sorry.” It was dark, and we were illuminated only by the running lights at our feet. I could just barely make out his face, which seemed almost familiar. I looked away and started up the steps. I stumbled, dumbly, and he caught my wrist.
“Are you a freshman?” he asked.
“N-no.” I shook my head. His hand was warm, and still held on to me.
“Then you’re the new girl.”
It wasn’t a question. “Yes.”
I saw his pale eyes squint briefly, and then he dropped my hand. A small chill ran through me, and I wanted him to say more. I wanted to say more, but I didn’t know what.
“Sorry for running into you.” I turned and walked up the steps, not understanding at all what had just happened.
As I snuck quietly through my door, I realized I didn’t know where the light switch was. More than that, I couldn’t turn on the overhead light since Dana was apparently sleeping. I flicked on my flashlight and stepped carefully to my bed, but not without stubbing my toe painfully on the suitcase under the bed. I bit my lip to keep from swearing, and then searched in the darkness for any of my things.
In the end, all I could find was my comforter and my pillow. I took off my jeans and slid noisily into bed. It was hard at first to fall asleep. I was cold and uncomfortable. I missed my big, cushy bed and the rest of my pillows, and even Jasper’s annoyingly frequent snoring that would only cease after a nudge in the ribs from me.
At home when I couldn’t sleep, I would make myself a little crudités plate like my dad always did, with Ritz crackers, cheeses, Wickles Pickles (the only kind worth buying), different kinds of meats, grapes….
Or maybe just a cup of tea and some of those jam-and-shortbread cookies my mom made and almost always had around. Suddenly nothing would be better than to tiptoe into my quiet living room, always lit by the fancy dim light in the corner, and cozy up on the couch to watch old Frasier reruns until unconsciousness swept me away.
I couldn’t even think about it without getting a pain in my stomach.
I finally fell asleep, into weird dreams filled with distorted elements of Manderley I must have subconsciously taken in, but which I still didn’t recognize.
Suddenly I was on the beach by the boathouse. It was pitch-black and freezing cold, even colder than before. I stepped into the water, which was so sharp and frigid that it felt like broken glass. Despite the pain, I kept walking. Before I knew it, I was swimming in the middle of the black sea. I couldn’t see where I was, or how far away the shore was.
Panic wrapped around my heart as I realized I couldn’t find my way to safety. There was a thunderous roar behind me, before a wave curled around me. It was strong, like a million forceful hands pushing me under. Every time I felt air, it would suck me under again and thrash me around like a Raggedy Ann doll.
A memory of those pale eyes I had barely been able to see floated into my suddenly aching head. He was mad, he was shouting. I couldn’t stand to see him like this.
I couldn’t catch my breath. I tried, and got a mouthful of salty water instead. I thought I reached the dry surface and took a breath. Instead I breathed in a rush of water that made my throat ache. My salty tears were mixing with the water around them and my body was contracting oddly as if I couldn’t control it.
“Anyone who has not already, please proceed to the Kenneth L. Montague auditorium for the First Day Assembly.”
I was shaken from my dream very abruptly when a voice I didn’t expect came over a PA system I didn’t know existed.
Why hadn’t my alarm gone off? I inspected it, to find that I’d set it for 6:00 p.m., not a.m.
Without thinking, I threw on some jeans and grabbed my bright yellow staff T-shirt from my last year at the Jax Beach Surf Competition. I flip-flopped out the door thirty seconds later with only my key in hand.
It took me fifteen minutes of running around like a rat in a maze before I found the auditorium. I pulled on each of the doors, but they were all locked. I looked around for anyone, but I was completely alone. Left with no other option, I knocked.
The door opened suddenly, and a youngish man let me in. “Freshman?”
“Oh, no, I’m a senior. But I’m new.”
“Try to be on time from now on.” He was stern but not unkind. He glanced at my clothes. “And at the end of the assembly, please put on your uniform.”
A shock of humiliation ran through me. I looked at the sea of navy-blue, white and khaki uniformed students in the seats. “Sorry, I’m coming from public school, I’ve never had—”
He nodded politely, though a touch dismissively, as I drifted into my annoying habit of overexplaining. I stopped, and he told me there was a seat down in front. To get to it, I’d have to walk—duck—past everyone.
I got there as quietly as possible and ignored the stares I could feel on me. Once seated, I stared straight up at the stage where I was only just noticing that there was a woman speaking.
She was reminding the students of the rules. Mostly everyone had no doubt heard the spiel as many times as I’d read it over the summer. I cringed when she got to the part about wearing uniforms every day to every function but Saturday and Sunday and social events. Weekends were mostly our own. We were allowed out from 9:00 a.m. until 10:00 p.m. on Saturdays, and from noon till 7:00 p.m. on Sundays. There were shuttles that would go back and forth from town to Manderley.
“… and absolutely no sexual relations of any kind anywhere on school property,” the speaker said, a tad optimistically, and adjusted her papers. There was a snicker in the audience that she must have heard but ignored. “And now I’m inviting Professor Andrews up to the stage. Thank you for your continued attention.” She took a seat at the back of the stage with several other teacher-looking people.
I clapped once, but the rest of the auditorium stayed silent. I shrank in my seat.
Professor Andrews turned out to be the man who’d let me in. He walked to the podium looking a little frazzled.
“Okay, well, I think Eloise, er, Headmaster Jenkins, pardon me, did a pretty good job of welcoming everyone, and reviewing the rules with you, so I won’t be getting into any of that.” He took his glasses from the neck of his shirt and put them on. “I’m sure most of you, at least many of you for whom this is not your first year, have already heard about Rebecca Normandy.”
There was a slight rustling in the audience, but an immediate halt in the whispering.
“In the interest of providing correct information to all of you at once, and keeping the school from crippling rumors, I’ll tell you what we know. Since May fourteenth, Rebecca Normandy has been missing. It’s not clear what happened, only that she was here one moment and gone the next. If anyone hears anything from her, sees her, or is in any kind of contact with Miss Normandy, you must tell someone.”
I listened carefully, and then felt my stomach plummet through my seat.
Rebecca Normandy was Becca, the old roommate. Hers was the “slot that opened up” at Manderley.
“This
