The following morning, I drove out to Scott's Storage Solutions. I had barely gotten any sleep the previous night. Following my creepy encounter with Rick, I'd gotten into my gym clothes and worked out. But it felt like I was being watched the whole time. I couldn't stop thinking about what Rick had said, and even when I was safely back home again, I was awake for a majority of the night, staring up at my ceiling, my brain a commotion of incoherent thoughts.

But once eight o'clock rolled around, I was out of bed and in my car. It was a short fifteen-minute drive to my destination. I took the back route to avoid the morning traffic. Administration wouldn't be there until nine, but people were able to go in and retrieve their things anytime. Clutching the key in my hand, I stepped out of my car and walked toward the place.

It seemed the area was divided into three sections. Garage-sized storage rooms were to the right and they were all painted green. To the left were some medium-sized red lockers, big enough to fit a person.

And straight ahead was the administration building and a wall of small yellow lockers. They were similar to the size you could find at theme parks or bus stations, with enough room to fit a backpack and other smaller personal belongings.

I looked at the key in my hand. Since the keychain attached to it was yellow, I started heading toward the small lockers. I wasn't sure what I would find, but eliminating the larger lockers made me feel ten times lighter. It eliminated an abundance of possibilities.

But I had also watched enough horror movies to know that the scariest of items had the potential to come in small packages. Maybe I'd find a gun loaded with bullets. Maybe I'd find a finger from another victim. Maybe I'd find a small, dead animal rotting inside.

My insides were twisting, turning, flipping, and squeezing. It felt like I was on a ride, dropping down, except it was never-ending. Once I had found the locker, I tightened my grip on the key. The jagged teeth sunk into my skin. With a deep breath, I inserted it into the lock.

It turned. I pulled on the locker door. And opened it to reveal two things: a manual to assemble a piece of furniture. And a letter.

I didn't wait to get into my car to read it.

Unappetizing thing, time. Or should I say "thyme." In all honesty, I didn't think you'd find the second letter. I congratulate you for your efforts. Perhaps the world isn't as stupid as I thought.

Now I suppose you want more information, considering you dedicated your time—and thyme—to working this out. Where should I begin then? The night he disappeared? Very well. Something you should know is that Colton talked to me before he left town. His face was unshaven, dark circles under his eyes, skin pale. He was a complete and utter mess.

Which was why he wanted to get out.

He didn't have to tell me why, because I knew. It was May 17. You see, if you had known Colton the way I did, you would have known that every year, on the same day, he disappeared. It took me a while to realize this. The first time was chance, the second was a coincidence, but the third was a pattern. And this continued for more years to come. If you were to look at his school records, you'd see a significant amount of absences that happened to fall on the exact same day.

It wasn't always like this. And I bet you're wondering why.

Let's backtrack eight years, to May 17. Colton was ten and had a fascination with trains. But that's too generic. Anyone could have noticed that. He was just a child, after all. But eight years ago, on May 17, Colton made an early transition from childhood to adulthood.

Which brings us to the second confession: Colton watched a man die.

Harrison Noel, aged twenty-three, crossed the street. He had a phone pressed to his ear and a coffee in his spare hand. He was on his way back to university for an afternoon class, talking to his pregnant girlfriend. The roads were clear, no vehicles in sight, the safest opportunity to cross. Then suddenly, a car turned the corner. It happened quickly. A man, a car, a collision, a death.

Colton himself didn't have to tell me the details of the event. A good old newspaper does the trick. It only took his confession of the incident to allow me to dig up my own information. This traumatized little child watched Harrison Noel die. Although there was nothing anyone could have done to save the man, Colton felt responsible, his guilt eating him alive.

And this year was the year he decided he needed closure, so he left town and went in search of answers. He wanted to find Harrison Noel's murderer. Yes, that's right. Murderer. It seemed like a perfectly unquestionable case of manslaughter, right? Wrong. Although the incident seemed accidental, in reality, it was a carefully structured plan.

Colton seemed to be flirting with death.

So I followed him.

And you're about to retrace his steps too—and find out what he did during his disappearance.

I felt breathless after reading the letter. Colton and I had been friends almost all our lives. Surely something serious like watching a man die would have come up in conversation. At first, I felt betrayed. The letter mocked me, teased me into thinking that perhaps I didn't know my best friend at all. That maybe he didn't trust me.

But witnessing a murder must have brought indescribable suffering, especially at only ten years old. We all deal with things in different ways. Maybe he wasn't ready to talk about it. I had to ignore the taunting tone of the letter. Maybe the guy Colton left town to find killed him too.

I hastily folded the letter back up, placed it in my pocket, and then reached for the instruction manual. It was a double-sided piece of paper, creased where it had once been folded into a tight package. It appeared to be for a very generic-looking table—no fancy compartments or drawers or shelves or attachments. It didn't seem to be anything special.

Until I turned it around.

One particular instruction line had bits and pieces highlighted with a green marker: Assemble L and M using screws 7, 8, and 9.

LM789

I repeated the sequence in my head over and over again until reciting it became second nature. When I looked up, I noticed a woman in her mid-thirties walking over to the administration building, coffee in one hand and a bagel in the other. She struggled as she pulled out a collection of keys and unlocked the door. However, it appeared she wasn't exactly having a stroke of luck because she dropped the keys the minute she pulled them from the keyhole.

"Oh drat," she whispered to herself as she realized she didn't have any free hands to pick up her keys.

This was my opportunity to get on the woman's good side. I rushed over as she placed her breakfast in her mouth and tried to shuffle the rest of her things around. Before she could struggle any further, I stepped in, picked up her keys, and pulled the door open for her. She looked over at me with kind brown eyes and shuffled her way inside. After she had dropped her things onto the desk and placed the bagel onto a tissue, she turned to me.

"You are an angel sent from heaven," she said, lifting her arms up to the sky. "Whose dumb idea was it to put a door you have to pull there anyway? Every morning I struggle just to get to my job. All right, love, my name is Dianne. How can I help you today?"

I held up my key. "I have one of your rental lockers and unfortunately, I've lost all of my paperwork. I was just wondering if you could tell me how much time I have left to use it so that I don't incur any late fees?"

"Of course I can, dear." Her voice was as sweet as honey. Dianne's fingers danced across her keyboard for a brief second before she reached her hand out to take my key.

There were a couple more seconds of typing and clicking. She squinted at the screen from behind her glasses. "Let's see. So you rented out locker number 183 last month on the fifth and paid for it to be used for six months. Your key won't be due until the fifth of May next year."

That meant the killer was here back in November. This was all terrifyingly well thought-out. I guessed they had rented the locker out for six months to ensure it would give me enough time to find it. But what if it had taken me longer? Would the killer have come back here to extend the time?

"Is there anything else, dear?" Dianne asked.

"Yes, actually." I snapped out of my thoughts. "This is going to sound ridiculous, but my family actually rented out this locker, and we can't seem to remember which name it was under. Would you be able to let me know so that the same person can return the key?"

"Not a problem! If you give me one second, I can double-check for you. This happens all the time with my husband and me." She clicked away with her mouse. I had to stop myself from shifting from foot to foot, putting my impatience on display, as I didn't want to betray the fact that I was desperate for more information. And a name would certainly get me closer to solving this mystery.

"Ah, here it is. So, the locker was rented out by a Mr. Elliot Benjamin Parker."

My blood ran cold. The killer had used my name. Not only that, but it was my full name. My heart felt like someone had ripped it out from my chest and wrung it like a wet sponge. My other details were probably in the paperwork too, like a phone number or an address or an email.

The killer knew all my personal information.

"That's me!" My voice was alarmingly high-pitched. "It's just strange because I was going through my bank statements and the bill hasn't come through on there."

"That sounds about right. Our records say that you paid up-front in cash. There is a two-hundred-dollar bond, however, so once you return the key to us in May, you should be able to get it back. That is, if the locker hasn't incurred any damages. Are you okay, sweetheart? You look a bit pale."

Dianne's voice sounded distant. My arms suddenly felt icy, so I reached out and rubbed my hands over the goosebumps on my skin.

I choked out a thank-you as I retrieved the key and stumbled my way out. Outside, the warm, summer air dried the sweat collecting on my forehead.

I made my way back toward my car and kept checking my mirrors as I drove. There was a prickling feeling at the back of my neck, as if someone were following me. As if someone were watching my every move.

‡

"Elliot?"

Cass's voice woke me from a sleep that I didn't even remember falling into. My neck felt stiff from not moving the entire time, and the rest of my body ached in protest as I forced myself to turn over and look at her. My sister frowned and gave me a disapproving shake of her head.

"It's four in the afternoon," she whispered, stepping into my room and closing the door behind her.

I was still half asleep, so I mumbled, "Leave me alone. I was studying."

"You've graduated," Cass said, sounding irritated. "You've been acting really weird lately, but can you please just have a shower, change your clothes, and pretend to be normal for two hours? I have afternoon tea made. And later, I need to talk to you."

I squinted up at her. "I'm beat. I think I'll sleep through the rest of the afternoon. Call me when dinner is ready."

Cass protested, but I had already curled back up in my bed, the familiar comfort of my mattress welcoming me back to unconsciousness. Just before I could fall fully back asleep, the covers were torn expertly away, and the pillow was snatched from under my head. I groaned, burying my face into the mattress.

"I don't think you heard me correctly," Cass said, her voice rising an octave. "Have a shower, get dressed, and be down for afternoon tea in ten minutes."

"My best friend died," I answered, wanting to disappear. "Let me sleep."

"I know he did. I was there. I'm involved too," she said. "Mom's here."

I flipped onto my back and sighed in defeat. It was only to be expected that my mother would turn up at the doorstep at the worst possible moment.

After a cold and invigorating shower, I changed and headed downstairs. The tension created by my dysfunctional family hit me the minute I got there. I could hear my father constantly clearing his throat, which was something he did when he was nervous. Cass had been cooking, the thing she did when she was put in an awkward situation—she believed food fixed everything.

As soon as I walked into the kitchen and stared at the stranger across the table, everyone leaped into their sweet and sympathetic roles. Cass ushered me to sit and passed me a plate of freshly baked scones. Dad poured me a glass of water, and my mother forced a smile. I hated the fact that my family tried to manipulate themselves into thinking we had perfectly normal relationships. They didn't have to pretend that we were okay because I knew that we weren't, and I had accepted our current arrangement. I was eighteen, not eight.

"Hi," I said, taking my seat.

Valerie kept the plastic smile on her face and slid a package across the table. "I got you a little something."

"You shouldn't have."

"Come on, honey," she said, trying to sound affectionate, but the term of endearment sounded like a strangled cry. "I never get to see you."

More like you never want to see us.

"Okay," I answered, not wanting an argument. I tore into the paper wrapping.

It was a book, a thin hardback without the dust jacket. Across the black surface of the front cover, in a silver scrawl, was A Madman's Message: A book by Gregory Everett.

"It's just a little something I read in my first year of university. It was such an eye-opener for me, and since you've graduated, I thought it would inspire you." Valerie's smile was broad and unwavering.

"Thanks," I said, trying my best to sound enthusiastic.

Dad, who had been silently sitting at the counter, coughed. "It's a really interesting read, Elliot. I studied it for one of my literature classes, and it's a well-crafted piece of writing."

My mother glanced over at my dad, her lips twitching. They held eye contact for the briefest of seconds before she turned away. The relationship between my parents was like a rubber band—flexible but breakable. They were civil, but they could never quite look each other in the eye. Cass tried to ignore it, scrubbing at dishes that were already clean.

"Anyway," Valerie broke the silence with her overly cheerful tone, "I want to take you for a holiday. Wherever you want, as a graduation present."

"I want to stay here."

Valerie cast a disapproving glare at my father, who shrugged and sipped his coffee. "It'll be good for you, honey. Get some fresh air, a change of scenery, somewhere where it's not so . . ."

"Morbid?" I suggested.

"Delicate," she corrected.

"Like I said, I want to stay here." I picked up a scone, smothered it in strawberry jam and fresh clotted cream, and took a bite, giving myself an excuse to stop talking, even it was only for a few seconds.

She sighed, uncomfortable with arguing with the son she hardly knew. "How about I give you a few days to think about it? I told Ryan I'd be away for a couple of weeks regardless."

The mention of her husband didn't seem to affect my dad much.He stared expressionlessly at his crossword puzzle and poured himself another mug of coffee. When I returned my gaze to my mother, she looked at me nervously.

"If I get something done, maybe I'll consider it."