Insanity

by Kira Moericke

  INSANITY

  KIRA MOERICKE

  Copyright © 2018 Kira Moericke

  All rights preserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever without written permission from the author except for brief quotations used in articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used factiously, and any resemblance to actual person, living or dead, business establishment, events or locales is entirely coincident.

  Produced in the United States of America.

  ISBN-13: 9781730890734

  To my Facebook followers. Your guys’ support means so much to me. Thank you.

  ♥

  Table of Contents

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-one

  Twenty-two

  Twenty-three

  Twenty-four

  Twenty-five

  Twenty-six

  Twenty-seven

  Twenty-eight

  Epilogue

  Nova’s Playlist

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  ONE

  LIGHTNING RIPPED ACROSS the dark sky, and thunder growled. The wind blew in giant gusts, throwing rain into my eyes as I wandered mindlessly toward the jagged cliff. Every ounce of my being told me to stop, to turn around, and head back to the ball. But I couldn’t. It was as if I were cast under a spell. I could no longer control my body. I couldn’t make myself stop.

  The edge of the cliff was coming nearer. I could hear the angry waves crashing against the base shore. My heart was beating furiously. I had to stop. Why couldn’t I stop?

  I was so close now. Only a few more steps before it would be too late. I closed my eyes, preparing myself for the fall.

  “My love! What in the world are thou doing?”

  I whirled around and saw him standing a few yards away, soaked from being in the rain. His eyes were wide with fear as he stared at me, watching my every move.

  I wanted to answer him. I wanted to tell him that I couldn’t move, that I couldn’t turn away. But whatever spell was over me forbade me from talking too. I opened my mouth, but no words came out.

  “Come. Let us go back inside and out of this rain.” He reached out his hand toward me. “Come my love before you catch pneumonia.”

  Wet hair flew across my face, but I didn’t move to push it away. Instead, I took a small step back. Some rocks and dirt crumbled from the cliff under my heels and plummeted down toward the raging water below.

  “Do not move, my love,” he warned, his voice rising now in panic. “Please, just come to me.”

  Whatever power possessed me, made me slowly shake my head.

  From where I stood, I saw the fear in my love’s vivid blue-hazel eyes. He reached out toward me.

  “Save me.” The words were barely audible over the clashing of thunder and lightning. But he heard it. His eyes grew wide as my whole body tipped backwards and plummeted down to the jagged rocks below.

  “Nooo!”

  His voice echoed through the surrounding darkness, enveloping me like a lover’s embrace before everything went black.

  ***

  I awoke with a jolt, sweat dripping down my face. In the dim, silvery lighting of the moon, I looked around the room, expecting to be comforted by my things. Instead, I was greeted coldly with strange belongings. I wasn’t in my room back in Cleveland, Ohio. Instead I was at Brier Hall, a school for the troubled on the northern tip of Maine. Sweat rolled down my face in rivulets.

  Kicking off the blanket that had twisted around my body during my fitful slumber, I stood up, crossed the small room toward the little window that faced the east, and unlatched it. I held my breath as the window squeaked open, praying that the noise didn’t wake up my roommate, Nova. The girl was a complete nightmare, and I’ve only known her for twelve hours. From her short black hair with the purple streaks down to her toe-studded boots.

  I almost had the whole window open when a sudden voice filled the darkness. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  I jumped at the sound of Nova’s voice. Turning, I looked in her direction. With the moonlight filtering through the small open window, I could just make out the purple stripes in her hair. I could see her dark eyes twinkling angrily in the darkness, but her face was obscured by shadows, so I couldn’t see her expression.

  “I–I was just opening the window,” I replied.

  “Why?”

  I could hear the dislike in her voice. I didn’t want to answer her, but something inside me told me to reply. “I was warm.”

  Nova grunted in the darkness, but she didn’t press on. I quickly hurried back to my bed and yanked my blanket up to my chest. I stared up into the darkness, not able to close my eyes. I think it may have been my nerves. I wasn’t used to sleeping in a bed that was not my own.

  Well, you better get used to it, a voice inside my head said. Being that this is going to be your new bed from now on.

  My guts twisted at the thought that I would be living here at Brier Hall for the next few months. All because of the nightmare. The one where I unwillingly let myself fall from the edge of a cliff. It started when I was twelve, and has been repeating every night for the past five years.

  When I’d told my parents after the second week of having the same dream, they decided to send me to shrinks, hoping that they could help figure out why the nightmare kept reoccurring every night. They never understood why I continued to have the same dream, but they had prescribed me some pills to help. The pills helped, but they had always made me feel numb. So I stopped taking them.

  “Great, now I can’t sleep.” Nova sat up suddenly. “Thanks a lot, New Girl.”

  I lay perfectly still as Nova crawled from her bed and flipped on the light. I threw my hands over my eyes when the sudden light flashed to life, chasing away the darkness.

  “Do you have to turn on the light?” I asked. I moved my arm away from my eyes and watched Nova walk over to her desk and pick up her iPod.

  “Yes.” Then she plugged her earbuds into her ears and lost herself in her own little world.

  Wonderful. I sighed and stared up at the ceiling. There was a giant water stain right above my head. I’m stuck in this nuthouse with a roommate that hates my guts.

  This was going to be a long eight

  TWO

  ROOM 103. WHERE is room 103? I glanced from my class list to the little number above each door. None of the numbers matched the one on my sheet, though. I groaned inwardly. Where was room 103?

  I was so absorbed in trying to find the right classroom that I didn’t see the figure emerge from one of the bathrooms.

  “Oof!” I stumbled back, then lost my footing and crashed to the floor. My book bag fell, scattering my books and folders.

  “Oh my gosh! I am sooo sorry. I didn’t see you there.”

  “No, it’s fine.” I moved to gather my scattered things, trying to ignore the pain that had erupted inside of me from when I had crashed into the gold flaked marble floor.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah.” I scooped up my books and folders and shoved them to my bag.

  “Here. Let me help.” A girl bent down and picked up my Past Eras textbook, which had slid the furthest away, and brought it over to me.
>
  “Thank you.” I took the book from her and stood up, slipping the strap of the book bag around my shoulders.

  “I’m Lena,” the girl said. She stuck out a hand toward me. I took it, and we shook. “Lena Bourgeois.”

  “My name’s Emma Knightley. But everyone calls me Em.”

  “Well, it’s nice to meet you, Em.” Lena beamed, a smile stretching across her face. The girl was as thin as a twig with stringy auburn hair that she had pushed back with a green and black checkered headband.

  I smiled meekly back. It was all I could muster.

  “You seem lost.” She tilted her head like a curious puppy. “Anything I could help you with?”

  “Uh…Actually, do you know where…” I glanced down at my schedule. “Mr. Atherton’s Past Eras class is?”

  “Yup! I’m actually going to his class right now. I’ll show you.” She started down the hall in the direction I had been going, then stopped when she realized that I wasn’t following. She twisted at the waist and motioned with her hand for me to follow her. “Come!”

  Not knowing what else to do, I followed Lena down the hall, tucking my class schedule into my book bag.

  “So, are you new? Wait. What am I saying? Of course you’re new.” She shook her head and smiled at herself. “You wouldn’t be lost if you weren’t new.”

  “Uh, yeah. I actually enrolled yesterday,” I told her. I hooked a strand of hair behind my ear as we took a right at a fork.

  “So did you get a roommate?” Lena asked.

  I nodded. “Yeah. Some girl named Nova… Nova…” I couldn’t remember her last name.

  “Nova Byron?”

  That sounded familiar. “Yeah, her.”

  “I know she can be a little…standoffish, but I don’t really blame her.”

  I turned my head to look at Lena. My brows scrunched up in confusion. “Why do you say that?”

  “Well, according to her record, I guess she got picked on a lot at her old school, so when her parents got a divorce when she was fourteen, it just kind of sent her over the edge to this rebelliousness.”

  “Wait. How did you get to her file?” Something inside me churned. Who would look in someone else’s private files?

  Lena blushed a deep shade of red that almost matched the color of her hair. “My mom works in the office here, and sometimes I help her with computer stuff.”

  That still didn’t make it right for her to be snooping, but I didn’t say anything.

  “So all classes are going to be on the first floor,” Lena said, changing the topic. “That’s one thing that you should know.”

  “Okay.”

  “There are two wings to Brier Hall; the North Wing and the South Wing. All the classrooms are in the South Wing and all the offices are in the North Wing.”

  Well, that helped a little bit on finding the class-rooms. But that still didn’t tell me where room 103 was.

  “So what was your old school like?” Lena asked as we continued down the hallway.

  I opened my mouth, ready to reply, but was cut short just as we were about to round another corner when we came across three girls, causing all of us to come to an abrupt stop. The girl in the center had wavy dark hair that she held back in a ponytail. She was tall, a few inches above my five foot seven frame. She had the features of a porcelain doll; beautiful and timeless. The two girls on either side of her were twins with blond hair and sharp, beak-like noses and squinty blue eyes. They didn’t even hold a flame to the girl in the center.

  “You need to look out more on where you are going, Lena,” the girl in the center said, her voice coming out clear and crystalline. It reminded me of falling water.

  “I’m sorry,” Lena rushed, her face reddening again.

  “It’s fine. Just watch it next time.” She shifted her head and looked at me. From where I stood, I could see her pupils dilate. “You too: Watch it.” She glanced at the twins on either side of her. “Let’s go.”

  Lena and I quickly backed away from one another, allowing Porcelain and her two friends to walk past.

  “Who is that?” I asked Lena as we regrouped together.

  “That’s Lexi Leclercq,” Lena replied as we continued our way to Past Eras. “She’s one of those sweet but mean girls. You know, the one that secretly hates everyone but acts all friendly?”

  “Yeah, I could kind of sense that.” She had been giving off a really strong vibe.

  “You should just try not to get in her way,” Lena informed me.

  “Shouldn’t be a problem,” I mumbled.

  I listened to Lena for the few remaining minutes that we wandered the halls. Finally we came to a room; room 103.

  “Well this is Mr. Atherton’s Past Eras class,” Lena said, pushing open the wooden door. We walked inside the room where there were four rows of tables on either side with a clear center aisle. I looked around, spotting a few people already sitting down at tables, and trying to figure out where to sit.

  “Here, sit with me.” Lena grabbed my wrist and pulled me along after her to the second table in the row furthest away from the door. She and I plopped down into the two center chairs. While Lena got her things ready for class, I sat back in my chair and looked around. In front of us sat a girl, who was inspecting her nails, looking bored. In the far corner of the room sat a boy, his head ducked low as he drew in his notebook. And there was a guy right across the aisle from us, dressed completely in black, despite the dress code, with spiky black hair and thick eyeliner and black lipstick. More people trickled into the room, all looking the way that I felt inside: tired and miserable.

  “Okay, class, it is precisely eight o’clock: Time to start class.” An older man with short, wavy gray hair in a brown suit strode into the room with a matching brown messenger bag thumping against his upper thigh. He shut the door behind him before he went to the front of the room. His light blue eyes scoped the room, briefly pausing on me before he walked over to the overhead.

  “Now we are going to pick up where we left off last week,” Mr. Atherton stated, going to the computer in the corner of the room and logging on. “Joey, could you hit the light switch?”

  I turned my head and saw the goth-looking guy with the black Mohawk drag himself out of his seat. He flipped off the switch, casting the entire room in darkness except for the light coming from the projector.

  “Now, we left off in England during the Victorian Era.” Photos flashed to life on the screen, and I couldn’t help but stare at them. There were images of women dressed in beautiful ball gowns and gentlemen who wore their long hair tied back with ribbons at the base of their necks. I stared at them until my vision started getting fuzzy. “Now, can anyone remember the years in which the Victorian Era took place?”

  I didn’t see anyone raise their hands–I was too absorbed with the photos that were switching on the screen–but suddenly a voice filled the air. “1837 to 1901.”

  “Very good, Mari,” Mr. Atherton praised.

  He switched the photo on the screen to show an oil painting of a Victorian ball. The soft droning sound of Mr. Atherton’s voice filled my ears, but I couldn’t make sense of the words he said. All I could focus on was the image. The handsome men and beautiful woman frozen in time in a single painting. A sudden wave of familiarity washed through me and I closed my eyes…

  Violins and cellos filled my ears as I looked around me, suddenly feeling very self-conscious. All the young maidens around me seemed beautiful and vibrant and so full of life. I felt miniscule to them in my ball gown, which was so blue that it looked almost black, while they wore their pastel colors, very much looking like the noble young women of London.

  “What is wrong with thy fair maiden who does not dance?”

  I turned my gaze to the side and saw a young man dressed in red and gold. A matching mask covered his upper face. His blondish-brown hair was pulled back at the nape of his neck with a ribbon that reminded me of the color of blood.

  “No one has asked me,” I rep
lied, trying to hold back the sad and bitter tone that wanted to crawl into my voice.

  “Now how may that be” –the boy smiled a smile that could warm the coldest of hearts– “when thou is the most beautiful creature in this room?”

  I could feel the heat rise to my cheeks, staining them a light shade of pink. I was suddenly glad that I was wearing the silver masquerade mask that I had chosen for tonight’s festivities.

  “Would thou care to dance?” The boy held out a gloved hand toward me. I stared at it for second, momentarily shocked that he was asking me out of all the young woman who waited along side of me before I reached out and laid my hand in his.

  His smile shifted to one to admiration as he guided me to the dancefloor. I hung onto one of his hands while I used my other to hold up the ends of my dress. He placed his free hand on my waist, and for a moment, I couldn’t breathe. I did not know if it was because of his touch, the corset that squeezed my middle to the perfect hourglass figure, or because of the way he looked at me with his beautiful crystal eyes.

  We were silent for a moment as we started to dance. We stared into one another’s eyes, not daring to look away.

  “So,” the boy said after a moment. He cleared his throat and finally broke eye contact. “What do you think of all this?”

  “You mean the masquerade ball?”

  He nodded.

  “It is…” I was speechless. The whole thing was beautiful and dazzling, enchanting and overwhelming all at once. I did not know how to reply, so I settled with, “Disparate.”

  “Disparate?” The boy raised his brows. “And what, may I ask, is disparate about it?”

  I looked around, seizing all the ball gowns and masks. The large chandelier that dangled in the center of the ballroom casted a warm golden light throughout the room. “I just feel that the master of this fine manor outdid himself. It is incomparable to anything I have yet seen in London.”

  “Well, the master then must have good taste.”

  “That may be so, but I feel like this whole thing is him flaunting his beauty and wealth to those of the city.” We spun.