Started With a Lie

Chapter Eighteen

Started With a Lie – Chapter Eighteen

Silence.

            I find that pretty rare for such a crowded hallway, but it is. Everyone is dead silent and they’re all staring at me. The speakers are quiet, turned off after calling my name. It’s like everyone has been expecting me to get in trouble. And now it’s finally happened.

            “Get into class!” one of the cranky elderly teachers yells, wondering what the commotion is in the hallway. “Detention for anyone who’s still lingering around in thirty seconds!”

            That’s all that’s needed for everyone to resume what he or she was doing before. It was like I had hit play on my remote control for a movie—my own movie. The hallway quickly went back to shouts and hollers as people shoved everyone—like a bloody world war—to move. I get shoved and I almost stumble to the ground.

            And then I remember the office is on the opposite wing. As nervous as I am about my calling to the office, trying to go backwards into the moving crowd of high school students is just the same as trying to walk back up a waterfall.

            I groan. Today is not my day.

           After I somehow survive making it through all the corridors, I take a deep breath when I stand in front of the door that reads Principal Appleton. Suddenly the door seems to be so dark and towering. Knowing I can’t just stand out here much longer, I slowly twist the doorknob and open the door. Principal Appleton sits in all his old-man-deceiving-act and I sit before him.

           “Um, you wanted to see me, Mr. Appleton?” I squeak. This is all so nerve-wracking. What have I done in the past weeks? I don’t think I broke any rules—well, I might of punched Peter, but I doubt anyone would rat on me.

           Principal Appleton pushes his glasses, which are falling off of his almost non-existent nose, and then folds his hands in front of him. “This is very hard for me to do—”

            “Am I in trouble? I swear, I didn’t mean to punch him that hard.”

           “No, you’re not—punch who?” he asks, speculating me. His wrinkled forehead creases, getting my attention on his completely white-as-snow hair and beard. He could be mistaken for Santa Claus, I swear.

              “Oh, never mind,” I say, taking that he doesn’t know about the whole Peter incident yet. I put on a small smile. “Why was I called here, Mr. Appleton?”

             Mr. Appleton frowns—what a surprise. He squeezes his hands tighter and his face becomes blank. And then I think, Shit shit shit. Am I going to get suspended? “It’s really hard for me to say this considering you’re a good kid and all,” he starts, “but there’s been an accident.”

        “An accident?” I repeat. And then my mind just swirls. An accident. It’s like when Dad died all over again. Please don’t let it be Mom. Please. I repeat this mantra over and over and over. “W-Who?”

*            *               *           *              *               *           *

            Immediately, I rush to the hospital. I park my car in the parking lot as fast as I can even though my car is completely diagonally parked against the cars around it but I don’t care. The police could give me a fucking parking ticket and I wouldn’t care. Not now.

             Not when my mother was in the ER.

            The automatic doors slide open and I rush through to the desk. There is a redheaded nurse there, typing away on her computer. I don’t hesitate when I ask, “Where is my mother?”