The sirens were close now. For a moment, I stood frozen in the middle of the room, eyes still fixed on the limp body of my step-father that laid sprawled out like a rotten piece of meat. "So, now what?" The words tumbled out of me in a raspy whisper. I had no answer. Nowhere to go, no one to turn to. But at least my brother—my sweet, innocent brother—was safe. That’s something, right? I needed a smoke. God, I needed a smoke.

I dragged my feet up the basement stairs, each step creaking underneath my weight and for the first time in weeks saw the outside world. To me it looked just as bleak as the dark basement that I was trapped in.

My mother was quiet, her deer-in-the-headlights eyes looking in my direction, but not understanding fully grasping what was going on. When she realized it was me, she started sobbing, deep, guttural sobs that made her whole body shake. But I didn’t stop. I couldn’t.

Upstairs, I ransacked my parents’ room, my hands moving on autopilot as I searched for something—anything—that would take the edge off. Cigarettes. I needed cigarettes. I ripped through drawers, tossing socks, papers, and forgotten knickknacks onto the floor in a frenzy. Then, in the small desk of my stepfather’s study, I found something that stopped me cold.

Envelopes. A stack of them, neatly tucked away, six or seven in total. My name was scrawled on each one in the same jittery handwriting, the ink slightly smudged, like they had been written in a hurry. They weren’t old. They weren’t dusty.

The Whodunit Diaries