Gargoyle Saga: In The Beginning

Chapter Eight

I closed the door and sighed with relief. It wasn't as bad as I thought, but then again this upcoming fieldtrip was starting to worry me and then when that was over and done with, the classes would worry me and then grades and... I found myself outside of the office door about to knock but I was frozen. I could feel it bubbling from inside, spreading through my body with hot pinpricks. It was a familiar feeling, one which only occurred when I worked myself up too much, one which happened when I over thought things. I was about to have a panic attack. I dropped the folder, clutching my head and exhaled deeply and loudly. My vision swam and I suddenly discovered I forgot how to breathe. "Calm down, please calm down!" I told myself over and over again.

I heard a door open. "Verity?" My eyes focused on the headmaster whose concerned face made it worse. "What's happened? Are you alright?"

"No, I'm fine," I lied and waving him away went down the hallway and sat on the floor. Footsteps approached me and I found him kneeling in front of me.

"Do you need some help?"

"No please don't. Just leave me be."

I stood up and flapped cool air on my face. "Calm down," I told myself, closing my eyes and pretending that I was at home where everything, though not perfect, was better than believing I was in a strange new school where people grew horns, wings and tails. "Please, please calm down!" I thought I had a handle on this. These damned attacks happened several years ago when I got mercilessly bullied at school. The thought of having going to school to meet those girls who mentally tortured me scared me so much I failed to go to school. My parents didn't understand how could they? "You'll kiss and make up," is what they said, but those girls would have rather give me the kiss of death. Spiteful, mean spirited, they made me hate myself. But that fear of intense rejection I carried with me wherever I went and it was with me now, drowning me, pulling me into despair.

"Verity, tell me what's going on." My vision swam and I saw two of him bending over me, his eyes worried, searching for some reason on what was wrong with me.

"Panic attack," I said and walked away from him. I felt so embarrassed. I was acting stupid, but my body was having a major freak out and there was nothing I could do to calm myself down. I didn't have a sentence to make it better, nothing to stem the adrenalin that abnormally pumped through my body making me want to run away screaming like a demented person.

Steady, firm hands suddenly took hold of my shoulders. "Verity, sit back on the floor and take deep breaths," he told me. I opened my eyes again and saw him standing a few metres from me. "Let me help."

I found myself shaking my head a little too vigorously. "No, really I'll be fine. I um-" pressing my hands against my head feeling my heartbeat thump loudly within my skull, I focused on a small detail. "Room 4 wasn't it?" Collecting the paperwork the headmaster had given me to take next door; I pushed through the feelings and knocked on the door.

Mrs Hatchett saw me approach her, she didn't bother getting up. "Oh so you finally have the folder."

"Yes." I slammed it on the desk. "Have a great day." I met the headmaster in the hallway; he stood there his face pale with worry.

"Verity," he reached out but I backed away.

"No, really sir, I'm fine. I'm so sorry; I don't want to trouble you. I'm just being silly. Thank you." Power walking down the two flights of stairs, I turned right and came face to face with the first year dormitories and counted the fourth door on the right. Testing the door handle it was unlocked and entering, shut it behind me and slid down the door trying to catch my breath.

After several minutes of remembering how to breathe properly, my heart rate became normal and I had stopped shaking. I hung my head and wiped a coat of sweat from my forehead. "Stupid bint!" I chastised myself. It had been over a week since my last attack and though I tried not to remember the trigger for it, I remember Rosie being with me rubbing my back and comforting me. I wasn't overly prone to having panic attacks, they cropped up now and again, usually triggered by something stupid and I'd have to find another trigger to pull myself out of one. Though, I didn't have anything this time round.

"God damn." I stood up and finally took the time to look around the room. First off, I was glad I was alone. I didn't want anyone seeing me in the state I was in. And I made a mental note to apologise to headmaster Sorren next time I saw him. Secondly, I counted five single beds. Four were already taken, two on one side, two on the other and one in the middle under a large floor to ceiling bay window. My bed, as I guessed when I saw several clean folded clothes on top, was on the right-hand side closest to the door. My suitcase was stood upright at the foot of the bed. I laid it down and began to unpack. I was lucky to have a decent sized wardrobe and managed to fit in all of my clothes and shoes and uniform, with room to spare. Checking my watch, I had officially been at the academy for a little over an hour and in that time I had managed to meet the headmaster, unpack my suitcase, discover I may have a tail, horns or wings within the next three years and have a panic attack.

"Wow. Mental case." Lying back on my new bed I stared at the high ceiling. "I kinda feel sorry for these girls I'm staying here with. They are going to totally hate me for being such a weirdo." I suddenly heard Rosie's voice in my head saying, 'Stop acting like a freak and just be you.' I was condemning myself without giving myself a chance.

Feeling very bored I decided to do something nerdy and find these books to read from the library. Taking the list and my key, I went out into the hallway. To the left was the main staircase. To the right were the other girl's rooms and the toilet block. My footsteps were muffled on the carpeted flagstones and began to descend the stairs to the ground floor.

It was strange that there wasn't a lot of commotion around the building for was big enough to play hide and seek for days, but where were the first years? If timing was topsy-turvy surely everyone should be in bed asleep? But if they aren't in their beds then where could they be? "Stop over thinking things!" I hissed at myself. "God I'll end up in a loony bin like my father says. Talking to yourself and arguing with yourself, sure fire way to a bouncy white room."

The library entrance was directly in front of me; a high arch that was decorated in tendrils of real ivy that seemed to have no roots. Pushing the heavy doors of the library, they squeaked loudly and instantly I got a "Shhh" from someone nearby. A lady in a long red top and black pencil skirt poked her head around a shelf of books. She peered over milk-bottle shaped glasses and frowned. "Are you new?" she whispered. Nodding in reply, she then pointed to the list I held in my hands. "Pass it please."

Moving around a set of chintz chairs, I handed over the list and without a word, she walked off. "Do I-"

"Shush!" she hissed from somewhere within the stacks. I waited and looked around the library. It was elegant in a sophisticated old-worldly way. Wood panelling covered practically every inch of the walls and ceiling, which I now believed was a prominent feature throughout the academy and large chandeliers hung down from the wooden arches within the room. Counting out of boredom, there were fifteen stacks on the left-hand side of the library and five on either side of the aisle that ran right through it. On the right-hand side, where the librarian vanished behind, where a further four stacks and beyond that, I peered around and saw a set of beech study desks.

"Here," the librarian whispered approaching me. "There are five books on this list. Once you've finished them, come back and I'll lend you the others when they've returned from their recent owners."

She passed them to me and I caught a glimpse of a title of one of the books, it read, 'Who Owns the Gardens? Elves, Fairies, Gnomes and other Fair Nature Folk.'

"Um, I have a question."

She pursed her lips and stood up straight. "Of course you do." She pointed to a desk that was barely visible from the amount of books stacked on it. "What's your name?"

"Er, Verity Hobbs. The headmaster said that these books were on loan from Area 51."

"Yes, that's right." She finished scribbling something then looked up at me, expectantly. "What's your question?"

"Well, I just wanted to know if the headmaster wasn't er fibbing. I mean Area 51 is about aliens, isn't it?"

Her right eyebrow rose up and she cracked a small smile. "First years are always entertaining. Just read the books. I'm sure there is one about recent magical history. You'll find there was an incidence about a Pegasus which relates to Area 51. Have a good day."

"Oh um, okay, thanks."I left the library, hearing the doors squeak close behind me and felt nervousagain. "Don't panic, just read the books." I ordered myself, and headed back tomy room.