Once Upon A Nightmare

- TWENTY -

- Cindy -

Okay, well first off, I just want it to go down in the books that I have never, ever done anything like what I am about to do right now. Just want that to be clear. Never have done anything remotely close to it so don't judge me.

Okay, so, since I got that out of the way, I'll tell you what is going on right now. So, wow I am so scared. Okay, deep breaths, Cindy, you got this okay? So, right now we just broke back into school and I know, you might be thinking "Who the heck in their right mind wants to break into school? Especially hours after you were let out?" or "Who the heck wants to go back to school at all?"

Well, to answer that, we do. We have a high suspicion that something is going down here. Something weird. We know for a fact― because Azel told us ―that on some days, there is a staff meeting held after school. Oh, but it isn't any normal staff meeting because then the whole school staff would be there and they weren't. No, this was a meeting for the evil villains from our books.

Yeah, we figured it out ―mainly because Azel told us. So, again, here we are... in the creepy, empty hallway... all alone... scared out of our minds...

"I want my mommy."

Bella looked at me, a frown was etched on her face. "I want my mommy too."

"Oh, suck it up, will you?"

We glared back at the person behind us. "Well, sorry for wanting our moms, Rider. It isn't my fault we are in an empty, dark, scary hall so stop back seat riding."

He tilted his head side to side. "Well, actually, it is your fault we are here. I'm the one who didn't want to go and got looped into babysitting you two, so there. Also, as a wise man named Ben Carlin once put it 'Snow White's mom: dead. Cinderella's mom: dead. Ariel, Jasmine, Pocahontas: dead, dead, and dead.' I feel like that was way too many times to say 'dead'."

"And my mom?" Bella asked putting her hands on her hips.

Eugene leaned in close to her face, looking her in the eye. "Dead," he whispered.

I sneered at him. "Well, thank you for letting us know a well know fact we have lived with for years."

We turned back but took notice as a shadow approached our way. Ducking into a random classroom, we waited till the coast was clear before slipping out.

"And what do you think you are doing?" a bratty voice asked, scaring us to death.

Oh, no. Not this one. I turned and faced the annoying sister. There Ana stood patiently with her arms crossed over her chest. I fought back the need to punch that ugly smile right off her face.

"Breaking into the school to see what the evil villains who escaped from children fairy-tales are doing," I replied in a bored, sarcastic tone... while not being all too sarcastic.

"Oh, well then follow me." She pushed herself off her feet and walked toward us.

Bella, Eugene, and I all glanced at each other confused. Shrugging, we followed Ana. In desperate need of breaking the odd silence, Eugene began singing a song about people catching him "riding dirty" which made no sense to any of us. None of use stopped him from singing it because it was better than following Anna in silence... through the empty halls. We followed Anna like lost puppies which, in turn, took us outside and to the school's greenhouse. She stopped in front of the little shed and held out her arms.

"Ta-da!"

We simply looked at her.

"Ta-da?" the words faltered at the end.

She rolled her eyes. "The thing you are looking for, well, it's in there. With the right key, you can open it, with the wrong key... I don't know for sure but I hear it open up to the shed... or was it to your death? Hump, oh, well! You'll figure it out, have fun!" She trotted off without another glance back.

"I can't tell if she is serious. Cindy, what do you think?"

I literally have no clue. I wanted to believe her but, then again, she was my "evil step-sister," so could I trust her? Something inside my heart did but my mind overpowered it.

I began searching around objects for anything that looked like a key, and soon enough, the other two began their search. I looked at the veggies for clues. Heck, I even checked the dirt looking for the stupid key. There was nothing there! Nothing! Nothing was standing out or just made it obvious that the key could be hidden there. She could have just sent us on a wild goose chase. For nothing! Ooh, when I set this all right I am gonna make her life a living―

"Wait," Eugene spoke up. "We looked everywhere, right? High and low?" We nodded. "Did we look low enough? Where is the one place that they think we are too stupid to look?"

Frustrated, I kicked the rock I stood on. I didn't know the answer to that. We looked everywhere, where else could we look? And how much lower could we― It finally hit me. The rock.

There were rocks everywhere. How did we not notice this before? It was so obvious that it wasn't obvious. It was right there and could be easily missed. We are so freaking stupid. After wasting our time, we searched under every rock. Finding not one, but three different keys, we fearfully placed it into the hole and turned, scared that we could open up the door to our deaths. To our pleasure, nothing bad happened. Now she's just making a fool out of us. We tried and tried again until we found the right key that opened the door to what we wanted to see. When it finally creaked open, a soft light shone through. It lured us in, drawing us closer to the object it originated from. It was as if it were a fish with a light attached to it, skillfully luring us into its mouth, waiting for the right moment for us to slip up. It didn't matter though because we finally found what we were looking for.

"A book?" Bella pretty much announced in a questioning manner.

The book shook slightly. A chuckled flowed through the room and the glow of the book brightened. Okay, not weird at all, you know. We looked through the pages then placed it back on its stand. Closing the door and placing the key back in its place, but not before making a copy of it for ourselves.

Running towards the coffee shop to tell the others something forced us to halt dead in our tracks.

Oh, no... 

🔽🔼🔽

► "Dead, dead, and dead," love that quote from Ben Carlin. You can find that quote in the video he made linked below. Also, they aren't paying me to spread their channel name or anything like that, I just really like them. And so do the characters of OUAN. ◄