I haven't been able to leave my room for three days and my mother is becoming increasingly panicked about my mental state. She thinks I might try to kill myself. I don't know why she'd care if I did, since she's never made much of an effort with me. She even threatened to call Dad. I'll go downstairs tomorrow, when the sun is high.

Jess' bedroom. That's what I'm supposed to write about, right? That's what I said I'd do?

It wasn't locked, but it was closed off. I don't know how to describe it. It was like the room was a separate part of the house. When I stepped through the door, I swear the temperature dropped by about ten degrees and the air was different. When I flicked the lights on I nearly burst into tears.

Almost every inch of the walls was covered with sheets of paper with black scribbles all over them. This one same design kept repeating, like a O with an X scrawled through it. I'll post some photos after this post if I can – I'm not 100% on how this blog website thing works yet. I tore some down and took them home with me. It was so wrong. Jess had photos of us together and a couple of old family photos taped to the wall over her bed, but they were covered by the weird drawings. Why? Why would she do that? I tore some of the papers down and shoved them in my pocket.

The first photo I uncovered wasn't me and Jess. It was an old family photo. Jess must have been about six when it was taken, all skinned knees and rosy cheeks, squashed between her mother and a figure who could have been a photocopy of the Jess I knew and loved. Jess mostly refused to talk about her dead big sister, except on the nights when it all got too much and she'd cuddle up close to me and whisper things. Laurie used to take her camping. Laurie's love of dancing. Laurie's sad smile.

The photo was old and blurry, taken sometime around sunset. A smiling family, framed by their porch against the glowing, golden forest behind them, blurring trees into tall, willowy figures with reaching arms. Laurie looked sad. I nearly took the photo with me, but decided not to at the last minute. I didn't need to steal things from a pair of grieving parents.

I lay down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling, fighting the growing urge to sob. It was painful to be here, in this room where we'd made so many memories. We'd planned our trip to the Americas here. I'd shown her my scars here. She had applied for vet school here. How many times had we stretched out on this bed and just lain together, Jess curled into my side like a kitten, my fingers tangled through her hair, breathing and being as one?

My fingers stretched past my head, trailing across the cotton sheets, burrowing under the heavy pillow. It still smelled like her, even a month after her disappearance. My left index finger brushed something hard. Reaching a little further, I stretched out and closed my fingers around it, pulling it from beneath the pillow and towards me. I sat up without looking at it, but I could tell what it was from the shape. It's a memory stick. I haven't checked out what's on it yet, but I will tomorrow, maybe.

I can't stop thinking about the implications of that memory stick. The police searched her room, so surely they would have found something like this and checked it or taken it as evidence or something? I don't know how these things actually work outside of silly American police procedurals. If they didn't find it, they either did a sloppy job of searching the room or it was placed there after they did the search. I'm not sure which is a worse reason.

I checked the drawer in the bedside table, the desk drawers, the wardrobe, under the bed, beneath the rug. Nothing but more drawings. I'm going to google the symbol tonight.