North End: The Black Forest

by Amanda Turner

  We trekked through well over half of the library, and as we were closing in on a section most students avoided—the dark magic section—I began to get nervous. But Miles suddenly took a left turn, veering away from the dreaded section. We walked between two tall bookcases to a room encased with glass. Inside were more rows of cases, but instead of books lining their shelves there were hundreds of DVDs. To the outside world I assumed DVDs were outdated, but North End didn’t even have cable, so this was high tech for us. Technology wasn’t very important in our culture. Most witches associated it with the human world, so they either had no interest or need. But even witches enjoyed watching films from time to time.

  Miles pushed open the glass door and stretched his arms out as if he was presenting the room to me. “Here we are! Comedies are right over here.” I followed him to the comedy section.

  “You must spend a lot of time here. You know your way around,” I commented as we browsed the selection.

  He simply shrugged. “I like to read. You pick one movie and I’ll pick another. Then we’ll decide between the two.” I liked the way he had things planned out already, instead of putting me on the spot. I wasn’t great with decision making. We didn’t spend much time browsing. I picked out one option and Miles did, too. He held them behind his back and told me to pick a hand.

  “Hmmmm. Left?” I said as I pointed towards his left hand. He held out the movie that I had picked. “Yes!” I cheered, even though I didn’t care what movie we watched. I barely even remembered the title.

  * * *

  When we reached Miles’ door, he hopped in front of me to unlock it and hold it open. “After you,” he said. I stepped in. It wasn’t the first boy’s room I had ever been in, but it was by far the nicest. I wondered if his uncle had hooked him up with a nicer room. It was on a corner which meant more space. And instead of one large window he had two, but they were both covered with tall, black curtains identical to the ones over my window.

  “Can you see the ocean from here?” I asked, pointing toward the window.

  “Not quite, but you can see the Black Forest, which is kind of spooky at night.” He pulled back the curtains, and I cupped my hands on the glass so I could see outside. There it was. The Black Forest in all its spine-chilling glory. The fog was, of course, covering the ground below the trees. It was straight out of a horror film.

  “Nice,” I said, awkwardly. I pulled back from the window and turned to face Miles, suddenly realizing he was standing very close to me. Our bodies were almost touching. Neither of us said a word, but I could practically feel the electricity in the air. Suddenly, I wasn’t sure what to do with my body. There was only one chair in the room, and it was under a desk on the other side of two beds. I shifted my weight to my right foot and crossed my arms not wanting to assume I could just plop down on his bed. Luckily, Miles took the lead by taking a step around me to sit down on his bed first.

  “Have a seat,” he told me as he patted his bed. “I’ll get the movie set up.” I took a seat and leaned back on his pillows trying to look relaxed.

  “My roommates are at a party so it should just be us for a while,” he said as he put in the DVD. I didn’t even have a DVD player in my room. It must have been his father’s. He was part of the human world after all.

  “Do you like your roommates?” I asked, glancing over to their side of the room. It was littered with clothes and old socks. Miles’ side was the exact opposite. Neat and tidy.

  “Yeah. They’re good guys. We’re not best friends or anything. Probably because I keep to myself a lot of the time, but we get along. How about you?”

  “Well, my relationship with Ava and Daliah is like the relationship you have with your roommates. They’re fun to be around and we’ve grown close this school year, but we aren’t best friends. Lillian is my third roommate, but we’re more like sisters.”

  “Yeah, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you two apart during lunch,” he laughed.

  “We’ve been best friends since my first day here. I was scared and shy, hiding in the corner and she came over to me.”

  “She seems really sweet. We should all hang out sometime. I’ve never really talked to her.”

  “She’d like that. She’s heard all about you,” I slipped. My cheeks burned with embarrassment, but Miles turned to look at me with a grin on his face.

  “Really?” he asked. I just shrugged and pretended to admire his posters of different famous landmarks around the world so I didn’t have to make eye contact. Miles had the DVD set up and came to join me on the bed. He laid back on his pillows, too. His bed was full size, so we weren’t forced to squish together, but our bodies were still tilted slightly towards each other, our hands just an inch apart. I still felt the electricity in the air and a magnetic pull to touch him. I was glad he left the lights on.

  The movie started to load and previews for old films popped up on the screen. “Josie,” Miles whispered, his voice rough. I turned my head and his eyes were burning through mine. “I--I,” he said like he was searching for the right words to say. Then his lips were on mine. This kiss wasn’t like the rest. The spark was palpable. We moved towards each other, and I wrapped my arms around his shoulders. My legs intertwined with his. I pulled back to take a breath and inhaled his cologne, some sort of spice, and his breath—minty. Before I could think again, he pulled me back in. I wasn’t sure how long we stayed like that—our bodies interlaced, his hands moving down mine. All of a sudden, the theme music for the music began to play. Loud. It startled me and I pulled back, jumping.

  We both laughed and I said “sorry” breathlessly. He leaned in to give me one more kiss on the cheek before turning to face the TV. He kept one arm around me though. I laid my head on his chest and finally relaxed. I could feel his heartbeat under my head, slow and steady. Every so often he would run his hands through my hair or kiss the top of my head, and his heart rate would quicken just a little. I couldn’t focus much on the movie. I was too busy soaking in this feeling. With Miles, I felt almost complete. I hadn’t even come close to feeling this way since I lost my mom.

  I was so happy when I was growing up. I never questioned if I was loved or felt like something was missing. Then Headmistress Craw and Professor Rose showed up at my room that night, and everything I knew came crashing down around me. They told me about the crash, how my father tried to save her. As soon as the words came out of their mouths, I felt a hole rip through my chest. Something in me was gone. I felt the sharp pain of that hole every minute of every day until this moment. The hole was still there. It always would be, but the pain was dulled. Lillian helped with that, too. I knew I was never completely alone. She was my family. Now Miles felt like part of that, too.

  I kept half watching the movie and cuddling Miles for a while until he wiggled out from under me. “Care if we pause this for a second? I need to run to the restroom.”

  “Sure,” I said. He pressed pause and mumbled a “be right back” before heading out the door. It was somewhat quiet, but I could hear mumbles of students in other rooms. Not sure what else to do, I started looking around. There were posters hung on every wall. His roommates’ posters mostly consisted of cars and bands. I glanced behind me to see Miles had a painting of the Colosseum in Italy. I wondered if he bought it while he was there with his dad.

  Miles still wasn’t back, so I looked at the books he had sitting on his nightstand. A couple were classroom textbooks I recognized, but a few must have been from the library. A book of charms. A book about nature. At the very bottom was a black book with a textured cover bound by a leather strap. There was no name on the binding of the book. I didn’t want Miles to come in and see me looking through his books like a snoop, so I turned back to lay on the pillows again. A few minutes passed by and there was still no sign of him. Curiosity started to get the best of me. I had never seen anything like this book before.

  I got up and sprinted to the door, looking both ways down the long hall. It was empty. Miles wa
sn’t headed back yet. One peek wouldn’t hurt, I told myself. I went back to the nightstand and picked up the book. I felt a pang of guilt now that it was in my hands. What if this is his private journal? If that was the case, I promised myself I would close it right away.

  I undid the leather band and noticed there was no name on the front cover either. Just rough, black material. I opened to the middle of the book to find a page of spells handwritten in deep red ink. But I had never seen them before. I wondered how advanced Miles was in his practice of witchcraft. He obviously studied a lot more than I did, but I couldn’t be that far behind him. Were these his personal spells he was attempting to create? That would be very advanced for such a young witch.

  I flipped through the book slowly, not because I was looking too intently at the spells, but because the pages were so thin and fragile it seemed like they might fall out of the book or disintegrate, even. I reached the final page in the book and finally found a title of some sort. In bold print, in the middle of the page read “Angelus Mortis.” My hands began to tremble.

  A scream pierced through the walls and echoed through the halls. It was a loud, shrill shriek of mortal terror. I yelped in response and tossed the book back on the nightstand before jumping onto Miles’ bed. I sat for a moment, listening, but only heard silence. Then the footsteps of more than one person shuffling in the hall. I slid the black book underneath the rest, right where I found it and stood. It sounded like the footsteps were heading towards where the scream came from, so I ran to open the door.

  Several boys were lingering in the hallway by their doors while a brave few were making their way to the end of it. That was where the scream came from. I moved timidly out of the door frame and, pausing after each step, made my way towards the end of the hall. My heart sputtered with anticipation and dread. I could see it before I got too close. The horrified looks on the boys’ faces. The terror on the two girls who seemed out of place in the hallway filled with boys. Their hands were covering their mouths and their eyes were wide.

  There on the floor at the end of the hallway where the paths branched in three different directions was a girl, who looked even younger than me, crumpled on the floor. The way her body was arranged showed that more than a couple of her bones were broken. A pool of blood was coming from her head. It was too much to look at. I went to turn away and go back to the room, but at that exact moment Miles came around the corner with blood soaking his shirt. His face was emotionless.

  I froze. “Angelus Mortis” means “angel of death.” Just then the Headmistress came storming around the corner with three of the medical ward staff behind her. She turned to the crowd of people gathered in the hall.

  “Get back to your rooms immediately!” Her voice was ice and her cloudy eyes were wild with alarm. The medical staff picked up the body of the young girl and moved her to a gurney. The crowd started moving quickly around me. They knew better than to wait around for the Headmistress to ask again. But I was stuck. My eyes were locked with Miles’. His mouth dropped open like he was in shock. I wanted to cross the scene and ask him what was going on, but the Headmistress said, “Preston, come with me.” She grabbed him firmly by the arm and led him down the hall.

  “I’m sorry, Josie,” he said before he turned his head and disappeared around the corner. The body of the young girl was being wheeled down the hall behind them. I was alone in the hallway then and I started to shiver harder and harder until I was nearly convulsing and couldn’t stop my body from moving. What should I do now? Why did Miles say he was sorry? I didn’t know exactly what happened to the young girl, but her surviving seemed impossible. If another witch was responsible for her injuries, should I be walking the halls alone? I decided to go back to Miles' room even though the empty, silent walls didn’t sound appealing. At least I could safely call Lillian from there and ask her to come walk me back.

  Without being fully aware of the motions I was going through, I made it back to the room and sat on the bed. My shaking had slowed, but I felt like I was going into some sort of shock. My pulse had quickened, but it was returning to normal now and an unwelcome numbness was spreading over my body. I pulled my flip phone out of my pocket and dialed Lillian. My voice was too calm on the phone and it confused her.

  “Wait, wait, what happened?” she asked. “Guys, shut up! I can’t hear Josie!” she yelled to the group of girls that were laughing in the background. I heard a few giggles and one girl say, “Tell her to kiss her boyfriend for us!” It sounded like my roommate Ava.

  “I think someone died,” I repeated softly. “A girl was found in the hallway here. Miles is gone and I don’t know what to do.” My voice was even and suddenly I was so thankful for the numbness. If I thought about the situation for too long, I would surely go into hysterics.

  “What happened to her?” Lillian asked with terror in her voice.

  “I think she was murdered,” I stated as calmly as if I were discussing a school assignment.

  “We’re coming to get you,” she responded firmly. “Give us five minutes.” The phone went dead and I sat in silence waiting for them to come. Any noise from gatherings or parties I was able to hear before was now gone. It was so quiet I could hear my ears ringing. Laying back on the bed, I pictured everyone in their rooms, sitting with friends or alone like me, and staring at the walls, trying to understand what just happened, what we just saw. Some of them had probably never seen a dead body before. I had only seen one.

  Maybe some were whispering theories about who did this to the girl. I refused to let my thoughts go any further than that. If I started wondering who had done this, I would start thinking of the black book on Miles’ nightstand, how he said he was sorry, and the expression on his face when he rounded the corner with blood on his shirt.

  The door swung open without a knock and Lillian barged in. Our roommates, Ava and Daliah, followed her. “There’s blood on the floor out there, Josie! What happened?” Lillian whisper-yelled.

  “I’ll tell you everything I know when we get to the room. I can’t stay here anymore,” I replied, nearly jumping off the bed. She nodded and put her delicate arm around me. We made the walk back to my room in silence. On our way, an announcement was made over the intercom. Headmistress Craw ordered each student to return to their rooms and lock the doors. She said there had been an incident and a student was attacked, but she didn’t divulge anymore. She didn't need to. Word traveled fast in this school. The students with phones had undoubtedly already texted their friends, and the ones that didn’t would meet in the bathroom to exchange information tonight.

  Our pace was swift as we made our way to the room. Down our hall we could hear doors lock and sealing spells mumbled. When we got to our room, we did the same, joining hands and repeating “signati Ianua mali spiritus” three times to seal the door.

  “There. That should do it,” I said feeling reassured. “No one outside of this room can come in without us lifting the spell first.” We spent the next couple hours talking about what had happened tonight, with the exception of the book on Miles’ nightstand. I wasn’t ready to explain that yet. I did tell them about the scream, the shocked faces in the hallway, the girl on the floor, and finally the blood on Miles’ shirt. I was quiet after mentioning that last detail.

  “You don’t think he killed her, do you?” Ava piped up. She was horrified, but I could see in her eyes she was enjoying this just a little. She loved gossip.

  “Josie, I’m sure he found the girl first and tried to help her. He was probably the one that went to get Craw,” Lillian comforted me. We were both sitting on my bed and she had her tiny arm wrapped around my shoulder again.

  “Yeah, Miles is a really good guy. I’ve talked to him a few times in the library. He would never hurt anyone,” Daliah said. But her words didn’t make me feel much better. Talking to someone a few times doesn’t mean you know who they are. Even I didn’t know Miles that well. You can’t really know who anyone is behind closed doors.

&nbs
p; Even with that being said, I still didn’t feel like he would be capable of hurting anyone. I remembered how I felt lying in his arms. He made me feel safe and comforted. I went to the Black Forest with him alone. If he was going to harm anyone, why wouldn’t he have done it that night? I realized all of their wide eyes were still focused on me, waiting for me to say something.

  “I know,” I finally responded. “I just need to talk to him, and I’ll feel better. I can’t imagine what he’s going through right now. If he was the one that found her...he must be terrified.” I pictured Miles walking down the hall and seeing the girl; maybe picking her up in his arms, unsure of what to do. I shook my head to clear the thought.

  “I bet he’ll call you tonight once he’s finished meeting with Headmistress Craw,” Lillian said. I hoped she was right. The other girls started theorizing about what happened to the girl and whether she survived or not. I suddenly hated that we were all referring to her as “the girl.” None of us even knew her name, yet here we were gossiping about her and the sinister people who might be in her life. I kept my mouth shut while they spoke of hopes of her recovering because I knew after what I saw in the hallway she couldn’t possibly have survived. If she had, she would never be the same. She would be traumatized. Like my dad.

  Ava thought the girl was attacked by her boyfriend. She went on to explain her made-up idea. The girlfriend had cheated. The boyfriend found out and killed her in a fit of rage. Another idea that was floating around through text messages was that there was a serial killer on campus. Which made no sense to me since there had only been one murder, but that small detail didn’t stop Ava from forwarding the idea to all her friends. I guess it helped people to talk through upsetting things. Trying to rationalize made it feel less scary, like it was just a mystery movie we were trying to solve before the very end.