Chapter 42 – Lilith’s Ultimatum – Holly Hayfield

According to Ms. Sampson I was officially the founding member of the gardening club. Thanks to Angel’s help I was able to bring some gardening supplies to school and prepare my gardening area. Angel came into the school long enough to carry two large bags of garden soil, while I carried up an additional plant pot filled with tools. We set everything at the top of the stairwell, beside the door. Angel gave me a pair of gardening gloves she bought earlier in the day as an impromptu gift. As soon as I put on the gloves I was starting to feel the yearning for gardening come back to me.

The week went smoothly after Ms. Sampson granted me permission to use the rooftop area. Val was spending more time with me, but not in any way that she would’ve liked. She was being bombarded with emails and letters from other students. They wanted to know who she was and why they should vote for her. Naturally Val didn’t have the ability to answer every single one of these personally so she left it to her student council group.

Sam bailed on the boring paper work immediately. Jay was proving to be untrustworthy with this type of work when she was getting emotionally charged about the number of girls interested in Val romantically. That being the case, most of the work was done between Lilith and I. Val herself was more concerned with checking what the three of us wrote rather than doing it herself. She’d correct us in spots and edit in others. At one point there were so many messages to deal with that I felt like I was working an unpaid job.

When lunch came around that Thursday afternoon we were hoping for a lighter work load after having finished so much the day before. It turned out that Val had another job for us. There was more paperwork to fill out as we ate lunch. This paperwork was more external in nature. The school maintained a working relationship with many of the surrounding businesses. The businesses would lend their financial support to whichever student council group won, depending on how they felt about each group. The work we had to fill out was details of our future plans.

“Aren’t we really just phoning it in?” Lilith asked. “I mean, we don’t have a lot of these details ourselves. Unless there are some other plans you’d like to tell us about.”

“Not at the moment,” Val said. “The details aren’t important as long as these people think we’re competent, which we will be. The money from these local businesses could let us fund a lot of school activities. It could go a long way towards anything we come up with in the future.”

“I’m all done over here.” I said as I stretched my arms out. “That was too much writing. These type of things should really be digital.”

“You know how these old dinosaurs are.” Val said. “As long as they pay up then all this donkey work will be worth it.”

“I’m done here too.” Lilith said.

Val stood up and began gathering the paperwork.

“Good, that should be enough for today. The school requires proof copies of all this. I’m going to make copies of them in the front office. Want to come with me, Holly?” Val said.

“I’ll go with you!” Jay said.

“Actually I was planning to work on the garden I was telling you about. There’s still about thirty minutes left for lunch. I want to make the most of it.”

“Do you really want to focus on something like that?” Val asked. “It’s almost the middle of fall. Is now really the best time for planting?”

“Gardening was a hobby of mine before changing schools. The plants I’ll be working with are perennials that should survive the fall and winter just fine.” I said. “When they blossom in a few months I’ll be sure to give you a flower.”

Val gave me a mixed expression. Normally her facial expressions weren’t so easy to read but this time it was clear. She was torn between trying to keep me focused on the student council work and letting me follow my interests. The garden wouldn’t expend large amounts of my time so it likely wouldn’t cut into the campaign work, but at the same time I’d be less available altogether. However this hypothetical flower would potentially be the first gift I’d ever given her. A flower produced by someone in their own garden was worth more than a store bought flower.

“Fine,” Val said. “But I get to pick the flower.”

Val turned to Jay and waved her over.

“Come on, Jay. You can help me carry the rest of this stuff.”

Jay gleefully jumped out of her seat to join Val. It didn’t even faze her that the only reason she was joining Val was because I had other plans. When the two of them walked out of the room only Lilith and I remained. Once I was finished eating I picked up my lunch tray to get ready to leave. Lilith grabbed my hand as I got up.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“I want to ask you about where we are with Ms. Logan.” Lilith said.

I sat back down.

“I’ve talked to her every day this week and she hasn’t told me anything that gets us closer to solving Malorie’s mystery, or getting back into the basement.”

Lilith bit her thumb.

“What about Naomi? Wasn’t she supposed to be helping us?”

“She said that her girlfriends all turned up nothing. They don’t know of a way down into the basement any more than we do.”

“Ugh! Shouldn’t you be close to getting her to talk by now?” Lilith asked in frustration.

I held Lilith’s hand and rubbed it.

“Well you see Lily, it’s not so easy. I can’t just query her system for answers like a machine. She has her own emotions and has to be approached on that level.”

Lilith pulled her hand away sharply.

“Don’t call me that.”

“You don’t like Lily? I think it’s cute.”

“What I’d like is to get another look at that body. There was so much we missed the first time we went down there. We don’t even know the way she was murdered. If we can get another good look at it then maybe we’ll open up new avenues to explore.” Lilith said.

“I agree, but it’s not so simple to get information from Ms. Logan. She has to be handled with delicately or else I could cause more harm than good. Right now I’m more focused on creating a bond of trust with her. I can’t just squeeze answers out of her.”

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Lilith folded her arms.

“And here I thought you were interested in getting to the bottom of the mystery. Instead you’re too busy playing camp counselor with Ms. Logan!”

Now I was the one getting frustrated.

“Hold on, Lilith. You’re making it sound like I’m not trying to help.” I said in my defense.

“Who are you trying to help? Me or Ms. Logan…?” She asked.

“I don’t see the two goals as exclusive. I can help Ms. Logan with her problems while also trying to get new information. Don’t you understand that?”

“What I understand is that we haven’t made any new progress for almost a week!” Lilith said and stood up. “If you were really my friend like you said then you’d be focused on helping me, not her. Or maybe I was wrong? If you won’t go through with the plan then have Ms. Logan hang out with you on the weekends instead!”

Lilith got up and stormed off, leaving her lunch tray and book bag there in the student council room. What she was saying was so selfish that I couldn’t bring her to see it from my perspective. She was so frustrated with the lack of progress that she wasn’t going to be patient enough to listen to my side of the story. That made me frustrated too. I was doing all that I could, wasn’t I?

As I got up to take my tray back to the cafeteria I began to reflect on her point. Was I really doing the best that I could to bring about results? Ms. Logan seemed happier lately and she wasn’t stuttering around me, that was definitely a positive result. It was just a result that Lilith didn’t care about. I was still trying to get new information on Malorie, it was just taking time. There just weren’t any new opportunities to push the agenda.

What Lilith really wanted was the next clue in the case. She didn’t give a damn about Ms. Logan. Then again, she never liked Ms. Logan to begin with. I was sympathetic towards Ms. Logan because I felt her life was tragic. There was no end to her suffering in sight and Lilith didn’t care about that sad fact. When Malorie died a massive part of Ms. Logan died with her. That was the tragedy Ms. Logan was living.

Were my attempts at helping Ms. Logan futile? I had been asking myself the past few days about what I could do to help her move on. I never stopped to ask myself if she could move on. Ms. Logan’s tragedy represented a horrifying mirror of my own. If she couldn’t move on from her personal dilemma then what did that mean for mine? Would my broken heart ever heal after being abandoned by Ellie and Opal or was I doomed to forever live in the past? As my grip on Lilith was slipping I could see myself sliding into a dark place just like Ms. Logan.

These thoughts haunted me even as I was working on my rooftop garden area. I felt so stressed that I stayed in my little garden even after the lunch bell rang. Normally skipping class was difficult for me but this time I didn’t even think about it. This work in the garden was helping to sooth me more than anything else could at the moment. I was happy to have gardening back, although I didn’t have much to do at the moment.

The first flowers I was planning on planting were pansies. Pansies were pretty easy to care for and would live through the winter here as long as we didn’t get a prolonged frost period. Even if they did die then I could learn from it and start again in spring. Hobby gardening was forgiving like that, unlike a lot of things in life. Whenever I failed in gardening I just started again next season. My failures in real life lived on in the dark corners of my mind forever.

I was preparing the gardening soil in one of the long plant boxes when the doorway to the stairwell flew open. Sam walked through with a look on her face like she was surprised to see me here. I was just as surprised to see her. Sam was out of breath and panting. I sat down the tool I was using to transfer soil from the bag near me.

“Sam…? What’s wrong?” I asked her.

Sam put her hands on her knees and breathed heavily like she had just got done running. She pulled down her black surgical mask so that she could breathe more easily.

“What’s wrong…?”She asked rhetorically and took another deep breath. “You’re what’s wrong! One of my girlfriends has the same class with you after lunch. She said you didn’t show up to class! Naomi and I were worried! We were afraid that Black Brittney and her goons had taken you off somewhere.”

“Sorry to make you worry about me. I came here when I was done helping Val. I’ve been here since the middle of lunch.” I said.

Sam slowly came closer and sat down against the wall beside the plant box I was preparing.

“I’m glad I thought to check this place. I remembered you talking about plans for a gardening club in our ChatCat group. What are you doing up here anyways?”

I pointed at the bag and tools sitting beside me.

“Well right now I’m just getting this box ready for planting. The soil has to be wetted a little and evened out before I can get started. That’s what all this other stuff is for. Once the soil is properly conditioned I’ll start placing seeds either afterschool today or tomorrow.” I said.

“Yeah, cool, but that’s not what I meant. I meant why didn’t you go to class? Couldn’t this wait?”

I looked down at the plant box and shrugged.

“It’s like when I found you doing graffiti on your first day here. I just needed some time alone.” I said.

Sam leaned forward and put her hand on my thigh.

“Is anyone threatening you?” She asked. “If they are then I want you to tell me right now and I’ll deal with them.”

“No, no it isn’t like that. This whole student council campaign has helped keep bullies off my back for the time being. No one wants to risk getting entangled with someone closely linked to Val. Val herself used to give me trouble but now that I’m working for her she is far less aggressive.”

“Then what’s wrong? Why are you up here all by yourself?” She asked.

“It’s a long story…” I said.

“Come on, you can tell me. Whatever it is I’ve got your back.” She said.

She patted my thigh as she said this. I put my hand atop her hand. The great thing about Sam was that I didn’t sense any ulterior motive in her friendliness. It was unfortunate that she chose to make herself Naomi’s right hand spy in our student council group. It would’ve been nice to get closer to her without that pretext.

“I guess you could say I’m feeling a little under the weather. I’ve been spending so much time this week talking to Ms. Logan that her state of mind is rubbing off on me. I’ve been trying to help her get to a better place but I’m starting to wonder if that’s even possible. Lilith doesn’t seem to think it’s important.” I said.

Sam smirked.

“You’re a trooper for trying to help her at all. Everyone else seems happy to avoid her based on what I’ve heard. I think it’s a sign of good character that you invest yourself into others like this. The world needs more people like that.” Sam said.

I went back to prepping the plant box. Sam watched vacantly as I worked.

“What do you think about it?” I asked her. “Do you think I’m wasting my time?”

“Well…” Sam started to say. “I don’t think it’s a question of if you’re wasting your time. I think it’s a question of rather or not this person is worthy of your time.”

“How do you mean?” I asked.

“This woman, Ms. Logan, has a reputation for being difficult. It must be true if she’s managing to wear you down like this. This woman seems to be investing very little towards improving herself. Why should a student be asked to invest so much into her? This type of personal struggle should be dealt with by a professional, not a student.” Sam said.

I hummed in contemplation.

“It seems like she doesn’t want to get help in any traditional sense. From what I’ve gathered these past few days, her family has been trying to pressure her into working with them. Ms. Logan is afraid of putting too much trust into anyone. She’s like a hurt animal and I don’t completely understand why. I’m not even entirely sure why she’s willing to trust me.”

“You don’t find that suspicious at all?” Sam asked.

“I’ve tried thinking about it from her point of view. If she’s afraid of talking to an actual professional then maybe she’s only willing to talk to me precisely because I’m a student. It’s a stretch, but maybe she longs for the sort of companionship she had when she was back in high school. It’s easy to look at me wearing her old school uniform and project an image of a peer onto me.”

“You’re saying she is completely delusional?” Sam asked with a half-smile.

“That’s not what I’m trying to say. I’m trying to say that she wants someone she feels she can relate with while also feeling safe and in control. She can’t do this with an authority figure. I make the perfect stand-in for someone she can approach on her terms.” I said.

Sam shook her head in disbelief.

“Whew, you’ve really got this counseling act down pat, huh? It sounds like you really know her.”

I smiled half-heartedly.

“The thing is I’m no longer acting when I go to talk to her. Without getting all narcissistic, I can see the light that I bring into her dark life. The more that I get to know her, the more familiar I’ve become with her pain. It pains me to think about. That’s part of the reason I’m up here. The other reason is pressure from Lilith. Lilith is upset with me and I’m sad about that.”

“From the way I see it you’ve got a choice. You can focus on trying to fix this broken woman like you’ve been trying to do. Or you can work to repair things with Lilith.”

“Which would you choose?” I asked.

“I can’t answer that for you. I can only ask you another question. Which relationship is more important to you in the long term?”