Horror Story: Academy

Chapter 2 - But Boys Don't Get Periods

Illinois, USA, 1983 --

Joseph Howe, "Red Hands," if you will, stepped out of the bathroom and raced down the hall, all traces of blood and murder gone from his hands. He barged into the school library and ran over to the librarian's desk.

"Can I help you with anything, Joseph?" she asked, concerned by his rushed, worried look.

"SCREW YOU," he yelled before grabbing a nearby, hardcover copy of The Catcher in the Rye off of her desk and without hesitating, slammed it into the side of the librarian's head.

She let out a disoriented wail as Joseph leaped over the desk and finished the murder in progress by choking the poor woman.

"You deserve death just for working here," he said, looking into her lifeless eyes.

Without another glance he got up, and sprinted out of the library to the next classroom. There he knew there'd be a teacher sitting alone.

* * * * * *

Illinois, USA, Present Day --

A relieved Lily stepped out of the academy doors and, almost frantically, began walking to one of Victoni Academy's yellow buses. She quickly studied the school emblem idolized on the large vehicle's side then continued in.

The bus reeked of fish and body odor, alerting Lily that a majority of the students on board were either up to no good or just didn't bathe regularly.

Even the bus driver added to the unpleasant experience. He wore a mask of what seemed to be hatred or disgust to Lily.

"Probably both," she thought to herself.

"Hey," she heard someone say from behind her. Lily ignored it along with the rest of the unreadable murmuring around her.

"Hey you," the same voice said.

Curious, Lily turned around to see an older boy looking straight at her.

"Can I help you?" she responded, realizing the voice had been directed towards her the entire time.

"Were you the one wearing a hat earlier?"

Lily felt her cheeks beginning to grow hot, "Yeah. Why?" she said, worried he'd also make fun of her for her choice of wearing a hat.

She watched as he moved to pick something up off the seat next to him. He turned back to her and tossed the object her way.

She caught the hat she'd thrown into the garbage earlier in her hand.

"Wait," she said as the boy began to turn away again.

"Yeah?"

"Where'd you get this?" she said, now concerned.

"It was under the seat," he said calmly, confused by Lily's strange behavior.

"Oh," she said, "Okay."

He gave a slight nod and went on with whatever he'd been doing.

Lily stared down at the hat now in her hands again for the entire four minutes it took to finally arrive at the driveway of her house.

She left the bus carrying the hat in her hand, unnerved by the fact that someone had obviously removed it from the trash. She decided to brush the thoughts out of her brain and continued with the rest of her night.

Dinner was the same awkward misery it had been lately, Lily's parents tried to get the details of her day from her, as though they cared, then talked about money and other things Lily hadn't cared to listen to.

After prepping for bed Lily wasted no time to get into her favorite place where she could be alone. She took the phone from her night stand and began to rapidly tap until she was staring at the Instagram news feed screen. A notification icon popped up to alert Lily she had a new follower.

As normal, she pressed the button to navigate her way to the notifications page where a bar reported to her that a user named lily_love_lily had followed her profile.

"That's funny," she thought before clicking the name to view the user's profile. She was greeted by someone who had been following one user and had zero followers.

"That's weird," Lily thought, as she processed the fact that the username had Lily in it and the only person they'd seemed to interact with at all on the app had been her, Lily Fogg.

A strange coincidence.

Lily scrolled down to see the user's single post. She clicked on the grey square and waited for the photograph to load. Once it did she immediately felt a shiver crawl down her spine. After reloading the image and taking a long blink before doing a double-take on the digital picture before her she realized this was what she had already thought it was.

It was a picture of the hat Lily had worn to school, thrown away, then been reunited with later on the bus. The caption below read, "Love this hat. Why would someone throw it out? :)"

Upon reading the beyond creepy text under the simple yet beyond creepy photo, Lily decided she'd had enough internet for one night, and people on top of that. In only a few seconds she had turned off her phone, and gone to bed, trying not to think about her hat.

* * * * * *

Lily exited Mr. Allan's social issues class room and continued down the hallway.

In math she talked to no one.

In science she barely made eye contact with anyone.

In english she didn't say a word unless prompted.

Then came lunch where she sat alone until a girl with black hair and dark eye make up appeared and sat down across from her.

Lily looked up and gave a quick grin in response to the girl's big smile and wide eyes.

"Hi," she began, "Jada," she ended, stating what Lily assumed to be her name.

"Lily," she responded.

"You wore the hat yesterday right?" Jada asked.

Alerted, thinking of the Instagram mishap of yesterday, Lily began to speak, "Yes. Why?"

"It was really cute," Jada answered, not sounding malicious or suspicious in any manner, "same with what you have on today."

"Oh," Lily said, "Thanks."

After conversing in small talk with Jada the rest of the lunch period, Lily felt and hoped that she had made a friend.

Feeling her bladder in distress, Lily decided she'd take a quick bathroom break before her next class. The hall was unusually quiet, lights from the ceiling reflecting onto the tiled floor below.

As she neared the bathroom, Lily noticed how clean the floors seemed in the downstairs hallways in a dull way. White, white, white. Endless white tiles. White, white, red.

"Red?" Lily thought examining the contrast in color. Blood. Without a doubt Lily knew the liquid trailing the floor was blood. She followed the path to the outside of the restroom. Like someone had sprung a leak while heading to go pee.

"Looks like someone had a surprise period," she thought before looking up to see the sign hanging next to the restroom.

The trail of blood lead into the boy's restroom, not the girl's.

A loud thump erupted from within the bathroom in front of her. Startled, she stared in but couldn't see past the privacy wall.

"But boys don't get periods..." Lily said to herself as she hesitantly began following the scarlet trail into the men's restroom.

Author's Note

Sorry for the long hiatus and the crappy second chapter. I just wanted to say that although the audience currently isn't very big I'll still be updating with a new chapter every week for at least the rest of July and August. (I LOVE feedback by the way.)

See you soon!