The clock above the chalkboard slowly ticked away. I watched for what felt like an eternity as the clock hand moved towards the 12. Once it finally it its mark, the bell rang and I quickly dashed from my seat. With book bag slung over the shoulder, I joined the crowd of fellow students streaming out of the classroom.
Minutes earlier, I had completed the final exam of my last class of the day, nay, the entire school year. That was it for me. No more high school! A mixture of elation and melancholy engulfed me as I had made many great memories in this school, from helping the Bruins, our football team, into the high school championships, to being voted Mr. Most-Likely-to-Succeed, and last but not least, meeting and falling in love with Storell Sumner, a junior who moved here last year.
Storell stood outside the classroom door with a huge grin on her face. She must have aced her physics exam, or maybe she was just happy that school was over. She walked over and we hugged. “It’s over!” she said. I reached over and ran my hand through her shoulder length brown hair. I wanted to say something intimate to her during this lovey-dovey moment but I sensed a nagging presence behind me.
“Come on you love birds, save it for outside the school,” Mr. Grimes, my now former calculus teacher, said.
Talk about ruining the moment. “All right Mr. Grimes, see ya!” I grabbed Storell’s hand and we darted out of there.
“Hey stop running! I don’t care if you just graduated, you still have to follow the damn rules!” Mr. Grimes shouted. Of course, his words fell on deaf ears.
*
Once Mr. Grimes was out of sight, we slowed our pace down and started walking. Hands still holding, we strolled through Hallway A, the hallway that led directly to the school’s main entrance. “Wait,” Storell said. She stopped and headed towards the lockers lining the wall. “I forgot to clean out my locker. Give me a sec’, okay?”
“Sure,” I replied. The moment I said that, I felt a pat on my shoulder.
“Paul L. Grant” bellowed the person behind me. I turned around.
“Brady! Don’t creep up on me like that, dude!” I said.
Brady towered over me by at least six inches. Being in the presence of such a giant would scare just about anyone. Still wearing a jersey and loose athletic shorts, he grabb ed the basketball under his arm, held it up with one hand, and then tossed it up and down casually. “I just came to say good bye to my dear friends of Port Arthur High School.”
“Oh right, you’re leaving next week, aren’t you? Dude, we should totally throw a going away party,” I said.
Brady shook his head. “Can’t, I got to practice. Got to ready for the summer program at U.Mass,” he said as he grasped his ball in both hands, and then made an arching shot aimed at a nearby trashcan. The ball slammed into it perfectly.
“Brady, you better make the NBA next year!” Storell said as she high fived him. My face turned red when she said that. Part of her charm was making silly inappropriate comments like that. Especially since she knew that the NBA had raised its age limit to prevent anyone under 19 from declaring for the draft. She walked over to me. “I’m done, let’s go.”
BOOM.
It sounded like an explosion. The floor vibrated as a huge force slammed me into the ground. Thick smoke enveloped the air. I heard several more explosions before I blacked out.
When I came to, I found myself lying on the ground, staring upwards through thick smoke.
I managed to stand up. Storell lay on the ground, motionless. I ran over to her and picked her head up. “Storell?” I could barely hear myself speak as I shouted the name.
She coughed as her eyes opened. She looked okay save for some minor scrapes on her forearms. Her jeans were covered with dust.
I looked over to Brady, who had been knocked towards the lockers. He stared at me. “What the fuck just happened?”
“I… I don’t know,” I said, feeling dumbfounded. I helped Storell to her feet and we looked for our bags. They had flown a few feet away.
Other students in the hallway appeared as dazed and confused as us. Some of them had experienced serious trauma, with one boy bleeding from the head. Tears streamed from his contorted face as he wailed loudly. That’s when one of the teachers finally showed up. “Is there anyone needing medical attention?” Mr. Morris, the chemistry teacher, shouted.
Several kids pointed to the crying kid bleeding from the head. Mr. Morris ran over to him. “Oh this is not good.”
“Mr. Morris!” I shouted. “Do you know what happened?”
“Is it a terrorist attack?” A boy asked.
Several outbursts of questions from the students followed. Mr. Morris waved his hands frantically. “Silence!” he said.
Everyone stopped talking.
“We don’t know what happened. There was an explosion in Room 210, and that’s what caused the noise and the smoke. Beyond that…”
Mr. Morris stopped his sentence midway as he stared down the hallway.
Room 210 was located at the far end of the hallway. Amidst the thick smoke, I saw a figure emerge. The figure turned out to be a boy. He limped towards us. I could not recognize him, but students closer to the rubble did.
“Oh my God, it’s Bennett!” a girl cried out.
Mr. Morris appeared stunned. “Be-Bennett? Bennett!” he shouted. He ran over to the kid.
Everyone stared at Bennett. Brady looked like a ghost with the expression he had on his face as he stared. I looked over to Storell. She grabbed my arm. “Paul… What’s wrong with him? Why are people staring like that?”
“Storell,” I said, turning towards her slowly. “Bennett’s been missing for two years.”
*
I sat on my bed and turned the tv on. Flipping through the first few channels produced the same result. Every local station had nothing but coverage of the explosion at Port Arthur High. And they all had the same worthless speculation of terrorist attacks and a missing hostage reappearing after two years. Nearby, Storell sat on the carpet, sitting upright against the bed frame. She filed her nails and didn’t look at the TV. “They can’t get Bennett to talk. Isn’t that weird?” she said.
With my eyes still glued to the scenes of smoke rising from the school, I answered her. “Yeah well, I wonder why they’re not talking about how he disappeared.”
Storell looked up at me. “Tell me,” she said.
“Are you sure you want to know?” I asked.
“When I moved here, I knew there was something going on, something strange that the locals didn’t want to talk about. I met you and thought I could find out what it was. But you convinced me that there was nothing strange and that people in this town are just like that. Well, that something strange is Bennett isn’t it? I’ve done the research; I know that it’s got to be him. Tell me.”
I sighed. I didn’t want to mention the Bennett incident to her, mainly because I had been involved in his original disappearance. Since Bennett had returned, it became pointless to keep her in the dark. “All right, this is going to be a long story,” I said, warning her.
She jumped up onto the bed and grabbed one of my pillows. “Go on, I’m all ears.”
“Well okay, so two years ago, I was part of this gang, not like a real gang, just a bunch of sophomores up to no good. All the big troublemakers were in the gang. Mike Wilcox, Jermaine Banks, Olen Detts, all those guys. Even Brady and I were part of it. So, Bennett was this kid that everyone picked on. He’s a bit chubby so of course the jocks didn’t want anything to do with him. He wasn’t very smart so the preppies didn’t like him. His clothing choice of polo t-shirts and Dockers didn’t sit well with the Freaks and Punks, who also rejected him. Nobody liked him. Nobody wanted to associate with him. He was the perfect target for our pranks.
So Brady found out that Bennett always went to class 208 after school. That’s the room next to 210. I don’t quite remember what Brady said, I think he caught him jacking off to a Maxim centerfold or something, but we all waited one day for him to go into that room. There aren’t any windows in that room, so it was completely dark. The lights were off. We waited a bit… about five minutes, and then Mike and Jermaine burst through the door – it was locked of course but Olen was an office assistant, and he had taken the master key just for this.
Mike shouted for me to hit the lights, so I reached in and flicked the switch. The lights didn’t come on. He then shouted at me again to hit the lights. I yelled out to him. ‘They’re not working!’
Then I heard screams! Olen swore and ran in, and that was the last I saw him.”
Storell stared at me in disbelief. “What? That was the last you saw of him? What about the others?”
“Brady and I were the only ones who didn’t go in. Well, right after Olen ran in, I quickly pulled my hand out and stood back. Then the door, the god damn door.” I paused. Memories were coming back to me that I didn’t want to remember. Storell sat there, with an eager look of anticipation. “The door… shut by itself,” I slowly stammered.
Storell frowned, followed by a cute pout. She then hit me with the pillow she was holding. “Don’t mess with me like that!” she giggled. “I didn’t want a creepy campfire story!”
I stared at her blankly, without making any facial expressions that would have exposed any other storyteller. Her grin slowly turned into a look of concern. “What? No, did it really?”
I nodded. “The damn door closed by itself. Brady and I tried to open it, but we couldn’t. And we couldn’t make anything out of the dark room.” I sat there silently, unable to continue at that point.
Storell reached over and wiped my face with her fingers. “You shed a tear there, hon’. Is it that terrible of a memory?”
I stood up from the bed. “Look, I never told anyone about this until now.”
My cell phone beeped. I swiped it off my desk and took a look. There was a text message from Brady.
COME TO SCHOOL CANT TALK NOW HURRY
“What is it?” Storell asked.
“It’s a message from Brady. He wants me to go to the school.”
“What? Shouldn’t it be closed off for investigation and stuff?” Storell said.
“Yeah probably, maybe he wants to meet outside. Come on, let’s go.”
“We’re going?” Storell looked like she wanted to stay.
“Normally I would ignore it, but it’s from Brady. He never texts me unless it’s an emergency,” I said. “Come on, let’s go!”
*
It looked like a murder had taken place at the school with all the caution tape plastered everywhere. The media and police mayhem from yesterday had subsided, with only one lone police car stationed at the front. We avoided attracting attention and drove around, discretely parking in the back senior parking lot. Brady ran over to me as we were getting out. “Dude! This is crazy.”
“What’s crazy?” I asked.
“Xec’ and I snuck into the school earlier, and we went over to room 210. Sure enough it’s all blown up and shit, rubble everywhere, but…” Brady paused.
“We’re listening,” I said to reassure him. Storell stood by me, grabbing my arm. I could feel her tense up with fright.
“Room 208, man. It’s just like two years ago,” Brady said. He trembled slightly. I rarely saw him in this kind of state.
“What do you mean it’s just like two years ago?” I asked.
“It’s all dark and shit! And the door is shut. You can’t open it. And you know, we’re not the only ones who know about that room,” Brady said.
“What are you talking about? I thought we agreed to keep it a secret!” I said. Of course, I had just broken that secret moments earlier, but I chose to leave that bit of information out for now.
“Yeah I know man, I’m sorry, but I told Xec’, and he might’ve told some other people, but it doesn’t matter, the point is, there’s a bunch of peeps who know, and they snuck in and…”
“Wait what, they snuck in? You mean, there’s a whole gathering of people there?”
Brady turned and started heading back towards the school. “Come on man, I’ll show you.”
The nightmare from two years ago had returned. I could feel a churn in my stomach. “Storell,” I said as I turned slowly towards her, “you should probably go back.”
“No,” she said, still clinging to my arm. “I’ll go.”
I didn’t want to involve her and now I regretted telling her about anything. And once Storell had set her mind on something, there was no convincing her out of it. We followed Brady into the school.
*
When we got there, a short dark skinned boy with glasses and curly black hair ran towards us. “Guys!” he said.
“We’re here, Xec’,” I replied. Room 208 and the remains of 210 were just ahead. But we were not alone. A large group of kids idled in the hallway, near Room 208. “Geez, do all these people know about the Bennett incident?” I asked.
Xecure shook his head as he took off his glasses and wiped them clean with his Pokémon t-shirt. “They don’t know about what happened. I asked.”
Brady grabbed my shoulder. “Isn’t that fucked up, man?”
What was going on? Why would these people be here? I even recognized some of them. Brady, myself, and one girl among the crowd were the only seniors, or rather, former seniors, in the group. The rest were spread out among the grades. I didn’t recognize the younger looking ones, but I knew all the juniors and sophomores in the group.
I approached the group. “Hey, what are you guys doing here?” I asked.
“The same could be asked of you,” said a boy. He was Pernwall Blooming, a sophomore. He usually hung out with the Indian foreign exchange students despite being a 3rd generation. And like most of the preppies, he possessed an air of arrogance and self-importance when it came to matters like this. I had little tolerance for his better-than-thou attitude.
I walked up to him and grabbed him by the collar. “I’m being fucking serious,” I shouted.
“Stop it!” a tall girl said. She pushed me off of him and stepped in between us.
Storell and Brady ran to my side. Xecure took a step back. The others approached, but kept a distance. They had been busy chatting among themselves but now stood silent, watching us.
“Look,” the tall girl said, addressing the entire group. “We’re all here for different reasons. We don’t know why this happened. Let’s stop our bickering for a moment and find out why each of us was called to this room.”
“Fine Montgomery! Try to be the leader! You couldn’t even keep the volleyball team from falling apart!” a girl heckled from the background.
Rather than return the verbal assault, Montgomery stayed calm. She turned to me. “Paul, can you tell us why you guys are here?”
I didn’t know Montgomery and her group that well. She was a fellow former senior like Brady and I. She was on the girls’ volleyball and softball teams and had been captain of both. The only other thing I knew about her is that she was dating popular jock Julian Falls, and I didn’t see him in the crowd.
I turned to Brady. He nodded, giving me approval to relate the Bennett story. I then spent the next five minutes relating the same story I had told Storell earlier in the day.
The reactions among the crowd were muted. Montgomery seemed to nod as if she had heard this story before. “Okay, then let me tell you what happened with us,” she said as she looked over to a freckle-faced girl wearing a red dress.
…
