The Cult of Romeo

XIX. Cold Little Heart

Act 3, Scene 2

I was on my way to anywhere that didn't have people. Breathing deeply and stumbling along the corridors until I'd soon walked for long enough that the number of students on my journey had trickled down to nothing and I was finally alone. That daunting feeling of isolation wrapped around my body and clung to my skin like a plague, making me feel cold.

In a daze of alcohol and patheticness, I followed the path that guided me further and further away from the hustle and bustle of opening night jitters. As I trotted past Mr Donahue's office, I noticed the door was creaked open, just a hair wide, but my curiosity sparked. When I glanced inside, the lights were off with the curtains closed firmly, and through the darkness, I made out only faint shapes. 

 Pushing past my initial hesitance, I snuck inside to quench the fascination inside me. I shimmied through the crack in the door and closed it gently behind me and now it was deathly quiet. Every breath that I strung echoed across the walls and I couldn't find the light switch. Through the slither of light that peaked through the thin fabric of curtains. The office looked a lot different today than when I visited with Julien.

Before, with every object glued firmly in place, the room looked like a display for a shop front rather than a real workspace. Now those very same objects were strewn across the floor without a sign of order. Books that had once been filed alphabetically on his shelf were now scattered across the office carpet with the telephone dangling off the hook and just grazing the floor below.

I tip-toed across the rubbish and to his scratched up wooden desk and saw the blazer again from last time. It was cold to touch as my fingertips grazed the fabric, I wondered what it was for. I wondered so deeply that my mind began to fog up with the past. 

I smelt lavender first, so strongly that I coughed away from it and almost slipped out of the vision. It felt like the scent was in my hair, in the beds of my fingernails and sunken into my skin. The blazer belonged to a girl. It was a girl with a radiant laugh, tanned legs that went on forever and blonde curls that danced in the wind. 

My heart skipped a beat as I pulled myself from the past because I'd seen it all. I thought back to that day, the last day I saw Jackie Keller alive, and knew that this was her blazer. That golden thread was enough to give it away but I had been ignorant towards the fact while too invested in the excitement of sleuthing to think for even a moment. 

This most definitely confirmed it. Mr Donahue and Jackie were involved once upon a time. The news was enough to make my hands slippery with sweat because it was real now. While I had theorised as much, and Mr Donahue's reaction on that early morning had surely given enough away; something about seeing a dead girl's blazer out like this struck a chord in me. Just as I was about to slip out through the door, it creaked open. I had no time to do anything other than throw myself into the storage cupboard. 

Still dark and extremely cramped, I put my hands out to find a comfortable spot. Nestled in the corner and behind the mountain of books that hid my body from prying eyes, I placed my hands over my ears in an attempt to block the splitting headache and fear that crawled over my skin like spiders. I wasn't sure who had walked inside but opening the door had allowed a stream of light to flood the room. I assumed the intruder was Mr Donahue but I couldn't be sure. 

My head was thumping and I felt my throat dry. It was difficult to tame my roaring heart but all I could do was close my eyes and breathe deeply. In...and out. In...and out. 

I'd finally calmed my erratic breaths and turned to the side, resting my cheek against the cold of the crumbling wall. Unfortunately, that was the worst thing I could have done. With the new light filling the office, I managed to glance inside a cardboard box and see an opened treasure chest. Filled with underwear, lavender shampoo, a hairbrush and piles of promiscuous photos taken of Jackie unnoticed. I felt the bile rise slowly up my throat.