Chapter 7: Longing for Justice
November 15, 2025 at 8:35 AM
Iris
I stare out into the bright sky outside the clear glass windows. The teacher is rambling on and on about a topic I don't have my interest in. The sky was also like this that day... It was a Monday, if I remember correctly. A bright sunny Monday during a school break. The day we were planning to go outside for vacation and to celebrate her birthday. Andrea used to be the earliest bird I've ever seen, waking up before everyone else, breakfast prepared and ready even before the second person even woke up. But that day, she wasn't up. We gave her an extra hour, assuming that she was just tired and sleepy. But she didn't wake up. Dad decided to go check on her... She never woke up early ever again. Her birthday cake we ordered to surprise her at the end of the day stayed in the fridge even to this day, none of us wanting to throw it away, no one willing to let go of the last bit of her. Now it's just in the fridge, slowly rotting inside its container along with our memories of her that are fading away.***
"Quick question, where did you get the Rosewood Warehouse book from?" I ask Narima as she joins path with me to our next class. "I don't know, I found it at home," she shrugs, "but the school library has it, I was checking it out afterschool." "Oh?" I follow her as she leads me to the building I've never been to despite my 12 years here in this school. The building, as I've seen from the main school building thousands of times, is large. As they advertise it, it seems like it is also the largest library in town, but only for the students' use. She scans her student ID card and I do the same. There is an entire section of the building dedicated to crimes, solved and, surprisingly, unsolved. And there is an entire shelf for this particular incident. "I'll be going now," she says plainly. I nod and she disappears, appearing once again at the outside of the building on the first floor, walking outside the school gate. Time to find out about this case... I guess... To be honest, I think it is unfair that Andrea was never mentioned once in the records, not even implied to have existed in their victim name records. Or maybe it was just shielded off from the public intentionally by the police or some kind of organization. But what I don't understand is why they needed to do that, since there is no way that it would be beneficial for anyone. I spend some more hours reading through the records of the victims and the events, still not seeing anything about Andrea, or even the smallest hints about her. Just why? Did someone hide it? Did someone destroy the original list? Did they remove it? "Hey Ash," Antony says when I pick up his phone. "How's your plans?" I stay silent for a while, thinking whether I should tell him about my plans. Or if I am even sure about it. "It's fine... I guess?" "What is fine exactly?" he asks, and I realized that the answer I gave him does not relate to the question. "Unless you have a plan now?" "I... um..." I still can't decide if I should tell him yet. "Anyway, when are you visiting this month?" "Right," he exclaims, as if realizing that he had forgotten about something. "I'm very sorry, but tell dad and mom that I won't be able to go this month." "Work, again?" "Yep, and I need to go now too. Talk to you later," with that, he hangs the call. I stare at the screen and sigh. I guess I'll just tell him the next time he calls...
