Showstopper

Hello, HGRPG! It's your friendly neighborhood Matt. I know I've been a terrible member and haven't signed on to this lovely site in a while, but it doesn't change the fact that this place is still my home and I feel comfortable venting to all of you. I've told many of you the situations that transpired over my freshman year, but I recently wrote an essay type composition where I describe how I felt and my perspective of the entire thing. Warning: this describes a very real and very traumatic instance of a murder of a young girl. Read at your own discretion I suppose.

My Friday night was pretty typical for me; endless scrolling through my Tumblr dashboard. Typical fandom memes and funny text posts occupied most of the space, though one picture made me do a double take. That same picture changed my mood and inspired me to write this little essay at midnight.

Innocent looking enough. Three best friends taking a mirror selfie, smiling and enjoying their company. So why, why on earth would this picture having 13,000+ notes currently on Tumblr? In July 2012, the two girls on the left invited the friend on the right to hang out, maybe go to a party or smoke some weed. They drove up to Pennsylvania, close to Sheila's grandparents' farm, and stepped out in the middle of nowhere. On the count of three, the two girls took turns stabbing their supposed best friend and left her dead body in a nearby ditch. If the story in general wasn't chilling enough, it takes an entirely new level of insanity. Those three girls went to my school. And creepier yet? I was close friends with a killer.

Starting my freshman year, "big city" West Virginia was abuzz with amber alerts and search parties trying to locate Skylar Neese. This kind of stuff didn't happen here, so it was an especially big deal when it was over a month and there was still no sign of the girl. I didn't really think much of it at the time; I was far more worried about learning the ropes and trying to survive high school at the time. Moving into a new house that was closer to the school put me in the center of everything, and it was hard to go anywhere without seeing a Missing Person's poster. The fall play auditions were approaching fast, and I was hard at work trying to memorize my monologues to get a good part in the show. And in the end, it all paid off, because I turned out to be the only freshman involved in the play. It was tough enough being a freshman, and being thrust into an extracurricular full of upperclassmen was really terrifying. But luckily for me, I found a friend fast; I'll call just call her Katie. Katie always offered to give me rides home and we frequently hung out together. But it wasn't just me and Katie. Her best friend, Rachel Shoaf, would occasionally tag along.

The first time Rachel spoke to me, I was having a Beatles jam session with a few guys in the show, and she complimented me on my voice. It's so weird looking back on it now, but I don't think she ever said a negative thing about me. Other people in the cast would tell me about how they didn't like her, how she was such a bitch, but I never saw that side of her. She seemed like a fun, down to earth, sweet girl. And boy, was she talented. She would always talk about how her dream was to play Eponine in Les Mis, and she could sing a mean "On My Own". In my mind, without a doubt, I just knew she would be famous. I never expected the kind of fame she received.

After the play, I never really talked to her. She was a Junior and I was a freshman, so we didn't have any classes together or anything like that. I saw her in the halls and we smiled and waved at each other, friendly as could be. In January, things changed. A body was found in a ditch in Pennsylvania with similar clothing to what Skylar was wearing, and hope for the girl returning alive was extinguished. Around that time, I stopped seeing Rachel in the hallways. I was told she was being homeschooled for the torment she received throughout the year, torment I knew nothing of. One rumor is that one person wrote a note saying "KILLER" and shoved it in her locker. I was disgusted, for I knew that she didn't actually do it. She couldn't have done it; she was Rachel, the talented and sweet girl who was very devout in her religion and went out to eat with me. Rumors upon rumors piled up about her and another girl named Shelia, who I never interacted with, drugging her and leaving her with a ruthless drug dealer, or the two of them chanting Satanic rituals while they killed her. The stories were so out there and far fetched that I never once believed them.

The last time I saw Rachel, she was hanging backstage for the musical. I knew she'd love to be apart of it, but it was for her best interest that she didn't put herself out there at that time. Most of the cast ignored her, whispering about her behind her back, but I was part of the select few that gave her a shot. A few months later, when it became public that she pleaded guilty to second degree murder, I STILL defended her. I told people that they don't know the whole story; there could be a million explanations. But I couldn't find any. The only logical conclusion was that she, in fact, did it. I was more mad at myself than I was at her, oddly. I felt like such a fool. All of the things I told her about how I knew she was innocent and that everyone who said otherwise were just assholes. All the times I defended her from the rumors, claiming that she'd never do such a thing. I don't understand it, and I don't think I ever will. I refused to believe the motive, that they just didn't want to be friends with her anymore. But I guess that's all there is. I always try to look for the good in people, and I keep reminding myself of all the times she was so nice to me. Was that all an act too? How much of her was actually real?

Thank you for taking the time to read this. If you have any other questions that the news won't tell you, feel free to ask or shoot me a PM. Love you guys!