A rainy November morning, Sylvia was walking to the bus stop to get to school. It’s been three weeks since her boyfriend died in a car crash. She’s still recovering, but pushing herself to live a normal life again, or as normal as is possible. Ever since the accident, she’s been getting tons of messages from friends and family who support her and want to bring her comfort in this time of her life. Besides these messages, she’s also been getting messages on Instagram from Andrew, her boyfriends best friend. He is very handsome, but she’s getting the creeps from his messages. Always wanting to meet up in his apartment, wanting to take her to dinner, … He needs to know his boundaries and stop messaging her, but she’s not comfortable enough to say this to him, just yet.

While walking to the bus stop, she receives another message from Andrew. “Hey gorgeous, how are you doing today? Want to meet up after school? I’ll cook you dinner so you don’t have to.”. She tries to laugh about receiving yet another ridiculous message from him, but instead, she stands still in the middle of the road and starts to cry. It took her a minute or two to realize that she had passed the bus stop, and the bus was already pulling up. She runs towards the bus while waving, but the bus driver couldn’t care less and drives off, without Sylvia in the bus. She starts crying again and sits on the curbs as she realizes the next bus arrives in just another hour.

Whilst thinking about another plan, walking towards the nearest grocery store – which is a 20 minute walk – and take the next connection there instead of waiting for an hour, Sylvia receives another message on Instagram. Andrew again. “Why are you ignoring me again? It’s not like last summer when we hooked up while you and Roger were still together. Stop being a baby and message me!”. She puts down her phone with a sigh and stands up. She puts in her headphones to listen to some relaxing music and starts walking towards the grocery store.

Just when she put on her favorite song, it starts raining. Of course, rain, just what she needed. She started walking a bit faster, to get to the grocery store faster. All the streetlights are off already, which is nothing weird since it’s almost 10AM, but with the rain and clouds in the sky, it’s very dark. Walking down this dark empty road makes her panic in her head a bit. But Sylvia keeps walking. She keeps looking over her shoulder, as she has a feeling someone is following her, but there’s not a soul to be seen.

Sylvia can see the grocery store in the distance already, but it’s still a 5-minute walk. She slows down to catch her breath. Her phone vibrates. She looks at the screen of her phone, while it gets wet. A phone number which she doesn’t recognize. Maybe it’s a family member of Roger to check in on her? She doubts for a second if she is going to answer the call or not. Sylvia stops walking and answers the phone with slightly shaking hands. “Hello? Who is this?”, she asks, but the person on the other side of the phone doesn’t answer her. “Hello again? Who is this and how can I help you?” she says in a quite annoyed tone of voice. “Sylvia?”, a man on the other side of the phone asks. “Yes, this is her?”, Sylvia answers with a shaking voice. It’s silent for at least 20 seconds before the person ends the phone call. Sylvia is shaking even more now and needs to sit down for a second. Who was this? Why did they have her number? What was the purpose of calling her? She starts crying.

After a quick minute, Sylvia finds the mood to get going again. Right when she starts walking again, she hears something or someone in the bushes on the right. She freezes and looks around, but no-one to be seen. She starts walking again, it’s all in her head, she figures. After a couple of minutes, she finally arrived at the grocery store. There’s police everywhere on the crossroads in front of the grocery store, “What the hell happened here?”, she wonders. She stops and stares from a safe distance, but quickly decides to walk over to the bus stop. The bus is only one minute away. She sighs in relief. An older woman, who is also waiting for the bus, quickly looks up and gives Sylvia a comforting smile.