onyx: poltergeist

twenty-three

CELINE

Okay then, yikes. Mr Lambert just collapsed at my feet, and Martin's feet. Not to mention that the blow from whacking against the lockers seemed pretty forceful, what in the world just happened? And what do we do now?

"There's no bleeding, but there's quite a bruise on the temple," Martin reported, precariously rolling Jayda's limp body over and revealing the bruise. Damn, it looked like it was going to leave a mark for quite some time, hopefully it fades eventually.

"Ouch, we should pick him up though," I immediately dropped down to the ground like how he did, weaving my arm around Jayda's limp shoulder and hoisting one side of the unconscious body up. Martin did the same on the other side, and I was grateful that we only have a small height difference, so carrying Jayda's body to the sick bay wasn't too big of a problem.

The only question I had in mind was why Mr Lambert fainted. He seemed pretty okay when he got out of Jayda's class, but started feeling dizzy halfway while heading to the cafeteria for lunch before blacking out on the floor. Strange, something was definitely up.

Martin and I staggered awkwardly down the hall to the sick bay. Jayda's body wasn't exactly a light one for us to hold up steadily, and with her backpack full of books and stationery it just weighed her down even more. Neither of us could even reach to turn the doorknob to the sick bay open without clumsily swinging the rest over like a human wrecking ball, but from the commotion we made by trying to do so eventually called for the nurse to get the door, thank goodness.

"Uh, I think we need to borrow one of the beds," Martin heaved, "he, I mean, she kinda...blacked out."

Oh yeah, the nurse might not know that Mr Lambert swapped bodies with Jayda.

"What he said," I struggled to give the nurse a small nod, "She's still breathing though, but she smacked her head against a locker and we probably need you to look at it." I recalled noticing Jayda's chest continue to rise and fall steadily when I picked the body up; good thing Mr Lambert wasn't dead yet, or the curse wouldn't undo itself, and we'll lose one of the nicest teachers that ever got to teach us. What a shame.

"Oh dear, come in please," she hurriedly beckoned for us to enter, "you two can lay her down right there." She pointed to a simple bed tucked away at the side of the room.

"Thank you," I quickly thanked her, briskly dragging my feet over to where the bed was along with Martin. Both of us awkwardly turned to sit down at the edge of the bed before slowly shifting an unconscious Mr Lambert in Jayda's body to lie down, rolling it over to the side so that the nurse could come check on the bruise on the temple.

"So did she lose consciousness when she hit her head?" she asked, scrutinising the reddish-blue mark on the side of Jayda's head.

"No," I shook my head in disagreement, "she, Martin and I were heading to the cafeteria when she said she was starting to feel quite dizzy, and when we tried to help her up she just blacked out and collapsed."

"And when she collapsed she hit her head against the lockers," Martin continued, wrapping up whatever that happened to Mr Lambert outside.

The nurse raised a questioning eyebrow at us. "Oh? I guess it wasn't a concussion then," she sighed in relief, "I'll get an ice pack to soothe that bruise though."

"Thank you Miss," Martin and I smiled back, rolling Jayda's body back onto her back before I reached forward to unfold the thin blanket. Besides the rhythmic breathing, the body lying on the bed in front of us was as still as a corpse, eyes shut and all. Hopefully Mr Lambert was still okay in Jayda's body.