Book of Praan: Volume 1

Chapter 8

"Hello, class," Mr. Avery, our vice principal, said monotonously. "Ms. Leeds is indisposed, so I will be substituting for her today."

My stomach flopped at the words, and the images of Leeds's body stuffed under her own bathroom sink floated across my mind. I stared down at my desk until my eyes went dry from the combination of drowsiness and not blinking. I tuned out whatever Avery was saying and focused on keeping the images away, although since it hadn't worked last night, I wasn't terribly optimistic it would work that morning.

I jumped when I felt someone lightly touch my arm. "Erica, hun," Danika whispered from beside me. "Everything okay?" Her brow creased into worry lines.

I smiled to make her feel better. "I'm fine," I said. "Just couldn't sleep last night." I left out the parts about waking up in cold sweats after dreaming about our dead teacher and the monster that took her place. "Up late studying for trig."

She wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Yuck. It's only been a few weeks and you already have exams?"

"Well, we have weekly quizzes, and I didn't do so hot on the last one."

Danika nodded her understanding. "Good luck, then!"

I gave her a small smile and went back to tuning everyone out. My mood didn't pick up during the day, either. Luckily, I managed to shrug it off with a simple "I'm tired" to anyone who asked. I considered going to lunch, if only to try and catch a short nap meanwhile, but I decided against it. Danika and the others would most likely want to be social, and Alexis was probably avoiding me. So, I wandered into the library and found a table in a corner so that I could put my head down.

At the end of the day, I went home in much the same funk I had gone to school in. I rushed through homework so that I could get to bed early in hopes of catching at least a few hours of sleep to make up for the previous night. I was so absorbed in my work that I didn't register Dad coming home.

"Hey, Erica," he said as he walked into the dining room.

I practically jumped out of my chair. "Jesus, Dad, you terrified me."

"Sorry," he said simply. He leaned down to kiss the top of my head. I didn't respond. I just went back to calculating trig functions. "How was school?" he asked experimentally.

He only opened with that when he was fishing for information. I knew that he probably figured something teenager-ish happened to give me an attitude. If I had felt more confident in my deceptive abilities at the moment, I would have attempted a sincere smile and a "Nothing much," but I knew the lie would fall flat, so I said nothing at all.

"Bad day?" he tried again. He leaned against the doorway connecting to the kitchen and folded his arms.

I sighed and dropped my pencil. "No. I just couldn't sleep last night, so I went the whole day feeling pretty drained."

He nodded. "What kept you up?"

I shrugged. "Bad dream."

"You know, it's funny. Susanna was just telling me that Alexis has been pretty moody today, too. You two didn't get into any trouble, did you?" He paused. "This doesn't have anything to do with that book, does it?"

I was so taken aback by Dad's sudden mention of the Book at all that I barely had time or energy to monitor my facial expression. "W-what? No, Dad, we gave that thing back ages ago, like you told us to."

He gave me a searching look for a moment longer before saying, "Good. Finish up your homework so you can go to bed." I nodded and did as told.

I was able to snag about three beautiful hours of sleep before the nightmares started. In one, I was reaching out to the antique shop owner as he sunk into the magic drain, only this time he latched onto me and dragged me along with him. In another, I was alone in Leeds's apartment. I couldn't stop myself from marching into the front bathroom and opening that dreaded cabinet. I saw the corpse as vividly as I had the day before, except this time it had maggots crawling out of its mouth and nose. I leapt back in shock and stared in horror. Then, its skeletal hand lurched out to grab at my throat. I screamed and covered my eyes, but nothing happened. When I opened them again, I was in a graveyard. There was a hole in the ground not five feet from where I stood. Morbid curiosity overcame me yet again, and I walked over to it to see what was inside. There lay a casket at the bottom. As soon as I leaned over the edge, the casket opened, slowly and deliberately. It revealed a shriveled corpse in much the same condition as Leeds's body, only this one was somehow still recognizable to me.