Academy of Deadly Arts

by Helen Scott

  "He's Xavier’s on-again off-again lover. The two of them can never decide if they want to be something serious or not, but they never really stop seeing each other. Xavier always says that he feels like something's missing." Bowie stopped talking all of a sudden, as though he had just revealed something incredibly personal about one of his roommates, which I guess he had. I knew next to nothing about most of them, although I was getting to know Bowie and now Noah better. Everyone else remained a mystery, especially Xavier.

  "I didn't realize that Xavier was gay. I mean, not that you can tell something like that from just looking at somebody. You could be gay for all I know. I'm gonna shut up now because I'm embarrassed and rambling." In that moment I would've preferred to be completely invisible not just partially. I didn't intend to stick my foot in my mouth it just happened more often than I would like.

  "He's bi. Our Xavier is a sneaky one, flies under the radar of pretty much everybody. If he's interested in you, he'll let you know, but other than that you would have no idea where his interests lie." An awkward silence fell between us before Bowie added, "And I'm not gay just for reference. I'm not opposed to dudes but I definitely prefer the ladies."

  Another uncomfortable silence fell between us as I tried to figure out how to respond to that. Fortunately, I didn't have to figure it out since Bowie spoke up again. "Try focusing on the bed and feeling it underneath you when you lie down. If you can stay like that then try to fall asleep. I'll be here just in case you need me."

  "Thanks," I said quietly. I really meant it. Bowie had been amazing since the first moment I met him, and now he was letting me sleep in his bed just so that he could keep an eye on me overnight. Most guys wouldn't even think that far ahead.

  As I settled onto the bed I tried to remember what it felt like to have the mattress sink under my weight, to have the sheets crinkle and wrinkle around my thighs and the soft squish of a pillow under my head as I lay back. As I lay there I didn't feel like I was thinking or focusing on the mattress, I felt like I was on the bed like any other evening. I didn't even notice when sleep took me.

  9

  Avery

  When I woke up the next morning I was solid. Not a thought I ever imagined having. But excitement filled me as I realized I could touch the bed and not see it through my hand.

  I wanted to leap from the bed and jump up and down, but as I looked over I realized Bowie was still sleeping. I wondered how much of the night he'd been up watching over me, making sure that I was safe. Tenderness filled my heart, which was an emotion I was not used to experiencing. I hadn't exactly had the most fulfilling life before I died, and there definitely wasn't anyone that made me feel tenderness in it.

  After I eased off the bed and tried my best to straighten the school uniform I’d been wearing for way too long, I silently walked out of the room I went in search of the other roommates. I found them all at the kitchen table or dining room table or homework table—whatever it was supposed to be. They were all sitting around and having what appeared like a very serious discussion. At the sound of my footsteps they looked up and smiles graced their faces as they realized could see me completely solid in front of them.

  "Told you," Jude said quietly.

  Noah jumped up from his chair almost knocking it over and strode over to me quickly before wrapping me in his arms. He picked me up and swung me in a circle as he spun the two of us around, before setting my feet back on the ground. "Glad it wasn't permanent," he said with a grin.

  I wasn't sure what to make of his sudden exuberant side, but I wasn't going to complain. This was the first time in a long time, longer than I'd been dead, that someone had been excited to see me. When he released the hug I wasn't quite ready to let go. He must have sensed it because he slung one arm around my shoulders and walked me over to the table where everyone was having breakfast.

  "I should get back to my room so I can get cleaned up before class," I said with a tight smile. The sudden realization that these guys, whom I barely knew, were more important to me than my roommate made me feel a little guilty.

  "I'll walk you," Noah offered as he grabbed a muffin and bagel from the table.

  "You don't have to. It's perfectly light outside," I said, trying to shrug off his arm.

  "And what if I want to?" he asked, his lips close enough to rustle the hair over my ear.

  "Fine. But don't be rude to my roommate, if she's there, that is," I said with a mock frown.

  "Scouts honor." Noah held up two fingers to his forehead while he balanced the breakfast foods in the other. I had the distinct impression that he wasn't ever a scout of any kind, but I didn't really care.

  "Take care, Avery," Gaius said.

  "You too, and tell Bowie thanks and I owe him one for watching over me all night," I said with a smile before we walked out the door.

  The dorm was a short walk away and an awkward silence seemed to fall between us as I ate the bagel Noah had handed me as soon as the door closed behind us. I didn't know what to say to him anymore other than, "Thanks for saving me last night."

  "I'm the one that put you in danger. I should have known that the wildlife would be more attracted to a new ghost." He was serious. The guy was actually beating himself up about this.

  "I put myself in danger. I knew what I was doing when we went off exploring. Don't forget that I'm an adult too, you know. I might not have been a ghost all that long, but I screwed up enough in life to have plenty of experience making bad decisions."

  When we reached the front steps of the dorm Noah paused. "I should get going," he said, shoving his hands in his pockets as though he was nervous.

  "Okay, maybe we can try hanging out again some time." My voice was annoyingly hopeful and definitely not the cool aloof tone I was going for.

  "Yeah, maybe." He smiled, and I felt rejection crush my heart. He'd just picked me up and spun me around and now I was getting 'yeah, maybe'?

  Whatever, man. "See ya." I gave a small wave before turning and heading inside. When I got up the front stairs a little way I looked over my shoulder and he was gone.

  Rose was in our room when I got back. Awkward vibes radiated out from both of us I was sure. Her retro fifties house-wife vibe was a little weird. I mean sure the decade had some serious fashion going on, not to mention classic music and movies, but I had always wanted to be more than someone's wife. I didn't think there was anything wrong with that, it just wasn't me. Just the same as how I didn't like The Beatles. They were the whole world to some people, but weren't my cup of tea, so to speak.

  After a quick shower and change, I grabbed a bag that had appeared in my closet and shoved my books in it for the day. It was kind of nice knowing I was going to see Sasha in my first class. A friendly face would go a long way after last night’s insanity.

  When I began to leave I heard a distinct huff from where Rose sat in the common area of the room. I pretended I'd forgotten something and shoved a random notebook in my bag when I turned around. "Doin' okay, Rose?" I asked as I slung my backpack over my shoulder.

  "Fine. Yourself?"

  "I'm good," I said with a smile.

  "Have a good time last night, did you?" she asked, but there was something snooty about the way she said it that set my teeth on edge.

  "We were watching a movie and it got too late to come home with all those creatures out there, so yeah, I did, thanks for asking," I said with a smile as I lied through my teeth. "How was your night?"

  "Fine. Thank you." Passive aggressive vibes flowed out of her like water from a tap.

  "Are you sure you're okay?" I asked, throwing the lifeboat of friendship one more time.

  "I'm fine, well on my way to the aetherworld. You, on the other hand, are most likely headed toward the netherworld, if you ever figure out why you're in purgatory, that is. I don't care what kind of company you keep, so long as you keep them out of this room. I don't want any filthy one-night stands contaminating this space. I won't have my chances ruined, not for any
thing." By the end of her little tirade she was sounding quite maniacal and I was actually worried about how much she believed what she was saying.

  "No one-night stands in the room. Got it. Anything else?" I asked sarcastically.

  Apparently she didn't understand my sarcasm because she went on to say, "I saw you and Noah walking together. You can keep him and his demonic music out of here as well. I am so close to figuring out why I'm here. I just need a little more time and then I'll be able to kiss this place goodbye. I won't let you ruin that, so you stick to your room and I'll stick to mine."

  I was gobsmacked. I could have been knocked over by a feather in that moment. Once I'd recovered enough I was able to respond. "Well, we have to go into the common areas to get to the bathroom and in and out of the room, so I assume there is a reasonable tolerance level for unavoidable interactions?"

  "Of course, don't be childish."

  "I'm going to class. See you, Rosey Posey."

  "Do not call me that!" she shrieked as I closed the door behind myself. I'd call her that until her ass moved on, because if she wanted to be petty, I could do it right back.

  By the time I arrived at Ghostly Studies 101 I was furious. My energy bubbled over making me feel jittery and unable to sit still.

  "Did someone wake up on the wrong side of the bed?" Sasha quirked a brow at me as I sat down with a huff.

  My leg began twitching and bouncing under the table as my ire built once more. "No, but my roommate just called me a whore and filthy and all this other stuff and I'm really frustrated!" My voice had been climbing as I spoke so by the end it was really high pitched.

  "Why?" Sasha gasped, her eyes wide with shock. I didn't know if she knew Rose or not, I doubted it, but I needed to vent to someone.

  "She assumed that because I didn't come back to the room last night that I was hooking up with someone," I said quietly, even though my anger wanted to rage from the rooftops.

  "You and Noah?" Sasha asked, both eyebrows raised now.

  "No, we're just friends." I waved a hand at her, squashing that idea for both of us.

  "The way he was looking at you after Demons, I'm surprised. I mean, not that you didn't hook up with him, but that you're just friends." Sasha added the last part hastily, like she didn't want to risk offending me in my current mood.

  "Yeah, no. We went exploring and ran into these things called Shades," I said as the professor was walking in.

  "Shades! Exactly what we are talking about today. The reason you shouldn't go out at night. Well, one of them anyway. Let's get started," Professor Kenner said.

  It ended whatever conversation I was having with Sasha and we both turned forward to take in whatever it was she wanted to teach us about the afterlife. Shades, as it turned out, were souls that had either escaped from the netherworld or had passed up the opportunity to move on and essentially decayed in purgatory. They were usually vindictive and angry and would attack on sight. Apparently, they weren’t as mindless as Noah had wanted me to believe, and once they got ahold of you they usually drained you to the point of extinction. Since we were already dead we couldn't die again, so they changed the wording a bit. Extinction meant there was nothing left of your soul. You didn't move on, get reincarnated, if that was even a thing, or really do anything other than cease to exist.

  The fact that I hadn't ceased to exist and that Noah had saved me hit me all over again, and I realized that the thank you I gave him this morning was wholly inadequate. He seemed to like muffins and once upon a time I loved to bake, so an idea quickly formed in my head and I jotted down the recipe as I could remember it. Now I just had to figure out where to get the ingredients and where I could make it.

  By the time Moira, as she corrected multiple students, finished we were all sufficiently scared of being out in purgatory at night. What I didn't understand was why there was no way of fighting these things or scaring them off. Couldn't we wall the academy in or something to prevent them from becoming a problem?

  Evidently, I wasn't the only one with that thought as another soul asked the same thing. It turned out that since they traveled through the ground and between dimensions. They were essentially impossible to keep out without complex magical wards which were only done when necessary. It seemed silly to ward every building when you could ward the wall around the campus, but I was sure there was some loophole I wasn't aware of. All I knew was that if I was going to be staying in purgatory for any length of time, and let's be real here, I was going nowhere fast, I wanted to learn as much as I could about the potential predators that were out there.

  10

  Bowie

  I had waited outside the Demons classroom for most of the last half hour. The class was running long, which I knew from experience was due to the fact that the professor never shut up. When the door finally opened and the students streamed out I looked for Noah and Avery. I couldn't lie, I hated that Avery had left without waking me up to say goodbye, so I'd decided to stop by and see how her second day of classes went. Totally a normal friend thing to do, right?

  Noah was the last one out, with the professor shutting the door behind him. His expression said it all. Something had happened and Avery was in trouble. She was new, still learning how to be a ghost. How could one woman get in so much trouble in such a short amount of time?

  "She lost some of her form during class," Noah said quietly as we both waited outside the door.

  "What? I thought you said she was all better?" I demanded.

  "She was," he replied with a shrug. "Then during class one of her arms started to fade and the professor noticed. I'm guessing that's why he asked her to stay after class."

  "Fuck. We should have told her everything." I scrubbed a hand over my face and looked at the hazy window in the side of the door. It let you know someone was in the room without displaying who or what they were doing. It was the same damn door on every classroom, but for once I wished the glass wasn't cloudy.

  When Noah didn't reply to my statement I looked at him again. The guy was beating himself up for what had happened to Avery, and now more than anything we needed to be strong for her, to show her that we would be there for her. She was special, I just knew it, although I couldn't figure out why just yet. I'd get there, though, it was only a matter of time.

  Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the door creaked and opened. Avery appeared, looking paler than usual, and exhausted.

  "Hey, guys," she said before she yawned, her jaw stretching wide before her hand came up to cover her mouth.

  "Everything okay?" I asked, while Noah brooded next to me.

  "Nope, not really, but I don't want to talk about it." Avery's free hand pushed some of her hair out of her face as she got ready to tell me off for pressing her on it. I wasn't about to do that though.

  "Okay. Want to grab some dinner?" I asked, redirecting the conversation. As much as I needed to know what the professor had said about her losing her solid form, I wasn't going to harass her about it. That would only make her clam up even more.

  "That would be lovely," she said with a smile that made my heart stutter in my chest.

  The woman was stunning. Her deep brown eyes and her pouty lips were a recipe for disaster, at least for me. She was petite but curvaceous and all I had wanted to do since I first met her was spend time with her. I mean, sure she was seductive as all hell, but I wasn't about to hit it and quit it. Not with her at least.

  "Shoot, I just remembered I said I'd get dinner with Sasha so we could work on an assignment together," Avery said.

  "We could all get dinner together," Noah piped in, surprising the hell out of me. He wasn't usually one to hang out with random people.

  "You sure?" Avery replied biting her lip in a way that had all the blood from my brain rushing south. Well, not that ghosts had blood, stupid afterlife confusion.

  "Let's do it," I said, trying to remain part of the conversation without drawing attention to the fact that I had a hard-on.

 
; "Can I change first? I hate this stupid uniform. We're all adults, I still don't understand why it's necessary." She huffed and fiddled with her skirt. The whole thing may as well have been made of sandpaper from the way she was acting and her inability to get comfortable.

  "Yeah, we can just stop by your room on the way," Noah said, with a charming smile.

  "You'd better not come up. Rose isn't exactly a fan of either of you and has already accused me of sleeping with both of you I think." Avery snorted. "Who knew ghosts could be such prudes?"

  "We can have a talk with her if you'd like. I'm not sure why you were matched with her anyway. Usually first years room with other first years, and Rose is on her what?" I glanced at Noah. "Seventh year?"

  "Dude, I don't know. You've been here longer than me!" Noah raised his hands and by the time we had concluded that yes Avery's roommate had been at the academy for at least seven years, which was how long I'd been dead, we were at her dorm. The reality was she could have been there much longer, but we wouldn’t know without asking Jude.

  The beguiling woman disappeared into the building while Noah and I waited outside so as not to upset Rose. Pulling on our own ghostly abilities we changed out of the uniform into more casual clothes.

  "So what's going on with you and Avery?" I asked, trying to figure out what Noah's end goal was. In our little group he was king of the hit it and quit it club, but that was usually when it came to the groupies.

  "I was just showing her the more exciting tour last night and we have a couple classes together. What's going on with you and Avery?" Noah replied, his eyes twinkling with a mirth that said he knew exactly what was going on.

  "I'm curious about her, that's all." I tried to sound nonchalant, but we knew each other too well.