[A/N: please, read part one or you'll be pretty lost :) bye <3]

"I-I don't know. They didn't say anything." I was on the phone with Elias, wasting battery but I really needed it.

"Do you want to go home?" His voice was muffled and went quiet every other word.

I took a deep breath and stared at the wall across from me. "No. I want to stay."

"Odila-"

"Something's wrong here. I need to stay, for Lily."

"Protect yourself Odila."

"I'm not gonna leave her."

"Just-just come back. Okay?"

"Okay."

***

"Tell me again."

I started again. Marelyn doesn't believe me. 

"We-"

"You and Miss Ava-Marie."

"Yes." Always trying to catch me in a lie. I've been here an hour. Repeating the same story over and over. What does she want?

"So, me and Lily heard the scream and-"

"What were you doing before?"

What, talking about you? Noo. Never. I can't stammer. Stammering means lying. "On our way back to our room. We were talking, and uh," Why. Been four times and I can't say that we were talking without trailing off. 

"You seem to be flustered." 

Where is Lily? I need her to stop me from going all smart aleck on this lady and blowing whatever small trust I've made. Probably like, 3%, but we're not gonna get farther if I go off on her. 

4-7-8, Odila. I feel better.

"I'm sorry, but It's hard to tell the story this many times. I'm tired." That's like, not technically sarcastic right? I'm not telling her 'I can't freaking focus when you interrupt me every five words'

"Okay. Continue."

"We went to see what was going on and I saw the girl, she was slumped against the wall with her mouth open a little bit. The hall was darkly lit. There were windows all along the wall."

"The North Hall."

"Uh, yeah, I think so." I had no idea. "There was-there was some dark stuff on her head. I couldn't see it very well." Thinking about that dark hallway still scared me. 

"What else?" She was taking notes. Probably gonna fact check me with Lily. 

"I saw a cat, or just a shadow of it, but it's eyes glinted like lightbulbes as it slinked away. I don't know where it went, I didn't care, really. Just thought-well, in the detective movies the smallest detail solves the case, and, and I thought it might help I don't know." My voice got increasingly smaller and I want to burn. 

"Thank you. You can go."

***

"Where were you?"

Lily was curled up on the bed reading a book, looking flustered and confused. Surprisingly, her words weren't. "I can't."

"Why not?"

She put the book down. "I don't like fire. The whole tattoo thing, it wasn't," She stops. "And then I see this girl, knocked out and bloody and-" Her upper lip quivers.

"Hey, hey, 4-7-8, okay? Deep breaths." I realized she didn't know what I meant. "Uh, In for four, hold for seven," I wait until her chest stops moving. "Out for eight. Again. It's okay, I'm here." She collapses into my arms. My stomach does this weird pancake thing. I don't think anybody has cried into my shoulder before.

"I'm scared," She whispered.

I whisper back, more strongly, for her.

"I'm here."