Chapter 3 of Mystery Novel

I told you Chapter 3 would be posted VERY soon!  I have decided to wait until I am done writing it to give it a title, so for now you can call it whatever you want.  I think I’ll call it “My First REAL Book” since I am actually dedicated to finishing it. Haha. Please comment and tell me how you like it so far!

Chapter 2 HERE

Chapter 1 HERE

~Michael

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Daniel decided to go to the mall for a while to wait out the hoodie-guy.

He went to the food court and ordered a pretzel and a Coke, and sat down at a table.  He just hoped that the hoodie-guy didn’t follow him to the mall.

Making sure nobody was following him, Daniel got up to leave with his Coke still three quarters full, and his pretzel only partially eaten.  He wasn’t hungry.  It was a sunny day, not a cloud in the sky.  But you couldn’t let that deceive you; the actual temperature was somewhere around thirty degrees.  The sun glistened off the mall parking lot and all the cars, yet it felt like there should have been a foot of snow on the ground.  That’s weather in Ohio for you.

Still making sure nobody was following him, he hopped in. Well, more like he slid in.  Remember, this was a tiny-ass car.

When he got back to the dormitory, he didn’t see the hoodie-guy, so he figured it was safe to go in.  He quickly got on his laptop to finish his paper for Internal Biology.  He wasn’t going for a degree in medicine but figured the class would be interesting anyway.  He was actually going for a master’s degree in criminal justice.

He typed until his fingers hurt.  Luckily he didn’t have any other homework to do, so he put his computer away and ordered pizza.  The woman on the phone said it would be about a twenty minute wait.  Twenty minutes later, his doorbell rang. When he got to the door and answered it, nobody was there, but they had left a note. It said in swirly, scribbled handwriting:

I’m watching you.

Every phone call you make, I can listen to.

Every move you make, I can watch.

Want more answers?  Meet me in the cafeteria tomorrow, 8AM sharp.

-Caliban

Daniel felt his blood run cold.  He broke out in a sweat. He started to have hot flashes. His heart rate began to rise rapidly and he felt nauseous.  That’s it, he thought, this guy has gotten on my last nerve.

So Daniel started down the staircase, and halfway down, he met the pizza delivery woman.  He told her she could take the friggin’ pizza back, he didn’t want it.  “You still have to pay for it, sir!” she called after him.

“No I don’t, your website says you have a full refund policy. Just take it back.” Daniel called back, never breaking his trot.  Pizza woman said something else, but he couldn’t hear her, and frankly, he didn’t care.

He started walking around the building, looking for “Caliban.” His mind was going at thousand miles a minute. So his name is Caliban, he thought. It’s probably just an alias, but what the hell does he want from me? My lunch money? He could just ask, like a normal person.  But that’s just it, he’s no normal person.  Probably a damn pedophile.  And how can I be so sure it’s a guy? It could be a woman.  Whoever they are, they’re not normal.  No normal person wears a mask and hoodie and stalks people with creepy texts and notes.

Caliban was nowhere to be found.  Daniel’s adrenaline was running on high, but it was of no use, since he couldn’t find Caliban.  He returned to his dorm, clueless and hungry.

~

The next morning was difficult.  Daniel had endured a night of relentless nightmares and restless sleep. But luckily it was Sunday and he didn’t have anything pressing to do.  But he couldn’t get damn Caliban off his mind.

Isn’t Caliban a character from a Shakespeare play or something? he thought.   I’m definitely not meeting this creeper in the cafeteria.  It’s Sunday and nobody’s in there, so there’d be no witnesses if he did something stupid.  Does he think I’m retarded or something? 

Daniel decided not to use his cellphone, just in case Caliban was telling the truth and really could listen to his calls.  But he decided he would go visit his friend, Matthew Fernandez.

“Hey, Hupfer my man! What’s up?” Matthew said.

“I’ve got a stalker,” Daniel replied bluntly.

“What do you mean, man?”

“I mean someone is following me and sending me weird notes and stuff.”

“Well why don’t you just beat ‘em up?” Matthew asked sarcastically.

“It’s not that simple,” Daniel said, “or I would have already done that.”

Matthew looked at him oddly.

“I mean, the guy wears a mask and a hoodie over his head. I’m afraid he’s got a knife or something.” Daniel tried to explain.  It felt awkward talking to a guy about his problems like this. But then again, Matthew was his best friend.

“Well…” Matthew dragged the word out, “you could kill him…” he said mischievously.  He cackled like a witch.

“Yeah, thanks. You’re a lot of help,” Daniel retorted. “See ya’!”

“Later, bro!” Matthew called.

Daniel was up late that night working on the final version of his Internal Biology paper, and getting distracted with Facebook. He realized that he had not had anything to eat since the day before and decided to cautiously go down to the vending machine. He got a candy bar and a soda and decided to go sit out on the front entrance to think.

When he walked out the front door, he walked right into the person known mysteriously as Caliban.