Flower

Chapter 17: Wolf

Someone tapped my shoulder in the middle of the night. I cracked an eye open to see Jane, dressed in a pair of sweat pants and a large sweatshirt.  Her eyes sparkled with nervousness and fear as she bit her lip. 

            "Whitney, get up." She urged. I opened both eyes and stared at her with bewilderment.  I checked the clock; 4:20 in the morning.

            "What's up?" I yawned as I pushed the warm covers off my body. I slid my feet to the floor and stretched. "Why are we getting up so early? It’s Saturday morning."

            "I know," Jane replied. "Something happened to Flora.” She averted her eyes and tugged at her lip. I furrowed my eyebrows. What could have happened? Betty had come over with magazines to look at Winter Formal dresses and announced that Flora had a date with Emmett. Of course, being girls, we all jumped for joy because we knew it would happen any time now.  Emmett was drooling over her, but we weren’t sure if Flora knew about it.

            "What happened?" I demanded, my tone becoming serious.

            "Get dressed and I'll tell you." I nodded and dug out a pair of sweatpants and slippers. I slipped the sweatpants over my sleep shorts and hustled to put the slippers on.

            "It's a little chilly out," Jane informed as she threw another heavy sweatshirt toward me. It was burgundy with Oregon Academy scrawled across the front. I stared at it for a moment and then slipped it on as well.

            "My parents got it for me," Jane said sheepishly. We then raced out of our dorm room and linked up with Betty. She looked frantic and I still didn't know what had happened.

            We clambered down the stairs and I asked, "What happened to Flora?"

            "Flora reunited with her mother and that didn’t go down to well, but then she went into some sort of shock and stabbed herself with a letter opener!" Betty exclaimed. My jaw dropped.

            "A letter opener?" That seemed a little extravagant and unbelievable.

            "Apparently so; there's blood all over the floor in the main office." I shook my head in disbelief. We pushed past the glass doors and met Rhett, Derek and Emmett. Emmett looked scared with an icepack on his nose.

            "What happened to your nose?" I asked the elephant boy.

            "She accidently kicked me." He sounded as if it was no biggie and it happened to him all the time. As a group, we trekked to the infirmary.  Derek looked stressed as he wore a light, white tank top and black sweat pants.  Rhett matched my pace, but did not breathe a word. His rusty red hair was messy and I had an urge to fix it, but I balled my hands into fists and shoved them in the sweatshirt pocket. Emmett on the other hand, did not wear sweatpants and such.  Instead, he wore a pair of black slacks and a white, button down shirt, now stained with his and possibly Flora's blood. 

            Emmett reached the infirmary doors first and we all piled in.  White, florescent lights blinded me for a second as my eyes adjusted. Derek and Emmett rushed to the front desk, where another nurse was typing away madly. 

            "Excuse me," Derek asked kindly, yet urgently. "Where could we find Flora Robins?"

            The nurse typed for a moment and then looked at the group of tired and frantic teens. What an odd group we must have looked like.

            "Flora is in the mental room at the moment."

            "THE MENTAL ROOM?!" Emmett exploded. "WHAT KIND OF ROOM IS THAT?" The nurse was cool as a cucumber. I shuddered by her coolness.