The Pact

*Trigger – Murder, hints of drugs, blackmail*

Adele had forgotten how the old building smelled. It hit her like taking a step back in time as she walked into her high school. It wasn’t quite the sharp, chemical cleaning smell that filled the air now, but the older scent buried beneath it – damp coats, the faint sweetness of cheap deodorant clinging to the lockers. As she stepped through the entrance hall, the building seemed to exhale on her return. Twenty years had passed but it still recognised her.

            Ben spotted her first. Of course he did. Twenty-year class reunion and old habits became instincts. His ability to always appear at the centre of things had clearly followed him into adulthood. He wandered through the crowd with the confidence of someone who wore success like a glove. His smile was bright, inviting but his eyes flicked over her with a quick questioning look, as if checking for cracks.

            ‘You made it,’ he said, though his tone was more surprised than welcoming.

            Adele nodded. ‘Would’ve felt strange not to, I guess.’

            ‘Strange is one word to describe it,’ Ben laughed but there was a strain to his voice.

            They stood together for a moment, side by side, the silence between them filling the space with everything they weren’t saying. Ben’s gaze drifted past her, scanning the foyer looking for the others. Almost screaming for a break in the silence. Or so she guessed. Adele turned towards the door; the heels clicking sharply against the foyer floor announced that Jenna had arrived. She looked immaculate, flawless. But Adele caught the slight tightness around her mouth that hadn’t been there at eighteen. She greeted Adele and Ben with almost a rehearsed warmth she had perfected long before adulthood, her eyes darting between them as though measuring the distance, the silence, the danger. Ryan trailed behind her, his hands shoved deep in his pockets, shoulders slightly hunched as if braced for impact. He offered Adele a small, genuine smile. Ryan had always been the buffer, the one who tried to keep the peace even when the rest of them were tearing each other apart.

            Adele looked around. The four of them together again. Almost enough to feel like the old days. Almost. Phil was late. Adele felt the shift in the air through the group. A subtle tightening. A shared breath held. Even after two decades, his absence carried weight. Ben checked his watch. Jenna ran her hands through her hair while Ryan stared at the floor.

            ‘He’ll show,’ murmured Adele, though she wasn’t sure why she bothered. Phil always showed up eventually but with his own agenda.

            The reunion team ushered everyone in the gym hall. It had been transformed with fairy lights, and banners that tried too hard to disguise the scuffed floor and peeling paint. Adele’s footsteps echoed as she crossed the entrance, memories rising within her. The pounding of trainers during P.E., the thud of basketballs, the whispered arguments in the corner that teachers never heard. The five of them had once stood in this very room and made a promise that shaped the rest of their lives. A pact sealed with fear, blackmail and a desperate certainty that they had no other choice. Adele pushed the memory down. Not now. Not yet.

            They drifted to a table near the back, instinctively falling into the same habits they had as teenagers. Ben sat slightly forward, Jenna angled towards him, Ryan hovering at the edge of his chair and Adele anchoring the other side. The empty chair between her and Ryan felt like a ghost. Conversations and laughter swirled around them, but their table remained a quiet island. Every so often, Adele felt herself or one of them glance towards the entrance, waiting.

            Phil arrived almost an hour into the evening. Not quietly. He strode through the doors with a deliberate confidence that turned heads, his expression set in a way that made Adele’s stomach twist. He scanned the room until he found them and something like satisfaction flickered across his face. Ben stiffened. Jenna’s hand tightened around her wine glass while Ryan exhaled slowly, as though preparing himself.

            ‘Long time everyone’ he said, settling into the empty chair.

            Adele felt that old dread grasp around her chest. That devastating tone that let them know they wouldn’t be happy. Deep down, she felt that weight that wrenched a knot in her stomach. He hadn’t come to reminisce or reconnect. He had come with intent, and she knew exactly what truth he wanted to drag into the light. The reason she had forced herself to show up tonight was right in front of her now.

            The evening blurred after that. Music thumped in the background, people danced, drinks flowed but the five of them remained locked in a quiet, separate orbit around one another. Every conversation, every glance was strained with tension, a reminder of the secret that bound them tighter than friendship ever had. Phil had disappeared into the crowd and Adele, too busy on quieting the noise in her head, hadn’t realised half an hour had passed until Jenna snapped her fingers in her face announcing Phil had ‘done his usual and ditched them’.

            Adele drifted away from the table and needing some air she slipped out into the corridor, the noise fading behind her. The school felt different in the dim light. Older, emptier, less scary but full of unspoken truths. She walked slowly; her fingertips brushed against the lockers. Footsteps echoed behind her. She turned and expected to see one of the others, but the corridor was empty. A shiver crawled up her spine as she continued on, drawn towards the old science department. The door at the end of the corridor was slightly ajar, but no light spilled into the corridor. Something about it felt wrong, out of place. Adele hesitated then pushed the door open.

            The room was cold. The air still. Moonlight filtered through the square paned windows casting pale shapes across the floor. Adele glanced around the room and about to leave when she saw him. She didn’t understand what she was seeing. Phil lay crumbled beside one of the lab benches, his face turned towards her. His eyes were open, staring at nothing. A dark stain had spread beneath him. Adele grabbed the handle to balance herself. She couldn’t move, couldn’t think. The man who had come to expose them lay silent, still and impossibly broken. Someone had killed him and just like that, the pact they made twenty years ago had come back to life.

            Adele didn’t know how long she stood frozen in the doorway. Time felt suspended, stretched thin like a thread about to snap. The metallic scent of blood caught the back of her throat and something older – fear, maybe. She couldn’t stop looking at Phil’s limp body, and his limbs twisted in a way that made her stomach lurch. She tried to speak; to call out but her throat closed around the words.

            Again, she heard a trail of footsteps behind her. But this time, they were real. The voices grew louder, familiar and a laugh whipped Adele back to her surroundings. She stood back into the corridor and was met with three smiling flushed faces. Ryan’s smile faded first and he skidded to a halt when he saw her expression. His gaze moved towards the door and craning over Adele, he let out a strangled sound, half-gasp, half-whisper.

            ‘Oh man… Phil.’

            Ben and Jenna moved forward, her heels clicking sharply on the tiles before she stopped dead. Her hand flew to her mouth, but the gesture was too precise. Almost like it was rehearsed. Ben swore under his breath, stepping back as if the sight physically pushed him away.

            Adele forced her voice out. ‘We need to call the police. Now.’

            Ben’s jaw tightened. ‘We need to take a minute to think.’

            The words hit her like a slap. We need to think. The exact phrase he’d used twenty years ago. When Penny lay motionless on the corridor floor, blood pooling beneath her hair. Adele’s stomach twisted. The past wasn’t creeping back. It was sprinting. It was right here, in front of them. Ryan crouched beside Phil, hoping more than anything for sounds of breath but Phil’s open eyes told their own story. Ryan stood again, avoiding touching Phil completely.

            ‘He’s gone,’ he whispered, his voice cracking. ‘He’s really gone.’

            Jenna stepped forward, her expression unreadable as ever. ‘We should go back to the gym hall. Someone might come looking and we’re just standing here next to a dead body.’

            Adele simply stared at her. Really? Jenna’s voice was steady. Too steady for finding a ‘friend’ murdered. Her eyes flicked briefly to Ben, then to the door, calculating. Always calculating.

            Adele swallowed, ‘We can’t just leave him here!’

            ‘We’re not just leaving him. We’re just not making stupid decisions.’ Ben snapped.

            Adele felt the old familiar panic rising, that same suffocating pressure she’d felt at eighteen. The same sense that the ground beneath her was shifting and she was powerless to stop it. The room blurred. The faint smell of disinfectant. The metallic tang of blood in the air. The echo of a piercing scream.

            And suddenly she was back there.

                                                            ***

The corridor had been empty except for the six of them. The school bell had rung half an hour ago and a handful of students had decided to stay at school to change for their upcoming prom. Penny’s voice bounced off the lockers, sharp and furious.

            ‘You’re all pathetic,’ she spat. ‘I’m going to tell Mr Sweeney and the police everything. Every. Single. Thing.’

            Jenna laughed, trembling with anger ‘Oh stop with your empty threats. You’ll do nothing like always P.’

            ‘Get the hell out of my way.’ Penny said calmly, as she shoved past her.

            Adele remembered the moments in fragments, like shards of glass. They had invaded her dreams her entire adult life. Jenna’s hand grabbing Penny’s arm. Penny twisting away. That sickening crack as her skull collided with the corner of the metal locker. The way her body slid down the wall of lockers, leaving a trail of blood.

            Silence.

            Then Jenna’s voice, thin and shaking, ‘We can’t let this ruin our lives. It was an accident. She tripped; you all saw that.’

            ‘We stick together. No one talks,’ said Ben.

            Ryan stood crying quietly. Adele frozen, unable to move, unable to breathe. Phil was staring down at Penny, completely lost. The pact had been born in that silence. A pact made of fear, guilt and the sheer desperation that they had no other choice.

                                                            ***

Adele blinked back into the present. The science classroom felt smaller now, like the walls were closing in. She took a step back, her legs unsteady. Her mind a blank canvas.

            ‘We need to call the police. It’s not up for debate,’ she said, her voice firmer now.

            Ben turned to her. ‘And say what? That we just happened to find him? That we were all conveniently together when he died?’

            ‘We’re not doing this again. We’re not covering anything up. Let’s just tell the truth this time.’ Ryan looked between them, horrified.

            Cool and assessing, Jenna’s gaze found Ryan. ‘No one said anything about covering it up. But he’s dead. We can just walk away and keep quiet. It worked before.’

            Adele watched her carefully. Jenna was calm, composed. Just like twenty years ago. She wasn’t grieving. She was thinking. Planning. Adele felt a chill crawl up her spine and realised Jenna wasn’t reacting to Phil’s murder at all.

            Ben paced between them, running his hands through his hair. ‘He must’ve come here for a bit of peace. Maybe he slipped. Maybe- ‘

            ‘He didn’t slip, Ben,’ Adele said quietly. ‘Someone killed him’.

            The words hung in the air like smoke. They glanced looks at one another.

            ‘We’re not pointing fingers,’ whispered Ryan.

            But they already were. All of them. Silently. Fearfully. Jenna stepped closer to Adele and she instinctively moved back. Jenna’s expression didn’t change, but something flickered in her eyes. Irritation, maybe. Or calculation.

            Ben stopped pacing. ‘We need to go back to the hall. Act normal. He’ll be found soon enough.’

            ‘You want us to pretend nothing’s happened?’ Adele just stared at him.

            Ben simply nodded his head. Ryan looked sick and put his hands to his knees. Jenna rubbed his back but never taking her eyes off Ben. Adele watched the way Ryan’s shoulders eased at her touch. Jenna had always had that effect – soothing, steadying, controlling.

            Adele’s stomach twisted again. Jenna wasn’t scared. She wasn’t confused or upset. She was waiting. For what, Adele didn’t know. But she felt the shift in the air, the tightening of something invisible, binding the group together. The same feeling she’d had twenty years, when Jenna had looked and Penny’s body and said, we fix this. Together.

            Adele’s voice trembled. ‘We’re not kids anymore Jenna. We can’t just walk away this time. We can’t just bury this’.

            Jenna’s eyes met hers. Calm, cold. ‘We’re not burying anything.’

            But Adele didn’t believe her. How could she after what happened in this very building?

                                                            ***

Adele remembered the moment Penny confronted them. It was supposed to be an exciting night ahead. Prom. But Penny and Jenna had been bickering all week and it finally came to a head after school, next to the lockers. Penny stood opposite them, her face showing no fear whatsoever.

            ‘You think I don’t know what you’ve been doing?’ Penny’s voice shook but not with uncertainty. I’ve seen the messages. The threats. The money changing hands.’

            Adele’s stomach dropped. She glanced at Ben, who stared straight ahead, jaw clenched. Phil lurked in the background. But Jenna didn’t move. Penny pulled a crumbled bit of paper from her pocket – names, dates amounts. Adele recognised the handwriting, Penny’s.

            ‘You’ve been blackmailing people. Students. Younger ones. Making them pay to keep their secrets quiet.’

            Adele felt the heat rise in her face. ‘Penny, it’s not what you think – ‘

            ‘It’s exactly what I think.’ Penny’s eyes flashed across them. ‘And don’t pretend you didn’t know about the other stuff. The pills. The money Ben was taking for them. You all knew.’

            Adele’s breath caught. She had known. Not everything, not every detail, but enough. Enough to feel sick now. Penny stepped closer, gripping the paper tighter. Adele glanced down. She could make out some familiar names from people in her year. With either money or drugs next to their name. She never tried to stop it. How could she? Standing up to Jenna wasn’t something anyone did and yet here was Penny doing it.

            ‘I’m going to make sure everyone knows. Your parents. The school. Everyone. I’m done being scared of you. You’ve been hurting people. Using them and I’m not letting you ruin anyone else’s life.’

            Jenna finally spoke, her voice low and cold. ‘You don’t understand what you’re doing. No one will believe you anyway.’

            ‘You’re all pathetic,’ she spat. ‘I’m going to tell Mr Sweeney and the police everything. Every. Single. Thing.’

            Adele remembered the way Penny tried to push past Jenna, the decision already made. And she remembered the moment Jenna reached for her. Everything after that was fragments. The shove, the scream, the sickening crack of skull against metal. Adele had never stopped hearing it.

                                                            ***

Adele felt the pull of someone leading her down the corridor. Ryan gripped her arm. They had walked away again. The silence between them thick with dread. When they reached the assembly hall, next to the gym hall, it was empty. The flickering lights from the reunion offering a small gift of light. Jenna sat on the stage steps, perfectly composed. Ben gravitated towards her. Adele and Ryan stood a few feet away, like ghosts.

            Ryan spoke first. ‘Jenna…. We need to talk.’

            Jenna looked up, her expression, soft, almost sympathetic. ‘Some reunion eh? Feels like no time has passed at all. I can’t believe this has happened.’

            Adele stepped towards her. ‘You didn’t look that shocked to be honest.’

            Jenna blinked slowly. ‘I was in shock. I still am. Poor Phil.’

            ‘No,’ Adele said, ‘You were calm. Controlling. Just like twenty years ago.’

            Jenna’s face hardened, ‘Someone had to. Everything you’ve ever had in your life since then, all of you, is because of me. Come on guys, you should be more grateful.’

            Adele felt the ground tilt beneath her. Grateful? Adele had lived with this guilt long enough. She knew Ryan had been in therapy for years. Phil had turned to drink and going by his social media posts this week, he had been planning on revealing the truth.

            ‘You killed Penny.’ Adele said.

            Ryan flinched. ‘Adele – ‘

            ‘No,’ she said, louder now. ‘I remember. All of it. You tried to convince us she slipped. Or you slipped and it was an accident. But it wasn’t. You pushed her.’

            Jenna’s face didn’t change. ‘You remember it how you want to remember it.’

            ‘I remember the look on your face.’

            ‘And what look was that?’ said Jenna tilting her head.

            Adele whispered, ‘Relief.’

            Jenna’s eyes flashed – a brief, sharp glint of something cold and dangerous. She stood slowly, smoothing her dress. ‘We were kids, we were scared. We made a mistake. All of us.

            Adele felt sick. ‘Phil was going to expose you. It was pretty clear if you read between the lines of his social media posts about owning your truth and living up to past mistakes. Did you kill him too?’

            Jenna’s lips curved into a small, chilling smile. ‘If I had, do you think I’d tell you?’

            Ryan backed away slowly. Ben moved closer to Jenna, as if becoming a human shield for her. Adele felt her throat tighten. Neither of them was scared. Jenna was in control and Ben, stupidly hopelessly in love with her now as he was back then, would do anything for her. The realisation hit her instantly.

            ‘You… you killed him. For Jenna,’ she said staring at Ben.

            Ben’s shoulders sagged. He just stood there. He didn’t deny it. He didn’t look upset. He looked content. No one spoke. Ben’s eyes went to Jenna. She didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Didn’t even blink. Then Adele saw it. The truth she’d been avoiding for years. The complete control Jenna had over all of their lives never stopped when high school ended. Jenna had always been the centre. The gravity. The force that pulled them all into orbit and now, she was using that same gravity to destroy them.

            Adele didn’t waste any time. She called the police and to her surprise, neither Jenna nor Ben stopped her. They arrived faster than she had expected. Blue lights flickered through the windows, casting long shadows across the floor. They had moved into the entrance hall between the assembly and gym hall. People began to filter outside with murmurs, gasps and the rustle of people stepping back as police officers moved through the crowd.

            Ben stood near the wall, shoulders slumped, He didn’t look at Adele. He didn’t look at anyone except Jenna. She stood a few feet away, her expression soft and wounded. As if she were the one who had been betrayed. Her eyes glistened, but Adele knew better. Jenna’s tears were always perfectly timed.

            A detective approached the four of them after someone pointed Adele out. ‘We need statements from all of you.’

            Ben stepped forward immediately. ‘It was me,’ he said, ‘I killed Phil.’

            A ripple of shock moved through the hall. Adele felt her stomach twist. Ben’s confession wasn’t heroic. It wasn’t even tragic. It was inevitable – the final act of a boy who had never stopped orbiting Jenna.

            ‘We’ll take your statement at the station,’ said the detective as she nodded slowly.

            Ben turned to Jenna. For a moment, the hall seemed to fall away. Like it was just the two of them, locked in a silent exchange that made Adele’s skin crawl. Ben’s eyes were full of something raw – devotion, desperation, hope. Jenna’s eyes were unreadable.

            Then she stepped forward and placed a hand on his cheek.

            ‘Ben,’ she whispered, voice trembling just enough to sound real. ‘Why didn’t you come to me? How could you do this?’

            Adele felt something inside her fracture. Jenna wasn’t comforting him. She was sealing the story. Cementing the narrative. Making sure every witness in the room saw exactly what she wanted them to see. The detective gently pulled Ben away. He didn’t resist. He didn’t even look back.

            Jenna watched him go, her expression a perfect portrait of heartbreak. Adele wanted to scream. Instead, she stood frozen as the hall emptied around them. Officers moved in and out, gathering statements, ushering people outside. Ryan sat on a chair near the wall, head in his hands, shoulders shaking. He looked like a man who had finally realised he’d been living in someone else’s story.

            Adele approached him. ‘Ryan – ‘

            He shook his hand. ‘I don’t know what’s real anymore.’

            ‘We need to tell them the truth. Ben never actually agreed with me. He just stayed silent. Maybe I was wrong and it was Jenna.’

            ‘What truth Adele? That we covered up a death twenty years ago? That we let Jenna decide everything? That she killed one person, maybe two and we’re just saying so now? That we’re all cowards?’

            Adele opened her mouth, but no words came. Because he was right. They were cowards and Jenna had always known it. She turned. Jenna stood a few feet away, her expression gentle. Almost sympathetic. She looked someone offering comfort after a tragic event. Not someone who had orchestrated it.

                        Adele moved towards her. ‘You manipulated him. If I could tell Phil was going to throw us under the bus, you definitely did.’

            ‘Ben made his own choices’.

            ‘You used him’, Adele said fighting her tears back.

            ‘I used all of you and you let me,’ whispered Jenna.

            Adele’s breath caught. ‘You killed Penny.’

            Jenna’s voice remained calm and soft ‘I protected us. The stupid bitch was going to ruin everything. She didn’t care who she hurt. Like I said, you should be more grateful. You think you didn’t benefit from the lie? You lived your life Adele. You went to university. You built a career. You moved on.’

            ‘I never moved on,’ Adele said.

            Jenna’s smile sharpened. ‘That’s your problem. Ben did. Not me obviously. He’s always loved me. To me, love is irrelevant. All that matters is loyalty.’

            Adele stepped back. ‘You’re a monster.’

            ‘No, actually. I’m a survivor’, Jenna stared back.

            A police officer approached them and asked Jenna to come with him to give her statement. Jenna nodded, wiping her eyes delicately. She turned to Adele one last time.

            ‘You should get home after you give yours. This has been a hard night for all of us. Stay safe.’

            Adele stared at her, stunned. Jenna wasn’t escaping justice. She was rewriting the story, and everyone was letting her. She followed the officer, her posture perfect, her expression soft and wounded. People parted for her instinctively, offering murmurs of sympathy, gentle touches on her arm. She slipped into the centre of attention effortlessly – just like she had at eighteen.

            Adele watched her go, feeling something inside her collapse. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just…quietly. Like something had been rotting away for years and finally gave way. Adele stared outside. The car park was emptying now. She stood alone as Ryan was led away to give his statement. The building looming over her like a monument to everything they’d buried.

            She realised then that the past hadn’t come back to haunt them

            It had come back to crown its queen.

            And Adele, exhausted, hollow and trembling, was left standing in the ruins of a story she had never truly controlled.