She stood struck by the new girl that just passed in front of her.
“Cher? Hello? Earth to Cher,” her best friend, Matt, said trying to make her come back to reality. She looked up instantly and then quickly glanced back at the girl and noticed that she was staring straight at her. “Whoa, what’s up with the new girl?”
“I don’t know. What do you think her name is?” She asked casually. Matt shrugged and tried to change the subject by asking her to come with him to get coffee. She declined him and began heading in the direction of her home.
On her way home, she noticed that a pair of footsteps were following her. She turned nervously, but relaxed when she saw her follower. It was the new girl. Cher smiled politely and the girl came running up to meet her. She said a casual ‘hi’ and kept looking forward.
“Hi,” replied Cher.
“So, you live in this neighborhood too?”.
“Uhh, yeah. Right down in this street actually.” Cher pointed down a wide street, with clean cut grass lined on either sides of the street.
“No way, me too, but i live near the end of the road though.”
“Oh, so your family were the ones who moved in last weekend.”
“Yeah. And now I’m going your school.” She seemed to be smiling slightly with her head tilted in Cher’s direction. They were now coming to Cher’s house.
“Well, here’s my house. And bye and thanks for the company home.” Cher smiled politely and the new girl returned the smile. “Oh, wait,” she called her back, “what’s your name?”
“Ruthie. What’s yours?”
“Cher.” They smiled to each other and went their separate ways.

The next morning, Cher was up and ready for school. She was dressed, with backpack on back and ipod on hand. When she opened the front door, she was surprised to see Ruthie at the end of the steps waiting and smiling at her.
“Morning,” Ruthie greeted.
“Good morning. How come you’re here?”
“Well i thought that you could use the company again.” Cher smiled and put away her ipod.
Together, they walked to school and together they entered school and together they spent the day. Matt, however, was not very happy about the third wheeler.
“Hey, Cher, can i talk to you alone for a sec?” Matt asked anxiously. Cher nodded and followed him to the back of the cafeteria. “What do you think you’re doin?” he asked abruptly.
“What?” Cher asked innocently. “She lives in my neighborhood and she’s a nice person.”
“Yeah right, you saw how people look at her and how she looks at them.” The revelations of all the evil stared and endless glares streamed through Cher’s mind.
“Oh so what? She’s still a nice person…to me.”
“That shit doesn’t even matter.”
“Look Matt, she’s my new friend and i think that she just needs a new start again.”
“Fine,” Matt said, angrily, “then why don’t you and your new friend have lunch without me.” And with that, he stormed out of the cafeteria and she made her way back to the lunch table. However, the strangest thing happened, Ruthie wasn’t there anymore.

That afternoon, she spent the whole day looking for Ruthie. She never found her, but what she did see, shocked her own eyes. After school that day, Cher decided to go home late and stay back to catch up on some study time,but, when she went to her locker, she saw, written him bright red letters, five gruesome words. They read, ‘OPEN LOCKER, DISCOVER MY WRATH’. They made her step back and she feared for her own safety that the message was a warning for herself. However, despite all of the words, she opened it anyway.
Her heart sunk in her chest as she saw the body of her best friend, Matt, fall lifelessly onto the floor. Only then did she realize that the letters on her locker were written in his blood. Tears began to well in her eyes and then soon, they began to come out like water flowing over a short dam.

The very next day at school, Ruthie was silent, most probably because she noticed how out-of-it Cher felt.
“You OK?” she asked sweetly. Cher nodded and made a fake smile. “Don’t worry, we’ll find out whoever did this and we’ll get them back for sure.”
“NO, i don’t want revenge. I just want to know who the fuck thought that this was funny, or even if the person had something against me.” Then, the lunch bell rang. “I’ll skip lunch today. i got some studying to catch up on, so later.” She waved her goodbye and made her way over to the science lab.

There, the science lover, Timothy, sat staring into a telescope. He jumped when he heard Cher come in. He smiled shyly.
“Hey.” She greeted nicely.
“Hi. Um…what are you doing here? I mean, it’s lunch.”
“Well yeah, but i just need to study is all. I don’t mean to bother you.”
“Oh you’re not.” he said and returned to his telescope.

After lunch, and after school, she returned home. She received a phone call from Matt’s older sister who said that they can’t identify his killer. After she hung up, she had this strange feeling in her gut that someone in her school had done it. But who? Maybe the football team who picked on him when he aced a test? Or maybe an ex- girlfriend who was angry and jealous? Well whoever it was, she was going to find out.