1.

The branch in Claire's head wasn't pulled out completely the night she was found...leaving everyone wondering where she was and what happened to her. Leading to a completely different story.

"Claire; breakfast! Would you please tell your daughter to get her fanny out of bed?" Claire's mother asked her husband.

"Claire drag your fanny out of bed!" Noah called up the stairs and proceeded to make his way to the kitchen for a quick meal before work.

Another two minutes passed in the house with still no glimpse of the cheerleader; leading Mrs. Bennet to march up the stairs and to knock loudly on the door.

"Claire, I'm coming in there!" She entered, only to find her daughter's bed was empty and made. The woman frowned and went back down the stairs.

"Did you get on to her" Lyle asked eagerly.

"Lyle," His father reprimanded him and looked to his wife. Who could only shake her head in confusion. "I think she left early."

"Why would you say that?" Noah asked.

"Well, her beds made and her school bag's gone...'SO' obviously she isn't here."

Strange enough, the three family members didn't dwell on those thoughts for very long and chalked it up to Claire being responsible about school.

That night, when Noah Bennet entered his house, he was surprised to find two police officers talking to his wife in the living room.

"Honey, what's going on?" He asked.

His wife turned to him, "I got a call from the school-Claire wasn't there today and...she never came home afterwards..." She turned back to the officers in front of her.

"Now," began one of the men. "you said she went to the Bonfire last night?"

"Yes."

"Is there anyone who you can name who she would have talked to there."

"Probably the whole football and cheerleading teams." She said, burying her face in Mr. Muggles fur.

"Anything you would like to add," The officer turned to Mr. Bennet.

Noah nodded, "Claire would have talked to Jackie and that Quarterback the most...outside of them...her only other friend is this kid Zach...but I don't see him going anywhere like that..."

The officers nodded and made their way out by themselves.

As soon as they were gone, Noah hurried up the stairs to Claire's room. Where he started to look through her things, he ignored the presence of his wife when she finally came up.

"I already checked..there's no sign that I saw she would have left with anybody...there isn't even any sign she kept anything in here she didn't want us to see." The woman laughed. "Either she is very smart or we just have the perfect law-abiding daughter." She said as she sat on Claire's bed next to her husband.

"I'd go with the first one, as much as I hate to say it." Noah said as he place one arm around his wife and touched her shoulder. The woman laughed, giving one last glimpse around the room before she led her husband back down to the living room.

The next morning, the Bennet household was filled with nothing but silence. So much silence that even Mr. Muggles kept his barking to a level zero.

Teresa tried to keep herself occupied by doing random chores around the kitchen. Noah just went off to work without a word to everyone else. While Lyle just sat in the living room watching cartoons with the dog.

It wasn't until noon that day, when a police car drove up to the Bennet's house and two police officers, one male and one female, got out and rang the doorbell.

Lyle was the closest, he got up without a word and went to answer the door. Upon seeing the grim looking faces of the officers in front of him, he immediately called for his mother.

It didn't take long for her to rush to the front door,

"Did you find her? Where is she?" She asked desperately.

The officer looked down ashamed, as if he was the cause of the teenage girl's disappearance.

"I'm sorry to tell you this, but...a body of a teenage girl was pulled out of Red River Creek as 4 am yesterday morning, we weren't informed of it until today...we need you or your husband to come in to identify the body." The male officer spoke.

What was surprising was how fast the woman had her purse ready, and how she approached the topic.

"The faster I identify the body, the faster I can tell you it's not Claire and that she is anywhere else but in a morgue right?" She pushed past them and went to her car, there weren't that many crimes committed near them so she already knew where she had to go.

Lyle just stayed behind, waited for the officer to overcome their disbelief then leave, and went back to watching television with Mr. Muggles.

He could hold his breath for now; he could keep from crying. Everyone could...they were just afraid of what would happen when they started.

To be continued...