Ava: After killing Justice
For a fleeting moment, I can tell she believes me, but she glances back at whatever text message she read earlier and the mistrust resurfaces. “Winona Cho just texted me, asking if I knew Victor was cheating on Justice with you. She says you were out with him the night Justice disappeared.”
“She’s lying.” For once, that’s the truth. She’s lying. I helped him back up that lie so he wouldn’t end up in jail because I’m ashamedly the stupid lovesick fool who hasn’t yet clarified if he was really at the arcade that night. That’s one thing about truths, it’s hidden behind layers of lies which only makes it much more tenuous to find.
“Her dad is the chief of police,” she explains.
“Isn’t he not supposed to discuss the case with his family?” I deflect, “someone should really call him out on it. It’s unprofessional.”
“Unbelievable,” she mutters under h
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Anonymous: Before killing Justice I look at her from across the parking lot. She waves at someone—a girl, hair a mass of curls pulled taut in a ponytail, dressed in the same uniform with a worried expression on her face—but her heart’s not into it so she gets into her car quickly like someone’s closing in behind her. She’s not wrong. She hasn’t got the slightest inkling of what’s coming for her. She has no clue what I’m capable of. I asked for one thing: honesty. Was that so hard? I guess it was a cumbersome task for Justice. If she had told the truth, I wouldn’t have her darkest secret tucked away in my head like a festering tumor. Justice hasn’t been coming to the hotel. She’s ghosted me, sent me to voicemail and avoided the café all week where she knows I’ll be able to contact her. Ever since I gave her hair a trim, she’s gotten the courage to do all this. She starts the car, pulls out of
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Ava: After killing Justice Victor or me. A choice that was more than Justice ever gave me. She didn’t deserve either of us, but she was keeping us hostage like dolls, always pulling the strings, always blending the truth with her lies. We could only get out if she opened the door or if we could see past the darkness she brought. She was the only light source we could see, always blotting out the other lights, pulling us into her gravitational field because she believed she was the centre of everything. Don’t believe me? Ask Odette. Oh wait, you can’t because she’s dead. Justice made sure of it. Just like she made sure I came out as a drunken fool when I proposed she choose between her best friend and her boyfriend. With Odette, the choice was clear. In Justice’s eyes, she became a liability. A thorn in her side she needed to pluck out. It was five months ago at our midnight rendezvous in the
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Ava: After killing Justice A knock on my bedroom door snaps me out of my reverie. I stop smudging the concealer under my eye and my eyes flit to the door. Asia stands in the doorway and from her stance I can tell she’s been there watching me for a while, which makes me feel even more disconcerted. “Hey,” I say, brushing off my nerves with the flick of a brush across my cheeks. “What are you doing here?” “I just want to talk.” She pads into my room dressed in a diaphanous nightgown which could give Mum a heart attack if she wore it anywhere other than at home. My desk chair rolls towards me and as she sits, I stand, keeping a wide berth between us. “Talk about what?” I feign interest in my wardrobe even though I’ve picked out my outfit for Terry’s get together. I’m met with silence which is rather unusual. My sister is a stickler for confrontations, and if her rigid post
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Ava: After killing JusticeHe shrugs. “Nothing. It’s just been a while since you texted me for a ride. I bet if Justice was here you wouldn’t have.” I filter out the mild disappointment in his tone and hold on to it, hoping it’s real. Or maybe I heard wrong and it’s just wishful thinking on my part. Again. You’d think I would’ve learnt my lesson by now from that night out in the arcade. It’s my turn to choose: Victor or Justice. It isn’t a hard choice to make because, after everything that happened on Friday, I owe Justice a lot.Victor pulls out of the driveway, looking through the rear mirror to navigate the curve. Without looking my way, he asks, “Are we picking Cece up? From what I remember, she also doesn’t own a car.”“I think she’d rather die than breathe the same air as me,” I say stiffly, annoyed that I’ve someh
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Ava: After killing Justice Then he leaves, walking into the long hallway and disappearing into the kitchen on his left. I rub at my arms, feeling unmoored for the very first time like a baby deer, not sure what to do with its limbs. I don’t even hear the compliment about my cute heels until a duo of girls passes by me. “Well, consider me impressed you finally bagged him,” Terry remarks from behind me, a smattering chuckle following his statement. I subconsciously pick at a loose thread on my shorts, feeling my heart skip with a guilty beat. “It’s not like that.” He cocks his head to the side, taking his curls down with him. His beard looks rough and the skin underneath is red. He rubs at it now, watching me. “Could’ve fooled me.” He pushes off the raised table and moves closer. Rests lazily on the wall in front of me. “From what I’ve heard, you two were together Friday night.” <
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Ava: After killing Justice Then my breath catches when a picture of Justice and I on the sand, arms wrapped around each other, backs hunched because we were shivering from the cold that was setting in. My eyes are fixed on Justice, frozen in time, forever eighteen. Victor took the pictures and I feel him stiffen beside me. Her laughter haunts me. The image of her shoving me deeper into the salty water and of her kissing Victor as I tried to dunk her too. I remember how she pulled away from him and hugged us both, shouting in our ears. “I’ve got my two most favourite humans in the entire world with me. We’ll always be together.” I remember how naïve we were. How stupid. How we had to grow up faster than humanly possible. Things changed when Odette came to The Circle. My train of thoughts comes crashing to a halt when I feel Victor trace the scar on my right hand. The light tracing of his finger over the scar sends a
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Ava: After killing Justice I’m out of the bathroom before I can form a single coherent thought. When I regain control, Red Reaper is the only one who comes into mind. The hallway smells of vape and mildly of Cheetos. I’m dizzy with confusion, with rage, with not knowing who is doing this to me. To Justice. It’s crossed my mind many times before and right now I can’t help thinking: what if Red Reaper is behind this? What if I’m next? Whoever placed the note on the mirror was close by and the realisation sets goosebumps tingling up my spine like a thousand cold fingertips. I spin around, my eyes darting over every surface. One name is getting sharper in my mind’s eye. Winona. She’s the only one who was up here with me. I crunch up the threatening note in my hand, feeling my heart squeeze along with it. “Winona, are you there?” I call out into the sequestered space. Being alone up here is making me think the worst.
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Skylar: After killing JusticeIn all my eighteen years of life, I’ve only witnessed one arrest. Mine. So when the cop with the square jaw and the determined glint in his eyes read Victor his rights, I recognized the fear swarming in his frantic gaze. I could only imagine what was going through his head: this can’t be happening to me. I’m just a kid. Why the hell are they arresting me for murder?It doesn’t take a genius to know his fingerprints matched those on the knife they found. But even with physical evidence, there’s this niggling doubt that has been piercing through my mind all day. Maybe what Ava was screaming has some truth in it. Maybe he didn’t do it. But the cops don’t scavenge on maybes, they only see what’s in front of them. A jealous boyfriend who might’ve found out that Justice cheating on him and one thing lead to another and wham! She’s dead.V