The Touch

Chapter 10 - Saving Melissa

I walk through after swiping my wrist again at the platform and then climb up the stairs to the top of the road. As predicted it is windy and there is an onset of rain coming. The clouds over head are dark and ominous and people are scurrying in every direction looking for shelter and checking their bags for umbrellas.

Taking Lincoln Street onto Broadway lane and turn the corner toward Kensington Gardens. The school is only a couple of blocks away now and as I get closer I feel the heat start to warm in my hands. It seemed the closer I get to areas where there is someone with the Touch that my hands act like some kind of beacon. The warmth was always the first sign, then tingling in my hands and wrists and sometimes it is a sensation that feels almost painful. It is like an urge, a need, to find that person immediately before my hands fill with flames. Well that is what it felt like to me anyway.

As I am nearing the corner towards the school the hair on the back of my neck starts to tingle and I swing around anticipating to find someone behind me. There was no one there.

I look at the cars parked by the side of the road, but can't see anything that would lead me to believe that I was being followed, although I felt that I was. There were only a few people in the street, a woman pushing a pram, an elderly man walking with a cane and a middle aged woman walking her small dog. I could feel that none of them had the Touch and they obviously weren't Watchers either. The feeling made my heart race a little but I couldn't work out where it was coming from. I decided to put it behind me and walk on. I had a task at hand and that had to be forefront in my mind. But the feeling remained all the way to the school and I couldn't deny it, I was being followed.

The school was very old looking with large white columns leading up to a dark grey building. Even the sign to the school looked original and I could tell this had probably been a school for well over a hundred years or so. No matter how many visions I had with Blind Bird, it always amazed me how accurate they were and I smiled to myself as I noticed that the sign was the same as it was in my vision.

It seemed to be morning tea time for the children as some were playing in the main grounds and others were sitting on the benches eating fruit or snacks. I walked into the school and a few children raised their heads to glance at me. They must have decided that I was just another teacher or nothing exciting, so went back to what they were doing. I wandered through to the back of one of the main classroom blocks and saw about a dozen teachers standing around the playground area. I scanned the faces and that's when I located him off to the side of a group of three teachers. It was the male teacher I had seen in my vision.

He was talking to a small girl dressed in a school uniform and she was obviously upset about something that had happened with another student. The two other female teachers had called over the other student for their side of the story and as I got closer I could hear that one of the children had pulled the others hair and had teased her about the colour which as a bright ginger colour.

The two female teachers made the other student apologise and the girl was obviously satisfied as they went off together to play another game. The female teachers excused themselves and walked off towards a classroom area. The male teacher was now alone.

Excuse me, could I please talk to you" I said in a slightly too high voice.

He looked at me and obviously decided that I must be new and had lost my way around the buildings. "How can I help you?" he replied.

I looked around to make sure we were a significant distance away from anyone's earshot and then started.

"My name is Lacey and I am here because one of your students is in grave danger and I need you to get her for me".