How to Save Your School From Soul Stealing Demons

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Renny slumps against Watts, who pulls her into a hug against his unharmed side. Ambrose lets his eyes fall shut. 

It's really over this time.

"Everyone's okay?" I ask, watching as they nod. Okay, but all clearly exhausted. 

My own body feels like lead, heavy with fatigue and devastation. My insides burn from the smoke; I'm still soaking wet and drenched in a fresh layer of sweat to top it off. The gym is like an oven. But I can hardly feel any of it.

I know I should be relieved. I should be celebrating and letting out a sigh of relief, letting go of every burden from the past two months. But I can't, not when Hemani is lying dead behind us.

I can't stop myself from turning to look at her body again. Why couldn't there have been another way? Why did Kayla have to give the necklace away, why to Hemani?

"We have to get out of here," Ambrose reasons.

I glance over to Kayla's body, but the space where she once laid is now empty. Just like Bernadette, she's gone. But Hemani remains, and will probably be a presumed victim of the fire.

Just as I'm thinking that we can't leave her in here to burn, that it wouldn't be right, I notice something. I think I imagine it at first, but no—she's moving. Hope shoots through me as I watch her stir, but it's plagued with a dose of disgusted fear. It can't be Joan. It can't.

Hemani's hand rises to move the long sheet of hair from her face, and I can tell from her expression that she's clearly out of it. It takes her a second to take in her burning surroundings, and then she's wide-eyed, scrambling to sit up.

"Hemani!" I hurry over to her, crouching down to help her.

She looks over my face, down at her vomit-covered dress, then around the gym again. "Diego? What's going on?"

The other three come up behind me, kneeling to our level.

"It could be Joan," Renny says, earning a look of pure what-the-hell-are-you-talking-about from Hemani.

"I don't think so," Watts replies, fascination coating his words. "I think... I think the prophecy was literal. The destined host will die. Those were Sara's words."

"And Hemani..." Ambrose trails off, shaking his head with a soft smile. "Wasn't the destined host."

My face breaks into a grin. And finally, the success washes over me. We're free. Free of Bozzanath, free of Joan. And Hemani is alive, and free of it now too—even if she never knew she was dealing with it in the first place.

Hemani takes my offered hands, letting me help to pull her up. "The... what?"

"You fainted because of the fire," Watts says, ignoring her question as we hurry for the exit—well, as fast as four injured people and one extremely lethargic person can hurry. I'm supporting Hemani on one side, Watts on the other. And Watts is helping Renny, who's also getting support from Ambrose. I imagine we look like one long, beaten-up chain. "Your head's probably a little fuzzy. What's the last thing you remember?"

She rubs her forehead. "I... remember leaving the gym."

Which means it was Joan in control from the moment she came back.

Watts nods. "When Diego didn't come out, you got worried. So you came back to look for him, but I guess the smoke really got to you."

It doesn't make much sense—most likely she would have told a staff member to come look for me, and there's no way anyone would have let her waltz back into the gym without whatever Joan did to make it possible.

But I guess Hemani really is still fuzzy, because all she does is give a slow nod and an, "Oh. That... makes sense."

We make it to the double doors just as the netting falls onto the floor behind us with a loud thud. Fire billows out around it, and with one final look around the gym, I can tell Vanterbest's west wing probably isn't going to survive this. The damage is already eating through the walls, spreading faster than I knew was possible.

And you know what? It's probably for the best. I hope Joel Vanterbest High has to be rebuilt and renamed, and that the grotesque history of the place is lost forever.

We head outside, and my lungs rejoice as we step into the fresh air. Sirens cry out in the distance, and as we head for the distant crowd of students and staff the metal door falls shut with a satisfying bang of finality.

It's over. It's really over. No more death, no more demons. Just me, the friends holding me up, and the endless possibilities of who I want to be now that I'm letting myself decide.

I turn to Watts, watching the orange flames reflect in his glasses, rising from the building and painting the night with a warm glow. "You know what?"

He raises his eyebrows and gives me an easy smile that's hardly hindered by his tiredness. "What?"

I return the smile, looking over our group and thinking about everything that brought us together. Everything that led up to this moment, this feeling of infinite potential. "I think I might have an idea for my first comic."

THE END! 😈💜

If you're reading this, let me say a huge thank you for reading all the way to the end of this story!! I hope you guys enjoyed it as much as I did! :') ❤

This was my first ever horror story, and the first time I've ever written any type of mystery-- I'm very much a beginner, so I hope that the way everything wrapped up was satisfying! I changed the finale so many times during planning but this was the one I finally felt happy with 😆 

(also I know some of you were probably expecting one of the gang to die, but I could NOT bring myself to do that LOL. I toyed with the idea but I just couldn't. Maybe I'm not cut out for this genre after all-- I like happy endings too much 😅)

again, thank you so much for reading!! I hope to see you in my next one! ;D