Lisa had known that Darren’s plan was absolutely outrageous; why would she have wanted to visit a cemetery in the middle of the night, especially with all the murders in the area lately? Despite her initial objections to the eerie setting, she still somehow found herself trailing after him, occasionally stumbling on half-buried headstones and roots sticking up from the ground.

She was doing this for Darren, she told herself. She had to remember that she was in it for the long game, and she was going to do whatever it took to win his attention and his heart… and his chiseled abs. Even if that meant taking a late-night stroll through a smelly, creepy burial ground, she would volunteer in a heartbeat.

Suddenly, Darren stopped and whipped around, making her bump into him with a start. “What the—“ she started to say, but the words lodged in her throat as she felt a searing pain in her neck that took her breath away.

Stumbling back, she raised shaky hand to the wetness pulsing from her throat, her fingers coated in a dark, ominous substance. “You’re pretty, Lisa, but you’re just so damn annoying,” Darren mocked as she fell to the ground, clutching her severed trachea. As blackness crept into her vision, she could barely make out Darren’s wide eyes and even wider grin before she let her eyes close into an eternal slumber.

Clarise Miller gawked at the phone she clutched tightly in her shaking hands. “There’s no way,” she mumbled aloud, not caring if anyone else in her classroom heard her. How could this be real? She clicked on the account that showed a seemingly sweet-looking woman in the picture, along with three small children at her side. All smiling; all the spitting images of their mother. Tears pooled on her lashes, but she hurriedly blinked them back, not daring to let anyone see and have something else to make fun of her for. She raised her hand and asked to be excused, blurting the first random excuse to come to mind. As soon as she was out the door and out of view of any classroom windows, she raced down the hall as fast as she could to the nearest girls bathroom, locking the stall and slumping against the door. She tried regaining her composure with little success, and pulled out her phone with trembling fingers. She couldn’t do more than stare at the picture for a few minutes. Searching the faces that smiled back. Scanning for an unfamiliar characteristic and waiting for her mind to stop tricking her. How could this account exist? She tried to swallow, but her mouth and throat had gone desert-dry. She scrolled to the account details under the woman’s name, and she nearly choked upon realizing that the account had been active only minutes before she found it. She couldn’t stifle her tears any longer, and a whimper escaped her lips as she sank to the grimy bathroom floor. She let the reality of her situation sink in as her whimpering turned to heaving sobs, and she wanted nothing more than to click on the profile and ask a million questions. Questions like, “How could you leave me behind?” and “Where have you been the last 12 years?” Her heart seemed to be breaking in her chest as she gazed down at her three year old self in the profile picture, her Mother’s arm draped across her and her older sister’s shoulder’s. Her older brother cheesed in the middle of the young girls, making her wail even louder at the memory of his toothy smile. Where had they ALL been for these past years? Clarise sucked in a final, shuddering breath, and stood shakily to her feet. So many thoughts swirled around her mind until she felt dizzy. She doubted the reality of her situation, as it just seemed too deranged to be true. Her mother, who had disappeared more than a decade ago with her brother and sister, had a profile on a dating app. When she had looked up her mom’s name on the platform, she hadn’t expected to actually find her profile. She had done it as a joke, as a way to entertain her fantasy that maybe, just maybe, she would find them someday. She hadn’t realized her world would come crashing down on her the instant she searched for Deborah Miller, and her mother’s picture smiled back up at her. She gulped down her anxiety as her finger hovered over the message button on the screen… Should I do it? The thought tumbled back and forth in her mind as she thought of the incident 12 years ago. All she could remember was her father telling her that “Mommy is going on a vacation for a while,” and that her brother and sister were leaving with her. This was after, of course, her mom had already left. For years after, Clarise had dealt with the burden of her drunken father, her relentless bullies, and all with no one to turn to. She had longed as a child for her mother to come swooping back in to take Clarise with her on her seemingly endless “vacation.” As a teenager, her longing had turned into cold hatred, and hidden behind her hardened resolve was an abandoned, broken heart. Why had her own mother deserted her? And why hadn’t she been good enough to take along with her, like her siblings? The endless questions plagued her for years, and they all came flooding in at once when she caught that first glimpse of her mom and siblings’ matching broad smiles. Squeezing her eyes shut, she forced herself to press the message button, and when she opened them, a blinking cursor leered at her. What would she say? She didn’t know, but she did know that she needed answers. She knew that she was going to get them, too, by any means necessary. Clarise resolved that she would search for her long-lost mother and siblings, finding out what happened to her family. She told herself she would follow them to the ends of the earth if she had to. And so the search began.

“So you really have nothing to say to ANYTHING I just said to you?” Marissa seethed, waiting for a response from her boyfriend that didn’t come. “Well Matthew?!” He turned his eyes to her for a moment, taking her in lazily from head to toe, then turned his attention back to his phone, where it had been the entirety of their argument. “Is there something you WANT me to say?” He retorted, and Marissa wanted to hospitalize him in that moment. She scoffed instead. “How about an apology..?You cheated on me for the second time, Matthew! The SECOND TIME!” She screeched, to which Matthew didn’t react or respond, and his smug nonchalance just riled her up more. She took a shaky breath with closed eyes to calm her palpitating pulse. Clarity was finally ringing through her mind, and she knew what needed to be done. He looked as though he couldn’t wait to get the conversation over with, and Marissa couldn’t wait to end it for him. “You know what Matthew..?” She said through gritted teeth. “I don’t need this anymore. As a matter of fact, I think this has been a long time coming.” She watched as Matthew’s attention turned back to her, unperturbed, as if he knew what she wanted to say next but didn’t care. She had been wanting to say it for years, since the first time Matt’s infidelity had been brought to her attention. After receiving a text with message receipts between him and another girl, she had wanted to end things right then and there, but his words had softened her heart to his actions, and she had let him back in. But not again… not this time. “You need to leave, Matt…” she said, and though she meant to say it loud and proud, she found the words came out as little more than a whisper. He stared at her with a cynical gaze, then laughed dismissively. “You don’t mean that, M. I’m just going through a tough time right now, okay? But you wouldn’t know, because you haven’t even asked me. You always make things about yourself, and I’m tired of it.” Marissa squinted at him as if he had just claimed the sky was green. Was he serious? She continued, shaking her head in disbelief. “I can’t do this with you anymore. I’m done, Matthew. You need to leave my apartment, now.” Her voice was finally bold like she wanted, and she prepared for him to argue with her. Matthew hesitated, then sucked his teeth and rolled his eyes. Standing to leave, Marissa was surprised but glad that he didn’t put up a fight, and she followed him to the front door, her chest still aching from the betrayal. He turned as he crossed the doorframe, and he looked annoyed rather than heat broken. “You sure about this?” He spat. “I might not come back after this dramatic act you’re putting on. Don’t act like you’re not going to come crawling as soon as my back is turned, Mari.” She swallowed down the urge to sock him in the jaw for the use of her nickname after everything he has done, and instead simply shook her head in disgust. “You’d have to be an absolute fool to believe that!” She sneered, and the hatred in her voice made his peeved expression wither into uneasiness. “I’ll never waste my time on you again. I wish you the worst, Matthew. And don’t come back for your stuff, ‘cause it’ll be in the trash by the time you get here.” With that, she slammed the door in his face, enjoying the expression of regret he wore in the end. She was done being a game to him. To anyone. She promised herself she wouldn’t let anyone ever stomp on her heart again. Her chest was still aching, but confronting Matthew at least left her feeling lighter. She sniffed, and went straight to the kitchen. True to her word, she found a trash bag under the sink, and she started the process of finding and tossing all his possessions inside, where they belonged.