Carved into the stone archway over the doorway, gilded words announced, “Saint Damon’s Academy.”
I glared at them. In the brochure, that name had looked dignified, a gateway to an education I hadn’t dared to dream about. This morning, in real life, they marked the next stop in my personal shit show.
The front door swung open and I tried to wipe the glare from my face.
Four women clad in conservative black and gray clothing stepped onto the tiled entrance where cement yard met scary church.
Seemed it was an ongoing theme these days.
They lined up in a row in front of the doors; hands clasped in front, heads bowed low, so the early morning sun cast their faces into shadow. They looked like nuns—nuns that had just crawled out of hell and swiped some fresh uniforms. Despite the growing brightness in the sky, the four resembled shadows, their faces somehow resisting the morning light.
If I’d been stupid enough to believe Nabila’s tale yesterday, I’d probably think these teachers were demons.
One looked up and I swore her eyes caught in the light, flashing like a cat’s.
A sick feeling started forming in the pit of my stomach, and I wished I hadn’t eaten that second PopTart for breakfast. It had been days since I’d seen anything, and this was a truly awful moment for my weird talent to restart.
I was starting to think it might be more of a curse.
“Welcome.” Flash-eyes didn’t raise her voice, but it carried clearly across the space. All talking in the courtyard abruptly ceased.
Almost as one, everyone turned to her, giving their full attention.
I felt an eyebrow creeping up my face and I struggled to force it back down. This wasn’t a good time to stand out from the crowd—not that I was delusional enough to imagine I blended in. Glancing around as subtly as possible, I noticed a small pocket of empty space had formed around me.
“We have a new student joining us today,” Flash-eyes announced. “I expect you all to welcome Ashley Alcantara.”
I didn’t need to look to know the feral group had suddenly fixed their attention on me. Shit. My heart, or wherever it was my instincts lived, demanded I start running. My feet refused to cooperate. Which was a good thing. I suspected my feet were being smarter than my heart.
Running attracts their attention, right?
“Hey.” Tipping my chin up, I aimed my best unimpressed stare at the teacher. Her eyes flashed again. An invisible rock sunk from my throat to my gut, adding to the lump of worry there.
I swallowed hard but refused to back down.
A slow, cold smile joined the flashing. “Ms. Alcantara will be joining Mrs. Churchfield’s homeroom. She will no doubt need direction.”
The way she said “direction” made me queasy.
One of the pseudo-nuns regarded me from beneath her hood. I couldn’t see her eyes flash, but I could feel them. I counted slowly to ten in my head. I’d been imagining all sorts of things since Mom died. But there was no way Jim had actually sold his soul, or the faux-nuns were demonic creatures. They felt like demonic creatures, but teachers often felt that way to me.
I needed to stop being crazy, to stop hearing Nabila’s crazy from the day before repeating in my head. So what if our apartment sucked at the school had shitty uniforms? I’d come here to honor my promise and make good on six months of free education, and no amount of weird energies were going to stop me.
I’d take their classes, get my credits, and secure myself a position in a music program.
The tide began trickling towards the doors and I fell into step with the rest as best I could. I had no idea where I was going, but I figured I’d eventually work it out.
“You’re in Mrs. Churchfield’s homeroom?” A low voice appeared at my ear.
“Huh?” Momentarily forgetting my cool, I spun around.
Hovering beside me was one of the Ferals. He was tall, lanky, with dark hair and easy, fluid moments. He was also older than me. Some girls would probably call him attractive—I suppose I might be one of them. The academy’s black shirt clung to his body like a second skin, the black pants riding low on his hips. How he managed to make that plaid jacket sexy was beyond me, but he did. Heat snuck into my cheeks, so I decided to study the large, double-doored entrance.
A folded piece of paper waved in front of my nose. “Your schedule.”
The heat in my cheeks erupted into a full-blown fire.
Stop being such a dork.
I glanced at him, finding amber eyes glinting with amusement. “Thanks.”
Get it together, Alcantara. Buying time for my cheeks to cool, I snatched the document, slid my thumb through the seal and quickly scanned the contents. Yup, that was my homeroom. There were also a list of courses—the same ones I’d been interested in during the drive—somehow already in place on my schedule: Introduction to Business, Introduction to Economics, Introduction to Cultural History, Study Block, and—thank you, Universe—Introduction to Cultural Arts.
“Yeah, says I’ve got homeroom with Churchfield,” I said, casually, like I didn’t give a damn whether it was this Mrs. Churchfield or the President. “You supposed to play guide or something?”
“Or something.” I glanced at him and found his lips quirking in amusement.
Stay cool, I ordered myself. “Short straw?”
“Volunteered.”
“Why?” I stared at him in surprise. I couldn’t imagine why someone who had to be one of the hottest guys in school would want to play guide for the new girl. This was something I’d have imagined Oscar doing.
“Bored.” The hottie grinned at me, displaying a row of white teeth, that for some reason, made me think of nature channel documentaries on jungle cats.
“I hear that. They any good here?”
“Good?” He chuckled. “No. Not really.”
“Great,” I sighed. Guess useful courses really had been too much to hope for. “Do they at least have a music program?”
“Music?” He looked like that was a surprising notion. “Maybe. They’re launching some cultural studies shit. Hired a new guy. Starting soon, I think.”
“Oh.” Disappointment gripped me. I guess having anything I wanted was out of the question today. “Figures.” I slanted him a look as we made our way into the gloomy reaches of the church. “So you know my name, want to return the favor?”
“Sure.” He smiled again, a streak of white in the corner of my eye. “I’m Nash Thorn.”
“Parents country fans, Nash?”
“Not exactly.” There was an ironic twist to his words, but before I could ask, we arrived at a glossy black classroom door and he reached over to hold it open for me. “Welcome to homeroom,” he said.
For some reason, the statement made me want to turn around and run away as fast as I could. “Thanks,” I said instead, and stepped past him into the room. It looked like every other classroom I’d ever encountered, except that the windows were covered in heavy curtains that gave the interior an eerie, purple glow.
Writing covered the back wall, though I couldn’t read it in the gloom. Swallowing a flare of panic, I gritted my teeth and slid behind the first available desk. I felt Nash move into the one directly behind me.
The symbols on the wall were starting to make me itchy.
Then a pseudo-nun, who had to be Mrs. Churchfield, entered and walked to the front. The atmosphere chilled by several degrees. Geez. She was a walking blast of air conditioning, unnecessary on this strangely cool Vegas morning.
“Welcome.” Churchfield laid her hands atop the front desk.
At the motion, a small tremor seemed to radiate throughout the room, and total silence descended in its wake. I was very grateful my strange vision hadn’t decided to rear its head because I feared what I’d see wrapped around this teacher would make me lose what little remained of my cool.
Nabila was just messing with you, I reminded myself.
“Today, in homeroom, we are introducing the fine art of bus
iness management, which will be expanded upon in your subsequent classes. Following this session, you will go to early economics with Mrs. Thacker in Room Four, where you will begin learning about contract negotiations. Afternoon will be as per your individual schedules and then homework.”
A few heads noticeably shrank inwards at the mention of homework, but they didn’t look like the slackers. My brows pulled together. And what exactly did Churchfield mean by business management?
Nabila is full of crap, I repeated silently.
Besides, this curriculum actually sounded kind of cool.
None of my other schools had bothered connecting different classes, or using a homeroom to introduce us to the topics of the day. And mixing the juniors like me in with the college seniors? Super cool. Maybe Saint Damon’s had some things going for it after all. Being a successful musician was more than writing songs. It involved tons of business acumen—just look at how Taylor Swift had owned her brand. I could use this.
I sat up, eager to find something not-terrible about my day.
Churchill rapped a thin, shining black rod against the front board. “These are the fundamentals. When one is managing a business, it is crucial that everyone knows their place…”
I frowned at the board, which marked out a hierarchy of spots in a theoretical business. There were lots of people at the bottom, and only one at the top. Even though the diagram was comprised of stick figures, the ones clustered on the bottom managed to look… sad? Who made sad stick figures, and why hadn’t she turned on the lights to make note-taking easier?
What the hell kind of class was this?
We were sitting in a dark room with weird pictures on the wall. The teacher was writing on the board—in the dark. Even for a wacky, alternative academy, this made no kind of sense.
I glanced over my shoulder and found Nash watching me. He winked and tipped his head in the direction of the front.
“Ashley Alcantara,” Churchfield announced, and I snapped back to attention, trying to remember what the heck she’d been talking about. “You are new,” she continued, addressing me without turning around, somehow making my new status some kind of accusation.
It was a test—a push.
My hands tightened into fists beneath my desk. I’d been pushed every day for the past two years, by wires and tests and solemn-faced doctors who always talked at me like I couldn’t understand the real meaning of their words. Pushed by the father I barely knew, who’d dragged me to a weird city and even weirder new home. And now I was being pushed by the one thing I’d hoped would make the rest of this shit worthwhile: my new school.
I realized I was done.
“Yeah, I’m new.” I agreed cheerfully, mostly just to push her back. Behind me, Nash gave a low whistle.
“Then you can explain the importance of hierarchy in ensuring the stability of business.”
“Well, Mrs. Churchmouse, I would,” I quipped, enjoying the way her fake nun’s habit rippled when I intentionally mispronounced her name, “but I don’t actually support capitalism. I believe in socialism,” I added, just to make her habit twitch a second time.
As tested in chat rooms on long nights on the ward, I knew I could argue with the best on this subject—arguing was always easier when you didn’t really care. I’d studied socialism in my last two units of homestudy, working on it while sitting beside Mom in the hospital. And while I didn’t actually want to live in a socialist state, I sure as hell understood why people fought for universal healthcare—I wouldn’t be in the dumpster fire that was today if I hadn’t had to spend every last cent supporting my dying mother. So if Churchill thought I couldn’t back up my word-dropping, she’d quickly find herself shit out of luck.
Go on. Push me, I thought. It was time someone else paid for me being stuck here.
“Indeed,” Churchill said.
The temperature dropped in the room, which had gone so quiet I could have heard Nabila drop one of her pins on the carpet. A chill ran through my body. My breath puffed before me like it did on cold winter nights. I’d have glanced at Nash to gauge his reaction, but my eyes were glued to Churchfield.
A crack echoed through the classroom, a jarring snap that reminded me of when I’d broken my arm as a child. “I don’t know about the expectations for behavior in your previous school, Ashley Alcantara, but at Saint Damon’s, we are always mindful of our superiors.”
Her head turned. The rest of her didn’t follow.
My jaw dropped.
My lungs stopped working as Churchfield’s head slowly rotated to face me. Her eyes were jet black pools that promised me, without words, that she could crush me as easily as a bug. That she considered me a bug. Compared to her, I was an ant waiting to be stepped on.
A rattling sound began filling the room and I realized I was shaking so hard it was making my desk jitter against the floor.
“Ms. Alcantara, I can see you were not properly briefed. Which was doubly evidenced by your behavior toward Mrs. Keats last night. Though she is beneath us, she must be allowed to serve her purpose.” That horrible, backward-facing head didn’t waver, those terrible black eyes boring into mine. Churchfield’s remained calm and steady, her body somehow continuing to make methodical notes on the board. “But let me be clear. If you disrespect me again, I will make you chew off every finger to the first knuckle on your right hand. Regardless of what anyone else has to say about it.”
Oh god, oh god, oh god.
She would do it—could do it.
She’d force me to mutilate my own body, strip away my ability to play guitar, and destroy my future with a blink of those dead eyes. I could feel the power rippling off of her. My vision popped and all of a sudden, a black and purple halo encircled her. It was the type of blackness that lurked in shadowed alleys, hid in closets. It was fear. And I was very, very much afraid.
Heart thumping wildly in my chest, I lurched to my feet.
Part of me wanted to beg for mercy, but I didn’t. I wouldn’t. I hated being afraid. I hated anyone seeing me afraid and weak, especially someone who wanted my fear.
“P-please,” I stammered. “I need a moment.”
Then I lunged for the hallway door.
I expected shadowy claws to tear at my skin. Unseen powers to yank me back inside that classroom and rip my flesh from my bones.
Closing my eyes, I hit the doorway at a dead run.
Instead of being pulled back, I flew straight across the hallway. The lack of resistance surprised me. I stumbled into the opposite wall before regaining my feet. Desperately, I looked from one end of the hallway to the other.
I had to get out. Which way was the door?
Wait. The fence.
I was trapped.
Hiccups leaped out my throat. My sight latched onto the white and blue sign for the ladies' washroom. I ran for it, feet scrambling and slipping over the polished linoleum.
Pushing through the door, I searched for a lock—nothing. Of course.
Backing slowly away, I stared at the door until my back hit the far wall. I pressed both hands over my mouth, but I couldn’t stop a high, keening scream from emerging. It was so high and quiet; I hoped only dogs could hear it.
Something hovered on the edge of my vision, and I jumped, only to find I’d landed beside the paper towel dispenser.
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
Where should I go? Where could I go?
Was there a Catholic church around here, and would those priests even bother helping me when I’d never been to church a day in my life?
“Oh shit. Oh God. Nabila was right,” I whispered to myself.
Jim had sold his soul and we were living in a demon-run world until he got it back. Something rustled and this time my scream was an audible yelp. Back pressed against the wall, I scanned the small, white-tiled room.
The door hadn’t moved and there wasn’t anyone in the three open stalls. The window was barred and…
The garbage can moved.
; Visions of an evil, garbage-dwelling creature flashed before my eyes. It couldn’t be as bad as Churchfield. Surely nothing was as bad as her. And even if it had been, my body wasn’t going to cooperate.
Frozen in place, all I could do was watch as a foot, then a hand emerged from the large blue container. The shoe was old brown leather, scuffed and worn through years of use. It was also familiar.
“Oscar?” I gasped.
A head of scruffy blonde hair peeked warily from the edge of the can, pale blue eyes fixed upon me through askew glasses and he hesitantly smiled at me. “Hello, Ash.” His head bobbed respectfully from within the can, knocking against the plastic side like a dull drum.
“What the hell are you doing in the garbage can, I—”
I stopped.
Oscar was stuck in a garbage can. Just like a bizarre parody of the character. Laugher burbled up from my belly, wild and higher than normal but still welcome. My world might be ending, but for some reason, I couldn’t get past the Sesame Street connection.
The rest of Oscar’s head appeared, confusion marking his features. Sadly no grouchy remarks joined him.
Arms wrapped around my middle, I laughed silently at a joke only I got. Who’d have thought the end of my world as I knew it would be followed by a guy named Oscar trapped in a can in the girl’s washroom? With tears streaming down my face, it took me a couple tries to help him out. I caught a glimpse of my melting eyeliner and hastened to fix it as he got himself put to rights.
“You didn’t answer my question,” I finally managed to ask. “What are you doing in the girls' washroom in the garbage can?”
He shrugged boney shoulders. “Happens sometimes.”
“But you’re strong?” Confusion rippled through me. “Why don’t you just beat up whoever messes with you?”
His skin turned nearly as white as the surrounding tiles and he shook his head rapidly at me. “Don’t say such things, Ash. Don’t remind them.”
“Them? Who’s them?” I waved a hand at the door, a desperate sweep that to me encompassed all of Las Vegas. “Oscar, I’ve just realized you and Nabila weren’t jerking me around yesterday. Not only are there demons in the world, but I’m at their school. And they own my father. So please, say something that makes sense.”
Rock and Ruin Page 9
