The Book of Death by Alexis Sapp (best business books of all time .txt) 📖

She looked at me and said 'Burn the book.' And then, she died. Right there in front of my eyes, she died. I panicked. I knew my parents would be up soon so I grabbed the book and hid it behind my desk. My mom came in to wake me. I pretended not to know. My parents weren't even going to tell me. Then as I was about to leave for school, I heard a tap on my window. So I ran to the forest. I hurt my ankle but kept running. Then I had a voice in my head. I didn't recognize the voice at all.But, for some reason I felt I should listen to it. It told me to get in a tree so I did. When I got into the tree, a weird creature flew above looking for me. I call it a Lanther. Then I got your text." I choked the words out in between sobs.

The whole time I was talking Jake didn't say a word. Just sat and listened. Nodding every once in a while to show he was still listening. He thought for a minute before speaking. "So, that's how Abby died... What about your parents? The police said they found them dead too. They suspect it was you. They're looking everywhere for you."

This was too much to handle. I buried my face in Jake's shirt. I busted out crying.Again. I couldn't help it. I woke up this morning and I was one of two daughters of two rich doctors in a nice house with good friends and everything I could ever want. It's only five hours later and I'm the last remaining member of a family, carrying around a cursed killer book and the only friend I have left Is Jake and I guess I don't have a house anymore.

I was crying so hard my throat began to close. Jake's shirt was now soaked with tears. He didn't mind though. He just sat with his arms around me, trying to help. Eventually I cried myself out. I finally went silent. By then, I was tired and honestly didn't know what to say anymore.

After waiting a few seconds to see if I was going to say anything, Jake spoke. "It wasn't you was it?" I looked up. "Okay really? Of course it wasn't me! I can't believe you would even ask that!..." I was about to go off on him, but he covered my mouth with his hand. "Chill out, I was kidding." "Not funny." "Actually,..." I gave him the evil eye and he didn't bother to finish his sentence.

"What should we do May?" I thought for a moment, trying to look for a response. I found nothing. "If I knew what to do I wouldn't have had you come here." "So no idea huh?" "Pretty much. If it weren't for the voice in my head I wouldn't have made it this far." I checked my phone. Noon. "We've been here over an hour. We should get moving. I don't know where we should go, but we can't stay here long." "Good call." "Where to?" "How about we walk to town in the morning and find a small restaurant or something and figure it out from there?" "Okay, but what'll we do until then?" "Just chill in the forest I guess. I'll go home when the bus would normally drop me off, eat dinner, then come back out here for a bit." "Okay. What should we do until then?" "First, we should make sure nobody can track us. Gimme your phone."

I handed over my phone and watched as he took the SIM card out and snapped it half, then in half again. "I'll shred it when I go home. I'll do the same with mine tomorrow morning. I need it now in case my mom calls." I kept watching as he took the back of my phone and broke it in half, then slid they keyboard out. I turned away now. I loved my phone and didn't want to watch what I knew was coming. I know it sounds superficial, but that phone was like my baby. Once I heard 5 snaps, I turned back. One snap broke the texting keyboard off, one broke the number keypad off, one broke the rest in half, and the other two broke the keyboards in half. "What are you gonna do with the pieces?" Jake didn't respond, just begun to dig a small hole. Great, My phone was gone and now he was burying it. Could this day get any worse? I didn't fight it though. I knew it was for the best. I just hated that now, I had no contact with the outside world. As far as they knew I was dead. I guess that's the point. I still didn't like it.

"Now what?" Jake looked thoughtful for a second. He smiled and pointed up. "Race ya to the top of that tree." "You're on." Then just like five year olds, we both hopped up and ran towards the tree, getting ourselves up to the top as quickly as we could. I won. Once at the top I sat for a minute on a branch, but I got bored. I hung upside-down from my knees and took my hands off. I heard Jake's voice coming from the branch beside mine. "Are you insane? Get back up here." He was trying not to laugh. I could tell by the tone in his voice. I pretended to be thinking for a second then shrugged. I put my hands back on the branch and let my feet drop. Laughing, I swung by my hands on the branch. "Seriously May, cut that out." He was laughing. I looked up, giving a devious grin. I steadied myself on the branch. Once I was done swinging I let go, dropping onto the branch three feet below me. The look on Jake's face was priceless. Once he saw I was fine he busted out laughing. When he was done laughing he did the same so we were now on the same branch. He smiled. "Tag, you're it." He poked my arm and swung down to a lower branch. He descended the tree and ran.

For the rest of the afternoon we ran around in the forest, acting childish, but having fun. At 3:00 Jake's phone beeped, signaling the end of our afternoon in the forest. We met back at the hideaway. "I'll be back at about five." "Okay. See ya then." Jake smiled and gave me a hug. "Bye May." "Bye Jake." He walked away, throwing a smile over his shoulder.

Once he was out of sight I started to climb back up the tallest tree. I don't really know why, I just wanted to see how high I would let myself go I guess. I got about eighty feet up before I stopped. I decided it probably wasn't good to be this high with the Lanther still lurking in the skies. I didn't know if the Lanther was still there or not, but better safe then sorry. I lowered myself down to about thirty feet. Oh crap. I left my backpack at the base of the tree. I sighed and began to lower myself down. By the time I finally got back down, an hour had passed. I picked up my backpack and threw it on my back.
I started to ascend the tree again. I heard a strange noise from behind me. I turned on my heels. phew, just a squirrel. Scared the daylights out of me. I heard another noise just off to my right. I turned to see Ashlee standing behind me.

"Ashlee, what are you doing here?" "Eh just wanted to see if you were okay." "How'd you know I'd be here?" "Oh please, everyone knows you and Jake come here a lot." "Okay. Why do you care if I'm okay? Everyone thinks I'm a killer." "Nah. Most people figure it wasn't you because you would never do something like that." "Well, what do you think?" "I don't think you did it." I let out breath. "Sit down, I'll tell you what happened." I explained what happened. Ashlee just sad and listened, nodding occasionally. Once I has finished explaining what happened, Ashlee was speechless. After she coordinated herself, she said "Uh-huh. Why you?" "Dunno"

'Don't trust her. Pretend you do, but don't.' Thank you. It was the voice again. Finally, I've been needing to hear from you. 'About time you speak voice. Why can't I trust Ashlee? She's been my friend for like, ever.' 'She's playing you, she wants to lead you into their trap. Just stay here and wait for Jake. He should be here any minute.' 'Okay.'

So, Ashlee starts to go on and on about what the police say happened. I smile and pretend to be listening, really I'm just thinking to myself how much of a traitor she is. 'Don't feed me this crap. You're just going to kill me later. Mhmm, yeah you came to help me alright. I wonder what Jake would say if I killed her here. I have a knife. Hmm. Nah, I'll at least wait for Jake to get here.'

"...and I came to help." "Mhmm, and how can you help me?" "Well I took a survival course once. I can help you survive." "Hmm. Okay, tell ya what. Go home and think. If tomorrow you still want to help me, meet me here at noon. Okay?" "Deal. See ya at noon tomorrow." And with that she was off. She skipped away with a smile on her face.

Just when Ashlee disappeared from the forest, Jake came into the clearing. He was holding a brown paper bag.

He smiled and waved when he saw me. When he got to where I sat, he helped me up, and we walked back to the hideaway together. We sat on the ground, and he handed me the paper bag. I opened it up to find a sandwich and a cookie. "Thought you might be hungry." "I am. Thank you." "Eh no problem. Wouldn't want you to starve to death." We both laughed for a minute."Ashlee stopped by." "No way. Why?" "Well she was feeding me some bull crap story about how she wanted to help me, and that she was on my side. Right before she started talking the voice told me not to trust her. To pretend I trust her, but to not." "Oh,I see." "Yeah. So I told her to go home and think about it for the night, and that if she still wanted to help me tomorrow to meet me here at noon." "So, she'll be here at noon and we shouldn't be around when she gets here?" "Yep. What should we do? Where should we go?" " Well, I'll meet you here at eight. And we can get an early start into town. Sound good?" "Okay." I began to eat my sandwich. I took small bites so it would last longer. Once I was done eating, I folded up the bag and put it in my backpack.

I set my backpack on my back. "What now?" "Well, we should find a place for you to stay for the night while I'm gone." "Take to the trees?" "Exactly what I was thinking." We both looked around. I pointed to a tree directly to my right. It was perfect. It was tall and had lots of leaves to hide in. He nodded and we both stood up and walked towards it. Once at the base he gestured for me to go first, so I got onto the lowest branch and began to climb. Jake was following closely at my heels. I stopped about fifty feet up. I sat