Shadow Girl

Chapter 2

Isn't it funny that when you're late for school, everyone stares at you as if you're a murderer?

"Oh I'm sorry, did you want an autograph? No? Well stop staring at me" I said sarcastically to my classroom as I slumped down in my seat.

"Come on class, get on with your work. I will deal with Ciara for so rudely interrupting my lesson" Miss Minford said to me with an edge to her voice. Great, more teachers telling me what to do. 

"No miss you don't need to deal with me at all, I'm perfectly fine," I said with a smirk on my face, "Just get on with whatever you're doing."

"Oh Ciara, you used to be such a good student..." she sighed. Victory - she'd given up. I opened my English book and began to write the date, but then I paused as I noticed something written across the middle of my book:

'you'll never escape' 

I was about to shout at Emma - a girl who despised me - but then I realised that she couldn't have possibly known about my nightmare, could she? Glancing down at my paper I rubbed my eyes; the writing was gone. "This is so stupid" I thought to myself, "I must just be paranoid"

The bell went 10 minutes later. I quickly darted out of the door in order to avoid Miss Minford giving me yet another lecture on punctuality. Emma glared at me as I left, she thought she was ruining my life, but I really couldn't care less about whether she liked me or not. I really didn't want to stay at school much longer, so I decided to just leave. Mum wouldn't mind - she was too scared of me to send me back. Actually, I couldn'y really be bothered to put up with mum acting all anxious around me, so I went down for a walk in the forest instead.

The forest was peaceful, especially since everyone was either at work or school. There was just one little gravel track weaving in and out through the trees, and little rays of sunlight trickled down through the leaves. If I was one of those soppy people I would've said it was magical, but I'm not that pathetic. A squirrel darted out in front of me, making me jump slightly. Stupid animals. Just as I started walking again two more squirrels ran out from the same place, followed by a few birds. 

"That's weird" I mumbled to myself, "maybe I should go check it out."

So I strayed from the path onto the dirt, and pushed aside a few branches in my way. I knew the pathway off by heart, but I'd never actually been off the path before. For every footstep I took the air seemed to get colder, and the wind slowly but surely picked up. 'Maybe I should turn back?' I thought to myself, 'something's definitely not right here.'  I started to turn around, but curiosity got the better of me, so I carried on. I didn't carry on for very long, mind you, as within five minutes I'd tripped over a tree root and was flat on my face.

"Oh for god's sake!" I exclaimed, but I soon shut up when something caught my eye. A dead squirrel was lying on the ground. I wouldn't normally have cared, but there was something... odd about this.

The squirrel didn't appear to have been wounded, and there was no sign of anything poisonous around. It couldn't have been old age, as the squirrel looked quite young. By this point I probably would've just disregarded it and left, but I couldn't stop thinking about all of the other animals fleeing from this spot. I sidestepped around the squirrel, but then stopped dead in my tracks.

Written in the mud were 3 words which chilled me inside: You'll never escape

I wanted to run but my feet were rooted to the ground. My fists were scrunched up tight and I was gritting my teeth so hard I feared they would break. What was this?! Is it some kind of prank?

"WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!" I screamed before collapsing to the ground in tears. Crying was something I hadn't done in years, so there was something really wrong with this. In movies you see people being strong and brave in these situations, but this is real. In fact most people probably would've broken down a lot sooner.

Rubbing my eyes, I crawled to my feet and stared at the writing. There was a large stick next to the writing, so I assumed it's been written with that. I wanted to go home and tell mum everything, but we'd never really had the best relationship.Nevertheless, I decided to tell mum anyway. If it wasn't for the nightmare I would've just disregarded this as a prank, but people couldn't tamper with my dreams...could they?