Lure // Jordan Parrish

Two // Beat Up The Buzz Cut

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        Ellah sat at the breakfast bar in her kitchen at midnight, alone in her flat like she often was. She stared across the small space to the calendar open that read January. She winced in her chair, closing her eyes and hearing her brother scream.

        It had been a year, exactly.

        Ellah’s phone dinged twice next to her, alerting her of the flight scheduled to leave in five hours and of her Mum arriving in two from Amesbury to take her to the airport.

        Ellah locked her mobile, setting it back down on the counter. It clattered half way; another yell in her head, but this one feminine.

        No one believed her when she was 10, and no one believed her when she was 23.

        But freshly at 24, she realised that she didn’t need to have someone else solve the case for her. She could do it herself.

        So, here she was, fifteen hours out from being back where it all began.

        Back in California.

        Ellah climbed down from the bar stool she was situated on, her bare feet padding along the cool wood floor of her home. She opened the door of her bedroom and opened the lid of her laptop, it already on the page she wanted.

        The difference from last year was that Ellah had her Masters degree in Forensic Science and she was smarter about how to take care of things. She knew she had to do them herself, which included returning to California.

        But not to Monroe.

        There was a connection to both problems; the trail ended in the woods.

        The woods of Beacon Hills.

        Ellah Carson was the new forensic analyst at the Beacon Hills Sheriff’s Station, starting in two days.

        She clicked on the main article on the station’s web page, a special section welcoming her to the department starting January 4th.

        There were two end results to her choice of moving to California from her home of 5 and a half years in Cambridge. She would a, find out what actually happened or b, suffocate under the inability to solve her own guilt.

        She knew it was her fault. Both times it was her fault.

        Fourteen years ago there were three of them. A year ago there was two of them. Now, it was only her.

        Two of the three were missing and presumed dead.

        And it was all on Ellah.

        She spun around in her chair, her room void of any but a packed suitcase and a carry on bag for the flight. She’d boxed everything up the week before and sent it off so it would reach her flat in Beacon Hills when she did.

        It was only now when it was too late when she started to question her sanity.

        Ellah powered off her computer a while later, shutting it and tucking it away in her shoulder bag. She checked over her things wordlessly, making sure she everything that she needed. She sat down on the edge of her bed, bending over and pulling on her white converse that had been practically demolished over the three years she’s had them.

        “Ellah, honey?” Lana's voice travelled through the flat, reverberating off of the bare walls instead of being sucked in by the usual elements in her home.