Starry Eyed

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Nineteen

The rain outside bites at the stretch of skin between my shoes and the leg of my trousers, streaking down in thick, icy sheets. Somebody has upset the clouds very much. Perhaps they, too, are mourning Harlem Potts.

Police cars are already arriving. They come roaring in across the gravel and send little pebbles flying everywhere, not caring if their blue paintwork is chipped off. I see their heads, peering around for any sign of a murderer that just happens to be running around with a giant knife across the field. It's a long shot, but they try anyway. Not many people register me in my big green jacket. I almost camouflage into the grass.

It doesn't snow here, so I melt into the field like a daisy in a meadow. The rain coat I'm wearing is covered in water, and tiny droplets trickle off the plastic hoodie down onto my face every now and again. They slide off the edge and fall down my face, spiking my eyelashes and ski-jumping off the bridge of my nose.

Perhaps I'm crying, but I'm not really sure. I feel like I'm crying, but it could just be the rain getting in too close to my eyes. Physically, I feel it, but emotionally, I just feel empty.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, wow. This kid is stupid. I mean, I knew that already, but you gotta be a special brand of stupid to sit alone in the middle of an empty football field with an axe murderer running around. But I had nowhere to go, and even though nobody would, I didn't want to be followed. Not even a worried teacher or student would chase me out into the rain.

It bites at my ankles between my sneakers and my trouser hems. I went back to the dormitory to grab a raincoat, but I forgot to pack my boots before I came here, so now I'm just suffering as payback to myself for forgetting. God, I sound like a depressed kid in some novel about suicide.

I watch the police in their navy uniforms, driving up as close to the buildings as possible before they prepare to get out of their cars. They are less dedicated to their jobs than we are lead to believe. Sure, some cops would kindly donate their entire lives to stopping a robbery of some sort. But these cops, at least, just look scared.

I understand, of course. But if I was signing up to be a police officer, I would accept the dangers of the job. If someone called me up to investigate a teenage murder at Huntley, I would be out of my car, in the rain, looking for freaking footprints in the puddles in the gravel. It isn't all that great to see police officers missing their opportunity to investigate because they're scared of the water. Great big cats who don't want to take a bath.

At the last possible place, the police officers park their cars right in front of the door and whistle out of them under cover at maximum speed. I've never seen people run so fast before. They are just a big dark blur. When all of them are under the shelter, and their captain (whatever it is) opens the door to the office, they all pour inside. A huge ocean of blue rain gushes into the school. Rain that's scared of itself.

I notice that the last one to get in, I think a woman if the red ponytail is anything to go by, is turned away by her leader and sent back to her car. He slams the door in her face and leaves her slouching her shoulders on the front porch of the school. With a heavy sigh, she turns back to look out at the cars, as if the longer she waits, the gentler the rain will become.

The woman gazes all around her, right out at the field, her eyes directly on me. I look down at the grass and pray the hood will disguise me, but when I look back up, she snaps her head back to me. It takes her a moment to convince herself I'm actually there.

"Hey!" She yells out, shocked to see me. I probably look like a mirage in the rain, a figment of her imagination. I watch as her expression goes through all the emotions. By the end of her mental arguing, she has clearly decided to come and get me, although she doesn't look too happy about it as she runs out into the field.