atelophobia ↠ e. kaspbrak | ✓

Chapter One

     I darted in between the piles of teenagers clumped in the stuffy hall, trying to escape the shouts of Henry Bowers and his dumb cronies behind me. I only knew of one place that could buy me some time. The girl's bathroom.

     I barreled into the girl's bathroom and ran into one of the stalls, immediately hopping onto the toilet and yanking the door shut.

     The stop left me time to normalize my breathing again and calm down.

     "Uh- hello?"

     My body froze. Don't talk, don't talk, don't talk...

     "Are you ok?" The voice was louder this time and clearly in the stall next to me.

     "Just shut up." I whisper-yelled, gritting my teeth anxiously. If the girl kept talking she'd lead Henry and his goons right to me.

     "Hey, what's your problem? I was just asking..." she snapped, letting her words trail off at the sound of someone stomping into the bathroom.

     I hung my head in defeat, knowing for sure I was screwed. Crap. So much for getting out of this school year alive... but my head perked up slightly when the voice to the loud footsteps was not of Henry Bowers, but of Gretta Keene.

     The bully began pounding her fist against the stall door and screaming profanities at the girl who wouldn't shut up earlier. When the girl in the stall came back at Gretta with her own insult, I knew she was done for. My hand reached out to push open my stall door so I could start telling Gretta off when she yelled something I couldn't decipher fast enough and brown sludge came leaking over into my stall.

     My outreached hand immediately flew to my mouth, preventing me from gagging at the noxious smell. I rolled my eyes as laughter filed out of the bathroom.

A long silence fell between us until the girl finally spoke up. "I'm sorry if any got on you."

I sighed, releasing my hand from over my mouth. "You're good." I replied, glancing down at the waste that coated the bathroom's tiled floor.

Pressing my hands firmly against the walls of the stall, I kicked against the door, knocking it open. With a small, mental countdown, I stood on the toilet and grabbed the top of the stall walls before swinging myself out and landing onto the part of the floor that wasn't covered in garbage.

The girl made it out right after me and shot me a weak smile. "I'm Beverly."

"Rose." I stated, smiling back at her.

     Suddenly, Henry Bowers and his gang's shouts rang throughout the hall once more.

     "Frick" I muttered, "I gotta go."

     And with that, I ran out through the hall and towards the double doors of the school.

----------

The sound of my worn chuck taylors slapping the ground and my heavy breathing filled the air as I barreled down the schoolyard past a group of small boys and into the street where I ran all the way home.

     I nearly collapsed from exhaustion by the time I reached my front lawn.

     "You're late, Rose." A deep voice said from behind me and I quickly turned my head to see my 18 year old brother, Tyler, standing on the front porch in jeans and a white t-shirt. "I was about to go to the school and find you myself." He added, gesturing to the car keys in his hand.

     I let out a shaky sigh, rubbing the back of my neck sheepishly. "Yeah, I uh- uh- got caught up talking to my uh- friend. Yeah, my friend."

     He scoffed. "you don't have friends. Real believable lie, Ro. Now get inside."