Chapter 17: Matthew’s Journal

The hallway smelled of dust and old floor polish, the kind that clung to your clothes and reminded you of every high school you’d ever hated. Elijah hadn’t stepped inside Briar Ridge High since the day he graduated, but the sound was the same—a distant echo of lockers slamming, the muffled thump of sneakers on tile, the tinny announcements over an ancient PA system.

The secretary had given him five minutes. “Sheriff’s orders,” she’d said flatly, as if she already knew he’d be pushing the limit.

Matthew’s locker was at the far end of the second-floor hall, number 218, its once-red paint chipped and faded to a dull brownish rust. Elijah tried the combination the secretary had written down, but the lock stuck halfway. He jiggled it, swore under his breath, and finally yanked it open.

The inside was mostly empty—no books, no backpack, no spare hoodie. Just a couple of loose papers at the bottom, a cracked plastic ruler, and, shoved all the way to the back, a spiral-bound notebook with a black cover worn at the edges.

Elijah pulled it out, flipping it open.

It wasn’t homework. It wasn’t anything close.

The first page was covered in rough pencil sketches—flames curling upward in jagged strokes, almost alive. Beneath them, a pair of eyes. Not cartoon eyes, not friendly—these were sharp, unblinking, and they looked like they were staring straight through the paper.

He turned the page. More flames. More eyes. A crude drawing of a match. Then, scrawled diagonally across the center:

THEY SAID DON’T TALK.

The next page was the same phrase again. And the next. Dozens of repetitions, sometimes big and bold, sometimes small and cramped, squeezed into corners between more drawings of fires.

Elijah’s stomach tightened. He’d seen obsessive writing before—clients who couldn’t stop replaying their trauma, kids in foster care who kept journals filled with one thought over and over. But this felt different.

This wasn’t just fear. It was instruction.

He flipped further ahead. In the middle of the notebook, Matthew had drawn the outline of the Briar Ridge water tower. Below it, a cluster of small stick figures. Around the edges of the page, those same watching eyes peered inward.

Elijah ran his thumb along the paper, noticing the pressure marks. Matthew had pressed the pencil hard—too hard—like the act of writing was a fight in itself.

A voice startled him from behind.

“Locker check, huh?”

He turned. A thin boy with acne and a mop of blond hair stood a few feet away, leaning against the wall. His hoodie was two sizes too big, his sneakers duct-taped at the toes.

“You know Matthew?” Elijah asked.

The boy shrugged. “Everyone knows everyone here.”

“Then maybe you know why he’s drawing this stuff.” Elijah held up the notebook.

The boy’s eyes flicked to it, then back to Elijah. “You shouldn’t have that.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s his,” the boy said, but his voice was tight. Nervous. “And because if you have it, you’re part of it now.”

Before Elijah could press, the boy shoved off the wall and walked away quickly, disappearing down the stairs.

Part of it now.

The phrase clung to Elijah as he slipped the notebook into his briefcase and shut the locker.

He drove straight to the motel, spreading the journal out on the table beneath the flickering light. Page after page, the flames grew taller, the eyes more numerous. Somewhere in the last quarter of the notebook, the words began to change.

Not just “THEY SAID DON’T TALK” anymore.

Now: “THEY SAID IT’S JUST A WARNING.”

And then: “THEY SAID HE HAD TO LEARN.”

Elijah stopped cold at one page.

It wasn’t a drawing this time—it was a list. Just four names.

Three of them had been crossed out so violently the paper had torn. The fourth was untouched.

He didn’t recognize the first three. But the fourth?

Landon Cresthaven.

The air in the motel room felt heavier, as if the shadows in the corners had deepened.

He thought of Matthew in the holding cell—skinny, scared, eyes darting at every sound. “They said it was just to scare someone,” he’d whispered. “Then the fire spread.”

Now Elijah was looking at proof that “they” might have also known about a murder.

There was a knock at the door. Not the polite tap of housekeeping—this was firm, deliberate.

He tucked the notebook under the mattress before opening it.

Tom stood there, his expression unreadable. “You’ve been to the school,” he said.

“Word travels fast,” Elijah said.

“It does here,” Tom replied, stepping inside without asking. “And people aren’t happy.”

“People?” Elijah said. “Or Richard Cresthaven?”

Tom ignored the jab. “I heard you found something in Matthew’s locker.”

Elijah hesitated. “Depends who’s asking. My brother, or the sheriff?”

“Both,” Tom said.

Elijah studied him. “Then here’s my answer for both—you’ll see it when I put it on the record.”

Tom’s jaw tightened. “This isn’t New York. You keep waving around something like that, you’ll end up making enemies you don’t even know exist.”

“I think those enemies already exist,” Elijah said. “And I think they’ve been using this town as their playground for years.”

Tom opened his mouth, closed it again. “Just… be careful, Eli.”

When he left, Elijah retrieved the notebook from under the mattress.

He flipped back to the page with the water tower. Something about it nagged at him.

The stick figures at the base—five of them. One had an X drawn over its head. Another had a small flame drawn on its chest.

A pattern, maybe. Or a countdown.

His phone buzzed. Unknown number again. This time, just one line:

We told him not to talk.

Elijah stared at the message until the screen dimmed. Then he looked back at the notebook, the eyes, the flames, the words scratched into the paper.

Matthew had been living under that threat for months. Maybe longer.

And now Elijah had the proof they wanted buried.