Lily St. Clair:

I woke up and it was completely dark in my room. I froze. I always kept a light on at night. Even though I would never admit it to anyone, I was afraid of the dark. Every muscle in my body was tense, so tense it hurt. Who turned off my light, or what turned off my light? What if somebody was in my room? A small part of me was trying to tell the rest of me there was a logical explanation why my light wasn’t on, but the rest of me wouldn’t listen.

Small part of me: Maybe I forgot to turn the light on.

Rest of me: I wouldn’t forget.

I woke up roughly around 2 A.M.or 3 A.M.every night, or, to be technical, every morning. I had terrible nightmares about someone watching me, watching my every step, my every move. Always following me, and not to make sure I was okay either. The really scary thing about it was that it was true. Every day it felt like someone was watching me, following me, someone evil, someone who wanted to hurt me.

As I was trying to convince myself that this was all in my head, and I was overreacting, and I’ve watched too many horror movies, I heard footsteps. Oh God. Oh. My. God! I was going to die, he was coming for me. I just lay there, in my bed; every muscle in the fiber of my being was tense. I closed my eyes and hoped I would die quickly.

“Lily.”

I couldn’t help myself, I screamed, and I fought when I felt arms around me. I was too weak, my arms were pinned to my sides, I gave up my struggle.

“Lily, sweetie, its okay.”

I looked up at my attacker, with wide and terrified eyes, then I hesitated.

“Mom?” I looked down to see a flashlight on the floor.

“The power is out,” my mom said. She reached for a tissue and dabbed it under my eyes. I then realized that I was crying.



Dan R. Landon:

Lily St. Clair, 110 9th Street, Los Angeles, California. She was my target, and soon to be my victim. Ever since I saw her last year I knew I had to kill her.

She was laughing with a pack of her friends. I never had friends.

She looked so happy. I was never happy.

She had a family that loved her. I never had a family that loved me.

She was too perfect. If you dig deep enough in anyone’s life, everyone has problems, but not this girl. She had family and friends that would jump off a cliff for her. She had perfect grades, always turned in her homework on time, this girl had potential.

I never had potential.



Lily St. Clair:

I heard my alarm and opened my eyes, I was still awake, and I hadn’t been able to sleep since my mom had scared me. I slowly sat up in my bed to look out the window, nothing was there. There wasn’t a big scary man with a bloody axe ready to jump through my window and hack my head off. I wouldn’t let myself be scared today, I would forget all about this and everything would be fine.

I got out of bed and picked out a T-shirt and shorts. It gets hot in California. I put my hands to my sides to see if I would be following the school’s dress code today. Nope, my shorts were about an inch higher then my fingertips and my T-shirt showed a little of my waistline, but I have a great body, nothing to be ashamed of, and the school doesn’t enforce the dress code, ever.

I strutted my way to the bathroom and started to brush my brown shoulder length hair. I looked in the mirror and loved what I saw. I am a future supermodel of California, a hot actress with tan skin and perfect hair. I don’t know why I was so scared last night, my life was so perfect. I put on a little eyeliner and mascara just to make my eyes pop and a little lip-gloss to make my lips shine.

I walked out of the bathroom, down the hall, and into the kitchen. I grabbed a granola bar from the counter. This stuff kept you thin, a great breakfast. My mom walked out of her room and smiled at me. I smiled back showing my perfect teeth.

“Are you ready for school Lily?” my mom asked, grabbing the car keys.

“Of course,” I answered, as I slipped on a pair of flip flops and trotted out the door.



Dan R. Landon:

I saw her mother’s fancy black car drive past where I was waiting on the side of the road in my car. I waited for a couple more cars to put themselves between us before I started to follow her. I knew where they were going; I just had to make sure I knew where she was. I did this every day, but today was going to be different. Today I was going to murder Lily St. Clair.



Lily St. Clair:

I walk into the high school feeling confident and happy. I think it’s the warm weather. My friends flock to my side as soon as they see me; it never takes them long, they know that I know they wait for me. It’s like they can’t function without me.

They ask me how I’ve been feeling lately. I know what they are referring to. I start to think about it against my will. There is a ringing in my ears and I can’t focus on what my friends are saying anymore, I hate them for bringing it up. Then I see spots in front of my eyes and the floor keeps getting closer. Then everything was black.



Dan R. Landon:

She is in the nurse’s office. I hope she doesn’t stay there too much longer. I have to do this right or I might go crazy.



Lily St. Clair:

I hear voices around me, my eyelids want to open but I have a fierce headache. I feel a cold hand on my forehead and flinch.

“Lily, can you hear me?”

I nod weakly.

“Open your eyes slowly, okay?”

I open my eyes, blink a few times, and then look around. I was in the nurse’s office on a small cot on the floor. I sit up and the nurse presses her cold hand to my forehead again, moves her hand from side to side in front of my eyes, and asks me if I remember my name.

A boy walks in with a bloody nose.

“I will be with you in a minute,” the nurse says.

She crouches by me and asks if I need any water or if I am feeling dizzy, and some other stupid questions while the boy stands there with a bloody nose. I nod or shake my head to answer her questions but my eyes are on the boy. When the blood starts to drip onto the carpet he starts to say something, but the nurse cuts him off with a rude remark about him staining the carpet. Nurses shouldn’t show favoritism, it just makes them look bad.

“You should go home sweetheart,” the rude nurse says.

“No, I want to stay for the rest of the day. If you haven’t called my mom or dad, don’t.”

I glanced at the clock; everyone should just be going to lunch. I stood up and started walking toward the cafeteria.

I didn’t eat much this morning, I just got a little nervous, it happens to everyone, it didn’t mean anything, I thought to myself. I walked to the lunch table my friends and I always sit at and they automatically stood up with looks on their faces like I had just had open heart surgery, and they thought I wouldn’t make it.

I held up my hand, “I’m fine, no memory loss, no broken bones, no internal bleeding. So what did I miss?”



Dan R. Landon:

She is still here; I just have to wait until she is alone.



Lily St. Clair:

My friends talk at a hundred words a minute, as usual, I just nod. I think about eating but there is only a little while before school is over. I feel a chill all of a sudden and look toward the cafeteria window. I see someone standing there, watching me. I feel a little light headed, but I look away and tell myself I need to get my eyes checked because I’m seeing shadows.

The bell rings and I stand up and glance out the window, he is still standing there, watching me. I feel sick and run to the bathroom. I lean over a sink in case I have to throw up. I think to myself that this doesn’t make any sense, no one else saw a man standing outside the window. There has to be some kind of surgery that makes you forget certain things.

I hear the bathroom door open and I stand up straight and pretend I’m fixing my hair. I hear heavy footsteps on the bathroom floor, maybe a janitor. I turn to leave but he is standing right behind me, so close that I can’t walk around him.

I am trembling, but I have to act like there is nothing wrong. I open my mouth to say I have to get to class, but his hand connects with the side of my head, and I fall and hit my head on the sink on the way down. I am surprised that I’m not unconscious. I realize that I can’t pretend that there is nothing wrong, and I have to get out before he kills me.

He picks me up by my hair with one giant hand and covers my mouth with the other.

“Don’t think about running to the door because I have it blocked off, and it doesn’t seem like you can yell for help,” he says in a deep, scratchy voice.

He has long, tangled, and unwashed hair, an untrimmed beard, and really creepy eyes. He is wearing really dirty clothes with a lot of holes. He lets go of my hair, grabs a knife from his back pocket, and holds it to my throat. This time when I knew I was going to die, I wasn’t so scared. He then only said three words to me before my whole world went black and red.

“You’re too perfect.”



Dan R. Landon:

I saw the life leave her eyes and her blood pour out of her neck. All I felt was satisfaction, I had done what I wanted to do, if I was thrown in jail for the rest of my life, I didn’t care. No one that perfect deserved to live. I moved the board I had used to block the door, walked out of the school with my bloody knife, and waited for someone to find her dead body.

Now all that is left is a bloodstained floor, a dead girl, and a newspaper that reads: Dan R. Landon, murderer of Lily St. Clair, sentenced to the death penalty.







The End