I can already feel the exhaustion that always follows a panic attack weighing me down. Time to get myself home before I crash completely.
“Sorry about the bag. Send me a bill for the repairs,” I tell Paul as I pass by the reception desk on my way to the changing room. He nods and once again I’m grateful Paul’s not the sort the make a fuss. He knows if I wanted to talk about it, I would. But that’s the last thing I want so I walk away without another word.
Not trusting my shaky limbs to make it through a shower here as well as the journey home, I grab my rucksack and the stupid cardboard box that, sadly, hasn’t been tossed out.
“Here.” Paul stops me by the exit, holding out an energy bar.
“Um, can you?” I nod at the box in my hands and he drops the bar inside. “Thanks.”
He nods. “Look after yourself.”
“I always do.”
He scoffs at that but lets me leave.
Luckily it’s still early enough in the afternoon that I’m on the tube home before rush hour starts. Living and working in London I’ve not had any choice, but since the incident I’ve had a lot more trouble coping with crowds. When I first started backat The Ledger four months ago, every time a stranger bumped into me my heart would leap into my throat, even now I still tense up. I’m not sure I’ll ever be OK with someone coming up behind me and touching me when I’m not expecting it. There’s more truth than I’d like to admit to what Corbin said about me being different now. But I still don’t agree that taking away work, my one escape, is the right course of action. I went back to The Ledger just two months after I was taken because I didn’t want any more time off, I just wanted to feel normal again. But, as I take a seat on the tube near the doors, automatically cataloguing my surroundings, I have to admit the normal from before is long gone. The Raven may not have taken my life, but he shattered my sense of safety, and I’m not sure I’ll ever manage to piece it back together.
By the time I make it back to my tiny one bedroom flat, I’m exhausted. After double checking the door’s locked and the chain’s in place, I abandon my box of stuff from the office in the corner of the living room to deal with later. Heading through to the bathroom, I strip off my sweaty gym clothes, and get in the shower. The warm water soothes my overworked muscles, and going through the familiar motions of getting clean helps settle my nerves.
Afterwards, I change into my comfiest pair of grey joggers and my softest t-shirt. The temptation to crawl into bed is strong, but I know I’ll feel like shit if I don’t eat something before letting myself sleep, so I drag myself through to the kitchen and make a sandwich instead. Grimacing at the slightly stale bread, I choke down the sad ham and mustard sandwich, reminded I’d intended to pick up some fresh bread on my way home today. Of course, that was before Corbin forced me out. It’s not surprising I forgot the errand given this day’s gone to absolute shit.
Now I’m clean with a full stomach I feel more human, and the boiling rage I left the office with has lowered to a simmer.While it still pisses me off that Corbin made this decision for me, it occurs to me this enforced time off could be an opportunity in disguise. He might be able to stop me reporting for The Ledger for the next year, but he can’t prevent me from going elsewhere or doing my own investigations.
I clean up my plate and set the kettle to boil while I think, staring at the peeling linoleum my landlord chose for the kitchen floor instead of tiles. Thanks to The Raven I’m too notorious to get a job at a different paper in London, hell in most of the country’s big cities. Even if I wasn’t turned down for my reputation as a reporter who became the story, I’d need to list Corbin as a reference and I know he won’t give me one right now.
That means I need to do something else, but what? Magazines would leave me facing the same issues as applying for a position at a different paper, and I shudder at the idea of working for a tabloid—no doubt they’d only try to exploit my experience with the country’s most notorious serial killer in recent years. I could continue my own investigation into The Raven but I’ve kept my ear to the ground since my attack and there have been no new leads. Two and a half years of the infamous serial killer dropping a body every month and now… nothing, not one new victim in the last six months. Not since I survived. While I’m glad nobody else has been hurt, I can’t help feeling like The Raven’s reign of terror isn’t over yet. I think he’s watching, waiting for something—I just don’t know what.
Still, I have to find something to focus on, a mystery to solve, or I’ll lose my mind. Corbin thinks he’s helping me but being left alone with my thoughts for an entire year is the last thing I need. Huffing in frustration, I close the unevenly hanging kitchen cupboard door and drop a tea bag into my waiting mug. If I had any real friends now would be the time to give one a call but aside from the occasional after work drink withpeople from the office there’s nobody, and even those surface-level relationships disappeared after I was attacked. The last real friend I had was back when I worked as a bartender in the evenings while I was studying at university. Something in my chest tightens uncomfortably when I think of Garrett, the larger-than-life bartender I used to work with. He’d been put in charge of training me, something he was obviously less than thrilled about, but once he realised I wasn’t completely hopeless we quickly became friends. Then two years later, after a death in his family, he moved back to his hometown and I never heard from him again.
That’s it. I grab my tea then dart over to the living room, a short five paces away from the kitchen-diner, and plonk myself down on the navy-blue couch. Snatching up my laptop from the coffee table, my knee bounces with my impatience as I wait for it to switch on.
Garrett’s hometown is a mystery that’s plagued me for years and this bullshit year off is the perfect time to finally look into it seriously. Back when we knew each other Garrett had been very cagey about his past. At first I didn’t think much of it. As someone who was abandoned at birth, I’m not too fond of sharing details of my past either. But once we got close I opened up and I’ll admit it hurt my feelings when he remained as tight-lipped as ever. Then, one night after we’d had a few drinks, Garrett told me about the town he grew up in. Crystal Lake. A small town nestled up in the north of England. The way he described it made it sound like something out of a TV show.
I’d been utterly enamoured with his description of the place, so different to the concrete jungle I grew up in, that I’d looked up the town later, searching for photos, only to find it didn’t exist. Not in an internet search, not on any map. When I confronted Garrett he’d been incredibly sketchy about the whole thing but insisted the town existed, just that it was so small it got leftoff maps. Sounded like a load of crap to me and I told him so, but then he pulled out his phone and showed me photos of him and his family in the town square and the local coffee shop he’d told me about. Sensing I was still sceptical, he texted his sister, asking for the photo of his family when their family first arrived in Crystal Lake. After a couple of minutes—just long enough for me to convince myself he’d been playing some kind of messed up trick on me—his phone chimed. When he turned the screen to face me, all my doubts were erased. There in full colour, stood next to a large wooden sign painted with the words ‘Welcome to Crystal Lake’ was a very young Garrett with his siblings, and a man and woman I recognised as his parents from the other photos he’d shown me.
Being the curious sort, I couldn’t leave it there. I pushed Garrett for more information, convinced I should be able to find it on a map somewhere, but he remained steadfastly firm in his original explanation. The more research I did the more the mystery, and Garrett’s caginess bothered me. Then Garrett left. He didn’t show up at work for a few days, and my texts went unanswered. When I told our boss I was worried, he bluntly informed me Garrett had quit and moved back home. Two weeks later, I finally got a text from Garrett telling me someone had died, that his family needed him back home, and not to call him.
Years later, it still hurts. He was my first and only real friend and he abandoned me just like my birth parents. Absentmindedly, my fingers drift up to toy with the necklace I’ve worn for as long as I can remember—the gold chain with its amber pendant and a note with my name the only things I have from my biological family.
After Garrett left I stopped looking into his hometown. Months of research had got me no closer to finding out more about the town’s history, or, well,anythingto even prove it existed. Without Garrett and his photographic evidence I feltlike I was chasing a fairytale. Shortly after that I graduated uni and started working at The Ledger. The hours were gruelling, but I was determined to prove myself. There was no time left for silly little mysteries.
Still, it’s always bothered me. Who hides an entire town? If it was truly as small and insignificant as Garrett made out there would be no need for all the quirky businesses he described. But I’d seen photos of a bustling town square surrounded by brightly coloured shopfronts. So if it wasn’t a tiny place people forgot to put on the map, that meant it was being left off on purpose. While I’m not one for conspiracy theories I’m positive there’s something going on in Crystal Lake, and this could be my chance to find out what’s happening there and what happened to my friend. Who knows, maybe I’ll uncover a story big enough that Corbin will let me come back to work early.
Investigative journalism is more than just a job to me—it’s who I am. I’ve always had a strong sense for sniffing out the truth, and this time won’t be any different. I can keep an eye out for any developments in The Raven’s case while working to solve the mystery of Crystal Lake and make sure Garrett’s OK. Getting out of London might even be good for me. It’s been six months and I still feel like The Raven could come back at any moment to finish what he started. But he’s not some all-powerful being. Whoever The Raven is, he’s still just a man, and he’s taken enough from me. My sense of safety, my privacy, and now my job. I refuse to let him take my sense of self. If I spend the next year cowering in my flat and licking my psychological wounds, he wins. So, I’m going to do what I do best—investigate.
Fuelled by renewed determination, I gulp down the last of my tea and turn to my laptop. If there’s something going on in Crystal Lake, I’m going to be the one to find out what. If my investigation also leads me to discover what the hell happened to Garrett, even better.
Hours later, I’m no closer to the truth than when I started. Frustrated, I snap my laptop closed and my stomach chooses that moment to growl obnoxiously loud. I need to eat something if I’m going to keep researching. Nobody works well on an empty stomach, but I’ve always needed to eat more than most, probably because at six foot two with a naturally muscular build I’m a fairly big guy. I don’t want to stop and cook, not when I’ve yet to discover a single lead, so I grab a generous portion of pasta bake from the freezer and zap it in the microwave before returning to the sofa.
Normally I’d turn on the TV and watch the news for company, but I’m not in the mood tonight. My attention wanders to the newspaper I grabbed outside the tube station on my way home. Maybe I’ll read the news instead. Absentmindedly, I flip through the pages, almost burning my tongue on my forkful of pasta. Usually when I finish the main articles I don’t bother with the sports and entertainment sections, but something tells me to keep reading. I learned a long time ago how important it is to listen to my gut, so I do just that.
That’s when I see it. At the back of the paper, tucked away in the job advertisements, looking utterly unremarkable. A job ad.
The Chronicle has an opening for a journalist on our team. Our vibrant community holds an array of events throughout the year, which the successful applicant will report on in our weekly publication. This position is perfect for an experienced reporter seeking sanctuary in a tranquil small town. Applicants must be residents or willing to relocate, as we do not currently offer remote working. Interviews for locals will be held in person, interviews for non-residents will be conducted via video call. All applicants must have completed their formal education, academy graduates preferred. Please submit your CV, cover letter, and threeexamples of your work to [email protected] by 22nd August.
For the first time today, a smile tugs at the corners of my mouth. Once again, my gut has steered me in the right direction. While I’m no closer to uncovering the secrets of Crystal Lake there’s no reason not to apply for this job. The longer the idea sits with me, the more I’m convinced getting out of London for a while will be good for me. I can continue my investigation from anywhere and, with the slower pace of a weekly publication instead of the daily grind at The Ledger, I’ll have plenty of free time.
Flexing my fingers, I open my laptop and bring up my CV. My heart sinks when I update it to show an end date for my time at The Ledger, but I shake off the disappointment and focus on the task at hand. It’s not forever. I’ll go back to The Ledger in a year. Until then I need another job to keep me sane. Nudging my glasses up the bridge of my nose, I note the wording of the advert is a little strange. I’ve never heard anyone refer to university graduates as academy graduates before, but maybe that’s a colloquialism. It doesn’t matter. Odd phrasing isn’t about to deter me from applying. This job’s the perfect distraction. Now all I have to do is land the position.
