The Metropolis Series #3: Quinn and Cassandra

I HATED GOING to the hospital.

I thought I’d start by saying so, noting how often I had gone there in the past couple of days. It had become a ritual for me, Bree, and Philip to meet after school to pay Curtis a visit. I thought I’d gotten used to seeing his head wrapped in bandages and his body motionless on a hospital bed, hooked up to machines that looked like they belonged to a dystopian sci-fi flick.

Curtis had thrown a party at his house the previous Saturday. People had crashed into his living room that night, and it was believed that he had slipped by the side of his pool while getting away from his house. The details were blurry among his schoolmates at St. John’s, but that was the story they told.

I felt alone knowing that their whispers carried mere assumptions, guesses that filled up as many holes as they could. Bree and Philip were among such crowd, and I could only imagine what kind of chaos would transpire if they knew what had really happened to Curtis.

We got off the elevator, and once we were on Curtis’ floor, two of the medical staff passed by conversing with each other rapidly in Tagalog. Before they could disappear down the hall, I managed to hear what they were saying:

That boy in the next room, one said.

He’s awake, the other said, nodding.

I froze in the middle of the corridor. Was it possible that they were talking about Curtis?

“Hey, Vasquez,” Bree said from behind me. “Why’d ya stop? Is something wrong?”

“Ah, it’s nothing,” I replied, taking a sidestep so that the people behind us could pass. “What if Curtis is awake? How do we tell him about the… accident?”

Philip stroked his chin. “We’d have to lay it out for him. Slowly… We don’t wanna freak him out, but he’s gotta know what happened.”

I nodded, a thought creeping into the back of my mind. We could tell Curtis everything Philip had seen after the party: the splotches of red in the pool water, the nasty gash on the side of his face, and his lopsided crimson head on the concrete. We could choose how grotesque we wanted the details to be, but they would never compare to witnessing the party’s horrific events.

For the second time, he had turned into a monster before my very eyes, and that was after I had told him the truth.

Philip led the way to Curtis’ room, which was a few steps past the vending machines. He opened the door and slowly stepped inside, Bree and I trailing behind him. Curtis was indeed awake, but his skin still looked pale, and his eyes squinted in the afternoon sun shining through the curtains. His voice was raspy as he conversed with the nurse by his bedside. I couldn’t make out what they were talking about, but the nurse kept shaking her head. Eventually, she excused herself, walking past us and closing the door.

That was when Curtis noticed us. He smiled faintly, forming deep creases around his eyes. They looked like cracks on his porcelain face, slicing through the freckles on his cheeks.

“Philip, hey,” he said solemnly. “Hi, Bree. And—” When he saw me, he narrowed his eyes. “Quinn?” he asked. “Is that you?”

I gave a little awkward wave as Bree slumped on the chair next to him. “Yeah, Vasquez had a little makeover while you were knocked out cold. It’s been the talk of the school for a while. She looks like a whole new person.”

“C’mon, Bree,” I touched the tips of my hair, which were now a little bit past my jaw. “It’s just a haircut.”

My hair used to be long and thick, and I had kept it that way for years. I never really thought of cutting it until a barista made me. Ms. Louise had once sent a knife flying to my face when I walked into The MacGuffin, which was the café she ran on the outskirts of town.

You see, stepping out into the street could get me mobbed in an instant, but thankfully, nothing like that had ever happened yet. The potential attacks, however, were due to my resemblance to a girl named Cassandra Diaz, who was notorious for all sorts of heinous things. She attacked a mansion full of teens, stabbed a girl in a school bathroom, and murdered another at Curtis’ party. It was Ms. Louise who took me to a salon and convinced me to have my hair cut so that at first glance, I wouldn’t look anything like Cassandra.

And since then, things had never been so quiet. My life had never felt so normal.

Curtis’ eyes seemed to sparkle. He appeared to be staring at me, regarding me with a smile.

“You look… great,” he said about my new hairstyle. “You should keep it that way.”

I didn’t know what to say. I’d had a crush on Curtis for the longest time, so I should have been elated by his compliment.

“Thanks,” I simply replied.

Philip stepped forward. “So glad that you’re awake, man.”

Curtis’ smile faded. “What happened to me?” He scanned the room, looking past Bree and Philip. “And where’s Rachael? Will she come and visit, too?”

Bree and Philip exchanged looks while I remained by the foot of his bed, never daring to take a step closer. The three of us would make an agreement every time we paid Curtis a visit: It was simple. Philip would do all the talking.

“Do you…” Philip stammered, rubbing his nape. “You don’t remember anything?”

Curtis furrowed his brows, his expression grim. “I remember… I remember the party. We were all having a great time dancing by the poolside. Everything was hazy after that, though. The nurses told me I had an accident. I slipped by the pool and hit my head pretty hard.

But it’s funny. I don’t remember any of that happening.”

“Not at all?”

“No…”

After that, Curtis was silent. He looked down at his hands, but his eyes eventually led him to the empty space between me and Philip.

“What about Rachael?” he then asked. “Where is she? Why isn’t she with you guys?”

Rachael and Curtis had been dating since the previous year.

Together with Bree and Philip, they formed the high school band Deus Ex Machina, the prime showcase of St. John’s musical talent.

“We haven’t seen Rachael since the party,” Philip replied. “She went home and she hasn’t gone to school since.”

Bree sighed. “It’s almost been a week. She just texts Philip for homework and sends her activities to the teachers via email. Besides them, no one has been able to reach her. She doesn’t pick up or respond to any of our messages.”

Philip and I exchanged nervous looks. Not only did Bree break the agreement that only Philip should speak, but she opened a topic I was trying to avoid.

It was on that night I had told Curtis about my evil twin, Cassandra. At first, she only appeared in my nightmares, chasing me down a forest. Unfortunately, she turned out to be a real person, and my resemblance to her had subjected me to all sorts of trouble.

I realized that whenever I told Curtis the truth about something, such as how I struggled with Cassandra, I would burst his bubble and distort his handsome form. His eyes would glow red, his nails would grow talons, and his skin would turn gray and gruesome.

I would corrupt him, turn him into a monster.

I was afraid that if Bree and Philip were to tell Curtis what they’d seen at the party, I was going to see another horrific transformation.

But they were insistent, not only because they believed that Curtis deserved to know the truth, but because I couldn’t express my fears and reasons to them.

They were Metropolitans. Their brains didn’t understand corruption in the same context as I did. If I opened up such concept to them, we might have another monster in our midst.

“At the party,” Philip began, “two people crashed into your living room. They had knives, Curtis. They were in combat in there…”

I couldn’t read the expression on Curtis’ face, but I knew it was dreadful. His eyes lost focus, and he sat perfectly still in his hospital bed with his hands firm across his stomach.

“Your folks are looking for the guy who messed your place up,”Philip continued. “Things were destroyed, people were put at risk—”

“Wait, guy?” Curtis interjected, his voice shaking. “I thought there were two of them. What about the other one?”

Philip sighed deeply. “That brings us to Rachael, actually. She… told me something before going back home. Something broke her at that party…”

Curtis clenched the hem of his blanket. “What?” he implored. “Phil, what happened?”

The room fell silent. Bree sat uneasily in her chair. My head hung low as my fingers formed knots. I managed to catch a glimpse of Philip, his furrowed brows and clenched jaw making him look older than he was.

“One of the party crashers was murdered that night,” Philip said. “And Rachael was unfortunate to see it.”

“A murder?” Curtis asked.

His eyes widened, and his skin turned pale—well, paler than how it usually was. His lips quivered, and he had trouble establishing eye contact with us.

“Someone was killed,” he stammered, “in my own home…?”

I stepped back, bracing myself for his reaction. I was afraid that he was going to think too much about everything we’d said. That usually led to the disruption of his ignorance and bliss, causing him to turn into a monster.

Philip sighed. “I’m sorry, Curtis. We didn’t want to tell you, but you needed to know.”

“So what are my folks doing about it?” Curtis pleaded. “Are they finding out who’s been killed? Who the murderer is?”

“They’re trying to find out who the two party crashers were first,” Bree replied. “There hasn’t even been any established leads to their identities.”

“The bloodstains and fingerprints left at the scene didn’t lead to anyone at all,” Philip added. “And no one at St. John’s could recall what the crashers looked like.”

Bree shrugged. “I guess because most of us panicked and ran for the back door. I know I did. Did you see the length of those daggers?”

“So…” Curtis scrunched up his brows. “I must have slipped on my way out? That’s how I got this head injury?”

“Possibly…” Philip said. “I just remembered not seeing you outside the house, so I went back in and checked. And then… I found you by the pool…”

Curtis simply nodded. He did it slowly like he was afraid that his head would snap off his neck.

“I see…” he murmured. “Jeez, that must have been a tough night, huh? W—Why can’t I remember anything?”

“The injury is probably to blame,” Bree said. “Perhaps you have some sort of amnesia now.”

“At least he still knows who we are,” I finally decided to say. Curtis might find my silence suspicious. “Imagine if he didn’t.”

“That’s true,” Philip agreed.

It wasn’t the first time Curtis had lost his memory. He had once completely forgotten who I was, and I was crushed because I was head over heels for him. That was my first encounter with Lethe water, the only known proven cure for corruption. It did come with side effects, though. Your entire memory could be erased.

“Anyway,” Philip said. “It seems that the only way we can get any leads to those party crashers is by getting Rachael to talk. She’s been stuck inside the house longer than any of us.”

“Dude,” Bree scoffed. “The girl’s traumatized.”

“That’s why we wait. Until this whole investigation moves forward, she’s the only hope we have. Rachael’s tough. She’ll be back soon.”

Curtis shook his head. “Oh God, Rachael…” he whispered. “I hope she’s okay.”

Bree sighed. “Me too…”

Silence then crept into the room. Bree, Philip, and Curtis weren’t aware that Rachael and I were left inside that house. While everyone tried to escape, I witnessed horrors with her. I had scars on my arms to prove it, and they hid under the sleeves of my sweater.

Rachael and I had seen Curtis get turned into a monster, the fight in the living room, and… God, Rachael had actually met Cassandra that night. Not only that, she’d seen her kill somebody.

Mackenzie. That was the name of the girl Cassandra murdered.

I could only hope that Rachael was like everyone else at St. John’s. Their memories were faulty when it came to strange, scary events. However, something at the back of my mind told me that I should dread the day of Rachael’s return…