Wretched Power | 𝐃𝐄𝐀𝐃 𝐏𝐎𝐄𝐓𝐒 𝐒𝐎𝐂𝐈𝐄𝐓𝐘 (BOOK ONE)

| CHAPTER TWO |

Maybe this really was Hellton. 

     Lana's mind had been too loud for her to notice that her brothers were searching for her belongings in the entrance hall of the dormitories while she stood idly in the doorway, many other students pushing past and searching for their things. There was confusion among students, typewriters, pillows, and record players. At the head of the hall, a school porter stood while watching a pile of unclaimed luggage. 

     As soon as a brother had grabbed her suitcase, and another grabbed her brown leather satchel, they escorted her up the stairs and to the dormitory they had discussed with Mr. Nolan. It was down a narrow walkway offside to the hallway and aisle of dormitories. Clark pushed open the door and Lana's brothers walked in, placing her things on her bed. It was no bigger than an apartment complex storage unit. Inside was a single bed, a desk, and a closet, but the room could barely fit all of it. 

     A boy, chubbier than the average boy in the school, with dark brown hair and a large nose, stuck his head in the doorway of Lana's dorm room if you could even call it that. "Hey stitches," he spoke, his voice full of humour.  He chuckled before he ducked out and ran down the hallway as Clark walked toward the door and closed it. 

      "That's George Hopkins -- Tony's brother. Don't listen to him, Lana." Tony Hopkins had been two years below her brothers when they attended Welton, quite a troublemaker if Lana remembers correctly from her brother's letters. His brother probably wouldn't be too different. 

     "Right. That's you all set up." Lana stayed silent as she watched Bernard meet with Clark and they each kissed her on the head before they stepped out of her room. "Behave yourself, okay?" 

     Not being able to think of anything else to say, Lana nodded, and her brothers left. She decided not to beg them to take her home again, instead, she accepted her place at Hellton. 

     She glanced around her dorm room,  thankfully, she had a window opposite her door, so she could have some natural light shine in while she was trying to study. The window didn't look like it opened, though, the frame seemed so eroded and rotten that it was probably glued shut so no rain could fall through the cracks and holes. The ceiling was slightly damp, dark cream-coloured patches scattered across it. The floor looked poorly swept, it was like it was polished with dust. Ashy. And the bedframe had white spots from where the black paint had chipped. Cobwebs gathered in the closet, and three loose hangers swung as she opened the rattling door. The drawers of the desk were stiff to open, and there were coffee stains on the surface. 

     "Home sweet home." She spoke through the thick smog of dust in her room. Now she did wish that she had begged her brothers to take her back home one more time. Maybe they would have given in this time. She doubted it. They were both stubborn. 

     She distracted herself and began unpacking her belongings from her suitcase, focusing on the task at hand so she wouldn't cry. She could hear the laughter of the boys as they settled into their new home as she unpacked, and she wondered if she should wander and introduce herself. Get the hard part over with. 

     Needing a break from the suffocation of dust, she stepped out of her room, closing the door behind her, made her way down the narrow hallway, and turned the corner to find a battlefield of boys, running down the hallway and down the stairs to retrieve a bag they had forgotten, and a thousand hands greeting each other as their names spewed from their lips. Instantly, Lana became overwhelmed and regretted yet another decision she had made today. 

     Carefully walking down the cluttered hallway and stepping over some suitcases, Lana was mindful of where she was stepping and captured glances of the dorms. They were all laid out the same, a bed pushed up against a wall, a desk at the foot of the bed, and then the closet between the wall and the desk, symmetrical on the other side. They have roommates?  Lana didn't get a roommate. That she could find understandable, though. A pre-hormonal teenage boy sharing a room with her just wouldn't have cut it past health and safety.