Searching for Hope, Finding Despair

Arata was sitting on his desk in the police department.

“I need all the information you can find. Question them if you need to. Yes, those are all the names. I’m counting with you.”, he hung up the phone and stared at the detective in front of him. “So, did you find anything?”

“Still nothing conclusive. But I’ll prove that Souma is the killer, just wait!”

Arata smiled and gave a folded paper to the other detective.

“What is this?”

“Have a look.”

The detective unfolded the paper to read its contents. “This has to be a bad joke.”

After what happened in the school last night, Hayato made me play some games with him until late. He was probably trying to make me feel better and forget all the bad things that happened. While I can appreciate that, now I’m felling very sleepy and I can’t hold a yawn.

“If you keep yawning the teacher will not be happy with you.”, Hayato said.

“And it’s your fault.”

“But it was fun right?”

“I can’t deny that.”

We arrived at school. Everything seemed normal besides a guy from our class coming in our direction.

“Why are you still here!? Give Mei back! You murderer!”, he yelled while grabbing my shirt collar.

Everyone around us stopped to see the commotion, a lot of them whispering something to near friend.

“If you don’t stop right now, I’ll make you regret this.”, Hayato said while holding the guy’s left arm.

The guy looked at Hayato and released me, and Hayato let off his left arm.

“I’m sorry.”, the guy went away.

“Are you okay?”, Hayato asked.

“Yeah. That guy is from our class… His name is… Sora, right?”

Hayato nodded. “I think he was a close friend of Mei.”

While everything was fine on the surface, Mei’s death wouldn't be forgotten soon and a lot of people were still suffering.

That’s right, no matter how I try to forget, her death will keep coming back to torment me unless I bring an end to this.

In the classroom, Naoto had some news for me, Hayato and Hina.

“I spoke with someone from the school staff and he said the school is looking for a new night guard, but he couldn’t give any detail about Akira.”

“So there’s really a demon here in the school killing people?”, Hayato asked.

Hina started to say something against that, but I didn’t pay attention.

Forget the absurdities that happened, is the police hiding Akira’s death too?

“If there’s no one here at night, how about we do the same thing we did yesterday? But this time we’ll try to find whatever Mei and Sakura hid.”, I suggested, stopping the argument between Hayato and Hina.

“I can’t just stay at your house again… Huh… Fine! I’ll find an excuse to leave home tonight, so you can count with me!”

“If you’re suggesting that, you should have an idea, right? If so, I’ll help.”, Naoto said adjusting his glasses like he always does.

“I don’t really want us coming here every night, but if you all are going to do that, I’ll come with you.”, Hina confirmed her presence.

Like Naoto said, I had an idea. It’s something very simple, but it’s better than doing nothing, just letting the despair eat my heart.

During today’s lunch break, only me and Hayato were eating together, speaking of pointless things to pass the time. Once again Naoto had something else to do and Hina said she would eat with other girls.

“What should I buy for my sister’s birthday?”

“Don’t ask me.”

“I still have some days to think, but I don’t really know what a 12 years old girl would like.”

“I think she’ll like whatever you give to her.”

“But I still want to give her something cool, she is my cute little sister after all!”

“Just buy a plushie.”

“Oh, that’s good idea! I knew I could count on you!”

The afternoon classes started and ended. We returned to our homes and before long, the time arrived. Once again we were in the middle of the dark schoolyard.

“What’s the plan?”, Naoto asked.

“Let’s search everywhere.”, I answered smiling.

“Wait, you call that a plan?”, Hayato didn’t like what he heard.

“Let me explain. Sakura said that her and Mei hid something together, but the detective said the two of them were never together outside school in the last two weeks before the murder.”

“So if they really hid something, it’s here in our school, right?”, Hina asked.

“Exactly.”

“But we don’t even know what we’re looking for!”, Hayato said.

“If this thing the two of them hid is the reason for their death, I would guess it’s something like a paper, a photo I’d say.”

“Are you saying Mei knew something the killer didn’t want anyone else to know?”, Naoto asked.

“It’s just an assumption. That said, the only other reason I could think for someone to kill Mei is revenge for her rejecting a love confession. But I can’t see any connection between someone getting rejected by Mei and she needing to hide something.”

“That makes a lot of sense.”, Naoto said as he placed his right hand on his chin, thinking.

“Still, there’s one strange thing about that theory.”, Hina said.

“What? Something strange?”, Hayato asked.

“Yeah, there is.”, I confirmed. “If Mei had some information about the killer and Sakura helped her to hid whatever it was, she should’ve know who the killer is, but she never told the police.”

“Maybe she didn’t know. Mei could've asked her to help hide the object, but Mei never truly showed what it really was.”, Naoto said.

“I know it’s nice to discuss those things, but I think we should act first. We can’t stay here forever.”, Hayato said.

“He is right. How are we going to do this?”, Hina asked.

“I really wanted to ignore the buildings, because there’s not really a lot of places to hide something and the police probably opened every single cabinet. But if it’s a photo or something like that, there’s a really good and easy place to hide it: Under a desk. Just use some tape and done!”

“So we need to check every single desk?”, Hina asked with a dissatisfied voice.

“We can’t exclude the chance of them hiding it in another classroom.”

“Alright! That’s something I can help with! Let’s go!”, Hayato said excited.

“Hina and I will start with the third floor, Souma and Hayato with the first. Always be together, we don’t know if we’re really alone here.”

“Understood!”, we all confirmed.

We entered the first building and Hayato and I went to the last classroom on the left side. Before opening its door, I peeked inside and confirmed it was empty.

“Can I turn on the lights?”, Hayato asked.

“No. Someone could see the light outside.”

“Understood.” Hayato said while getting his phone to use as a flashlight.

With that, we started our marathon of checking every single desk.

One checked, two checked, three… Next row. One, two, three… And we finished the first classroom a lot faster than what I had imagined.

We went to the next one and repeated the process, never saying anything, just focusing on our task.

Before long, we finished the first floor and went to second one, once again starting with the last classroom on the left side.

When we were going to the next classroom after finishing the one before, we saw Hina and Naoto arriving on the second floor.

“Oh, you guys are already here?”, Hina asked.

“Nothing on the third floor.”, Naoto informed us.

“It’s the same for us.”, Hayato answered.

After that exchange, we resumed our search. 

I didn’t really expected to find anything, but Hayato called me.

“Souma, I found something!”

“What?!”

I went to the desk were Hayato was and there I saw the paper under it. We nodded to each other and I got the paper after removing the tape on it. The paper was folded and Hayato illuminated it with his phone.

Slowly, I opened it and we read its contents.

“Ah.”, Hayato let a sound escape his mouth.

“It’s just some equations...”

“Give me a break...”

“Someone wants to get good grades, I can’t blame him. Just don’t get caught, whoever placed this here.”, I said while returning the paper to its original place.

After that, our search restarted.

“Should we check the bathrooms too?”, Hina asked after we finished the last classroom.

“I don’t think you can hide something there, but let’s do it.”, I answered.

In the end, we found nothing. It was probably safe to exclude the first building from the list of possible locations where the object is.

Without wasting time we went to the second building to repeat the process. And after a long search, we once again didn’t find anything.

“I’m tired!”, Hayato said as we left the building.

“I think we should stop for today.”, I said.

“If there’s nothing in the last building, where would they hide it?”, Hina asked.

“And let’s not forget that there’s the possibility it has already been found by someone else.”, Naoto said.

“Maybe we should check this area during the lunch break tomorrow. It we’ll be really hard to do it in this darkness.”, I said.

“I agree.”, Hina replied.

“At least today we didn’t saw anyone hiding behind the first building.”, Hayato said as he looked in its direction.

“Someone hiding...”, I whispered while walking towards the back of the building.

“Souma?”, Hina asked.

My friends stayed behind, looking at me dumbfounded.

I didn’t really went behind the building, I stopped in front of the small corridor between the back of the building and the wall that limits the school area. Using my flashlight, I tried to see if there was anything there.

“Nothing…?”

And then, I stopped moving the light, letting it reveal a flower bed near the building with plants big enough to reach my waist.

“That...”

I turned to my friends, motioning for them to come.

“What happened?”, Naoto asked.

I pointed to the light. “All the plants have the same size and are perfectly aligned with the exception of that one spot”.

“Could someone be hiding there?”, Hayato whispered.

“Maybe I’m being too paranoid, but I want to check.”, I said.

“If you say so...”, Hina said.

We went together, stopping in front of it.

“It’s really a mess.”

I ignored what Hayato said and just moved the leafs to see if something was there. And then, I backed off in fear.

“What happened?!”, my friends screamed.

“Why… Why are you there?”, I said.

Confused with my reaction, Naoto moved the leafs out of the way to reveal someone from our class sitting among all those plants.

“Sora?!”, Hayato exclaimed.

The guy who blamed me for Mei’s death this morning was there, his hands and legs tied, a piece of cloth on his mouth and a lifeless expression on his face. There was no blood, but Sora was definitely dead.

Hina had both of her hands blocking her mouth, trying to not scream. Naoto was lost in thoughts. I was still frozen in place.

“Hey, what should we do?!”, Hayato asked.

“We’re leaving!”, Naoto said.

“Leaving!? We’re leaving him here?”, Hayato protested.

“How are we going to explain our presence here? The school is closed, and here we are with a dead person!”

“He is right, let’s get out of here!”, I said.

We ran to the gate and after confirming there was no one outside, we jumped it. Without wasting any time, we parted our ways.

After reaching the still opened convenience store, I stopped running. If anyone sees me right now, they could think I just went to buy something.

Still, I couldn't believe that Sora was dead.

Why?

Sora tried to attack me this morning and now he is dead, people could say that I’m the culprit.

But it’s a bit too obvious, right?

If I was a murderer, would I kill someone who had just antagonized me in front of a lot people? And do it on the same day?

Maybe the murderer is getting anxious?

But if the killer is trying to frame me for all those murders, it means he knew about what happened this morning.

Who could be?

For some reason, Hayato appeared in my mind.

“No, impossible!”, I said to myself while shaking my head.

“Meow.”

I stopped. A few meters away, Tama was sitting in the sidewalk.

“What do you want?”

Like if he was answering me, Tama started to move and before he disappeared in the alley, he stopped for a moment to once again look at me.

Is he calling me?

I stopped in front of the alley, it was the same one were I found Sakura’s body. And once again, there’s an opened dumpster there.

There’s no way… Right?

Holding my breath, I went to check it. My heart was racing like never before when I looked inside and my entire body was consumed by despair.

I couldn't say anything, I was using all my strength to not vomit. A body of boy of my age, using the uniform from my school was inside the dumpster, but it had no face. A lot of blood, truly a scene straight out of a nightmare.

I sat in front of the dumpster, my mind going blank. And once I realized, it was morning and I was in my bed.

After washing my face in the bathroom, I tried to reorganize my thoughts.

“What happened…?”

Before I could answer that, the doorbell ringed.

“I’m on my way!”, I yelled.

I changed my clothes as fast as I could and I went to open the door.

“Good morning, can we talk a bit?”, the detective Arata said. “Oh, and you don’t need to worry about school! Summer break is starting early this year.”

“What?”

“Let’s have a good conversation between friends.”, Arata said while showing me a photography of Sora’s body.