I am Katherine Clark, Sophia Brown’s best friend. No one knew how Sophia’s life ended, so I am here to tell you the real story. Sophia had a rough life . Her mother and father died in a car crash when she was fifteen. She then moved to Chicago to live with her Aunt Charlotte. She had never felt love or kindness from her aunt, but it was either live with her or go to a foster home. Sophia shared a room with her little brat cousin Amanda, and Amanda always took the spot light. When Amanda came home with two A’s and 5 C’s she got cookies. When Sophia came home with straight A’s she got nothing. Sophia then went off to college. There, she met the love of her life, Jack. They fell in love, got married and moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After two years Sophia was pregnant, and when Jack found out he thought that she had cheated on him so he left her and moved back to Chicago. Then I come into the story. I lived two doors down from Sophia and Daniel, until I got married, moved out and had a baby, Tyler. We kept in touch, and Daniel and Tyler became friends. Ok enough about me. Let’s get back to what happened to Sophia, but I have to start from the beginning…
It was a clear night on October 16th, 2010 when Sophia Brown heard a
noise. Not just a creak of a floor board, or a hoot of an owl. It was loud; a piercing noise. She walked out of her bedroom and down the hall to her son’s room. She opened the door a crack so she wouldn’t make noise and peaked inside. Everything looked normal except for the fact that Daniel wasn’t there.
But she thought nothing of it because he was sleeping over at my house that night. He and Tyler were having a sleepover. They were both 15 at the time. She went to the back stairs of the apartment and stepped out the back door. There lying at her feet was Daniel. He was dead. Her neighbor Declan walked out.
“Should I call 911?” he said.
But she couldn’t say anything. She was in too much shock to say anything. So Declan went inside to call 911.

The next morning the detectives interviewed Tyler and I.

“Last night Daniel had complained of a stomach ache and said he had wanted to go home,” I said, “so I drove him to the back door and once he opened the door I drove away. Something must have happened when I was gone.”
The detective then moved on to Sophia and asked her what she had seen that night. The world in her eyes was spinning getting faster and faster. She collapsed. The floor was the sky and sky was the floor. She felt as if a rock hit her head. Her blonde hair was wet and stained red. The world began to fade away as if she was floating into space. Then everything went black. She was in a dark place. She couldn’t scream; she had no mouth. She couldn’t see; she had no eyes. It was deep silence. She had nothing to say because no one would hear her. It was like sleeping but with no dreams. Sophia doesn’t dream not even in a coma.

When she awoke she was lying in a hospital bed. No one was there and the only sound she heard was the occasional beep from the machines. When the doctors had discovered that she had woken up they had told her that she had been in a coma for two years. They had claimed that Tyler killed him because he had walked Daniel to the back door of the apartment because he had to go to the bathroom.
“I have a son?” she said.
“Yes. You don’t remember? The night before you fell into the coma he had been killed.”
“I don’t have a son and even if I did, he isn’t dead.”
“Ah I see. Can I ask you a few questions?”
“Sure.”
“Come with me.”

Sophia was then taken into a room where they sat her down and asked her a few questions. She was frightened; she didn’t know where she was, what the doctor was doing, or how she got into this hospital. She felt as if everything she saw was brand new. Her head felt as if it was completely empty. She was thinking. Trying to recall the memory of that night, and her life began to flash before her eyes. Daniel’s first birthday, his first words, his first steps… a vivid image would appear in her mind. It was as if she was reliving the moments in her head. Every moment up to that night was perfect. She was standing in her dream watching herself lying over Daniel’s body when she noticed a shadow that she hadn’t seen before. When Sophia was let out of the hospital she went to the police station.
“Hello, were you the station who had followed up on Daniel Brown’s murder case,” she asked.
“Yes,” said the secretary, “how may I help you?”
“I have proof that that Tyler Clark is innocent.”
“What proof? We had already done a DNA scan on Daniel, and Tyler’s fingerprint was the only one found. Unless you have the murder weapon that is the only evidence that anyone hasn’t found.”
“I just woke up from my coma. I had a dream. I know where it is.” Sophia then took a ride down to her apartment with the detective. When she pulled into the driveway the memory of that night began to flood back into her head. There she was watching herself sitting over Daniel’s body. She was noticing things that she hadn’t seen that night. Then she saw the shadow.
“Hello,” said the detective, “are you alright?”
But she didn’t answer she walked straight over to where the shadow was with the detective trailing behind her. All she saw was an empty sidewalk covered with fallen leaves.
That was when she noticed a drain covered by leaves. They were old and wrinkled, as if someone had left them there to shrivel up. She lifted the cover and stuck her hand in. It was damp and moist. She felt something sticky and then a prick. Sophia thought a bug had bitten her, so she lifted her hand out and a clean slice went down her finger. No bug could have done that. So with her other hand she reached in and grabbed onto something hard and heavy. Sophia then pulled out her hand, and a knife covered with blood was there in front of her. “Nice work,” said the detective. But little did they know that there was someone watching them from the roof of the apartment next door…
“They’ve found it, but not for long.”
TO BE CONTINUED…