Is It A Crazy House or an Orphanage?

“Let’s play hide and seek!”

Everyone turns in unison to stare at her.

“Well you were the one complaining about not doing stuff,” Coke says, letting her shoulders rise and fall in a half hearted shrug.

“I really don’t think this is the place to play kid games though,” I say.

Of course Mello has to make everything a competition. “Oh, so you think just because it’s a kid’s game I won’t be able to beat Near?”

“I never said that, you’re putting words in my mouth. I don’t like it when you do that, I have other things I need to fit in there!”

This time I earned the antagonizing stare of shame.

“Food you perverts,” I giggle.

“Fine, but you’re gonna be the seeker!”

“Me?” Coke asks, pressing a hand to her chest.

A smirk spreads across my face as I nod.

She gave an eye roll. “All right, all right, fine. You’ll be sorry once you find out how great of a seeker I am!”

“Of course we will,” I say, my voice full of mock interest. “Now turn around and count!”

Before the word one even had a chance to leave her lips, we start running in all directions. Thinking myself a genius, I run down to the hallway Watari took me the other day to take that test. Part of me guessed that kids weren’t supposed to go down their on their own, meaning Coke might not look there. Then again, she is Coke, and believes rules don’t apply to her.

I’m not sure whether I should sneak around and try not to be seen, or whether to just come right out and act like it’s perfectly normal for me to be there. So, I’m kind of doing both at the same time. I figure it looks super weird. Ahead of me I can see a door open just a crack, the lights are out inside. It looks like the perfect place to hide.

Once inside I look for a more discreet place to hide inside. There’s a big file cabinet next to the desk over there, if I climb up and sit on the desk, I can position myself just right behind the metal cabinet, that you won’t be able to see me from the doorway. It’s perfect. The desk is covered in a ton of paper, but I can just curl up on top of it.

After a few minutes of waiting, I’m getting really bored. This may have been too good of a hiding place. These papers aren’t comfortable, what am I even sitting on?

I reach down and grab the spiral bound book, hoisting it onto my lap. I can already tell it’s old, probably something boring too, since it’s so big. I’m about to put it down, when I catch the title: RECORDS.

Records of what? Deciding to find out, I flip open to a random page. The first thing I notice is this picture of a girl. She has wispy dark hair, and this kind of creepy half smile on her face. The dark rings around her green eyes, give her the slight appearance of a zombie. I shift the paper clip off the photo, revealing another underneath. I assume it’s the same girl, but she looks so drastically different in this one it’s hard to tell. She doesn’t look sickly, she looks stunningly beautiful. Thick brown hair, so dark it was almost black. Emerald green eyes. Cheeks that were naturally tinted the slightest shade of pink. Full red lips and flawless skin.

Next to the picture is what appears to be a profile, a list of all her important information.

Name: Alice Chadwick
Alias: A
Sex: Female
Date of Birth: December 9th 1984
Date of Death: August 28th 1999
Height: 4’10”
Weight: 98 lbs.
Blood Type: AB-

It goes on to list her other statistics and such, but those are the ones that caught my eye. At the bottom, someone had scribbled in really messy hand writing: Suicide. Hung in room 13.

Wow, way to make things creepy. Then I realize, this girl must’ve gone to Wammy’s, meaning this entire book must be filled with pages about the rest of us. I quickly begin flipping through pages, as I’m doing so a page marked: Mihael Keehl catches my eye. Guess whose picture is on that page. Mello.

Name: Mihael Keehl
Alias: Mello
Sex: Male
Date of Birth: 12/13/1989
Date of Death:
Height: 5’3”
Weight: 105 lbs.
Blood Type: A-

I guess he really is a guy… I kind of feel like a stalker though, so I start scanning pages again, this time keeping a look out for anyone else I know.

Sure enough, a few pages later I find Mail Jeevas.

Name: Mail Jeevas
Alias: Matt
Sex: Male
Date of Birth: 2/1/1990
Date of Death:
Height: 5’1”
Weight: 110 lbs.
Blood Type: O

Now I intentionally look for Coke’s page. It’s near the front, and unlike the previous ones, the paper is crisp and white.

Name: Coralin Hollan
Alias: Coke
Sex: Female
Date of Birth: 3/6/1990
Date of Death:
Height: 4’10”
Weight: 98 lbs.
Blood Type: AB

Just as I’m about to flip the page to what I assume is my own profile, foot steps begin to reverberate around the hallway outside. Panicking, I rip out 4 pages. You guess which ones.