K-12: Legacy

Drama Club

Weeks later, Bahari and I walk through the gleaming halls of K-12. We look at the antique paintings on the wall. Dimly-lit vintage chandeliers hang from the high ceiling, casting long shadows on anyone walking below. I look at our own reflections on the shiny marble floor and listen to the soft thud of my vans as we walk. 

"We're going to be late for class," Bahari says.

"Honestly, who cares at this point?" I ask, drily. I really didn't care at all. The school board made a petition to fire the principal- my father. If they all sign it, my father will have to find another job, and I may have to move schools. 

If I end up leaving this corrupt place, my mission for Cry Baby and Lillith will have failed, and I would be put in a new body to try again.

I had begun to despise my father. I saw how he literally didn't care about the welfare of the students as long as he made money. We could be locked in a cellar somewhere, and he wouldn't even blink. 

Last Monday, a first-grader came out of the principal's office with blood trickling down the side of his face, with tears in his eyes. When I had asked him what had happened, he just shook his head and said, "Mommy didn't pay the tuition. I have to leave." 

It was then I decided that I would not put up with my father's bullshit anymore. When I was younger, I had blindly thought that my father couldn't possibly be as bad as people said he was, but now I knew the truth.

....

"Wait," I said, pausing by a pair of double doors marked 'Ballroom.' "Let's take a look."

"I'm not sure that's a good idea," Bahari replies. 

"Come on. What's the worst they could do to us?" I ask, holding up my hands in supplication.

Bahari didn't need much convincing. "Okay, fine. But just a look."

I open the big doors and gasp. 

There were so many beautifully-dressed couples swirling around on the dance floor, gliding and turning in time to the ghostly music. The crystal chandeliers reflected off their skin- some pearly white, others mahogany, and some a rich shade of turquoise- creating beautiful rainbow prisms across the gleaming wooden floor and pearl-toned walls. 

The view was beautiful, like a scene from a storybook. But at the same time, if you bothered to look closely, it was revolting.

They all looked... Off. Their heads hanged although their arms and legs made graceful sweeping gestures. Moans and quiet sobbing emanated from them. They were exhausted, as though they danced themselves to death, and even their spirits remained in this beautiful room, twisting and floating across the floor. 

Even the smell was putrid, and my eyes landed on a nondescript door in the corner, where the smell must've been coming from. Probably where they hid the bodies, I thought, trying not to vomit all over the pristine floor.

And then I sneezed, and the music stopped. The ghostly heads of the dancers snapped in our direction, glaring at me as though I had laughed at a funeral, which in a way, I had. 

"Hello," I said, trying to hide my mounting panic. "You all look lovely... Bewitching, even!"

Apparently I had said the wrong thing because the spirits started shrieking and as one, came speeding towards us!

Bahari grabbed my arm and thrust me out into the hallway, and then slammed the doors shut, just as the mob reached the doors. 

"Let's get back to class," Bahari said firmly.

"Okay, see ya!" I said, not in the mood to argue. We took off in opposite directions.

My life felt like a play, one of those sad Shakespear ones where all the clueless characters walk right into an obvious trap.