Clever Reflections

FIVE- Salem

I had been extremely careful with Cinna, making sure she was startled as little as humanly possible in our far-from-homely Tesela environment. She seemed extremely skittish, and I couldn't even begin to guess at why. She was capable, if a bit clumsy and her glasses made her eyes look so entrancing I doubt she'd run into any issues in asking for help or guidance. It made me angry. It made me protective, despite the fact that I possessed absolutely no right to be.

That said, she had obviously been terrified when she entered the Home Ec room, and with the odd way Ms. F kept her, she had every right to be estranged to the course. She'd been stony while Ms. F made the kids silent enough to speak to them, and though I tried to console her with the knowledge that in a few minutes we would be gone from this building, she looked... petrified.

When I asked Cinna to chop vegetables unsupervised, I wasn't thinking. She just kept glancing out the window while I went about my usually solo routine, and it freaked me out. I felt like a bad host. Give her something to do, Witchburner. Distractions. Busy work. I gave her the first task that came to mind. The newly sharpened, glinting knife may not have the best solution. But she seemed resolved as she nodded, steeled her face, and took the knife in a hand like a dead jellyfish.

I guided her through how to use it, and she learned quickly. Soon she was completely immersed in her greens and I finally looked away to the water that was fast boiling into steam. I thought I had the situation under control. I thought Cinna's apprehensions were nothing but a scared girl's nightmares.

And then, the fucking juvenile delinquents of Tesela Middle made their grand showing. I'd been expecting a performance all day, the JDs played truth-or-dare like fruit flies reproduce; constantly and in exponentially increasing intensity, and if one of them chose truth they were a wimp and were thusly punished. By this system, innocent bystanders, and especially new or peculiar students were randomly attacked according to the deliverer of the challenge's whim.

While Cinna was chopping and I was dealing with the soup, I let my guard down. I stopped hovering and they struck.

I had finished adding the flavouring and was turning to ask Cinna for the vegetables. There was a kid breathing down her neck. I began to yell out a warning, but was barely able to make a sound before the kid's fingers darted out and tazed her. Shit. Shit indeed. The voice in my head sounded gleeful.

In a flash, Cinna changed. And not in a reference to a period of time sort of way. As I watched, she crouched in on herself in a seemingly practiced way, somehow twirled the knife into a different position in her hand, and in one fluid motion, slashed his shoulder open. It was the most graceful thing I'd seen her do in the whole day that I'd been watching.

Okay that' pretty creepy, Witchburner. Admitting that you've been staring at a person for a whole day? You have reached new lows, my friend. A kid was wounded on the floor, and that is the first thought I had? I'd be seriously worried about myself if I hadn't been so concerned with Cinna, who, after dropping the knife and staring at the blood in shock, had started to bolt from the classroom, snatching her bag and nearly running into most of the chairs left randomly in the middle of the aisle.

Well? What are you waiting for? It's your fault she'd running, so go after her. Go!

I went.

For an asthmatic, dyslexic, ADHD myopiac, Cinna ran surprisingly fast. I lost her around the first bend and then just guessed, attempting to follow the sounds of her footsteps and breathing, like echolocation in reverse. I dashed as such in at least one loop, barely catching glimpses of a battered shoe or the tips of flowing, dark hair, until finally, breathless and clueless as to where to head next, I slowed, stopped and folded over, resting my hands on my knees. I blinked a few times, breathing raggedly, and heard a door clanging shut. My head jerked up, and I pushed myself onward, jogging past on more turn before seeing the door to the girls' bathroom bump shut in one last bounce.

I was across the hall from the bathrooms, which weren't the main ones, so the school hadn't thought it necessary to refurbish them since they'd been added sometime in the 1980s. The vandalism had spread even to the outside of the door and no matter how many coats of paint they slathered over the scratches and sharpie markings, I could still make out the offensive words.

If the Tesela administrators were murderers they'd get caught. You're helpful.

Really? I don't mean to be. I rolled my eyes, accepting if not trusting that the voice in my head was not my own. What are you waiting for, Witchburner?

The truth was, I wasn't sure. I was having doubts. I had established that I wasn't ordering myself around, so what basis did I have to follow whoever had infiltrated my thought's words? She'd run into the girls' restroom. What if Cinna just needed to pull herself together? What if I was just overreacting? Everything was probably fine.

Sure you want to go with that theory? I don't exactly have a more logical one. Let me break this down for you. You have a dude talking in your head, you trusted that dude enough to follow it this far. This far is chasing a strange girl whom you met this morning because she fucking. Stabbed. A. Kid. Something is about to happen in that bathroom and you are going to want t be there for it and you are having reservations because it's the little girls' room. Grow a pair, man. She's going to fucking need you, so once again: go. If you care about anything past yourself, fucking GO.

I felt like I'd been slapped. I was standing dumbly, my traitor thoughts screaming at me, with my jaw hanging somewhere near my knees. All at once, I startled into action, mouth snapping painfully shut, chest heaving, legs dashing for the heavily vandalized entryway.

I burst through the door just as a foreign, almost liquid light began to illuminate the small bathroom. I squinted, unable to see anything near the source of the light. A buzzing was beginning to fill my mind, drowning out all other possible sounds. Bracing myself, I squinted back into the light, and saw-or thought I saw-someone pulled forward, and another form coming the opposite way, as dancing falcons, trading positions on hairpin turns.

I saw Cinna, gripped in a blinding embrace, and the echoes of the words, "Take me" lingering in the singed air.

I didn't think.

I didn't stop and question my instincts as I had outside the room.

I didn't think.

I sealed my eyes and screamed like a donkey as I plunged headlong into the mirror. A wave of something overcame me and I was sensually overloaded as I tumbled into and out of and around some substance and plane that was well beyond the dreary repetition of what I knew as home.

Confusion overtook me as I spun and glided. I felt about five years old, debased to simplistic alleyways of thought. Cause to effect and nothing to trouble the in-between.

Hold on, Witchburner.

Rich. Comes from you, voice. You are not here. Why aren't you here?

I'm here.

You are not here. If you were here I would see you.

Your eyes are closed.

If I opened my eyes, would you be here?

I am here.

Are you sure?

Yes.

Do you promise?

I promise.

... Okay.

I drifted for a long time. I must have, because when I finally forced my lids up, they were crusted with dried tears and I was far from Tesela. My vision was still blurred and my hearing still impaired. In short, I was completely unreceptive to my surroundings. I had no idea of anything beyond my own body.

I closed my eyes again. Whatever horrors awaited, they could await for a few more minutes. I took a breath, thankful for the fact that at least that was possible. I flexed my fingers, my toes, my ankles and wrists. I tensed all of my muscles and relaxed. Tentatively, I let the floodgates of thought peek open.

My first thought was instinctual-for myself.

My second thought was ingrained-for Cinna.