by M.E. Timmons
Chapter 29
The rest of the weekend passed by too quickly. I spent some time on Saturday in the library as I usually did, only I had Adrian with me, who seemed to enjoy reading almost as much as I did. It was a nice change, and we even discussed some of the books we'd both read. He agreed with me that Isadora's stories all seemed to come to tragic ends, and I agreed with him that the speeches in Dracula were way too long to be realistic.
I spent most of Sunday with my friends. Jack and I played tennis outside, which I wasn't very good at. He beat me easily since he was so much faster than I was because of his werewolf reflexes and strength, but it was still fun. In the afternoon I watched TV with Rhea and Heather, while Melissa was off watching another band practice, though she complained before she left that Michael never asked her out. She didn't give up that easily, though.
That night there was another dance recital going on in the ballroom, so we went to go see it. There were dance classes held at the school, and the teacher was a professional, and I heard she taught well. That night the dancing was ballet, and it was very well done, so I enjoyed it. I wished I was able to move like they could, but I figured it probably took years of practice and more natural grace than I possessed.
Things went well for the rest of the week. I continued to work hard in class, and I was really starting to get better at controlling my drawing. I also found that I was getting better at fighting, and when I was paired with Lucas even he noticed that I was more of a challenge. In my free time I was mostly with Adrian, who was happier than I had ever seen him. I also spent a lot of time with Jack and with my roommates. Jack continued to complain about Adrian, especially whenever he saw us together. I didn't hear any more about him and Heather, though they seemed to be on good terms.
With things going so well for so long, I almost started to get suspicious. It was becoming clear to me that I was getting far too used to crazy things happening, and I was almost bored. Still, I was glad to have some peace, even though it didn't last. Even with my suspicions that something would happen eventually, I didn't even realize just how much things were about to change.
The problem didn't start until Friday. I'd spent breakfast and lunch with Adrian, and supper with Heather, and I spent the evening with Jack. He was complaining that I didn't spend enough time with him anymore, though I was seeing him as often as I did before Adrian got out. We spent the evening in the west wing watching a movie. Jack had managed to find some popcorn for us, which seemed to be a rare commodity at Winterwood, like any other type of junk food. The movie was a romantic comedy, which wasn't exactly my favourite genre, but Jack had picked it, saying he'd heard good things about it.
We sat close together so we could both reach the popcorn, which was in a bowl on my lap. It was originally on Jack's lap, but he almost knocked it over a few times. He was acting kind of weird, and he was nervous. I didn't understand why, but I could see it in his aura. He looked over at me almost as often as he looked at the movie, which was as boring as I'd expected it to be. I was getting tired of all the stupid jokes that seemed to be in every romantic comedy. I preferred epic movies.
About halfway through the movie, I noticed that Jack had his arm behind me on the edge of the couch. It wasn't touching me, but it was close. I looked over at Jack, but he was busy pretending to watch the movie. He laughed at a stupid joke and reached for some popcorn, but he wasn't looking, and he ended up knocking the bowl to the floor, and popcorn went everywhere, including all over me.
"Sorry!" Jack exclaimed. He jumped up and started sweeping the popcorn back into the bowl with his hand. I bent down to help him.
"Are you alright?" I asked. "You've been acting a little strange all night."
"I'm fine," Jack claimed, but his voice was slightly higher pitched than normal. "Why wouldn't I be? It's not like we've never watched a movie before."
"Okay," I said. I didn't want to push him. I figured that if something was going on he wanted me to know about he'd just tell me. He usually did anyway, since he wasn't very good at keeping things to himself.
After we had the popcorn sufficiently cleaned up, we sat back down to watch the rest of the movie, which I had a hard time paying attention to. I looked around the room a bit, and saw that there were only a couple of other people in the room, and they were playing cards in a corner. I assumed they were playing poker, since there was money on the table, which was against the rules. There weren't any teachers around to point that out though.
When I looked back at Jack, I saw that he was watching me. "Do you not like the movie?" he asked.
"Not exactly," I answered. "I prefer movies that have more interesting story lines and fewer ridiculous attempts at humour. You know I hate romantic comedies. I thought you did too."
"I don't usually like them, but I thought I'd give this one a try at least. It is pretty bad though," he admitted.
"Why did you want to watch it in the first place? Surely there are better movies around here somewhere."
"I don't know. I guess I just wanted to try something new," Jack said, but he wasn't looking at me when he said it. He was lying, and he was hiding something, but I couldn't figure out why.
"Are you sure you're alright?" I asked, starting to get suspicious.
"Yes, Jules, I'm fine," he said, sounding a little annoyed. "Can we at least finish watching the movie?"
I shrugged. "If you really want to," I said.
We watched the rest of the movie, which was only slightly better than the beginning. Jack had his arm behind me again, and he was still sitting close even though I didn't have the popcorn anymore. I wasn't too concerned, since I was accustomed to his presence.
Near the end of the movie, which involved a very mushy scene with people running towards each other in an airport, I felt Jack shifting beside me, which resulted in his leg touching mine. I moved my leg over to put a little more space in between us. Then, after the mushy scene was over, he did something I was not expecting at all. He leaned over and kissed me, right on the lips.
I pushed him away immediately. "Jack! What the hell are you doing?!" I exclaimed.
He looked embarrassed, and hurt. Instead of answering me, he stood up and started pacing in front of the couch, like he was trying to sort out his thoughts. I waited impatiently until he spoke, still feeling shocked.
"Juliet, you know how I feel about you. I know you think you like Adrian, but I know you care about me. We can be together, Jules. It would be so easy, since we've always been close. It's just another step in our relationship, and I think it would be really good for both of us."
"Jack!" I exclaimed again, appalled. "You are my best friend, and that's all I want! Of course I care about you, probably more than anything, but I'm not in love with you. I already told you that, and I thought you understood."
"Adrian's no good for you! You should know that by now! I can't believe you would choose a guy who actually physically hurt you over me. What have I done that was so bad? I've never been anything but good to you, and I'm always there when you need me. Don't I deserve the same in return?"
I could feel tears falling down my cheeks from the pain I heard in his voice; the pain that I had caused. "Jack, you know I'd do almost anything for you, but I can't lose our friendship, and I can't be in a relationship with you. I don't feel that way about you, and it has nothing to do with Adrian."
"Fine," Jack said. I could tell he was close to tears himself, but he was more angry than upset, which scared me. He walked away from me and headed out of the west wing. I called after him, but he didn't turn around. I stood up to go after him, but I collapsed back onto the couch, deciding that it wasn't a good idea.
I was still sitting there crying a few minutes later, and I was stunned by what had happened. It was something that I'd been afraid of for a long time, though I'd never really expected it to happen because things had been going so well. I wasn't sure how
things would be between us anymore, and it scared me. It broke my heart to think of losing my best and oldest friend over something I couldn't control.
After a while I got up and turned the movie off, which was in the middle of the credits. Some of the people playing poker in the corner were watching me, and I wiped my tears away, though they kept coming back. It took me another five minutes to calm down enough to go back to my room in the south wing. I managed to keep my tears in check while I walked through the halls, but by the time I sat down on my bed I was sobbing. Rhea, who was the only other person in the room, asked me what was wrong, but I didn't have the strength to answer. She hugged me but let me continue crying, which I did for a good hour after that.
By the time Heather and Melissa came in I had calmed down some, and I had stopped crying. I felt cold and empty instead, and I didn't want to think about Jack at all. When Heather asked me what was wrong, I told her I'd had a fight with Jack, and I wasn't sure what I was going to do, which was pretty much the truth. I didn't let her see how deeply I was hurt.
After the lights were turned off, I tried to sleep, but I kept shifting around. I couldn't stop my thoughts from running freely in my head, and I couldn't get comfortable. I didn't want to stay in bed like that, so I got up and went to the desk in the corner of the room that was usually stocked with paper and pens. It wasn't too hard to see because of the light of the nearly full moon shining through the open curtains at the window. Not knowing what else to do, I grabbed a sheet of paper and a pencil and started drawing. It was a good thing I didn't have to see in order to draw.
The drawing took almost ten minutes to complete even though my hand seemed to be flying across the page. I couldn't see it well enough to be able to tell what it was about, but I could tell that there were two figures in the drawing. I went over to the window so I could see it more clearly. When I looked at it in the light of the moon, my blood felt like it had turned to ice.
The drawing was of Heather and Melissa, and they were outside in the woods. I didn't recognize the area, so it wasn't anywhere I had been before. I could tell it was at night because I could see the moon hanging over the trees. When I compared it to the moon outside my window, they looked exactly the same. None of that was what scared me though. What bothered me was the way the girls looked, which was even more frightening than the drawing I had done of Michael. Melissa was staring straight ahead with eyes that were open wide, and her hand was held up to her open mouth. It was an expression of pure shock and horror, not fear. It was too late for fear. Heather was clinging to Melissa like she could barely stand. Her eyes were closed, but I could see tears glistening on her cheeks.
They looked like they had just seen someone die. I started to panic.
The first thing I did was wake Heather up. She took her time with opening her eyes, and she tried to bat my hand away because I was shaking her. When she did open her eyes, she saw something in my expression that made them go wide, and she pulled the covers off and got up and gripped my shoulders.
"Juliet, what's wrong?" she asked. I could hear fear in her voice, but it was nothing like the fear that I was feeling. I shoved my drawing at her, and she immediately tried to make it out, but after squinting at it for a minute she gave up and went to the light switch. When the room was bathed in light I heard grumbles coming from the two occupied beds in the room. Rhea rolled over and put her head under her pillow, but Melissa sat up.
"What's going on?" she asked in a groggy voice.
"Oh my goodness," Heather said when she looked at the picture, and her eyes went wider. "Do you know when this is?"
I shook my head, but I pointed out the similarities between the moon in the picture and the moon outside presently, and I also realized that she was wearing exactly the same pyjamas as the ones she was wearing in the drawing. Melissa came over to take a look at the drawing as well, and her reaction was similar.
"That does not look good at all," she said, serious for once. "I don't think I've ever looked like that before in my entire life."
"We have to do something," I said. I felt anxious, and I had a gut feeling that something bad was going to happen, and it was going to happen soon. The problem was that I didn't have a clue as to what it was.
"We need more information," Heather pointed out. "It's not like I plan on going for a stroll in the woods tonight. Do you think you can try drawing something else that will tell us what this means?"
"Yeah, that's pretty much all we can do at this point, though maybe we should tell someone else, like a teacher," Melissa added.
"Okay, I'll try drawing another picture. I don't think we should tell someone else until we have more information," I said. I let them hold onto the drawing while I went to the desk and got out some more paper. Starting a new drawing was easy, like my hand had something that it needed to get out. It only took about five minutes to complete the second drawing, and I knew right away that it was related in some way to the first because it was even more horrible and much more specific. The location was different, but that didn't tell me much. I motioned for Heather and Melissa to come over to look at the picture, and they both gasped.
The second drawing was in a room that I knew well. I had left that room earlier in the day after what had happened there. It was clearly the common room in the west wing, and it looked pretty much the same as it did when I left it. The movie I'd been watching with Jack was still sitting on a table where I'd left it that was barely in view, and the empty bowl that had contained popcorn was beside it. In the center of the drawing were two wolves, and they looked like they were running at each other with bared teeth. I recognized Adrian instantly, and he was the bigger of the two. I had no doubt in my mind that the other wolf was Jack, and he was at a disadvantage.
Once the initial shock wore off and I was able to move I left immediately. I didn't even bother to change or put on shoes, so I was still in my thin white nightgown with my feet bare as I ran through the halls. Mrs. Espenas, who was monitoring the hallways in the south wing that night shouted out for me to stop, but I ignored her and kept going. I was aware of Heather and Melissa running behind me, though Melissa stopped to tell Mrs. Espenas what was going on.
My heart felt like it was out of control, but I kept going. I didn't pass anyone else as I ran down the stairs and then out of the south wing. I was halfway down the hall when I realized that I was going the wrong way. I was heading toward the east wing instead of the west wing, and I cursed myself for the silly mistake, which I assumed was caused by my disorientation from being in the halls in the dark.
I was about to turn around and go back, which would have been faster than going all the way around the school, but I heard something coming from the hall past the east wing. I slowed, and Heather caught up to me, and she was breathing hard.
"Why are you going this way?" she asked between breaths. "The west wing was in the other direction."
"Yeah, I realized that," I said. My voice sounded remarkably calm compared to how I felt. "I hear something though, don't you?"
We stood there in silence for a minute, and the sounds became clearer. There were people shouting and running, and I could see the light from flashlights moving over the walls as the people holding them moved quickly. There was definitely something going on down that hall, and I almost fainted when I realized where the voices were centered. The infirmary was down that hallway.
"Oh my god," I said, and my voice no longer sounded the slightest bit calm. "We're too late."