"Mister, are you following her?" Hugo asked. "I don't think your place is in the woods."
"Is her place in the woods?" the man asked.
"She takes a shortcut."
"So am I. Kids these days, tsk," he clicked his tongue with an annoyed look at Hugo and walked past them. Perhaps if Hugo had not said anything, he would have just backed up.
Hugo waited until he was out of sight. As soon as he could not be seen anymore, Hugo turned to Rhea. "That guy has been following you all the way from school. I think he was waiting for you nearby."
"Yes," she said.
"Yes?" Hugo repeated, surprised. "Rhea, he had been following you!"
"Yes, I know that," she said calmly. "He has been doing that for a few days. At least, I have noticed him a few days ago."
"And you have done nothing?"
"I have written a complaint, but I have minor prosopagnosia. I could not describe his face," she replied.
"If you knew he was following you, why would you go take this route? It's dangerous!" Hugo said, getting angry.
"Hugh, I know what I am doing," she said. Her eyes were still calm as well as her voice. For the first time, her calmness annoyed Hugo.
"What were you doing then?"
"It's none of your business."
"It is my business!" Hugo articulated. "If one of my classmates goes missing or something happens to her, isn't it going to be my business?"
"Oh, aren't you a kind soul? And I wasn't going to go missing. I was just… going to catch him."
"Catch who? Your stalker? He is a huge man. You are nothing compared to him!" Hugo said, looking at her up and down as if measuring her. "You barely reach my shoulders. That guy is at least two inches taller than me!"
"Lower your voice," she said. "I need to go home. I have to feed Silence."
"Your cat?"
"Yes."
"… I will walk you."
She stared at him in disbelief. It was like no one had ever offered to walk her home. Or, maybe, no one had ever offered to help her.
"Alright," she said.
Hugo kept looking around to make sure that guy was not following them.
"He is not following anymore," she said. "He went ahead of us."
"He could just follow us again. It is a forest. We would notice nothing."
"He is not following us," she repeated.
"Are you sure?"
"I would have heard footsteps," she said. "Besides, why are you so angry? It's not like you were doing anything different."
"…"
"I thought you would make an excuse," she chuckled. "Not that I would have believed you though."
"I'm sorry."
"I won't forgive you."
"Right… But… I won't do it again."
"You were not alone."
"I will tell him," he said.
Hugh did not try to make any small talk throughout the way. She did not either. She looked comfortable with the silence. He also never minded silence much.
Hugo had never been to Rhea's place. His father had been there countless times, but he always refused.
"Well, thank you, and goodbye," she said and started to go in without a second glance at him.
"Wait," he said, holding her by the arm. He quickly let go, seeing the unamused look in her eyes. "Ah, sorry… But, can you tell me about the stalker?"
"Why?"
"Because…"
"Hugh, I thanked you for helping me already even when I did not ask for help. You were worried about me and I am… thankful for that. That's it. I don't feel the necessity to tell you about what I was planning to do."
"It concerns your safety," Hugo said.
"And it doesn't concern you," she pointed out. "I need to go. See you at school tomorrow. Thanks for my lost biology book."
Rhea turned her back on him and went inside. Before going back, he took his time to look around the house to make sure that guy was not there anymore. It did not matter even if he was late. No one was waiting for him back at home anyway.
Rhea locked the front door. Her family was partly Asian as her father was an Indian American. So, their family followed some of the Asian traditions, including entering the house without their shoes on.
Rhea looked like her mother who was a white American but was not white herself. She had light brown skin as if the mixture of her parents. But her brother was quite pale. Her mother said Ronan looked like their grandfather from their mother's side.
"Ronan," she said, almost silently, "you made the front dirty."
She was staring at the mud right near the front door. "I don't like it," she said.
"I will clean it up," Ronan said from the kitchen. "I made you a sandwich. Come on and eat up. You must be hungry."
She took her shoes off and went to the kitchen. "Have you fed Silence?"
"Yeah. She is in your room."
"Hmm…"
"What took you so long? You usually come home quicker than this," he said.
"Uh… Talked to a classmate."
"A friend?"
"He is not my friend," Rhea said as she washed her hands.
"It was a boy?"
"Uhm," she said, taking a seat in a chair.
"I see. Well, you need to meet a lot of people and maybe go out with someone."
"I am not really interested in romance right now."
"Because you are asexual?"
"Dr. Frost is not right. She thinks I am asexual just because I don't find the people around me attractive enough to flatter me," she said.
"Asexual people don't find people attractive enough to flatter them."
Rhea stayed quiet. She ate her sandwich silently without arguing. She did not bother to let her brother know that she had fantasies that asexual people did not. She just had not found someone who matched her fantasy boyfriend.
"This morning, did they question you?" Rhea asked.
"Yeah," Ronan said, opening a can of soda that was already on the table. "The fact that Dr. Frost wrote about you in her diary in a very weird way that the police keep on questioning you and me."
"Dr. Frost…"
"Riri, she wrote you asked for something from her, you wanted something."
"I did want something. I still want something."
"What is it?"
"I don't remember sharing everything with you, Ronan."
"We are siblings, Riri!"
"Siblings or not, I like to keep a distance, Ronan. You know it," Rhea said. "Thanks for the sandwich. I will be in my room, napping."
Rhea stood up and left. Ronan could only watch.
His sister had always maintained a distance. It did not matter how many times he tried to get close to her, and break her shell; he never succeeded. As time went by, he accepted her as she was. But sometimes, he still tried to break that one shell that he never could break.
Dr. Frost's case was still ongoing after seven days, but it was mostly considered to be a suicide than a murder. Rhea was questioned another time and the police promised it was the last time if anything serious was not found.
After that day, Rhea did not find Hugo, and Verdell following her. She also did not see her stalker anymore.
She knew someone had been stalking her. She was not sure for how long, but she saw him for the first time outside her window. He was standing behind a tree with a camera.
She let him follow her for seven days to make sure he was truly following her. She made a police report and also a picture of the guy following her. Rhea had seen his face only once when she had seen him for the first time. But after that, he always wore a mask and a baseball cap. Because of Rhea's minor prosopagnosia, she could not even recall his face. The police said they would do something, but she knew they would not. They usually ignored cases of stalking until something serious happened.
She wanted to take things into her own hands. So, she tried to lure him into the forest. She had her stun gun. Rhea was quite confident in her fighting skill which she learned from her mother. Both her brother and she could fight not just with bare hands, but also with different weapons. She also knew how to use a gun, a rifle, and a sniper rifle. Her mother focused on people's weak points and always taught her how to win against just anyone, no matter how strong they were. It did not always work, but Rhea was too confident.
She did not want to kill him. She just wanted to take him down and call the police. Rhea was sure that guy would attack her if he found her alone in the forest. He would at least try to do something. That was what Rhea wanted, so it would not look like she attacked first; it would be called self-defense.
"Have you heard? The assistant headmaster died last night," Rose said to her friends. She had pulled Rhea with her to hang out as well, despite Rhea's discomfort.
"Who died?" Rhea asked.
"Ah, the assistant headmaster. He was found dismembered in his apartment," she explained. "I mean, he did not technically die."
"He was killed," Rhea mumbled.