By Zulk RS
I woke up early today. Getting out of bed, I went to stand in the balcony to take in the morning atmosphere. The morning breeze blowing through my hair felt good. The weather was quite good today. I will go for a walk through the park after breakfast. My classmates were all studying for the Physics final tomorrow but I wasn’t worried. Physics is one of my stronger subjects along with Chemistry and Biology. Even if they weren’t busy though, I wouldn’t really hang out with them. I simply don’t enjoy their company. I don’t know, I just feel like I can’t quite be on the same page as them. Besides, I like being alone with my own thoughts to keep me company more.
I walked through the lush green grassy ground of the park. Physics tomorrow, Chemistry next then finally Mathematics; that is all that remains of my high school finals. After that all I would have to do was wait and relax while I waited for the results to come out. Then off to applying for college. I feel like Harvard would be a good college for me. It’s quite a prestigious college and I feel I would fit right in among the brightest minds. I spent minutes walking through the park, contemplating what the future might hold. There is no reason for me to not be accepted to Harvard; I’m the top student in my class after all.
I’ve been lying on my bed for quite a while now. The test results were published some time ago and unsurprisingly, I topped my class once again. I have officially graduated high school and have applied for enrollment in Harvard. I would have left it at that but my parents insisted I try for other colleges as well so I applied to the best colleges of my nation as well. Clearly I am eligible to study at any one of them.
So why is it that I have not been accepted to even one of them? I just can’t understand why I was rejected. My grades are better than that of everyone else in my school and I clearly excel in almost all my subjects so why is it that I have been rejected, not just by Harvard but by the other colleges as well? I am not sure what to do. I think I need to go for a walk again. I read in the news today that there will be a solar eclipse a few weeks from now. Maybe I should go outside that day to see it.
I did not feel like going out during the solar eclipse that was days ago. I honestly don’t feel like doing much except lying in bed most of the time. I’m still not enrolled in any colleges and I don’t know where else to send applications anymore. All the best colleges of the country don’t seem to want me for some reason. My parents have been sending letters to all kinds of colleges in my stead. I still feel as though I will have trouble fitting in and adjusting to the other colleges but I guess I need to bite the bullet and enroll somewhere at least.
I’m not entirely sure how long it’s been but today I have finally been accepted into a college. It is located at the far end of the country. I have never heard of that college before today. My parents told me that I should be happy that I was finally accepted but for the first time in a long time, I feel unsure. Of course, I will have to move into the dorms there. My parents will provide the fees and I will have to work for my own spending money. I am set to leave for college in about a week from now.
My experience in the new college has been weird. By now I’ve been here for about a month and I can’t quite describe how I feel about this place yet. I guess you could call it a feeling of being out of place but that does not quite capture how I feel. Even though I’m surrounded by other students and I have made two friends since coming here, I still feel somewhat isolated. I do not feel like I can quite connect with the people here. Perhaps it is just a case of being in an unfamiliar situation. I am doing well in my classes and my teachers seem to appreciate me so that is still familiar. Today I walked to my dorm in the dark. I had classes that lasted well after sunset. I wrote down notes, listened to the teacher’s lectures and stared at the white board all under the rows of fluorescent lights that are affixed to the classroom ceiling. Fluorescent lights were too common in this college. In fact I don’t think I’ve seen a single lighting fixtures that wasn’t a fluorescent light. Someone stole one of my notebooks. While waiting for the last class to begin, I noticed it wasn’t in my bag. I have no idea who stole it but I believe it might have been that one girl in my class. She is not as smart as me and does struggle in the class a bit. So she would have the motive to steal it. I also know when it could have been stolen too. Yesterday during track class which takes place at the same time as that girl’s basketball training, I had left my bag unintended. She had the motive, means and the opportunity so I suspect it was her. However, I can’t report her to the teachers without evidence. Tomorrow I will at least report to the teachers that my notebook has been stolen. My two new friends, Max and Jean tell me to not jump to conclusions and to at least look for it but I’m absolutely sure that I put it in my bag. It must have been stolen, there’s no way around it. Feeling quite upset about the stolen notebook, I decided to walk by the small school garden. Sometimes I like to take a detour though this place while going to and from my class. The grassy place always puts me at ease.
One of my teachers, Mr. Munshi is hiding something from me. Handing me my lost notebook back, he told me that I had left it in class but I know he’s lying. I don’t know why he would lie to me. I know I put the notebook in my bag yesterday; I even double checked. It must have been stolen during track class when the bag was left unintended. How did it end up with Mr. Munshi? He told me I left it in class but I didn’t even have class with him yesterday. Could the thief have lied to him about “finding” my notebook in class? I honestly don’t know. I’ve been talking with Jean and Max about moving to a cheap apartment together. It sounds like a good idea. The rent is cheap enough and I make enough at my part time job to pay a fraction of it. If we do decide to move, we would probably be moving there sometime next month.
I have now settled in to my new room in the apartment I’m sharing with Max and Jean. I’ve set up my flimsy wooden desk and furnished everything with my books and notebooks. My friends are going out later today so I will have the house all to myself. Already this place is much quieter than the dorm. I can concentrate on my studies better. I have mid-terms coming up soon. I actually have to study for it so I can’t go out with my friends. I don’t want to go with them regardless though. I still can’t seem to just connect with them. Something always just feels off when I interact with them. I’m honestly stumped. I don’t know what it is. I thought my uneasiness in this place was due to the change in environment but I think it’s something else. I’ve been here for quite some time now yet I still feel like there’s something that just doesn’t fit; something about how they walk, how they talk and how they move; something that I’m just not able to see or figure out. What could it be?
The mid-terms had gone well enough. I can’t feel the sense of accomplishment that I used to when I did well on my tests. Perhaps the stress was eating away at me. I had decided to walk through the garden again since the grassy place always calmed me down. That was when I saw it; a single rose bush. It was quite strange. I had never seen the bush there before. I walked through the same garden on my way to class this morning yet the bush wasn’t there at the time. There are no tools or clues to suggest that the bush was planted while I was taking the test yet there it was; sitting out in the open in plain sight. I have walked through this place so many times since coming to this college that I would have definitely noticed it were it there before. I stared at the bush and its bright red roses, wondering where it came from. I stepped closer to it to get a better look but the closer I got I felt a sinking feeling in my chest and a gnawing at the back of my mind. I somehow knew that getting closer to it would be a bad idea so I stepped back and walked away. I rushed home after that.
I couldn’t sleep last night. I was just thinking about the rose bush that I saw yesterday. On my way to class I decided to take a detour through the garden again, just to see the bush one more time. When I got there, it was gone. This time however, there were signs of digging around the place. It seems the bush was dug up but why? With the questions of the curious rose bush still on my mind, I headed to class.
Ever since the bush appeared and disappeared, I had been visiting the garden multiple times every day for the last month. I believe the encounter opened my eyes to why I felt so uneasy here. Everything seems to be normal and fine on the surface but when you dig just a little deeper, you find that there are many things that don’t seem to fit quite right. First there was Mr. Munshi who lied to me about the notebook. Then during the tests, the worst student in the class suddenly started scoring over 80% in his tests. I have noticed three girls at the garden who seem to visit there as if on some kind of rotation. One of them who had long black hair would be in the garden one day, the next day, there will be the tan skinned girl and on the day after that, the girl with red framed glasses would be there, after that will be black haired girl again as the rotation loops back to her. The only time none of them are there is when it rains. Where they stand or walk around in the garden is also fixed. The black haired girl will walk around the outer edges of the garden. The tan girl would stand around at the center. The bespectacled girl would always be seated on a bench, reading her book. At random times, I see something flash behind me or from my peripheral view but when I turn, there’s nothing there. I don’t know what is going on but I will get to the bottom of this.
My grades have started to slip a bit as I have been spending more and more time trying to figure out what is going on in this place. I tried calling my mother but the call never gets through. My finals have been worse than my mid-terms but I don’t care. The girls are still there and I need to figure out what their issue is. I skipped a few classes to find out their identities. The black haired girl is named Aisha. The tan girl is Valerie and the bespectacled girl is Beck. It seems they’re friends who grew up in this town. Could their strange appearance in the garden be connected to their history? Are they part of some kind of group? I couldn’t find any common classes or clubs that they are all part of so maybe they’re part of the same friend group? I’m going to try and figure out each of their daily schedules and find out what they do during their days. I have a very bad feeling about this and I’m honestly afraid but I need to get to the bottom of this strange incidents. I should bring the large kitchen knife with me for protection. I think I’ll plan out my moves and prepare for a week before I act.
After I planned out my movements and got measures to hide my involvement. I had decided to start with Aisha and then follow the other two once I have her schedule down. If my suspicions were right, she would have met with the other two at some point. To do this, I had to skip more classes but this is important. Max asked me about the missing knife and I told him a lie that it bent accidentally when I was cooking and I threw it out. He seemed to believe me. I made a hidden compartment in my desk drawer. I did this by hammering a flap of wood that matches what the bottom of the drawer looks like into a place a few inches above the actual bottom of the drawer. The nails are only fix one end of the wood while the other end rests on nails that aren’t sunk into the wooden flap. I drilled a hole at the bottom of the drawer. Through that, I can use a pencil to push the flap open. In this hidden compartment, I have hid the knife. Starting tomorrow I plan to follow Valerie and find out her schedule as well. I will have to skip classes to do that as well.
I had made a mistake while following Valerie. On the third day I was following her, I think she figured out someone was tailing her. She kept looking over her shoulder and trying to glance at those around her. At one point she picked up her pace without any warning. I took this as a sign that she was on to me so I quickly dipped into an alley to throw her off. However when I peeked back out, she was gone. I went to class today to avoid suspicion, putting my current plans to follow the girls on hold while I planned my next move. That’s when I became sure that the three girls are part of some kind of cult. They figured out somehow that I was the one following them even though I made sure to obscure my face with the help of dark shades and a face mask. When I went to the toilet in the middle of class, a strange noxious odor hit my nose while I was inside one of the bathroom stalls. At first I didn’t think much of it but then I looked down at my feet and saw a cockroach struggling and writhing on the floor. I realized then that the smell was indeed from some kind of toxic gas. Based on the smell I’m sure it was sulfur dioxide that was used. I tried to get out of the stall but the door was locked. Someone had locked me inside that bathroom stall and was trying to gas me. I felt my eyes, nose and lungs burn as I frantically kicked the door. Finally I managed to break something in the door and kick it open. With watery, bloodshot eyes I ran out of the washrooms as fast as I could while coughing, wheezing and gasping for air. I know Valerie and her cult was responsible for this. As I ran out of the bathroom, I saw her standing right outside the washrooms. It felt like time slowed down as I made eye contact with her as I ran past her. I swear she was surprised to see that I had survived the attack. If I had the knife I would have killed her right there but I didn’t. All I could do was run back home. How? How did she know that I went to the washroom? How did she know I would be alone there? I don’t have the same class as any of the three girls so how could she have known which floor I was on and which bathroom I went to? I thought long and hard about the answers to these questions when I finally realized what had happened. I had a class with Mr. Munshi. I asked him before I left for the washroom. That is how they knew exactly where I was. Munshi is part of their cult. It would explain so much. It would explain why his attitude toward me had soured ever since the incident with the rose bushes. It would explain why he lied to me about my notebook. They obviously can’t attack me when there’s a risk of hurting others as well so that’s why they tried to gas me in the bathroom stall. I need to be extra careful in Munshi’s class. I need to be careful around him.
I have been avoiding the Munshi’s class for a few weeks now. The attitude of a lot of the teachers toward me has gone sour as well. This is a sign that they too are part of the cult. I don’t know what their goal is but I will find out. I think I’m too far into this conspiracy to pull out into. If I try to leave, they will hunt me so I need to find out what they are doing, gather evidence and report it to the police. I spent the entirety of this month’s rent money on a small hidden camera I can carry around in my pocket to take pictures of anything suspicious.
They are trying some new, twisted tactic to get me. I keep seeing the rose bush from the corner of my eyes. When I turn around they keep vanishing. I have noticed Aisha, Valerie and Becky keeping an eye on me from behind the trees, far away benches, from bus windows. I need to get to the bottom of this.
I can’t get caught. The police are looking for the three missing girls. I had to do it. I couldn’t let the cult know where I lived. I’m alone in my battle against this enigmatic cult. I keep seeing more and more rose bushes. I believe that it’s not a normal bush but some sort of psychological hidden message or something. I believe it is tied to their cult somehow. The cult of the rose? I have never heard of that cult but I don’t expect to either. Their influence is much greater than I thought. I had called my parents to tell them about the cult when I realized that there was something off about their voices. Their vocabulary was just not right. They used words which they usually didn’t. The pitch of their voice was an octave off. I believe my parents have either been killed or the line is being intercepted. I had hung up, while pretending I didn’t suspect the cult at all. I can’t rely on their help. The cult of the rose is dangerous. They won’t stop until they have wiped out the only man smart enough to stand against their practices. I had to take them down. I had to figure out how they keep showing me images of the rose bush. I had to figure out how they were messing with my head. I had to interrogate someone. One by one, I ambushed their spies, Aisha, Valerie and Beck. I took them to a remote location to interrogate them. I did not want to hurt people but I had to save myself and the world. I had to know how they were doing what they were doing. Their wills were strong. I tried everything to get the information out; I tried bargaining; I tried threats; I then moved on to violence and finally to torture. It was not use. The control of the cult was strong. No matter what I did to them, they wouldn’t answer me. They wouldn’t tell me what I needed to know. I just hope the cops don’t find their bodies now.
I sit in my dark room. I figured out what they were doing. It’s the lights. They’re using the lights. They’re using mind control devices that look exactly like fluorescent lights. These lights that give off a buzzing sound, use light and sound waves just outside the human visible range to implant subliminal messages and symbolism in the victim’s minds. This is how the cult of the rose controls its members and indoctrinates people. They plan to control the world. I must stop them. Just today I saw them unload crates upon crates upon crates of these devices from a truck. The white van had a rose decal on its side. My house is the only safe place. They are getting desperate. They have even slipped strong acid to the entire city’s tap water to try and get me. I haven’t showered in weeks. I need to plan my next move carefully before they finally get me.
I can’t stay here anymore. Max and Jean were working for the cult. I should have known. They kept banging on my door, trying to convince me I was crazy. I thought they were just naïve; they didn’t understand the reach of the cult of the rose. I thought because they weren’t from this backwater hellhole that they were independent like me. They have been indoctrinated. I don’t know how long they had been working against me. All those pleas to come out were so that the cult could assassinate me. All those cries for eating and drinking well were attempts at poisoning. All the times they told me to go see a doctor were lies and ruses to bring me into the cult’s clutches. No more. Today when I took a sip of my water, I immediately realized by the taste that it had been tampered with. For a split second I had seen Jene approach the bottle this day but I did not think he touched it. I was wrong. That was enough time for him to poison the water. They know I’m going against their cult and they know where I live. They were lowering me into a false sense of security they can ambush me. I’m too smart for the cult of the rose. I fled my apartment today but not before silencing Max and Jean to stop them form reporting to their leaders about my escape. I will continue my fight against the cult of the rose alone. I will kill every member of the cult one by one if I have to.