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You. Are. Kidding. Me,she responded. I could hear the words coming out of Crystal’s mouth, imagined her thumbs moving rapidly against her keyboard, scouring social media for more information.
As I walked in the direction of my third class—creative prose, my favorite—I heard other people whispering about it, too. It was a girl, they said. Found in a ditch. One person said she was strangled. Another said she was hit over the head. A landscaper had found her early that morning. Someone’s roommate’s boyfriend caught a glimpse of the body.
My class was nearly over before I registered that Layla had never texted me back. She wasn’t as big on gossip as Crystal, but a murder on campus warranted even the tamest of people to show some interest. I remembered she had a test that morning, but wasn’t that class finished already? By now, she should beheaded back to the apartment. Surely, she’d seen my text, had heard the rumors.
A strange shudder racked my body—was I even sure Layla had returned home? Sure, her bedroom door was closed, but that could have happened during last night’s drunken confusion. This morning, I’d never laid eyes on her, and she wasn’t responding to my messages. She could have stayed over at Mike’s, I thought. Still, why hadn’t she replied to my texts? By the time class ended, I had sorted through a half-dozen what-ifs, and just as quickly shot each possibility down.
I was almost at the apartment when I finally received a text. From Crystal, not Layla.
Come home now. It’s important.
Somehow, I already knew. I willed myself not to scroll social media, not to type her name, as though avoiding the news would keep it from coming true. My horrible suspicions were confirmed when I walked inside the apartment and saw Crystal’s tear-stained face.
Apparently, Layla and Mike had stayed at Twisted Timmy’s until near closing. A fight had broken out at the bar, and they disappeared sometime during the scuffle. A few pedestrians came forward and said they remembered seeing the couple walking in the direction of on-campus housing.
What happened next remained a mystery, but it was Layla’s body that was found in that drainage ditch beside campus, her vibrant life cut short. No one had seen what happened, no nearby security cameras captured the altercation. Crystal and I gave our statements to the police, described Mike to the best of our ability. It didn’t take long for officers to track him down, and when they told us about his history—two dropped sexual assault allegations—I think we all knew what happened.
I knew, because it had almost happened to me. It was the same Mike from the fraternity party, and if I’d trusted my instincts, he never would have been left alone with Layla.
“At least he didn’t get the best of her,” Crystal said, some days later, our first time speaking to each other after the news broke.
“He murdered her!”
“He didn’tassaulther because she fought back,” she said, as though death were some sort of consolation prize. “That’s probably why he killed her.”
We were all relieved to hear there was no sexual assault, and the police agreed with the theory that because Layla had fought back, Mike’s violence escalated, resulting in her death. At first, he proclaimed his innocence, but once the other two women came forward again with their allegations, his legal team urged him to take a deal. Michael Massey was sentenced to over forty years in prison, sparing Layla’s parents the heartbreaking details that would have come out in a trial.
Layla’s murderer had received punishment, but that didn’t ease the guilt Crystal and I felt. We had been with her that night, had been with her almost every night since we were freshmen. If it hadn’t been for us leaving her behind, Mike would never have had the opportunity to attack her.
I’m having a great time.
My last conversation with Layla haunted me, as did every detail of that night.
Crystal and I weren’t the only ones struggling with blame—Layla’s parents believed we were just as culpable in their daughter’s death. They explained to every news reporter that would listen that friends abandoning friends was just as unethical as what Mike had tried to do, even criminal. They filed the civil suit against us soon after. Even though the suit was dropped—legally, we hadn’t done anything wrong, only returnedhome after a night of drinking—I felt the heavy weight of my guilt, as did Crystal, although we dealt with it in different ways.
Crystal busied herself with socials and activities and clubs, trying to involve herself with the campus community and somehow erase her reputation as the girl who’d left her friend behind. She cultivated a new image for herself, one even shinier and more spectacular than the one before.
I pulled away entirely. I dropped out of college, stopped thinking about my future altogether. Writing was still important to me, but it took on a different role in my life. It was no longer an activity that I enjoyed but something I needed to do, a way to separate my mind from the past and the present.
To separate myself from Layla, and the role I played in her death.
Each day became a task of pulling myself further and further away from that night, diving into a world of make-believe, into a mundane present.
Until the other night when, fueled by lack of sleep and a vicious night terror, I revisited Layla’s story.
And then I shared it with the world.
TWENTY-FOUR
All I want is to get away from Banyon’s Bridge. My chest wheezes with each harsh inhale, my boots tapping against the gray cobblestones. I’m alone, seemingly, but I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve been duped. Whoever left the envelope with the black heart on it is one step ahead of me, could still be here, watching my stunned reaction.
Layla isn’t something I talk about. Ever. Not even with Crystal, the one person in my life who experienced the brutal ordeal alongside me.
The most notorious true crime stories have an aura of mystery surrounding the cases. The straightforward murders—girl meets boy in a bar, he attacks her and is swiftly arrested—are easily forgotten. The name Layla Williams still lingers in some true crime circles, but not widely, because of its quick resolution. This article was left strategically, and whoever left it not only knows my past, but is threatening me with it.
Thankfully, my connection to the crime seems to have been forgotten, except, most notably, by whoever has been sending me black hearts for the past ten years. The implication behind the symbol is clear. My stalker blames me for Layla’s death, tries reminding me of it at every major turn in my life, as thoughI could ever forget. They’ve thrown a series of slurs at me in the past decade—Fraud, Abandoner, Cheat. And what hurts the most is that the black hearts stalker is right. Layla’s death was always my fault.
I slam the car door shut and crank the engine, holding my frigid fingers in front of the heating unit, waiting for warm air. I believe I know who left the message behind on the bridge, the same person I was following in the first place, the culprit I’ve been hoping to catch in my carefully laid trap.