"Peyton focus!" My drama teacher, Ms Drew, shouts at me.

I snap out of my daze. "Right, sorry. Where are we?"

She sighs. "Page 12, you're begging the Beast to let your father go and keep you instead. Come on Peyton, get with it!"

Get with it? Ha I'd like to see myself try. Ever since last week when I found out that Steve's not as perfect as I thought he was, I've spent most of my time zoning out and wondering what he could possibly be keeping from me.

And, yes, maybe it's none of my business, after all I haven't told him about the man following me or the notes. But I can't help but feeling that this is something big. Something that's going to change things.

Oh and speaking of notes...

I may or may not have been stupid enough to leave a note of my own basically telling them that I'll do whatever they want in order to keep Olivia Wright a secret. But the main question that's been bouncing around in my mind is:

Why do I care so much?

I mean would people actually believe them? What happened in the coma sounds crazy, so crazy that I could probably cover it up some how. But why do I feel the need to harbor the secret deep inside of me? Maybe it's because—

"Peyton!"

I snap my head towards the shout. "Huh?"

Ms Drew sighs loudly. "Let's take a break, shall we?"

Everyone makes there way off the stage. I quicken my pace to catch up to the person I so desperately need to talk to. I grab Kevin's arm before he walks of the stage.

"Can—can we talk?" I ask quietly.

Thankfully, Kevin doesn't ask any questions. He just nods and follows me to the janitors closet by the stairwell. I feel Steve's eyes on us but I don't turn his way.

"What's up?" He asks as soon as the door is closed.

I let out a breath. "A lot of things actually. And one of them has to do with the note."

He raises his eyebrows. "As in the note?"

"Yes as in the note! What other note would I be talking about?!"

"Okay okay, calm down. What happened? Did you get a new note?" Kevin asks.

I nod my head and pull out the crumpled note in my pocket. I hand it to Kevin and he reads it with wide eyes.

"How far are you willing to go to keep it a secret? It's almost as if they want you to answer them. But, jokes on them, we're too smart to—" He cuts off at the sight of my face.

"You didn't." He says, his eyes wide with frustration and panic underneath his glasses.

"I...did." I whisper.

Kevin sighs with frustration and honestly I can't blame him, I would be frustrated with myself too. We're silent for a minute. Then Kevin breaks the silence.

"What exactly did you say?" He asks quietly and carefully.

Oh boy, he's just going love this.

"I...I said that I was willing to go far. Like really far." I reluctantly tell him.

A tension filled silence fills the room. Kevin looks torn between anger, frustration, and something that looks like fear.

But his voice sounds surprisingly steady when he speaks. "I'm not trying to be inconsiderate or anything but I've been wondering this for a while, why exactly do you care so much if people know? I mean Olivia Wright is a part of you, why don't you just embrace it?"

He sounds exactly Rachel. Which a part of me knows that they're both right. Who I am now is majorly influenced by who I was in the coma. I mean that was my life for, well, an entire lifetime. And if I'm being honest, my life was so much simpler back then, so much happier.

Why is being Peyton Comber so difficult?

"I don't know Kev, I just don't know. I don't know anything really. I guess a part of me just wants to pretend that the coma, the life I had, didn't actually happen. It makes it less painful to accept that it wasn't real." I confess. Even after all these months it still hurts to think about how everything in that life wasn't real.

Kevin takes a deep breath. "But it did happen Peyton and no matter how much you want to pretend that it didn't, it did." He pauses. "You wanna know what I think? I think that you were Olivia Wright for a reason. I think that, no matter what the doctors say, that life you lived was real, because it's real to you. Maybe—maybe it was like a second chance."

Wow

Could—could he be right? Was there a reason that my life inside of the coma was so vivid and realistic? Why I had a life at all?

A second chance.

But a second chance for what?

"Kevin do you think that maybe I did something bad, like really bad, that got me into the coma in the first place? Whoever wrote the note said that they hadn't forgotten what I'd done...maybe that's the key to all of this! If only I could remember..."

I've hit a slump with my memories. Nothing I've done has triggered a single memory recently. I used to hate when that happened because it always gave me headache, but now I would take that headache in exchange for answers any day.

Kevin seems to be thinking about this too. "Didn't you tell me that you get flashbacks sometimes?"

I nod. "Something has to trigger them though."

"Well then maybe we just need to find the right trigger. Maybe it's time to stop focusing on what's happening now and find out what happened then." He says seriously.

Find out what happened in the past.

But what if I don't like what I find?

Just take a peek and see what you find before worrying about it.

Just take a peek.

A peek into the past.

***

So that afternoon I search every inch of my house for anything that could be a potential trigger. This includes photo albums, random trinkets from the attic, and old news paper clippings. Rachel is thankfully still at work so I have about two hours to try to work this out without her being nosy.

It's not that I don't trust her or anything, it's just that I know she would lie if I asked her if she knew anything about me doing something bad. She likes to keep me in a bubble. Which is sometimes relieving, but there's just too many things going on for me to stay in it right now.

"Come on—please trigger something!" I will the five photo albums in front of me. But after flipping through three of them with no luck, Rachel comes home. Thankfully she's too tired to ask questions so I just simply move to my room.

After a while I start to pace. "Stupid brain! Just cooperate already and remember! Is it really that hard? Apparently s—aurgh!" I trip over something and find myself sprawled on the floor.

What did I even trip on? Knowing me with my daddy long legs it was probably just air.

My eyes search around and finally land on a loose floorboard. I guess I'll just tell Rachel th—wait, a loose floorboard? What if...

I grab an old golf club I found in the attic and wedge it between the loose board. Then, with all the strength I have, I launch the floorboard up in the air, removing it from the floor.

Pushing the fallen board aside, I scramble to look inside the new hole in the middle of my floor. And inside I find...

A stack of opened letters and worn photographs. A few dusty newspapers clippings and a redwood box with a big black X on it. I frown and pick up the box. I wonder what's inside. But before I take a look, I look at the other things.

The newspaper clippings are all about different scandalous pranks and schemes. Like tagging the elementary school with some not-so-nice words or smoke bombing a local grocery store.

Why would I have kept these?

My hands quickly fumble for the letters. They're all from the same address: 666 Rockridge St.

I close my eyes that address sounds...familiar.

I slip open the dusty envelope and pry out the letter. My eyes quickly scan the paper.

You're almost ready. Syla says that after this you'll be a full member. Excited? You should be. So here's the plan, meet us downtown at the old moonshine place. Wear dark clothes and don't tell ANYONE where your going, we don't need another repeat of what happened with Tim. Bring the matches, we have some work to do. -X

My head feels heavy. This all...I know this. I—remember this. I just need to concentrate. I squeeze my eyes shut.

Remember, remember, remember

Then, before I know it, people and pictures flash through my head.

A group of teenagers, all beat up in some way or another

A fire burns in front of my eyes

Sirens blare in the distance

Someone pulls my arm and tells me to leave it

Close misses, long runs

"It's dangerous, you need to stop!"

"I'm in too deep to stop now!"

Smoke

Bright lights

X

Then everything goes dark.

***

"Give me back my letter!" I yell as I lunge for the piece of paper in my moms hand. I can't believe I was stupid enough to leave it on the kitchen table!

"Not until you explain yourself! Peyton I don't even know what to say to this! What even is this?!" My mom shouts back.

"It's nothing! Now just give it to me!" I was way taller than my mom now but she was still quicker.

"Who are you meeting at the old moonshine place?! Why does it say to wear dark clothes? Why does it say to bring matches?! Peyton Elizabeth Comber I am your mother, tell me this instant what this all means!" She's never looked so angry before. But that's not what hurts me, the fear in her eyes is what makes me want to cry.

But if she knew what I was doing...she would definitely try to stop me. And I can't stop now, I'm too far in.

So instead of yelling I try to reason with her. "It's not what you think it is, okay? It's..." I trail off.

"It's what Peyton? I'm waiting." She snaps at me.

What do I even say? How do I even explain this? Some part of me wants to spill the entire story to her. To get the weight off my chest and fly free again.  But who knows how much trouble I'd be in if I did? Besides...I have to do this.

So how do I explain this? Simple: I don't.

"It's just a code, okay? Hannah invited me to this party downtown and she didn't want anyone who wasn't invited to know about it. The old moonshine place is code for the planetarium and matches are really sparklers, I'm in charge of bringing them. And by full member she means that I'll be a member of her little group. Does that clear it up for you?" I lie straight through my teeth.

My mom hesitates. "Honest?"

This time I hesitate. "Yes. I promise. Can—can I still go to the party?"

She pauses for a minute before answering. "Fine, you can go. Just don't be out past midnight and call if anything happens. Ask Steve to give you a ride home. And be careful, you're fifteen, you're too young to throw your life away."

I force a smile. "I know mom, I know. I'm going to get ready for the party now. Can I have my letter."

She nods and hands it to me. But before I'm fully up the stairs, she calls my name.

"Peyton?"

"Yes?"

"If anything's wrong...if anything is going on...you would tell me right? You know that I'm here?"

No

Yes

I don't know.

But I close my eyes and force out: "Of course I do. But nothings wrong and absolutely nothing is going on." Then I lock my door and start to get ready.

Once I'm ready for the "party" I grab my backpack and fill it with matches, a lighter, and a small pocket knife. Just in case.

Somethings going to burn tonight...and it's not going to be me.

Then I jerk back to my reality. The weight of the memory crashes down on me and I crumble to the ground with earth-rattling sobs shaking my body. My head is pounding and my eyes sting but the only thing that I care about is the one thought bouncing around in my mind:

What on earth have I done?

Hehe hoped you liked that chapter! SO sorry that I haven't updated in a while, school has been insane and I also have softball starting up. My update schedule has been a tad messy lol. But I hope that this chapter was worth the wait. Thanks for reading!-Vanna🌻