Cryptic Mysteries - by Vera Nick

Chapter 3 For the first time in... well, ever, I actually stood in front of a mirror and studied myself. Really studied myself. My blood-red hair was, as usual, packed into a bun. No makeup. Just me. My deep purple eyes, the ones I'd always been convinced screamed WEIRD!, stared back at me. Dad's genes had certainly done most of the work. I inherited his red hair, while somehow his dark reddish eyes and Mum's bright blue ones had combined to create... purple. Deep purple. Honestly, I used to think I looked like a science experiment. But today... I wasn't bad. In fact... I was kind of beautiful. Well, to some extent. Feeling oddly dramatic, I pulled out my hair tie like they always do in the movies. My hair tumbled down... ...and instantly reminded me why I kept it tied up. It was a tangled disaster. "Right," I sighed. "Reality wins again." Mum could make it look amazing, but keeping it that way every day? No, thank you. Don't judge me. I study books, not beauty routines. As I tied my hair back up, another thought wandered into my head. Was Sally actually jealous of me? Ridiculous. Probability? Point one percent. Still... Experiments exist for a reason. Our school's anniversary was next week. I never went to school events. Sally knew that. Which meant she wouldn't expect me to show up. If she really was jealous... Her reaction would tell me everything. --- The day of the anniversary finally arrived. "Ouch!" "Manners," Mum laughed as she gently tugged another section of my hair into place. "Looking nice shouldn't be this painful." "It isn't painful," she replied. "You're just dramatic." Easy for her to say. She'd been excited ever since I told her I wanted to attend the anniversary. Making people look beautiful was practically her superpower. "There," she said proudly. "Done." I opened one eye. Then the other. "...Whoa." The girl staring back at me barely looked like the one who spent every afternoon surrounded by textbooks. "You look lovely," Mum smiled. I couldn't even argue. For once, she was absolutely right. I wasn't trying to become someone else. I wasn't trying to impress anyone. This was simply an experiment. Observe one subject. Record her reaction. Very scientific. As I made my way towards the school, the afternoon breeze gently rustled the trees overhead. Halfway there, something caught my eye. Scratched into the side of an old streetlight was a strange symbol. Three circles connected by thin, crooked lines. It wasn't random graffiti. It looked... Intentional. I slowed for a moment. "Huh." Someone must've had way too much free time. Around the edges, someone had smeared a dark red paint that had dried into uneven streaks. From a distance, it looked almost like blood. "They really wanted to make this look convincing." People did weird things for attention these days. I shook my head and continued walking. A few steps later, there was another.. Standing out against the faded metal, strangely out of place. A chill crawled across my shoulders. For a second, I couldn't explain why. I rubbed my arms, laughed quietly to myself, and kept walking. "Nerves," I muttered. "It's just nerves." The school gates came into view, and just like that, my thoughts shifted back to the anniversary. Whatever that strange symbol was... It was probably nothing. For now, I got a party to get to.

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