It's been a day and I can't stop thinking about Jiara. Damn. Those eyes. I could stare into them all day and not get bored. Shaking my head, I frown and remind myself that she's not mine to take, throwing another pebble into the pond. I gaze at my reflection in the water, feeling my short, light brown hair and looking into my ice-blue eyes. In the water, I see someone come up behind me—Matthias. I look over my shoulder at him and smile. "Alexei! You good?" He asks me. "Yeah, I'm fine. Don't worry about me. Where's Vance?" I don't see him standing next to Matthias. "He went down south to visit his folks for a week. It's just you, Jiara, and I for now," Matthias tells me. It's just you, Jiara, and I for now. His words echo over and over again in my head and I can feel myself beginning to detach from reality again, back into my head. Matthias snaps me out of my daydream with his words. "Woah—Alexei! Come back to earth!" "Sorry," I say. "No problem. I gotta go pick up Jiara—I'm gonna take her out tonight," Matthias informs me. "See you soon, Alexei."
I'm gonna take her out tonight. So they're dating? I knew I shouldn't have let myself begin to think about her. I have to stay focused on my goal. As I lift the barbell off my chest, a bead of sweat drips down my forehead. How annoying. The barbell feels a lot lighter than usual, so I sit up on the bench press and go to put more weights on it. Strange. I put the whole set of weights on already. That can't be all of them, though. I go upstairs out of the basement to find Mr. Sergei and question him on the matter. "Mr. Sergei!" I call. Outside the window, I see his figure. He's carrying a suspiciously large garbage bag over one shoulder. I try my best to picture what's inside. My thoughts go back to the day where I saw him with the knife in the basement. I can feel my body go cold. The thought still disturbs me, however I try to put it. Mr. Sergei is a killer, my subconscious keeps saying, and there's something very wrong with the bag he's holding. I peer at it again. There's a strange dark liquid dripping from a hole in the bag. I run outside to keep spying on him. Mr. Sergei throws the bag into the back of his pickup truck and hops into the driver's seat. Once I hear the slam of the car's door behind him, I jump into the back of his truck. Here we go again, I think. This isn't gonna end well, is it?