Chapter 7
Madison sat down on the edge of my bed and sighed.
“I know what I’m like when I sleepwalk,” she said quietly. “I already told my parents. They’re taking me to see a doctor next week. I’m being careful. I really am.”
Then she looked down at the watermelon and made a face.
“Do you know how hard this thing was to open without a knife? I didn’t dare keep anything sharp in my room, so I basically had to smash it open with my hands. I got watermelon all over myself for this.”
Only then did we really notice the mess.
The fruit had been split open unevenly, jagged and lopsided, and her shirt was splattered red from chest to waist.
The sight was so ridiculous that all of us started laughing, half from nerves, half from relief.
None of us bothered cutting it properly. We just grabbed spoons and sat on the edge of the beds, passing the watermelon around like kids at a sleepover.
By the time Madison left, it was all gone.
That night, for the first time in days, I actually thought everything might be okay.
But the next morning, while the mood in our room was lighter, Reilly suddenly spoke in an odd tone.
“Wait.”
Jessica and I both turned.
“There’s something I didn’t tell you about last night.”
She looked strange. Not angry. Not irritated. Just pale.
I opened my mouth to ask what she meant, but before I could, commotion broke out in the hallway.
We rushed to the door.
A girl from the next room came running over, white as a sheet.
“Something happened again,” she gasped. “Someone else died.”
“This time it was in the boys’ dorm.”
The victim was a junior from the computer science department. According to the first rumors, his roommates had woken up to a metallic smell in the room and found him dead in his bed.
By noon, students were already posting wild theories online.
Then someone uncovered the connection.
The literature freshman who had died upstairs and the computer science guy had been dating.
A couple.
Dead within days of each other.
No footage of anyone entering or leaving either dorm.
The whole campus suddenly felt cursed.