Chapter 2

I stood there for a moment, just breathing in the stale air of Scarlet’s room, feeling the weight of my new reality pressing down on me. This wasn’t just a room; it was a crypt, a mausoleum where the remnants of a girl’s life lay scattered like forgotten relics. And I was the unwilling archaeologist tasked with sifting through the ruins.

Methodically, I began to explore the space. The room was a canvas of teenage rebellion and hidden depths. Band posters adorned the walls, their edges curling away from the paint, while stacks of sketchbooks and canvases were piled haphazardly in the corner. The air was thick with the scent of incense and something else—a musk that I couldn’t quite place, a scent that seemed to resonate with the part of me that was now attuned to the spirit world.

I approached the desk, a cluttered landscape of charcoal pencils, dried-up paint tubes, and crumpled papers. My fingers grazed over a stack of journals bound together with a fraying ribbon. I hesitated, the detective in me warring with the invasive guilt of prying into someone else’s most intimate thoughts. But I needed to see what I was getting myself into.

With a deep breath, I untied the ribbon and opened the first journal. Scarlet’s handwriting was a scrawling script, a blend of elegance and raw emotion that spilled across the pages. Her words were a window into her soul—raw, unfiltered, and aching with poetry and pain. She wrote of her loneliness, her struggle to find her place in a world that seemed to have no room for her. She poured her heart out onto the pages, her words a mosaic of her battles with depression and anxiety.

As I turned the pages, I could feel her presence in the ink, the ghost of her emotions lingering like mist over water. I was struck by the realization that I was reading the autopsy of a soul—a soul that had once inhabited this body that was now mine. I traced the edge of a sketchbook with a finger, feeling the texture of the paper, the imprint of her dreams. Every scribble, every note she’d left behind, whispered of responsibility I couldn’t shirk. It was more than empathy; it was a visceral connection to her pain, a shared heartache that throbbed in the silence of her room.

In the corner of the mirror, almost hidden behind a photo of Scarlet with a group of friends, I found a crumpled appointment card. It was for the school counselor, Dr. Colin Jennings. The appointment was scheduled for tomorrow, a cruel reminder that Scarlet would never get the chance to seek the help she so clearly needed.

I tucked the card into the back pocket of my—no, Scarlet’s jeans as I continued to scan my surroundings. The room was a puzzle, and every piece I found seemed to raise more questions than answers. I was a detective again, piecing together the life of a girl who had slipped through the cracks. But this time, the stakes were higher. This wasn’t just another case; it was my existence, my second chance at life.

I felt a gnawing hunger in my—no, Scarlet’s—stomach as I descended the creaking stairs, the scent of food lingering in the air. The kitchen was a picture of domestic disinterest, the remnants of a meal scattered across the table, the flickering light of the television casting an eerie glow over the scene. There they were, Scarlet’s parents, engrossed in a sitcom’s canned laughter, their plates empty, not a thought spared for the girl they had neglected both in life and now, unwittingly, in her afterlife.

I stood in the doorway, my presence unnoticed, the detective in me analyzing their behavior, the new teenager in me seething with resentment. “You couldn’t save a plate for me?” I asked coldly.

Scarlet’s father grunted, not tearing his eyes away from the screen. “There’s leftovers in the fridge,” he mumbled, a dismissal if I ever heard one. Her mother, equally disinterested, waved a hand in the general direction of the stove. “Help yourself, dear. You know where everything is.”

My fingers twitched at my sides, the urge to lash out, to make them see the error of their ways, was almost overpowering. But I couldn’t risk revealing the truth. Instead, I moved to the refrigerator, the cold air a balm against my frustration. Inside, I found a half-empty container of days-old takeout, a carton of milk on the verge of expiration, and a sad-looking apple. Not a hint of what they had just feasted on. This was the extent of their concern for their own flesh and blood.

As I fixed myself a plate, the comforting sound of the microwave’s hum provided a comfortable backdrop to their indifference. As I waited, I watched them, these people who had created and then abandoned Scarlet to her demons. Rage simmered beneath my skin, a fire stoked by the injustice of it all. I was a detective; I had seen my fair share of dysfunctional families, but this—this was a special kind of neglect.

“Work was good?” I asked, leaning against the counter, the picture of nonchalance. It was a test, a way to gauge their reaction to the daughter they thought they knew.

“The usual,” Scarlet’s mother replied with a sigh, finally glancing in my direction. Her eyes were void of any real interest, nothing like the warmth I remembered from my own mother’s gaze. “And how was school?”

The question caught me off guard. “Fine,” I said, my tone clipped. “Just fine.”

I took my meal and retreated to the sanctuary of Scarlet’s room. As I ate in silence, I couldn’t help but feel the enormity of my situation. I wouldn’t let Scarlet’s memory fade into the background. I would be her voice, her shield. And if her parents wouldn’t listen, I’d find someone who would. Tomorrow, I’d keep that appointment with Dr. Jennings. Maybe he could shed light on the darkness that had consumed Scarlet’s life. Maybe he could help me understand the depth of the girl whose body I now inhabited.

For now, I would bide my time gathering information and building my case. Because one thing was certain: I would not rest until I uncovered the truth behind what happened to Scarlet. And if her parents were complicit in her pain, they would answer to me—they would answer to Poppy.