Innocent Killers

IK (5) Tension

Dragging herself up to go to school one week after the funeral was something Katherine struggled to do more so than usual.

She hadn't been back yet. None of them had, the school had given Clara's closest friends time to grieve. But it ended up like more time to polish their lies into perfection.

She sluggishly pulled on her navy blue and black checkered school skirt and white button-up shirt. She moved to her bedroom mirror and began to brush out her messy head of brown hair. In an attempt to seem somewhat like the girl her peers would recognise she applied some makeup, despite how much she didn't want to. After half an hour of getting ready she left her room and entered the kitchen.

Grandma Lee sat at the kitchen table with a large newspaper in her hands, one plate of ready-made pancakes sat in front of her and another dish seemingly unclaimed next to her.

"Morning Gran." Katherine greeted before slowly sitting in the seat belonging to the unclaimed pancakes. She began to shovel mouthfuls of her breakfast into her mouth instantly.

"Katherine," Grandma Lee welcomed before lowering the newspaper in her hands so that she could meet Katherine's eyes. "I need you to tell me the truth about what happened at that cabin, not the bogus story you and your friends told the police."

Katherine choked on her pancakes for several seconds before calming down and giving her Grandmother a horrified look.

"We told the truth," Katherine lied.

Grandma Lee rolled her eyes and had a bite of her pancakes. Then utterly sure of herself she again accused Katherine of once more of lying, only this time to her only families face instead of a police reporter.

Katherine's palms began to develop sweat, and she awkwardly pushed the pancakes around her plate. Then she sighed, she had never been able to keep anything from Grandma Lee and now was no exception. She couldn't talk to anyone and right then, she didn't trust her friends to know her discomfort with everything.

They may think of her fear as a threat and surrender her in as a culprit or even kill her. The people she had grown up with where all loose canons. Including her. And at any moment one of them could explode, and she did not want to be caught in the crossfire. But Katherine was falling apart inside; she craved comfort that her friends could no longer give her, all their presence did was make her skin crawl.

Keith was eerily silent, Marcus was twitchy and paranoid, and Madeline was turning into a professional actor.

It was all too much for Katherine.

"Katherine?" Grandma Lee pushed.

Katherine looked up from her plate with watery eyes and opened her mouth ready to spill her guts when a sudden at horn screamed into their ears from out the front of their small house.

That snapped Katherine out of her moment of pure weakness.

Katherine jumped up and mentally scolded herself for being so naive sure her Grandma loved her, but it was dangerous to speak to anyone. She and her friends' lives depended on how well they could all keep their lips sealed.

"Sorry Granma Lee, Madeline's here. Can't keep her waiting you know what she's like." Katherine quickly dumped her unfinished breakfast in the kitchen sink before grabbing her school bag rushing out of the front door before her Grandma could even respond.

Katherine slowed her rapid pace to a slow walk as she grew closer to Madeline's sleek black range rover.

Madeline sat in the driver's seat, to busy applying extra lip gloss to her already moist lips to spare Katherine a glance as she slid into the car.