelf and walked out.

She felt silly for being there, and the drive home felt agonizingly slow. Her parents were not home when she got there and a note her mother left said they were out on a date. Ariel grabbed herself a soda and went to her room. She wanted to sleep, but the idea of it just made her uncomfortable. She was more sore than she was the previous day, and the feeling of unease that she had been feeling was only growing.

Eventually she decided to sit outside on the roof again, hoping it would calm her mind like it did the night before. Like the night before, she was nearly to a point of calm when she saw movement and her eyes snapped to it. Unlike the previous night, the person was not slinking in the shadows. They were standing on the sidewalk across the street where she had seen Jane, but they were looking up at her. It was not Jane, though. It was Sarah.