Haunting

The Problem With Pacifists

Introducing chapter 3! This is probably a bit longer than the others, by the way, but I didn’t know where else to cut if off. I haven’t gotten any comments on this story yet, so if you’re reading this I’d really appreciate it if you could take the time to tell me what you think of this chapter and the story in general, even if it’s just to tell me what you hate about it. Constructive criticism welcome! Enjoy the chapter, and please comment/vote :)

Pic is of Kit Sparks -->

The bus didn’t pull up to the school until 8:45, a scant fifteen minutes before the beginning of the first class. Tally pointed this fact out to Shay, who just laughed. “This is early,” he’d said with a smile. Tally gathered her things and, dodging the debris of Nat and Nick’s tantrum, got off the bus with the others. Nat and Nick were the last to get off, as the bus driver held them back to inform them that they had one strike left before they would be walking to and from school. The rest of them had all burst out laughing at that, and at Nat’s outraged expression on hearing the news. Nick just stood there impassively and took his reprimand like a man- Nat proceeded to freak the fuck out until he began to resemble a chicken having a seizure. Eventually Shay and Eimear had reached up to physically pull him form the bus, and they headed towards the school’s main entrance.

The Ballypooka Community School building reminded Tally vaguely of a Depression-era prison building- squat (despite being two storeys tall), small windows, tall wire fences around the perimeter of the school land. Also, the sickly yellow color it had been painted did the building no favors appearance-wise. It was obviously a lot smaller than Tally’s old school back in Florida, but then again this new school looked to have a lot less graffiti daubed across the walls.

There was, however, a growing crowd of rowdy students gathering by the bicycle racks, a sight that was horribly familiar to Tally. Mia and Eimear both sighed wearily, for once resembling actual identical twins, and led the rest of them towards the crowd of teenagers. “Stay here with Tally and Evan, Shay,” Nat said authoritatively, cracking his knuckles ominously with his eyes fixed on what was obviously a fight, “I doubt Tally wants to get caught in the middle of this shit on her first day. Oh, and if you see Toby, try to keep him out of trouble too.”

With that, the others took off, leaving Tally, Evan and Shay leaning against the bike racks, Shay and Tally shamelessly craning their necks to try and catch a glimpse of the action. After watching Nick and Eimear clear a path for Mia and Nat, Tally caught sight of the older of the two motorcycle boys from earlier that morning, Kit Sparks, landing a brutal punch to a menacing-looking guy’s cheekbone.

“How’d they know it was Kit?,” Tally asked Shay without tearing her eyes away from the action, correctly guessing that Shay’s friends didn’t go around breaking up every single fight in the school. Shay shook his head, looking bemused. “They were expecting it,” he explained, “That guy Kit’s beating the shit out of- that’s the guy who punched his little brother last week. One beating is never enough for Kit, not when lil’ Sparky is involved.”

“I told you not to call me that, Shay,” a  younger, intelligent voice piped up from behind Tally and Shay. The two whirled round, Shay relaxing immediately once he saw who it was. Standing beside Evan was a short, skinny, cute-looking boy with the same tousled black hair as Kit, and bright intelligent green eyes. There was a noticeable red patch on the pale skin of his forehead, the beginnings of a bruise and most likely the cause of the fight that was still raging on, if the enthusiastic roars of the spectators were anything to go by. Noticing Tally for the first time, the short boy smiled happily at her and gave a cute little wave.