Whisper

Chapter I

Dani pushed open the door and stepped out into the cool night air. She was glad classes were done for the day, and that she could go home and relax. But there was something on her mind, something she couldn't stop thinking about. She was assigned a project in her creative writing class and had agreed to meet her partner the next day at the library at seven in the evening. Her partner was very keen on being the storyteller for this project, and Dani was happy to just play reporter but the girl had seemed almost too eager. It was their final project of the year, and she wanted to get a good grade on it. The students were supposed to write a story detailing a character's life, and the minimum word count was ten thousand. She hoped her partner had a good story to tell, or they wouldn't get a passing grade on the project.

Dani looked both ways as she crossed the street to the covered bus stop. As she turned to face the street, she thought she saw her partner standing where she had just come from. She blinked her eyes and the vision was gone, but something about it stuck with her as she boarded her bus. It was a long ride home, so she settled back into the seat and pulled out a book.

She loved how a good book could make time fly, and she waved at the bus driver as she stepped onto the street. Her apartment was on the third floor of a building in a bad neighborhood, but it was affordable on her housing allowance and was comfortable. She was thankful that the building had a buzzer and a code for the residents, so random people couldn't just enter the building. She entered the building and punched in her code, waiting for the metal cage to buzz open. Once inside, she pulled her keys out and went to check her mail - nothing, of course. After locking the box up, she turned to the elevator but noticed that it had an 'Out of Order' sign taped to it. She sighed deeply.

The walk up the stairs wasn't too bad, but she definitely couldn't wait for the elevator to be fixed. She unlocked her door and stepped into her small studio apartment. It was home. Posters of horror movies and metal bands plastered the walls, books lay in heaps on the floor and coffee table. She wasn't a slob, but she wasn't the tidiest person ever. She closed and locked the door, including the chain lock, then put her book bag on the counter. She was hungry - the only food she had was cereal and ramen. She pulled a pot out of the cupboard and started to boil some water.

As she cooked, she considered the project and what she had already learned about the character her partner had chosen to play. She was an original character, which made the project a bit more interesting as she wouldn't already know something about them. The character was a vampire - yawn, that's been done before - but her partner assured her this character was unique.

She placed the ramen noodles in the water and waited three minutes - once the time was up, she pulled it off the stove and drained some of the excess water. She added the flavor mix and stirred until it was a delicious brown broth. She took the food to the couch and set it down on the table as she sat back and waited for it to cool down. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a flash of red from outside her window, but when she looked there was nothing there. With a sense of urgency, she went to the window and opened it to peek out. No one was on the fire escape–she was completely alone. She went back to the couch and began to eat her still scalding hot food. She just wanted to crawl into bed and be done with the day.

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The sun was well beneath the horizon when Dani arrived at the library. She went up to the front desk and waited for the man behind the counter to look up. When he did he seemed rather unamused.