Hide and Secret (Wattys2015)

(29) Jill's POV

Taylor and I tailed our mystery woman (Who we'd officially dubbed as the Lady in Blue). We continued to follow her as she floated from room to room, not talking to anybody.

"What is she doing?" Taylor whispered to me.

I shushed her as we tried to be normal looking as we followed the woman. Every now and then, people would stop to talk to me and wish me a happy birthday. They never acknowledged Taylor, who was right next to me the entire time.

It made me realize that people weren't exactly sure why Taylor was here. All of those people who knew me as the popular girl also knew me as the girl who tormented Taylor. Everyone was waiting to see what would happen. They thought I was using Taylor as the victim of a joke that would reveal itself in time. Either that or they were just utterly baffled as to why she was here in the first place.

I linked my arm with Taylor's and made sure everybody saw. That way, everyone could guess that Taylor was at my party because she was my friend.

We continued to follow the Lady in Blue once more. The woman opened a partially open door that led into a dimly lit room, her mask still securely disguising her face. Taylor and I followed suit, but before we stepped into the hallway, I took off my shoes, signalling for Taylor to do the same. That way, we could be more discreet.

We followed her through the dark room. We could just faintly see her. My parents had reserved parts of the area for my party. Evidently, this room wasn't one of those areas, so therefore the lights had been turned off. As one got further in, the room narrowed into a long, endless, dark  hallway.

As the woman continued to creep, and Taylor and I continued to follow, I looked around furtively for clues surrounding this woman's identity. Was she the sender? Was she a helper of the sender? Was she just an ordinary party crasher who coincidentally wore the same dress the sender said she'd wear?

My heart started pounding rapidly as I let my imagination get the best of me. Would anybody hear me scream down here?

Suddenly, there was a loud crash coming from behind Taylor and me. The two of us whirled around. As we did this, Taylor let out a loud yelp as her hold tightened on my arm. She gripped it so hard I had no doubts that she'd left indents of her nails in my bare arm.

When we finally got grips on our fears, we realized that there was nothing behind us. Absolutely nothing... Except for a closed door. The door hadn't been closed when we came in.

I quickly looked at where the Lady in Blue had been standing just a moment ago. She had vanished, too. I observed this with an almost emotionless thought process. I was essentially a numb robot, just going through what felt like daily motions, because that was what my life had become. My life had turned into always being on high-alert all the time. And now it was simply mundane amidst all the chaos.

Meanwhile, Taylor tried to open the door, as she was thoroughly freaked out. The doorknob, even though it was yanked on and twisted, would not budge. "We're locked in!" Taylor squeaked with fright in her voice.

I stepped towards her. "That can't be," I denied, not believing her.

I went over to open the door myself. Surely it was just stuck. It was fully possible. This place was old. Old doors were bound to get stuck when opening or closing. And this was simply another case of that, right? It had to be.

But no matter how much I pulled, banged, yelled, and even kicked, that door would not open.

"Great! We're gonna die in here!" Taylor wailed, quickly starting to panic. Her eyes were welling up with tears, and as she looked to me for a plan, I saw for the first time an emotion that hadn't ever once crossed her face: Absolute despair. Taylor had essentially given up hope, and that was just heartbreaking. Throughout all of this, Taylor had never given up hope. She had always held onto the steadfast belief that everything would be okay sometime soon.