Ghost Stories

"Ahh! Stop! You're messing me up!"

"Jill, no. Not even. That lipstick makes you look like a -- "

"Who stole my bag?"

The girls' bathroom was full of giggles and squeals as we prepared for playing in the bands that afternoon. I tried to ignore them as I put on my mascara, my jaw hanging slack.

Suddenly, the door banged open and Maria charged in, panting. "You guys. I'm really freaked out right now."

"What happened?" I turned with the rest of them, my mouth still open.

"The books," she said, "on the top shelf in our classroom. I was just sitting there, and they started falling, one at a time, real slowly." She shuddered. "Like someone was knocking them off."

We all exchanged glances. That was odd, and very creepy, and we were about to discuss it when the grade ones busted into the bathroom, and we all fell into pretending we didn't care about anything at all, much less some unnerving story about our classroom.

Back in the classroom, we put in Owl City's CD and started singing the song "Fireflies" together. On the first line, the song stopped suddenly. We turned to look at the CD player and saw the CD flying out into the walk-in closet.

My hand flew to my mouth and I chewed furiously on my nails. "That's where Delyla died," I said softly.

We all knew about Delyla. She'd bled to death in that closet years ago, though no one knew why. The idea made us all go cold. And then the door slammed shut.

Two pairs of sharp scissors flew out of the basket on our teacher's desk. One pair flashed by my friend Sammy's knee, slashing viciously into the skin. Sammy began to scream; her boyfriend, Josh, rushed over and scooped her up. He barreled towards the door, yelling for the others to pull it open. With some effort, they did, and he disappeared in the direction of the nurse's office.

I moved to follow, but the door slammed shut again, and this time it wouldn't open.

We were all in panic mode now. Jill fainted, swooning across her desk; suddenly, the window shattered and the glass pelted all of us. Covered in blood, my teacher dashed to the P.A. system and called the principal.

Thirty seconds later, the principal arrived, grim-faced, and pushed her way into the classroom.

"There is a poltergeist in here," she said. "Everyone calmly walk to Mrs. Arjo's classroom. You will perform in there."

Josh was supporting Sammy down the hallway by the time we were standing solemnly to Mrs. Arjo's room. Sammy was conscious again, but she looked queasy. I spotted them through the window, and tried to wave at them to get their attention, but they didn't see me and kept walking right back to our classroom.

A feeling of dread clamped onto my stomach. I bit my lip and hoped nothing would happen to them.

Then, a dreadful scream.

Moving as one, we all rushed back to our classroom, our teacher at the rear of the pack. I was first there, and stepped through the doorway, only to find myself screaming silently.

Sammy and Josh were sprawled on the floor amidst the broken glass, their arms gashed by what looked like scissors.

Next to them, their blood was not pooled, but scraped into rough letters.

"Now you see how it feels."

I lost consciousness.