Forty-One After Midnight (Completed)

Chapter Twenty-Five

"If he blows us off we're done for. We are lucky that we're all in the same place at the same time, but one-hundred years from now that may not be the case," Kyle began. "I think it was amazing we had everyone in the same school, but in 2141 there's no saying where we'll all end up. And even if we are together," he paused and pointed at Jane and the other ghost kids, "I'm sure they don't want to wait another hundred years to try it again."

"Kyle has a point," I added. "We need to go look for him or something. We can't just sit here hoping that he shows up. If he's having doubts, maybe we can change his mind."

"We have less than forty-one minutes now. There's no way we can pull this off," Kelsey said.

"Yes we can. We just have to hurry," I told her.

"I'll go try to find him."

Mrs. Reeves stood up and left the room. It made sense, she was partially his father. If anyone could get him to listen again, it would most likely be her.

I took the crumpled page out from where I had stuck it in my bag and looked at it again. I carefully read each line to myself.

"Hey guys? When it says twelve to be given, we're not actually being sacrificed are we?" I asked.

Kyle looked at me and shrugged. I looked over at Jane. She shook her head.

"They need twelve dead for it to work Nicole." I looked over at Laney. "And we already have that." She gestured toward the ghost kids. "All that's really needed is for their spirits to be present."

"So then why are we here?"

"Bodies basically, just solid proof of these kids."

"Oh."

I wasn't sure if that was comforting or not, but I guess it should have been since that didn't mean we were actually going to get sacrificed.

-

A while later with seventeen minutes left, Mrs. Reeves finally came back. Luckily John was following right behind her. He hung his head low and I wondered for a moment what went down between them. Did he chicken out? Did she somehow convince him to do it again? I guess none of those answers really mattered though. What did matter was that he was here.

"Okay, so the second it hits 12:41am we begin. Everyone make sure you're in your correct spots.

Everyone got back up and walked over to where they were supposed to be standing. John was at the head of the whole group. Laney and Mark stood at his sides. Mrs. Reeves wasn't really needed anymore so she just sat back and watched the whole thing with the ghost kids.

I turned my head and looked over at Jane who was standing off to the side looking back at me. Now is when it really started to sink in that I was technically losing my best friend for the second time. That's what she felt like now. It was just like in my past life, and I hated to have to say good-bye. I knew it was the right thing to do, but as I laid there on the ground waiting for the clock to hit forty-one after midnight, I felt a tear roll down my cheek. I was glad that no one else seemed to notice.

-

It was time. This is what we had been planning for the past few weeks. Now was the moment of truth. I held my breath the entire minute while I watched the minute hand on the clock change once more. We had forty-one people on the forty-first day of 2041 and it was now forty-one minutes after midnight.