Nicole Herrera

**Nicole Herrera** is one of Maddie's best friends.

## History

### Blackmailing Mr. Anderson

Nicole recorded a video of Mr. Anderson and Claire Zomer talking about Claire blackmailing him for good grades in exchange for her keeping quiet about some money he'd stolen from the school. She then used the video to blackmail Mr. Anderson herself, for a cut of the money, which she planned to use to go to school in Chicago after two different art schools told her her portfolio wasn't good enough to get a scholarship.

### Maddie's Party

When Maddie's mother was sobering up, Simon said she should throw a party. They decided to invite all their friends, meaning Nicole, who happily accepted.

### Maddie's Disappearance

When Maddie disappeared, Nicole and Simon both struggled to sleep. At the school assembly, Nicole was annoyed that the cheerleaders were doing their routine and left to put up missing person fliers around the school. In Ms. Fields' class, Nicole point out that the jacket that had been placed on Maddie's seat wasn't Maddie's as she wouldn't wear something like that. Ms. Fields said it was hers and she'd placed it there to hold a place for Maddie until she returned. Simon felt it was an empty gesture and ended up fighting with Xavier, whom he believed knew something. The fight culminated in Simon grabbing Xavier's bag, spilling the contents, including Maddie's phone. Nicole questioned why he had her phone. After class, Nicole and Simon watched Xavier in the office. Simon was convinced that Xavier had done something to Maddie, though Nicole was less certain.

Nicole and Simon later attended the vigil for Maddie, though when they went to go outside, Simon said he needed a minute and he'd catch up with her. After the vigil, Nicole found Simon in Ms. Fields' classroom and said they were going to search for Maddie in the woods. Simon left to join her.

Nicole asked Simon what he did when Maddie appeared out of nowhere and showed him a photo memory of her and Maddie that had come up. She was convinced Maddie would come back for HorrorCon and planned to by them tickets. They also noticed Ms. Chung watching them and Nicole said she was the grief counselor. She later saw Ms. Chung in the hallway, again watching her.

### Searching for Maddie

While working in the library, Nicole got a notification that Maddie had liked one of her photos. She immediately texted Simon that she thought she knew where Maddie was and went there herself, to a closed factory where Maddie used to hang out. Xavier followed her there and told her he'd been cleared by the police as Mr. South had seen her in the boys' bathroom, but people had already made up their minds about him. They were both frustrated that the police seemed to have given up on finding Maddie and decided to go look for her themselves. They teamed up with Sandra and went out to the woods, where Nicole found Maddie's ticket, which Xavier saw she had the last time he saw her. It was covered in a boot print, which Sandra confirmed matched Maddie's boot.

Nicole was upset because she had to interview Claire as a homecoming candidate for her media class. She vented to Simon about this and also told him the police had searched the area around where they'd found Maddie's boot prints and found more, leading to a service road. She believed Maddie was alive and survived what happened in the boiler room. Simon told her he'd ben talking to Maddie. Nicole said she had as well because Maddie wasn't really gone and Nicole planned to prove it at Horror Con because she was convinced Maddie wouldn't miss it. Simon told her that Maddie was gone, despite what Nicole wanted to believe.

Nicole interviewed Claire, but confronted her over pretending to care about Maddie even though they weren't friends. Claire said she would give up being Homecoming Queen if it would bring Maddie back. They hadn't been friends in a long time, but she said she was still upset that Maddie was gone.

Nicole and Xavier left school to go to Horror Con. Nicole ranted about Claire and was upset when Xavier didn't join her. When she questioned it, he admitted that he'd been cheating on Maddie with Claire. Despite her anger at him, Nicole continued on to Horror Con, but made him stay in the car. She searched for Maddie, but no one had seen her. Xavier left the car and found Nicole. Nicole told him he was supposed to look out for Maddie, but she was gone. Xavier said he knew he'd failed her. He wished he could take it back, but he couldn't. She told him she really thought Maddie would be a Horror Con and she was finally thinking Maddie might really be gone like Simon had said.

### Homecoming

When Maddie learned from Xavier that the police had found Maddie's backpack in an abandoned house, she passed the news on to Simon. He was upset that she was still working with Xavier. When Xavier came to them and told them the house in question was owned by Claire's stepfather and was about to be torn down, Simon said he still wasn't convinced that Xavier didn't have something to do with Maddie's disappearance. Once he left, Nicole and Simon argued about him and Nicole said she was upset that Simon was pushing her away because she didn't want to lose two friends.

Nicole went to the homecoming game, where she passed out missing person flyers with Sandra, Xavier, and Simon. While they were there, Xavier, Simon, and Nicole all received a text with a video of Claire blackmailing Mr. Anderson about the stolen money to give her straight As. They met up and wondered about who recorded it and why that person sent it to them. Xavier wanted to give the video to his dad, but Nicole said that would make his dad suspect him again and they didn't have time to keep clearing his name. When Sandra said she was done for the night and wanted to go home, Nicole offered to take her. At Nicole's car, Sandra asked if she thought Maddie would forgive her and come home. Nicole said she liked to think everyone could be forgiven for anything if their hearts are in the right place.

When Claire agreed to go to the Homecoming Dance with Xavier, Nicole helped him get ready. Then she went to the dance with Simon, where Simon set up a picture of Maddie, hoping to guilt Claire into confessing. After Xavier came to them and told them Claire was a good liar, Simon told him he needed to push her harder, angering him and causing him to storm off and say he'd figure it out on his own. Then Sandra called and said she'd heard someone in her backyard and thought it was Maddie. She didn't want to call the cops because she thought they'd scare Maddie off, so Nicole went to Sandra's house to check it out.

By the time Nicole got there, she didn't find anyone in the yard, but she said she believed Sandra that Maddie was out there. Nicole was there when Sheriff Baxter came to the door and told Sandra that they'd found a possible murder weapon by the house where Maddie's backpack had been found and connected it to a school employee, who had been detained for questioning. They believed Maddie had a large amount of money and that person wanted it.

Later that night, Nicole was outside, digging in the rain.

Nicole was suspicious when Claire joined their investigation, as Claire hadn't spoken to Maddie in years. While Claire, Xavier, and Simon went to the sheriff's station to see what the police had on Mr. South, whom they believed was innocent, Nicole remained at school and went to the AV lab, where she kicked a freshman off a computer so she could use it. Then she asked Mr. Balkin if there were back-ups if something got deleted from the hard drive. He told her the program auto-saved every three minutes, so you just needed to know where to look to retrieve deleted files. She found the video recording of Mr. Anderson and Claire and deleted the back-up. Simon saw her do this and confronted her over blackmailing Mr. Anderson. She told him that she was doing it so they could all go to Chicago together and stay friends. Simon asked her where the money was. He wanted to turn it into the police so they would see that Mr. South didn't have it, leading them closer to figuring out what actually happened to Maddie. Nicole took Simon out to the woods, where she'd buried the money the night of the dance. She dug a hole where she'd buried it, but the money wasn't there. They heard someone moving in the woods, so Simon went to chase them.

Xavier wanted Nicole to go to the police and admit to the blackmail to exonerate Mr. South, but Nicole and Claire were worried about the consequences of that. They decided to wait because they had no proof they were telling the truth. When Xavier got an address of where another break-in had occurred, they went to stake it out. Several hours later, Xavier got tired of waiting and he and Nicole went inside. Claire ran inside when she saw someone approaching the house. Xavier chased the person, but they took his truck and backed it into him. Nicole recorded the truck driving off and then called an ambulance, which came and took Xavier away. Nicole sent the video, which showed Maddie as the driver, to Simon.

## Relationships

### Familial

According to her, her parents can only afford for her to go to community college.

### Friendships

She, Maddie Nears, and Simon Elroy were best friends.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Séance Anything
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 My So-Called Death
3. ↑ The Fault of Our Scars
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Dead and Confused
5. ↑ Ghoul Intentions
6. ↑ The Twilight End Zone
7. ↑ Grave the Last Dance
8. ↑ Madison's Body