Unspoken Conversations (A Sequel to ‘Faithwood Boarding School for Girls’)

Author’s Note: Hi! Also: NOTE FOR ALL Y’ALL WHO GO ON LIKE SPREES: I personally think that likes are nice, but comments and critiques are much more helpful! I kind of hate it when people just go on random liking sprees. I would appreciate it much more if you took the time to read and give feedback. Points are nice but at the end of the day, improvement is better! Ok, so this didn’t need a sequel, but here we are. I loved the original, I don’t think I did it justice, but I hope you enjoy regardless. The original is a little old, I submitted it as my third story for ‘On the Moors’ and had it prewritten for months before then. (If you read it then be warned, there are many grammatical errors... Link: https://blog.reedsy.com/creative-writing-prompts/contests/64/submissions/39148/) It gives me Coira/Vesta vibes...yes I’m putting the link to their story too: https://blog.reedsy.com/creative-writing-prompts/contests/79/submissions/52920/. Sister-murder-conspiracies-with-added-drama, and just general dramatic-London-stories seem to be my thing... 

Unspoken Coversations (A Sequel to ‘Faithwood Boarding School for Girls’) 

A Dramatic Short Story by Ana Govindasamy  

Trigger Warnings/Disclaimers: Murder, Drug References, Addiction References, Bullying, Bereavement Themes, Car Accident, Suicide

London. It’s my home. Our home.  

I never get to see much of it though. 

My name is Aria Shasharkan. I was born in a country hospital, in a small town called Tritan. I was a preemie. I don’t remember much from Tritan, but I wish I did.  

We moved to London not soon after my birth. And her death. 

Delta. 

She was my sister. But she was killed by her supposed best friend, Anaya in her fourth year at Faithwood Boarding School. It was tragic. Apparently I was also kidnapped. But soon after Delta’s death, her killer’s roommate came in. The police were called. I was found. 

It’s probably a good thing I don’t remember anything. I don’t remember court, I don’t remember the press. I don’t remember the police, the trauma. 

She would’ve been a great sister from what I’ve heard. She was kind, understanding, and compassionate. And she chose my name. She’d wrote it in her diary and it according to her ‘It just stuck’. I have her diary. It makes feel close to her, like I’m in conversation with her. I open it and she’ll tell me about her girlfriend, Jamie Evans. Her killer, Anaya Gill. Watching the twisted progression of their friendship, knowing how it ended...it makes me sick. Sometimes, she’d talk about me. She said she’d hoped I’d be athletic. 

I am. 

But not as much as I’d hoped to be.  

Since Faithwood, my parents decided to move out to London. I grew up here, went to school here. Until Year 3, that is. Because while the investigations into Delta’s death went on, more deaths at Faithwood resurfaced. The main one being the disappearance of Nicola Bell.  

I’ll try to sum up the case.  

Nicola Charlene Bell went missing on the 5th of September 2010. She was a student, in her last year at Faithwood. She was beautiful, funny and smart. A Chess Champion, winner of the Senior Math Challenge, which required an IQ of at least 140 just to compete and had several other accomplishments. 

In short, everybody wanted to be as successful as her. When the news that she went missing broke out, it made headlines and multiple search parties were launched.    

The police later declared that Nicola Bell was dead, as it had been 100 weeks since her disappearance. Until her body was found under the rugby pitches in the boys’ division of the school while investigations into Delta’s death went on. 

Soon it surfaced that she was a drug addict, which was what aided her intellect. She was also severely depressed from exam pressure, trying to keep up her reputation and the threat of people finding out about her addiction. 

 She went out to the local pub one day, got drunk and ended up spilling all her secrets to two other students who were there. They were drunk too, "tired of hearing her pathetic words", and ended up driving her to suicide. 

The students panicked and hid her body and any evidence they were there that night, according to the one remaining student; the second died in a car accident two years later. The bar was empty, and was underfunded with no CCTV, so no one could prove nor deny it. The student was arrested, and both cases closed, but more deaths were surfacing, and the school couldn’t cover it up. They had to close in 2016. 

Names flash in my mind. There was a memorial service held for all the deceased in 2017, and their names still hang heavy in my mind. 

Delta Shasharkan.

Nicola Bell. 

Jamie Evans. 

Michael Jefferson. 

Rachel Anders. 

Jack Beck. 

Jazmynn Davies. 

Damian Roberts. 

Lila Chaudhury. 

Robin Thompson 

Parts of the full Nicola Bell case were disgustingly similar to Delta’s. And now, no one knew how many students had access to illegal substances, whether lethal poison, recreational drugs, or performance enhancing drugs.  

And it made national news. 

It was more press. 

They’ve dubbed it “The School of Secrets and Blood” 

It was more bullying. 

That was when I started being home-schooled. 

I had friends at school, real friends. But more enemies outweighed them. Maybe it was good decision. Maybe it wasn’t. But it’s too late to change. 

I’m lonely though.  

We still don’t know how I’m going to do my exams. And the news hasn’t died down yet, either. London is supposed be bright, busy. I’d loved it when I wasn’t locked away from society.  

Now...now it just feels like life goes on, forgetting me, yet still keeping me in their minds forever. Like it’s trapping me in this eternal cycle of ennui and publicity. Like it’s out to get me.  

Always. 

My parents, they try to shield me from it, like I’m still the baby they had the day they found out about their daughter’s death. I understand, but I need closure just as much as they do. I may not have a true memory of my sister, but reading her diary...she’s just as alive as I am. She made her life spring off the page, her handwriting just as lively as she was. She addresses her diary as “you” as well, so we’re trapped in beautiful conversation.  

I miss her, without meeting her. 

And I want to find out what happened to her.  

For her.  

I take out my shoebox of old newspapers. It’s so satisfying seeing the age next to Anaya’s name slowly tick upwards. 

15. 

17. 

22. 

26. 

27. 

It’s been 12 years.  

I take out the papers and find the plastic folder beneath them. 

My letters to Delta. I’d written them in response to her diary, years of unspoken conversations were all tucked away in the red, plastic wallet. I switch my lamp on, flip to a fresh page in my notepad, and start to write again. 

*** 

I awake. As my eyes try to re-adjust to the light, I see her. My sister. She’s her fifteen-year-old self still, but she looks older than that. My eyes adjust further, and I see I’m in a classroom. The whiteboard says, “London History”, but it’s covered in other graffiti, with words like ‘outcast’ , 'killer’ and ‘addict’. But I pay them no attention. I’m the only one in the class. Everything is silent. When Delta speaks, no sound comes out. Even when the door slams open and a figure strides in, face covered by her coat hood, it’s silent. I know it’s Anaya, but Delta doesn’t notice. She keeps on teaching me, some lesson I don’t know. But still, I’m absorbed in it. She’s so passionate, so lively, despite the hush. 

Then the gunshot rings out.  

No scream. 

Just the gunshot.  

I wake in fear. Delta told me about something like this, when she had vivid nightmares, encapsulating her fears, highlighting every single one of her insecurities. They were horrible. And so are mine.  

I blink a few times to find I’ve fallen asleep at my desk. My letters are strewn across it, spilling onto the floor. My lamp is still on, pen still uncapped. Her diary is still open, and I can read one sentence.  

“She’s not dead. She’s just taking a break, and I’ll see her later.”