Cursed ✔️

97. Destiny's Plot

"If I tell you why I'm here, would you tell me how come you're here too?" Emily asked Alex sitting on the bed.

Fearing that John could come any moment now, Emily, Clyde, Helena, Ryan, and Alex all went to the room where Alex was staying.

"Ok," Emily continued after Alex nodded. At first, she did not want to say anything about it but as this was the only option she could think of, she looked at Clyde, Helena, and Ryan who were invisible to Alex's eyes and then said, "Hannah and John are my friends and I believe you have met them."

Alex nodded still sobbing a little. "Yeah, both of them came to the hotel at which we were staying at that time and they asked us about the cursed stone."

"So you know about the stones?" Emily asked. If she knew about them, she could know something about Diana too.

"Not more than what Hannah and John told me," Alex replied in a weak voice.

Emily asked, "What do you know or how do you know about the stone being cursed?"

"I remember that day clearly." Alex stared at the empty and dull walls as her mind took her to the flashback."It was 28th November and we all were celebrating my birthday. When the party was over and everyone had gone home, I was sitting on the rug in my living room opening the gifts. There was this one particular gift that did not have any name written on it. It was not even a box or a proper shape. It was like someone had gift-wrapped the item itself without even bothering keeping it inside a box or something before wrapping it up.

I opened the wrapper anyway and there it was - the most beautiful emerald stone that I have ever seen. I showed my parents and they were mesmerized the same way I was. As days went by, I forgot to ask my friends and the guests that came to my party who had given the gifts. I even thought about making a locket from it.

But since the day we had the stone, our lives were never the same.

Unexplainable events began happening around us. We found ourselves feeling like we were being watched or followed. My best friends were suddenly getting sick and it was like our family was going through sad times. And then we lost my big sister. But it wasn't like she was suffering from a serious illness or something. Everything happened so suddenly. She wasn't even in an accident - "

"If you don't mind telling me, how did she die?" Emily asked with Clyde, Helena, and Ryan looking at Alex.

Alex closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and continued, "One day, when I came back from the school," Alex bit her lips. One could clearly see the struggle and pain her sister's death had on her and now she had even lost her parents too.

"I heard my mom crying from upstairs and I soon figured out that the sound was coming from my sister's room. I threw my bag on the floor as I ran upstairs and the sight I saw -" Alex gulped her saliva and pressed her thumb in a fist to hold back the tears.

Emily and the rest could sense that she must have seen the dead body of her sister but what she told them next, they didn't see it coming.

"I- I- saw her dead body hanging from the ceiling with her eyes staring right back at mine.

My mom saw me and ran towards me to hug me. She showed me a note where my sister wrote that she is committing suicide as she couldn't bear the weight of all those whom she had bullied."

"Was your sister a bully?"

"No, I mean, she was. But that was way before I was in middle school. She surely was a bully but she had changed. I know that. And I do not think that she could ever commit suicide. She wasn't that weak to take her life like that. She couldn't leave me like that. She promised to never leave my side, to always be there for me. She was the best sister and best friend I could have ever asked for. She was the only one who stood by me in my low times and I blame myself that I couldn't be with her through times like this. Something was surely troubling her for her to take such a step. If only I asked her and if only she told me."