One Of Us

1

  I looked at the tall brick building from the passenger’s window as the car entered the front parking lot, and, for the first time, I realized that the high school had little to no windows facing frontwards, towards the road, with exception of the corridor bridges that connected the different wings of the school. Weird. I wondered why that was, and had some few quickly spun theories before I was interrupted by my driver and host in this country, who had been talking to the security guard and later on listening to the talk show on the radio. “Well, here we are.” She entered her car into her assigned parking spot, pulling the parking brake and shutting the engine off. “I have the science club meeting to watch over after school today, so we’ll meet then, alright? I know you have swimming team today, so you should be fine. Actually, if Mr. Reed takes his sweet ass time again, I’ll be the one waiting on you.” It was still too early for me to think of a full sentence response, but Ms. Chama’s remark made me chuckle.

  “You said a swear word, Ms. Chama. Are you allowed to say that to your students?” She made a mock shocked face, and chuckled.

  “Hey, look, you’re seventeen, almost eighteen, right? You can handle yourself, right? Consider it... Cultural learning.” I chuckled at her joke, and she smiled as she exited the old, red sedan, the door warning sound beeping meekly on the background, and got her bags out of the back seat. “Just don’t tell your mother I’m teaching you that, it’s already bad enough that the principal and the assistant principal have to chew my ass every time some kid in my classes tells their parent that I run my mouth on class, despite trying to control myself.” I exited the car and got my backpack from the back seat. “It’s too much for me! I don’t have that much self-control, jeez!” This time, I laughed, waiting for her to get around the car to follow me to the school entrance while struggling to carry her totes and shopping bags filled with tests, class notes, projects, and laboratory equipment she would distribute in class today. In between the mess on her hands, the messy ponytail and the already messy outfit, she looked like your typical science teacher.

  “Hey, Rahul, by the way-” Her joking mood had been replaced with a more serious look, and my stomach sunk a bit, knowing what was next. “I know you have been dealing with some nasty people at school... I have heard about how there are some bullies who have been telling you to go back to your country and other mean things...” I couldn’t help but to nod subconsciously, and she bit her lip anxiously at that response, thinking of what to say next. “Look, I am not going to sugarcoat it, these are some difficult times we’re experiencing in this country... I bet your ESL teacher must have talked about it before... And I’m sorry that you have to experience that, I am doing everything I can in my power to try to stop them. And I know you think you can handle them, and I respect that- I mean, you are almost a foot taller than me, and a very capable young man... But I just want you to be safe, okay? I would feel terrible if you were hurt in any shape or manner while under my care.”

  Even if she wasn’t my mother, she was still very protective of me, also because she was my family while in this country, so I understood where she was coming from. Her worry was very apparent, and I could tell she was holding back from being more pressing on me, maybe because she didn’t feel comfortable? Or she thought I wasn’t comfortable enough? “If anything happens, and you think you can’t handle it... Just... Give me a call? Or run to my classroom, I don’t know, get in contact with me. I know you teens tend to feel like authority is useless on these cases, and that going to the main office or the AP office aren’t going to do you any good...” I mean, I guess she wasn’t wrong, but it wasn’t really the case with me, mine was more of a difficulty than contempt for authority... “But know that I am here, and I am always, always available, and even if I have to throw a chair at someone to protect you, I will do it so, alright?” Wow, with such overprotective instincts, I wondered how she didn’t have a family of her own at her age. Nodding in agreement, I responded.

  “I know, I know.” She smiled at me softly, and then started her struggling strut towards the main entrance, trying to keep all her material from not falling. “Are you sure you don’t want help?” I asked the same question I ask her every day, and she replied the same as always.

  “I tell you every day, Rahul, I didn’t need help before you came over to live with me, I don’t want to get used to your help, otherwise I’ll struggle once you leave.” I shook my head in disapproval, but she was too engrossed struggling with gravity to notice me. We entered the school along with some crowds of students who had just been dropped off by a school bus, and while she greeted the main office secretaries as she customarily did I waved her goodbye, and went down the hallway, shuffling through the forming crowds of students who were starting their days as well. Passing by a familiar crowd of guys who were from the same year as me, I did my best to ignore them as they started their already knee-jerk reaction to my presence, throwing offenses about my skin color and nationality, and even threatening me. I didn’t pay attention to them, bullies were best dealt by not feeding them attention, or so I was raised believing in. Only thing I noted was one of their threats, but I tried my best to not dwell on it.

  “We’ll make your bitch-ass sorry for coming over to our country, you hook nosed rat! You better watch your back, we’ll get you the moment you don’t have that cunt babying you!” Did they really refer to Ms. Chama like that? I felt newly enraged at how disrespectful they were towards her, they could say whatever they wanted about me, but how dare they treat such a hard-working, earnest woman like that?? But before I could turn around to confront them, I heard someone call me in a completely different tone.

  “Hey Rahul, let’s get out of here. ” The lanky sophomore clad in all black attire besides his long orange and purple scarf, and sporting brown hair and eye bags that made him look ghastly had interlocked arms with me and dragged me away before I caused a scene, and I went along since I recognized him.

  “Oh, sure thing, Noah. I was just- Going to my locker either ways...” We continued heading down the hallway, and I was still recovering from the scene that had just happened. He kept on leading me but he had already released my arm, he just held my hand like a kid, leading the way. After some minutes, he also let go of my hand, once he judged we were a safe distance from that group. “Th- thank you for getting me out of that-“ He shook his head.

  “Naw, dude, it’s fine, we’re friends, right? That’s what friends do, save each other’s ass.”

  “No, but really, thanks, I was about to lose it there.” I spotted my locker number and approached it.

  “Because of what they were saying about the chemistry teacher?”

  “Yes. I mean, I learned to tolerate people saying things like that to me... But Ms. Chama didn’t deserve to be called like that.”

  “Yeah, no, those guys are scumbags. I mean- It’s not like she’s everyone’s favorite teacher...” I looked up at him with a raised eyebrow, wondering what he was going to say next, and he took a second to recover his words. “But- uh- Like, that’s not how someone should talk about someone, mainly if they are just doing their job. Uh- voluntary- uh- job-”

  “Being my host mother.” I glanced at the titles of the textbooks I was given in at the beginning of the school year, and picked out some titles that were relevant for classes today.

  “Yeah, right. She’s like, doing what she’s supposed to do, right? Like, protecting you is her duty. She’s like your mother. Here.” I nodded, trying to get his train of thought, and closed my backpack with a single zip. “So they are assholes.”

  “Yes. Assholes.” I anxiously glanced down the hallway from where we had come from, to see if I could spot the group maybe coming over. Noah gave one look and decided to pitch in his daily question.

  “So, uh- hey, like, do you wanna go meet my other friends? They are all cool, you’ll like them, and we have so much time to kill.” I tried my best to hide my mild contempt at his offer, not because he was a bad person, but I had heard before from Ms. Chama herself of the crowds he hung out with when I first mentioned about Noah, way back when we met. Dangerous, problematic, deviant students, who were all sorts of trouble. I was specifically warned to stay away from them, and, seeing no reason why to disobey that, tried my best to avoid his invites at any cost.

  “But... Don’t you have class? I was just heading down to class after picking up my textbooks.” The boy scoffed.

  “Dude. It’s early. Six forty-five. Like, classes don’t start in another forty-five minutes.”

  “Yeah, but it’s better to arrive early than to run late. Also, I want to study some parts before Calc today, to keep up with class.” Noah scoffed again, and chuckled half-heartedly.

  “You nerd. Okay, I won’t get in the way of you and your books.” I could tell he was hiding some rejection, and I felt guilty, but I just couldn’t abide to his request. I didn’t want to make her worry, or worse... Make my parents angry... So it would have to be a no every time. But I would never tell him that.

  “Sorry... Maybe another time...” God, why was I so awkward!? Why did I have to be in such a tough spot?

  He smiled half-heartedly now, and then told me, “You know you can’t just keep on running away from it.”

  “No-no, really, I am not running away from your offer-“

  “Yeah, right.” Guilt had made a pit in my stomach, and I wondered how much I was hurting my newly found friendship acting like I was acting. Before I started over thinking, he chuckled and said, “Okay, okay, I won’t drag you too much. But you’re still going to inevitably meet them, one way or another. I’ll make it happen.” Delivering that last line with a grin, he almost sounded like he was sentencing me. Jeez.

  “Okay.” I nodded, and started heading down towards my first class.

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  Gym was third period, right after lunch, and if it wasn’t for the fact the cafeteria food was so light and snack-like, I don’t think anyone would be handling their stomach well because we were doing sprints and jogs for warm-ups. Purely aerobic exercises weren’t my forte; I did train sword-fighting, jiu-jitsu, and had gotten into the swimming team in the short period I was in this school, but jogging? Sprinting? I don’t think I would do well either ways, you need to have a whole different physique, to be shorter and skinnier, or so I was told. I wasn’t the worse, at least, and I did try my best. After all, physical education is another subject in school, and very participation-graded, so I might as well participate well, to keep my average high. I don’t think my parents would be thrilled either ways to see large disparities on my report card, regardless of what excuse I gave them.

  The coach’s battery-run radio played on the grass besides the red running tracks where all the students were gathered, blaring pop hits from a popular radio station through its strident speakers. After I was done with my rounds of warm-up, I went to join the others in my recurrent fashion: standing some feet away from every single group, and just minding my own business while the coach didn’t give any further instructions. A very plain-looking girl wearing her dark brown hair on a ponytail and large square glasses approached me after finishing her rounds, taking me by surprise. Wasn’t she from Ms. Chama’s church? I recorded seeing her some Sunday a while ago, while I was waiting for Ms. Chama at the lobby and snacking on donut holes from the communal breakfast the older women had set out for churchgoers on long tables. She was dressed in those white robes kids and teenagers wore while they helped the priests with mass, carrying a smoking censer and coordinating the other ones with their candles and banners.

  “Hey! Are you Rahul?” I frowned. How did she- “Noah told me all about you. You’re the foreign exchange kid, right?” Oh, she was Noah’s friend as well? I nodded in agreement. “That’s so cool, I’m Rose.” She smiled, expecting me to reply, but I was stuck mentally for a second, trying to process the information in. Didn’t Ms. Chama tell me Noah’s friends were dangerous? But she was so plain and nice and also a church girl, how could she be one of these problematic kids? Or was she another, unrelated friend? I needed to answer, what was it that I should say next?

  “Oh- uh- um- Nice- Nice to meet you- Uh- Rose.” I extended my arm for a handshake, a default greeting as per every English book ever, and she giggled and shook my hand enthusiastically, going along with my awkwardness.

  “Nice to meet you too! But you don’t need to greet me so formally, we’re just on gym class.” I blushed, ashamed at my screw up.

  “S-sorry.” She shook her head, trying to comfort me.

  “No need to be sorry, it is just a greeting. You’re not from here, and English is not your first language, right? Learning all of this must be difficult, so mess ups are expected. Nothing to fret about.” Wow, she was so nice. “Like, if I was learning another language, I would be even worse, I bet.” I wasn’t sure of what to respond to her, so she just kept on going on, asking that one question everyone ever asked me.

  “So, how are you enjoying your stay in this country?” I mean, it was mostly okay, save for the troubles I was dealing with, but I wasn’t going to mention that, should I?

  “It’s- It’s cool.” Wow, I’m very eloquent. She chuckled.

  “Cool? I am guessing you’re more of the silent type aren’t you?” Not out of choice, but pretty much. “Did you do anything fun so far? You have been here for... A month? Two? Right?” I nodded, agreeing with her. “Has Ms. Chama taken you anywhere interesting?”

  “N-no... She has been busy, with the science fair coming up, and her science club going to a field trip soon...” Also, because going anywhere would be a hassle, she would have to explain so much to my mother, ask with a month in advance, give her step by step of the itinerary, and my mother would probably be calling every fifteen minutes just to know if we’re on track. But I didn’t want to make myself sound pathetic, so I thought of something quick I noted way back when I was packing my bags to take the plane, and looking at online maps. “Uh- But she told me we could- I mean, we- We would- Could go to see the Falls. You know, west of here? At the border?” Wow, I’m a terrible liar, but I think she bought it.

  “Oh, the Big Falls? Yeah, those are cool, I went there some years ago. You know, they have big rainbow lights that turn on at night? It is really pretty, you really should go there some time, and it’s only a two-hour drive from here!” That sounded cool, my interest for this randomly recognized place I had no plan on visiting had been increased. I quickly felt despondent that I probably would never witness those rainbow lights. “But there are also sooo many things to do closer to here too. There’s the falls uptown, the lake, the river and canal trails, the state park, the local parks, this amazing barbeque joint downtown, this museum, that one restaurant, that other historical house...” She kept on listing so many places around town, I suddenly felt really ignorant, and even ashamed that I had never thought of doing anything beyond my typical routine of going home to study and do homework, and waste whatever little time I had after nightfall online. I had really wasted my time so far in this country doing nothing, hadn’t I?

  “But yeah, you really should ask Ms. Chama about things to do- Oh, look, we’re moving onto the next activity! Oh, no, it’s ultimate Frisbee day.” Her change of tone and subject snapped me out of zoning out, and I could hear several students groan as the coach and his assistant brought the bags with Frisbees.

  “What? What’s that?”

  “Oh, you’ll see. It’s like, golf, with Frisbees, and we have to throw through hoops from like, over twenty feet of distance. Everyone hates it because it takes forever to get through one game. Okay, let’s get going, the Frisbeeing fields are way back behind those woods.” What a bizarre idea, I noted, and followed her and the rest of the class as we treaded towards these hidden fields.

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  That was one of the most frustrating games I had ever played, and whoever thought this was a good idea needs to rethink it thoroughly. After an hour and a half of fighting against faulty aerodynamics due to our cheap plastic equipment, changing wind directions rendering any Frisbee tossing a random outcome, and overall poor planning for a game, I felt disappointed I couldn’t even get one point. It was as bad as Rose had told me, and, by the end of the class, no one had even motivation to do more than hang out with their friends. They wouldn’t even jog towards their fallen Frisbees, and just left them lying about. I stuck close to Rose as we continued to chat, and laughed at our terrible attempts at trying to make a score. A few times I was bumped on by some of the guys from earlier on the day, despite the vastness of the grassy field we were playing on, causing me to stumble back, and even making me lose my glasses once, but she had been there every time to reach out to me. It was nice knowing someone was there for me besides Ms. Chama, who couldn’t be with me all of the time, and that I had made some more friends. It made me take my mind off things I would be otherwise more concerned about.

  But I had stayed behind now, volunteering along with one or two other students from the class to comb through the field along with the coaches, hunting for stray Frisbees and whatever else people may have lost during class. I insisted to Rose that I would be fine, also because as much as I enjoyed her company, I wanted a break from so much socializing; I just wasn’t used to this much talking even back at my home country. She had to run to the girls’ locker room and I had to go to the boys’ either ways, and in the back of my mind, I reasoned that if I waited for a little while, I could go change without bumping onto those guys from class. I was searching the limits of the Frisbee field where the woods surrounding the school started when I realized, maybe a bit too late, that my reasoning was far from right.

  From the corner of my eyes I saw a group approaching me from the entrance of the field. I knew they were going to try to surround me, and I knew they were up to no good. Turning to look, I noticed some had bats, sticks, or other equipment they had intentions on using on me. I also noticed that there was no one left there at the field, and that I had perhaps stayed for too long here, to my dismay. This was not going to end well, and I quickly attempted to think of a plan of escape as some of the guys yelled at me.

  “Hey, you dirty rat, we told you we would get you when you weren’t protected by that cunt! Now, you’ll learn your lesson for daring to come to our country and our city!” A hoarse, raucous roar was heard at the distance but I paid no heed. My mind was rushing to figure out what to do as they rushed in to get me and I rushed to get away from them. The next moment I knew, several guys were shouting in pain and screaming to get out of the way, and the roar became loud and clear, and only then I realized. Was that a motorcycle? I turned around to look, and several guys had tumbled over, and the others were dispersed some feet away, trying to get away from what seemed like a motorcycle chasing after them. I didn’t understand what was going on anymore, but the driver then turned the motorcycle towards me, and the first instinct I had told me to run, so I kept on running. The motorcycle quickly overtook me and skidded on a muddier patch of the grass, and I could hear a feminine voice yell at me as it passed me.

  “You fucking idiot, stop running away from me and further into the field! Run out, goddammit!” And I realized that was true, I should have been running out of the Frisbee fields and out of the woods, or I’d be trapped. I started running the other way as I heard the motorcycle crash, and looking over my shoulder, I saw an olive-skinned girl in a black dress and black platform heels running after me. The motorcycle had hit one of the hoops, several feet away. “Run! Run! Run, you idiot!” And we ran, going past the guys who yelled and tried to catch up with us, but whatever devil overtook the two of us, we ran nonstop. My lungs were burning, and I wondered if my childhood asthma would make a comeback at the worst time, and my legs were tired from gym, but the adrenaline kept me running. I could hear the girl wheeze, she didn’t seem the type who was used to this much exercise either, and running on her outfit seemed even more difficult, since at least to my advantage I was still on my gym clothes and sneakers. But nevertheless, she kept up some feet behind me as we gained distance on the guys, making through the baseball fields and towards the side parking lots.

  A different crowd seemed to wait by what looked like a rusty green mom van, and they waved at us, and beckoned us to come to them, and without a thought I followed their beckoning. I stopped just a few feet from the van, collapsing on my knees from the sprint of a lifetime I just had to go through, and shortly after, my rescuer followed suit, wheezing and coughing even louder than I did. A few people approached us, two who I recognized from earlier. One came over to the girl to check on her, and the other approached me.

  “Oh my God, are you okay? You weren’t hurt, right? Did Roxanne save you on time??” That was Rose, who had switched to her normal clothes, and was sporting now a pair of the most ridiculous earrings I had ever seen, but I wasn’t done catching my breath yet, so I just nodded and shook my head at her questions, and that made her more at ease. “I knew you said you would be fine, but the moment I had exited the locker room, I saw these guys leaving out to the field, and I knew they were going to go after you.”

  “Thankfully we were out here having a smoke, Rose here wanted us to run the van through the fields, but Mike insisted that there was no way he’d ruin the van.” That was Noah who was checking on Roxanne.

  “Yeah, I literally spent five-hundred dollars last week just to fix the damn exhaust pipe, hell to the no I would run through muddy fields with my van.” That voice belonged to a very fat guy, darker skinned than me, and covered with very apparent scars. He tossed his cigarette butt on the floor and stepped it out, before going around the car to enter it.

  “Roxy had a better idea, though!” A very androgynous girl with wild yet short blonde hair and a black leather jacket grinned ear to ear approached Roxanne and extended an arm to her, who took the arm promptly and got up. “She high jacked one of the motorcycles here and took it for a ride! It was awesome, did I tell you have skills, girl?”

  “I need a smoke.” The now very clearly goth girl hissed at the punk, who handed her pack and lighter promptly, and Roxanne quickly lit it up and sucked in like her life depended on it, and exhaled, now looking much calmer. I got up as well, and I was beginning to question what sort of crowd were my saviors. “Thanks, Alex... Yeah, that one is a goner, I crashed it onto a pole on the back field, it’s bent on the middle now.”

  “Oof, did you get caught on any camera while on it?” The blonde asked, but was quickly interrupted by a very feminine looking guy? Girl? I wasn’t sure. They sported a crop top and fishnet stockings and a neon green undercut, and spoke in urgency.

  “Guys, let’s get out of here.” They looked towards the fields, and when I looked over, my stomach sunk, realizing that it was the group from just some minutes earlier. They were indeed coming after me, and some were getting close already.

  “What do you mean, Robin-“ Noah was the last to look up, “Fuck! They are really insistent, huh?”

  “Oh no...” Rose spoke under her breath.

  “For fuck’s sake...” Roxanne cursed, and took another large drag from her cigarette. “Mike! Start the car!”

  “Fuckin’ hell-“ Could be heard inside the van, as the engine staggered to start, and the big guy could be heard cursing at his old engine.

  “What are you guys waiting for, let’s get in! I call shotgun!” A petite blonde girl dressed up like a doll opened the front door and sat down, I could hear someone say “No fair, Agnes!” but couldn’t discern who was it on our rush to get in. One by one the others entered as well, taking their respective places on the two rows of seats on the back.

  Noah and Roxanne rushed me into the car, and Robin and Rose had already sat on the back. “No smoking in the car! Last thing I need is my upholstery smelling like nicotine!” Mike declared while still struggling with the ignition, and Roxanne scoffed, but promptly pinched off the tip of her cigarette with her fingers. Alex was rushing in when she shouted, “Come on, Mike! They are less than ten feet from us!”

  “I’m trying! I told you, this stupid thing gets difficult when it gets cold, it won’t start as easily, and I don’t want to risk drowning the engine!” Alex cursed under her breath, and drew something from her back pocket that made me go wide-eyed, and quickly shot some feet above on the air, the loud bang echoing through the fields, so to warn the others.

  “Get back, the lot of you, unless you want to get seriously hurt.” She spoke the last part with a very threatening tone, and, looking over the seat, we noted the hesitation and shock of the group, who were already hurt from Roxanne’s motorcycle chase. At that moment, the van finally started up, gasping out some dark smoke from the exhaust before clearing up, and Alex slung into the back seat, and Noah quickly slid the side door closed. “Go, go, go, go!” Mike stepped on the gas, and the van rushed out of the parking lot, past the security post on the exit of the school to the road. With a few sharp turns that sent everyone to the window, the van rode past the school and down to the nearest highway entrance. I wasn’t sure what was going on anymore, and wasn’t completely sure if I was onboard with it, but it was too far late now to look back.

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2

  The fear for my wellbeing was dissipating in me as the van put miles in between us and the school grounds, but the realization of what had just happened didn’t quite hit me yet. It all felt very surreal, like one of those crazy dreams that are not quite into nightmare territory yet, but weird things just keep on happening and you just can’t stop them. It had to be, right? The silence that had overcome the van wasn’t helping either, after all the discord and shouting and craziness from earlier, suddenly everyone seemed very silent, which fed to my suspicions that maybe this was just a dream. Maybe if I bit the inside of my lip hard enough, I would end up doing it likewise in real life, and would wake up from the pain? I tried it a few times, but in none of them I had the heart to sink my teeth enough to really hurt. A brush against my right arm made me jump on my seat, and the very tired looking sophomore who was just trying to check on me gave me a concerned look.

  “Hey, are you okay? For real?” For real? Not really. But I nodded nervously, which only made him more concerned. “It’s okay if you’re not okay, that was all pretty scary just back then.” My eyes welled up in tears when he said that, but I did my best to hold them back.

  “He’s definitely not the least okay, Noah, he’s paler than you,” said the goth sitting to my left, leaning over to look at my face. “He looks like a deer staring at the headlight. Hey, buddy, stay with us, alright?” I nodded some more.

  “Mike, I am starving, can we go to the marketplace and find a place to have a bite? Also to calm the big boy’s nerves? He might pass out on us.” The messy-haired blonde said from the seat behind.

  “We just passed that exit a few seconds ago. I’ll take the next one to stop at the gas station near the tech institute. They have those cheap chili queso dogs and loaded pretzels.” A few of the members of the van cheered for that statement.

  “I want a slushie!” Shouted the girl at the front passenger seat.

  “Great, I can finish my goddamn cigarette then.” Roxanne said. “Do you smoke?” She asked me, and I took a second to process that question, only to frown and shake my head vehemently.

  “N-no, they are bad for you.” She chuckled and gave me a half-grin.

  “Figures, you do look like a nerd, after all.” She had another idea, and declared to the van crowd. “I am fucking thirsty. I want a beer, anyone else want one? You want one, big boy?” She looked at me again, and I shook my head.

  “No thanks.” I declined once again.

  “I wouldn’t mind one or two.” Exclaimed Alex.

  “Same!” Robin exclaimed.

  “Maybe I’ll have a sip at most.” Noah pondered.

  “Can I have some?” Agnes temptingly asked.

  “No way in hell!” Mike shut her down, and she whined, but the others all agreed that this was a bad idea.

  “No fair! Why can’t I have some? Robin is barely over a year older than me!” She exclaimed.

  “Physically, but they are definitely much older mentally than you.” Agnes protested in response, but Alex continued on with her reasoning. “Also, last thing we need is trouble with your mother, she’d have our hides if we were letting you be so badly influenced.” Alex answered, and the mention of that one word made me things click in my head that made my heart sink very badly with overwhelming anxiety. Oh no. I was skipping school. I was with the group of people I was warned to stay away from. I was being taken by those people away from school. I was missing back at school. What would Ms. Chama do? What would she say to my mother? What would my mother do? She would make me take the first plane in the next morning, for sure!

  Flashes of what had just happened came back, and things started falling into pieces in my mind. The motorcycle. The gun! Those were Noah’s friends. Those were the friends Ms. Chama had warned me about! What was I doing with them? But they had saved me. But they were bad company! I needed to get out of here, I needed to go back to class, I needed to end this madness. Glancing around in my still dazed state, I tried to figure out how I could return to school, to end all of this, to make it all as if nothing had ever happened. The van took a ramp exiting the highway, and its passengers shuffled through their pockets and carry ons, taking out whatever type of currency they had.

  Roxanne let out a sound in frustration while counting her money. “Fuck, I don’t have any extra cash with me, just enough for my carton.” She looked at me, and I shook my head once again.

  “I am on my gym clothes-“ I didn’t have anything on me, now I realized. My backpack, my normal clothes, my textbooks, everything, they were all on the gym locker.

  “True. Great.” I did have the key with me, I hoped. After all that craziness and all that mad running, I hoped it was with me. I slid down my hand into my shorts pocket, and found the key, but also, I had realized that I had my phone with me.

  “I’ll pay!” Alex chimed in. I had my phone on me, I had forgotten that! I could call Ms. Chama-

  “Yay! Thanks, Alex, you’re a lifesaver!” I could just run off when they weren’t looking, and then call Ms. Chama and ask her to pick me up-

  “I always knew that I glow on the dark when you eat me up.” Agnes groaned loudly, while Robin giggled immaturely, and Noah howled. Roxanne scoffed and threw a couple punches at Alex, who dodged all of them. Rose giggled at the scene.

  “Oh, my God! You are so dirty!” The blonde cackled on the back seat while she avoided Roxanne’s fists, and at that moment the car parked at the side of the gas station’s convenience store. Roxanne turned forwards and asked the driver, “Mike, by the way, can you buy us the beer? You are the only one who can legally buy those things.”

  “Sure, just don’t act conspicuous at the store, or I’ll get into trouble with the police again.” The driver took Alex’s, Noah’s and Robin’s money and counted it, then pocketed it before leaving the car. The van’s side door was opened, and everyone started pouring out of the car and heading towards the convenience store.

  I followed suit but stayed some feet back, and the moment they entered, I ditched them, trying to composedly walk away from the gas station and deciding to go to the truck rental diagonally across from the gas station, since it had its lot number in a big and clear decal on its store windows. Number 1000, that’s easy to say to her, right? I spotted the road sign at the crossing, noting the street address mentally, and dialed Ms. Chama’s number as I crossed the road at the red light, rushing to get away from the gas station before the group saw what I was doing.

  The phone rang until it ended up on the voicemail. Looking at the time on my phone, it was 1:40 PM. Great, she was right in the middle of her fourth period class, of course she would not pick up the phone; it was probably on silence mode, at the back room of the science laboratory. Arriving at the front of the store surrounded by all the moving vans and trucks and storage units, I tried calling her a few times more, but to no avail. I was stuck here. Oh my God, I was stuck in the middle of nowhere, outside school, and I couldn’t go back. I didn’t know anything about this city! I didn’t know where I was! Everywhere I looked was just long stretches of road leading off from the crossing, a few undistinguishable buildings, and what looked like train tracks far behind the gas station I had just ditched. Besides that, all there was to this place was a lot of yellowing grass and bushes and whatever other native flora that was dying with the change of seasons.

  I paced around the outside of the store, panicking as I attempted to call again, my eyes swelled up with tears as I realized in what sort of situation I was in. My thoughts raced, should I just go back and play along with them? I didn’t even know where they were taking me? Could I beg them to drop me off back at the school? Was I in trouble already? What would Ms. Chama think? She was going to freak out the moment she realized I was gone from the high school! Would she call the cops? At that moment when I was drowning on my own screaming thoughts, I barely felt the tug at my free arm, and a voice that ordered me.

  “Open your goddamn mouth!” I let out a small scared scream and before I could look at who was that, I found that a large pastry covered in jam and icing was lodged on my mouth. I looked at it, and then realized I was actually surrounded once again by worried and angered faces. They had found me. I looked at the one who had lodged the danish on my mouth, the goth girl from earlier, who was red with anger now. “Eat it, goddammit! It’s fucking good!” I sunk my teeth on it, and took the rest of it out of my mouth, and proceeded to chew on the bite I had taken. Was that cherry?

  Rose looked mortified at me while grasping the wrapper of the danish that I was currently holding to. “Oh my Lord, Key, we were all worried when we noticed you didn’t get into the store with us! What were you thinking?”

  Alex frowned, saying, “Yeah, dude, like, what the hell, you scared us shitless. We all thought you got abducted or something.”

  “I told you guys that he was panicking, you didn’t believe me? You can see it on his face. Thank God he didn’t get into a traffic accident or whatever.” Roxanne was talking to the others, and then turned to me and chastised me. “Eat more of the danish, do it!” I shyly took another bite, and could feel my face brighten up to probably a glaring red, while fighting my hardest to not let the tears surge.

  “You’re an idiot, you know that?” Agnes sipped on her multicolored slushie with an angry frown. Noah slung his arm around me, trying to comfort me, and told the others.

  “Yo, guys, take it easy now, he’s had a rough and confusing day. He probably doesn’t even know what the heck is happening right now.” I couldn’t hold it anymore, and my eyes welled up with tears, some running down my face, and I sobbed. Robin frowned sadly.

  “Aw, jeez, see. There, there...” They hugged me, and promptly the others closed in hugging as well, with exception of Roxanne, who just stared at the scene, and Agnes, who was distracted by the green van that was slowing down in front of the store. “It’s gonna be alright, alright? Everything is over now.” Mike exited the van, and commented on the scene.

  “Okay, what’s going on now? Why is everyone so sappy?” Agnes shrugged at Mike.

  “Rahul here started crying, I think they’re trying to comfort him or something, but it just looks ridiculous. Bunch of losers.” Mike rolled his eyes at Agnes, and told the crowd.

  “Alright, guys, you’re crowding him. Rahul, you can come and sit down and calm your nerves. We’ll get back on the road after you feel better.” He slid the van door open, and I walked towards it, feeling numb and displaced, and sat down at the edge of the seat. Agnes opened the front door and sat in there, enjoying her slushie and pretzel; Rose and Robin slid into the back seat, and got to opening a pack of some sort that made lots of noise and what I presumed were coffees that reeked of flavored creamer; Noah sat on the ground next to the van, despite Mike’s protests, and drank from his giant soda cup, and the others were outside, smoking once again. I finished my danish now that my tears were drying up, and a box of chocolate-covered donuts was shoved onto my face.

  “You want some? It has all the nutrients your body needs, like sugars, and fats, and chocolate. You know you want some chocolate.” I took a donut, thanking them under my breath, but they insisted. “Take more! Take three, there-“ They took two more donuts and piled on my hand before setting the box down on the back again. “There, eat them, sugar and chocolate helps you feel better.” I took a bite from one of the donuts, and decided they were good after all. Very sugary, but good. I went through them voraciously; I hadn’t realized that a snack-like lunch would mean I would be starving so quickly. At that moment, the cellphone I had even forgotten I was still holding on my hand started ringing up the ringtone I recognized right away as who that was, and I anxiously answered her.

  “Hello Ms. Chama.” That got everyone’s attention.

  “Rahul? Is that you?? What happened, why did you call me twenty times in the span of five minutes?? Is something going on??” The volume seemed unusually loud, and I could hear some of the others giggling and whispering, and so could her. “Who is that with you??”

  “I- Uh- I-“ Noah took one glance at the phone, and commented.

  “Dude, I think your speaker phone option is on. She can hear all of us.” Some chuckled, and others shook their heads at my blunder, and the voice on the phone recognized him quickly.

  “Is that- Noah?? Wait- Who is ‘us’?? Are you with Noah’s friends??”

  “Hey Ms. Chama!” Alex shouted. “We’re just hanging out with your boy here! We promise we won’t bite him!”

  “Not if he doesn’t want to be bitten!” Added Roxanne, and now I was flustered once again.

  “What?? What is this?? What are you guys doing with him?? I had a call down from the PE teacher telling me he was missing at the end of class, did you take him along on your school skipping trips??” Everyone grunted and groaned with her last question, but Alex kept her composure while talking to the chemistry teacher.

  “Look, we just saved your boy’s ass from some serious shit just about thirty minutes ago, and think he needs some time to decompress, alright?”

  “Wait- What happened?? Rahul??” I didn’t know what to say, but I needed to say something, I was the one who called first, after all.

  “Um- This group- Followed after gym class- And tried to beat me up at the Frisbee fields with sticks and bats-“

  “WHAT?? Oh MY FUCKING GOD, ARE YOU OKAY?? DID YOU GET HURT??”

  “No, no- Roxanne saved me-“

  “I’m heading down to Bella’s office right now to get this straightened up right away! It’s about time they did something serious about those guys from your class. But- Where are you?? Where are you guys?? You’re suddenly gone, and there’s some sort of incident that security and the local police is sorting out there by the fields, everyone heard a bang-“

  “We were just on our way out of town to take a quickie road trip, Ms. Chama. Nowhere too far, we promise, just running some errands out of town and showing Rahul here the beautiful autumnal countryside.” Alex said with the most fake innocent tone. Wait a minute, I frowned.

  “WHAT??” They were taking me out of town? “Wait, I have class to go, I have to go home, I have to study-“ Noah cackled on the parking lot floor, Robin followed suit on the backseat.

  “Dude!” Alex exclaimed.

  “Goddammit, what a nerd!” Roxanne groaned while tossing her cigarette butt out.

  Rose tried talking to me, “Rahul, dear, we appreciate your efforts to keep your grades up-“ But was interrupted by the teacher.

  “Actually, they do have some reason in this case. As much as... Well- As I don’t really like you hanging out with those kids,” An audible “well, fuck you too” was heard from either the girls outside at that moment, but Ms Chama chose to ignore it, “You do need some time out after what happened today- I’m so, so sorry for all of this- I swear I’ll sort this out as fast as I can. Last thing I want is for you to get hurt, you know.”

  “So are you greenlighting us to kidnap him on our road trip?” Alex tested the waters with the teacher.

  Ms. Chama sighed on the call, and agreed on it. “Yes, Alex. You can take him on your road trip.” Everyone cheered to some lesser or higher degree, and she added to her statement, “But I don’t want to hear of you getting him into any trouble, especially with the police! Last thing I want to do is explain to his parents why his son suddenly has a record. And no drugs or alcohol for him!”

  Alex rolled her eyes. “Fiiiine, we were not planning on doing anything too wild anyways.”

  “Thank you, Alex. Also, please try to bring him back on this day, alright? Preferably before the end of the night.” Why did I feel like a girl being taken out on a date for the first time, and Ms. Chama was my watchful father growling at my date? I looked at the others, who were holding in their giggles and snickers at the conversation they could not believe they were having with my host mother, and was once again feeling my skin glow red. “And Rahul?”

  “Yes, Ms. Chama?” I answered apprehensively.

  “Have fun, alright?” Okay, that was literally like a date night talk. Alex had the widest, most mocking grin at me as she tossed out her cigarette.

  “Yes, Ms. Chama.” I responded.

  “Alright. See you later. Have fun!” The phone call ended, and one by one, the others went from giggling and snickering to full out laughter. Alex started tearing up from how much she was laughing.

  “Duuude! She babies you so much! I can’t believe that I had to ask her permission to hang out with you!” I glowed extra-hot at everyone’s laughter, lowering my head to hide my face.

  Roxanne grinned warmly, “Okay, but that was sort of really cute, though, and I’m being honest here.”

  “Yeah, that was so cute!” I gave her a confused frown. Even Rose was on board with mocking me? “Really, though! I think it was adorable, she really treats you like her child!”

  “It- It’s just because I’m living with her-“ I tried to justify, but was cut off by Mike.

  “Don’t take them seriously. You should be thankful you have someone so worried over you, even if she does sound a bit overbearing. She just wants to secure your safety.” He then put out his cigarette, and started heading down to the driver’s door. Well, that’s true, I guess. Roxanne also headed in, and I gave some space for her to pass to the far left seat.

  “Yeah, too bad she doesn’t see us under the same light,” said Noah, as he got up and tossed out the empty box of his hot dog on a nearby trash bin, and then came back to enter the car, and I hopped over a seat to let him in. “Like, yeesh, I knew she wasn’t a fan of us, but the way she talked to us-“

  “It’s not like we are anyone’s fan favorite at the school staff either ways, Noah. After all, we do have a reputation that precedes us, and it’s not completely unjustified.” Alex nonchalantly said as she slid down the back seat carrying a plastic bag with an open six-pack, and Robin and Rose shuffled their coffees and donuts. “So yeah, she treats us like trash.”

  “She’s a bitch. Can’t wait to have her next year, it’ll be sooo fun!” Agnes declared from the front seat, and I wanted to counterargument here, tell them she wasn’t as bad as they made her seem, but could I hold up an argument against six people?

  Roxanne added, “Yeah, I hated her class, and also, she’s totally a pyromaniac, like, you need to watch out because she explodes things every other day just for the hell of it.” Okay, I did not know she was like that in class, that did sound sort of scary. I guess I was glad I was to be in physics instead. She then grinned as she remembered something while getting her bottle from Alex. “Hey, but look on the bright side, Agnes. At least you won’t be alone anymore on the ‘no beer’ rule. Sorry, big guy, we do have some peach iced tea, though, it was two bucks,” she said while popping off the cap, and Alex handed an actual quart of iced tea and a chili dog to me, the later she insisted was mine. Agnes snorted.

  “O- kay...?” I took both, not feeling like I had much option of refusing either ways. Mike then spoke over everyone, announcing his driving plans.

  “Okay, Rahul, so here’s the deal: we’re going to this native reservation on the other county to stock up on our cigarettes for the month, but we were planning to go to the state park southwest of here afterwards. But you don’t have anything on you besides your phone, right?” I nodded, and he sighed. “Yeah, that’s what I feared, I’m pretty sure you need to show some ID at the entrance of that park. Okay, gang, change of plans? Are we just going to the reservation and back, or do you have any suggestions of what to do?”

  Agnes quickly suggested her pitch, “We could pass by that one diner with the crazy ice cream flavors! I could really have some strawberry cheesecake parfait ice cream right now.” Robin and Alex agreed that this was a good idea.

  Roxanne pitched in as well, “We could go visit the next city over, there’s Oktoberfest this week, and they are offering haunted hayrides on the northern part of town-”

  “Yeah, but everyone knows our city’s haunted hayrides are way better than theirs! It’s on an actually haunted abandoned farm too. And Oktoberfest is a glorified beer festival, not to mention other questionable things they pride so much on... We’d not even be allowed in, much less poor Rahul here.” Noah retorted, and Roxanne scowled.

  “Okay, but I was just suggesting... So what do YOU have in mind?”

  “Big Falls!” Everyone turned with a confused or surprised look at Rose, me included. “Rahul told me earlier he wanted to go see them!” My eyes widened as I realized what she was talking about. Oh, no, she thought I was being serious back then?

  “Really? That would be a longer drive, we would have to take the interstate for about two hours, but it is very doable, if you guys have toll cash. We can pass by Cones and Dogs on the way there, since it is two exits before the reservation.” Alex, Roxanne, Robin and Agnes audibly cheered and Noah hooted while Rose smiled happily, but I felt guilty that I had lied to Rose and now they were all taking it seriously.

  “I- Uh- I didn’t mean- I mean-“ My protest met with questioning eyes, and that made my words come off more convoluted and disjointed and I got more and more nervous about it. “I wasn’t- The Falls- Not really-“ I didn’t know what I wanted to say anymore, and sort of trailed off, not knowing how to finish my sentence.

  “Do you want or not to go there?” Roxanne asked bluntly, and I shook my head, then nodded, and then settled for this halfway wobble that only made her groan and roll her eyes. “Choose already, goddammit, or we’ll just do it anyway!”

  “No- It’s- It’s fine-“ I admitted defeat to not cause a confrontation over a lie that honestly didn’t seem like that big of a deal. After all, I was already obliged to go on this trip, might as well not make it an uncomfortable one.

  “Then Big Falls it is! For fuck’s sake, was that too hard?” I shook my head at the goth girl, and leaned back on my seat, letting out an audible sigh. Noah chuckled, and took a turn ragging on me.

  “Wow, dramatic much? It’s a road trip, not a death sentence, you should at least enjoy it, you know?” I guess he was right, and despite the voice on the back of my head wished things would just return to normal and I could just be at home wasting time on the computer, I too needed a break from routine, for the better this time. For the worse things had already almost gone that way today too.

  The van revved up once again as Mike exited the parking and headed down to the nearest highway entrance, and I began to feel drowsy from exhaustion, mental and even physical. I tried staying awake, also to not let the food I was still holding on my hands fall off, but there was only so much one could do to defeat sleep before it overtook me. Everything faded away into tranquil darkness, and the music that played from the old stereo on the front faded away, faint echoes that dissipated in the darkness.

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3

  While struggling over Physics homework on my study desk, I went to look up online some constants that I needed to do my calculations, and somehow found myself checking my grades online. It all seemed fine, all 90s as expected, but yet, when I blinked, I realized the numbers on my online report card were dropping on real time. My stomach sunk and I froze, sweating cold as I watched the numbers plummet past the 80s, 70s, 60s, and then I heard a familiar voice yell at me.

  “How dare you bring grades like that home!” I turned in fear to face my mother and my father, who glared angrily at me for my failure. “Just look at that! You are a shame to our family, you know? We feed you and clothe you and even paid for your trip abroad, and look how you repay us? With grades like that, you don’t even need to come back.” And the two walked away. I tried yelling, asking them to please let me explain, but I wasn’t allowed to speak, it was like I had my voice stolen from me.

  I got up from my chair in a fumble, but the moment I stood up, the scenery all changed now to the school hallway. I was just entering the school, to go to class. Déjà vu, I swore I had done this earlier today, didn’t I? I couldn’t remember, my memory was far too hazy, I must have been tired from waking up early after staying up until late the night before trying to finish that class project for whatever was the class. I walked down the hallway, backpack on me, shuffling through the forming crowds of students who were starting their days as well. And then I recognized that one group of students who were always trying to get to me. They blocked my way this time, and surrounded me quickly, and I didn’t see a way out.

  “Hey, loser, we heard you’re failing your classes today! You can’t even call yourself a nerd now, little bitch, so guess what? We’ll break your kneecaps with our bats today!”

  “Yeah, why don’t we crush his skull as well, while we are at it? He clearly doesn’t need that useless brain after all.”

  “Yeah good idea!” The group started swinging at me, and I tried dodging, but I could feel the pain from their attacks all over my body.

  I tried pushing them away, panicked at their threats, and managed to get away after some few hits, but it was okay, I could run, I could run. I looked behind me, and they were closing in quickly, and everyone around didn’t care or just got out of my way, but no one reached out, no one helped. That was it, I would die alone, in this country away from home, with no help, no one who cared-

  I woke up in a jolt with what felt like a tremor or something that made my bed shake, my back aching badly, but my neck aching worse. My body felt like lead, mainly my legs, and in my dazed confusion, I couldn’t tell when did I sit up or where was the music playing from, or why did my room smell really badly of cigarettes, burnt rubber, synthetics and moldy air. Or why was light coming from so many directions.

  Oh, wait; this was not my room anymore. I was in Mike’s van. The road trip. Oh, right. The radio, not surprisingly, played rock through all the static and fuzz caused from not being able to capture the station’s signal properly. I looked around, and found that Noah was engrossed on his phone, scrolling through some social media and chuckling at pictures, while Roxanne seemed to be passed out while holding open some sort of novel. The van took a few turns around some inside roads, until it eventually entered a gravel parking lot to the side of a worn down diner that seemed straight out of the 1950s, including its large neon sign with “Cones ’n’ Dogs” written in cursive.

  A voice coming from the front startled me out of my waking daze. “Alright, we’re going to stop for ice cream and whatever else you guys want right now, also remember to go use the bathroom! I don’t want to hear anyone whine when we’re back on the highway about how much they’ve ‘gotta go’ or I swear I’ll drop you off at the shoulder and just keep on driving.” Roxanne woke up with a yawn, and Noah inhaled while he stretched right next to me, while I could hear the three on the back also yawn and stretch, even kicking the back of the seat I was on. I could hear the parking brake being pulled, and the car was shut off, and people started shuffling to get out while Mike shook Agnes awake on the front.

  “Man, road trips are cool and stuff, but my knees are killing me already.” Alex complained.

  “We’ve only been on the road for forty-five minutes, Alex,” commented Noah while he opened the van door and got off, giving another big stretch on the parking lot.

  “Forty-five minutes too many!” She hopped off, and I followed right after, and so did the rest of the group, and with the doors closed, the crowd split up in between those who wanted to go to the restroom just outside the restaurant, and those who went into the restaurant. I followed the latter group, which consisted of Mike who went to chat with the cashier, Agnes, who hurried right to the ice cream counter adjacent to the cashier, and Rose, who followed along with me, and indicated a table for us to sit on the dining part of the diner, a separate room with typical booth tables in dark red and normal tables of light wood. We sat at a booth table all the way on the back.

  “So, are you feeling better now? You were out pretty quick back at the van, we didn’t even get to talk to you.” She started. That’s true, I literally fell asleep the minute they entered the highway.

  “Um- Yeah, I was- Tired. Didn’t get much sleep last night- And the day has been sort of exhausting so far.” The latter was an understatement, but I didn’t want to worry her any further, I was already tired of everyone worrying over me today.

  “Oh... Not exactly a routine day, huh?” She smiled sweetly, and I felt warm on the inside. Okay, I retract what I had previously thought, she was pretty cute.

  I chuckled. “No... Not exactly.”

  “Did you eat anything besides the danish and the donuts? Alex took your hot dog and ate it after you fell asleep, your stomach will go bad if you don’t eat anything more solid than desserts.”

  “I- Uh- Well, I mean- I didn’t want to upset Alex, but I’m actually a vegetarian-“ She let out an audible “Oh.”

  “Oh, no, I didn’t know that- Oh, no, we didn’t even bother asking-” She was flustered over their mistake, and I felt embarrassed for causing that.

  “No, no, it’s okay- It happens- Uh- Even Ms. Chama was surprised on the first day at dinner time-“ She gasped as she remembered something.

  “Oh, no, the danish! That has eggs! And milk, I’m pretty sure! And so does the donut-“ This was a mess already.

  “No, no, it’s fine, I can eat eggs, I can drink milk too, I just don’t eat meat or seafood.” She sighed in relief.

  “Oh- Okay, whew, I’m glad then we didn’t force you to eat something that you shouldn’t.” I’m glad too.

  “Yeah- No, it’s- It’s okay... You guys didn’t do anything wrong.” She smiled again, and then got up.

  “Okay, I need to go to the restroom pretty quick. I’ll be back, I promise!” Rose having rushed off, and Agnes and Mike not being done with what they were doing, I was left alone at the table, only having to dismiss the waiter with the excuse that I was waiting for my friends to start ordering. She insisted on me keeping the menu either ways, which I immediately set down on the table after giving a quick glance and frowning at some of the things offered in there. Who in their right mind would put syrup on scrambled eggs and bacon? Or on potatoes? Or on anything that’s not sweet? This was way too wild for me and my stomach, which threatened me with a heartburn from all the sugar earlier, made a clear point that nothing there seemed appetizing either ways. I glanced outside the blurry windows, partially covered in condensation both from oil and vapor, and looked around to see the surroundings.

  Beyond the diner’s parking lot, half-filled with cars with plates from different places, I saw the road where we had come from, which had gravel and dirt dragged from the lot several feet into the road. Beyond that, there was a house up the road, and another down the road, and a large section of tall, yellowing grass intersected with a small bundle of trees that seemed to be where the property division line must have been set. Some few cars passed through, and I spotted a few school buses filled with kids, which indicated to me that it must be nearing 3 PM right then. Looking towards the back of the parking lot, on the direction opposite to the road, I could only see more unkempt, drying grass, and some low bushes, and further on, some woods, and all the plants had that distinctive warm coloring that meant their leaves were being shed. The sky above glared grey with clouds, but it didn’t seem like it would rain any time soon.

  “What are you doing here??” A voice I didn’t recognize spoke loudly, and I turned to face a middle-aged black haired woman I had never seen in my life prior to this moment held the angriest scowl against me. I wasn’t sure of what she had said, so I tried being polite.

  “Excuse me?” I replied.

  “What the hell are you doing here?? You think you have the right to just step into here like it’s the flea pit you came from?” Excuse me? “Get the fuck out of here! If you can’t speak English, then you should be deported,” I frowned, still not fully getting her hostility.

  “But I can speak English-“

  “Oh, my God, are you talking back to me now- Oh my God, Manager! He’s verbally abusing me!” What? I tried reasoning with her, but it went as well as you could imagine.

  “Excuse me-“ I shifted on my chair to look at her directly, and she started pushing me off, and smacking me, and I covered my face with my arms to protect it.

  “AAAHH!! He’s attacking me! Cops! Someone! Help me!!” I didn’t know what to do, I just froze in place as she did her scandal, and a waiter came over to look. I looked at her with a confused and scared look, and she just rushed off, hopefully to tell someone about what was going on. Within some instants, she brought over the one guy Mike was talking with earlier, who seemed to be the manager of this place, and Mike as well, who followed along. Both looked very angry.

  “Ma’am, get your HANDS off this boy right here or we’ll call the cops on you!” The manager yelled while the waitresses came over to try to take her away from me, but the woman started screaming.

  “He tried attacking me! I’m just defending myself from him! Lock him up, right now!” I didn’t know what to do, but I looked at Mike in a panic, who just nodded at me. What did that mean?

  “Ma’am, I have contacted the local police, if you don’t stop hitting this young man, you will be probably charged with disturbing the peace and physical abuse of this young man, get your HANDS off this young man!” I didn’t know how to react, and at that point, I had frozen over, but she punched off a waitress while trying to struggle away, and I cringed in my seat, hoping that she would not try to attack me again, but yet she kept on screaming.

  “This is- Completely ILLEGAL! I will have your HEAD- On a platter, I swear!” She punched one waitress, and tried storming off, but the police walked into the door of the dining room, and followed her out, and all I could hear was the fighting outside, until I saw the police come around the corner outside the window and into their car, leading the restrained woman into it. I was left just truly wondering what in the world had just happened until Mike sat down in front of me at the booth, and Agnes just followed suit.

  “Can’t leave you alone for two seconds and you end up in trouble, huh?” I looked at Mike, frowning in confusion and shock at everything that had just happened.

  The manager apologized to me. “I’m so sorry that you had to deal with that- Uh- If you would like anything- I will personally pay for your meal-“ Oh, no, I couldn’t accept that, could I? That just felt wrong. I turned to him, waving dismissingly.

  “Oh- No- Sorry- Thanks- I’m not even hungry-“ Agnes and Mike groaned audibly, and I started reddening again.

  “Just take the offer!” Agnes protested. But that just felt wrong, I couldn’t do that!

  “Are you sure? Not even something small like onion rings or fries? I really don’t know what else I could do to apologize in behalf of this establishment-“

  “He will take the fries, Jerry.” Alex said, before hopping over from the booth behind me and propping herself right next to me, and the others who had been out also came over to seat at the table, smelling of fresh smoke. I guessed that’s why they were out for so long.

  Roxanne, who had sat right next to me, on the opposite side to Alex, expressed her concerns at the same time. “We didn’t realize what was going on until the police arrived here, and much less realize it was you who were in trouble again, Rahul. You are a trouble magnet, aren’t you? Just can’t seem to catch a break.”

  I tried protesting again, but they just shut me down, so I reluctantly accepted the fries after all.

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  It had been around thirty minutes or so on the road after we had resumed our car trip, the van had not gone back to the highway, and instead followed through internal countryside roads, cutting through many harvested or semi-harvested grain and produce farms, and few sparse small towns and villages, some so small that I couldn’t even tell if there was any sign warning what township we were in. It all looked sort of... Spooky, I guess? It really had this weird autumnal vibe that I had seen on TV since young, glum, yet vivid, and with an almost supernatural vibe to it, and with the sun beginning to set, the shadows overcast the road, reinforcing the spooky atmosphere. I watched from the window, now sitting farthest from the side door, and would have been enjoying it more of that if I wasn’t somewhat annoyed at how the group was treating me so far today.

  It wasn’t as much of something major, and I didn’t want to start a fight about it with people I had just met today and yet had saved my hide, but the fact that I felt like I was being shut up all of the time, and none of my protests mattered was beginning to get to me. But I wouldn’t fight, that would be dumb, wouldn’t it? I wished yet again that I was back at Ms. Chama’s home, in my room. When checking my phone once again, I noticed the battery was just below halfway, and sighed in frustration that I didn’t have the charging cable with me. I didn’t realize I had sighed loudly until I noticed pairs of eyes looking at me.

  “’Sup? Something bothering you?” Alex questioned, while Noah and Roxanne looked, and I shook my head trying to dismiss it, to no avail.

  “Nothing. It’s nothing.” Roxanne, who was now visibly upset, aggressively retorted right away.

  “What do you mean nothing, obviously it’s something or you’d not look so pissy right now.” Alex groaned, and someone sighed, while Rose tried to stop her.

  “Roxy! Cut it out!”

  “It’s nothing! Jeez, leave me be!” I raised my voice. Noah shrunk, caught in between the two of us.

  “Nothing? My ass. Spit it out instead of being a passive aggressive little bitch!”

  “Shut the hell up the two of you or I’ll pull over and toss you both out for yelling while I’m driving, right now!” Mike shouted from the front, louder than either of us.

  “Rahul here is being a little whiny bitch who can’t seem to suck it up-“

  The van’s brake was hit so hard, everyone jerked forward. “I said SHUT THE HELL UP!” Mike yelled, and we could hear a car behind us honk wildly at the sudden stop. Roxanne scowled at me, and huffed, defeated, then turned to look at the window on her side, and I resumed watching mine. The next minutes were uncomfortably quiet, besides the low-volume radio, which now had tuned itself into some country station, to make things even better.

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  Upon arriving at a store with a giant totem pole after a patch of forest, the van parked on the side, and even upon exiting, not much talk was made besides small talk about the quantities of what they were going to buy, although Mike did tell the gang to stay on the gift shop and snack area of the store, and that included to me, as we went in, and so I did. Upon entering the store, I headed down to the area where there were larger than life dreamcatchers, shirts with prints of all sorts, and memorabilia with wolf and local wildlife motifs, mostly carved in wood, besides a large shelf of assorted incenses that were 10 for 2 dollars, and smelled strong enough to give me a headache, so I moved away.

  The others spread around accordingly, finding something to do. Agnes headed directly to the incense, and started picking through the ones with the most cryptic names, like “Fairytale Magic” and “Dusk to Dawn Enticement,” in between others, and smelling them, pondering if she would take them or not; Roxanne and Alex were discussing over what beef jerkies to get from the multiple different varieties they would get; Rose, who knew the Native American cashier, headed up to talk to him, and chat with him about family and life, and quickly slipped into some other language that I did not know, presumably some indigenous language, which made me curious about her background, but at the same time I felt it would be improper to intrude; Robin made themselves a coffee from the coffee machine on the corner, and poured countless little portions of flavored creamer, confirming what I suspected from their coffee from earlier; Noah, who was looking through the gas station type snacks that they sold, mumbled something about a lower price, and then came over to me, showing several packages of what looked like some sort of pink roll, and I knew what he was coming over for.

  “Hey, Key, you want some? Those are good, and they’re on sale-“

  “No, thank you.” I cut him, coming off as ruder than I had planned, and once again, I found myself being stared at with judgmental looks from the others who were around, and yet again, I felt my face redden. To my irritation, Noah insisted on it, and Alex came over to reinforce him.

  “Are you sure? I can pay for it-“

  “Dude, c’mon, it’s cool-“

  “No! I said I don’t want it!” I interrupted the two of them, and I felt ashamed of yelling, but something pushed me to keep on going. “For fuck’s sake, why is that I can’t have a say on my own decisions with you guys? If I don’t want something, is it that much to accept?? I said NO, THANK YOU!” Noah shied away from me, and Alex just looked at me in confusion. Why was I so strung up? I noticed that at that moment, everyone in the shop was paying attention, the others, other shoppers, even the cashiers. I had to get out of there. I had to get out-

  “Woah, buddy, it’s just sweets-“ But I didn’t get to hear the rest, rushing out of the shop, to get away from the mess I had caused, away from the people I had embarrassed myself in front of. Where though? I literally yelled at the only people who could take me home. What the hell was I doing with them, I wanted to go home, I had nothing to do with them, I had nothing in common with them, I was not meant to be around them-

  “Rahuuuuul!!!” I turned and saw Rose rushing out of the store, a store bag in hand, and Roxanne and Alex followed behind. I froze in place, not knowing what to do. Running would be stupid, of course, but I felt even more ashamed of yelling back there because I embarrassed myself in front of her. She caught up with me. “Rahul, dear, are you alright? Is something bothering you?” Truthfully, a lot of things did, including this trip, and them, but I didn’t feel in place to tell her that.

  “Yeah, dude, are you like, feeling okay? If you’re not, I mean, you can talk to us.” Alex chimed in.

  “If you’re comfortable enough, that is.” Rose added in. Roxanne just glared, staying some feet away from the group. I didn’t know what to say to them, and with the spotlight falling onto me, by my own fault, wasn’t helping.

  I nodded, trying to dismiss it, and giving the worst half-hearted smile I think I had ever given, “Yeah, no, I’m- I’m fine... It’s nothing.” I wished I hadn’t reacted so strongly back then, I am so terrible at lying, and none of them looked like they had bought it.

  “Are you sure? You seem pretty frayed, is something the matter? Are you not enjoying the trip?” Wow, that was pretty direct from her. “Do you want to go back? Is that it?”

  “Yeah, like, I guess we could drive back to town, and drop you off at Ms. Chama’s place, if you’re not feeling that great about it. It’ll be okay, we won’t be too hurt about it if you just want to skip out on us, we can go another time.” I wanted to say yes, I parted my mouth, preparing to agree, but I stopped. Guilt, over the fact that I would be basically ruining everyone’s day and making them all turn back when they wanted to take this road trip, and this feeling that I would be missing out on something that I could have fun with and do something more than my usual studying then gaming after-school routine made me stop before I could speak up, and I closed my mouth.

  “Well??” This time, Roxanne asked, with a clearly annoyed tone. “Speak up!” Rose turned to her with chiding tone.

  “Roxanne, let him decide without you pressuring him!” Roxanne huffed, and was going to retort, when I answered.

  “I- I don’t want to go home yet.” I mumbled, not really sure if I wanted that, or not.

  “What was that?” Alex asked.

  “I don’t want to go home, okay? I just- I am-“ I didn’t know how to express my frustration, and in my exasperation, I tried gesturing something, but it didn’t work, and they all looked very confused at me. I sighed in defeat, yet again, and just added in. “Forget it. I lost my train of thought.” I didn’t know what to say, I didn’t want to hurt anyone, I had a lot of things I sort of felt uncomfortable with at that moment, them included.

  “This day has been sort of a mixed bag so far, hasn’t it?” Alex spitballed. “And we’re not helping, are we?” I guessed that was the closest to words my complaints would get to be, and I hadn’t said it, so I didn’t feel as bad agreeing with them. “Yeah... I guess I’ll apologize on our behalf, we can come off as... Sort of uninviting to someone outside our group... Even too pushy... But hey, it’s hard not to try to pick on someone as much of a pushover as you are.” I squinted at her, unsure if I was meant to be offended, but now annoyed that she would admit something like that, and asked.

  “Wait... Were you guys testing me? Were you being pushy on purpose??”

  Alex chuckled, grinning mischievously. “Yes.”

  Rose frowned in horror at my suggestion, and her friend’s response. “Heavens, Alex! No!”

  “With these guys? Maybe so.” A voice coming from the group some feet away from us stated which turned out to be Mike’s, who was carrying several bags with him as they exited the store. Wow, were they for real right now? I furrowed my brows, very annoyed at this confession.

  “Okay but... Can you... Not? Do? That?” I asked in annoyance, and Alex burst out laughing for a minute, and I looked in disbelief at the others. “What’s so funny??” Rose told Alex to stop it, and she apologized.

  “Oh, Rahul, I’m sorry... But that reaction was gold. Um, what was it? Oh, yeah, I’ll stop testing you.”

  “Yeah, we ALL will,” said Mike, and he gave a glare at Roxanne, who just rolled her eyes and looked away. He then turned back to me and said sternly, “but you also need to apologize to Noah. You had no business yelling and taking your frustration out on him.” I reddened up in shame, as I looked at Noah, who tried to dismiss it.

  “No, no, it’s fine- I get it-“ But Mike was having none.

  “No, it’s not fine, Noah, you shouldn’t take on flack like that, you know it.” Noah tried to say something, but realized there was no discussion with Mike.

  “I- I’m sorry, Noah... I shouldn’t have lashed out on you, that was not right...” I trailed off by the end of the apology, but he just nodded and responded.

  “No. It’s all fine. It didn’t bother me at all-“ He chuckled awkwardly, and I chuckled awkwardly in response, it was all very awkward. I thought I heard Agnes groan, and then Mike announced.

  “Okay, now this is all settled, are we going to Big Falls then? Sunset is in about two hours, and we still have an hour on the road. I know you guys will probably want to stop by any attractions on Big Falls, although I’m afraid there are not really many other things to do there for free besides the falls.” The others all started heading back to the van once again, and I followed along, still feeling some awkwardness from earlier, even if they resumed their small talk about what we would do next, something about a lighthouse in a fort near the lake or something, and I tried engaging in, but I had no clue at that point of what was even being said.

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4

  The rest of the trip there was sort of a droll compared to the first hours, although not a boring one. I received a call from Ms. Chama, where I gave her an update of where I was, and what we had done so far, while Alex and some others snickered while listening to our conversation. Later on, Agnes, who apparently was very knowledgeable on the topic of Big Falls history, and specifically this fort that was nearby, described in great detail about the history of the French and their agreement with local tribes to build a fort, and how this war in between the British and the French had influences over the fort and who owned it, and how that shaped the history of the town and the region in great detail. When I asked where she learned so much about it, she just looked dead in my eyes and said.

  “I waste way too much time at the Calkins library during weekends.” And just resumed talking about it all in greater detail than our guide would later on go. I wanted to ask her more, but the moment I inhaled some air, hinting at wanting to interrupt her again, she gave me a glare that made me think twice. I gave a quick glance at Noah, who just indicated nonverbally to pay attention.

  Later on the road, the radio station now having switched to a specific station that constantly bragged it played every kind of music of any genre and age, as long you called to request by name and artist at a specific number, and right after the advertisement was over, surely enough, Alex was dialing the number, and soon got an answer on the other side of the line, and asking a second to choose, she covered her phone’s microphone. Everyone in the van started tossing suggestions in, or well, shouting them in, to Mike’s irritation.

  “Living On a Prayer! Do Living On a Prayer!” Robin shouted.

  “Wishmaster by Nightwish!” Suggested Roxanne.

  “Do the May Ah Eeeh song!” Agnes snarkily added in, much to the chagrin of multiple people in the van.

  “Might as well do What Is Lo-“ Noah retorted, but Mike interrupted almost immediately.

  “Nope! Nuh-huh! No way! Do not dare suggest either of those in my car, Jesus Fucking Christ!” To which Agnes and Noah both blew raspberries back at Mike.

  “We could listen to something like the Vengaboys, I like those 90s dance songs...” Rose suggested more quietly, and Alex snapped her fingers and pointed at her with a mischievous grin.

  “Aha!” And whispered something into her flip phone, and everyone shouted over, asking her to tell what did she say. “Thank you very much!” She exclaimed at the phone, and shut off the call, giggling. “Oh, Mike, Rose, you’ll LOVE this one!”

  “I- What?” He looked over at Alex, who burst out laughing incontinently. “What did you ask??”

  “Oh, don’t you remember when you were in the talent show in the year before?” She teased, and his eyes widened, while Roxanne and Agnes looked as confused as me.

  “You did not!” Mike shouted, and Alex cackled loudly.

  “Ooooohhhh... Oh no.” Rose giggled awkwardly. “You are vile, Alex.”

  “What, what, what? What is this mysterious story of embarrassment that I haven’t heard of?” Robin inquired, bouncing on the back seat and Rose promptly began explaining this mysterious event.

  “On Sophomore year, well, for me at least, Mike must have been on his first time on Junior year-“

  “Second,” Mike interrupted.

  “Right, second time, we had first met each other on AP World History-” Wait, what? How come he was in AP classes if he repeated years? “On class discussion groups, and somehow we started talking about instruments, and figures he plays the guitar, while I play my violin, and I thought it was cool, but the teacher thought it would be even cooler if we played for this upcoming project where we’d have to do a presentation of a specific topic in the history of the past 200 years-“

  “Obviously she picked about the last days of the Russian Empire because she is obsessed with that topic-“ Mike added in.

  “Hey! Just because I named my violin way back in 8th grade Princess Anastasia it does not mean I have an obsession! Not anymore, at least!” Rose retorted.

  “Uh-huh,” Mike answered sarcastically, not even entertaining her as to take his eyes off the road, while multiple snickers could be heard around the van. “The issue is that you still call it that.”

  Rose glared at everyone, and specifically at Mike, through the rearview mirror, and then continued on. “I don’t really...”

  “Yeah, you do.” Roxanne intruded, while Alex started laughing again, but Rose continued on quickly.

  “Well, anyways, we did a slide presentation, and then played a song, Rasputin, Mike’s choice-“

  “Hey, since you got to gab on and on about the Anastasia theories, I had the right to at least do something I liked as well. Also, I already knew the chords for that song-“

  “Yeah, he did play them very well, and I tried to learn as fast as possible-“ Rose rambled, but Roxanne sighed impatiently, and interrupted the story.

  “Okay, but where’s the funny part?” To which Rose answered.

  “Wait, it’s getting there. Anyways, so we played it for class, and everyone cheered and even clapped along, it was a wild success. Then our teacher somehow convinced the two of us to play it on the talent show in November.”

  “Bad idea.” Mike emphasized.

  “Well, it wasn’t a bad idea per se, it just... Didn’t go as planned...” Rose pondered, and then continued on. “So we went to the talent show, after weeks of practicing and everything, Mike and I even dressed up in Russian clothes-“

  Alex then interrupted to add in her comment directed to Roxanne with a wide grin. “The moment I saw that, I already knew it would be hilarious. He had-“ She started laughing, and could barely finish her own sentence. “He had- Hahahahaha- A fucking fur cap, you know what I’m talking about? With the flaps and the little star pin on front, and also, it looked really stupid on him!” Roxanne nodded, smiling and chuckling.

  “Shut up!” Mike shouted. Alex continued on.

  “And don’t even get me started on Rose here-“ But she was promptly interrupted by Rose, who raised her voice to drown out Alex’s comment.

  “Anyways, so we went to the stage, and started playing it, and I mean, we had some initial stage fright, but we were playing well, I’d like to think-“

  “I guess,” Mike commented.

  “We asked to clap along, and even started dancing when we go to the bridge, to improvise a little bit, and to hype the audience, I mean, it was hard out there-“ Rose kept on going, despite all the interruptions.

  “It was a sight to behold, walking the fine line of utterly ridiculous and hallmark-worth, you guys really missed out on that spectacle.” Alex now commented to everyone.

  “But then Mike’s hat just... Slipped off his head- And we were already dancing close to the edge of the stage-“ Rose mumbled on the last part, which prompted Alex to jump right in and complete the story.

  “And next thing you know, bam! We didn’t even get a warning, the two of them had just fallen off the stage, Rose had tangled herself on the microphone cords and pulled down the microphones with her, Mike’s guitar was broken, it was a disaster! Everyone in the audience, even the teachers, the assistant principal, everyone was laughing at it!” Roxanne joined in the laughter with Alex, while Rose and Mike now had their turn being red with shame, Noah glanced at me like he was thoroughly done with Alex’s antics, and Robin concerned with asking Rose multiple questions about her wellbeing after the ordeal. I didn’t know what to say nor felt like it was that much of a funny story to laugh, and sort of felt bad for the two of them, so I just chuckled and kept an awkward smile to try to fit in.

  “Were you okay? You didn’t get hurt, right?” Robin asked, which Rose just shook her head, and assured him.

  “No, no, Mike had just accidentally tugged on my dress on the fall, and I tripped on the cables, but I fell on top of him, he was more hurt-“ To which Mike answered.

  “I was fine. Just had some heavy bruising, mainly where I fell on top of the guitar-“ He then grimaced while reminiscing. “Too bad, though, I liked that guitar, totally wrecked it then. I haven’t played since then.”

  “Aw, I’ll get you a guitar for Christmas, then you can wear your dumb fur cap play that song again!” Alex mocked Mike, who was getting tired of her bantering.

  “Lay off, will you? It has been two years, either ways.” He said, in an annoyed voice, to which Alex responded.

  “Legends never die.”

  “Although, their little incident was voted to be the ‘Let Us Never Mention Again’ incident of the year on the yearbook superlatives,” Noah added in.

  “Yeah, yeah, also because everyone mentioned it for the rest of the year-“ Alex stopped suddenly, listening in to the radio, that had just finished playing the last song, and the announcer spoke up.

  “And now, a special request, or so we think it is since she did whisper it to us on the phone, from our caller Alex, Rasputin, by Boney M! Enjoy your 70s disco, Alex!” The song started with its drum roll, and she announced.

  “Hey, there it finally is! C’mon, Agnes, hurry, raise the volume!” To which Agnes promptly did before Mike could protest, and the song was played loudly enough in the radio so everyone in the van could hear. The song fully in, Alex started singing the lower vocals, and trying to get the others to join in too. “There lived a certain man, in Russia long ago- C’mon guys! Sing along!”

  One by one the others joined in, spare eventually for only Mike, who just drove quietly and glared glumly at the road. I didn’t know the lyrics to this song, and felt a bit awkward joining in given that Mike didn’t seem that happy about it, but I did eventually join in with the chorus, since it was literally the only thing I could figure out quickly enough and even clapped along.

  “Ra-Ra-Rasputin, lover of the Russian Queen!” We all sung, and Rose and Alex beckoned respectively for Mike to join in too.

  “C’mon, Mike, won’t you sing?”

  “Aw, c’mon Mike, don’t be sore! Embarrassing stories that others will be telling their grandchildren when they’re old and senile happens to everyone! You just live and learn to move on from how ridiculous you looked then!” Mike grinded his teeth and responded to Alex.

  “Shut the fuck up or I’ll fucking beat you up, Alex.”

  “Naahhhh, you are too soft on me to do that! You would never hurt me!” Alex smirked while taunting him, and giving in, Mike sighed.

  “You really have no fear, do you?”

  Alex grinned. “Living is optional, being annoying on my level is not!” Mike chuckled, and then just accepted the invitation.

  “Okay, fine.” He waited to join in the next verse, with a deep announcer voice copying the male singer of the song. “But when his drinking, and lusting, and hunger for power became known to more and more people, the demands to do something about this outrageous man became louder and louder!” Everyone cheered, Alex in specific hooted, and everyone started chanting and even clapping along with the song.

  Alex, Noah and Mike sang the lower pitches, while Rose, Roxanne, Robin and Agnes sang the higher ones, and I just joined in the chorus part, but even then, I didn’t know beyond the one line, but it didn’t matter, everyone sang along and it was just fine. Finally, we reached the last verse, “And so they shot him ‘til he was deeeeead!” And Rose and Mike spoke in unison the last part.

  “Oohhh, those Russians...” Both of them burst out laughing, and so did the rest of the group, and, for that split moment, I felt like maybe I did belong with this wild group after all, and that maybe they weren’t as scary and terrible as their reputation preceded. But yet, there were some things that felt wrong, and my mind wandered onto them, but Noah, who sat next to me, interrupted my train of thought quickly.

  “You having fun, Rahul?” To which I just nodded, and said.

  “Yes, definitely.” I partly lied, and felt guilty for doing so. The next song on the radio started playing, which was some 90s love song I could not recognize the name, but it sounded vaguely familiar.

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  Not much later, we arrived in the city of Big Falls, and after that we went to our quick tour through the fort that was at the border of the lake that fed the falls, and Agnes spent the entire time discussing with the tour about dissenting details, to which the tour guide was very happy to discuss with, but the other members of the tour all groaned when Agnes was at her twentieth argument with the guide.

  Later on, we passed by some stores and a diner that had refillable coffee mugs for not even a dollar and a giant basket of donuts special, and finally, we all headed down to see the actual falls that gave the city its name, jittery with overcaffeination and sugar rush. The sun was setting already, the sky brightening up with vivid gradients as it headed down the horizon, and. It was already almost 7 PM according to my phone, and Rose told me in excitement as we walked down the pathways along the riverbank, heading up to the bridge where we could see the larger than life waterfall better.

  “Oh, Rahul, look! Look! They are turning on the lights! We got here just in time!” The whole group turned to look over at the waterfall, which started reflecting colors of all sorts from the large spotlights on the banks, matching the also bright sky that was quickly darkening. Rose hurried me up the bridge, while the others followed behind, besides Noah who stayed behind. The group stopped, and Alex and Robin beckoned him to come, but he just said.

  “Oh, no, no way I’m going up there. I’m good here.” And sat on a bench at the base of the bridge crossing the bridge.

  “You scared of heights?” Alex asked with a grin, approaching him.

  “Yeah, actually. Terrified.” Noah said, glancing over at the bridge and the drop into the river with a nervous look.

  “Oh.” Alex said, her grin fading away, and then after a second of thinking, added on, “Okay, fine, I’ll stay with you.”

  “Oh, no, it’s fine- I’ll just wait for you guys-“ Noah started to excuse, but she quickly interrupted as she plopped herself next to him on the bench.

  “I said, I’ll stay.” And then she turned to us. “What are you guys waiting for? You guys need to show Rahul the falls! Go!” And Rose beckoned me and the others to continue on. I gave a quick glance at the two on the bench, and then headed up to the top of the bridge along with the others.

  Twilight was setting in, and we watched as the waterfall’s lights became brighter and brighter as the sky darkened, its yellows and pinks and reds contrasting against the waterfall’s blue lights. Eventually, the last of the sky’s orange glow gave away to the grayish darkness that preceded night, and then it was finally dark, and Big Falls was as beautiful and as multicolored as Rose had promised. We all had watched in awe, making some small talk, until eventually, with the darkness having settled in fully by then, Agnes just turned to the rest of the group and said.

  “Okay, now what?” And with that, the whole group seemed to snap out of that moment we were in, and looked at each other.

  “Now... We go back.” Mike said, and the realization that this was the end of the day settled in way too quickly for me, I felt a small sadness about it. I guess it was time for us to head back, after all, but I didn’t want that, I didn’t want it to be over like that.

  “Cool.” Agnes responded, and started heading down the bridge back to where Noah and Alex were seated, and the second of silence that overtook the group confirmed to me that my feelings about not wanting it to be over were not alone. The group followed after Agnes, and Rose turned to me to ask.

  “So, Rahul, give us the verdict, did you like it all?”

  “The lightshow? Yeah, it’s really beautiful, like you had told me.” I promptly responded, to which she chuckled and shook her head.

  “This whole day, silly! Hanging out with us-“

  Robin interrupted her right away. “Of course he liked hanging out with us, didn’t you?” They directed the question to me while jokingly batting their lashes at me, and I hesitated maybe for a bit too long while piecing together what to say, because their smile then turned to a frown. “You didn’t?? Aww...” I panicked a bit, trying to say something to appease them, and the group.

  “No, no, I liked hanging out with you guys, it was fun!”

  “Yay!” Robin responded, clapping happily.

  Rose smiled at me. “Oh, I’m so glad!”

  “You better.” Roxanne mumbled loudly enough for me to hear, and joining up with Alex and Noah, who both had just gotten up from the bench, Alex inquired.

  “What you guys glad about?”

  “Rahul said he liked hanging out with us, Alex!” Rose responded to her.

  “Oh, great, cool! You could hang out with us every day if you want, you know? That would be cooler.” Which was a nice invitation, but it did bring back my concerns about what would Ms. Chama, or worse, my parents think if I were to hang out with this group more often. Probably I would never hear the end of it. “Well, if Ms. Chama lets you, fourthie.” I squinted at Alex, and she gave a wide grin, while Rose smacked her and then chided her.

  “Alex, don’t you think you’ve tormented enough people enough times today already-“

  “Okay, okay, just kidding, juuust kidding, yeesh.”

  Noah joined in. “It’ll be okay, I told Rahul he’d meet you guys eventually, for better or for worse, and it happened. He will hang out with us again, I promise.” He smirked at me, and I didn’t know what to do but to smile back awkwardly. Oh, yeah, that was ironic that he did say that earlier, it’s almost like he prophesized it.

  “I... Guess.” I added in.

  “I guess hell to the yeah, you are. This is not a choice, fourthie.” Completed Alex, and then the topic shifted, as we started heading our way back to the van, planning out how the drop-offs would happen when we were back in our town. I really wasn’t all completely in for the idea, I would have to consult Ms. Chama, but I don’t think she would be all that enthusiastic about this promise they made.

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  If the end of the trip to Big Falls was quick, the way back was even quicker, also because several people on the van had fallen asleep despite all the coffee we had. I watched the roadside that was shrouded with darkness since my cellphone was on low battery mode, mainly after I received yet another call from Ms. Chama, who yet again wanted a status update of the trip, and a forecast of how long it would take for me to get home. After passing over some time estimates Mike gave me of how long before we got back in town, and how long to get to where I lived once we exited the interstate, she then finally asked me about how did I enjoy Big Falls, and if I had any pictures. I did not have any pictures I took myself, in my attempts to conserve battery by ignoring my phone altogether, I forgot to do that, but Robin, who had been awoken by my conversation on the phone, commented groggily that they had taken some pictures of the group, and they would send it later, before falling back asleep. Once the call ended, and the van was quiet once again, but for the radio playing some more rock that basically only Mike was listening to, I too ended up closing my eyes, and drifting off in a nap.

  I was woken up by a shake from Noah. “Hey Rahul, hey Rahul. Wake up, big guy, we’re at your place.” Surprised awake, I yawned and stretched, and then sheepishly asked.

  “At my place- Oh, we’re already back?” Wow, we were back in town already? How long had it been? I checked my phone, I was asleep for an hour.

  “Yeap- Oh, I think that’s Ms. Chama at the front window- She’s turned on the front light, I think she’s heading outside, man.” I looked over at the one store house, front door light on, and surely enough, the messy ponytailed glasses-bearing woman came out, sporting sweatpants, a baggy hoodie and flip-flops. “What the hell is she wearing... Isn’t she a bit too old for like, a hoodie or flip-flops...?” Noah added in as Ms. Chama came over. Everyone was awake by then, and none were too happy to see her, and she tried approaching the group with a tentative smile.

  “Hey Rahul! And... Hmmm... Don’t tell me... Hello Michael, Alex, Roxanne, Rose and Noah, nice to see you guys again, it has been a while huh?”

  Rose answered softly a “Hello,” quieter than what I had seen so far today, and Roxanne turned away, while Alex and Mike gave their fakest smile while greeting back. Noah just didn’t bother responding or even acknowledging her.

  “Also, hello, Robin, how is homework getting along? Planning on turning it in any time soon?” Robin, just mumbled something about working on it. “Don’t forget, there’s a test on carbon compounds next week! You better study.” She then looked at Agnes on the front seat with a smile. “And... I’m not sure who are you, are you a freshman? What’s your name?”

  “I’m a nonya.” She answered.

  “A what? A niner? Is that what they call ninth-graders now?” Ms. Chama cluelessly asked, which only prompted Agnes to rudely answer.

  “No, it’s a nonya, for nonya business.”

  “Oh... Oh... ‘Kay-“ Ms. Chama answered monosyllabically, and then she turned to me, and smiled awkwardly. “Well, Rahul, are you heading in, or do you plan on staying in the car?”

  “Oh, yeah- Sure- Uh-“ I got up from the seat, and moved over Noah and Roxanne, while repeating “excuse me” multiple times, and tripping over Roxanne’s bag.

  “Don’t you have your backpack?” Ms. Chama asked.

  “No- It’s in my gym locker-“ I remembered as I hopped off the van, and I double-checked that my key was still with me, which was the case. I seriously hoped that this meant my things were safe.

  “Well, it’s okay, you can get it tomorrow.” Ms. Chama then directed to the group. “Well, thank you guys for delivering Rahul safely home, and for helping him out today-“ Which was replied with multiple mumbled responses in the terms of “No problem.” She then said, “I’m... Heading in... It’s sort of chilly tonight... Uh- Good night to you guys.” Now she mentioned, it was getting very cold very fast for me, mainly considering I only had my gym shorts and tee on. Ms. Chama started making her way back up to the house. The tension of the scene was dissipating as she distanced from the van.

  “Awkward...” I let it slip out loud.

  “Yeah, she’s not on anyone’s top favorite teachers... And definitely not on mine after she flunked me last year despite my good Regents score.” Noah mentioned quietly, scowling.

  “She also picks on people for the smallest and dumbest things, like doodling on class.” Roxanne added.

  “And dozing off- As if what she lectured wasn’t exactly what the textbook said!” Alex mentioned.

  “And having a bad reputation regardless of how well you perform in class. When I had her for AP Chem last year, she pissed me off so much, she would take off much more points from my homework and tests than other students who did the same mistakes, and harassed me throughout the year just because I was not a model student like every other stuck up prep on that class.” Mike told. “So on the end of the year, the day after the final exam, I set my notes on fire in her classroom. With her potassium nitrate and some sugar I found on the lab. And then told her to ‘go stick her fucking attitude up her virgin ass.’” Everyone giggled lowly, to not attract Ms. Chama’s attention, but I was frankly a bit shocked, and just chuckled awkwardly, again. Mike continued on his story. “I had a 5 in the AP Exam either ways, despite having a miserable average no thanks to her, and I still have ISS to attend for yet another two months this Fall. Whatever.”

  “Oh...” I didn’t know what to say, I wanted to defend her, but it felt improper, given the stories that they had just shared; thankfully, Noah recovered the conversation really quick.

  “Well, anyways, but that is not on you dude. She seems like she’s a cool person outside school, as far as we can tell.” Alex and Mike agreed. “Which is cool, I guess.”

  “Yeah...” I noticed that Ms. Chama had reached up to the door and was waiting on the doorframe for me. “Uh, well, I’ve got to go... Goodbye, I guess?”

  “Nah, man, more like good night, you aren’t escaping hanging out with us, remember?” Alex grinned, reminding me of the conversation back at Big Falls.

  “Yeah, she’s right.” Noah added, smiling.

  I then corrected myself. “Alright, good night, guys.”

  Rose smiled sweetly. “Good night, Rahul.”

  “Night,” curtly said Agnes from the front seat.

  “G’night.” Mike joined in.

  “See ya in school, fourthie.” Alex mocked.

  “Night-night!” Robin said enthusiastically.

  “See you tomorrow.” Said Roxanne.

  “Yeah, see you tomorrow, Rahul. Really.” Said Noah, and I shut the slide door, and headed up the pathway, still waving to the van while it drove away. I was still smiling when I walked up to the door, and Ms. Chama then said.

  “From the smile on your face, I’m guessing you had tons of fun today, huh?” To which I didn’t even hesitate before I nodded and answered.

  “Yeah!”

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5

  The wind was deafening, shaking the trees above with rage, and leaves and branches seemed to be flying all over the place. The forest was almost as dark as if it was night, I could barely make it out where was the winding path, which I hoped not to step out of in fear of coming into contact with some poisonous plant. A flash brightened up the entire forest for a split second, and then thunder rumbled like an earthquake, echoing through the open space and within my chest alike. Semi-skidding, semi-sprinting, I rushed my way through the open trail of the flooded area of the lower woods in a semi-panicked state, trying to make it uphill through rotting foliage and oily mud. Brambles, foliage and low branches alike crept over the trail, grasping at my clothes and my skin and face, catching on and scratching relentlessly, but my nerves were drowning in adrenaline, and I was too focused on the one task: escape this place.

  Some feet behind and ahead of me, I could hear the strained breaths and stumbling footsteps of the others, as well as their grunts and yelps as they too struggled to trace our way back the fastest we could. Noah could be heard cackling every few seconds behind me, and, suddenly, Rose screamed ahead of me, followed by Alex yelling, and a splat of wet mud was heard way back on the group. I turned around, automatically rushing back downhill to help the second one up, but when I reached her, I too slipped and fell on the mud, bottom first next to where she was getting up from falling face-first. Roxanne hiked past Noah, who was on the back of the group, her black platform heels half-sunk into the mud, reaching both of her hands out in help.

  “Come on! Get up already!!” She screamed, fear contradicted her dark, heavy makeup, shining through her amber eyes, and her short raven hair was distraught and spotted with leaves. I took a second to recover from just the shock of the fall, as everything seemed to be both happening too slow and yet too fast for me to process. Alex, whose pale face, golden hair, and zipped up leather jacket were all now soiled with black dirt and decay, took Roxanne’s hands, while I struggled to balance, but managed to do it.

  Noah reached up to us right as we started making our way once again up the incline, towards the drier part of the woods. I looked at it, the forest that thickened into a wall, where you could not see where the path led you a few feet ahead. How far were we from civilization? His sunken eyes and ghostly white face now had a mad look, and he chuckled to himself once again before exclaiming in almost maniacal manner: “I told you guys- The stories were real! A ghost! We spoke to a ghost!” The wind howled so much, we could only understand each other speaking loudly.

  “I don’t think that was a ghost, Noah, ghosts don’t exist-“ I started off as I broke off a branch, but was right away cut off.

  “Yeah, no, he was just bullshitting us-“ Said Alex, who was already ahead of the group, but she also was cut off.

  “No way! You guys all saw that!! He was controlling the weather, and hovering over the waterhole!” Noah exclaimed in a desperate tone.

  “The weather is changing by itself, a storm is about to happen, that’s it.” I tried to impatiently rationalize what we had seen while also trying to firm my slipping left foot under me. “We don’t know what we saw, everyone here was already on a panic by then, which plays with your mind-”

  “But I saw that! You saw that!” We ALL did!” Noah screeched at our subgroup, which was almost at the upper part of the forest, but Mike and Robin, who were both helping Rose detangle her dark hair that seemed to be absolutely caught on a dry bush, looked over to see what was happening, while Agnes was nowhere to be seen. Uh-oh. Roxanne, very irritated at Noah’s antics, yelled at him.

  “SHUT UP!” And at that exact moment another lightning brightened up the forest, followed right away by thunder like a reverberating drum roll across the sky, making it impossible for anyone to speak for a second or two. To be honest, I wasn’t sure anymore of what I had seen, if anything at all, but I couldn’t piece my thoughts together even if I was really trying to. Catching up to the other group, I stopped to see if I could help with Rose, but she was pretty much freed up from the tall bush that attempted to catch onto my hairs as well. Roxanne, Noah and Alex did not even stop, but a movement off the corner of my vision, right around the muddy part of the trail where I had slipped, made me freeze.

  That was him! The guy we had approached earlier, who we had seen back at the cattail-ridden waterhole, the one who we had angered earlier! How did he catch up to us already? My blood pumped loudly in my ears, and I barely heard Mike’s instruction, but I figured his tug on my shoulder meant run, and so I did that, being now on the tail end of the group. Lightning struck a third time, and for a few seconds all I heard was the forest rumbling.

  The trail on this area of the forest had sharp curves, and the bushes, brambles, trees and creepers claimed much more of the walking space, but I had already noted that earlier, when we first entered the forest with foolish intents. What surprised me was to find newly fallen trees partially blocking the path, which I had to haphazardly hop over while trying to maintain speed. The trail quickly opened up more, with less tree coverage and more bushes edging the trail, signaling we were on the more used paths, and hopefully closer to the road but that didn’t change the overall lighting, as the storm overhead seemed ready to pour.

  The winds died down suddenly, leaving an eerie silence that made the group’s running noises loud in the absence of forest noises. Suddenly I heard a creaking noise a few feet behind, clear as day, and goosebumps crawled all over my body as I pushed my already strained body to run faster. The ground inclined up dramatically, and the forest was becoming thinner, which meant I was finally reaching the roadside from back when we had entered the forest.

  I could only see Mike ahead of me, and could hear the others on a distance, shouting for us. If I could make it to the road I would be saved, so was my rationale, and I tried to reassure myself of this to ignore the overwhelming feeling I had that I was being followed. My lungs hurt from how hard I was breathing to try to keep up the pace, but that was the last stretch, I just needed to climb up that incline as fast as possible. Slipping on the loose dirt and tripping over roots and branches, I grabbed onto whatever could help me, letting the brambles dig into my palms and the inside of my arms. Last stretch and I was climbing up the incline by holding onto the ground at this point, but finally, I could see asphalt beneath.

  “We’ve got Rahul! Great, everyone’s out!” Roxanne exclaimed as I bent over to try to reclaim my breath. I could see her mud-laden boots approach me, and I looked around in exasperation.

  “Is- Agnes- Here??” I struggled to voice my concern I had noted way back, in between much needed gasps for air.

  “Yeah, I was out first.” Said the younger blonde girl in a pink frilly dress now dashed with grey and brown, while she furiously scratched her legs. “I cut through the forest because the path was too winding.”

  “Agnes, stop itching that rash. It’s probably poison ivy, you’ll get it on your hands.” Said Rose, who approached Agnes, reaching out to the younger girl’s arms, but Agnes shook her off, annoyed.

  “Who cares? Let me itch it!” Rose stepped back, looking offended at having her help be rejected. Standing up after finally recovered my breath, I half-smiled at her in solidarity.

  “You guys saw him do that, didn’t you? He was walking over water!” Noah interrupted, repeating once again for everyone, but all he got as responses were a few scowls and Rose’s frown. I was still trying to make sense of what had just happened, and what or who we were running from.

  After a few seconds, Alex chimed in. “Look, I don’t know what I saw, man, but can we just not talk about it ever again? Please? For the sake of everyone’s sanity here?” Robin, Agnes and Roxanne nodded right away, and Noah hung his head, visibly frustrated and angry at the others. Mike, who had been hunched over looking at his phone for the past few minutes, looked up and announced to the others.

  “Okay, so I have figured where we are we, in relation to where I have the van parked, it should be about a mile down the road this way.” He extended his arm to behind him. Seeing his phone reminded me to check my back pocket to see if mine was still intact, and I scrambled to get it out of my wet jeans. The screen had cracked from my fall. Whoof. “We should get going before the-“

  Lightning flashed again, and thunder followed suit, but this time, torrential, freezing rain came in third, drenching our ratty, mud-splattered, scratched up and bleeding group. A collective sigh of frustration was heard, but no one could tell who contributed to that sound.

  “Before that happened.” Said Mike with a disheartened tone, pocketing his phone, and I did the same in a hopeless attempt to keep my phone from getting wet, given its new vulnerability. “Well, we better get going.” And started his limping walk, and the others followed him in this walk of shame. I looked back once more, half-hoping there was something there, but also half-fearing the possibility, and it felt like the forest was staring back at me, so I just started pacing while limping to join up with the rest of the others.

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  “Did you hear about the new disappearances from last week? This time, it was a girl and a guy from Wellington High that just suddenly vanished. Both sophomores, too.”

  “Oh wow, really? I didn’t know, was it on the news?”

  “Yeah, they were talking about it on this morning on the local news channel! Apparently this was not the first time the girl went missing, she was on the news a while back for going missing and then she was found again, so the police thinks it was a runaway pact or something of the sort, but yet considering they are like, the sixth ones to disappear without a trace on these past recent months, and who knows how many have gone missing in past years-“

  “And there are now the girls from both Watson and our school who showed up dead in the woods last month...”

  “Exactly, police is opening up an investigation, also to figure out if they’re interconnected in some way.”

  “Jeez, I hope it’s not a serial killer or something of the sort! Can you imagine?”

  “Yeah, no, it’s scary out there, but you know what’s worse? Police is warning parents to keep track of their children’s locations and what we’re doing at all times outside school.”

  “Ughhhh!!”

  “Yeah, I know right? Like, this will suck so much, my mother literally told me that from now on she wants status updates on where I am and what am I doing at all times.”

  “Oh wow, that sucks!”

  “Yeah, ugh. Why does all the crap have to happen weeks before the homecoming dance? Now I can’t get Jaxon to-“

  “’Sup Rahul? Enjoying the fire drill?” I snapped back to reality upon hearing my name, and stared for a split second, dazed and confused, at the pale, lanky guy with scruffy brown hair who was just a bit shorter than me, sunken dark eyes, and a weary complexion, sporting a beanie and a bulky scarf of matching blue colors over an all black outfit, before realizing who he was and why was he talking to me.

  “Oh, hey Noah. Sorry I didn’t hear you, I had phased out.” He dismissed it with a hand waive.

  “Nah, it’s okay- I had asked if you were enjoying getting out for the fire drill.” Oh, yeah, fire drill, that’s why everyone was out on the baseball field despite the chilly, gloomy weather, following the instructed pathway we were meant to take as soon as the fire alarm had rung. I was in a Civics class test when it rang. I needed to get back to finish that.

  “Uh- I mean, we were right in the middle of a test-“ He scoffed at my response.

  “God, Rahul, you’re nerd!” I reddened up at his response, and tried explaining myself.

  “Um- I was- In the middle of a question ...” Noah just shook his head.

  “Whatever, man, don’t try to explain yourself, you’ll only dig your grave deeper.” I squinted, mildly offended. “Anyhoo, I came over here to tell you, you’re forcefully invited to join the gang later. We’re going on a ghost hunt on this beautiful October afternoon.” I frowned at him, remembering my commitments for the day, and crossed my arms at a useless attempt at warming myself from the wind gust that made the whole crowd of students shudder. The ear-piercing alarm bells could still heard on a distance, coming from inside the giant dull red building.

  “But I have sword-fighting practice-“

  He chuckled, interrupting before I could finish. “Dude, what? That’s an actual thing you can do nowadays??”

  “Yeah- My mother had to do a whole phonebook search for this town to find a place that offers classes before I came over, they only offer it at this school at Triangle Center...” His eyes lit up when I mentioned the plaza. “I’ll never hear the end of it if I start skipping those classes...” Mama was generally a kind and gentle parent, but there was no space for me to just start slacking off, I feared.

  “Triangle Center, as the one located in the center of Jacksonville? Is it that one place with the yellow header on the intersection of South West with Mill Road?”

  “Uhhh-Yeah, I think?” I wasn’t really sure if that was the right intersection, come to think of it I hadn’t memorized the name of the streets in this city, all I knew was what Ms. Chama had told me, that the school was at Triangle Center.

  “Dude, awesome! There’s a records shop across the street from it! And a bunch of boujee little shops, with snobbish pretentious teens as cashiers and waiters,” he rolled his eyes and waved his hand dismissingly, “That town likes to think they’re way better than the rest of us, just because their daddies drive them around on fancy cars. But hey, there’s also a really great pizza place there. You so have to go there, they’re amazing! Also, there’s this old farm a mile or so from Triangle Center, it’s perfect to start off our ghost hunting adventure.” I think I had seen that farm on the way to my classes before, it wasn’t exactly a friendly place, with its rotten shack and vine-ridden silo, and excessive amounts of tall, potentially poisonous weeds everywhere, I hoped they were not planning on dragging me into that.

  “You have really strong opinions about that place, huh,” I said in a snarky tone, to which he raised his voice and spread his arms wide, declaring for all to hear.

  “Dude, honestly! Fuck Jacksonville townies!” To which some other students shouted in agreement. “They can go straight to hell, them and their little pinned up blazers from their preppy private schools and their overrated, overpriced coffees!” Several classmates of mine, as well other students, were all agreeing in chorus by now, but a teacher heard Noah yell and chided him promptly in a surprisingly bellowing voice.

  “NOAH COTTON, LANGUAGE! WE MAY NOT BE IN CLASS, BUT I AM STILL WATCHING OVER YOU!” He cringed at the bulky older woman with long dark hair sporting a long dark green cardigan and thick glasses, who overshadowed most of her all the students, and responded to her out loud.

  “Sorry, Mrs. Woodsfolk!” Then he turned to me and said, “But yeah, they have some good-ass places there. So it’s set, you’ll go to your sword fighting practice, we’ll wait for you, and then we’ll go to the pizza place and then off ghost hunting.”

  “You know Ms. Chama won’t like that. And you know she’ll be there, she drives me to all my classes.” I told him. “Also, why are you guys so bent on this ghost hunting business? They don’t even exist-“

  “Jeez, Rahul, don’t ruin the mood!” He interrupted. “It’s October, man! TV is reprising every single Halloween special ever, horror movie season is going strong, the weather is turning grim and dark, don’t you feel it in your bones the need to partake in supernatural adventures?”

  “Uh- Not really...”

  “Well, too late, like I said first, you’re forcefully invited.”

  I sighed, and answered, deadpan. “Well, what choice do I have?”

  Noah scoffed. “You make it sound like you’re being forced to do the worst thing ever. It’s just hanging out with us.”

  “No, I just don’t like to be forced by others to do things.”

  “Then just come along of your own accord, jeez! Or don’t! It’s not that hard, is it? I swear to God we won’t cook you and eat you for dinner!” The air was oddly silent, and everyone took a second to realize what that meant, but when they did, multiple groans could be heard among the hundreds of students outside. “Aw, man, is it already over? Ughh, whelp, back to US History I go.”

  “LET’S GO, LET’S GO, TIME TO GO BACK TO CLASS! QUINTON, YOU TOO, DON’T THINK I CAN’T SEE YOU THERE!” His teacher beckoned the class, and other staff followed suit. Everyone started shuffling back uphill, towards the fire exits.

  “Seriously, dude, it’s fine if you don’t come-” It’s not like the decision is on my hands solely. “But you’ll miss out on a sick adventure...”

  “Okay, I’ll come around.” I caved in. “I’m just going to have to explain to Ms. Chama. Somehow.”

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  Unfortunately, I still had not mentioned a thing to my host mother by the time sword-fighting practice was over, because I had no idea how to approach her on how to ask her to let me hang out once again with the one group of students she warned to stay away from. Time for plan B, I guess, I thought as I zipped up my grey hoodie before entering the car.

  “So- Um- I was wondering- Do you think I could- If I could stay over here, and maybe, you know, hang out here, now that my class is over? I could call you later to ask me to pick me up-“ Ms. Chama looked at me in confusion from the driver’s seat of the tomato-colored car, which led me to fumble with my training equipment as I tried to put it all on the back seat. “I- You know, to just- Um- I wanted to explore here- Yeah, I wanted to hang out here, to explore, I never really go anywhere... If that’s alright?”

  Frowning in complete loss, she asked. “To do what?” I couldn’t think of anything to make up on the spot, and I was afraid I would blow my cover. She glanced over me towards the right side window, and looked back at me with a look that signified right away she had figured out what I was trying to cover up, and, upon glancing over my shoulder, I figured out why.

  A familiar girl sporting her short blonde mane, which was especially messy today, and her signature black leather jacket and white tee combo waved enthusiastically at us from my window, beckoning for me to come, and I could hear Ms. Chama sigh in disappointment. My stomach was a pit, and I furrowed my brows at Alex, trying to convey to her the situation she had put me in. “Fine, sure, just... Stay out trouble.” I looked back at her, wondering if I was off the hook, but then she added, “And we'll talk about it later.” I nodded dreadfully, and then quietly exited the car.

  “Jesus Christ, why the funerary look?” She said in a mocking tone, as we both followed down the sidewalk towards the crossing light. I looked over to see if our teacher was still watching, and to my dismay she was still there, the car was still off, reinforcing my anxiety about that talk. I sighed, and mumbled in response.

  “Nothing, just... I didn’t get to tell her I was going to hang out with you guys today.” She cackled, drawing the attention of multiple passersby, and probably Ms. Chama as well, but I didn’t check a second time on her, I was already red enough from shame.

  “Oh, no, Rahul, you’re lying to Ms. Chama now? Why, no wonder she thinks we’re a bad influence for you to be around.” I froze up, getting caught up fumbling as I tried explaining myself yet again.

  “No, what- She never said- It’s just that I didn’t want to tell her because- Um- I wasn’t sure where we were going- And- I didn’t want her to get worried of- Um, if I was lost.“

  “Rahul, stop lying, you’re giving me second-hand embarrassment.” She said this with a condescending smile, and I could feel the heat glow of shame that emanated from my face, imitating the pedestrian lights. I shut myself up before I embarrassed myself any further today, and the lights turned green for us. I sheepishly followed alongside her while looking at everything around. She glanced a few times over, from what I could see from the corners of my vision, and then let out a very audible sigh when we reached the sidewalk once again, and mumbled something about a long day under her breath. It did seem like it would be a long day, after all.

  Passing by a few stores, we stopped in front of what looked like a bookstore, but, looking through the store windows, the shelves were wrongly placed, they were horizontal? Oh, those were not books. I glanced up at the marquee, a big, yellow sign named this place “Rocky’s Rockin’ Records.” Alliteration, I recalled the English Language Arts teacher say in class, when describing this sort of literary element, which was not really much of help right now, but it was interesting to find a real life example of it. Alex entered the store and a bell rang above her by the glass door, and she proceeded to greet the only costumers present at the moment, familiar faces that recognized me as well when I followed her in.

  The medium sized store comprised of multiple hip-level top-opening shelves creating a short maze-like aisle formation, semi-filled with actual vinyl records in their sleeves, properly organized by genre and artist. The back wall and part of the side walls were lined with tall shelves with other music-related things, like antique record players, 3-in-1 stereo radios, and other objects that seemed to be there more for the sake of giving the store a proper ambiance, than to be sold. There was another record player, on top of a small table on the back corner of the shop, which could barely be seen behind Robin, who was wearing a mixed outfit comprising of a white lace shirt, a sleeveless bomber jacket spotted with colorful patches, small jeans shorts over fishnet stockings and ankle-high boots; Noah, who was still wearing the black long sleeved shirt and black skinny jeans, but now sported a plaid scarf on a knot; and Agnes, who was wearing some plaid school uniform I could not recognize in themes of blue and grey, complete with a grey tie, and an oversized blue hair ribbon. The three were listening to the Bee Gee’s “Staying Alive” together. Mike, who was wearing a large dark blue hoodie and jeans, was looking through different CDs on a shelf on the other side of the store, and Rose and Roxanne both approached the two of us, looking like day and night, respectively, as one sported a baby blue cardigan, a pink graphic tee, and light skinny jeans, and oversized plastic heart earrings, and the other wore a maroon tank top, black leather pants and black platform boots, and a jingling silver necklace and matching nose ring.

  “Rahul! You’ve made it!” Rose’s cheerful tone as she approached the two of us at the door was an automatic mood lifter, making me smile before I could catch myself. Turning to the blonde, she started teasing her. “And Alex, you’ve made it back without picking any fights, nice, nice.” Roxanne chuckled, and added on.

  “Yeah, we only sent you on a pick up mission, after all.”

  “Hey, gimme a break, I’m not always brawling, only part-time.” She said with a cocky grin to the two of them.

  “Hey Rose-“ I chimed in to ask about something, but was almost instantly interrupted.

  “Where’s the sword!?” Exclaimed Noah loudly, who was now approaching our group of four, and for a split second I had no idea what he meant by that question. “I thought you just had sword fighting practice across the street!” The cashier of the store, who originally was very engrossed with their own tasks behind the counter, was looking over to see what were we talking about, and the others at least glanced over, or turned around to look. At least it was only the group and the cashier in this shop at that moment, because I was already feeling very self-conscious, being put on the spotlight like that. I looked down to avoid having to look at anyone in particular.

  “Um- It’s on Ms. Chama’s car- I don’t usually carry it around...” I barely mumbled it out, looking around at the staring eyes of the curious bunch.

  “It’s true, I saw him putting the thing on the back of her car, together with other stuff.” Said Alex, louder than me by miles. She turned to me. “But that looked like a wooden stick more than a sword? Are real metal swords not allowed? Because that’d be sick to see.”

  “It’s because I practice Japanese sword-fighting... Also, that would be unnecessarily dangerous, I don’t practice with a fencing mask or any armor or padding of any sort.” I said, in a slightly more confident and louder tone.

  “Aww...” She added, disappointed. I shrugged, not knowing what else to say. What did she expect from my class, bloodshed? It’s not like I already didn’t get bruises from just getting hit with the wooden sword by sparring partners. “I guess I did expect too much from a paid class in Jacksonville.” People had this much resentment for this town, apparently.

  “Oh my god, there it is, the Backstreet Boys vinyl! I told you it was still there!” Exclaimed Robin, which prompted everyone to look over, including me. They hopped over from the shelves back to the record player, and was getting it out of the sleeve when Mike announced while paying for a CD.

  “I’m done here, guys. I’ll give you guys five minutes to wrap up here, I do not want to stay out-“ He glanced at the cashier, who was registering the sale. “There after sunset, that is the one line I don’t cross.”

  “Aww, can’t I listen to one more song?” Robin asked.

  “Five minutes, or I’m leaving you behind.” Mike insisted. “I’m going out for a smoke.” He left, ringing the door bell once again, with his CD towards the ugly, rusty green van parked outside, which I recognized as his.

  “He wouldn’t.” Robin said, already putting the vinyl on the player, and placing the needle on the tracks. Hearing the familiar beginning of the boy band’s famous “Everybody,” Alex chimed in.

  “Hey, don’t play that song without me!” She headed over to the record player, and started singing along. “Am I sexual-” She sang, while rubbing her hands down her body in an exaggerated form.

  “Nor me!” Exclaimed Noah, joining in with the chorus and the group. Robin, Alex, Noah and Agnes now were all singing in a disharmonious chorus and being over the top and theatrical as they danced along with the song, drawing in the laughter of Rose and Roxanne, and even I was chuckling at their antics.

  “You guys are ridiculous! I do not know any of you clowns, do you hear?” Roxanne announced. “I am going out to smoke as well! Rose, Rahul, are you guys coming?” She said before leaving the store, the bell ringing once again. Rose turned to me and smiled.

  “Shall we?” And I nodded. She waved at the others, and held out the door for me, the bell ringing above me once again, barely audible over the others’ antics on the back of the shop. I tried holding the already opened door for her, but she refused, so I let myself out first. When she left, the door shut itself, and the four loud ones were left to their own entertainment.

  “So... Where is ‘there’?” I asked tentatively to the three, but had already remembered Noah’s talk from earlier before Roxanne answered first.

  “Oak Marsh-“ She smiled sarcastically as she continued on. “Which is neither a marsh, nor does it have that many trees left-“

  “It was originally an actual marsh, as far as I know, at least the far part near where the canal is,” Rose chimed in.

  “Yeah, what Rose said.” Roxanne continued. “It’s a historical farm about a mile or so from here, but it’s mostly abandoned, mainly the house, barn and silo area. The town does keep it from completely falling apart,” she explained before Rose cut her in again, “but besides the fields where the town hold the Halloween fair and the yearly haunted hay rides, everywhere else is left to be reclaimed by the wilderness. We’re going in there for some good ol’ fashioned ghost hunting, it’s a popular ghost sighting location in this region. I even brought my Ouija board and some things for a ritual.”

  “Oh, no, we are NOT messing with Ouija boards or your witchcraft!” Exclaimed Mike. “Last thing I want is a ghost on my ass because of you!”

  “I already have it with me, it’s in my purse in your car.” Roxanne said, and Mike’s eyes widened in shock.

  “WHAT??”

  The two started arguing about the dangers of messing with the supernatural, and I couldn’t help myself but to feel like this was just a really dumb conversation to begin with. It’s not like ghosts or whatever else was true, and those Ouija boards and similar “ghost contacting methods” only became taboo with the whole phenomenon of horror movies and those dumb ghost-hunting TV shows from conspiracy theory channels, which were all faked. Honestly, the bigger concern I had with going over to that old farm was not having the ceiling cave in and hurt us.

  “Speaking of the Halloween fair, you should come with us! The hay rides are so fun! And they even got a haunted house of mirrors last year!” Rose was looking directly at me, her eyes shining with excitement, and I took a second too many to realize that she was actually addressing me.

  “Yeah, and it was so frightening, Mike here ran out of it in fear!” Roxanne interrupted the discussion, while Rose rolled her eyes. Mike squinted at her while putting out his cigarette with his foot.

  “I wasn’t afraid, I just don’t like getting jumpscared.” He answered, unamused.

  “Right.” Roxanne retorted.

  “Either way, I was already feeling sick in there, it was very disorienting, and I did tell you I was feeling nauseated within minutes of entering there.” Mike said, still not amused by her taunting. “If I had stayed I would have puked.”

  “Riiight.” She insisted.

  “Alright! We’re all done and ready to go!” Yelled Noah, as he slammed the door of the store open. “Ghosts, here I come!!” Robin and Alex left right after him, and they all approached us. Agnes was the last one to join, walking slowly as she was engrossed while texting on her phone.

  “Alex, do you want the rest of my cigarette? I’m tired of smoking.” Roxanne offered, and Alex took the offer right away.

  “Thanks, I just need a drag or two, I blew my lungs out inside there and have way too much oxygen on my blood now.” Mike went around the van to enter the driver’s door, Robin entered the front passenger’s, and Noah and Agnes entered the sliding door, going all the way to the back seats. Rose beckoned me to go into the car too, and we both entered and scooted over to the left on the middle seats.

  “Finish up there and let’s get going. Before the sunset, remember?” Mike reminded the two last ones outside of his restriction, to which Alex gave a thumbs up as response. The two talked about something quietly, which I could not hear from inside the van, much less after Noah started chanting.

  “Ghost. Hunting. NOW! Ghost. Hunting. NOW! Ghost. Hunting. NOW!” He drummed on the back of my seat, looking at the two outside, and Robin soon joined in, clapping and chanting. Agnes continue to be busy with her phone, and Mike was trying to maintain his calm while the two loud ones chanted, and Rose couldn’t help but let out cute, small giggles over this shenanigans. Alex and Roxanne both looked in. “GHOST! HUNTING! NOW! GHOST! HUNTING! NOW!”The chant was louder now, and the two seemingly gave up on talking, and Roxanne walked in, scooting next to Rose, while Alex got rid of her cigarette and entered the last seat available. Noah and Robin cheered.

  “Alright, alright, settle down, kids, I’m gonna drive now, alright? Next stop, Oak Marsh farm.” Mike said as he placed the key in the ignition. Robin let out a high-pitched “woo-hoo,” which earned a scowl from him.

6

  Pushing through the yellowing tall grass and whatever else species of weeds that had grown taller than me during the summer and now were drying up with the gloomy season, I stepped carefully through the muddy grounds, and I could feel the moist coldness creeping into my sneakers, leaving me wondering once again what was I doing and how did I end up there and then. An old brick house, three stories high, with a roofed porch in front of it, a downtrodden barn with red paint so rotten that it looked brown, and the creeper-infested silo, stained from decades of rain and neglect, all watched us as we slowly approached it, standing taller than the grass, as we approached the first structure, and despite standing firm in my belief that there was nothing supernatural that could threaten me, I still felt uneasy in their presence, like an unwanted trespasser who was being warned to leave while I could. This felt wrong, but also, it felt like a really dumb and bad choice for an afternoon activity, and I looked around hoping anyone else, had come to the same realization and would side with me on this.

  Noah and Roxanne, who were ahead of the group, looked like two kids heading down to candy land, unsurprisingly enough, and Alex and Robin, who were following the first two closely, didn’t seem to mind this little exploration. I could tell that Rose, who was right behind me, seemed concerned with this place, as she looked over her shoulder every few seconds, and Mike, who was a few feet beside me, seemed to be impatient, pushing the tall grass with perhaps a bit too much endeavor. Meanwhile, Agnes was still engrossed on her phone, falling behind everyone. Approaching Rose, I hoped to fish some confirmation bias from her.

  “So, why are we here? Isn’t it illegal to trespass on private property?” She looked at me with her mouth half-parted, pale like she was sick, and I realized my mistake at quick-judging her. She then stuttered, and finally answered me.

  “Um- Technically it is not private property, as it’s- It’s been left to the town of Jacksonville after the last descendant of this family died-“ She looked over her shoulder once again, and I ended up following suit almost instantaneously. “They- Um- They died a while back, like, fifty years ago, and since then, the town has made this a historical site, and upkeeps at least the structure- Because- It’s one of the oldest buildings in this whole county- It’s from the time of the settlers.” That would have been a fun factoid to learn about in some other setting, but it really didn’t sit well with me when she looked over her shoulder once again. I could feel her anxiety, it was so palpable it was beginning to affect me.

  “Um- Anyone else have the feeling that we’re being followed?” Rose spoke up in a high, trembling voice, making everyone freeze on their tracks near the doorsteps of the old house. I had doubts about going up to this house before, now I didn’t even want to stay here anymore. Everyone looked around, looking bewildered and nervous. I could swear that for a split second, I could hear a distant rustling of leaves in the middle of the tall grass, sending chills down my spine. It could have been my imagination playing games, I told myself, but that didn’t make me feel any better.

  “Fuck me-“ Said Mike, who then started hollering. “HEY! WHO ARE YOU? WHY ARE YOU FOLLOWING US??” Did he actually hear that too, or was this just a preventive measure? Everyone’s eyes were either at Mike, or at the direction he shouted at, and, after some seconds of silence, where all we could hear was the wind rustling through the tall grass, and the distant cars passing by the road behind all the grass. A quick rustling revealed to be some sort of black bird, that flew out of the grass, squawking, but nothing else happened. After a minute or so of silence, Alex started.

  “Damn, Rose, I didn’t figure you’d be so scared of ghosts, you’d be the first one to crack,” she said in a snarky tone, and Rose huffed and responded.

  “No way, I’m not scared of ghosts, I know God and his angels will protect me from any evil-doing spirit.” Alex chuckled, but Rose continued on. “But living humans is a whole different story, there’s no praying to protect you from bad people.”

  “If you need to go back to the car-“ Mike started suggesting, and I was about to chime in, but she cut him off right away.

  “No way, I’m not staying back, and by myself, no way, that is even worse, who knows what could happen.”

  “I could head back with you, then.” Mike tried suggesting, but she shook her head.

  “No, I’m sticking with you guys, we were going to have fun together, weren’t we?” She said as she approached the front porch steps, and the others flooded the porch, watching Roxanne over as she seemed to be fiddling with the door lock, leaving only Mike and I behind, a few feet from the house. There went my chance to leave, and she did have a point, if there was someone following us, it’d be a bad idea for any of us to split up from the group, even me. “Besides, if anyone tries to attack us, you big guys, Mike and Rahul, can protect us, can’t you?” She smiled at the both of us, but I only responded by looking baffled and surprised, I wasn’t so sure I would actually be of any help if needed be.

  “I think that I’d be of more use than the two of them on that matter, Rose, I can throw a good right hook, and I have plenty more fighting experience than anyone here.” Alex chimed in, and Rose chuckled.

  “Oh, no, I’m sorry, the three of you can protect us, right?” She smiled at Alex, who took the moment to inflate her ego.

  “Nah, Rose, don’t you see Rahul is a softie, he’s knee-shaking over your talk of protecting us? He’s clearly the type who’s afraid of hurting a fly, even if it bit his face off.” I mean, true, I did consider myself a pacifist, but wow, that was rude. “And Mike-“

  “I choose not to engage in unnecessary violence,” he said, cutting her off curtly. “And I prefer to stay clear of unnecessary messes, and not brag about my bad choices like it’s a good thing.” Alex’s grin was lessened, and a flash of anger passed her eyes. “So, do tell me, what do you, after all, think of me?” And like that, the situation turned very uncomfortable very quickly as the two stared at each other silently, and I averted my eyes so to not involve myself. Thankfully, a clicking sound of the turning handle was the only thing that saved everyone, but especially Rose and I, from the tense situation that had cropped up.

  “Finally! I was beginning to think here that you were just lying to look cool, jeez!” Noah said out loud, earning a few snickers, and Roxanne snapped back, as she put away her lock picking tools in her black leather purse.

  “Why would I be lying over something stupid like this? The only one here who cares about stupid shit such as ‘looking cool’ is you, dumbass!” She then stomped into the house, and despite a slight hesitation at first, the others started entering the house one by one, and lastly, Mike and I headed towards the door, one pissed and the other hesitant.

  Standing in front of the open door, I wondered if I was really committed to this seemingly not completely legal act. I stood as the last one left outside, and looked back at the yellow grass field, softly rustled by the wind, warmly illuminated by the golden light of the sun that was beginning to near the horizon; and far behind it, the road, where the ugly green van could barely be seen parked on the curbside. Someone could have already alerted the police about us breaking into this place, and as much as I wished to believe Rose’s justification, I was warned multiple times prior, by both my parents and Ms. Chama, to not get myself into trouble, much less with the police.

  Should I just head back? I took a half-step towards the porch stairs, but froze completely when I saw, unmistakably, a patch of tall grass move against the direction of the wind, and a pair eyes flash for a second, giving away that there was definitely something hiding there. Whelp, there went all of my courage I had drawn up to walk away, and I could hear my pulse on my eardrums as I dry-gulped. I had to warn the others, so I turned around and stormed in, making sure to close the door behind me.

  Coming in, I could already hear a commotion happening, and I could tell right away what was going on, as the shouting was loud enough to be heard down the hallway that led into the rotten old house with peeling moldy wallpaper and debris littering the floor. Yech, this place felt extremely unsafe to be in, I wondered if I could get a lung infection from the black patches of fur growing right beside me on the walls.

  “... I don’t CARE what her sob story is, this little princess isn’t entitled to treat others LIKE SHIT because she is always in a bitchy mood!” I heard Mike yelling as I entered what I presumed was the decaying leftovers of a living room, sporting a brick fireplace with petrified ash, graffitied run down walls, the three-legged wooden skeleton of a bench, and more debris littering the splintering wooden boards, that had holes that led to darkness. The two windows, on the right side and back of the room, had no longer any curtain, and the glass panels were either non-existent or only shards, covered in muck from ages. The others were spread roughly in a circle, Roxanne and Alex in defensive poses turned towards Mike, Rose seemed to soothing Noah, who was red from crying, and Robin and Agnes looked visibly uncomfortable from the situation. The Ouija board, which was the topic of discussion earlier today, sat idly in the middle of the room, surrounded by a few candles and Roxanne’s bag, and the debaters were being careful to not trample on the setup.

  “Great, because I don’t owe anyone here a background story!” Roxanne responded rashly. She then proceeded to shout at everyone else, red with rage, which caused a flinching reaction from some of the others. “And I will act like how I fucking wish, if any of you got a problem, then leave, I don’t fucking need any of you either ways!” Alex glanced at her with a strange expression, but then turned right away to Mike to rejoin the shouting match, and, before she could speak, I intervened, warning of the danger out there.

  “Guys! I just saw someone out there, there IS someone watching us from the tall grass!” Everyone’s eyes widened as they all turned towards me, and the situation was dropped instantly, as everyone hesitated on what to do next.

  Mike decided to head right away towards the hallway into the front doorway, closely followed by Alex, who mumbled something about leaving things on the car. Others grouped up while quietly tense, looking down from the living room entrance, and I joined the group as well, as I was not feeling very sure about being brave and joining the headlines. Reaching for the door handle, only the clicking of the door mechanism and the others’ breathing could be heard, but no one could tell what was going on until Mike turned around and announced with audible frustration.

  “The door is stuck shut.” Alex rushed to the kitchen, left adjacent to the hallway where everyone was gathered up, to peek through the dusty and broken window. “Last thing I want is to get stuck at this old rotten place while someone is out there.”

  “Yeah, who closed that?? Last thing I want is to have to call 911 to be able to get us out of this place.” Roxanne chided as she rushed back to the middle of the living room, to search her bag for a second or two, before she found a kit where she got her previously used lock picking tools from. I remained quiet out of guilt, remembering I had trapped us in there, as she passed by the group towards the front door with her tools at hand.

  “Well, I don’t see anything out there, just dead grass.” Alex looked at me through the hallway entrance to the kitchen with a taunting look that made me second guess myself. “Are you sure that you saw something, or are you just scared of this place? Be honest, we won’t laugh too much.” But at that moment, we all heard as clear as day the same mechanical noise.

  At first it was a quiet clicking, which then became a persistent and aggressive clattering. The front door handle rattled without anyone touching it for the longest seconds, before it ceased. My heart raced as a million possibilities passed through my mind, and I almost died from a heart attack at Mike’s loud and purposefully aggressive shout.

  “WHO’S THERE??” This was followed right away by what was unmistakably rushing footsteps of someone running on the front porch. “Alex! Who’s that??” He added, snapping Alex out of her frozen state, and she scrambled back to the kitchen window in hopes of catching whoever was that.

  “Damn it, they must have gotten back down into the grass, or went around the house!” That did not help the tension subdue, in fact, anxiety was high in between the five of us who still huddled together like a band of penguins seeking strength in numbers against enemies. I found myself shaking, and Noah scratched his left arm with such fury that it was audible, while Rose let out a quiet whelp with every exhale, Robin fiddled with their fingers while looking all over the place, and Agnes was furiously texting on her phone. Roxanne scrambled to open the door, but one of the thinner tools fell off her hand, and she swore under her breath as she leaned close to the floor, looking under the door.

  “Fuck!” Roxanne exclaimed before announcing. “The stupid wire rolled under the fucking door!” She sat down, and scrambled through her kit, looking for something similar to help her finish the task at hand. “I have other wires I worked into different shapes, but they all don’t fit the door lock, and I forgot to bring the pliers, so I can’t fix them up-“

  “Cellar door!” Rose suddenly announced, making everyone jump and look at her immediately. “There’s- There’s a door on the root cellar on the lower floor, if I remember the drawings right.” We were all confused, the fear muddling our rationale, so she insisted on the suggestion to see if we agreed with it. “We could try the door there, to get out of here. Maybe the door won’t be as stuck?” And then there was the consensus she was seeking, that it was a good idea, at least better than what we were currently doing. Roxanne then scrambled to put back her tools into her kit, while Mike said as he joined the group.

  “Well, what are we waiting for, then, lead the way. We need to get out of here.” Rose nodded, and then headed into the kitchen, following her memory, while the others followed her instead. Roxanne rushed to the living room to gather her things up, while Rose tested the door on end furthest from the window of the decrepit kitchen, rattling the handle loudly as everyone held their breaths and hoped this would work. With a loud and rusty click, the handle did give in, and the door creaked open, revealing pitch an unwelcoming pitch-black darkness, and damp, musty air. I was less than happy to go into that place, it was like you could almost see the mold spores floating in the air, probably poisoning our lungs, and being this dark while it was still bright out there was not a positive sign.

  A quiet shattering noise we all heard come from a distant room reminded all of us of the urgency we had to get out of this place. Roxanne rushed over to join the group, and so did Alex, and everyone went pacing down the stairs, with a couple of us, including me, turning on our phone’s flashlights to attempt to not misstep on the decaying steps descending into the all-consuming darkness. It was almost supernatural how the darkness overtook the little light we could produce, or even the light from upstairs, although the latter was much weaker, as the little sunlight shed from across the kitchen became warmer and dimmer with the beginning of the end of the afternoon. Irritated at how this already not so innocuous little adventure of ours was quickly going south, and how I would have to be careful to not breathe too deeply in this mold-ridden and dusty underground, I promised myself I would just straight up refuse to come in the next time, and this would be the first and last time ever that I would get into a mess like this. That is, disregarding the whole town-skipping adventure from the other week.

  Reaching the bottom of the stairs, we all looked around with our phone lights, and I was unpleasantly surprised to learn that this lower floor of this old house, which was already ridden with extremely dirty shelves filled with antiquities of another era that housed all sorts of insects that I barely caught a glimpse of as they scurried away from my phone light; which also had beaten dirt for a ground, probably century-old and with only God knows what contaminants and microbes; it also had a low ceiling, which was just a little taller than me, and had a skin-crawling amount of old, dust-covered spider webs that were as dense as weaved cloth, dressing it like decoration for a party, which were currently lightly shaking with our movement, releasing more dirt onto us, which some fell into my shirt, giving me the chills.

  As I vigorously shook my shirt while in the little lit area at bottom of the stairs, I heard a distant sound of the old wooden planks creaking upstairs that didn’t only repeat only once, in fact, had an easy to recognize repeating pattern, and, to my dismay, seemed to be coming closer. I scurried out of the light and into the total darkness of the room, together with the others who were searching for the doorway to this root cellar Rose spoke about. It didn’t help that, despite the room having a low ceiling, it was still extensive, as it covered quite a chunk of the area as the upper floor, and the area was subdivided with half-empty storage shelves, creating something of a maze out of this room, and navigating it in low light conditions was at least annoying. The others were navigating through the shelves, attempting to keep some level of silence as to not draw the attention of the intruder upstairs, but I managed to get a squeal from whoever I accidentally bumped onto as I attempted to dodge a hammock of spider web and dust that threatened to brush with my hair.

  “Eek! Watch out you clumsy idiot!” Said the rash voice as I scrambled to get my phone back, which almost fell onto the floor with the bump, and I was faced with a pair of golden eyes glaring at me from almost a foot below my line of sight. The unnecessary offense made me almost not want to apologize, too, it’s not like I meant it, and I almost impulsively responded to her with my best comeback.

  “Well, I’m sorry, it’s not like- It’s not I could see you in the dark when you basically blend in!” I heard a few snickers coming from the others, and Roxanne looked at the others, then back at me with an incredulous, angry look that made me flinch. Did I go too far? I could see her little smirk of satisfaction at my reaction.

  “What, you think I’d hit you over you stuttered out little sass? Coward.” She then turned to walk away, but bumped onto a shelf and rattled all of its contents, which only made the snickers louder, and even I scoffed at her. We heard a door click all the way on the back, which I hoped rightfully that it was a good sign, as Rose then announced, barely audible from where I was.

  “Alright, guys, I found the door to the cellar!” The announcement had multiple quiet but cheerful responses but they were quickly switched to yelps and squeals when we heard a loud door slam come from upstairs, as the basement door upstairs presumably shut close due to the air current. I attempted to hurry through this claustrophobic’s nightmare of a lower floor, bumping onto Roxanne, who elbowed me back on my lower abdomen.

  “Watch it! It’s the second time you bump onto me!” She hissed, and I responded, irritated.

  “Well, get out of the way then, I’m at least trying to get out of this place!” To which she retorted, mockingly.

  “Why, are you scared?” Shouldn’t I? Shouldn’t she too? I frowned, completely baffled by that sort of question in this sort of situation, before continuing to walk, but she tagged along, continuing to take jabs at me. “Oooh, so you are scared, huh. This is too much for the big guy, huh? So much for your little sword training, huh, it’s not like it apparently helps you even get some courage, huh?” Was I the only reasonable person in this whole group, or were the others just so used to being reckless and stupid that something like being chased by some stalker while being stuck on an abandoned farm house filled with pathogens everywhere was no big deal?

  “Well, I’m pretty sure none of us want to die in this place, Roxy.” Alex chimed in, just a few feet ahead of the two of us as we went around a bend, and finally could see the back of the room, with the door sitting in the middle of that back wall, nestled in between shelves with apparently what seemed to be tools, including some I could recognize, like a plow tooth, and a rusty pair of big bolt cutters. I rushed through the door first, not caring anymore to discuss with Ms. Edge back there, I was getting out of this stupid, dirty, rotting farmhouse, I told myself angrily, or so help me. “Hey, hold up, big guy! Don’t leave us behind!” Alex said, but I ignored the two of them as the smell of the next room hit me strongly, and I almost retched, scrambling to cover my face with my dirty shirt to not smell the putrid smell of food that had been semi-sealed in this darkness for who knows how long.

  This room had wall shelves and gaps with boxes and bags and other containers, and some things even hanged from its ceiling, and I could imagine that at least one of those containers had the source of the horrible, pungent smell that lingered there, as this was very discernibly a food storage place. Well, duh, it was called a “root cellar” earlier, wasn’t it? I argued mentally with myself as I pocketed my phone after shutting off its flashlight function, as this room was marginally brighter than the previous one, due to the light shining through the door’s cracks. It was still dark, and the light was really orange right now and thus felt weak, but at least it was not the near-void darkness of the previous room.

  I saw that Rose, Noah and Mike were at the top of the stairs that led to the cellar door, shaking it vigorously, but it was useless, as the chains that locked the doors shut together were stronger than the three of them. The rattling made the feeling of dread grow within me, and despite the fact that I couldn’t tell the others’ face well on this very dimly lit, dusty environment, but I could still tell that the atmosphere was tense once again. Salvation was so close for us, to get away from whoever was persecuting us around the house, to escape from this decrepit hell that I accidentally got everyone stuck in, and yet, the stupid lock was the only thing keeping us from all of that.

  “It won’t budge!” Exclaimed Noah, and others let out some interjections of anger and frustration, but Alex chimed in quickly.

  “There’s a bolt cutter on the other room, I think it’s big enough to break those chains!” And then we all heard the same clicking and then slow creaking at the distance, and then the slow, heavy steps going down the stairs we had just gone down previously. My heart was beating so hard it felt like it could jump out of my chest, and Alex and Roxanne both turned back, visibly shaking, and I joined them in trying to look back at the other room to see if I could at least catch a glimpse of whoever was after us. It was useless, though, as the room was too dark, and the rows of shelves blocked the view of the stairs. The three of us were just there, on the doorway, peeking into that dark hell that were had just traversed, and then Mike reminded us.

  “Can anyone get the bolt cutter already??” Promptly and regrettably, I stepped forward almost involuntarily, walking past the two girls but I could feel my knees weaken the moment I was back in that room. I couldn’t tell if that someone was near me in there, the darkness did not allow me that knowledge, but I felt an overwhelming feeling of paranoia, as if someone was breathing down my neck, right behind me. At the time, I did not think of taking out my phone once again, as I was barely thinking, and all the light I had was whatever came through the other room, and neither of the two on the door had their phones out.

  Time slowed almost to a halt as I shakily felt with my hands the shelf that I supposed remembered seeing the bolt cutter sitting on, and I questioned myself if I even knew what would it feel like, but as I brushed my right hand over what felt like a large rusty wedge, which clicked to me as being the plow tooth. Right of that, then, was the bolt cutter, as my memory recalled, and indeed I felt its metal arms and recognized it, grasping it quickly and rushing back to the root cellar.

  The door was quickly shut behind me with a slam, and everyone cheered as I showed the tool I correctly picked up, we were getting out of there! As I walked down past Robin, he announced something that made everyone’s stomach drop.

  “Hey, where’s Agnes?”

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7

  Everyone stopped what they were doing, and looked at each other, doing the much delayed headcount that anyone should have done earlier. Roxanne and Alex were still by the door, as I noted when glancing at them; Robin and I met each other’s eyes standing in the halfway point of the uncovered area of the room, which had boxes littering but a narrow path towards the cellar door; And looking towards our only source of quickly dimming light, Noah, Rose and Mike were on the top, middle and bottom steps of the short stairs leading up to that door, respectively. Seven people were finding our way out of the house, when eight people had entered it on the first place. Oh, no, no, no...

  I tried to searching mentally when was the last time I had last seen her along with the group. The last room was too dark to see properly, and the shelves did not help with the small vision field we had using the phones. The last time we could see everyone more or less clearly was... On the stairs going down from the kitchen! But did I remember who was where then? I remember Roxanne and Alex were the last ones on the group, and Rose was first, as she was the one to open the door, and she led the group through the first basement room. I remembered counting there being three phone lights being on, or was it four? Either ways, they were enough to illuminate the whole group as we were going down, which meant whoever was on the back could see everyone. I turned to ask the two by the door.

  “Alex, you were on the back, and could see everyone from the top of the stairs, do you remember seeing Agnes with us when we were going downstairs?” To which she answered with hesitation.

  “... No? I don’t think so?” And I turned to Roxanne, who prompted her answer before I even repeated my question.

  “No, actually, I assumed she was way on the front, because I couldn’t see her.” To which Noah retorted.

  “Nuh-huh, she wasn’t on the front, I was right behind Rose, who was leading everyone, so we’d have known she was with us.”

  “Yeah, I’m afraid she wasn’t with us either, nor did she go past us at any time.” Rose agreed with a worried frown.

  “Then she’s probably still upstairs, and the one responsible for the footsteps we’ve been hearing,” concluded Mike. “She’s probably searching for us.” The air was heavy with guilt. “While that stalker is also up there, if they haven’t found a way into the house as of yet.” Looking at each other, we all knew that at least someone had to go back regardless of how scared we were.

  “Aw, fuck, I’ll go find her,” announced Alex, “I’m right by the door anyways.” Without a second of hesitation, she reached for the handle of the door we had just closed, and I heard a barely audible click that gave me a second of hope, but that was not the case. We could hear her rattling the handle as our stomachs collectively sunk. Alex just looked at Roxanne, and whispered, disheartened and without any courage to announce the bad news.

  “You’ve GOT to be FUCKING kidding ME! How did the door lock itself JUST NOW??” Roxanne replied without thinking twice, confirming the second time in a row we had gotten ourselves into this situation. This was a nightmare, or so I thought, why did we even come to this place, first of all?

  “Well, I guess we have no choice but to leave through the cellar door then,” Mike said, and then extended his hand towards me, requesting the item I had forgotten I was still holding. “Rahul, the bolt cutter.” I stepped towards that end of the room, but halted when I heard the clanging of the cellar door being forced from the outside, shaking like it was about to break. Rose and Noah let out a scream and both rushed down the stairs and out of the way, and Mike stepped back. A second rattling noise came from behind me, at the door to the basement, which made Alex squawk, and both the girls at the door run towards Robin and I. Mike stopped, realizing something, and turned towards the cellar door and asked loudly, as to be heard beyond both ends of the cellar, “Agnes, is that you?”

  The rattling stopped, both doors at the same time, and for an eerie second, only our elevated breathings could be heard. Then, at the cellar door, we heard a familiar voice.

  “Guys? Are you down there? I’ve been searching for you all over!” And we all breathed a brief collective sigh of relief, before the second instance of that voice, which came from the opposite end of the room.

  “Guys? Are you in there? I’m lost inside this house!”

  Everyone was frozen in place now and the tension was palpable in the air. Did I hear that right? I questioned the veracity of what had just happened, hoping it was just a delirium of some sort, maybe my mind just acting up because of the situation we were in. I looked at the others, hoping that someone had more of an idea of what was going on, but even Mike seemed confused and scared, which, in turn, only made me feel worse.

  “Hello?? Guys? You’re in here, right?” The door to the basement rattled once more, and screams were heard from our group.

  “Hellooo?? Can you open up? I’m out here all by myself!” The cellar door rattled, and the two doors alternated in rattling, and more screams were heard. Someone started sobbing in between us, I wasn’t sure, as the sunrays were weakening because sunset was almost over.

  “Open up!”

  “Open up!”

  The voices repeated echoed in delay from each other, and the doors kept on rattling with thunderous strength. I was shaking by then, completely frozen in place, terrified of everything, my ears drummed with my own heartbeat in a loudness that was almost deafening. This excursion was not just a bad, idiotic idea, this was a nightmare! Someone was sobbing, I could barely hear that, and whimpers could also be heard, and I looked at Mike once again for reassurance, who was frozen in place, pale and horrified, and that didn’t make me feel any better. Suddenly, the rattling and the shouting stopped, and the cellar went eerily dead silent, as everyone seemed to have held their breath, dreadfully waiting for any further development.

  Some faint rustling could be heard coming from beyond the cellar door that was characteristic of steps on grass, and, to the surprise of everyone, as soon as the steps seemed to move away from the door, Mike ran to the stairs and up its steps, charging towards the chain with the bolt cutter’s blades wide open, aiming to cut through their metal links as fast as possible, and so he did. The clang of the clean cut through the links, followed by the metal clinking noises of the chain pieces slipping off the door and falling through the steps to under the stairs because of their heavy nature and the padlock that kept them together, were enough to get the adrenaline rushing even more through my blood, if that was even possible.

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