Seattle Rain

Once upon a time, in the far off land of Chester, England there was me: A small town orphan who had no place to belong. My Aunt Dannie had been in a car accident and was not able to provide for me any longer. I was 13. My parents were on another one of their mysterious trips when it happened. They took a plane to Hazel Grove but that took 8 hours. They then drove to Chester, England. After enrolling me in a private boarding school in Seattle a year later, they left once more.

Three years passed and I had made a few friends. My closest friend was named Giselle. It was the beginning of my senior year and I was determined to have the best school year ever. When word came from Peru that my parents were missing, I nearly collapsed. Giselle helped me get from the girl in the back of the class with red, puffy, eyes back to the leading student for Valedictorian. Christmas vacation came around, and so did the annual winter formal. This was my first time going, because I had gone home for the holidays for the past three years. Giselle was super excited because she thought this one guy named Flynn was going to ask her, and she’d had a crush on him for the past two years. A week before the formal, we ordered dresses and shoes for the party.
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The next day we picked up our dresses and shoes. We had the rest of the day off, so we went to Vios Café. It has amazing food and the building is awesome. Barb was on cashier duty. She knows us better than Headmistress Cathleen.
“The usual?” Barb asked us.
“Yeah” Giselle said.
“Kay, get them two lunch bowls of soup and two hot chocolates” Barb shouted to Kay, the cook on duty.
We got our orders and saw Flynn come in.
“Hi Flynn. I heard that you have a new student at Harrows” Barb said.
“Yeah, his name is James. He’s pretty cool, but I don’t think Gwen will like him very much” Flynn responded.
I looked at Giselle and raised one eyebrow.
He ordered and then walked over to the booth we were sitting at. He slid into the seat across from Giselle.
“Why would I not like this James person?” I asked Flynn.
“He might just beat you for Valedictorian” Flynn smiled. “Oh, and Giselle, I was wondering… maybe you could go to the formal with me”
“Okay” I could tell she was trying not to squeal.
We ate then left for Westfield Southcenter. It was our favorite mall in Seattle.
We browsed for a few hours then picked out a salon to do our hair for the Winter Formal. When we finally went back to our dorms there were only 2 hours until dinner. We went down to the game room and played pool for half an hour then went to the library and did research for a group project that was due the day after the break ended. Dinner was pretty normal, except Giselle was beaming more than usual.

We went shopping in the morning with Eboni, another one of my friends. We were talking about who would ask her to the formal next, as she had already turned down three guys.

We got back to the campus and we were just walking around when Giselle squealed.
“Gwen, Eb! Look!” Giselle exclaimed.
“What?” I asked.
“There’s Liam!” Giselle said dragging me to him.
“Hi Liam” I said.
“Uh… hi?” he looked confused. We didn’t really ever talk to him.
“So…” Giselle thought for a minute and grinned slowly. “Do you want to have a pool tournament after dinner? We asked a few other people, and we thought you might like to come”
“Okay” he still looked confused.
We walked back to Eboni.
“What was that about?” I asked.
“I was setting him up so that he can get to know you and maybe ask you to the formal” she said as if it was obvious.
“Okay… But we still need a date for Eboni” I pointed out.
“Hm… maybe if she would stop refusing guys, she would already have one” Giselle looked at Eboni.
I rolled my eyes. “Fighting about it isn’t going to solve anything”
I checked my phone. “It’s almost time for dinner. We should get back to the dorm”

Giselle left for dinner with Flynn, leaving me and Eboni to walk together.
“Are you even good at pool?” Eboni asked.
“Well, I don’t know. I always beat Giselle” I replied.
“I don’t think I’m very good” Eboni said.
“You’ll be fine” I assured her.
During dinner, we asked 13 people to be in the pool tournament and all of them said yes. After dinner, we went down to the game room. About halfway through the third game Eboni went to get a drink of water and Liam came over to me and Giselle.
“Hey, Gwen, can I ask you a question?” He looked at Giselle. “Alone?”
“Sure” I said.
Giselle giggled and walked over to Flynn.
“Does Eboni have a date to the formal?” he asked awkwardly.
I started laughing. “No. I think you should ask her. But wait until after the pool competition. Since she’s winning, I have a feeling she’s in her competitive mood”
“Okay. Thanks” he smiled at me.
He left and Giselle came back over to me.
“How did it go?” she giggled.
“Twist ending. He asked me if Eb had a date yet, and he’s going to ask her after the tournament is over” I said.
“Oh” she looked thoroughly surprised.
“Yeah. But we still need to find a date for me” I pointed out.
“Okay, maybe Lucas? Never mind. Sam? No. James? Yes!” She said, scanning the room, her eyes resting on a tall, slightly muscular guy wearing khakis and an untucked blue button up shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. He had light brown hair, blue eyes, a long nose, and a smirk on his face.
“Um… How about no?” I smiled at her.
“Come on” she dragged me to him.
He was talking to Flynn. Giselle walked to him and laced her fingers through Flynn’s.
I glared at her and turned away, walking towards the refreshment table.
Giselle excused herself from the conversation and stormed to me. James glanced over at us.
“Why didn’t you talk to him?” Giselle asked.
“Unlike you, I can’t just start up a conversation randomly!” I exclaimed.
“Fine. Be that way” she dragged me to the table were Eboni was eating chocolate covered strawberries.
“Let’s play truth or dare” Giselle said.
About three minutes into the game Liam walked to our table.
“Liam, truth or dare?” Giselle asked.
“Uh… Truth” he replied.
“Is it true that you’re going to ask Eboni to the formal?” I finished, knowing what Giselle was going to say.
“Yes” he smiled at Eboni uneasily.
“Well Eb? Are you going to go with him?” Giselle nudged her.
Eboni giggled. “Sure”
“Great” Giselle beamed. “Now we have to find Gwen a date”
The next day, I was watching the sunrise on the balcony. Flynn’s balcony was right below ours, and I didn’t notice when James emerged from the balcony below ours, his hair disheveled and wearing a bathrobe. I was wearing a plain white sundress with silver sandals and silver chandelier earrings. I had my hair in a french braid.
“What are you doing?” James was looking up.
“Isn’t it obvious? I’m watching the sunrise” I rolled my eyes.
“I thought I was the only one who did that” he said.
“Well, I haven’t set my alarm for the past two days, so I guess that explains why you haven’t seen me out here before” I replied.
“Yeah, I guess it does” he smirked.
I walked into the room and accidentally woke Giselle up.
The phone rang. I answered it.
“Is this the academic residence of Gwendolyn Sounde?” a voice asked.
“This is she” I replied.
Giselle walked into the bathroom to get ready.
“We will read the last will and testament of Rebbekah and Xavier Sounde at the King County Courthouse at 5 pm the 29th of December” the voice said.
“My parents?” my knees felt shaky.
“Yes” the voice replied.
“I’ll be there” I said weakly.
I hung up. Giselle walked out of the bathroom, hair still in a matted craze.
“Who was that?” Giselle asked.
“Wrong number” I smiled at her.
“Gwen. I’ve known you long enough to know when you’re lying” Giselle raised one eyebrow.
“My parents had a will. They’re going to read it on the 29th” I said faintly, already crumpling to the floor.
“Oh…” Giselle came and sat beside me. “Do you want me to come to the reading with you?”
“Yeah. Thanks Giselle” I replied.
“What are friends for?” Giselle said.
“Do you think Eb will go with me too?” I asked.
“Is the sky blue?” Giselle said certainly.
“Actually,” I started, peering out the window at the rising sun. “Right now it’s a shade of red-orange.”
She smiled slightly. “You know what I mean. We’ll both be there, Gwen.”

Eboni
I left Gwen and Giselle’s room and glided to my dorm.
“Hey, Eboni. I finally have a date to the Formal!” Rayna, my roommate, exclaimed.
I was surprised. She hadn’t talked to me the whole year.
“Who?” I asked.
“Liam Strauss. Do you know him?” Rayna sounded so happy.
I felt dizzy. My head was spinning, my knees buckling, my consciousness fading away.
“What?” My vision was starting to blur.
“Yeah. He took me to the pier and asked me” Rayna said.
I blacked out. Rayna was shaking me when I woke up.
“Eboni! The formal’s today! Get up!” Rayna shouted.
“Okay! I’m awake” I hoped it was just a dream.
“I’m so excited to see Liam at breakfast” Rayna exclaimed.
It wasn’t a dream.

Gwen
I saw Eb enter the Dining Hall for breakfast. She wouldn’t talk to Liam, eat, or even talk to me and Giselle. We went back to our dorm. When we finally got Eb to talk to us, she explained what had happened the night before.
“Eb, are you okay?” I asked.
“Yeah I’ll be fine” Eboni didn’t sound very convincing.
James walked up to us. “Could I talk to you alone” he asked. Giselle didn’t giggle because he looked really worried.
“Listen, Liam wants to know what’s up with Eboni. He figured I could ask because girls in fragile states and stuff” He grinned sheepishly. “And I was coming over here anyways”
“Oh, really” I cocked an eyebrow. “Whatever for?”
“Uh… I was wondering if you wanted to maybe…” He trailed off.
I was trying not to smile.
“You’re laughing at me” he complained.
“No, I’m not. Now get on with it” I tried not to laugh.
“Do you want to go to the formal with me?” he blurted out.
“I would love to. And Eboni’s fine,” I lied. “Just girl stuff.” I turned and walked towards Eboni and Giselle.
“What was that about” Giselle looked concerned.
“Oh, he wanted to know what was up with Eboni” I rolled my eyes. “And then he asked me to the dance”
An awkward silence followed.
“We need to go to the spa to get our hair done” Giselle looked at me. “Come on, it’ll be fun”
“Fine” Eboni agreed reluctantly.
We had so much fun that Eb forgot the events of the night before for a few hours.
We went back to our dorms to change for the Formal. Eboni went to hers, but when she came back, she had her make up and dress on.
“Wait! Eboni shouted as we were about to leave. “who will I go with?”
“No one. You’ll go by yourself” Giselle said.
We left and Liam was outside, leaning on the wall.
Eboni went back into our dorm.
“I can’t do this. Just tell him to leave” Eboni pleaded.
“Okay! Have it your way and not show him that you shouldn’t be messed with.. Don’t show him that you don’t care” Giselle said, shaking her.
“Giselle! Stop. Gosh” Eboni protested.
“Okay, you two. We are all going together, right now” I said firmly.
I walked out, Giselle and Eboni following. We just pretended that Liam wasn’t there.
He ran up to us.
“Ebs, what’s wrong?” Liam looked concerned.
“Liam, Rayna’s probably waiting for you” Eboni said.
“Who is Rayna?” Liam asked.
Giselle cleared her throat loudly. “UM… She’s only Eboni’s roommate who you asked to the dance after you asked Eboni. Yeah, she’s only that girl” Giselle was furious.
“What?” He was confused.
We walked in silence until we got to Eboni’s dorm. Rayna walked out.
“This is Rayna. Rayna, this is Liam, the one who you are supposedly going to the Formal with” I said, glaring at her.
Rayna looked surprised, but quickly recovered.
‘Hey Liam! Let’s go” Rayna said.
“Do I know you?” Liam asked.
“Liam, you’re so funny. We’re going to be late” She bluffed, laughing.
“Oh yeah! We are going to be late. Rayna, sorry you don’t have a date. You can hang out with us” I said.
Liam took Eboni’s hand. Flynn and James’s room was around the corner.
The night was the most fun I’d had in more than 3 years.

December 29th 2013
I sat at the long table, Giselle and Eboni leaving.
“The first asset that will be called to our attention is the estate of Mr. and Mrs. Xavier Sounde. This is left to Tanner Sounde” the man said. “The rest of their possessions including their money is left to Miss Gwendolyn Sounde” the man concluded.
I was surprised.
“You may go. Your inheritance will be listed as yours” the man said.
I left the room and Giselle and Eboni rushed to me.
“What did they leave you?” Giselle asked.
“Everything except for the house” I replied.
Eboni and Giselle gaped.
“Really?” Eboni said unbelieving.
“Yeah” I said.
We drove back to the campus in shock.
When someone finally said something, we were in me and Giselle’s room.
“We should be getting ready for dinner” Giselle said.
Eboni left and we got ready.
“Are you okay?” James asked.
That’s when I realized that he didn’t know know about my parents going missing.
“Yeah, just in shock” I said. “Something unexpected happened today”
James didn’t ask further.
Rayna was still mad. I'm not even sure exactly why she was so mad, but then one day she perked up. I thought maybe she'd changed. Boy, was I wrong.
"My twin brother is finally switching schools and coming here instead" She announced at breakfast.
Me, Giselle, and Eboni looked at each other.
Giselle cleared her throat. "You have a twin?"
"Yes. I'm sure I've mentioned Ryder before" She smirked at us.
Everyone else at the table nodded.
"Oh" Giselle said.
The next day Ryder arrived. I don't know what we were expecting, but whatever it was, it was not Ryder.
He was tall and athletic, but not the bulging muscles type. He was more the fast and agile type. He had tan skin, sandy blonde hair, and green eyes. In other words, he was nothing like his small, petite, black-haired, Ryder's twin sister.
Ryder
The first thing wrong with this school :
The karate class is taught by an amateur, hot-shot, senior girl, with an ego to match her hair: long and twisted.
When I first entered the class, late from a meeting with the principal, who had explained the rules and codes of Harrow’s and given me my schedule and a map of the campus, she had scanned me with her dark eyes, glaring as though I had cursed at her.
Untangling herself from a puny boy with big, round glasses, she walked over to me, still with that intense fire. I just simply kept my pace, walking towards her, smiling wide. I handed her my schedule, when she came to be right in front of me. She glanced down at the neon sticky note taped to it. She must have found it legitimate due to the signature of Headmistress Cathleen, so she handed it back to me, resuming the angry stare.
I stretched out my hand. She shook it, hard and cold.
I smiled still, and introduced myself. “Good morning. I am Ryder Edwards.. I just switched over from Lakeside. I’m still getting used to everything, but I’m a fast learner, and I received my black belt in my past karate class. So I should do pretty well in this class.”
She just kept up the daggers. “I’m your new instructor, Maiko Chang. I’ve been an expert in karate since age ten, I started at four, and I now teach the skill and technique. I do not give any leverage to any students, no matter their capability. If I were you, Mr. Edwards, I wouldn’t count on having an easy year in this class.”
She walked off, twisting and tossing her ponytail over the shoulder of her, small, petite figure.
The entire class period she went on pushing people to their limits. I felt bad for all of those first-year learners. They looked as though they had died and been brought back to work harder. I was ready to fight, but Maiko insisted that I wait until the end of the week.
Next, my sister is the most insane person at this school. I’m not exaggerating.
She has been trying to ruin the lives of three popular girls who didn’t do anything to her for the past week. She’s been attending this school for a week. In the meantime, she has no friends whatsoever to back her up. She is also trying to get a boyfriend at the same time. Not the best thing to do while you ruin people’s lives. Did I mention that one of those girls is her roommate?
One good thing is that my roommate, Lucas, is also a black belt. He’s in my karate class, and he has a broken arm, so he was sitting out too. I’d talked to him then and became instant friends with him. He was a major gamer, and always had some video game stashed in his bag or pocket. The dorm, which had previously been sole-inhabited by Lucas, was filled with leftover junk food and wrappers, as well as screens and consoles as far as the eye could see.
Now I’ll talk about lunch.
First, I sat down with a lot of my karate classmates, including Maiko. But most of them acted as if I wasn’t there. At least I got some reaction out of Maiko, even though it was just more sneering.
So, I left and sat by sister, who, surprisingly, was sitting at a table by the three girls who she’d been trying to destroy. When I sat down beside her, she quickly excused herself from the table, pulling me along with her.
“Go away, Ryder! What are you doing here?”
I smiled, teasingly. “Didn’t mommy and daddy tell you that I was switching schools?” Of course they had, but I decided to rub it in a little.
Rayna rolled her eyes. “I meant, what are you doing sitting by me?”
“I didn’t see you sitting there.”
“Right, you just happened to sit right next to your twin sister, out of four hundred other students in this dining hall?”
“Yep. Pretty much, that is what happened,” I said with a straight face. “But I think I’ll sit by you anyways”
She glared at me, obviously frustrated. “Just don’t talk to me”
“Not making any promises” I winked at her.
I walked back to the table and leaned back. and smiled my biggest smile at the ginger.
“I’m Ryder, Rayna’s twin brother” I said holding out my hand.
She shook it and raised her eyebrow at the brunette then at the black haired girl.
She turned to me.”Hi I’m Giselle, this is Gwen, this is Eboni, this is my boyfriend Flynn, that is Gwen’s boyfriend James, and that is Eboni’s boyfriend Liam” she smiled at me.
That is when I realized they were all sitting by guys.
I decided to put together a ninja squad. Yes, a ninja squad. I had to find someway to stop Rayna. She is insane. So I talked with Lucas and he suggested to put together a group from our karate class. I made one change to his plan. We would collect a group of athletic people. Not just people from our karate class. But our first mission is just us two. If I know one thing about Rayna, it’s that she always keeps a journal. She has to get all of it out. We’re going to find her journal.
The next day, we waited until she went to lunch and then snuck into her room. We looked for ten minutes then I found it.
“Lucas, I found it!” I said.
We looked through it and found the latest entry. It said that she was going to booby trap Giselle and Gwendolyn’s room.
“We need recruits for the next mission” Lucas pointed out.
“Yeah. We’ll need at least two more people” I was determined to make this mission a success.
We looked for possible recruits for an hour after school got out and still found nothing. Then we decided that just looking wouldn’t get us two recruits. We had to talk to people.
The first person we talked to was a red belt in our karate class. He wasn’t the best, but he was fast and agile.
“Hi!” I said. “Do you want to walk with us for a little while?”
“Sure” he joined us.
“So, we were wondering if you would like to be in a club” Lucas said awkwardly.
“What kind of club?” He asked.
“Well, I like to call it a ninja squad” I replied.
“Sounds cool. Who else is in it?” He sounded interested.
“Well, right now it’s just us” Lucas put in.
“Okay. I’ll see if some other people want to be in it” He said. “By the way, my name is Atlas”
“Um… Atlas? Make sure that the people you ask, you can trust. This thing is a secret. And look for agile, not buff” I said.
“Okay” Atlas walked away.
Gwen
I knew Ryder was up to something. Zeus and Atlas were acting weird around him. Zeus and Atlas are twins. They are also Greek. They are extremely flexible and they do karate. I wondered what he was up to. We were in our dorm when I brought it up.
“Don’t you think Ryder, Lucas, Zeus, and Atlas are acting weird?” I asked Eboni and Giselle.
“Um… isn’t weird their normal self?” Giselle laughed.
“Giselle, I’m serious. Something is going on” I insisted.
“Okay, then what’s bothering you?” Eboni said.
“I know they’re up to something, I just don’t know what” I replied.
“We could spy on them?” Giselle suggested.
“Not the best idea” Eboni advised.
“Whatever” Giselle flipped her hair.
“Guys, focus. What could they be doing?” I was sure they were up to something.
“They’re all in karate” Giselle said.
“Now we’re getting somewhere” I was relieved.
“Could they be helping Rayna?” Giselle wondered aloud.
“There’s only one way to find out” I said.
“Um.., we have to be careful” Eboni pointed out.
“Okay. We could observe from a distance” Giselle suggested.
“Agreed” Eboni approved.
“When do we start?” Giselle asked.
“What are we waiting for?” I said.
THE PARTY
We observed. We were almost always watching, waiting for them to make contact with Rayna.
“Maybe they aren’t helping Rayna” Giselle suggested.
“Either way, we still have to keep tabs on them” I said.
We split up after lunch and told each other what we saw after dinner.
“I have an idea. We need to go to the ballroom” I said.
“Why?” Giselle asked
“There’s a small New Years Eve dance in the ballroom. Maybe they’ll be there” I replied.
“Okay” Giselle said. “I’m not against going to a party”
I rolled my eyes.
“Then let’s get ready” Eboni said.
Eboni went back to her dorm to get ready. Me and Giselle took turns in the bathroom. When Eboni came back, we did each other’s makeup. Then we went to the party.
THE TRAP (RYDER’S POV)
We were waiting outside Giselle and Gwen’s room when they came out. Luckily, we were in hiding.
“I thought they had already gone to the party” Atlas said once they were out of earshot.
“Now they’re gone” Lucas pointed out.
“Okay, now we have to wait until Rayna comes” Zeus added.
“No, until she leaves” I corrected.
Rayna appeared and opened the door. When she finally left, we opened the door. a bucket of chocolate sauce spilled just as I leaped back.
I looked carefully and saw a trip wire. I gave the signal for my tool kit. Lucas handed it to me.
I took the scissors out and cut the wire. I realized that there were too many wires. It would take forever to cut them all. I leaped, spun, flipped, and finally got through the trip wires. I noticed the network of wires and spotted a place where most of them came together. It was like a spider’s web. I disabled all the traps besides the trip wires on my own.
I signaled Zeus and Lucas to come. Atlas was the lookout. I tossed them each a pair of scissors and we began cutting the trip wires. there were about five wires left when Atlas signaled us. We had been cutting trip wires for almost two hours. Zeus and Lucas cleaned up the chocolate sauce and cut the other wires while I went to talk to Atlas.
“How long do we have?” I asked Atlas.
“Probably five minutes” Atlas whispered.
“Well we better help them get the room cleaned up” I gestured to Lucas and Zeus.
We had barely got the room cleaned up when Atlas spoke up.
“Thirty seconds till they round the corner… Now” he said.
We ran out of the room, getting to our hiding spot right before they came around the corner.
We were sitting at our booth at Vios when Ryder, Lucas, Atlas, and Zeus entered, laughing. They ordered and proceeded to walk towards us.
“We have come in peace” Atlas said, grinning.
“What d0 you want?” I asked, rolling my eyes.
“We come in peace” Zeus grinned.
Giselle started laughing and wouldn’t stop.
“Giselle, people are staring” Eboni said through clenched teeth.
“I……. can’t……… stop” Giselle laughed.
“Great” I hoped no one got a good look at our faces.
They left. I couldn’t blame them. Giselle had quite a reputation for this.
But it kept bothering me. They said they came in peace. I wondered what they were going to say. I finally talked to Eboni and Giselle about it.
“Something isn’t right. What were they going to say?” I said.
“Maybe that they were aliens?” Giselle giggled. “After all, why else would they say they came in peace?”
“That’s probably not why” Eboni shook her head.
“We need to talk to them immediately” Giselle suddenly got serious.
“No… If we just come out and ask them it’ll be awkward” I said.
“So…?” Giselle asked.
“Nevermind” I rolled my eyes.
Just then we heard a knock on the door. I opened it and was surprised to see Ryder, Lucas, Zeus, and Atlas standing there.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“Okay, this time let’s skip the whole peace thing. We have been foiling Rayna’s plans and we are here to make an alliance” Ryder said.
“What?” I was confused.
“We have been ruining Rayna’s plans for about… a week” Lucas shrugged.
“And we are here to make an alliance” Atlas grinned.
“And we accept” Giselle shook Ryder’s hand.
When Arber asked Giselle, Eboni, and me to attend a party in his dorm, I don’t think any of us knew what to say. We were eating lunch. We’d never really known him very well, so it was a big surprise. Giselle was the first to speak.
“Um, why?” She raised an eyebrow. I elbowed her in the side. She looked at me and shrugged.
He shrugged, too. “I guess you would wonder why all of a sudden I invite you over. Well, it’s my roommate. He’s sort of… socially awkward. And I found something in our closet this morning while he was in the shower. And I have a feeling that he’s been checking out Eboni’s roommate.” He chuckled.
Us girls exchanged glances. Eboni burst into laughter.
“Wait! My roommate? Are you sure you have the right girl?” Eboni exclaimed.
He laughed. “Yes, no matter how crazy it sounds, Vincent has been completely taken by Rayna.”
Giselle could not control the giggles.
“What proof do you have?” I asked.
“Our closet is proof enough” he smirked.
“Show us” Giselle finally calmed down.
We followed him to his dorm and we heard the most horrible remake of ‘Baby’ by Justin Bieber.
“Vincent a serious case of Bieber fever” Arber winced. “My apologies”
“You think a girl with One Direction infection is much better? Rayna has a mini shrine in her locker” Eboni challenged.
“So does Vincent” Arber smiled. “And he also has a huge Rayna shrine”
“What?” Giselle asked.
He opened the door to his closet and that was the end of any challenges. Arber had definitely won. There was floor to ceiling portrait of Rayna on the left wall.
“Wow, he’s actually a really good artist” Giselle finally said.
“You better go” Arber glanced at the bathroom door. “I think he’s almost done with his shower”
“We need to show Rayna” I shut the door.
Rayna
I stepped into Arber’s room and heard the shower running.
“So he wasn’t almost done with his shower?” It had been three hours since Giselle, Gwen, and Eboni told me about a freshman's creepy obsession with me. I had to go to few classes after that.
“No, he was almost done. He takes showers three times a day” He explained, as if it was obvious.
“Okay…” I said awkwardly.
“The shrine is in here” Arber gestured to the closet.
“Wow… I am at a loss for words” I looked at the closet.
“It seems to have that effect on people. To me, it’s kind of amusing” Arber grinned.
“Yeah, because you’re not the one with a creepy freshman stalker” I retorted.
He laughed. “Well, you have a point”
I glared at him. “Yes, I do. I have a right to be completely creeped out”
“So, how do you like the portrait?” He glanced at the wall to my left.
I noticed the portrait of me in Choir, singing my heart out. My hair was blowing out to the side as I finished off my solo in L’dor Vador, a Hebrew song that we were singing for a music festival.
Neither of us heard the horrible singing stop, or the shower shut off. I was about to leave when Vincent, wearing only a towel around his waist, walked into the room.
Vincent
I was minding my own business, taking my second shower, when Rayna Edwards and my roommate Arber walked out of my closet, where I had a portrait of her. I was wearing only a towel around my waist.
Gwen
I stood outside the airport in Chester, England, dreading walking through the humungous Entry Hall, eating in the dining room, and staying in my old room. It was February 17 and I was staying with my uncle Tanner. He was standing in the airport waiting for me. He hadn’t changed since the day of the reading. He leaned against the wall, his hands shoved into the pockets of his camo-green shorts, his legs crossed, his red hi-tops standing out against the crowd. His old Avengers t-shirt was faded and his hair disheveled. Three hours later, I was going through my stuff and cleaning my room.
“Hey, Gwen” Tanner called. “It’s almost time for dinner. We have a guest”
I wondered who he could possibly invite over for dinner. It’s good to be prepared, so I did my makeup over again and got on some more suitable clothes than sweatpants and a t-shirt. I grabbed a pair of jeans, my black Converse, and a mint crochet shirt. In two minutes, I looked a lot better. I closed my door and locked it, then ran down the stairs to the dining room. Even before I was halfway down the stairs, I could hear Tanner laughing. I caught my breath and walked in.
“Ah… There you are Gwen” Tanner gestured for me to sit down next to him. “This is my new neighbor, Xander”
“Hello” Xander said.
“Hi” I smiled.
“Okay, dinner should be ready” Tanner walked into the kitchen.
“I’ve heard interesting things about you” Xander looked at me.
“Oh. I bet you’ve heard a lot of embarrassing stories. That is, of course, what my uncle Tanner lives for” I laughed.
“Actually, I’ve heard a lot of good things about you” Xander leaned forward.
“Really, like what?” I cocked an eyebrow.
“Like you got accepted into Harrow’s solely for your sixth grade science report on nuclear power and your story about Gaea” He leaned even closer.
“Wow. When I’m actually there, my uncle makes it seem like I’m the clumsiest, most awkward person ever, but when I’m not, he brags about me” I thought aloud.
Xander leaned in and kissed me. I pushed him back.
“Just so you know, that was for James” I smirked.
Just then Tanner walked in. “Sorry it took so long. Grilda accidently spilled some champagne. Dinner will be ready in about twenty minutes” He turned to me. “Sorry, you can go back to your room if you want”
“Thanks” I walked up the stairs to my room.
I had my room cleaned before dinner was ready, so I wandered around the house for a little while before I noticed that the door to the office was open. Unless she was instructed to, Grilda would never leave the office door open while visitors were here.
“Someone must have told her to leave it alone” I muttered to myself.
“Dinner is ready, Gwen” Tanner called from the dining room.
I would come back after dinner I thought to myself.
Halfway through dinner, Tanner sprung a weird question.
“Gwen, there’s this thing that I was invited to at your school, since I’m your legal guardian. Is it formal?”
“It depends” I said. “What is it?”
“A dance or something” he replied.
“If it’s a dance, it’s formal. If it’s a meet and greet thing then, it’s not formal” I answered after some thought.
“I think it’s both” he frowned.
“Then it’s formal” I tried not to laugh.
“So do I have to wear a tux, or just khakis and a button up shirt?” he asked.
“I’m not sure. I’ll email Headmistress Cathleen and ask her” I said.
“Is your headmistress old and grumpy like the one I went to school with?” He grinned.
“No. She’s pretty young. I think maybe a year younger than you. And she’s not grumpy” I glared at him.
“Okay! If looks could kill, I would probably be dead” Tanner held up his hands.
“If looks could kill, you would have been dead a long time ago” I laughed.
“True”
“I’ll find out” I smiled.
I totally forgot about the office for a few days. I remembered on my second to last day there. I walked into the office. It had papers stacked neatly on the desk and was perfectly organized. I leafed through the stacks of forms and financial records. I got to the locked file cabinets and had to go to the pantry to get the keys, but they were gone. I walked to Tanner’s rec room.
“Do you know where the keys to the office file cabinets are?” I asked.
“Um… I believe they’re in the office.” he said as if it was obvious.
“Oh… I thought that they were on the key ring.” I replied.
“No, why would your parents put them somewhere obvious?” he shook his head.
“The office was kind of obvious”
“The key ring was more obvious, so people would naturally look there. If it wasn’t there, they would determine that these people are smart, and not bother to look in the other obvious places”
It made sense, but I was still confused, so I walked back to the office, Tanner yelling at his TV show behind me.
I found the keys shortly after looking. I opened the cabinets. The first two were full of boring legal documents and bank statements. The second cabinet held a locked chest and an old book, bound in leather. I went to the pantry and found a really old key. Guessing it was the right one, I took it up to the office. The chest opened silently as I put the key in the lock. There was a letter from some random political figure.
The next item was a bank statement, except for a different account. It had weird things on it like two pounds of paracord, a water purifier, two Swiss Army knives, and a waterproof sleeping bag.
Then, there was a ship’s log. At first I was confused, but after going through the rest of the chest, I realised that my parents were always there when something strange happened. On the ship people started dropping dead, including the captain. No one left knew how to control the boat, and the murders kept happening. My parents solved it.
There was an old journal next. An American blogger was putting fear in the hearts of many through harmless conspiracy theories. It turned out to be a twelve year old kid. It also talks about a supposed runaway teen washing up on the shore of Lake Erie. They eventually discovered she had a microchip containing government secrets. It had several other cases and my parents cracked them all. But there was nothing related to Peru, as I had hoped.
I moved to the old book under the chest. It had notes on the Incan people, some scratchy, messy, others elegant, beautiful. I recognized it as my parents’ handwriting.
“So that’s why they were in Peru!” I muttered to myself.
I looked for more Incan notes, but they had probably taken the rest of their notes with them.
As I traced the sloping curves of my mother’s notes and the sharp turns of my father’s, I thought about what to say to Headmistress Cathleen when I emailed her. At the beginning of each school year, she gave us her email address, just as a way to contact her. I pulled a laptop out of the desk drawer, logged onto my email account, and typed a quick message.
my uncle had a ? is he allowed to be casually formal to the dance
Gwen
She must have been on her computer, because it didn’t take her long to reply.
Her: sure i don't care
Me: Thnks
I went down to the rec room, to tell Tanner her reply.
“Hey,” I said, entering the room. “Cathleen said you could be casually formal.”
“What does that even mean?” he didn’t look away from his tablet.
“You can wear khakis, an untucked button up shirt, and maybe your Converse” I replied.
“Can I roll up the sleeves?”
“Sure”
I left the next day, taking the ship’s log, the journal, and the notes with me.

Rayna
I walked into the cafeteria, and suddenly a hand pulled me back into the hallway. It was Ryder.
“Rayna, I need to ask you a question.” he said.
“Ask away”
“Why are you doing this to Gwen, Giselle, and Eboni?”
For the first time ever, I confided in my brother. “ They just seemed too perfect. They have perfect lives and perfect families.”
He laughed. “You really don’t know them at all, do you?”
“No, not really.”
“Eboni’s parents are health freaks, convinced that she’s allergic to dye. She can’t eat meat or milk or eggs. Giselle’s parents are completely overprotective. She can’t watch any PG-13 movies until both parents have seen them and approved. She doesn’t even have a phone.”
“That’s better than ours.” I said.
“It might be. But I promise you the next thing I say will make you want to punch yourself for ever doing anything to Gwen. Her parents were proclaimed legally dead in December”
“What?” I said, shocked.
“Please, promise me you’ll leave them alone.” he pleaded.
“I promise”
Gwen
I wasn’t sure what to do when I noticed Rayna was acting differently. She seemed… nicer. She smiled and laughed and told jokes at our lunch table. She didn’t glare at us or try to ruin our lives. She did bump into me once, but she helped me pick up my books and said sorry. I was surprised when she asked us to come to her choir concert.
“Um… Sure” I said.
I glanced uneasily at Giselle. She shrugged.
“I mean, I would ask Ryder to go, but he would probably embarrass me.” She grinned sheepishly.
Sincerely, I knew that I was glad she reached out to us. But she had been hostile for so long, I wasn’t sure if it was a good idea. Ryder said that she wouldn’t bother us anymore, but most of my brain didn’t believe him. But two nights later, we were sitting in the auditorium, waiting for the concert to start. When the choir got to L’dor Vador, Rayna came up to the front of the stage and waited until her solo. Her voice was amazing. After it was over, I noticed Vincent in the crowd. I smiled to myself. He had his sketch pad and was looking intently at the canvas.
I nudged Giselle. “Look.” I pointed in Vincent’s direction.
She giggled. “They would be so cute together, don’t you think?”
“Giselle, why do you obsess over other people’s relationships?”
“I guess it’s because mine is perfect, so I need to compensate for lack of drama.”
I rolled my eyes.
The next morning, we confronted Vincent in the hallway. I couldn’t believe Giselle had talked me into this. I had a feeling from the beginning that this was going to end disastrously, but Giselle insisted on it.
“Hi, Vincent. We need to talk to you.” Giselle grinned.
“Okay… Why?” He asked.
“It’s about Rayna.” Giselle giggled.
His eyes widened. “What?”
I winced. “We were the ones who told Rayna.”
“How did you find out?”
“Arber! Who else could have known?” piped Giselle.
He didn’t look surprised. “Okay, what is there to talk about?”
I took a deep breath. “Isn’t it a little creepy that you have a floor to ceiling portrait of her in your closet?”
He narrowed his eyes. “Arber showed you the closet?”
“Yes”
“Ugh!”
I raised my eyebrow. “Did you hire someone to paint it?”
He looked hurt. “No! I’m an artist”
“That makes it immensely less creepy.” Giselle smiled.
Rayna walked behind Vincent and saw us talking to him. Her eyes widened and she walked faster.
“So, are we done talking?” He looked at his watch. “I have Advanced Oil Painting in fifteen minutes and my locker is on the other side of the campus.”
“Yep. Sit by us at lunch though.” I replied.
“Yeah, sure” he walked away.
At lunch, Vincent finally talked to Rayna. They talked about their favorite movies, TV shows, and bands. Surprisingly, Rayna’s favorite TV show was Once Upon a Time, her favorite movie was Phantom of the Opera (the same as mine), and her favorite band wasn’t a band. It was Birdy. Vincent’s was Santigold. His favorite TV show was Doctor Who (the same as mine) and his favorite movie was Inkheart.
Flynn walked over to our table and whispered something in Giselle’s ear. She smiled and followed him into the hall.
Flynn walked back in about five minutes later, without Giselle. Eboni assured me that she was most likely okay. She came in a few minutes later. Her hair was now down and slightly wet. It covered most of her face but I caught a glimpse of red, puffy eyes that had been hurriedly concealed by foundation. A tear rolled down her cheek. Eboni and I were the only ones who noticed. Rayna and Vincent were engaged in a conversation about Coldplay, James and Liam were discussing Psych, and the other people at our lunch table were either making paper airplanes or eating. After lunch was over, I had to go to Band and Advanced Physics. But as soon as I had a free period, I found Giselle crying on our balcony. A guy in a leather jacket glanced up at us, concerned. He left after Giselle stopped crying.
“What happened?” I asked.
“Flynn broke up with me” She burst out in tears again.
“Am I going to have to punch a certain jerkface?”
She smiled weakly.
Eboni walked into the room. “Do you guys know where Liam is? I need to talk to him.”
“No” I said.
Giselle shook her head.
“Oh well…” she sighed. “What happened at lunch?”
“Flynn broke up with her.” I stated.
“What should I do?”
“Well… normally, I would say don’t give him the satisfaction of seeing you hurt, but…” I trailed off.
“If you do that, he’ll just be more convinced that he did the right thing.” Eboni finished.
“Exactly. The guilt will probably have a larger impact on him.” I smiled.
I could tell that Eboni was sincerely sad from the second she got an 78% on her Statistics test. Stats is her favorite class, but for the past week, she seemed distracted. At first, I thought it was just because Flynn dumped Giselle and Eboni was sad for her, but it would never interfere that much with her grades. Later, at our lunch table she told me why she was so sad.
“Liam has been avoiding me.” she frowned. “He keeps saying that he has to catch up on homework, but I saw him hanging out with Arber, right after he said he was going to study in the library.”
I told her all the usual stuff, it would be okay and all that.
But it wasn’t okay when he started to flirt with a girl named Scarlett in his “studying” time. And it would never be okay again when Eboni saw them kissing in the west wing.
She told us that she had been going to the conference room in the east wing for a student council meeting, when she heard Scarlett’s high soprano voice giggling and Liam’s deep voice laughing along with it. She peeked around the corner and there they were, kissing. Liam saw her over Scarlett’s shoulder and his eyes widened, but he didn’t stop to apologize. She was devastated.
Rayna and Vincent had gotten to know each other better and he finally got around to asking her out. The story we heard from Arber was that Rayna said no and walked off.
After all that drama, I figured all of us girls needed a night off. So I invited Eboni, Giselle, and Rayna to a night of eating pizza and ice cream, watching chick flicks, and gossiping. We had a lot of fun. We woke up at 8 am and could only remember going outside and me taking my phone out. I realized that I didn’t have it.
“It’s okay.” Giselle said. “You probably just left it outside.”
“Yeah… I think I remember leaving it on the bench that the sprinklers can’t reach.” I reasoned.
We got ready and went outside, but my phone was gone. We looked all over for it, but couldn’t find it. Later, James walked over to me and pulled me away from the others.
“I’ve been calling you all morning. We need to talk.” He looked concerned.
“Sorry, I lost my phone.” I grimaced.
“Okay, just find me when you have the time to talk.” he walked away.
I sighed and returned to the group’
“Guys, we need to figure out what we did with my phone last night. We’ll have to retrace our steps.” I stated.
“Okay,” Rayna agreed. “Let’s start with the dorm.”