Miss Hollins Academy for the Gifted Ch.5

    He leaned against the cold mettle. His arms hung through the bars and he rested his arm pits on the cross beam. He was on his knees. Exhaustion fought for control of his eyelids, something he wouldn't or couldn't allow. A fire cracked down the way as it heated the room with minimal heat. It was far enough away that he could just make out the light of it, but far enough away that he couldn't feel any heat.
    “You can't stay awake for ever.” The creature, for it couldn't have been human, said. No one in this area was, except for him and except for his daughter. He hoped she was okay and wasn't worrying about him. However, she was resourceful. He was sure she had found his journal by now and he prayed that she would do what she could to continue his work if he didn't get out of this alive.
     He looked through his bloodshot eyes at the thing before him. He'd been searching for it for nearly thirteen years and here it was. Its security pack had blindsided him when he was leaving after dropping Grace off. He wasn't sure where he was now, but he was close to getting his revenge and he grinned at that.
     He glared, risking his eyes fully shutting. He wouldn't allow this thing to win. He couldn't. “Bite me.”
    It walked to his jail cell. It was in its human form. Tall, slender figure. It lifted its hand to his face and traced its thin, sharp nails along his chin ever so gently. It didn't want to break his skin and allow that tasty, tasty blood to escape.
    “Oh, I will.” He answered him. “In three more weeks. That's all. After that stupid dance the kids insist on having, I'll have my dinner. I always enjoy eating from the same family. Well, most of the time.” It took a step back into the dark. He couldn't see it anymore. “You see, every human has a certain flavor but it seems that your... species tend to marry others with a similar flavor and they have kids that taste just like them.” It smacked it lips as if it could almost taste it. The sound made him feel sick to his stomach. “You're wife was delicious. And I'm sure you'll be just as delicious.”
     He forced himself to his feet and screamed. A string of profanities followed. He would have his revenge on this creature. He had his reasons for enrolling his daughter where he had and he would take these menaces down, even if it killed him. He would do what it took to eliminate the werekalas and keep society safe.

    Belinda sat across from Grace on her bed. Rae had taken one of the desk chairs in the room. Grace looked at her friends.
    “What do you know about horror movies?” Grace asked. She turned her eyes up to the posters above Belinda's bed. “Specifically.”
    “Can you be more specific about that?” Belinda asked. “I mean, are you asking about their history, their making? Release dates? What exactly?”
    Grace looked at her. She wasn't really sure what exactly she wanted to know or what she wanted to ask. She wasn't even sure why horror movies had anything to do with what she had recently learned. Maybe it was the theory that her father had, that most fiction had some roots in reality. If there were really any mythical creatures that maybe Belinda would know how they worked.
    “What about stuff about, like... I don't know....” She sighed. She had to sound crazy and maybe she was.
    “Did you get any more answers?” Belinda asked, looking at her friend. Grace wasn't even sure where she had been going with her questions or why she had wanted to ask Belinda about her knowledge on classic horror movies.
    “Yes... no... I don't know!” Grace felt her mind was tied up in knots. It was a washing machine on the spin cycle, all the colors of the clothes spinning around and blurring together. She couldn't make out one thing from another. She wasn't sure what was real anymore and, with the exception of no contact with her father, that scared her the most.
     A heavy silence fell in the room and weighed on everyone. Belinda and Rae weren't sure what to say and Grace was lost in her own world. The sound of a laptop fan was heard, the ticking of the analog clock above the door kept pace with the quiet.
   “You need to get out of here.” Belinda said, sitting up. “You need a distraction. Come on!”
     Grace tried to protest but Rae and Belinda wouldn't hear of it and pushed her into her coat and they headed out their dorm room and into the cold air. Snow was beginning to fall and they forced Grace to walk with them.

    “The school's supposedly haunted, anyways.” Trevor said as he tipped back in his chair. The group sat around the crackling fire in the student center, or the SC as the kids called it, of the campus. The building was the hub and a place for the students to go whenever, day or night. It was opened twenty-fours a day and allowed a place for the kids to get away.
    “No way!” Friday protested. He took his fork and stabbed at the salad that he had bought just before the dorm kitchens had closed for the night. “That's a load of malarkey!”
    Trevor narrowed his eyes at Friday. “Us, of all people, should be the least skeptical, Friday.”
     Grace had sat in silence since getting to the SC. She hadn't wanted to go into to much detail with everyone else about what was going on. Aaron kept shooting her concerned glances. She had eventually told him her mood had nothing to do with him and she was still looking forward to going to the dance with him.
     “Anyways,” Trevor went on, “Miss Hollins supposedly haunts campus.”
     “Why would she haunt campus?” Rae asked, slowly getting into Trevor's story.
     “Well you know, our school was founded just a little more than a decade after the Revolutionary War.” Trevor said as he started diving into his story. “Because of that, there was still some tension. Miss Hollins was considered to be a very nice, yet stern woman who had sided with the British during the revolution, not that she did any fighting.”
    “Well, duh!” Aaron interrupted.
     “I'm telling the story, here!” Trevor snapped at him. Aaron rolled his eyes and Trevor went on. “Anyways, even though over ten years had passed since the war, the memories were still fresh in many minds, especially the minds of the first students.”
     He glanced around and smiled. “You see, there's this rumor going on that some of those who had supported the patriots in the fight for freedom from taxation without representation and from drinking silly tea-”
    “The war was not fought over drinking tea or not, Trevor!” Rae chirped.
     “Fine, fine, fine, those who had supported the patriots in the fight for freedom from taxation without representation got wind that Miss Hollins had been a tori. Now that didn't set well with these students, and while our school now has a policy that no one can be kicked out unless they kill someone,  they were willing to risk expulsion.”
     “Where the heck is this going?” Friday mumbled under his breath. Rae sent him a sympathetic glance and went back to listening to Trevor's tale.
     “One night,” he paused and looked out the windows. He could see snow covering everything in a thick layer. The trees loomed overhead, their branches holding more of the frozen water. It had stopped snowing and the clouds had moved out. An almost full moon shone over the everything, giving it an eery glow. “It was a night a lot like this one, actually. Those students snuck out of their dorms and headed for Miss Hollins own quarters. Upon reaching it they began to climb the ivory lattice to kill Miss Hollins, they were attacked by a werewolf!”
     Everyone sat on edge now. Grace had been as well up until the werewolf comment. She had had enough of were-talk for one night and was ready to give it a rest.
     “Miss Hollins was awoken by the struggle. She rushed to her room and opened the window. She saw the wolf mauling the kids, their blood seeping onto the snow. In a flurry, she turned around and grabbed the double barrel shotgun she kept by her bed. She loaded two silver bullets into the chamber. She took aim and fired. BAM! BAM! The wolf fell dead, but unfortunately for the kids, it was too late.”
     He paused and looked at his friends and smiled. “Miss Hollins was eventually murdered by the little sister of the werewolf, many years later. She had only been three when her older brother had been killed by Hollins. Now, the ghosts of the mauled students are said to haunt Buxington Hall, the place that use to be the residence of all administration and faculty while Miss Hollins also haunts the campus.”
     A pause fell among the group, the fire could be heard crackling away. “Really, Trevor? She haunts the place?” Rae asked. She had been engrossed in the story up until that moment.
     “How else do you explain the sightings of her, Rae?” He quipped.
     “That's the issue you have with his story, Rae? That Miss Hollins haunts the place?” Grace questioned.
     Trevor looked at her. “What issue do you have, Grace?” His face was inquisitive and held a wonder.
      “The werewolf. You couldn't have come up with a more realistic killing for the wannabe murderers?” She questioned. “It would have even been as simple as it having been a real wolf.”
    There was a long, awkward pause. Grace wondered what she had said, who's toes she had stepped on. Maybe her group of friends were weird believers in werewolves. She was just sick of all the talk and wanted to get away from it.
    “Grace, I'm a werewolf.” Aaron was the first to break the silence.
     “Aaron, I like you, and I'm glad we're friends,” she started, “but I've had a really emotionally taxing day and I'm just sick of anything were-related. I don't want to hear anymore tall tales.”
     “Grace, he's telling the truth.” Belinda said, “He's a werewolf and I'm a were-dragon.”
     “Were-Raven.” Rae announced.
      “As silly as it sounds, I'm a were-turtle.” Friday answered, smiling.
     “And I'm a sexy, were-vampire.” Trevor said leaning back in his seat, rest his right foot on his left knee and placing his hands behind his head.
     Grace looked around at her friends. Then, she started to laugh. She started to giggle and soon she couldn't control her laughter. Her sides began to hurt and she felt like she was going to crazy. The logical explanation was that Belinda had overheard her talking to Joe and had gotten her friends in on this joke to try and lift her spirits.
     “Grace, we're being serious.” Belinda said. Her laughter slowed as she realized just how serious they were.

     “Miss Hollins Academy for the Gifted.” Aaron started, “'the gifted' means were-creature.”
     “What?” She asked. That couldn't be. It had to be a tale they were telling her. They had to be pulling her leg. It was crazy, were-creatures. But, now, her mind had to wonder. Her dad's journal entries had been full of references to were-creatures, Joe had told her some things about them. Maybe the idea wasn't totally fake.
     “This is a place for us to be safe and be normal... to get a normal education.” Rae said. All eyes where on Grace.
     “You see, we're considered freaks, and dangerous to society, and we are – well most of us are – when we're in our a were states. When I'm a wolf, I can't control what I do. Its all animal. Its all instinct.” Aaron explained.
     “That's why we're escorted away on the nights that we change and escorted back after.” Belinda went on, “and, for a lot of us the next day after changing sucks. That's why they normally give us a day off from class.”
     Aaron stared at Grace for a beat or two. “You're completely normal, aren't you?
     Grace stared at Aaron. What was normal, anyways? She didn't know. Her head was jumbled. She wasn't sure which was up and which was down. If she had been smacked in the face, she probably wouldn't have even felt it. This was a ball of confusion and she wanted to scream, she wanted to cry, she wanted to laugh. She wanted her father.
    Her throat was dry and her tongue clung to her teeth. She couldn't speak even if she wanted to. She just slowly nodded her head in response.
     “That explains a lot of your confusion and answers to our questions.” Friday said, earning him a sharp elbow jab from Rae.
     Grace suddenly felt her hair in her hands and realized she had lowered her head to her palms. She stared at the ground and noticed how clean the carpet was, as if it had just recently been laid. She felt like she was going to throw up and maybe she was. Her world was being thrown off kilter and out of bounds. She wanted to scream and curse. This wasn't fair, this wasn't fair at all.
    She then felt one had land on her shoulder blade, then two, then three. Before she knew it all five of her friends had a hand on her back, each trying to comfort her. She looked up. She wasn't sure what to do next and before she even know what was happening, she was up and running from them.
    “Grace!” Belinda exclaimed after her.
     She heard her, but kept running. Air. She needed fresh air. She ran down a hallway in the student center and came to a door. It was on the end that most students never went and before she could register what she was doing she pushing it open and running outside into the cold, night air.
     Grace ran a few steps from the building and fell to her knees in the snow. She took a few deep breaths. The cold air ran down her windpipe and it filled her lungs. It felt good on her hot cheeks. She kept her eyes shut, trying to process what was happening. She felt the snow begin to melt and seep through her jeans. She didn't care. The cold was welcomed. Things began to click in her brain, it was like a puzzle that was finally being solved and the puzzle worker having their a-ha moment.
     Were-creatures were real. Her dad was a crytpozoologist. Her mother had been murdered by a were-kala. Whatever that was. It was all real. It all seemed irrational, but it was the truth.
     Grace slowly raised her head. She opened her eyes and across the yard she saw someone moving. The figure was dark and moved slowly, almost as if it were floating. Grace couldn't make out what it was wearing exactly, but it seemed to be in a dress with a full skirt. It suddenly stopped when it realized Grace's eyes were on it and than, it vanished.
     “Grace!” She heard Aaron running and coming up behind her. “Are you okay?” He asked, his breath forming little puffs in the cold air.
     He put his hands around her and slowly helped her to her feet as the rest of the group gathered around her, with Friday slowly bringing up the rear.
     “Di-did any of you guys see that?” She asked. Her mind was confused and discombobulated.
     “See what?” Trevor asked, looking out in the direction Grace was staring.
     “I saw... a figure. It was human like but it was to far away to make out any features or anything. When it realized I was staring at it... it vanished... just like that.”
     “Well, the far building there is Buxington.” Rae offered, “maybe there is some truth to Trevor's story.”
     “Come on Grace,” Belinda said putting her arm on her shoulder, “let's get back to the dorm. Its been a long day for you.”