The Truth Hurts

61 │deceit, a two-way street

Taylor's phone rings from underneath the sheets. She rolls over in the bed but ignores it, allowing the call to go to voicemail. Pulling the comforter up to her shoulders, she snuggles her chin into the pillow as she drifts back off to sleep. The second she dozes off it rings again, this time waking her up. She groans, reaching over to dig the phone out from the mess of sheets and slides her thumb across the green button to answer it.

"Hello?" Her voice is groggy. She rubs at her forehead and, in a matter of seconds, finds herself wide awake. Her eyes stretch open as she sits up in the bed. "Wait Riley, slow down. What?"

She pauses, looking over to see Marc still asleep next to her. She slips out from under the covers, careful not to shift the mattress too much as she doesn't want to wake him, and stands up next to the bed. Her voice lowers to a whisper as she snatches her jeans up from the floor, quickly sliding her legs into them. She finds it difficult to keep her voice calm. "Oh my god. Are they alright?"

As Riley talks to her, she lifts the sheets on the corner of the bed in search of her shirt. She finds it near Marc's leg and quickly pulls it over her head. "Okay, I'm going to go check on her. Alright. Bye."

Taylor ends the call, setting the phone on Marc's computer desk. As she reaches down to grab her backpack from the floor she realizes that she's not wearing any shoes. She turns around and quickly slips her feet into her sandals, which were luckily kicked off right in front of the bed, before looking back at the computer desk. She grabs the backpack and reaches for her phone when she suddenly freezes.

Looking at the desk, she sees the edge of a clipping from the Riverside Newspaper sticking out from underneath a binder laid on the table. Although just a few words of the first paragraph can be seen from the page, along with the corner of a picture, she immediately recognizes the article.

She picks up the binder and sets it aside, revealing the newspaper clipping of the bus accident that was printed the following morning after it had happened. A small picture of Daniel is amidst the paragraph underneath the image of the wrecked school bus. She reaches down to touch the article and pulls it toward her, gasping when she sees what was hidden underneath it.

A stack of developed photographs lie in front of her, the first picture taken from the courtyard in front of their school. Julia's body is being hauled out in a black leather bag on a stretcher as the paramedics lead her to the back of an ambulance. She can see students swarming around the area as they look at the crime scene, Marc clearly one of many in this crowd, and it reminds her of the moment her and Kris were riding the bus and arrived at school to discover what had happened. When the murders first began.

Reaching down, Taylor picks up the small stack of photos and flips to the next one, covering her mouth as she sees a close up of the stretcher inside of the ambulance before the paramedics were able to close the doors. Marc must have zoomed in on this one. She flips through the following photos, not really wanting to be reminded of everything they've already been through, and catches a glimpse taken from the parking lot at Cesar's apartment complex.

Suddenly, her hands tremble as she stops at a photo near the end of the stack. She sees herself sitting next to Morgan in his Mustang and immediately knows when and where it was taken. But how did Marc know they were there?

More importantly... why has he not said anything?

This whole time she has felt like the one betraying Marc, but now it is coming to her realization that perhaps it's the other way around. She shakes her head, feeling the irony kick in, and flips through the remainder of the pictures to see the last few were taken at Kandice's house the night of her murder. He must have arrived late as all he has are images of the crime scene after the body was removed. A puddle of blood is smeared on the pavement alongside small shards of glass that must have fallen from the balcony along with her corpse.