Lexi grabbed the hall pass and proceeded to the bathroom. She didn’t need to use it, but she didn’t want to stay in the classroom any longer than necessary. Listening to everyone carry on about Jill and her exploits and the gifts she doled out was nauseating.
As she tossed water on her face and stared at herself in the mirror, a loud clap of thunder shook the school followed by a flash of light and then darkness as the power went out. Was the school just struck by lightning? she wondered. Inside the bathroom it was pitch black. Lexi’s fingers slid across the stall doors, but she immediately halted when she heard the sound of angry crickets.
Hurriedly, she hid in one of the bathroom stalls. She froze and listened. Soft breathing pulsated in the silence. She was not alone, she was certain of it. Whoever it was, was being as quiet as she.
Panic struck her. She fought the urge to ask if anyone was there, but even the calmest of teenage minds will start visualizing scenes from scary movies. Her paranoia played tricks on her mind. At any moment, she was certain an axe or a sharp hook was going to split the door as a murderous psychopath started his rampage with her as his first victim.
She could not take it anymore. “Hello? Is anyone in here?”
There was no response.
The breathing got louder. The bug noises got louder. They were getting closer. Lexi scooted away from the stall door and slowly, quietly lowered to the floor. It was too dark. She would need night-vision goggles to see anything.
There was a rubbing sound, metal-on-metal. Someone was trying to open the stall door. Lexi leaped to the door. Her weight slammed it closed just as it started to open. She tried to find the lock, but could not get it flush with the jamb.
Her heart pounded at a feverish pace and sweat dripped from her suddenly drenched hair. Lexi screamed for help. She placed her shoulder against the stall door, but even with her full weight she couldn’t keep it shut. Whoever was on the other side was too big, too strong. Lexi placed her feet against the front of the toilet for leverage.
And then she heard it…
Chills shot down her spine when an all-to-familiar hiss sound rose above the bug noises. “Open up.”
She feared for her life. She knew what was on the other side. She had seen it in her dreams.
“No!” she screamed. Lightning lit up the bathroom and Lexi saw the beady red eyes from her nightmares.
She screamed. Overcome with terror, she allowed her weight to ease off of the door. The creature on the other side started to make headway, pushing the door open. Lexi shrieked and drove her shoulder into the door. A long, skinny, brown hand had slid between the stall door and the wall. When Lexi slammed the door shut, it trapped the creature’s hand.
From the other side of the door, a shrill hiss came from the injured creature. The harder Lexi pushed, the more pain she produced. With great swiftness, Lexi repeatedly lunged into the stall door. The beady-eyed creature squealed in pain and its fingers twitched.
The lights in the bathroom flashed on and off again as the electricity returned momentarily. The incensed creature struggled to free itself. It shook and convulsed, nearly knocking Lexi to the floor on the other side until it finally freed itself.
Lexi heard the bathroom door open, but she refused to leave. There was no opposing force pressing against the stall door, but she could not bring herself to open it. Tears rolled down her face as she listened for breathing, but only heard her own pounding heartbeat.
An eternity passed before she mustered the courage to move. The lights remained out, but Lexi knew she must leave before it, whatever it was, returned. Lexi took a deep breath before she opened the stall door. She tiptoed toward the exit. The lights came on in a flash. In the reflection of the mirror, she saw someone behind her.
Startled, Lexi spun around. On the bathroom wall was a poster with Jill’s picture and the words: “Vote Jill 4 Class President.” Lexi placed her hand on her chest. She tried to catch her breath. The bathroom door opened suddenly. Lexi leaped back. Sasha and Anastasia walked in, giggling and chatting about the only topic anyone in Pfearville cared about—Jill. When they saw Lexi, they both jumped back and screamed.
“Lexi, you scared me,” Sasha gasped. Anastasia nodded in agreement.
“Tell me you saw it.” Lexi ran to the door and flung it open. She looked up and down the hallway. There was nothing but her classmates roaming the halls.
“Saw what?” Anastasia asked.
Lexi was about to start crying. She had just survived a very close encounter with death, and now everyone was going to think she was crazy.
“Lexi, are you all right? You’ve been acting weird all day.”
She nodded at Sasha’s comment, but did not answer. Lexi bolted down the hall, nearly sobbing. She was going crazy. Classmates glanced at her with peculiar expressions on their faces. They had to be talking about how weird she was acting. She ran to her locker. Her mind was thinking about a million things, and she could not remember her combination. She closed her eyes. Relax, she told herself. Think. The relaxation techniques were not working.
Lexi took another deep breath. Her eyes went down to her hands. They were trembling. What is going on with me?
She took a second deep breath and told herself everything would be fine, but she did not believe it. Lexi almost abandoned her locker altogether, but decided to give it one last attempt. With great concentration, she managed to open the door.
In a rush, Lexi removed her backpack and books. She had to get out of there.
“Lexi,” a voice said from behind her.
Overly anxious, she screeched and dropped her backpack. Her books spilled across the floor.
“You scare easily these days,” a voice said flatly. Standing behind her was Cambree Meyers. She wore her typical arrogant demeanor. She had her hands on her hips and her eyes were narrowed. “Where are you going?”
Lexi leaned down, collecting her items. “I’m leaving,” Lexi answered.
Cambree placed one of her Jimmy Choo sandals on the science textbook so Lexi could not pick it up. “No, you’re not,” she commanded. “You are going to help me.”
“No, I’m not. We don’t like each other, remember?” Lexi stood up defiantly. Had her world had been turned upside down so much so that the notion of helping Cambree Meyers was actually in the realm of possibility? Surely not.
“I don’t care,” Cambree responded with her own firmness. “This isn’t just about you and me. It is about everyone. Something is going on at this school. You and I are the only two not affected. We’re going to find out what’s going on.”
Lexi packed the final books into her bag. “Since when did you start caring about the other people at this school? You find out what’s amiss, Cambree. I’m going home.” She walked down the hall and descended the stairs.
“Are you having any crazy dreams?” Cambree asked from the top of the stairs.
Lexi froze.
“Thought so. I’m having them too.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?” Lexi asked.
Cambree rolled her eyes in disgust. “Because I’m not nuts. If I started telling everyone about weird dreams, they are going to think I’m crazy. Unlike you, I have a reputation to uphold.
“But that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is Jill. I will not be defeated by her. The one with the will is the one with the win, Lexi. I would think an athlete such as yourself would understand that truth.”
Lexi let out a deep sigh. She did not want to ally herself with Cambree, but saw few options. She was running from a fight and she never ran from anything. “I’m going to regret this. Fine, let’s go.”
Chapter Seventeen
Research
“Failing to plan is planning to fail.”
-Alan Lakein
Maudie Ogeltree-Savernson had not been married in years, and yet she could not bring herself to drop the Savernson from her name. She loved the way it sounded even if it did not roll off the tongue. It was so long that i
t did not fit onto her name badge. She would not change it. In fact, Maudie did not change anything. She still wore her hair in the typical feathered 1980’s style, and she always wore denim. It might be a vest or shirt or a jacket, but denim was always there.
Maudie was Assistant Principal Stevens’s secretary. She was nice and most of the students got along with her, Lexi included. Cambree, however, hated her. And the feeling was mutual. Maudie was efficient at her job, a bit of a busy body, but there was one thing she excelled at, and that was being Assistant Principal Stevens’ gatekeeper. Nobody, no matter how much money their father made and donated, nobody got to see Assistant Principal Stevens without Maudie’s knowledge.
It was because of this fact the two girls knew exactly how to handle Maudie. Cambree sauntered in with her typical air of superiority and said, “I need to see Assistant Principal Stevens.”
Doubt and distrust crept across Ms. Ogeltree-Saverson’s face. “And why is that, Ms. Meyers?”
“Because I said so.”
“Well, with that attitude I doubt your own reflection would want to see you.” Maudie went back to typing.
Cambree rolled her eyes. “Fine. When I see him next, I’ll make sure to tell him about the three kids I saw vandalizing the side of the school and how I tried to alert him so he could stop their hi-jinx, but that you wouldn’t let me.”
Maudie’s lips pursed and her eyebrows lowered. She studied Cambree for a prolonged moment.
Before she could say anything, Cambree offered, “Oh, wait, Assistant Principal Stevens is in study hall this hour. I’ll just go tell him myself.”
“Stop,” Maudie snapped. “Show me where these kids are and I will tell Assistant Principal Stevens.”
Cambree shrugged and rolled her eyes before replying, “Whatever.”
Lexi waited until Cambree and Ms. Ogeltree-Savernson had left the office. As the two of them rounded the corner, Cambree looked back and gave Lexi the thumbs-up sign. Lexi gave a thumbs-up back to Cambree and then realized she was being friendly to someone who had never been friendly to her. This doesn’t mean I like you.
She moved quickly. She knew exactly where to look. Last year, Lexi was the office aid and she got along very well with Maudie Ogeltree-Savernson. Anybody could, just as long as you smiled at her jokes and listened to her stories and told her you liked her denim. Lexi prayed that Mrs. Ogeltree-Savernson had not changed the password: “denim4life.” Her head moved as if it were on a swivel. Lexi looked around as she typed the password into the computer. An hourglass came up as the computer processed the keystrokes, and a moment later she was in Maudie’s main window.
“Yes,” Lexi said with a grin. With purpose and efficiency, Lexi found the student files. She pulled up Jill Alexandria Martin. She scrolled through Jill’s transcripts. It read like a traveler’s itinerary. She spent a semester in Allagash, Maine, two years in Roswell, New Mexico, three months in Snowflake, Arizona, a semester and a half in McMinnville, Oregon. Jill had even lived overseas. For two years, she lived someplace called Cussac, Cantal, in France.
Jill’s grades were exemplary.
Lexi printed the transcript and narrowly escaped the office before Cambree and Maudie returned.
“Cambree Meyers, you’re going to have a lot of explaining to do when Assistant Principal Stevens returns. I’ve got work to do and you are running me through the school on wild goose chases.”
Cambree watched as Lexi walked around the corner before saying, “Um, I really thought those boys were spraying lewd comments on the side of the school. They must be using invisible paint or something. That’s my bad.”
Ignoring Maudie’s threats, Cambree briskly walked to catch up with Lexi. “What did you find?”
“Look at this,” Lexi replied. “Jill has lived in over a dozen towns and she only gets A’s. There is no way someone can get an A in every class from all these schools. Let’s call the schools and see if she even went there. I bet she made all of this up.”
“Good idea,” Cambree replied.
“Tell me about your dreams,” Lexi said as she looked up the school phone numbers.
“Well,” Cambree started. “There was one where Jill and I wore the same outfit to school. Then, there was one where I won prom queen and they put the tiara and sash on me and everything and then Assistant Principal Stevens said, ‘I’m sorry, there has been a mistake. Jill was the actual winner.’ It was terrible, Lexi, an absolute nightmare. People were pointing and snickering. Can you imagine?”
Those are nothing like my dreams. In fact, that actually sounds kind of funny, Lexi thought. I would like to see that.
“What were your dreams like?”
“Uh, same kind of stuff. Really creepy,” Lexi answered.
“See,” Cambree said with a nod. “We’re not so different.”
Your dreams are nothing like mine because we are nothing alike.
Chapter Eighteen
Black Out
“There’s a snake lurking in the grass.”
-Virgil
They found all of Jill’s old schools on the internet and called each one of them. Lexi’s notion that Jill completely fabricated her transcript was neither debunked nor proven. One of the secretaries, Mindy N. Mork, in Roswell, New Mexico had no record of Jill, but she said that sounded a lot like a girl name “Marsha Hinn.” The same held true for the school in Allagash, Maine, but she went by the name “Haley Enn.” Eventually, the folks on the other end of the line would become suspicious and ask questions. Lexi would say, “Thank you for your time,” and hang up.
“We’ve got her,” Cambree said with a devilish smile.
“How so?”
“Isn’t it obvious? She’s changing her name,” Cambree replied. “Don’t you see? She’s living a lie. For whatever reason, she’s been traveling from place to place because she is hiding from something—or from someone. I bet her and her brother killed their parents.”
“That sounds a little far-fetched.”
“Whatever. What’s your theory then?”
“We need to be certain. We need to call all the schools and get pictures of these girls that match Jill’s description.”
A light flashed on in Cambree’s head. “Better yet, we can look up their yearbooks on line.”
Lexi nodded. “That’s a good idea, but how are we going to do that? Google?”
Scrunching her face like a shar-pei puppy and shaking her head, she said, “We’re not going to do it. I’ll make my brother Aiden and all of his geeky friends do it.”
“That would be nice of them.” Lexi actually liked Cambree’s brother Aiden.
“They’re not nice. They’re nerds, complete wastes of space. They call themselves the Bad Gnus. That has to be the worst gang name ever, but they’ll do it if I promise to be seen with them in public. I’m sacrificing a lot for you, Lexi. I hope you realize that.”
Lexi scratched her head, but did not respond. Grabbing the phone, she said, “I need to call my grandma and tell her I’m on my way.”
“Why don’t you use your cell phone?”
Shaking her head, Lexi simply replied, “It broke.”
“So, go get a new one.”
Lexi did not argue. Cambree was privileged and did not understand that not everyone could simply afford to fix their broken cell phone, let alone go buy a new one. She picked up the phone and started to dial, but realized the line was dead. “It’s not working.”
Cambree grabbed the phone. “Let me see that.” She pressed the dial tone and set the phone next to her ear. She shrugged. “Oh, well, just use my cell phone.”
Lexi took the brand new, overly bedazzled phone and dialed the number. “You have no bars,” Lexi pointed out, holding up the phone.
“Impossible,” Cambree announced. “We have the Mega Plan. It’s only for the one percents.”
Only Cambree Meyers could take pleasure in being one of the hated few.
Taking the phone from Lexi, she examined it. “I’m goi
ng to have my dad call and threaten to sue when he gets home. This is unacceptable.”
The power went out, and the entire room went black.
“What happened?” Lexi whispered.
“Duh, the power went out,” Cambree replied. “I’ll check it out.”
“I’ll go with you.”
It was just as dark in the hallway when they opened the door. Outside, thunder angrily shook the heavens. A heavy downpour commenced.
Lexi was so nervous she nearly knocked Cambree to the ground when Cambree halted.
“God, Lexi, are you trying to kill me? Are you scared of the dark or something?”
It was like something out of her dreams. “No, sorry, I couldn’t see that you stopped.” Normally, she was not scared of the dark, but the last few days had been anything but normal. She found herself quite antsy.
The two girls started walking down the stairs. “Mom?” Cambree yelled. “Dad? Aiden, you better not be playing around or else I’m putting your picture back on ImSoPathetic/AdoptMe.com.”
As they made their way toward the entryway and the front door, Lexi heard the sound of crickets. She spun around, looking for the beady red eyes. Her hands began shaking. Any minute, she would hear the hissing. She covered her ears. The creature from the bathroom must have followed her from school, and now it was going to kill her.
“Cambree,” Lexi whimpered nervously.
“What is that sound?” Cambree asked.
“Bugs. I hate bugs. It’s a giant bug. It followed us. It’s going to kill us.”
“What are you talking about? Take a pill.”
Lexi thought she could hear it. She covered her ears and shook nervously. She had to get out of there. She was about to start running when Cambree began yelling.
“Cambree!”
“Get them off of me! Get them off of me!”
In the feeble and fleeting light, Lexi watched as Cambree spun around slapping at her head and hair. The cricket sound was louder. Lexi’s heart was pounding through her chest. She did not want to die nor did she wish to watch Cambree die either. But what could she do? She couldn’t see what was attacking Cambree.
The lights flickered once and then came on for good.