Dead!

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Some things just don't turn out like they do in the movies. I know that I'll never spill my coffee on a cute boy at Starbucks and make him fall in love with me in an instant. Love just doesn't work like that. I'll never meet a wizard or battle dragons, because that's all fiction. Perhaps the greatest irony of all is that on the day of my death, everything seemed perfectly and completely ordinary.

I woke up to the sound of my cat Dash trying to climb up onto my bed a few minutes before my alarm went off. I reluctantly got out of bed just as Dash scampered away and my phone started playing "Wildest Dreams" by Taylor Swift to wake me up. I turned off the alarm and started getting ready for school.

My parents and my little sister Heather were already in the dining room by the time I got there. "Good morning Ivy," Mom said.

"Good morning Mom," I grumbled as I shoveled cereal into my mouth as quickly as possible.

"Hey Ivy, what's the capital of Portugal?" Heather asked me as she tried to finish a homework assignment that she had forgotten to do the night before.

I shrugged. "I don't know, Barcelona?" I said. I had honestly forgotten everything that I had learned in sixth grade.

"Okay," Heather said as she wrote that down.

I finished my breakfast and ran back upstairs. I took a shower and then threw on a sweatshirt, a pair of yoga pants, and a pair of sneakers. I threw my hair into a ponytail and got into my parents' minivan.

Yes, I know. I drove what was possibly the least cool car ever, but it was better than nothing. I backed out of the driveway and drove to my best friend Chloe's house.

Almost as soon as I pulled into her driveway, Chloe jumped into the passenger seat of the car and started babbling as she usually did. "Oh my gosh, you would not believe what happened last night!" she exclaimed.

"What happened?" I asked.

"You remember Brad, right?" she said as she adjusted the strap of her tank top. Chloe clearly didn't know how to dress for a November day in Iowa.

"Of course I remember him," I said. "You went out with him freshman year."

"Well, I talked to him yesterday," Chloe said. "He said that he wants to try out for varsity soccer next year. Thank goodness he's not friends with Anthony anymore."

I nodded. "Anthony's a loser," I said. That was one thing that everyone at Millard Fillmore High School could agree on. Anthony Wilson was at the far bottom of the popularity hierarchy, but there was a good reason for it. Nobody wanted to hang out with a kid who couldn't add until he was in fifth grade and once wore the same dumb outfit for a week straight.

"Yeah, he's so weird," Chloe said. "I saw him in that empty lot once. You know, where that apartment building burned down? He was just wandering around for no reason. It was so strange."

"I'm surprised that he hasn't dropped out yet," I said as I parked my car in the student lot. "He's probably old enough, and everyone wants him gone. He should just do it."

"So are you going to be at cheer practice tonight?" Chloe asked.

"Uhh...no," I said. "I have a paper to write for English." I really just wanted to get out of cheer practice. Even though Chloe was the captain, I didn't like cheer all that much. I would have quitted, but I liked the sort of status that it gave me.

"Aw, that's too bad," Chloe said as she got out of the car. "I guess I'll see you later then, Ivy."

"See you soon Chloe," I said, heading into Millard Fillmore High School. I had study hall first period, which was, of course, utterly useless. I didn't have anything to do, so I figured that I would get a pass to the library from Mrs. Bryant and go on Instagram on the school computers.

I did that, but when I got to the library, I didn't really see anyone I was friends with. I hadn't talked to Maya Jackson since elementary school, but there was a good reason for that. The short Hispanic girl had apparently turned into an emo, judging by her penchant for band T-shirts, black lipstick, and skinny jeans. She was sitting at one of the tables and had her headphones on. At the same table, there were two boys. I recognized one of them as Jack Snyder, who was mostly known for being a total geek. He was helping a boy with a funny accent study for a physics test. At the far back of the library, there was a boy with brown skin, straight black hair that fell into his face, and a hockey jersey playing a computer game.

I walked to the back and logged on to the computer next to the one that the boy was playing on. There wasn't anything interesting on my Instagram account, so I just messaged Chloe for a while.

That was when I heard a gunshot.

I turned around and frantically started looking for the librarian, but there weren't any adults in sight. A few minutes later, I heard Attention! Attention! This is a Code Red Emergency! over the PA system.

What were we supposed to do? There weren't any teachers in the room. As I looked around, I saw that everyone else was as clueless as I was. I shut off my computer, ran to turn off the lights and hid under one of the tables in the library. I would have locked the doors, but I had no idea where the keys were. Everyone else hid under the table with me.

"I'm scared," the boy with the weird accent whispered.

"It's going to be okay Henri," Jack said as he kissed the top of his head. "Homicide only makes up 13% of teen deaths."

"That's not reassuring at all!" Henri said.

"Hey, you're Ivy, right?" the boy who was playing on the computer whispered to me.

I nodded. "What's your name?" I asked.

"Raj," he replied. I looked over to Maya, who still had her headphones in. I clung to one of the legs of the table, even though I knew that it wouldn't save me if someone did come in here.

The door creaked open, and light from the hallway flooded into the library. Just my luck, I thought as Anthony Wilson stepped into the room, carrying a rifle. "Who's in here?!" he shouted as he waved the gun around. Jack clung to Henri, and I tightened my grip on the table leg.

All of a sudden, Anthony flipped the lights on. "Agh! My eyes!" Raj screamed, and Anthony lunged for him. Raj tried to run, but he didn't even make it out of the library before Anthony grabbed him by the neck, held the rifle up to his head, and fired.

The boy that I barely knew was dead.

The rest of us were too scared to move. Anthony ran to the back of the library and found the table that we were hiding under. He ripped the headphones from Maya's ears. He mumbled something incoherent before taking the gun and firing yet again. Maya screamed and then fell to the ground.

The girl whose soul was trapped in 2005 was dead.

Anthony then pointed his gun towards Jack, who was still clutching onto his boyfriend. He fired, and Jack collapsed into Henri's arms. Henri was killed only seconds later.

The nerd and the new kid were dead.

I knew that I was next. Anthony lunged for me and I barely even put up a fight as he aimed straight for my head. I heard him fire, and I felt nothing but pain, excruciating pain, as everything faded to black.

But that was when I woke up.

A/N: Hey! Thanks for reading the first chapter of Dead! I'm trying something a little different for this story, so I made a Spotify playlist that I'll add to throughout the story. It's a little bit of alternative classical punk pop, so check it out!

https://play.spotify.com/user/epichorn31/playlist/3VVOT1cvNvixP7IYp4ZaDV