The Academy

Chapter Twenty-Five

Marisol locked all of us in our dorm room.

Aspen and I sat on my bed, snacking on pretzels, while Carlisle slept on Marisol's bed and Lindsay looked through my minuscule bookshelf. Marisol didn't want any of us to be alone. Which was a good thing, because I didn't want to be alone, either. If Headmaster Rosterford was aware that any of us knew, would he kill us as well? Who would be the first to go?
"We're going to act like we've got no idea, right?" Marisol mumbled quietly. When everyone looked at her with a confused glance, she clarified, saying, "That we know she didn't kill herself. We can't act like we know it's a murder because then Rosterford be aware that we know."
Carlisle was still sound asleep. She wouldn't be much help in situations like this, anyway.

"I do agree that we shouldn't tell the police about Rosterford," Lindsay said, pulling her light brown hair into a thin ponytail. "To all of us, Ivy just killed herself."

"That feels so wrong, though," Aspen said with a sigh. I agreed. Wasn't lying to the police a crime?

"We don't have much of a choice," Lindsay pointed out. "We tell the police, Rosterford kills one of us. We keep our mouths shut, we live. It's a no-brainer."

"Then why does it feel like I'm a liar?" Aspen asked, placing another pretzel in her mouth.

"You're withholding information," Marisol clarified, "not lying. There's a difference."

"Which is?"

"Think about it. How do you lie by not saying anything?"

Aspen shot Marisol a death glare.

"I need to tell you guys something," I spoke up. Just like that, all the eyes in the room were on me. Even Carlisle's, who had just woken up from her nap seconds ago. "I was the first to see Ivy's body, but I didn't call the police."

"What?" Aspen's jaw dropped. "Why the hell wouldn't you call the police after you see the dead body of one of your friends?"

"Because I stole something from the crime scene," I admitted, a weight taken off of my chest. "If I told them and they knew something was missing, they'd blame me."

Everyone grew silent, until Carlisle asked, "What did you steal?"

"Vivienne Aldridge's journal."

You could literally feel the emotion of surprise in the room. It was tangible in the air. So far, I've been on the sidelines, on the bench, never actually playing during the games. Now, I was the captain. The star player. Just like that.

"No way," Carlisle mumbled, shaking her head. She must not have actually been asleep the whole time. "You have the one thing that could prove Rosterford's guilt."
I nodded and took the diary out from under my mattress, where it had been ever since I stole it. Carlisle was the first to get ahold of it and she flipped through it, saying that Vivienne Aldridge's penmanship was amazing. As if that mattered.

When Lindsay got it, she gasped and covered her mouth. After everyone asked her what was wrong about a dozen times, she muttered, "The pages. They've been ripped out." To me, she asked, "Did you rip any pages out of this diary?"

"No!" I exclaimed, feeling somewhat hurt. "I would never!"

"Well, the pages that have to do with Rosterford are gone."

Carlisle ran her hands through her hair, as she usually did when she felt stressed. "So Headmaster knocked off Ivy, found the journal, and ripped out the pages. That means that there's absolutely no proof that Headmaster Rosterford has ever done anything wrong."

"So the diary is useless," I clarified, feeling my importance in the situation slipping through my fingers like loose sand.

"Pretty much."

I hated myself. I hated how I couldn't do anything right. The one time I thought I would make the right decision, able to prove that Rosterford was guilty, I was wrong. I didn't expect the pages to be gone, but they were. Everything I did, risking being arrested by tampering with a crime scene, stealing evidence, and trying to be a team player, was for nothing.

"It's okay, Kayleigh," Lindsay said to me with a reassuring smile. "It's not your fault that the pages are gone."

"Yeah," Aspen said, placing a hand on my knee. "It just would've been great if the pages were there. But you couldn't control that. He stole the pages before you had the opportunity to take the diary."

"Whatever," I said, snatching the journal from Lindsay and stuffing it under my mattress. "I'm done. Goodnight."

Ipulled the covers around myself, ignoring my friends as they told me it was okay.