Arachville's Academy for the Paranormal

Chapter 5

Finally I find my room on the third and final floor. Someone is already inside, I can hear them moving boxes.

My hand shakes as I unlock the door, and open it a crack."Hello?"

A voice replies back, "Come in! I'm just moving my junk around!" The voice has an accent, but I can't tell what it is.

I walk in and see a tall girl moving boxes probably three times her weight.

She has a nice natural tan unlike the Dorito-raped girls back at my old school.

Her hair was a black and was somewhat wild-looking. However her the only unnatural thing about her is her glowing amber eyes.

"Hi," she sticks her hand out. "I'm Naomi!"

"Victoria!" I shake her hand, she has a really tight grip. Naomi turns back to her stuff and continues to move it.

My stuff is piled up next to the bunk bed. Surprisingly Naomi hasn't claimed a bed yet.

"Which bed do you want?"

She picks up the biggest box yet and throws it on her back. "You pick which one! It doesn't matter!"

I notice a medium-sized dog bed on the floor. "Aw! You have a dog?"

She sets down her box. "What do you mean?"

"The dog bed?"

She laughs at my confusion. "That's my bed!"

At that moment Naomi crawls into the bed. Twirling in place like a dog before laying down.

Now that is also unusual. "What? You've never seen a werewolf lay down?"

I couldn't speak. Cat got my tongue, or in this case a dog. "No, not really?"

Naomi laughs, "Yeah, I never understood why humans just lay down instead of checking their surroundings first?"

We continue to talk about werewolf customs and even about different creatures. "So what exactly are you? I don't smell any strong magic scents on you, so your not a witch or wizard."

"Ummm, I'm not really sure myself. Just today I learned I'm not human..." I feel my face burn. Apparently it something everyone learns at a young age. But she mentioned that I don't have a STRONG magic scent.

Naomi sniffs the air wildly. "Well I definitely smell some positive energy," she gets closer and sniffs the air again. "But some negative energy....."

We both turn our heads when the door cracks open. A young woman appears I'm the door way in a puff of smoke. Her jet black hair has an odd purple glow, and she hovers over the ground.

"I'm here to take role call...."

"Does anyone actually enjoy working here?" I whisper quietly to Naomi. She smirks and turns back to the lady standing in our dorm.

"Ok....... Victoria Silvercrest?"

Feeling awkward I slightly raise my hand. The strange woman rolls her eyes and scribbles away on her scroll of paper.

"Naomi Sibahi?"

Naomi flashes a smile and snorts. That's when I realize her canine teeth are sharper than the average person. "Present!"

The woman scribbles again on her paper. "Finally Colette Acula?"

We both look around, our room did have a third bed. I didn't even notice it before.

Naomi crosses her arms, "Who?"

Mist woman looks back at her scroll. "Oh, my mistake she been accounted for."

And with that she disappears into the same cloud of smoke. Our door slams shut, leaving us in complete silence. With no clue as to who the mysterious third roommate was.

The silence is finally broken by the growl of my stomach. Naomi giggles, "Sounds like someone missed breakfast."

"More like lunch." I add and I start to unpack my stuff.

Naomi watches over my shoulder as I grab stuff from my boxes. "You want some help?" She offers kindly with a smile. The kind of smile you give your best friend after doing something stupid together.

"Sure....." Naomi grabs a box and holds it about her head. A couple minutes later we are all unpacked, sitting on the empty third non-bunk bed playing twenty questions.

"Is it painfully changing into a werewolf?"

"No, what special talents do you have? It might help narrow down what you are." Naomi grabs a paper ready to write my answer.

What have I done that's paranormal? I can hold my breath for 45 seconds! That's not good enough......

I can tell Naomi is getting impatient. "I..... I'm very persuasive?"

Her pen doesn't move. "What do mean by persuasive?"

The more I think about it, the more I realize how extremely persuasive I am. On the debate team I've never lost. "No one can say no to me. They don't even argue? I just win the debate?"

A small smile creeps across her face. "Interesting, I've never heard of that talent before!"

Is that a good thing? "So? Any ideas?"

"Did you not hear me say I've never heard of that before?"

The old speaker in our room blares to life. Resulting in a chalk board scratching noise. We both cover our ears. A woman's sing songy voice rings throughout the halls. "All students make your way to the mess hall for the first banquet! Followed by the First Day Social, so don't be late!!!"

"The First Day Social?" I ask as I uncover my ears. My old school never had things like a social.

Naomi winces and grits her teeth, "I'm sorry that noise is killing me!"

The room is silent, "What noise?"

Still covering her ears Naomi starts to whine like a dog. "Make it stop!"

After a minute or two the speaker click and Naomi stops. "I hate when someone leaves the intercom on, it frequency is unbearable to anything with very advanced hearing." She glares and snarls at the speaker. "Now what did you say?"

I'll admit it is going to be weird having a werewolf for a roommate, but I'll have to get used to it. Naomi is a very nice person, dog, thing?

"What's a social?"

"It's kind of like a school dance, minus dancing. It's a way for noobs, like yourself, to make new friends."

I open my mouth to object but then I realize it's true I have only two friends.

Naomi grabs straightens out her uniform in bathroom mirror. "Are we ready?"

"I guess," I look down at my robe. It looks ok, for a school uniform. "But I need to find my friend Thomas, he is new this year too."

"Is he your boyfriend?" She follows up with kissing noises.

Thomas? My boyfriend? I'll admit I'm single and Thomas is nice but I just met the guy. "No I just met him this morning. He rode my bus!"

She smiles when I get so defensive. "Fine what room is he in?"

"Four.....thirty eight?" To be honest I forgot. A good memory was never one of my strong suits.

The door creaks open as if it anticipated when we would leave. Naomi is unfazed by the magic door. "I hope you remember what he looks like!" She teases and walks out into hall. I don't want to get lost, so I run after her, shutting the door on the way out.

"Of course I remember his face! I'm not....." My voice is cut off by the creaking of a door. Then almost as fast as it had come, it slams shut. No one is in the hallway.

"I think that was our door!" Naomi runs over and opens our door, cautiously sniffing the air. "Someone was in here!"