Turn

5

The week went by and Virginia started to settle into a routine. She ate meals with Catherine, hung out with her roommate and her friends a few nights, and saw Tracey again as she walked from math to sociology. Every other day, when she had lit class, she would verbally spar with Greyson and Catherine and occasionally Quinn would join the conversation. He made a beautiful point that Friday about choosing to sink rather than to swim and the death of a soldier for stealing a teapot. He said something that stuck with her:

"Slaughterhouse Five reminds us of the senselessness of war, of death itself. It reminds us that we're the only animals that systematically assassinate each other not just for our own survival but for our twisted and arbitrary sense of morality."

He was right. She wanted to tell him so after class, but something stopped her before she crossed the room.

"You good?" asked Catherine, seeing Virginia's face.

Virginia shook her head. "Yeah, I'm good. Just what Quinn said threw me off a little."

Catherine narrowed her eyes. "Whatever you say roomie. Come on."

Looping her arm through Virginia's, Catherine leaned on her best friend. They walked outside and Virginia felt someone watching them, watching her. Greyson and Quinn were standing together, talking quietly, and Greyson's eyes were on Virginia like they always were. His gaze started to unsettle her. They unsettled her. But she said nothing about it as she and Catherine went back to the hall.

A little while later, Virginia stared at the computer screen, the cursor blinking at her, black on the empty white electronic sheet of paper. This essay was not writing itself. Her history professor had assigned each of them to write three pages about some aspect of local history that interested them, which was about as vague as could be. She'd spent the last three hours online sifting through local history for something interesting. So far, all she'd found that was even mildly intriguing was a gruesome triple-murder in the 30s and something about a weird commune that lived on the outskirts of town in the late 60s. Everything else was boring, as was expected of the little town of a couple thousand that had grown up near the college.

Shutting her laptop hard, she decided that she would go to join Catherine studying in the rec room where quite a few people gathered. Virginia sighed heavily and tucked her laptop under her arm. Tucking her phone in her back pocket, she walked down several flights of stairs and into the basement. Usually the rec room teemed with people, some chatting, some playing games, and a lot doing homework, bent over screens or pouring over textbooks. This time, however, it was empty. There were only a couple lights on, a lamp and one of the overhead lights, the one over the pool table, and it cast eerie shadows all across the room. The TV was blurry white and black in constant motion so that it looked like it was for the most part gray. Virginia didn't think that TVs still did that.

She felt like she was walking into a dream, with a strange chill running through her and goosebumps rising along her arms. "Virginia?" she called out, her voice low but strong.

There was no answer. She set her computer down on the table and sighed heavily.

"Great, now I'm a crazy person who's talking to ghosts that aren't even there."

Sitting down, Virginia opened her computer again and stared at the computer that was still a blank page with a blinking cursor.

"You look like you could use a coffee," said a voice as Virginia stared at her computer screen.