“Are you in there?” sings a voice. “Come out, come out if you are. Come and play?”
I startle awake to panting and grinding against the wood. The small room I’m in is pitch black, so I know it’s in the middle of the night. I must have dozed off, but the chill down my spine has me wide awake, unable to move or draw air in properly.
Now is not the time to hold your breath, Bella.
“Want me to let you out?”
My lungs falter at that. I don’t want them to let me out. Whoever that is, I want them to go away. But I can’t move. My whole body is frozen solid.
“Who…,” I croak, clearing my throat. “…who is it?”
The guy on the other side of the door laughs. He sounds off his fucking cake. “It’s me, Carter,” he whispers. “Romain thought he was clever locking you in. Fuck him and his rules. I’ve come to let you out.”
Tension seeps out of me slightly, but not enough for me to let my guard down. He’s drunk or on something. He’s not himself.
“Carter, are you alone?” If he’s alone, maybe I can handle him. Hopefully, he’s too fucked to do anything but hump the door.
“Oh, we’re alone, baby.” There’s a sound of him moaning, and I think he’s licking the door at one point. Gross. Maybe I’m better off staying put? When I hear him trying to prise open the door with his bare hands. There’s the sound of wood smashing, splintering, tearing through whatever false security I had as he tries to punch his way through the door. I get to my feet, my heart doing a number in my chest, ready to run through him to get back to my rooms. Plastering myself against the back wall of the cupboard, I grab the broom handle.
“Fuck,” I hear him say. “I think I broke my hand,” he laughs.
And then, he’s gone.
I listen out for him for a while before I pass out again, clutching the handle of the broom like it could save me from the monsters in this school.
The caretaker doesn’t findme until the next morning. Thankfully, he hears me yelling inside the cupboards and fetches a crowbar to let me out. He also brings Helen.
“Ah, Miss James, I see the boys have taken a shine to you,” she grimaces.
Exhausted and anxious, like a deer caught in headlights, I stare at her.
“Are you okay?”
“I was just…” the words die on my lips as I see Helen’s face, mouth in a straight line, head cocked, waiting for my response.
“Yes, I’m fine. It was just a prank. They locked me in,” is all I can say. I attempt to straighten my clothes after an entire night on the dusty cupboard floor.
“Well, I can see that. You look positively worn-out and shell-shocked. Why don’t I walk you back to your room? You can tell me all about it on the way there,” Helen says. I give a slight nod. Getting interrogated by Helen is the last thing I want to do, but she is the deputy head and my superior. I let her lead me through the throng of students into the main building.
“Maybe take the day off?” She suggests as we get outside my minuscule apartment in Lower Halls, the entrance is opposite the junior common room.
“I have homeroom….”
“I’ll get Mr. Glover to cover you.”
I nod at her and then stare at the lock to my room. I don’t have a key. My bag was stolen yesterday before I was locked in the cupboard.
“My key is gone. My bag was…misplaced.”
“I’ll get one of the janitors to bring a spare until you find it.”
As usual, at this time, there’s no one around. Lower Halls is mostly empty, enough that I turn back and look Helen directly in the eye. “How do I stop this?”
“What? The hazing?”
“I would call it bullying, but yes.”
She sighs. “You don’t. Usually, it’s a new student who gets this kind of treatment. You must have rubbed someone the wrong way to have their spite aimed at you. This can’t just be because you reported the incident in the clinic. Is there anything else I should know?” Her eyes search mine, trying to find the answer inside them.