Chapter one

What happened and who really did it

My day started out as any other. Wake up, get dressed. By the time I looked at my clock, it was too late- or rather, too early. Why had my alarm gone off? Three-o-clock?
I looked worriedly to the window, still very dark outside. I looked to the alarm clock. Then to my calendar again. There I noticed a circle around... today.
Oh, yeah. My plane left in three hours. I was going to see mom. Yippee.
A knock at my door startled me and my thoughts.
"Honey? Are you awake?"
"Yeah, dad. I'm up. Did I wake you?" Stupid, stupid me.
"No, no. Don't worry about me. Get packing right away, okay Bells?"
"Okay, dad. Thanks." I wasn't allowed to call him Charlie to his face.
I looked back to my window and gasped. I blinked, naturally, and then my eyebrows furrowed in confusion. I thought I'd seen a man-boy there. Not older than myself, but he'd seemed real!
My first reaction was fear. Fear for Charlie, and then pure curiosity. Who was it? Am I seeing things? I knew my brain was dysfunctional, and that guy- far too beautiful to exist- might not even be out there to worry about.
As I packed, I worried about this new issue. This three-day trip sounded worse and worse by the minute.

Back to now, I don't know how I got here exactly, but I need to figure this out. How do I get away? That reminds me... I need to get cell phone service...

Finally home again. I mean, I miss mom and all, but she bleached her hair and dyed it purple, just because that's my favorite color. That is a great reminder of why I turned her over to the crazy farm.
I missed no school thanks to our three-day weekend. Monday went by normally enough. Normal for me, anyway. My friend Jessica went into shock on Saturday. I drove up to the hospital after school to check out possible causes. Detective Bella... it had potential.
"... Right there in my window and he was GLARING at me!" Jessica emphasized the hurt in her voice while she recited what she'd seen.
I knocked. "It's Bella."

"Oh, Bella! Please come in! They don't believe me!" Jessica pouted. I came in to sit on the edge of her bed.
"Tell me what you saw, please Jessica." I smiled encouragingly.
The doctor rolled his eyes, but Jessica didn't notice, or ignored him. Her eyes took on an animated glow, and she either talked so fast her words started to slur, or the slurring occurred based on the fact that she was high- extremely so- on the medicine. I jumped suddenly when I tuned in and her description took a familiar turn.
"You saw the guy in the window? I've seen him too! What did he look like?"
Both Jessica and the doctors eyes widened in surprise. The doctors, because Jessica wasn't delusional, and Jessica's' for the same reason probably. Then the doctor turned curious, then suspicious, while Jessica turned to relief.
For a moment, my expression held. I felt so happy to discover that my brain wasn't too dysfunctional, that I could just scream.

And so I did, but for a reason other than joy. 'The guy' was there in the window. I didn't blink, for fear he'd be gone, but my girly gleeful giggles came abruptly to a halt.
Jessica noticed and followed my gaze. She gasped, and we both involuntarily blinked at the same time. Again, gone.
The doctor looked to the window now, saw nothing, and frowned. He cleared his throat.
I chocked out, "That the guy?" in a hoarse whisper.
Jessica looked at me quickly, and started hyperventilating. I had to know.
I nearly tripped to sit on the edge of Jessica's bed. I repeated, "That the guy?"
This time, she grabbed my hand with both of hers, and nodded very slowly.
The doctor gave a disproving, disgusted "uugh" and walked out.
I would've giggled, but Jess' pale, frightened, shaking expression stalled it in my throat.
"Bella," she whispered, for no more than a whisper was able to escape her pale lips, "Bella, that was him! He looked at you!" Her voice began to get louder and shake with her. Her green eyes pleaded with me at an unasked question. "What's wrong with us?" Why can only we see him?"

I looked away. I had no answer for her. I pulled my hand away and stood. "I gotta go. When can you leave?"

"I don't know. Could you ask for me? Please? Don't leave me alone! Please!" she sounded so pitiful I almost considered staying. "What if he comes back?! What if he's after us?!" Hyperventilating again, Jess' bed appeared to be shaking with her.

Rushing down the hall, a scream stopped me in my tracks. The doctor came around the corner at that second. We exchanged glances, and then turned the screams' direction and darted back to the room Jessica occupied.

Her bed caught my sight before she did – and that was the cause of the problem… she wasn't in her bed, and a trail of blood led to her window from the last place I'd seen her.

My "detective" side kicked in, and my first guess, since the trail went to the window, was the guy we'd seen since only we'd seen him, and he'd only been in the window.

Had he been waiting till I'd left to attack Jessica? If so, why hadn't he attacked when she'd seen him the first time? Was it even him? He hadn't looked angry or dangerous when I'd seen him last time in the window with Jessica there. In fact, He'd looked relieved and… a little worried.

But who else could it be, if not him? No one else had been in the room but the two of us, that I was aware of. But maybe there had been someone… only, how did they get in there?

I chewed on my lip. The doctor informed me that the FBI would be here in a few hours to check it out. They had to drive out here from Seattle. I turned to the doctor. "Where's the phone?" I smiled at him.

"Down the hall, take a right, down the stairs, take a left, and it's at the end of the hall in the cubby to the left. A dollar fifty first three minutes, seventy-five cents each additional minute. Got that?"

I repeated it quietly to myself and nodded. "Got it." I called as I moved down the hall. Dad would want a full report. Should I tell him about the guy? No, probably not. Him being the chief of police, he would definitely worry.

No one answered the first time I called, so I assumed he was probably watching sports. The second time, though, he answered. "Hello?"

"Dad? It's me. Jessica was okay, only almost went into shock again, and now she's… gone." Missing… dead… who knows? I continued thinking to myself.

"Gone like home? Dead? I don't understand, Bella!" Charlie sounded very frusterated.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. Be home in ten minutes. See you then, dad. Bye." I hung up and stood there for a minute. Then I turned around and headed back down the hall.

I walked past door after closed door on my way back to the stairs. I got faster, till I almost tripped, in my growing fear. Fifteen feet to go.

I tripped my way toward the stairs, and right before I passed the first open door, I saw him in my peripheral vision, standing there in that open door way.

The suddenness of him being right there startled me. I gasped and nearly tripped again as I stopped and turned. I didn't blink. I didn't move.

He stepped forward so that he was only three feet from me and spoke. "Do not forget what you have seen." Then his brows furrowed and he looked slightly down and to my right. His velvet voice surprised me.

I gasped and accidentally blinked. Gone. Darn. I turned slowly back toward the stairs. Not tripping would be very hard now while focus had become impossible with his voice like velvet honey mixed with my every thought?