Feral (The Irisbourn Chronicles Book 1)

by Victoria Thorne

  "I'm taking a shower," Heather suddenly announced, jumping down from the counter. "Sorry for scaring you, too."

  After having time to recover from my earlier scare, I was able to reply in earnest, "No, it's fine. I overreacted. I'm sorry."

  Heather’s cherry lips pressed together in a small smile before she disappeared around the corner in a flash of hair. I stayed in the kitchen until Matt came home, so that I could help him unload his colossal haul of groceries.

  When we had finished putting away half of them, the findings of that morning’s exploration reentered my thoughts.

  "I went and looked around in those unfinished rooms today."

  Matt picked up a jar of pickles and tossed it into the air with nail biting carelessness. "You mean the study?"

  "What? No," I shook my head. "I mean the two unfinished rooms at the end of the hall upstairs."

  Matt thought for a moment, then set the jar of pickles on the counter. "I never saw two unfinished rooms."

  "Probably because the door was locked. But they're there, and I got in. Come, I'll show you." In my eagerness to share my new discovery, I didn’t wait for Matt’s response before dashing upstairs. Matt followed, his face screwed into a dubious expression. He must have missed the door entirely.

  This time I entered the rooms without the slightest sensation of anxiety. Perhaps it was because things just didn’t seem as frightening when they didn’t have to be faced alone.

  Matt produced a long whistle that cut through the stagnant air. "Wow. This is really interesting”

  I squinted through the darkness in an unsuccessful attempt to read Matt’s facial expressions. "And strange. Don't forget strange."

  "Yeah, that too. I can’t believe I didn’t notice the door. How’d you even unlock it?”

  I was about to tell him about the necklace, but the words stuck in my throat. I couldn’t quite understand why I didn’t want to tell him. Perhaps it was because the way I had unlocked the door had been so unusual. I wasn’t even sure he would believe it – hell, I could barely believe it myself – and I didn’t need him asking me questions about something I didn’t understand.

  “Oh, you know. Paperclip,” I lied.

  But Matt was so caught up in his inspection of the room that he seemed to have already forgotten about me. My suspicions were confirmed when he jumped at the sound of me clearing my throat.

  "Well, if you want, I can put away the rest of the groceries while you stay up here." I knew we would be lucky if the box of popsicles we had left sitting on the counter hadn’t become a rainbow puddle by now.

  "Sure, that's a good idea. Thanks, Amber."

  After I had finished unpacking the groceries, I decided to take the kitchen for a test run and do something I almost never did – make breakfast on a stove. After an hour of experimenting, cursing, and burning, I stood before a barely satisfactory meal of fried eggs and toast. I took more pride in my work than I had a right to. As I watched my brother and sister chew, I silently prayed my culinary handicaps wouldn't result in food poisoning. To my relief, Matt and Heather didn't complain or make disgusted faces, so I took that as a sign of success.

  I spent the rest of the afternoon in my room in a state of idleness. But my mind refused to rest with my body. It was still trapped in the mysterious room.

  In an attempt to distract myself, I typed up a fast standard text message to Dylan to let him know that I had survived another day. Dylan called within minutes, demanding to hear specifics. One of the reasons that I had been friends with Dylan for so long was because he was one of the few people I could talk with honestly, without fluff and falsely cheerful text messages riddled with happy faces and vapid lingo. He was a childhood friend who took me for who I naturally was, with understanding rather than judgment. If anyone were to know my darkest fears, it would be him.

  "How was your day in fairytale manor?" Dylan prompted.

  "The house, it's beautiful and huge, but it's... well, a little creepy." I bit my lip. It was not something I had dared to admit to my family, not after moving so far just to get here, but it was something that needed to be said nonetheless.

  "That's normal. All new houses seem creepy at first."

  "I don't think that's it, Dylan. Sometimes, when I'm alone, I'll feel – I don't know – nervous?” I shook my head. “It sounds stupid when I say it."

  "Are you okay? Did you talk to Matt?"

  "I don't want to bother Matt. It's just... nerves, that’s all."

  Dylan was quiet for a few seconds. "I'm sure you'll feel more comfortable after a couple days. Just give it some time."

  I closed my eyes to hide my frustration with myself. "You're probably right, I'm being paranoid."

  "It's understandable.”

  "Our neighbor's house is even stranger. I can see it now through my window, all worn and decrepit. Yesterday I even thought I saw a face in one of the windows."

  "That's really messed up," Dylan's voice was colored with shock. "If I saw anything like that in my neighbor's house, I would be begging my parents to move."

  "Well, I was your neighbor, so I know for a fact that you saw weirder things through our windows," I laughed. Nevertheless, my gaze remained fixated on the house outside my window.

  "True, true." In the background I could hear Dylan's younger brother throwing a temper tantrum. "Oh, crap, I need to go," Dylan said anxiously, his words jumbling together the way they did whenever he tried to speak too quickly. "Nathan is breaking my Star Wars set."

  "Star Wars?" I teased. "You mean you still have those dolls?"

  Dylan sighed. He had given up on convincing me that they were not dolls, but collectibles, years ago. "Not if I don't stop my brother within the next ten seconds.”

  "Go save the force, Dylan," I laughed. It was a relief to know that as much as my world had changed, Dylan was still the same.

  Chapter Six

  Two days after our arrival, Heather and I returned to school. Inelegantly streaked with teal paint, Pierce High was much smaller than the intimate private school I had attended since kindergarten. Panthers had been painted on the entire building, from the walls to the floor to the ceiling. Tiny teal panthers decorated everything, even the bathroom stalls, to the point where the school’s panther pride had gotten slightly embarrassing. The administration must have thought this would be a groundbreaking subliminal way to promote school spirit.

  Since I was thirty minutes early, I reported to the attendance office to sort out any last-minute paperwork. Inside, I hesitantly approached a middle-aged woman playing solitaire on her computer, which, unsurprisingly, had three stuffed panthers sitting atop it.

  "Excuse me," I said in a halfhearted attempt to get her attention. "Hi, I'm a new student here."

  With a quick flick of her wrist, she minimized her card game and shot me a courteous smile. "Hello, Miss. Welcome to Pierce High School. Name?"

  "Amber. Amber Tesse."

  "Tesse.... Tesse..." The woman flipped through folders in a filing cabinet behind her desk, which – what do you know? – happened to be the home of another stuffed panther. "Ah, Tesse. That's right, you're from..." She glanced at a paper in the file. "San Jose, California."

  "Fine, fresh, fierce, we got it on lock," I grinned, quoting the first thing that popped into my mind (lyrics from an old Katy Perry song) before I could stop myself.

  She looked at me strangely then whispered the words to herself as if trying to decode them. Clearly she wasn't familiar with the pop culture reference. Suddenly I wanted nothing more than to disappear in to the ground.

  "Well, I hope you'll like it here. Here's your schedule and locker combination, and if you have any issues, feel free to see your counselor, Mrs. Cartwright. Anything you want to know?"

  "No, I'm fine. Thank you for your help." I tucked the papers into my pocket and fled to my first class before I could say anything more mortifying.

  My morning classes proceeded rather uneventfully; my teachers introduced me then
entirely forgot I existed after the first ten minutes. Unlike my instructors, my classmates kept throwing curious glances back at me, which I pretended not to notice.

  Everything was going smoothly until my third period pre-calculus class. Ms. Garner, a thin, stern-looking woman of about forty, welcomed me with a brusque handshake. “Miss Tesse,” she addressed me in a low, clipped voice. "I wish you the best of luck in my class."

  Wait a second – what was that supposed to mean? That hadn’t sounded like a sincere wish at all. I shifted uneasily under her scrutinizing glare. "Thank you..?"

  She smirked and, changing moods in an instant, clasped her hands together in excitement. "I'm sure everyone would like to know who you are. Give a small introduction for yourself, and then go to your seat." She raised a long, chalky finger toward a vacant seat in the very center of the room. "Understand?"

  Of course I understood. But understanding her demands and wanting to follow them were two entirely separate things. And I definitely was not eager to pick arbitrary facts from my life to share with a room full of strangers.

  Sensing my hesitation, Ms. Garner eyed me warily. "If you can't even make the effort to introduce yourself to your fellow classmates, how do I know you have the motivation to be in my class?"

  Before I could even recover from the shock of what she had just said, the bell rang and Ms. Garner stalked back to her desk. I could already tell I was going to hate this class.

  Alone at the front of the room, I became the focus of twenty-five pairs of eyes. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I vaguely registered that I had seen one of the boys at the Italian restaurant.

  I cleared my throat and nervously ran my hand through my hair. "Hi, everyone. I'm Amber. I'm going to be in this class for the rest of the year, and I look forward to getting to know everyone better." Well, everyone except for Ms. Garner, who was blatantly gesturing for me to continue. "And... uh... I'm from California?" Somehow that came off as a question.

  "Oh, a Californian," a high-pitched nasaly voice remarked just loudly enough for me to hear. "I didn’t know they learned math in surf school." A few scattered girls snickered.

  "Excuse me?" I scanned the room in disbelief.

  "Cecelia!" the familiar brown-haired boy hissed.

  "Sorry, but the idea that all Californians are below average intelligence is a completely baseless stereotype," I clarified, addressing no one in particular. I drew the line at people calling me dumb. Although I had never been one of those students constantly calculating my GPA, I had always done quite well in all my classes.

  "But you can surf, right?" the same voice called, which evidently belonged to a rude girl with a fake spray tan and blond extensions.

  "Do you have a half gallon hat?" I countered exasperatedly. "Stereotypes aren’t reliable."

  At that moment Ms. Garner chose to exercise her power as the authoritative adult rather than just grimace from her desk. "Okay, enough of this foolishness. Amber, return to your seat."

  Taking a deep breath, I calmly crossed the room and avoided eye contact with the obnoxious girl. As soon as I sat down in my chair, the girl in front of me twisted around in her seat to face me.

  "Hi," she whispered quickly. "I'm Alexis."

  "Hey, Alexis." I smiled at her cute, bobbing pigtails and doe-eyed grin.

  "You're going to have to forget Cecelia," Alexis recommended apologetically, flicking her eyes in her direction. “She’s terrible to all the new kids. It’s just her primitive way of saying, ‘Welcome to Pierce High! I’m going to make you hate it here so you know not to get in my way.’ Also ignore Ms. Garner. I have a theory that she hates children in general."

  "What a fitting career choice she made, then," I muttered, my voice saturated with sarcasm.

  "Right? Did you know, last year sh-"

  "Amber!" Ms. Garner barked, her unforgiving eyes boring into mine. "I do not know how teachers conducted their classes where you came from, but if you plan on being in my class, you will follow my rules, one of which involves not disturbing other students. If I catch you bothering one of my students again, there will be consequences."

  Thanks to Ms. Garner's outburst, all judgmental eyes were now focused on my nervously flushing face. I must have been making an amazing first impression. I was about to open my mouth to clarify that Alexis had been doing ninety percent of the talking, before I realized that I liked Alexis.

  It would have been wrong to drag her down with me, so I just narrowed my eyes and replied hoarsely, "Of course. I understand."

  Fortunately, the class didn't get any worse from there – at least, not for me. Toward the end of the period, Ms. Garner patrolled the classroom and peered over her students’ shoulders to scour their work for mistakes. As soon as she found that a student had written an incorrect answer, she pounced on the opportunity to embarrass him or her in front of the class by vociferously pointing out the error "so that no one else would make the same careless mistake." It was impossible not to notice the exponential increase in the classroom’s stress level. I could see students perspiring over their papers, praying that Ms. Garner wouldn’t look at their work too carefully.

  Clicking her fingernails together impatiently, Ms. Garner stood behind me for a full minute before moving onto the next student. When she finally left, she seemed slightly frustrated. Perhaps she had expected me to be dumb, too.

  I had never seen students bolt out of a classroom faster than that pre-calculus class did when the dismissal bell rang. Since I was unfamiliar with the established protocol, by the time I had finished putting my books into my bag, the class was already empty.

  "Amber, isn't it?" Well, almost empty.

  I swerved around in surprise, my bag nearly hitting the person who seemed to have materialized out of thin air. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the person talking to me was the brunette boy who had called out Cecelia. Based off his prominent build and tan, I could immediately tell he was an athlete.

  "Yup, that's me.”

  He flashed his teeth with pride, like he had just gotten an answer right on a test.

  "And you are...?" I prompted.

  "Spencer, Jess' son. I also think I saw you a couple nights ago at a restaurant." He held out his hand as an offer to shake mine. Huh, I didn't know any teenagers who typically greeted other teenagers with handshakes.

  I was about to appropriately respond by placing my hand into his when the Ms. Garner cleared her throat and brusquely recommended that we "refrain from dilly dallying between classes."

  "Let's get out of here," Spencer huffed. He raced to the door to hold it open for me. This kid demonstrated exceptional manners.

  "I was wondering if you knew where chemistry room 4105 is?" I produced my raggedy, torn campus map from the depths of my bag. "I have to be there next period, and I can't find it anywhere on the map."

  Spencer grinned wider. "That's my fourth period too. Just follow me there. Oh and don't worry, it isn't even marked on the map. Always fools the new kids. I'm surprised an admin didn't tell you."

  No longer needing it, I stuffed the map back into my bag. "Then I guess I’m lucky to have met you.”

  We managed to arrive to class with a couple seconds to spare. From the back of the room, Alexis waved at me and motioned that I should sit in the seat beside her.

  I was relieved to find that Mrs. Rosa, the chemistry professor, was the polar opposite of Ms. Garner. After welcoming me to the class in a way that did not sound like a threat, she offered me the option of introducing myself, which I politely declined by explaining that most of the people in the class probably already knew me from their other classes. She then told me that I could sit in any of the free desks that I wanted, handed me a study guide, and launched into her lesson on covalent bonds.

  After chemistry, the class went to lunch. I had originally planned to sit alone at the back of the cafeteria, where I could inconspicuously consume my unexciting peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Despite my best efforts to remain unseen
, Spencer and Alexis discovered me and vehemently encouraged me to join them. I agreed.

  Spencer introduced me to another girl and boy at the table, whose names I forgot as soon as he said them. I had never been good with names, especially now, when everyone seemed to know mine while I knew no one else’s. I was particularly afraid that I might mispronounce someone’s name, or worse, call them by the wrong name all together. As a precautionary measure to keep me from embarrassing myself, I decided I would just try to avoid using names unless I absolutely had to.

  The girl smiled at me amiably while the other boy continued eating without looking up. They looked nice enough, normal enough.

  “Hey, babe.” The girl tapped the boy across from her on the shoulder. "Please be a normal person and say hello."

  "Oh sorry, yeah, hi." The boy glanced up reluctantly for a second then resumed shoveling some form of pudding into his mouth.

  "He doesn't like new people," the girl whispered. "He'll start talking to you eventually."

  "So, how long have you been in town, then?" Alexis asked.

  "Three days, including this one."

  And the bombardment of questions from all directions began.

  Did I like it here? I guessed so; I couldn't honestly answer that question after only three days.

  What was California like? Fast-paced and much more temperate, with fewer palm trees than people gave Californians credit for.

  Where did I live? On the west side of town; I hadn't learned the name of the neighborhood yet.

  Why had I moved? Alexis had asked this question. I didn't want to outright lie to her, but I also didn't feel like unraveling the tragic family story for people I barely knew. So, instead, I told her that "the family needed a change." When Alexis weaseled for specifics, I diverted her attention by asking her where she had bought her lovely blouse.

  The rest of the day dragged on monotonously, with people asking me the same questions and me giving them the same well-rehearsed answers. When the final dismissal bell rang, I bolted out the doors in my anticipation to get home. After a day of drowning in unfamiliar people and questions, I just needed some time alone.