Kaetlyn
“The world is not made dangerous by those who do evil, but by those who look on and do nothing.” That is what Albert Einstein said, and the phrase comes to mind when I think of that day at the elementary school in Vancouver, Washington.
My name is Kaetlyn Marie-Grace, and I used to be a teacher’s assistant there. I am 14 years old, with golden-blond hair that falls to my waist and blue eyes that sparkle. I turn heads when I walk through the halls of P. Elmer High School, so I decided to take school on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and take a job as a teacher’s assistant (TA) at Smiles Elementary School on Thursday and Friday.
I remember that day. I was wearing a deep blue shirt and jeans, and had my hair pulled into a braid. When I walked into the office of Smiles, the office assistants seemed a little off…
“Why, hello, Mrs. Reef.” I told the woman at the front counter. It was only 8:00 am, and I was already feeling tired.
“Hello, Kaetlyn. The office pass is below the counter in that cabinet.” She said, taking a brief break from typing to point at the first cabinet on the left.
I felt confused. “Mrs. Reef, you know that I have a TA pass in my purse.” I pulled out the laminated sheet of yellow paper to show her.
Mrs. Reef frowned and clicked on a file on her computer. “It says here you need to fill out a new application to be a TA if you want to stay one.”
“I filled one out at the beginning of the year!” I said. Another glance at my watch. 8:05. Ms. Em would be wondering where I was.
“I’m sorry; it seems we never got that updated. Go on up.” She went back to her typing.
I went over to the door and grabbed the handle. Though I pulled back and down on the handle, there was no click, and the door did not open. “Could you please unlock the door?” I asked Mrs. Reef.
“Oh, yes. I forgot. Here.” She pressed a button, and the door swung open, almost hitting my in the face.
I rushed through the door and up the stairs. I walked into room 209, but there was a man sitting at Ms. Em’s desk. He looked up and said, “Oh, you must be Kaetlyn. My name is Mr. Yon, and I’m the substitute for Ms. Em today.” He smiled and pointed to a pile of papers. “She needs those copied, 24, and stapled.”
He went back to what he was doing, and I picked up the papers.
“The Study of Lycanthropy, by Erin Schnitzel.” I read off of the top page. “Would Ms. Em approve of this?”
He looked up again and smirked. “In her notes she just said, ‘do anything you feel is appropriate.’”
I decided not to anger yet another substitute, so I went down to the Teacher’s Lounge. There used to be a TA Lounge, but someone (an annoying boy), filled it with his old socks and it had to be walled up.
As I walked in I saw another TA, named Elisa, trying to use the copier.
“Kaetlyn, can you help me?” She asked.
“What’s the problem this time?” I asked, barely suppressing a sigh. Almost every time I come down to copy something, Elisa is always down here, and she always has forgotten something.
“Well, how do I enter the number of copies I want?”
I sighed loudly this time, and point to a mini-screen with two arrows by it in the middle of the copier. She smiles and says thanks. Elisa adjusts the number to 100 and hits the large green button that says “COPY”.
She grabbed the copies and left the room. I set the packet on the copier and enter the number 24. In a matter of seconds, it was spitting out copies. All of the sudden, it jammed.
As I looked around the room for something to un-jam the copier, my eyes skim over the back wall and seem to catch on a picture. I walked closer to get a better look, and all of the sudden I realized what it was a painting of.
Long, brown fur with a touch of shagginess. A feral glint in its eye, and a violent gleam on the dripping fangs. This was no tame dog or wolf. This was a member of the lycanthropes. A werewolf.
I reached up to touch the textured deep brown fur, and, to my surprise, it felt like real fur. Maybe the artist attached fur to the painting? I wondered. Nah. All of the sudden, while I was marveling at how life like the painting was, my finger was suddenly drawn to the werewolf’s eye.
My finger rested on the eye for but a moment, but then the werewolf moved. I was so startled, I almost fell over backwards. A poem briefly flickered through my mind that I had written the previous week.
Werewolf moves,
Werewolf smiles.
Though the moon is not yet out,
The boy is still dangerous.
When the moon breaks through the clouds,
Wolf emerges.
Silver fangs
And evil eyes.
Stops at nothing ‘til it dies.
Bad idea to write a poem about werewolves. My best friend accused me of insulting Twilight. Who needs best friends, anyways?
I was jerked out of my thoughts by a slight snarl. At first I thought the copier had started back up, but when I looked over at the copier, the error message was still flashing.
Slowly, I looked up at the picture. Blank.
A loud growl came from behind me. I turned around and saw a life-sized werewolf.
