I pull the shirt over my head and slip inside the navy blue jersey sitting on the bench.

The chants of the crowd can be heard through the paper thin walls of the locker room, adding up to the adrenaline boosting within the players. The cheerleader squad has particularly ordered for new pom-poms that match with the colour combination of our team jerseys. The coach is set on the field since afternoon, giving us offensive positions and then changing them every five minutes. Mr. Leighton, the not so respected principal of Arlington is in attendance in the stands, accompanied by the sponsors of our team.

A scene like this doesn't just occur every other evening on the campus.

It isn't very surprising that the university talked a local malt energy drink producer into funding a gymnasium for our practice sessions. It sounds normal until you find out that our sponsors also produce something known as Wodka; the long lost cousin of vodka, who obviously didn't turn out as great as expected. Not that it will be a problem, because half the student crowd is already in line with the unwritten 'bring your own booze' rule, and has carefully stocked on those discounted chips bags from the supermarket giants nearby.

This is only the half of it, though. The other half is constituted by a horde of girls, donning either an original or a knock off of the letterman jacket of the players. It is nothing less than a battle field with the crushes, the girlfriends, the exes, and the recently single ones– all using fifty shades of pink as their weapon. And then there are troubled ones like me, who has to deal with a recently patched up girlfriend and a Mia. I have run out of words to describe the complicated relationship we share, and name reference seems like the only safe option right now.

Truth be told, they aren't here for the sole purpose of supporting the Arlington Aardwolves, a name curated by our principal's nerdy nine year old. Actually one of the major reasons why I myself have shown up today, is because the informant insisted on meeting me here. I have been visiting DixonValley in the last week, and fortunately came across a reliable looking source to gather more clues about A.L and his pack as I have come to know. If we don't get a lead on this snake trailing behind us, who knows one of us might get ticked off the list the next time.

If only I had not let Emma's warnings get into my head, I could have found Kylie before the incident happened. The whole thing still feels like a blur, despite of the horrendous images stuck in our minds for eternity. Whether it was the moment when I got a call from Mia, or the time when my tearful eyes bore through the flashing red of the fire trucks, or when we witnessed Kylie for the last time– her burnt carcass lying on the stretcher, barely supported by weathered flesh and worn out clothes. I wish we at least had a chance where we could deny the possibility of the body indeed being Kylie's, but her damned purple hair didn't let us have that opportunity. The worst part of it all is that none of us can keep ourselves from wondering about how it even happened.

I haven't even reeled out of the nightmares from my parent's death as yet, and now I have a fresh lot to haunt me in my sleep for what seems like forever. More so because I feel like a compliance in this fatality. I guess I truly deserve what Eddie Minsk did to me, and what he stole off of me. My voice is still as hoarse as an electric guitar tuning on a tangled cassette tape, or at least that's what Mr. Grayson described it like when he canceled my two year contract with Grayson records. He encouraged me to try auditioning again in a few months, but I can't really focus on anything that might or might not happen in the future. Except for the slight yet very plausible chances of the four of us being convicted.

"Schiller! If I am not mistaken, you are the current captain, right?" The coach's voice blasts throughout the locker room.

"Yes, sir."

"Then act like it," he points towards the door and trudges out before I can respond back.

I still nod in the direction of the door, and finish a final stretch before heading out with the rest of the team. It is a miracle that inspite of washing down a keg of beer within twenty minutes, I haven't lost the ability to walk straight or to see the world through both of my eyes. Although, I am feeling a little heavy down in the chest area as compared to the rest of my body. It should dilute once I witness the opponents relentlessly swearing at us, because the fuckers don't stand a chance against my team. Let's go Arlington Aardwolves.

If only it were as easy as said.

Leading the players to the ground, I proudly look around as the stands cheer for their home team. The huge crowd easily blends in an array of colours; their faces smudging into each other like a messy oil painting. The laughs, the cries, the scoffs, the smirks, and the very few visibly troubled ones. I inevitably gulp at the sight of a washed out face sticking out amongst the monotone of forced smiles. Who is this? Did we bully this one, too?

"Yo, quarterback?" A crass voice makes me return to the noisy stadium, and I come to the realisation that I have been holding on to the ball for more than two minutes now.

"What is wrong with you, boy?" The coach comes next to me and whispers discreetly. Judging by the sweat marks on his t-shirt and his history of heart diseases, I better get my floating head in this game.

"Nothing," I murmur whilst shaking my head to put off the guilt until halftime.

"We need to win this one, alright," he pats my shoulder before rushing back to the stands. These are the very words that instilled an ever lasting fear of me letting my team down the moment I got selected as a QB.

As if on cue, the stadium begins to chant my name to help me let go off the brown leather I am digging my fingers into. I try to break out of my frozen stance, but a crippling feeling of trepidation sinks throughout my body within seconds. The coach's words, the importance of this game, the informant sitting somewhere in this crowd, the suicide note, the newspaper article... everything gradually comes back to my alcohol heavy mind. Before I can try to take a throw, nausea takes over my senses and makes me frantically run back to the building.

My head stays bowed down to the ground, whilst I drag my heavy feet towards the house of Henry IV. I barely even make it five steps ahead the line of scrimmage, when my consecutive dry heaves turn into a case of full blown vomiting. I slash my throat out as nothing but a grimy combination of beer foam and bile juice spills in front of the blur film wrapped across my eyes. I barely even hear the sounds of my own hauling, let alone the gasps and screams all across the field. Once I feel a choking emptiness in my windpipe, my knees drop down to the grass; it's slight wetness helping in cooling down the layers of sweat all over my feverish body. A few pairs of hands float in front of me, slapping my burned out face whilst I unwillingly concentrate on a pool of the contents of my stomach, splashed across a sparkling blue skater dress. I fail to make sense of it until a loud scream almost renders the whole stadium dumb. It doesn't take a second guess to recognise the screeching voice as that of the t&d girl. She reluctantly takes a few steps forward to dominate my vision with her bronze stained skin, and to utter a bunch of cuss words she probably learnt from Taylor Swift.

Luckily, a few of my teammates help me get off of the ground and carry my weight across the university before she can get a chance to torture me any further. I thank my stars as they set me down on the bench of the locker room, giving me some time to get rid of the throbbing pain in my skull. The coach hands me over a wash towel, which weirdly enough pigments itself red as I rub it across my face. I try to take a sniff of the blotch of red, curating it as blood as the metallic odour reaches my nostrils. A few people around get in a state of panic at the sight, but I take it be a bloody lip at best.

"Coach," Jason Hurley shouts from across the room and signals for everyone to come over. I discreetly follow the rest of the team, and turn more and more paranoid as we near my locker. Jason gathers them in a circle, directing their attention to a sealed plastic bag in his hands. I try to look over the padded shoulders, but end up regretting the action as I get a view of the contents of the plastic bag. I don't even need to take a closer look to tell the exact quantity of  the red capsules sitting in there. Five, to be precise. Or rather four, a voice in my head tells me as I take a second look at the now dried up blood on the wash towel.

I take a step back once the packet gets handed over to the coach, but fail to make it as silent as I intended for it to be. All the players simultaneously turn behind to eye me with suspicion brooding in their eyes, while the coach holds a look of partial anger and partial disappointment. He begins to say something, but I sprint down the narrow path between the lockers the very next moment. A few yells calling my name out are heard along the way, but I keep up with my pace until I find an empty classroom with the door wide open.

I take the corner most seat and dump myself on the desk as I attempt to catch my falling breath. The thought of Jason getting his hands on my dose baffles me, and more so because I quit consuming those pills weeks ago. I had a fresh stock delivered to my address every four weeks, but I canceled it a month back and flushed the rest down the toilet in one of the stalls on this floor itself. Even if I had them on me, I would never be a fool as to store them in my gym locker for everyone to spy on. And if I am to consider the possibility of someone planting the pills in my locker, then I still have the lingering question of how I took them in the first place. I think it became pretty clear from my disgusted spewing back in the stadium, that all I ate or drunk in the past twenty four hours is an hefty amount of beer. All of this is nothing but a mystery to me.

"Hey," someone presses the latch across the door, but I don't even bother to look at the intruder.

"Hi," I push out of my dry mouth, waiting for the stranger to introduce himself.

"I am sorry," the same, abashed tone plays itself from the night my house had turned into a makeshift pub. It would take a lot more than a steroid overdose for me to forget that one in a million chance encounter.

"Sorry for pretending to flirt with me, when you have no such feelings towards my puked out ass?" I chuckle in mere hopes of covering up my sadistic state.

"No. I am apologising for pushing you towards whatever happened out there."

"Huh?" I finally get up from the uneven desk, silently wincing in pain as I push aside the loose screw poking my neck all this time. "What does that even mean?"

"I am the one who mixed those pills in one of your beer bottles," she gulps as a frown creases over my forehead. "And the one who placed them in your gym locker."

Monica takes a pause to study my reaction, but I fail to give one. "I am going to say the same thing once again; huh?"

"I know you take these pills because I am friends with Kell, the guy who delivered them to your house. He always said, these things are solely meant for increasing your hormonal levels and muscle tissues and stuff like that... I had no idea these pills can be so dangerous," she comes closer to study the blood stains on my chin. "I never meant to hurt you, Archie."

I have a thousand questions crowding my brain at the moment, but only one of them seems important enough to actually deal with, "Is this Kell guy, my dealer and apparently your friend, the same Kell Rhodes who had his name published on NY times' front page a few weeks ago?"

"You don't know this, already?"

"I mean I obviously saw him all the times, he came at my house for a delivery on behalf of the company... but I never bothered to ask his name." I try to remember if I ever saw any name badge on his tee, but my dazed mind barely cooperates.

"Well, yes, he is the same Kell Rhodes," she takes a seat in front of me, fidgeting with the buttons of her black blazer as we speak. "I know it seems odd that I have a connection with someone like him, but that was all in the past. And I am now going around covering that disreputable past."

"Disreputable?" I almost take a minute to make sense of the fancy word. "Are you sure about that, Monica?"

"As much as I want to deny, it is true after all. Back in the beginning of the freshman year, I was a completely different person. I was reckless, I skipped classes, I got drunk in the middle of the day in the backseat of my boyfriend's jeep, and in my hookup's convertible during the night, I smoked pot, I occasionally engaged in drugs, I was a scandalous mess all in all. The people I hung out with, weren't poles apart from my persona, and most of them tagged along with me since my high school days at DixonValley High.

It was all madcap teenagers nonsense until reality came catching up on my hazy lifestyle," she chuckles humourlessly. "I found out that I am pregnant, and that my boyfriend is a really big jackass, all in one night.  Taking it as a cue to mend my ways, I decided to leave all the trippiness behind. During the first few weeks, it was nothing but forced measures to try and keep the child safe and sound. To be honest, I wasn't even attached to the child... she was the only one I had to blame for everything wrong with me and my stupid decisions."

"She? You... you're telling me that you have a daughter?" I can't help but smile as I picture a little Monica, probably dressed up in a same oversized blazer as hers.

"I had a daughter, Archie," she furiously blinks to keep the tears at bay. "I barely had three months with her before the incident happened. I lost her in a miscarriage, I lost Hailey even before I had a chance to see her, to hold her, to wrap that little finger of hers around my giant ones," she heaves a sigh whilst eyeing her trembling hands.

"Hailey Stalling, the name you had engraved on that little tombstone in the graveyard," I recollect the case of the unusual dates I saw back then.

She just nods in response. "Once I lost Hailey, I almost gave up on getting a fresh start on my already tarnished image. The syndrome only added to my unusual aura, of course. I had become a lesson for the sixteen year olds in my neighbourhood, to help them avoid messing their life up like I did. Everyone including me, forgot that I still have a couple more years ahead of me. It's not like I didn't feel any grief towards what happened, or that I have stopped feeling it now. In fact, I cannot think of a morning when I wake up and the thought of my daughter being on my side, isn't lingering in the back of my mind. But, people often ignore that I am just a nineteen year old at the end of the day. When I see the rest of the students doing regular college stuff; going to games, to clubs, to parties... I get tempted to join them. So, I did that. All that night was supposed to be, was a one time thing. It wasn't meant to end the way it did."

"What are you talking about?" I pull my t-shirt to wipe off the sweat gathering around my neck yet again.

"There was a party at one of DixonValley's sophomores house, where a couple of my old friends had gathered as well. I wasn't planning on going, but they insisted so much, I gave into their pressing and into my temptations. When I got there, everything seemed fine– a huge crowd of kids sprawled across the flat, playing beer pong, smoking joints, making out in secluded corners... nothing seemed triggering to me. Although, after some two hours, news spread like wildfire that someone had a stash of coke in there. I didn't pay heed to it until one of my own friends got some on her hands. She insisted I take a drag as well, but unfortunately I refused her then and there," she shakes her head, while I arch my eyebrows in confusion.

"Isn't that the right thing to do, though?"

"It seems so until you do something worse. I didn't take a drag, but I mixed some of it with vodka, rum, tequila and basically every variety of liquor in that house. Not only did I spike those drinks, I passed them around to kids who hadn't even graduated out of high school. Even if you can't tell by now, I was extremely drunk. The actual horror of what I had done, only came to me when people began to puke their blood out. Inspite of the panic spread across the crowd, someone managed to call 911, and got them to the hospital in due time. But we missed out on a few; the ones who had taken off to a club in Manhattan."

"Club, you say?" I silently pray for this horrid story to end before the part of my own sins can come up.

"I don't know if this is true, but I heard that a few students from Arlington itself, got involved in a fight with them. Kell Rhodes went missing, and some other kid did too... but none of this would have happened if they were in the condition to protect themselves," she lets out a few tears, but immediately covers up with a floral handkerchief.

As her words inscribe themselves on the walls of my mind, I fairly recollect one of those kids being a little nauseated all along the way to the barn. In fact, the reason they ever caught our attention is because someone from their group threw up on Kylie's Ballenciagas. Never in the world could I ever think about Monica being the reason why.

"When I saw one of the guys from DixonValley in the stands today, particularly looking out for you, I couldn't help but wonder about it," she pulls me out of my train of thoughts. "I know you are interested in meeting up with him, because the police is linking Kell Rhodes' missing case to the one of your friends' death on the campus. My doubts confirmed once I heard him asking, if Archie Schiller comes out on the field any soon. I got scared, I didn't want him to tell you anything I wouldn't get a chance to correct or prove my word against. I would have talked to you before the game, but there wasn't enough time left to narrate this entire story in front of you. So, I impulsively took a few pills and crushed them into the beer bottle sitting in your locker. I didn't mean to plant them inside and get you in trouble, but someone came in right away and I slipped the bag while trying to find a place to duck down."

"So, you do know that these pills tend to have an effect on me?" I lose my cool as she tells it all so casually.

"I know that large quantities can lead to bouts of vomiting and dizziness, but I had no clue that the effects can go as far as inducing blood. I didn't do it on purpose, I cannot even think of doing anything of that sort after what happened that night," she stares into empty space, as if remembering the incident.

"It still doesn't justify your actions."

"I know it isn't an excuse for whatever I did, and if you still want to meet up with that guy then I won't stand in your way," she gets up from the seat, but halts in front of me. "Do you happen to know about the students from our Uni, who got into a fight with those kids, by any chance?"

"No," I immediately answer. "You know what, I don't think I need to meet up with that guy anymore," I get up as well, looking into her now deadpanned eyes.

"Deal."