Traces of You

Chapter 13

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🔞 ⚠️ CONTENT WARNING  SEXUAL ASSAULT ⚠️🔞

Miles burst out of the library. His throat felt tight as if there was a snake wrapped around his neck. He didn't know where he was going, only that he needed to get away. When he got to the outside,  body went limp and he found himself heaving down below some trees. Everything around him was a blur and his earing was ringing with a loud buzz.

Several things he had found out, all horrible, horrible things. They weren't theories or gossip; they were truths written down on paper for the world to see. Truths.

In reality, he could only blame himself. Who was he to act like he was violated when he willingly searched up this incident himself? He clicked his tongue, his own way of casting disappointment towards himself.

The girl's name started with a 'N' of all letters. Of course he could be overthinking it. It couldn't possibly be the only person he knew who started with a 'N'. No, it had to be someone else. In the first place, the girl was dead, and it had been almost two decades ago. There wasn't a chance that he had met something that wasn't real.

His fist gripped the grass. He ripped it from the ground as he stood back up, grabbed his backpack, and ran out. He was stupid. There was no way it was someone he knew. It was definitely a coincidence.

There are only twenty six letters in the alphabet, so there were millions of possibilities of names. 'N' just happened to be of someone he knew, and of someone who died. It was completely irrelevant.

Someone called 'N' lived years ago and was raped by her brother. Someone called 'N' committed suicide at the school, but no one knows where she did it.

It's these thoughts running amuck, he found himself standing in front of the sports shed, though he had no clue how he got there. He wasn't thinking of where he was going, as long as he was moving. But to bring him here of all places? A second ago, he recalled being in front of the library,

Dwelling on his surroundings, the weather had suddenly taken a turn for the worse. The once clear sky was suddenly overrun by a sheet of dead clouds brooding over him. Maybe the world was trying to make him feel even more unsettled than he was. It didn't help that the weather report didn't mention anything about potential rain. It was nearly summer.

Second to the moody weather, he noticed that the shed had clearly been cleaned or repainted because it looked quite nice to what he usually saw. The seasonal rust was suddenly blown away and the chipped metal was somehow looking brand new. Even the dents from countless flying rugby balls had been un-dented. He thought that maybe the sports department finally decided to take care of appearances around the field, considering the shed was around 20 years old.

Though these things were not uncommon, what was uncommon was a sudden loud shriek coming from inside the shed. As human as it was, it was a chillingly painful sounding scream that he would've normally ran away from. But for some reason, his body told him to go toward the noise. Pulling and drawing him in, he was like a mosquito guided towards the light. His feet grudgingly went toward the door of the shed and he peeked through the cracks.

At first it was pitch black and he couldn't see anything. Frankly, he hoped that he was really just imagining the scream, but as he carefully tried to calm his curiosity, he suddenly found something squirming around on the ground.

Nina? he thought in confusion.

"Stop it!" she screamed while struggling on the cold pavement.