by Azzurra Nox
“Let me help you,” he quickly offered his hand but she slapped it away.
“There’s no need, I’m okay,” her voice was irritated.
“Are you sure?” a young man’s voice said.
Jon hadn’t realized that he was there till he had spoken. Now his attention was diverted to this tall, mysterious young man. It wasn’t usual for him to find someone taller than him being six foot, but the young man stood a full six inches taller, making him feel strangely small. His eyes fell on the guy’s shoulder length chestnut hair and thought how long it would be before the mother superior who ran the school would twinge her nose towards the length. There wasn’t an official code that banned males from having long hair, but he knew that it wasn’t entirely encouraged, and would be met with disapproving looks. Another thing he noticed was that he wasn’t dressed in the school uniform. Instead, he wore a pair of black jeans, a black shirt, and leather jacket. He looked like he had just stepped out of a rock video.
The young man helped Amelia back on her feet, and Jon looked briefly away because he felt a strange sensation in the pit of his stomach when he saw their hands touch. Briefly distracted by his thoughts, he didn’t realize Amelia was talking to him.
“What?”
“I said, what are you doing out of class?”
“Oh, uh…Sister Agnes told me to go in the office to get her something,” he lied not wanting to reveal his real reason for being in the hall. “What about you?” he attempted to throw the ball back into her court.
“Showing Michael around, he’s new to the school.”
“I just transferred here last week,” Michael quickly retorted as though on cue.
“Nice,” Jon mumbled wanting to get out of his presence. There was something about him that he didn’t readily trust. The way he was poised, his calm yet dominating demeanor, and the way his gaze seemed to pierce into your soul and read you through like one would with a newspaper print.
“Where are you from?”
“I live in L.A. but I was going to a public school before.”
“We’re actually kind of busy,” Amelia interrupted.
“I’m sure,” he stated as he walked past them bringing the conversation to a closure. Suddenly a dreadful thought wormed its way into his mind. The M that Lena had kept tracing over the past week…could it be? He couldn’t even finish the thought, he suddenly felt ill. A cold sweat broke lose and he ran down the hall towards the front entrance. He needed to get out. The walls were caving in on him. Asphyxiation overwhelmed his senses and his stomach felt suddenly seasick. Emotion sickness. His desperate hands clutched the doorknob as though his life depended upon it, turning it to the right, giving him his liberation. His salvation. Outside it was temperate, he gasped for air. This couldn’t be happening.
In his mind’s eye he saw Michael take Amelia’s hand to help her up, then it went to Lena’s scribble of the hearts and the letter M. No. This couldn’t be happening. He wiped his brow with the back of his hand, leaning against the wall because his knees felt weak. His legs were no longer made of flesh and bone, but jelly. Any second he would topple over from his weight. Or at least that was the feeling. If only he could’ve handled everything with Amelia and Lena differently. Maybe all of this wouldn’t have occurred. Amelia wouldn’t have been pissed at him, and Lena wouldn’t be avoiding him. That kiss was such a terrible mistake, but how could something that felt just perfect be the wrong choice? Someone would have to teach him that following the heart isn’t always the choice that brings the best results, but it’s also the road that leads to less regrets. Jon primarily focused on that. No regrets.
Chapter Fifteen
As soon as second period was dismissed, Lena rushed out of the classroom with the speed of an Olympic runner. She dodged students, lugging her messenger bag heavy with books and notebooks. Jon had seemed upset, and the note being exposed for everyone to hear had only served to inflict upon the awkwardness that had transpired between the two of them since the night of the kiss. He hadn’t showed up in mass right after Algebra, despite the fact that she had reserved him his usual spot, and now she was worried. She didn’t care if she was going to miss out on Biology she needed to speak to him. See that he was okay.
She knew him well enough to know that he’d be at his usual hideout. It was a secluded corner of the campus where a gazebo was under construction near the football field. Students ready for P.E. filed out towards the field dressed in shorts, t-shirts, and sneakers. She ran towards the gazebo, breathing heavy from the exertion. Once she approached the spot she dropped her bag. This was going to be tricky. They had set up a barbwire fence around the gazebo so that students wouldn’t trespass. But she knew that he was there. She was certain of it. Without much hesitation she threw the bag over the fence so that it was already on the other side. Then she grabbed on the parts of the fence that weren’t prickly and climbed up, once she had reached the top, she jumped off, landing on her feet hearing a rip on the way down.
“Damn!” she exclaimed noticing that she had ripped her skirt. How was she going to go to class now with a ripped uniform? She heard footsteps, and she hurried in grabbing her bag, and made her way towards the gazebo. A little smile formed on her lips when she saw the familiar cloud of smoke. She pulled the plastic sheet away to enter.
“I knew you’d be here.”
Upon hearing her voice, Jon quickly turned around. “What do you want?”
“Don’t be so rude,” she walked closer to him, looking down at his seated figure. “I was worried. I even ripped my skirt and scrapped my palms,” she pouted displaying her hands that showed little scratches from the barbwire.
His expression softened, his blue eyes looked less icy as he compassionately took hold of her hands, stroking the hurt spots. “You’re a crazy little fool, but I love you for that.”
A strange warm feeling enveloped her when he uttered those words, but then her mind shot back to Michael and the night he saved her. How strong and comforting his arms had felt around her. Everything had felt like a dream. She must’ve blacked out because the next thing she knew she was sleeping in her bed with no notion of how she had gotten there. The entire night had been so surreal, the thick fog, the mysterious scent, and then falling off the bridge that she had no intention of telling what had happened to a soul. The thought of her dad thinking she was still ill and locking her up in another institute for troubled minds made her quake with fear. If she told anyone they would think her mad. Except for Jon, maybe he’d understand.
Sitting down next to him, she grabbed his cigarette putting it out. “That’s such a terrible habit, why don’t you do something more constructive?”
“Like what?”
She dug through her messenger bag till she came out with a harmonica.
“This. I’ve been meaning to give it to you.”
He chuckled, “You want me to play the harmonica in exchange of smoking?” He shook his head as though to imply that it was a crazy idea. But nonetheless he accepted the gift and began to play. His initial tries were atrocious but then he got the hang of it and played what sounded like a blues tune.
“Remember when you said you saw the black bird?”
“What about it?” he said in between the tune as he continued to play, acting as though he had no other worry in the world.
“I think I saw it again. But it was foggy. I heard it speak.”
Suddenly he stopped playing. A chilling silence hung in the air like icicles at the entrance of a cave ready to fall with the first ray of sun.
“What do you mean that you heard it speak?”
“Well,” she swallowed down trying to collect her thoughts. Her fingers picking at a scab on her left hand in a nervous attempt to downplay the situation, “After I left the theatre that night, I was walking near the bridge when something strange happened, I heard a sound like birds in flight, and that smell, and then I heard a voice,” she stopped, knowing it sounded unbelievable especially now that it had
been verbalized. “I…it was comforting and soothing,” she had started to bleed from where her scab had been.
A heavy silence followed before he spoke.
“Was the scent flowery?”
“Yes.”
“I believe you. I know it sounds insane. But I do. What did it say?”
“I don’t remember…I think it was, that I shouldn’t be afraid, and then I fell off the bridge..”
“Wait,” he cut her off, “You fell off the bridge?” skepticism filled his eyes and tone.
“Someone was there to break my fall, but it was just like you said, how you felt like someone was pushing you over when you were on the Ferris wheel that night with Milly.” She could hear the faraway shouts of teenagers on the field as they played soccer. The gazebo felt like a safe spot, wrapped up in plastic except for the small door-like entrance Jon had cut open with a Swiss Army knife awhile back when they had first discovered the spot. It was cozy and warm. The perfect hideout.
“I don’t know what’s happening. Do you think someone could’ve killed Blake?”
“Didn’t Blake commit suicide? We all saw her jump from the Bell Tower.”
“Yes, but what if it was made to look like a suicide? What if she heard the same voice? What if she had been pushed off the Bell Tower?”
“Are you hearing yourself? That almost sounds like a plot of some kind of whacked out horror novel…” then she stopped. Cut Here. The serial killer always made it appear like suicide. Two sharp slits to the wrist. By the end of the novel the reader discovers that the killer was the gorgeous protagonist who had had a near death experience prior to the killings. Her thoughts were colliding at a million miles a minute. Maybe it was possible that Blake had been killed. In a strange sick way, it was starting to unfold a frightening possibility. But who could’ve done it, and how was it connected to the mysterious black bird? Who would believe them? Better yet, how could they stop whoever was behind this from striking again?
She heard someone stumble, and they both got silent. Whoever was there was getting closer to the gazebo, the plastic crackled by their movements.
“Wait here,” Jon told her as he crawled out, but Lena was too curious to stay put. She followed him closely behind, making out black hair in the distance. “Who are you?” he called out, “Show yourself!” and crouched behind the cement containers slowly came out a frail looking girl.
“Hope, what are you doing here?” she said having recognized the girl. She was in a lot of her same courses at school but the two had never spoken before till this very moment.
“I’m sorry,” she quickly apologized in her usual timid way of speaking. Before any statement she always seemed to offer an apology beforehand, it was a preface of some sort. “I just didn’t want to be in P.E. right now,” she bit her lip looking down at her feet. She hadn’t even changed into her athletic outfit, but rather was still in her uniform.
Hope Peters was one of the few students to attend St. Lucy Academy due to a scholarship. Rumors had it that she lived in a rundown home with her grandmother and they were so poor that they couldn’t afford to pay for the utilities that they simply did without and that’s why her hair was always dirty and greasy and hung down her face like it had just been combed with Crisco. The girls at school mercilessly made fun of her, whilst the boys would make comments such as, “Hope, you’ve got no Hope.” But despite all the taunting that ensued, she had an impeccable curriculum. Her GPA a perfect 4.0.
“It’s okay, we were just scared that it was someone from the school security or something,” Lena quickly told her to help her ease her nerves, seeing that the girl looked agitated from the way her hands trembled.
“I…I just wanted to be on my own,” her voice quiet looking down at her black shoes, biting her nails nervously, trying to get out of the spotlight from the two of them. She tucked a strand of uncombed hair behind her ear, looking up at Lena, her eyes a striking jade shade that seemed too big for her small freckled face. “I heard what you said…that you think Blake was killed…”
“We were just speculating, there’s nothing certain,” she told Hope not wanting to tell her anything of what had been previously discussed. Their theory wasn’t yet proven, and Lena preferred outsiders not to know of what they were thinking.
“I’ve heard a voice in the mist too.”
“What?” Jon didn’t seem to grasp what Hope was referring to.
“It’s a seductive voice, but deceiving too.”
“Don’t play us for fools,” his hands clenched in a defensive manner. Lena stepped in front of him, trying to keep the situation calm.
Shouts came from the field, and then the sound of a lawnmower turned on making it difficult to hear anything.
“What do you mean you heard a voice? Where?”
“At night when the fog approaches, I hear it.”
Jon started to laugh, but it was a nervous laughter. The sort that one lets loose after expecting the worst and then noticing that the circumstance wasn’t as deeply grave as one had expected It to be.
“It’s true. At first I thought I was dreaming, but I’ve heard it too often for it to be untrue. The voice travels in the wind late at night. It says that we can’t escape. There’s going to be another death.”
“Do you have any idea who it could be?” Lena wasn’t certain if she could take Hope’s word but noticed a change in Jon.
“Then it isn’t just us?”
Hope shook her head. Solemn and resolute in her affirmation. The lawnmower in the background got louder. It was coming closer in their direction. Frightened, Hope ran away but Jon was quick in grabbing her arm but she struggled out of his reach as they watched her small frame move between the hedges and climb up and over the barbwire fence.
“Do you believe her?” Lena had to shout so that Jon could hear her. He only shook his head in a manner that didn’t give an indication of agreement or disagreement but rather one of disbelief.
“Look,” he told her as they walked towards the barbwire fence. In his palm was a beaded bracelet attached with a charm of a small dagger with a pentagram on its handle.
“What a strange thing for her to wear,” she said, then couldn’t help but mention, “Do you think she’s heard the voice?”
“She was eavesdropping on us. She could’ve just been making stuff up to scare us.”
“But why would she do that?”
“She’s creepy. Haven’t you noticed? She has no friends and always carries around that strange black book. Who knows what she writes in it. Maybe she’s contemplating to eliminate us all in some sick manner.”
“Don’t say that. She’s not like that.”
“You barely know her, how do you know what she’s like?” he shot back giving her a hard look. “Suddenly you’re going to believe some hocus pocus drivel about premonitory speculations? Come on.”
“But you were taken aback when she spoke.” She threw her messenger bag over the fence, and Jon helped her over it, before he followed suit, landing with a loud crunch as his boots crushed the grass and gravel beneath his feet.
“She gives me the creeps, okay? Like I said, she heard us talking and decided to fabricate her own little tale.”
“What if she wasn’t lying? What if someone really killed Blake? Shouldn’t we do something?”
“Do what? You want us to keep a vigil on all the students in St. Lucy’s Academy till we notice some psycho? That’s ridiculous.”
“Then what do you suggest?”
“I suggest we keep our mouths shut and speak of this no more before people think we’re really nuts.”
“But you’re the one who suggested that Blake could’ve been killed!”
“Just because I made the suggestion doesn’t mean I have a solution!” Red faced his breath caught in his throat she could hear him have trouble breathing.
“I’m just as scared as you,” taking his hand and giving it a squeeze. He kissed her forehead, and pulled her closer to him. She felt safe
in his arms, closing her eyes a moment till she recalled of Michael and then the grip on his hand turned loose.
“Right now I don’t know what’s happening but I can promise you this, nothing is going to hurt you if I can help it. I won’t let anything or anyone hurt you. You mean too much to me.” Again, words like that made her melt like a cold butter stick under the fiery heat of an August sun. Maybe she should forget about Michael. What were her chances of ever seeing him again? And why did being so close to Jon feel so right? But at the same time why had she felt such an adrenaline rush being in Michael’s arms? Sure, she was in a critic position and he had saved her, but it wasn’t just that. She couldn’t quite pinpoint her feelings or rather it would be quite folly for her to imagine that she loved him. How cliché and she was too cerebral to fall into those romantic notions. She knew better than to think that love was that simple. Love needed to be nurtured like a plant. But yet her mind couldn’t stop going to that night at the bridge, and how being so close to death had only made her feel more alive. Class had been dismissed. She could tell by the way the field was vacant of its players whilst a new batch of students began their walk towards it. Looking down at her skirt, she was reminded of the gaping hole she had managed to tear during her jump over the fence.
“Can we just call it a day and ditch classes?”
“Anything you wish, babe,” a grin formed on his face as he pulled down his Ray Bans looking too attractive for words to describe. The black hair falling over his eyes in a sweep whilst the rest was cut in short layers in the back. Despite being worried over Hope’s premonition, Lena wanted to cast those thoughts aside so that she could enjoy this fleeting moment where her heart felt light. It hadn’t felt like this in a long time. Ever since her mother’s death, a weight had set it and left it’s disastrous unrelenting grip on her that nothing had managed to shake. But between Jon’s affection for her and her fancy for Michael, it had begun to feel less prominent.