Where he was, he didn't quite know. But where he was, standing on a cliff, grass beneath his feet, was somewhere strange and beautiful and familiar.

    Above him was the sky on fire, a tapestry painted in seamless layers of orange and yellow and blue. An expanse of creased, dark blue silk ended below, at the foot of the cliff, crashing onto the rocks in white froths, their sounds a calming, peaceful roar in his ears. The wind blew against his still figure like a gentle passing embrace.

    The boy took a breath. Then—

    "This is it," said a gruff voice. "The last of our days."

    "And after midnight, we shall never lay our eyes on the horizon again," sighed another voice, the most articulate of his friends.

    A moment's silence, as the breeze washed over their still figures, the sun dipping slowly into the sea.

    "And what lies beyond that?" asked the only girl among them, her voice barely a whisper. "What shall become of us?"

    "That we shall only know when the time comes," replied a new voice, smooth and boyish, the youngest of them.

    "And the perils beyond?" the boy heard himself ask. "How are we to face the unknown?"

    For a while, no one spoke, every one of them unsure and quietly anxious. The wind blew towards them once again, just as the sun sank gracefully into the sea, finding its resting place in the dark waters.

    "Together," the boy with the gruff voice said. "We face them together."

Something beeped—once, twice, thrice.

    Sander's eyes cracked open at the sound. He found himself in the shadows, far away from the cliff and the horizon, and he could hear the noise no more than a couple feet away, on the bedside table where an alarm clock sat. His eyes settled on its face, "5:30" flashing in light green digits. The blond boy reached a hand over, pressed down a button. Silence.

    For a moment, he simply lay in bed, in the quietness of the room, wiping away the sleep from his eyes—until something made a low rumble, a sudden deep-throated sound. Sander lay there, still and startled, as the creature—whatever it was—whistled out air. Then came another rumble, and an exhale of breath, and the same deep-throated noise.

    He glanced over to the other side of the room, where Damien lay sprawled across the bed, looking more passed out than having fallen asleep. Still fully dressed in a black tee and jeans and socks, the sheets creased beneath his heavy form. At the bottom of the bed were his shoes, one sneaker upright, the other upside down on the floor.

    Sander smiled to himself, remembering. If it weren't for his intervention yesterday, he was sure a fist, not an alarm clock, would've woken him up right now. And so he decided against waking his roommate, as a subtle gesture of thanks, allowing Damien more time to recharge. Besides, after yesterday's events, he needed the sleep.

    Sander sat up, pulled the sheets away, got out of bed. He didn't want to be late. He wanted no more trouble after yesterday . . .

    A quiet sigh escaped his lips.

    Yesterday had done enough.

Even before the sun was up, the team had been running around the campus grounds. And this to them was normal, an everyday routine, and they no longer complained as they did in the start.

    "All right. Move, move, move," their coach said, clapping his hands.

    Teenage boys jogged past him, most of them as tall as six feet to six foot four. Then one of a few anomalies moved past, one of the shortest of the boys at five-ten. Yet he was skilled and quick, surpassing most of them on the team.

    Their coach had always been aware of Jack's potential, having noticed this back when he first tried out. He was applying for the Ravenwood Academy Athlete Scholarship Program back then, coming from a run-down public junior high school in the city, his family in need of financial aid. And when he did get in last year, his freshman year, the coach decided to give him extra training almost immediately, pushing him to new heights. Jack was aware of this—that his coach was giving him extra work not for the reason that he was bad, but because he was good, and his coach aimed to push him to excellence. And he did get better, and this he held with great pride, more so when he proved this through last year's winning shot.

    Jack jogged on. By now, they had gone past the girls' dormitory house, and they were rounding a curve in the road. Jack kept his eyes on the path up ahead. There was the curve, and the trees that lined the road, and two tall men who stood in the shadows, watching.

    Jack blinked as he ran past them, not wanting to believe what he just saw. But then he found himself pausing in his tracks, flitting his eyes back over to the trees he had just passed. And under the shade, there stood . . .

    No one.

    "Forster!" the coach called out, approaching him. "Why the sudden stop, boy?"

    "Coach, I—" he began, just as Coach Little came to a halt before him. The coach—a bald, dark-skinned, middle-aged man, standing six feet tall—crossed his arms, then, and wore the signature austere expression the boy knew so well.

    "You what?" questioned the coach, raising an eyebrow.

    Most of the team had jogged past them by now, and Jack could feel some curious eyes linger on them for a second, before turning back to the path ahead.

    "I—" Jack glanced back at the trees, at the shadows—no one. "Just got distracted," he said, his eyes returning to the coach. "Thought I saw something. But it's nothing, Coach."

    "You pulling my leg, Forster?" asked Coach Little, with a hint of growing frustration.

    "No, Coach," said Jack, alarmed.

    The coach patted the boy's shoulder, hard, then blew his whistle right in the boy's face, leaving a ringing sound in Jack's ears. "Then get a move on," he scolded.

    Jack turned right then and there, and moved, jogging at a pace faster than usual. He had to catch up with the rest of the team up ahead.

    "No room for distractions," Coach Little called after him. "Keep your head in the game. Understand?"

    "Yes, Coach," answered Jack, without a backward glance.

    But he swore—and he knew—his eyes hadn't played tricks on him back there.

Max was walking down the pavement, without company, fully dressed for the first time in his school uniform since he first tried it on.

    He felt strange going to school dressed like this: collared white long-sleeves, gray slacks, black leather shoes, a black and blue striped tie, navy blue blazer in hand. His past schools never required a uniform, and in his mind's eye—and proved true by the mirror earlier this morning—he looked like one of those stereotypical snobby rich kids on television. So, before leaving, he rolled up the sleeves of his white shirt, in some effort to ease the feeling, to look more like himself. On the positive note, he thought, the whole boarding school thing sort of gave him the Harry Potter or X-Men vibes, and he had to admit, it did stir a little spark of excitement within him.

    The pavement was rather quiet that moment, save his own footsteps and those of a few others also making their way to the academic building. But it was when he was passing by another large, antique structure—much like the boys' dormitory, with its gray stone walls and smoke blue roof—that he heard a chorus of giggles, and he was pretty sure he heard a squeak, too. Max looked to the left, catching sight of a group of teenage girls by the double doors of the girls' dormitory. A couple of them were stealing glances in his direction, and when they saw that he had seen them, they looked away, turning their sights back to their other friends, and giggled again.

    Max ignored them, and walked on.

    As to where his roommate Jack was, he had no idea. He woke up this morning finding Jack's bed empty. And there had been no sign of him since. No note, no text, no mention of him leaving early the night before. He had feared that he would get lost, that he would find himself late, but the signs around the school grounds were easy to follow, and he still seemed early enough for class. Turns out there was no need for a companion, after all.

    He had already gone past The Raven's Nest, the academic building coming to view, when somewhere someone called out, "Hey!" Footsteps pounded against the pavement. "Wait up!" Max thought there was something familiar about that voice. "Max!"

    Max paused in his steps, and turned around. Sander was running towards him, one hand grasping the strap of his crossbody backpack, the other on the hem of the blazer he wore. And in no time, he came up beside him, panting a bit.

    "Hey, Sander. What's up?"

    Sander caught his breath for a moment. Then they continued their steps.

    "Nothing," said Sander, shrugging, his left hand closing around the strap of his backpack. "Just saw you from afar, thought I'd say hi."

    Max chuckled. "That's one way to do it."

    "Glad you appreciate it."

    They were walking up to the entrance now, taking their steps on the concrete path, past the statue of a raven about to take wing. And that's when Sander noticed something out of the ordinary: two security guards stood by the double doors, one positioned on each side.

    Right in front of the boys were a group of girls, popular girls in their junior year as Sander knew them to be, sauntering their way to the front doors. And before any of them managed to step inside, the guards shot out an arm each to block their way in. The girl at the front took a step back, accidentally stepping on the toe box of one of her friend's polished black pumps.

"Um, excuse me?" said a pretty girl with long blonde hair, mobile phone in her perfectly manicured hand. Sander and Max heard her phone ring a couple of times. Then it intoned, "The person you have called is unavailable right now. Please try your call again later." She cursed under her breath.

    "Necessary precautionary measures," explained the guard at the right, "and that means tighter security, young lady." She was a big woman, dark-skinned, with eyes and a voice that told the world that she was one not to cross.

    The other guard, a middle-aged man with receding hair and a short beard, added, with some sort of authoritative, good-cop smile, "No exceptions, no excuses."

    "Now," said the woman security guard. "Please form two orderly queues. Boys to the left, girls to the right. Open your bags, show us the contents for inspection; we'll pat you down, then you're free to go."

    Without delay, two lines formed.

    "I'm guessing this is new," said Max, going behind Sander.

    Sander zipped open his bag. "It is," he said, holding out his backpack to the security guard.

    "Well, we don't want what happened yesterday to happen again, do we?" said the male security guard, gesturing Sander to put his backpack down on the ground. He patted the blond boy down. "All right, good to go. Next."

    And with that, Max stepped forward.

The bell had rung almost half an hour ago, but Damien was still running, fully aware that he was late for his first class. He ran up the steps to the front doors, was blocked by a security guard, scolded by another security guard, had his bag inspected, was patted down, and after that ran down the corridor and up the stairwell, till he arrived at Room 221.

    He pulled the door open, then, and all eyes turned to him as he took a step in. He could hear some snickers in the room. "'Morning, Mrs. Chase," Damien managed to say.

    Mrs. Chase, a pretty, petite brunette in her mid-thirties, sighed. Then she said, "You're late, Mister Bautista. Thirty minutes late. I've already marked you absent."

    Damien nodded. "Sorry, Mrs. Chase."

    Mrs. Chase gave him one last look, and gestured that he take his seat. And with that, Damien made his way over to the desks, past a dreary, raven-haired girl, along an aisle where a pretty, blonde girl lifted her bag off a chair and tapped her perfectly manicured hand against the desk beside her. He took his seat there, next to her, and the second he did, she pouted her glossy pink lips, batted her long mascara-touched lashes, and muttered, "Where were you?"

    "Cheryl, I—"

    "You were supposed to meet me before first period. We were going to walk to class together, remember?"

    Damien said nothing. For a moment, all he could hear was Mrs. Chase discussing about this school year's syllabus, the usual practice.

    "I tried calling you, and you weren't picking up. I even texted you, like, a million times."

    "I slept in," muttered Damien. "I was tired."

    "But a promise is a promise, Damien," she said, disapprovingly. "And remember, you ditched me yesterday for your friends and some guys you just met."

    "And what seems to be the problem here?" said Mrs. Chase's articulate voice. "Mister Bautista, Miss Grant, care to share your conversation with the class?"

    All eyes turned to them, and both Damien and his girlfriend said nothing. Mrs. Chase looked down at them, the look on her face stern and expectant. Somewhere near the front, Lyn smiled a lopsided grin, unnoticed to anyone else. There was just something funny about this, she thought.

    "Thought so," said Mrs. Chase, after a few beats of silence. "Going back," she went on to say, walking over to the teacher's table, "with these activities in store and for you to have ample time for each one, your initial assessment test will be on Wednesday, and your first graded activity is scheduled next Monday."

    A chorus of groans echoed round the classroom, but Mrs. Chase paid no mind—she was used to this.

    "On Monday, you will be having your second assessment test." She paused, then added, "With a twist."

    The room was quiet now, save for a low mumble of murmurs somewhere.

    "I believe that to truly assess your skills in grammar and vocabulary, it must be done on the basis of application than merely giving you a written test. Hence, for your second assessment test, you will have to make a creative presentation about someone." Mrs. Chase's hand reached for a pile of papers on the desk behind her. Then, "Each of you will be paired with a classmate, and you will have to tell us about your partner through any original, creative presentation—whether that be through speech, video, poetry, song, et cetera, as long as it would require you to speak and apply your skills in grammar and vocabulary. Now," she said, handing sheets of paper to those seated in front, "these are the criteria and corresponding points for the activity. Please get one and pass. And while the papers are being distributed, I will be assigning you your partners, so please pay attention."

    Mrs. Chase then returned to the teacher's table, took a seat behind the desk. She reached for a particular piece of paper on the tabletop, and read, "Sean Anderson and Deborah Turner . . . "

    "Talk about stress on the first day," whined Cheryl, taking a sheet and handing the rest to the girl behind her.

    Damien shrugged. "Just another day in the life," he said.

    "Easy for you to say."

    "Damien Bautista and Adelina Taraschi," announced Mrs. Chase.

    Although it wasn't quite apparent, it did surprise Damien to hear Lyn's name, to find her seated a couple of rows in front of him. And she was looking at him, too, giving him a rather blank look.

    "She's new," said Cheryl, taking notice. "I haven't seen her around before." Then her eyes narrowed, glancing at her boyfriend to the raven-haired girl and back again. "You know each other, don't you?"

    Lyn turned her sights away, then.

    "Childhood friend," said Damien. "And nothing more than that," he added, placing his hand over his girlfriend's.

    Cheryl smiled and giggled with delight.

    An hour later, the bell rang, putting everything in motion—someone pulled the door open; students zipped their bags, picked them up, and made their way out; Mrs. Chase announced a few more reminders over the noise. And as he had promised her, Damien and his girlfriend walked down the hallway to their next class together, her hand in his.

Sander stumbled into the cafeteria, quickly making his way to the queue, yet his eyes were searching around for someone, anyone he knew he could trust.

    He had to be fast. He didn't like the looks Ronny and his friends were giving him back there in class—they didn't mean well. There was something in his brain, a thought, that nagged and bounced around the walls of his headspace, convincing him that they were keeping an eye out for him, despite their agreement with Damien yesterday. But a part of him thought that it might have been because of it—the deal—that they acted this way: the incident had left them humiliated, it had done something to their pride, and it was his fault, or so they perceived it to be. So he kept his head low, in some effort to blend into the crowd, to hide and remain invisible.

    Sander, however, might have been too late. There was a tap on his shoulder from behind. And so he braced himself for the worst, and turned his sights to the back, his eyes falling upon a petite figure, blonde and blue-eyed.

    He breathed out a sigh of relief. "Oh, hi, Talya," said Sander, as calmly as he could.

    "Hi," she said, giving him a perplexed look. Then, "Sander, are you okay?" she asked, concerned.

    Sander nodded, stiffly. "Yeah," he said, keeping a straight face. "I'm okay."

    "Really?" said Talya, raising an eyebrow.

    "Mmhmm," he said, giving her a thumbs-up, his elbow knocking into the side of someone standing behind him. He muttered a quick apology, the boy behind him glaring at Sander's shorter form, and then he turned back to Talya, who simply gave him a weak smile.

"Sander, I saw you hurrying down the hallway," she said. "Like, what's the rush? Looking for someone?"

    Sander chuckled. "Oh. No. I was just"—he thought of an excuse—"hungry."

    Talya laughed. "You must be very hungry, then."

    "Yeah, really hungry," said Sander, taking a step back as the line moved forward, stepping inadvertently on the heel of whoever stood behind him. The boy glared down at him once again, and Sander muttered another apology.

Talya said, "Still doesn't explain why you kept looking around even after you've fallen in line."

"Well," said Sander, "I was, um—I was looking for you."

Talya blinked in surprise. "Oh."

    "I was thinking if we could have lunch together."

    The line moved again. Everyone took a step forward.

    Talya bit her lip. "I have a meeting over lunch," she said, "with the other student council candidates. We've got so much to do—planning and posters and platforms to come up with." She glanced down at the floor for a moment, and looked back up at Sander. "Sander, I'm really sorry—"

    "Talya," he said, giving her a reassuring smile. "It's all right. I understand." He paused, realizing something. "Just don't wear yourself out, okay? Take some rest when you need to."

    Talya smiled. He understood. "Thanks, Sander. Maybe we could—"

    "Hello! Dudes!" another voice called out, one Sander found familiar. Sander looked up. Talya looked back. Max stood a few paces behind them, a nervous smile etched on his face. "Hope I'm not interrupting anything, but you're holding up the line."

    Sander transferred his glance over to front of the queue. A considerable amount of empty floor space separated him from the boy he elbowed earlier. By now, the other boy was holding his tray out to the cafeteria lady as she dumped heaping spoonfuls of mashed potato, and he was staring at Sander, annoyed, the look in his eyes enough to express how much of an idiot he thought the short, blond boy was.

    Sander swallowed a lump in his throat, held an arm out before a red-faced Talya. "Ladies first," he said, nervously.

Talya nodded, took her steps forward. Sander followed suit.

An air of quiet embarrassment lingered about them as they moved down the line. They got their food, paid the woman behind the counter, went through the motions without a glance or a word to each other. Sander could feel eyes look his and Talya's way even as they walked away from the counter together. Yet he ignored the glances, or rather did as best he could to shrug the thought off, deciding with conviction that as a friend and as a gentleman he should walk Talya to her table: it seemed the right thing to do.

"Maybe we could hang out sometime," said Talya, breaking the silence between them. "After the elections, after all this campaign stuff is over."

Sander smiled at the thought. "Sounds good to me."

They arrived at Talya's table, a group of students in active discussion, sample posters and notepads and plates of half-eaten food strewn about the tabletop.

    "Well, duty calls," said Talya, with a weak smile. "See you later."

    "See you, Talya."

    And with that, Sander took a couple steps back and turned to the other tables, searching for an empty one himself. But before he could take another step, a hand rested on his shoulder, and he looked back and up, at a tall boy with tousled brown hair.

    "Looking for a table?" asked Max.

    Sander nodded. "Are you looking for one, too?"

    "Yeah," said Max. "A table. And company."

    Sander looked around. All tables seemed to be occupied that moment, but there was one he caught sight of—and although it wasn't empty, having met her yesterday, he sort of knew her, the raven-haired girl who sat there reading a book. He hoped she wouldn't mind, and so he began to make his way over to that particular table, with Max following right beside him.

    Sander asked, "What about Jack?"

    "He's with the basketball team."

    "I'm not surprised."

    "I don't want to disrupt anything," said Max. "And I'm sure I'll just be some odd-one-out, anyway. Sports isn't really my thing."

    Lyn looked up when she sensed their presence, or rather when their shadows fell upon the pages of the book she was reading. She stared at them blankly for a moment, before Sander asked, "Mind if we sit here?"

    Lyn said nothing, then, "I'll be reading my book, making no noise, and pretending I'm not here."

    Sander looked at her, bewildered.

    "It means she's cool with it," said Max. "It's a Harry Potter reference."

    "Smart boy," said Lyn, giving Max a sarcastic smile.

    Sander and Max set their trays down, and took their seats, opposite each other.

    "So tell me," said Max, putting his backpack down on the floor, "how did a dorky nerd like you get to be friends with a smart, popular girl like Talya?"

    "Is it that unlikely?" asked Sander.

    "Mmhmm."

    Sander thought for a moment, then said, "Ronny and his gang stalked her for the first few weeks of her freshman year. It was the creepy kind—messaging her online, following her after school all the way to the girls' dormitory, calling her out to give them her number or that someone as beautiful as her should be hanging out with jocks like them. That kind of stuff."

    "But she's the headmaster's daughter . . . "

    "They didn't know back then," said Sander. "They just saw her as another one of those pretty freshman girls."

    "Like a new, shiny toy?"

    Sander shrugged. "You can put it that way." He paused for a moment. "One day, after school, she was headed back to the girls' dormitory, and they were calling out to her. Ronny and his friends came too close, and he grabbed her wrist. They pulled her to the trees, and said they wouldn't let her go unless she said yes to Ronny, so she threatened them that she'd call her dad. But they didn't believe that, and that's when she started crying for help. But those who saw that, who heard her, just walked on as if nothing was happening. That's the thing about people—they're always too scared, even to do the right thing."

    "But then you did?" asked Max.

    Sander nodded. "Sort of. I told Ronny to let her go, but all I got was a punch in the face from one of his friends. Can't remember who. His friends went on to beat me up, just as Ronny told them to do. Then, while everyone else was distracted, Talya pulled her phone out, called her dad. Once they heard Doctor McKenna's voice on loudspeaker, Ronny and his friends fled, leaving me and Talya there. They left me with a bleeding nose and some bruises, so Talya brought me to the infirmary. She thanked me, I thanked her. We started talking after that. Then we became friends."

    "That was really brave of you, though," said a girl's voice.

    Max and Sander shifted their eyes over to Lyn, book closed in hand.

    Sander asked, "You were listening the whole time?"

    "Hard not to," she said.

    Sander shook his head. "You're weird."

    Lyn simply smiled, as if holding back a chuckle. "I get that a lot," she said, "and not in the best ways."

Weird, the word echoed in Max's headspace. A word so easily thrown into the air of conversation, a description without much thought. Yet inadequate, in his opinion. There seemed more to Lyn than "weird". Max studied the girl seated opposite from them, and quietly pointed out to himself a few details that might have given her the label. Weird. Pretty odd—like the title of a Panic! at the Disco record. The things the eyes could see and so easily judge by mere appearance.

    For one, her raven hair and her pale skin did give off a subtle goth vibe. And her listening to their conversation this whole time, despite her reluctance to even be in their company, did surprise them.

    Then there was the mess of bracelets adorning her wrist, catching Max's eye. Bracelets of threads woven together, a bracelet with an ornate black glass bead on a thin strip of black leather, bracelets with names of rock bands embedded upon rubber surfaces, and, amidst the chaos, red lines etched on pale skin peeking through.

    Max's eyes widened, then, and he drew in a breath, sharp yet noiseless. And all he could do was stare, trace her scarlet cuts with his eyes, and wonder why she would do this to herself, wonder what could have possibly pushed her to hurt herself like that. But before he could look away, Lyn caught him staring. She pulled her sleeve up, and said, "I'll get a move on."

    "But it's barely thirty minutes into lunch," said Max. "And it doesn't seem like you've eaten anything." He held up a box of french fries, then, "French fry?" he offered.

    "Not hungry," she said, rising from her chair. She swung her backpack over her shoulder, picked up her book. "But thanks, anyway."

    And with that, she left, leaving behind two confused boys. Lyn made her way out the cafeteria, without a pause, without even a backward glance. She stepped into the empty hallway, then ran straight ahead, in search for somewhere she could hide, somewhere she could be alone.

Trigger warning. Skip to the next chapter if necessary.

Lyn pushed the door open, shut it quickly behind her. No one else was in the restroom, and for this she was grateful. She could feel the tears behind her eyes threatening to spill.

    She just had to listen, didn't she? If only she didn't listen, if only she hadn't stuck around to hear it all, she wouldn't be wondering now why no one had come to save her when she needed someone the most. Of course, she didn't deserve any help from anyone, but Talya did—Talya deserved someone to save her. Talya was kind and pretty and good enough. She deserved something good, because she was good. She had her life together, unlike—

    CAN YOU SAY THE SAME ABOUT YOURSELF?

    Then rushed in the memories, wave upon wave, into her brain—the things that happened, the things they'd said, the reasons why they did what they did. And she just had to be careless, didn't she? Max shouldn't have seen that. He shouldn't have seen that. No one should see that.

    It was her own fault. Lyn's fault. Everything was her fault. What they did, what he saw—it was all her fault. Who she was, what she was. Monster in human flesh. No one else to blame. What they did, why they did—her! Her faultherfaultherfaultherfault . . .

    I deserve it, Lyn thought to herself. Punishment. It was punishment because of me. I deserve it. Don't fit in, can't be normal, not good enough—monster! What you did. You must be punished, punished, punished. Punished—

    NOW, they hissed.

    She walked over to a cubicle, stepped in, locked the door behind her. And there she cried, screaming noiselessly into the void.

    She knew they were speaking to her again. They were singing their wretched song, their voices echoing into the shadows, into the smoke, entangling into her own thoughts. She should just shut them off, her parents said. All this nonsense about those voices. But she can't, she can't, she can't . . .

    It was her fault. Everything was her fault. Herfaultherfaultherfaultherfault . . .

    She hung her bag onto the hook at the back of the door, zipped her backpack open, dug her hand deep inside, into a little pocket at the back, till she felt it.

    In her hand was a pen—or so one might think. There were two caps—one end was a pen; the other, a knife.

    Lyn chose the knife.

    No one should see, she thought, twisting the cap. Lyn pulled her sleeve down, pushed her bracelets up her wrist, to reveal pale flesh marked in red lines. No one should know, she thought, running the cold blade against white skin. It's all my fault. I deserve this. They'd see me the way they saw me, do to me as they did to me—if they knew, if they saw. No one should see. No one should know.

    NO ONE, they chorused, smiling in the dark.

_______

Author's note: Before anyone attacks me, I know this isn't an accurate description of mental illness and that experiences of mental illness differ from one person to another. But these are one of the things I cannot better express than through metaphors—how it feels, the chaos that pervades one's mind. I hope this doesn't offend anyone, and I hope you understand. Till next time.

xx,
Lazarein