Third Story: A Night to Remember

Chapter 3

18 October 2021

We ran and ran like mad, past the locked classrooms for God knows how long. Judging from the faces the other three are making right now, they must be wishing that they had left a classroom open so that we can hide inside. From the corner of my eyes, I spot an open room and direct the other three towards it.

As soon as the team get inside, I frantically shut the door and lock it from within. Nam and Vân push the nearest desk towards the entrance to block the door. Perhaps it is a bit too much, but if ghosts were real, they would just simply go through the door because they are not corporeal, to begin with. Those two people hide under separate tables while Xuân and I dove under one on our own, holding our breaths. The windows of this room face the moon, so moonlight partially illuminates this place. The shadow of the window frame can be seen from my position under the table. I instinctively use my index finger to try to touch the ground where the moonlight hits, making a shadow. What a strange situation we have found ourselves in, I thought.

My train of thought is abruptly broken when the shadow of a person walks by. I close my eyes again like before, in front of the music room. Footsteps. Echoing throughout the hallway. Firm and steady steps, unlike those of the guard previously. Footsteps? How would ghosts have footsteps and a shadow? These things don't make any sense after all. Xuân covers her mouth and tries her hardest not to make any sound. She is too frightened to notice the discrepancies.

"Xuân, calm down. I'm here," I whisper into her ear as I hold her tightly in my arms. "The ghost won't be able to hurt you."

She says nothing in return, tears beginning to form at the corner of her eyes. We stay like this for a while before I let go of her. Then the steps gradually become faint until completely drown out by the silent moonlit night.

"Thành, are you alright? The ghost's gone now."

While absorbed in my own world, Nam has already left his hiding spot and come over to me. I snap out of it and nod lethargically. Xuân looks up and wipes her unshed tears. Vân is also standing and looking around the place now.

"There are no ghosts. They wouldn't have a shadow or footsteps."

"But you definitely saw it, right?"

"It might be someone playing a crass Halloween joke on us. It wasn't funny in the slightest."

"Where do you think we are?" Vân interrupts our little discussion, asking no one in particular.

"From the desks and the documents lying around, I'll say the staff room," I reply.

We were too deep in a panic to even recall the layout of the school. Spurred by fear, we just went into the nearest room we could hide from the 'ghost'. How peculiar though, the staff room of all places was unlocked. Surely the guard could not have made such an egregious mistake?

"Let's get out of here, we're not done yet," Nam insists, though I am sure they are merely hiding their fear under a cheery façade.

"What do we still have left, though?" Xuân enquires.

"The blue flames and the woman's cries."

"In that case, how about we visit the other labs or the toilets? We haven't checked any of them at all."

"Let's go to the labs then."

At Nam's suggestion, we onerously make our way back to the third floor, hoping that the strange apparition would not catch us again. Soon we arrive at one of the chemistry laboratories and examine the windows, walls, and doors for anything suspicious. I'm starting to think that we might be too meticulous for our own good, and we should have just asked our upperclassman from the German class, 12A3, to do this instead of us. But I think he would just regard the whole affair as bogus, similar to how I did this morning. Even if he did take Nam's request seriously, he would charge a steep fee for it.