Chapter 49 – A Mystery within the Mystery – Holly Hayfield

After leaving my mark in the school’s basement we decided to pack up and head home. Everyone went their separate directions after another lengthy encounter with the school fence. Lilith and I were walking home together in the streetlight. We walked with our arms linked to keep each other warm. At one point I took off Sam’s hoodie and put it on Lilith so that she’d stop shivering.

“Are you sure it was a good idea to leave the URL for the Immortal Diary down there?” Lilith asked me.

“I think so. I spray painted it on the lockers in the hallway. If Ms. Logan goes back down there she probably won’t leave the ‘shrine’ room. Given how tense she was about going back down into the basement before, I get the feeling that she won’t be going down there any time soon.”

“What makes you say that?” She asked.

“She has no concrete reason to go there now that the body isn’t down there. The painting she delivered to the underground was an act of closure. She was honoring the place that Malorie had rested for years, not necessarily Malorie herself.”

“About that, where do you think the body is now?” Lilith asked. “Could it be at her house?”

“I don’t think so,” I said. “Ms. Logan lives in a suburban area. Bringing a body like that onto her property would be too conspicuous. She also owns several cats in a dirty house with little space. No, I don’t think moving the body was her plan. It was probably Ms. Sampson’s attempt to tie up loose ends.”

“If that’s true then there’s no telling where it is.” Lilith said. “Malorie’s body was misplaced because we happened to stumble across it. It’s upsetting to think about.”

I moved in closer to Lilith as chilly wind blew down the midnight road.

“I don’t think we can be faulted for that.” I said. “We weren’t the ones illegally hiding a corpse. If we can get the police involved then I think the corpse will turn back up.”

Lilith gave me a sullen look.

“Do you really think that’s still possible?” She asked. “Do you still have hope after seeing that empty box in the basement? It looks like Ms. Sampson and Ms. Logan have done it. They got away with murder.”

“They haven’t got away with it yet.” I said. “Not as long as someone knows the truth.”

“While we’re on that topic, what was the point of writing the URL down in the basement?” Lilith asked. “I mean, it isn’t like anyone will see it down there. I thought you were against the idea of the website gaining steam?”

“I was, originally.” I said. “However, circumstances have changed. Now that the corpse isn’t there Malorie’s story feels a bit less substantial. It seems almost like another school legend, just as much as the Killing Cat. That’s the tone that the public will be viewing Malorie’s story from. That’s how her story is going to spread.”

“You’re forgetting part of my question.” Lilith said. “The story can’t spread if no one can see the URL graffiti you painted.”

“They will.” I said, “But if I told you how they’ll see it you might call me crazy.”

Lilith smiled for the first time that night.

“I think you’re crazy either way.”

I smiled back at her. We stopped linking arms so that I could wrap one arm around her instead. It was becoming even colder outside but luckily we were close to Lilith’s house. As we came into the driveway we saw that Lilith’s aunt and uncle were still out, just as planned. We were home free.

Inside we found that Lilith’s cousin was still awake in his room, playing his video game console. We cut him a deal. If he agreed to it then we’d promise not to tell his parents that he was staying up playing games. In return he wouldn’t mention the fact that we were gone or that other girls came to visit. The young boy thought he was getting the better end of the deal since we were letting him stay up even longer past his bed time.

Lilith let me use the shower first since I was her guest. The hot water felt nice after being in the cold for so long. It wasn’t until I was washing my hair did I realize just how dusty that costume room was compared to the other rooms of the basement. Ms. Logan must’ve had a harder time going in there to clean. It wasn’t hard to imagine that the things in there would fill her with anxiety. That made me wonder even more about the tapes we had and the pictures we took.

When I got out of the shower I expected to find Lilith in her room, preparing for bed. She wasn’t there. I ventured downstairs into the living room and looked around. I heard rustling sounds coming from the kitchen. When I went into the kitchen I saw that she wasn’t in there either. There was a door in the kitchen that led into the basement. Down in the basement Lilith was looking through boxes.

“I found it!” She said as I came down the stairs.

“You found what?” I asked.

“This is the old tape player we have! Check it out!” She said.

It was and old cassette player that was basically just an old fashioned boom box. It wasn’t a fancy or intuitive machine but it would get the job done.

“You want to get started on fixing those tapes tonight?” I asked.

“Can’t we…?” She asked.

Her big brown eyes were working on me. It was hard to say no after seeing how wrecked she was over Malorie earlier. If this would help her recover from that revelation then I didn’t mind. After spending so long lecturing her about the benefits of friendship I had to. This was going to be one of those times that she could rely on me.

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“Sure we can.” I said. “Let’s take this up to your room and I’ll get started. Meanwhile, you should go ahead and take your shower so you can get changed into your pajamas.”

“You’re okay with starting without me?” She asked.

“Yes, I’m familiar enough with cassette tapes that I should be able to start alone. It’s been a while but I used to have one of those tape recorders for kids.”

“Okay, I’ll take a quick shower then I’ll be out to help.”

“Okay!”

When Lilith said she was going to take a quick shower she meant it. I went into her room and got started on the tapes like we had planned. She couldn’t have been in the shower for longer than 3 or 4 minutes. More of her no-nonsense character was shining through in the face of this new information. There was no way she was going to miss this for the world.

The first problem with the tapes was how interlinked they were. It was hard to tell which tapes belonged to which cassettes. Sorting the cassettes away from each other was the first task that we tackled. The next task was untangling the tapes of each cassette so that their films could be rolled into place in a straight orientation. Doing all of this without damaging these decade-or-so old tapes was a delicate operation. It wasn’t surprising that Ms. Logan couldn’t see it through.

We unexpectedly worked through the night without a wink of sleep. Lilith wasn’t ready to give up on Malorie, and neither was I. For her this was a matter of restoring her faith in the possibility that we could discover the truth. For me this was about living up to my duties as a friend. The sun came up in the window behind us as we were working on Lilith’s bed. Her aunt and uncle were pulling up in the driveway just as we were close to finishing.

Lilith was dozing off as we worked. Eventually she gave in and let herself collapse into one of her pillows and go to sleep. Not me. I continued working. There were only two more cassette tapes to finish winding up before I could hit the hay. These two were the easier ones of the group considering Lilith had already started on them. Altogether there were fourteen cassette tapes in total. They were mostly labeled ‘School Play Script’ with an associated order number, but two were unlabeled.

Once I was finished working I placed all the cassette tapes into Sam’s bag, and then placed the bag on the floor. I crawled into bed beside Lilith and wrapped her into the covers with me. I nestled in close behind her and wrapped one arm around her. She looked so peaceful when she was sleeping. It looked like she was resting easily despite a hectic night. I hoped to get the same sort of rest myself.

I started dozing off when I heard the door open. I turned enough to see that it was Lilith’s aunt Margaret. She smiled excitedly but stopped herself from saying anything when I put my finger over my lips and nodded towards Lilith. She walked in the room to get a good look at Lilith and realized that she was sleeping. With that being the case she pulled out her phone in landscape mode. She pointed at it and gave me a questioning look. I rolled my eyes and gave her a thumbs-up so that she could sneak her picture.

Lilith’s aunt was satisfied once she had her picture of Lilith and I snuggled up together in bed. It must’ve been difficult for her raising Lilith after Lilith’s parents passed away. Lilith seemed to have difficulties of her own in that regard. It looked like their family was getting along well, but Lilith remained relatively aloof. It must’ve been a massive relief for Margaret to learn that Lilith wasn’t alone at this alternative school. That’s why she had my sympathy. She truly cared about her niece’s wellbeing and happiness.

Lilith woke up before I did. It was late in the afternoon and the sun was going down. I noticed because I heard rustling from the bag with the cassette tapes on the floor and felt that she was no longer in my arms. I turned to get a look at what she was doing. She was already preparing the boom box for operation. She had the cassette player door open whilst looking through the bag.

I yawned as I sat up in the bed.

“What are you doing?” I asked her.

“I wanted to listen to one of the tapes, but I’m not sure which one I should listen to first.” She said.

She went through the bag picking up the cassettes only long enough to read their labels. She began arranging all the cassettes into rows in front of her, ordering them by number. I slid down off the bed with the blanket still wrapped around me. I put my arms around her to encompass her in the warmth of the blanket as well. This gave her some short pause, but she seemed to be growing used to my touchy affections.

“The unlabeled tapes,” I noted as she pulled one out, “I don’t know why they’re unlabeled.”

“They might not have anything on them.” Lilith said. “The play never got finished, right? Jacob said that Malorie was the one writing it. If she was killed before the play ended then these are probably just leftovers.”

“You might be right.” I said. “Let’s put that one in to make sure. If they don’t have anything on them then we can just put them aside and ignore them.”

“Okay.” Lilith said.

Lilith put the tape into the boom box. It took a moment for anything to happen. There was a static-filled background noise like the tape wasn’t operating correctly. Just before Lilith could press stop, a female voice appeared on the tape.

“The curtains open and reveal our main character sitting alone in the woods.” The voice on the tape said. “She is approached by Nyx, a black cat doll I’ve stitched together for the play. The Nyx doll has batteries inside it to make the eyes glow to make it seem spiritual to the audience. The batteries should last the full duration of the play.”

It sounded like the girl was flipping through pages of paper, probably more stage notes. Her voice was unfamiliar. It sounded husky and weary. The tone was completely flat as she spoke. She was talking like she was reading something grave.

“Does that voice sound familiar to you?” Lilith asked me.

“I have no idea.” I said.

There were more sounds of paper moving before a door slammed in the background.

“Malorie!” This new person shouted as they came in.

Lilith and I looked at each other with widened eyes.

“You’ve fucked up this time, Malorie!” The person said.

“What do you want from me, Vivian?” Malorie asked drearily.

“You know exactly what I fucking want! I want my peaceful life back! Why’d you have to come here and ruin things between me and Abby? We were doing just fine without you. Now… Now she’s involved in all this shit because you had to be a sneaky little snitch.” Vivian asked.

Malorie let out a long drawn out sigh. I could hear her return to looking through her papers as she abandoned the conversation. There were stomping steps as Vivian came closer to the recording device. Suddenly the sound of papers whooshing into the air drowned out anything else. It sounded like Vivian threw Malorie’s papers onto the floor.

“Don’t ignore me.” Vivian demanded in a vicious voice.

There was a tense pause between them.

“We don’t like each other.” Malorie said. “We’re never going to like each other. You don’t want to actually talk to me about why I ousted the theater club for their murder. You just want me to feel bad that I did. That’s not going to happen. Soon enough, everyone will get exactly what they deserve.”

This was a motive. It sounded like Malorie told on them for something they did.

“Murder…?” Lilith asked.

I shrugged at her. The cassette tape continued.

“I understand your self-righteous bullshit well enough. What I want to know is what about you?” Vivian hissed. “When will you get what you deserve?”

“Well, Ms. Hoffman told me this would absolutely be the end of the Art and Theater club.” Malorie said. “So it sounds like I’m going down with all of you.”

The infliction of Malorie’s tone turned positive towards the end. It was like she was laughing at the thought of everyone going down together. This seemed to enrage Vivian because there was a large bang and crashing sound. That was the end of the tape. It took me a moment to realize what happened, but I recalled the damaged cassette player back in the school basement.

“Vivian was the one that broke the cassette player we saw at the school.” I said.

“You’re right about that! I was wondering what that sound was.” Lilith said.

“It seems like this just got even more complicated.” I said.

“I think we’ll find out something more on the other unlabeled tape. Let’s put it in and listen.” I said.