For Nevermore Season 1

“blackout” for two weeks, Josie snuck her cell phone to her so she could hear Sam’s pile of voicemails. The messages had started out simple and friendly, “Hey, we need to talk.” As days passed, their frequency increased, as did the pain in his voice. “I’m sorry, Noella. I don’t know what happened. It just sorta did. Please, call me back.”
    He stopped calling on Friday. Noella was worried that since he probably didn’t know she was on a full blackout, and punished from using the phone, he took her silence as a sign that she didn’t want to talk to him. Maybe ever again. Josie had offered to let Noella use the phone to call him, a few times over the weekend. Noella wanted to every time, but as soon as she started dialing his number, something inside her froze.
    What do you say to the person who broke your heart?
    The worst part was that Noella didn’t really have any right to complain that Sam had kissed Becca, or Becca had kissed Sam, or however it went down. It wasn’t like he knew Noella had fallen for him.
    Noella had nothing and everything to say, but given the opportunity to call, she chose the coward’s path. Avoiding the conversation was easy, and the safest way to keep herself from feeling like an idiot. Unfortunately, her plan had expired. In another hour she’d see Sam at school, and with two classes together, there was no way to avoid him.
    Noella was already thinking it a second before Josie said, “It’s not too late. You want to call him now?”
    Noella looked around for Randy. “Isn’t Randy home?”
    Josie shook her head. “He had to go in early today, so if you wanna call Sam and get it out of the way, now’s your chance.”
    Noella looked down. “No, I can’t. I don’t even know what to say.”
    Noella hugged Josie, thanked her again for being so great and always looking out for her, then promised that she’d try to make things better with Sam at school. Josie assured her that everything would be fine.
    Noella went to her room to get ready. She grabbed her pills from her nightstand, opened the orange bottle, popped a pill in her mouth, then, out of water in her bedside bottle, went to the bathroom to fill a paper cup to wash the pill down. She turned off the faucet, caught her reflection, then took a startled step back.
    For a split second, it felt as if someone else was on the other side of the mirror. Someone who looked like, but wasn’t, Noella. She inched closer to the mirror, then raised her hand to the glass, half expecting her reflection to stay still. But Noella’s reflection mirrored her movement.
    She breathed in relief. Noella hadn’t had nightmares, that she remembered anyway, or hallucinations since last week’s events. In fact, she hadn’t dreamed of anything at all, at least so far as she could remember. While she missed seeing her father, and Dante, in her dreams, Noella felt the reprieve from her nightmares was an even exchange.
    Noella went through her morning motions slowly, preparing for school at a crawl as her mind turned the twisted pieces of her reality’s puzzle over and around in her head.
    She was lost in a world where nothing made sense. The video showed that there was no man, but even if there had been, even if that part was true and the video was a lie, it couldn’t have been Dante.
    But he said your name. He knew you!
    Yeah, sure, like you didn’t imagine that, too.
    I didn’t imagine him burning a man alive with his hands! The sheriff’s department has a body. That’s proof that something happened!
    Noella finished getting ready, then pulled her sweater over her head and ran downstairs to wait for Josie by the door. Josie was downstairs a minute later, and they were in the car, driving to school a few minutes after that. As they drove, rain began to drizzle again. Noella stared out the window at the ugly morning, soaking in gray.
    Josie pulled to the school’s curb. Noella thanked her aunt, said goodbye, then stepped from the car, hoping for a return to normalcy. And hoping not to run into Sam.

    **

    Noella was three feet from Josie’s car when her eyes fell on Katie’s memorial, as the scent of a hundred carnations curled into her nose. The memorial was set in front of the school’s main entrance — right where her tortured body had been found. A giant portrait of the pretty young girl, last year’s class photo, rested on an easel in a forest of flowers, teddy bears, cards, and posters with various scribbled versions