June 1, 2024
Joe Wilson
Like every morning, I entered the school at exactly 06:00 AM. Before starting the novel Dark World sitting on my desk in the staffroom, I made myself a strong cup of coffee to shake off the morning fatigue. Without coffee, I felt like an unfinished sentence. As I lost myself between the pages of my book, my ears were tuned to the door.
07:10 AM
I was waiting for the door to open. Every single day, at this exact minute, Lily Taylor would walk through that door. Involuntarily, I waited to hear the sound of the door, to feel her presence. But the silence remained unbroken. I fixed my gaze on the door.
"Why isn't she here?"
Lily was the most punctual, most organized person I knew besides myself. Even if she were ill, she would find a way to be here at this hour. A sense of unease settled deep inside me.
12:30 PM
I spent the entire morning checking whether Lily had arrived. With her not in school, it felt as if one of the building's main pillars was missing. When lunch break arrived and she was still nowhere to be seen, I reached a breaking point of curiosity and worry.
"Has something happened to her?"
Unable to take it any longer, I called the principal:
— "Director, did Lily Taylor, the Math teacher, send word that she wouldn't be coming in today?"
— "No, Joe. We haven't heard a thing."
My hands were shaking when I hung up the phone. I didn't have Lily's number; I rushed to the staff contact list. I dialed the number, but I was met only with that soulless voicemail message:
"The person you are trying to reach is currently unavailable..."
I called over and over again.
Always that same damned voice. I had made up my mind: as soon as school was over, I was going to her house.
04:30 PM
The moment school ended, I drove to Lily's house. It was only a five-minute drive. I waited at her front door for minutes; I rang the bell, I pounded on the door.
No one answered.
"Something has definitely happened," I said to myself.
Just as I was about to give up and leave, my eyes caught the flowerpot next to the door.
"Lily is a smart woman; she isn't reckless enough to leave a key under a pot," I thought. Still, in a desperate move, I lifted the pot.
A silver key was there, shimmering on top of the soil.
As I entered, my conscience and my anxiety were clawing at each other:
"I'm sorry, Lily. I know this is a crime, but if you've fainted inside or if something worse has happened, you'll thank me. If everything is fine, you can report me to the police; I'll accept it."
As a citizen who lived by the rules, I felt the weight of what I was doing, but the thought of Lily being in danger overrode my guilt.
The inside of the house was much simpler than I expected. In fact, it was so sparse that it was hard to find evidence that a human being lived there at all. I thought I had entered the wrong house until I saw the study; the room was filled to the brim with books. There wasn't a single photograph or personal item in the house. Despite searching the entire place thoroughly, there was no sign of Lily.
"I have to call the police."
As soon as I left the house, I filed a missing person report. Lily Taylor was not a woman who would vanish without telling anyone.
That night, I could do nothing but pray that we would be sitting across from each other reading our books in the staffroom at 07:10 AM the next morning.
But the next morning... Lily Taylor was not in that room again.