THE INNOCENT DELINQUENTS

Chapter 22: 'On Pain Of Death'

Death.

Death is a strong word, it means and refers to so many things, and one of them is salvation. However, it doesn't mean the same to everyone, it differs from one person to another, depends on the person who died. Sometimes it's a wish, and sometimes it's fear, but both of them are painful to live with, the hope of to not exist, and the fear of losing and to be lost; as much as they are different, they are similar.

Jonathan has lost his beloved, and Griselda lost her life. She loved life and how she used to live even though she was suffering because of what had happened in the past, but she managed to live quietly. On the other hand, Jonathan enjoyed his life too, because there was a girl named Griselda by his side his whole life. He doesn't know how to proceed and live without her.

Silence has spread in the room where the heart machine tone is the only sound heard. Jonathan has lost his senses at that moment, he froze in his place, he couldn't balance and sat on the floor hugging himself and hiding his face in his knees. His father rushed to him clapping his fingers to bring him back from where he sent his soul, but he keeps failing. The only thing that will heal his crashed heart right now is Griselda's voice, but that was impossible. Dr. Melton fell down next to his son crying, it wasn't clear to the nurses who he was crying for, his son, or Griselda.

Suddenly, a beeping sound grabbed their attention, Jonathan raised his head with a liquid nose, he looked across the machine that was drawing lines within the straight line of her heart. He wiped his burning tears in shock and stood up fast, and Dr. Melton followed.

"It's moving", Jonathan said, "Her heart came back to life", he added with a faint excited voice.

Eventually, she let out a scared breath, and relief looks were on their faces. At that moment, Griselda was neither in a coma nor dead but stuck in a vision of her memories all rushing back together at once. Every single moment she forgot has come back when she fell into the river. She now remembers it all including the incident, which was the thing that blocked her brain. She can remember that Mazekine is the one who killed Ben along with the feeling of fear and pain that she has been through.

She can feel it all over again and cannot wake up from it, because the shock was too much to handle which made the temporal heart attack. The fear of not speaking to anyone about what happened after her parents didn't believe her story hurt her more, simply because Mazekine as Dr. Brice told them wasn't even there, it was only Griselda, and Dr. Brice was luckily nearby.

After two hours, she woke up well, healthy and nothing is damaged again. She relieved Jonathan that she's totally fine and she is fully back, but she wasn't fully okay, she can understand it all now.

The reason why Mazekine went to that house is to punish Ben for trying to rape her when she was a kid, or at least explore the truth if what they were saying is real. She thought she was old enough to punish the reason for her misery. Everyone used to tell their side of the story, and only what they just heard. The kids in school have always been mean to her, they were bullying her, she was an outcast and an easy target. Mazekine then thought that it has all started because of the rumors about the rape, but it was because she was weak to stand up for herself.

When she entered the house, Griselda followed her without having second thoughts, the look in his eyes when he saw her was so familiar, he knew her, and the way he grinned was scary. His eyes have given them Goosebumps and a bad feeling that something bad is about to happen. He was struggling with his words, yet, now Griselda can understand the reason why he was misbehaving and being as evil as he looked like.

As a result of Ben's suffering in the sanitarium because of the too many unnecessary medicaments, he became deaf-mute, his tongue was so heavy to form a word, his brain was damaged as well to clearly talk or explain anything in a sane manner. Yet, back then, Griselda couldn't guess that he's just trying to talk or say something, he was scary, and they thought that he was going to hurt them.

Griselda and Mazekine were holding at each other scared, they were struggling to understand a word coming out from his mouth, "I showed your mother, I tried to show her the story, you were so little, you were there. Why she didn't let me explain? Is she one of them? Why she did hurt me? did he pay her too", he said. Two of his fingers were caught, he told her that her mother did it, that is to say when she was defending herself. Griselda back then knew that he is mentally unstable, she was warning her not to get close to him because of the so many scary night stories they were telling them about him.

He suddenly approached her and grabbed her, Griselda was startled and bit him in his arm, but Mazekine didn't want to run away, she wanted to end her nightmare right away without carefully thinking of the mistake she was about to commit. She took a lamp and kept hitting him in the back of his head several times. Ben has fallen on the ground from the first hit bleeding, Griselda was trying to stop her before would kill him, but she was so scared and helpless.

However, Angelica was standing in the back door, too scared to approach them, she was watching them and crying, she couldn't do anything and scared to get involved, there were too much blood and thirteen years old kids.

A while later, after Mazekine realized what she had done, she called her mother who came as fast as she could, Angelica called the police without thinking that her friend is involved too. Griselda went to the kitchen to find a phone to call the ambulance, but Dr. Brice has already arrived. She didn't see that two other girls were in the scene too, she took her daughter without letting her explain or telling her that Griselda is there too. On her way out, she spotted the camera in the living room where the murder had been committed, she put her daughter in the car and hurried back to take the recordings before the cops will arrive.

Griselda came back to the living room and found only Ben lying on his stomach on the floor swimming in his own blood. Suddenly, she heard the police sirens and thought that they will assume that she killed him, but Angelica came in from the back door and pulled her outside in the forest, and run as fast as they could until they are in the house. Since that day Griselda had an upside-down life, depressed and scared all the time when she knew that Ben died, but more scared to confess anything to anyone. No one knew what happened that day except for them and Griselda's parents.

Dr. Brice's ex-husband was the detective of the case, and since his daughter is the one involved in the murder, he faked everything and gave Griselda's parents fake investigation results. He convinced them that her fingerprints and their daughter's were all over the place but the murder weapon had Griselda's fingerprints. The Forbes couldn't clearly think back then, their focal concern was to save their daughter from jail, so they blindly believed Dr. Brice's testify and didn't even try to listen to what their daughter had to say.