Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc (The Fallacy of Ghost Hunting)

Oh great, Sid thinks to himself. Stuck in a room with everyone I hate.

He glowers covertly at the other four people wandering aimlessly around the otherwise empty classroom. One sits beside him. Again. It’s Gale. “It has been exactly three hours after our dismissal,” she helpfully informs in that formal tone that’s always needlessly polite.

“Gale, there’s a clock on the wall. If I wanted a timecheck, I’d get it myself.”

She doesn’t seem at all deterred at his sarcasm. “Pardon. I only meant to emphasize the length of time we have been here,” she says. We have. Not We’ve. In all honesty, Sid has no clue on what she has against contractions. He’s above asking, though. Asking means he actually noticed and cares. A ridiculous assumption.

“Sid,” she says more seriously, her brow furrowing in worry. “It is past our bedtime,” she stresses. Part of Sid wants to laugh at her for sleeping at eight. The other part forgot that they were dismissed at five o’ clock. Due to bad weather, students got out an hour later instead of earlier. If only the widdifully wonderful Mayor had listened to the weather report this morning. Ninety percent chance of rain. Ninety. And yet he didn’t suspend.

The storm’s still pretty strong, but the sound is muted by the windows. All of them were closed right before everyone absconded. Everyone except for these unfortunate five. Previously, they had been waiting at Gate C, but the flood had gotten too high. It even got to push open the Gate, which would not have happened if the guard made sure it was locked before fleeing. Sid assumes he had fled. No one in their right mind would stay behind under those circumstances.

Sid’s eyes pass over the other three who have been talking nonstop the entire time. Now, they seem pretty glazed over. Even Keil, the overboard extrovert who everyone likes. It’s strange to see her finally quit standing and slump on a chair, an unmistakable frown on her face. The other two, the Santiago’s, look rather antsy.

“How long do you think until we have to start speaking to each other?” Sid murmurs to Gale.

“It is inevitable, I think. But you have successfully ignored each other for three whole hours and counting. With persistence, I estimate thirty more minutes maximum?” she says.

“You getting sleepy there, Sid?”

Sid closes his eyes in exasperation before slowly turning to face the speaker. “No need to shout, Keil. We’re the only five people in the room.”

“No need to snap, Obsidian. I was only asking,” she half-laughs. A malicious grin cracks on her face. “I don’t advise you to sleep, though. There are rumours...” She stands on her chair. ”... of the school being... haunted.” She wiggles her fingers drammatically. Thunder rolls abovehead, making Keil smugger.

Ral, one of the Santiago cousins, claps her hands and smiles, eager for a story. On the other hand, Rob raises an eyebrow, the side of his mouth poking upwards.

“Oh God,” Sid sighs.

“It was not unpredictable. You should have foreseen it,” Gale tells him.

“You A-classers are such killjoys,” Rob drawls out.

“It’s A-students, Santiago,” Sid retorts, but does not rebut. He can’t think of anything to say that won’t sound defensive. Rob sticks out his tongue, causing Sid to roll his eyes.

“Boys,” Keil cutts in. “Trying to tell a story here. Okay.” She wiggles her fingers again and uses her deep, creepy narrator voice. “It was a regular school day. The sun was shining, and a few little gradeschoolers thought it was the perfect day to play hide and seek. One of them was Little Johnny.”

“Why is it always ‘Johnny’?” Ral whines. Rob shushes her, but she continues. “I’m just saying, why not ‘Edward’? Or maybe ‘Lolita’? It sounds way creepier than ‘Johnny’--”

“I don’t make the stories, Ral!” Keil points at her in mock outrage. “I just tell them. Anyway--”

“Who makes them up then?” Sid asks.

“Little Johnny thought he found the best hiding place!” Keil near-yelled, drowning out Sid’s possible elaboration. “In an old Bodega the Janitors stopped using. He snuck in there, and sure as the sun, his playmates couldn’t find him. They called him out, but he wanted to be the ultimate hide-n’-seek champion. He didn’t come out for hours--”

“Didn’t he need to pee?” Ral asked.

“Ral! Where was I? Oh yeah. His friends had already quit looking for him. Finally, Little Johnny decided to come out-- ONLY TO REALIZE THAT HE HAD LOCKED HIMSELF IN! For days he cried for help, but no Janitors used that bodega anymore. Only after a month... when his body started to reek... did they discover it rotting away and infested with maggots!”

“Eww,” Ral and Sid reacted. Rob laughed. Particularly at Sid.

“Some say that Little Johnny’s ghost is stuck there. And that he can only escape if he finds another unfortunate child to take his place... And that is the story of Bodega 5!” Keil finishes in a suddenly cheerful tone.

“I find that story pattern somewhat overused, I am afraid,” Gale confesses. Keil looks deeply offended. Her mouth hangs open.

Rob takes over. “Well, got any better ghost stories?” he shoots.

Gale shakes her head. “I do not make any.” Sid snorts at that, earning a glare from Rob.

Thunder cracks in the distance, making the stranded students remember their predicament. Sid doesn’t know about the others, but he’s perfectly fine with sleeping over in the school. His parents are working overseas, so there isn’t anyone fetching him tonight. Commuting is a ‘no’, because of the lake that has developed in the span of six hours. Sid has already accepted these facts.

The silence stretches, until broken by Keil. “So...” Her evil grin has returned. “Anyone want to go ghost hunting?”

“Keil, we’re highschoolers,” Sid says.

“We are middleschoolers by K-12 standards,” Gale corrects.

“Whatever. We’re fourteen, and I’m sure none of us believes in ghosts anymore.”

“So you used to?” Keil presses him. Sid tries on his best withering stare.

“I wanna come,” Ral pipes up. They all stare at her. “What? It’s not like we’ve got anything else to do. I’m tired of just sitting around.”

Rob stands. “Then I’ll come too, I guess.” Eyes turn to Sid and Gale. Gale looks at Sid. Sid rolls his eyes.

“What? Too killjoy or too chicken?” Rob taunts. Ral shushes him, then turns to Sid.

“Come on! Who cares if ghosts are real? It’s better than just waiting here,” she smiles generously with her palms out.

Sid looks at her hand and considers taking it. Instead, Sid tries to look severely annoyed when he says “Fine.” In truth, he just doesn’t want to be alone.

“I shall tag along,” Gale announces.

“Good choice!” Keil says. “Alright, I lead! Bodega 5, here we come!” She marches to the door, followed by the cousins, then by Gale and Sid. Gale leans in to whisper in Sid’s ear.

“Do you think leaving the room is a wise choice?” she asks.

Sid ponders for a moment before shaking his head. “It’s not about ‘wise’ anymore, Gale. It’s about how stupidly we can pass the time,” he jokes.

*

The corridors are dark. The only sources of light are the lightning streaks that come in succession from outside. Sid knows the switches would work, but turning them on would make Rob tease him for being scared. That imbecile. No one else tries to turn on the lights, though he sees Ral twitch towards the switches as they pass by.

“So what’s our plan exactly? We enter Bodega 5 and lock ourselves in?” Sid says.

Keil turns to walk backwards-- or at least that’s what Sid can tell from her silhouette. “Not a bad idea, Sid!” Her teeth reflect the scarce glow of lightning.

“That’s boring,” Rob says. “I wanna check out the Quad.”

″’Cause that’s far more interesting, Santiago.”

“Take a hike, Trinidad!”

Ral falls behind to talk to Gale. “Do you get this a lot? I get this a lot.”

“Sid’s personality is something to get accustomed to,” Gale agrees. Traitor, Sid thinks.

“You know I was talking to the Janitor the other day,” Keil started babbling again. “And you know how this place used to be a convent, right? Well the Janitor told me that he had to stay late the night before. At around midnight, he said he saw some movement down at the Quadrangle. He had one of those huge flashlights, and he shone it down--”

“Did he glimpse the Midnight Murderer?” Gale asks, looking sincerely intrigued. Sid remembers her obsession with serial killers. She literally has a poster of Jack the Ripper in her bedroom. She sleeps with it on the wall right beside her bed.

“God-- No!” Keil says, actually looking scared for a moment. “He saw a nun DIGGING HERSELF OUT OF THE GROUND!”

“Oh,” Gale says, unimpressed.

“The Midnight Murderer’s been in the asylum for a year, Gale,” Sid reminds her. “There’s no way a janitor saw him two nights ago.”

“So that’s your name. Gale,” Keil says thoughtlessly.

Sid scowls at her. “Seriously?”

She spreads her arms out as if to say What? It’s not my fault! “Sorry,” she shrugs.

“Though most people find it repugnant, I am not offended that you forgot my name,” Gale says, sliding her hand against the windows.

“Thank you,” Keil grins.

Before Sid could fume at her, the lights at the far side of the corridor flicker on and off. Ral gasps, Keil spits out an expletive, Rob spits out a more atrocious expletive, and Gale keeps silent. “What was that?” Keil exclaims.

Sid scans the corridor with his eyes, but the light is gone, so he sees nothing. Ghosts aren’t real, he thinks over and over again like a protective mantra. He sees Rob take a daring step forward. Undoubtedly to show off.

“It was probably just the lightning,” Sid discourages him.

“Yeah. The lightning inside the building,” Rob glances back at him. Ral quickly follows behind her cousin, as if to give him backup against this imaginary monster. Keil steps forward too.

Sid sighs in exasperation. “Come on. There’s a million reasons why that light could have flickered. It’s probably not a gh--”

All the lights above them turn on, causing everyone to yelp. They spin around quick to see Gale’s hand on the light switches. “Pardon. I thought it would be easier to find clues if the light was on,” she says.

Sid squints against the brightness. “At least we know we’re not all imbeciles--”

A series of metal clangs and clatters ring out from the far side of the corridor, where the lights have turned off. “Shut up, Trinidad,” Rob hisses. “What room is that at the end of the corridor?”

“The Cooking Room,” Ral whispers to him, trying to conceal the quiver in her voice.

She’s scared, Sid notes, but that won’t stop her from beating the living hell out of whatever comes round that corner. Last year, she beat up some older students who were trash-talking Rob. She never got caught because the older boys didn’t want to admit they were beat up by a twelve-year old girl.

Sid smiles to himself. He was the one who got the older boys to trash-talk Rob.

Rob enters the room first, determined to find a ghost. He doesn’t turn on the lights, probably due to his stupid theatrics. Everyone gets in at once, not wanting to be the rearguard in a horror movie. They venture around in different directions: the Santiago’s to the farthest kitchens near the giant mirror, Sid and Gale to the near ones, and Keil to the one and only refrigerator.

“You know there’s a ghost story about this place. A teacher sees a child playing around while the students are having a practical test--” Keil gabs.

“Keil. Shut up,” Rob says.

“Not helping,” Ral adds.

Keil raises her hands in surrender, then returns to investigating the refrigerator.

Sid feels around the sink of the second kitchen. It’s dry, as to be expected. He looks at Gale, who’s in the first kitchen, nearest the door.

“Anything?” he asks her quietly.

She rummages through the emergency kit by the wall. She turns to him with an object in each of her hands. “Flashlights,” she smiles, tossing one.

Sid reaches out to catch it. “Thanks,” he says when he does, realizing only then what would have happened if he didn’t get to. It would be noisy, and he’d be breaking school property with four witnesses. He shrugs it off, and tests the light.

Keil shrieks. They all snap their necks towards her. “There’s Stick-O!” she says ecstatically, grabbing a plastic cylinder filled with wafer sticks from the fridge.

“Keil, I will-” -expletive- ”-kill you,” Rob growls.

Keil chuckles. “Light’s in my eye, Sid,” she covers her face. Sid makes the flashlight point at the floor, annoyed. “That’s better,” she says, beginning to munch on some Stick-O’s. “I can’t believe they would leave these here! Mm, they taste so good!”

Sid continues his search, trying not to grumble. His light reflects on something silver. It’s in the third kitchen. He walks into the area then sees pots and pans scattered on the floor. He releases a huff of surprise when his flashlight hits them all. “Rob...” he calls.

“What?” comes the reply.

Sid doesn’t answer. He sees little red spots on the floor, trailing further. He shines his light on the part of the floor they lead to, and is surprised when something reflects. There are utensils-- No, knives spilled on the floor. Four knives, Sid observes.

Each kitchen has five.

Ral screams. She stretches her hand to point at the mirror, as if it had wronged her. “I saw something! S-someone-- I saw someone in the mirror, h-he was staring at me like--”

“What do you mean?” Rob asks. “Where?”

They both look at the mirror. Sid checks over his shoulders. He feels like they’re being watched. Ral stammers. “I-i-it was right--”

“Guys,” Gale raises her voice. She looks serious. Almost angry. “Let us leave.”

They all bolt out at her command. Let us leave, Sid thinks. Was she telling them to leave, or was she asking permission from someone they couldn’t see to allow them to leave?

“Run!” one of them shouts, and they all flee through the corridors, then down the stairs. Sid doesn’t recall ever running so fast in his life. By the time they stop, they’re on the floor of the Mini Hall, breathless. Sid lies down on the rough floor, already feeling like he wants to sleep. He rolls his head to see the others.

Keil’s hugging the Stick-O’s to her chest. That girl has jacked-up priorities.

Gale’s beside him, looking left and right. “We... are complete,” she breathes out. Rob sits up, looking bummed. “I almost caught the ghost,” he complains.

Sid sits up at that. “Are you kidding me? Your cousin--”

“I saw it,” Ral exhales, her breath evening out. She’s holding her head in her hands, looking as if she wants to cry. “He looked at me with his eyes... so angry. He... he was so angry... At me...”

Silence hung thick and foreboding. Sid turns to Keil. “Give me a Stick-O. I’m gonna need it,” he says, taking one of the chocolate wafer sticks.

The walls of the Mini Hall are made out of glass. Outside, they can see with the help of the limited light from streetlamps, that the storm is still violent. Rain pours down the glass, and the trees are swaying dangerously. Sid remembers that since the Hall is in the first floor, it overlooks the quadrangle. He stands and lumbers to the glass, leaning on it for support.

“Hey Rob,” Sid calls without turning. “Here’s your sightly quadrangle.”

He hears Rob walk to his right. Rob mutters yet another expletive. Sid concurs. The quadrangle is flooded to the point that only the tops of the trees are visible. That and the flagpole, whose tip is burnt black, after being hit by lightning. That was when the faculty decided to give up on the Mayor and send the students home, but the flood was already too high for them to be safely dismissed. The ground floor classrooms were evacuated and, praise the Lord, the gradeschool students were sent home first.

One thing is certain: No one’s voting for that Mayor next election.

“Guess the nun wasn’t the ghost Ral saw,” Keil says nonchalantly. Sid looks at her. She’s stretching on the floor like a cat in the sun. She rolls over to meet his gaze. “You got scared, didn’t you?”

And just like that, Sid’s back to being stubborn. “I did not,” he glowers.

Keil’s grin spreads like a disease. “You sure looked like you did.”

“I did not.”

“Did too.”

Sid rolls his eyes, then returns to the window. “Okay,” Keil says. “Maybe we should go somewhere else haunted. Classroom 8C is nearby.”

Nobody asks What happened in Classroom 8C? so Keil goes out of her way to ask herself. “You guys don’t know that? The classroom with a poltergeist that pretends to be a class observer? Miss Benito?”

“No one wants to hear your stories, Keil. Ghosts aren’t real,” Sid’s words drip with venom.

″‘Ghosts aren’t real!’” Rob says in a poor imitation of Sid’s voice. “Did you not see what happened back in the cooking room?”

“I’m saying that there may have been a plausible explanation for that!”

“I’m not a liar,” Ral suddenly blurts from the corner. “If you think I’m lying, I’m not.”

“Okay, guys. Chill,” Keil interrupts, waving her hands above her head. “How about we just head to Classroom 8C to prove to Obsidian here that ghosts are real. We have... what? Twelve hours ’til the staff arrives?”

“Seven hours and thirty minutes. It is approximately nine-thirty right now, and the staff arrives at five o’ clock tomorrow,” Gale states, examining her watch.

“Right, thanks, Gale. I think my school bus won’t mind,” she glances at the flood outside, before her eyes return to Sid. “So?” Without waiting for a reply, she stands and ambles to the corridor.

To Sid’s surprise, Gale stands up too. Sid pulls her aside and tries to ask her without the others hearing. “Have you grown daft?” he starts.

“I have not.”

“Why?”

“Keil is obviously persistent in her ghost hunting aims. Splitting up in a school as spacious as this would be, as you say, daft. It is better to stay together. And as we cannot convince Keil to stay with us, we should instead follow her,” Gale reasons.

Sid blinks once. Twice. Then he sighs. “Fine,” he relents, joining her out the room.

Rob stands too. “Ral. You coming?” he calls. Ral remains on the ground, hugging her knees. She’s picking on the cuticle at the sides of her fingers.

“Ral! Ralene Santiago! I can’t leave you here!” he urges. Ral stands and begrudgingly follows them to the door. Sid nods, then faces Keil. She’s smiling like a lunatic. “Get on with it,” Sid says, and Keil obediently skips away.

*

The door to Classroom 8C is locked. Keil tries pathetically to bust it open, before Rob takes out from his pocket an honest-to-god lock-picking set. Sid gives him a look that states explicitly, What the hell do you even do with your life?

Rob growls and thinks probably along the lines of Who cares what you think? Get out of my way, which is typical of him. The felon manages to unlock the door within seconds. They hear a click, and Rob pulls the door open with a dramatic bow.

“Damn, man! Good job,” Keil smacks him on the shoulder.

“Convenient,” Gale remarks, walking in after Keil.

Ral smiles. “Whatever. I could do that faster if I tried.”

When it’s only Sid and Rob in the corridor, Rob rises from his bow and puts his hands on his hips, a smug grin on his face. Sid gazes up at him. “Oh bravo. Your deft hands astound me,” he says dryly. Rob sticks out his tongue, but doesn’t look disheartened. A rare defeat for Sid.

Inside the room looks no different from any other highschool classroom. Keil jogs to sit on the chair at the teacher’s table. She swings her arm to point at the blackboard. ”‘Eef yu dohn’t get tu annsah dees kwehhhs-chuns, yu weell nevah pass mayyy class,’” she says in a scratchy imitation of their science teacher’s voice.

Ral laughs from one of the armchairs. “Do Math Dad next,” she says.

Gale is standing in the center aisle, beaming her flashlight all around the room. “I see no poltergeist,” she frowns. Rob examines the observer’s chair at the back of the classroom, beside the huge cabinet that only teachers can open. He seems to really take seriously this whole ghost hunting business.

Sid leans on the cabinet, not bothering to turn on his flashlight. His eyes meander boredly, until they rest on the curtains, gently blown by the wind that escapes the closed windows. It almost looks like the curtains are breathing.

″‘Any questions? No? Okay, get one-whole sheet of paper--’”

They all jerk their heads up in fear at Keil’s impression of their math teacher. It was his signature ‘Pop quiz intro’. Students were never prepared for any of his quizzes. Keil laughs at their faces. “Math Dad: scarier than any poltergeist,” she jests.

Sid rolls his eyes-- just in time to see a silhouette pass behind the classroom windows. He stands straight, squinting at those windows on the wall that separates the classroom and the corridor. “What the...”

“Gale, how good are you at volleyball?” Keil asks, standing on the teacher’s table. Gale looks at her confused. “Decent? I do not understand the significance,” she replies.

Keil’s eyes are intense when she says, “Catch me.” She jumps from the table, her arm brushing the ceiling fan. “Volleyball players do not catch!” Gale screams before a loud crash is heard and the light from Gale’s flashlight disappears.

The room is drenched in complete darkness. Sid’s stomach tightens in discomfort. He hears groans, footfalls, the shuffling of clothes, and a squeak. He assumes the last one came from Ral.

Since no one’s asking how Gale is, and because she might have hit her head on the floor and died, Sid takes the duty upon himself. His voice fails the first few times he tries to talk, which is stupid because he isn’t afraid of the dark. And he isn’t afraid of ghosts. Nope. Not one bit.

“Gale, did you survive that?” His voice comes out higher than usual. Despite the cold, sweat trickles down his brow as he waits for a reply. The shuffling of clothes is audible, then a few more footsteps. “Yes,” Gale’s voice finally chokes out from somewhere on the ground in front of him.

“I knew I could reach the ceiling fan,” Keil croaks, contented.

“Gale, turn on the light,” Ral demands. She sounds mad. She’s scary when she’s mad.

Sid hears clattering, like pieces of shattered glass. Gale speaks. “I think Keil... I broke it,” she corrects herself. Sid groans at her chivalry. Keil practically breaks her back, and Gale still sees to it that she’s blameless.

Before he scolds her for it, his voice dies in his throat. He has that feeling again-- They’re being watched. He opens his eyes wide, but still it’s pitch black. A cold wind brushes the back of his neck. It came from his left. Sid realizes, a chill running down his spine, that the windows are on his right.

“Ha!” Rob yells as he smacks the light switches on. Something Sid forgot they could do.

“What the heck, Rob!” Ral screams at him. Keil and Gale slowly get up from the floor.

“I felt something!” Rob says seriously. “Something passed by me!” He marches to the curtains, searching for-- what? Sid isn’t entirely sure. Thunder booms outside, causing everyone to jump. The light flickers off, and for a moment, Sid is sure someone is laughing at them. Playing tricks, yet unseen.

“Show yourself!” Rob shouts at the walls. Everyone inches towards him for protection. They all know something is malevolently wrong here. Everyone but Sid, who leans on the cabinet again. He tries not to look frantic when he fishes for the flashlight in his pocket. He presses the button, beaming the light on Rob’s chest.

“There’s nothing to see. No one, rather,” Sid says coolly.

“Give me the flashlight,” Rob orders.

“No.”

“Dammit, Sid! I’m serious!”

“It’s my flashlight,” Sid says, realizing how childish he must sound.

Rob growls like a territorial dog. “Fine! Just-- Point it at the floor! I think I saw something.”

Sid waits a few seconds before doing so. He doesn’t want to look too cooperative. The beam hits the floor. Sid steps forward, sweeping the light around until it finds drops of blood at the door. Was that there before? Not too much blood, Sid thinks, but just enough to drip from a wound without squeezing.

There are only a handful of drops. One... Two... Sid traces them with his light until it reaches his shoes. The trail ends there.

“Look out!” Rob warns.

Sid feels a hand grab the back of his (meticulously ironed) uniform, and toss him to the chairs. The cabinet crashes to the ground where Sid was previously standing, breaking the two backmost seats as it falls.

Good Lord! What are they keeping in there? Sid thinks. He turns to see who pulled him, but everyone is already scrambling out the room. He picks up his flashlight and follows suit. Gale slams the door shut when they’re all out. They walk away briskly, as if they’re being chased. They probably are, Sid thinks. The feeling hasn’t left.

“It’s real! It’s real!” Keil covers her mouth in astonishment. Sid notices that she isn’t holding the Stick-O’s anymore. She must have left it on the teacher’s table. Not that they’re going to risk their necks to get it back, anyway.

“I knew it! We shouldn’t have gone here!” Ral cries. “Let’s go back to the Gate. Please!”

“Sid has to say it first!” Keil says. ”‘Ghosts are real.’ Come on!”

“First of all, I’d like to thank... whoever saved me. No need to name yourself, I won’t treat you any differently anyway.” Sid isn’t as ungrateful as he pretends to be. Sometimes. “Second of all, that wasn’t a ghost.”

Keil stops in her tracks. “Oh you little--” An expletive blesses their ears.

“Are you -” -expletive- ”-kidding me, Sid?” Rob explodes. “It tried to kill you! Squish you flat against the floor--”

“That was the cabinet. No ghost of any kind,” Sid says flatly.

“Oh yeah, the cabinet just started bleeding and decided to fall!”

“Listen here, Obsidian,” Keil grabs him by the collar. “You’re just being... being--the guy who dies first in any horror movie! We are not going back to the Gate until you swallow your fat pride and admit it!”

“Please, Sid,” Ral begs him. “Just say that ghosts are real. We won’t hold it against you!”

Sid stares at Keil, mouth tightly shut. At one second, Keil lets go of Sid’s collar, allowing him to regain his personal space. The next second, she gives him a solid punch to his cheek. Sid’s left eye tears up at the pain, and he feels anger boil inside him. He turns and punches her back, his knuckles colliding painfully with her cheekbone.

Before it turns into a full-on brawl, Gale steps between them, pushing a hand in each of their chests. She eyes both of them. “No,” she says plainly, yet effectively. Keil rips herself away from Gale’s reach. “Bodega 5. Now. Sid is going to see a ghost, even if I have to lock him in for it to happen,” she says through gritted teeth.

Sid laughs bitterly.

“No!” Ral bellows, stomping a foot. “We are going back to Gate C!”

“Guess what? You can’t make me,” Keil jeers.

Rob’s eyes travel back and forth between the two. Sid has to withhold a snort at that. Usually, it’s Rob making a ruckus. Now that he’s on the sidelines, he’s utterly clueless.

“Uh, guys, look, we can split up?” Rob suggests, moving his hands up and down, as if to pat calm the aura.

“Well fine! We’ll go this way,” Ral says, pointing towards the direction of the Gate.

“Fine!” Keil spits.

“No,” Gale repeats. She is suddenly brimming with authority. “We are not splitting up. Keil, I thought you would have learned enough from all those movies you say you watch, that splitting up just makes us easier for the monster to target. We are neither going to Bodega 5, nor to Gate C, because I do not know if you remember, Ralene, but the flood is almost as tall as we are-- perhaps taller! Understood?”

Everyone shuts up for a whole minute. Gale huffs, seeming uncomfortable with all the attention, but keeps her face austere. Sid’s mouth is open. He doesn’t remember ever being this proud of someone else in his entire life. “Where do we go then?” he asks.

Gale stares at him for a while, considering the question carefully in her head before answering, “The bathroom. The boy’s bathroom.”

They all make a sound of disbelief. “The boy’s bathroom has toilets and urinals, for both our genders,” she explains. “We have gone three hours without using the bathroom, and like I said, we cannot risk splitting up.”

Rob scratches his arm. “That’s gonna be... real awkward. And the girls’ bathroom is right beside the guys’, right? So that’s like, close enough. It’s not splitting up too far,” he reasons.

Gale gazes at him. “I am not allowing you and Sid to be alone in a room together.”

“She’s got a point there,” Keil raises her eyebrows pointedly at Rob.

“Alright, alright, let’s go. I don’t like being out in this corridor,” Ral confesses. “It feels like I’m being...”

‘Watched’ goes unsaid. They are all aware of that now.

*

The walk to the bathroom is quick-paced, but not quite a run yet. The five flock close together, as if in danger of being snatched if they stand an inch too far. The rain is loud on their ears, but Sid feels that for every five pairs of footsteps, he hears a sixth set that is much heavier, and faster.

He hopes it’s just his imagination.

Gale is in the vanguard. She stops when they’ve reached the bathroom and ushers everyone inside. Rob turns on the light and shuts the door behind them. And they’re in.

Keil exhales noisily. “That was...” She throws back her head and laughs. Ral joins in for no apparent reason.

“No one, like, got possessed, right?” Rob asks.

“It’s not like we’d admit it if we did,” Sid says, hands on hips. “How would you be able to tell?”

Rob glares at him. Then speaks in some foreign, possibly made up, language. “Exorcizamus te omnus immundi... Spiritum omni satanica potestas...”

At first, Sid thinks Rob is talking gibberish, which he can’t say he didn’t expect. Then he recognizes some words. “Did you just exorcise me?” Sid wrinkles his nose.

“Too bad it didn’t work,” Rob sneers.

A deafening thump comes from the door, causing all of them to lurch away from it. A series of expletives comes from Keil’s throat. More thumps follow, threatening to take down the locked door. The knob starts shaking violently like it wants to fall off.

“Get into the cubicles,” Ral orders, and they scramble to obey. Sid locks himself in his cubicle and covers his mouth because of the insane thought that the ghost might hear him breathing.

The thumps turn more urgent, and Sid swears the door is going to break. But all of a sudden, the thumps halt. Sid hears the patter of shoes against the floor outside speed away... and disappear.

Sid exhales in relief. He leans his back against the door and decides that maybe he doesn’t have to use the urinal tonight. The toilet would be enough.

Once everyone is done and out of their cubicles, Sid asks, “What now?”

Everyone seems to look at each other upon hearing the question. Sid washes his hands while waiting for the others to come to a decision. He hears Keil spout out another expletive.

“Pardon?”

“That banging on the door earlier?” she says. “Yeah. I think that was Gale.”

“What do you mean?” Sid turns around and feels his heart fall flat into his stomach. The faces he sees are all as appalled as he is. Because Gale isn’t one of them.

″You locked her out the room?” Sid snaps at Rob.

“How is it my fault?” Rob throws his arms out in exasperation.

A distant scream tears through the air. “Gale!” they all shout.

Sid bolts out of the room. “Gale! Where are you?” he yells. He takes out his flashlight, and sure enough, there is a trail of blood on the floor. “Gale!” he shouts.

Thunder booms overhead as if to emphasize the dread and trepidation that chokes Sid as he barrels through corridors. He can hear the other three close behind, but he doesn’t care at the moment. Another scream pierces their ears. “GALE!” he bellows, even though he’s running out of breath, and his heart is beating too fast.

He stops running when his knees threaten to give in. He follows the trail with the beam of his flashlight. There are suddenly more drops on the floor. Bigger. He shines the light on the end of the corridor, right beside the stairs. There, he sees a figure. Huge and hunched over a heap that Sid recognizes as-

“Gale!” he shrieks, speeding towards her. The figure stands between the two students. Sid can see that its hands-- both of them-- have only three fingers. The middle and ring fingers are missing. The clothes it’s wearing look like they came from a hospital, all white but spattered with red. Sid musters up enough courage to point the flashlight at the figure’s head.

Sid gasps. A hideous wound shaped like an eye takes up the entirety of its forehead, and the wound bleeds heavily down onto its face. It-- He looks angry. Angry enough to kill.

The Ghost pins Sid down. Sid wants to squirm, to scream, but he’s frozen. Like in some twisted nightmare he can’t wake from. The Ghost lifts a bloody knife and stabs it down on Sid’s upper arm. That’s when Sid’s voice starts to work, and a scream rips his throat raw.

He isn’t aware for the next few seconds, except of the searing pain that throbs in his arm, but somehow, the Ghost isn’t on top of him anymore. He rolls his head to the side and sees Rob thrashing around, his neck in the hands of the monster. On the other side of the floor, Ral is tearing through her skirt like she’s done it a million times, to use as a bandage for Gale. Honestly, these Santiago cousins. What have they been training for?

That leaves Keil. Out of nowhere, she plummets into the Ghost and whacks his head with a broom. The Ghost stumbles backwards and drops Rob. “Let’s GO! GO! GO!” Keil pulls a coughing Rob along. Sid staggers to his feet, wincing when his arm gets displaced. He places the flashlight under his good arm, and uses his free hand to squeeze his wound.

He’s running up the stairs, and everyone is there alongside him. Keil tugging on Rob, and Ral supporting Gale. But they’re injured. And the Ghost is faster.

“Obsidian, you’re the smart one. Where do we go?” Keil demands.

“Well, I don’t know! I just got stabbed, why do you think--”

“Just think of something!” Rob rasps.

Sid might resort to expletives himself. A glance backwards tells him that the Ghost is gaining on them. Only a few stairs away. We have to get out of here, Sid thinks, Out of this godforsaken school. But it’s raining too hard, and they’d need a submarine. Or, like, a really tall car.

“I’ve got an idea,” Sid says. His head starts to feel lighter. He’s lost a lot of blood.

“What?” Keil, Rob, and Ral ask in unison.

“It’ll only work if you know how to drive.”

“I know how to drive,” Rob assures.

Sid barely stops his eyes from rolling. “Of course you do. Alright, everyone. Just follow ME!” He darts away from the stairs and into the corridor. They’re on the top floor, but the place Sid has in mind is on the first. He hopes their stamina lasts.

His head is throbbing, and his eyes are threatening to close. He sees a fire alarm button and smashes it with his left hand, nearly dropping the flashlight in the process. The alarm goes off along with the emergency lights. Thank you! he thinks.

“Why did you have to do that?” Ral says loudly over the sirens.

“To keep me awake,” Sid says in an equally loud volume.

He seizes a small fire extinguisher they pass by on a pillar. He takes off the pin and forces it into Keil’s arms. “Ack!” she yelps.

“Familiar?” Sid bellows.

Keil laughs. “No!”

“Grip the hose tight and squeeze the trigger!” Sid instructs. “And don’t forget to aim!”

Keil must be a fast learner, because when Sid glances backwards, he sees the Ghost gets a full blast of foam in his sorry face! What a peculiar ghost this must be. He falls back, and Keil keeps squeezing.

“Stop!” Sid tells her. “Use it only when it gets close!”

Keil nods and runs faster. Ral points ahead of them with the hand not supporting Gale. “It’s a dead end!” she shouts.

“Stairs!” Sid shoots to their left, quickly descending the staircase. He’s getting tired... sleepy...

“You kidding me?” Rob’s voice comes from behind him.

“Stairs,” Sid repeats weakly, before adding a more audible, “All the way down!”

″‘ut these ‘re ‘rivate stairs,” Sid hears a slur that takes him a joyful moment to identify as Gale’s voice. “They ‘on’t lead down to the groun’ floor,” she says.

‘Don’t’ Sid notes. A contraction. There can be miracles. “I know,” he laughs. He must really be dying.

The Ghost bursts after them before they’re even a floor away. Keil screams and shoots him in the face again, but misses. Sid nearly trips on a stair, and decides to stop looking at what’s going on behind him. The only thing he should focus on right now is in front.

They’ve travelled down two floors when Sid realizes that he can no longer feel the tips of his left fingertips. He doesn’t look at his wound. He knows he wouldn’t like what he’d see. The last floor is finally in sight when Sid’s legs fail on him and he tumbles off. His arm is seized when his head is just centimeters from cracking on a stair. Sid screams. It’s the bad arm.

The next thing he knows, he’s riding on a person’s back. Piggyback. Good Lord. He feels like he’s five or something.

The first floor in the private area is used to access the school’s personal parking lot. It isn’t walled, so the rain is deafening from out there. The floor there is the same height of the fieldtrip bus’s windows. The grey stairs that lead down to the bus door are flooded. Yeah... Forgot to put that under consideration, Sid apologizes mentally.

“Quick!” Keil’s voice shouts. “I’ve run out of foam!”

So it’s not Keil carrying me, Sid thinks. His eyelids droop, and right now, the hair of whoever’s carrying him feels amazingly soft under his chin. “Sid,” he hears like a lullaby. “Sid...”

“SID, WAKE THE-” -beep- ”-UP!”

His bad arm is slapped, causing him to jolt in pain. “I’M BLOODY AWAKE NOW,” Sid screams.

“Well, what do we do?” Rob-- because of course it’s Rob-- shouts.

“Get in the bus!” Sid shouts back.

“It’s flooded! How on earth do we do that?”

“How should I know!”

Keil interrupts their conversation by stepping forward and ramming the fire extinguisher into one of the windows, one... two... three times and it shatters. She throws her jacket over the shards, and chants, “GO GO GO GO!”

Ral gets in first, then she and Keil carefully help Gale enter the vehicle. Rob makes sure Sid is safely in before crawling through the window himself. Keil hops in, slicing her knee on a shard. She inhales sharply, and Ral has to help her in the rest of the way.

“The keys,” Sid shouts, fighting to keep alert. “We forgot the bus keys!”

Rob carries Sid in his arms--Bridal style. I can’t believe him. I’m never going to live this down, am I?-- and lays him down gently on the seat behind the driver’s. “No need,” he says, “I can hotwire.”

“You WHAT?”

“Uh, guys?” Keil whispers. Sid looks back and sees that Keil’s knee has already been bandaged (cleaned too, he hopes) by Ral. Honestly, if she rips anymore strips off that skirt, she’d be wearing what the school considers provocative clothing.

Keil, Ral, and Gale are crouching beneath the seats. Sid looks out the window and sees that, yes, it’s the Ghost, and they ran out of foam just in time. “Rob. Hurry,” Sid hisses.

“I’m trying! Hotwiring a bus is a lot harder than hotwiring a car!”

The Ghost puts a three-fingered hand on the shattered window’s frame and tries to enter the bus. Ral takes that as a cue to spring from hiding and slam the unholy creature with the fire extinguisher. They really do come in handy.

The Ghost makes a gurgling noise, like his vocal chords had been ripped out sometime ago. He charges at Ral with his knife, and she dodges just in time, but the Ghost is already half inside the bus. Keil takes over, pulling a wrench from God-knows-where, and beating the Ghost up with all her strength.

Sid drags Gale away from the scene, and onto the floor behind the driver’s seat. It’s the first time he’s properly looked at her since she was abducted. Her face is deathly pale, and both her upper arms have been bandaged. The stains that bleed through are the same shape that was on the Ghost’s forehead: an eye.

Sid risks a glance at his own wound, where a messy white substance is already clotting. The deep stab was probably supposed to be the pupil. The Ghost hasn’t finished his drawing yet.

“Rob...” he calls.

“I’m trying!” Rob snaps from the floor.

Sid looks at Keil and Ral struggling to keep the Ghost at bay. An idea forms in his mind. “Ral! Help Rob get this thing moving!” Sid stands.

“I’m a little busy at the moment!” she growls.

“The faster you get the bus working, the higher the chances are of us surviving! Now, Ral!” Sid commands, hoping she doesn’t beat him up.

She looks between Sid and the Ghost, then with a frustrated shout, she slides to Rob’s side, leaving the fire extinguisher on the floor. Keil takes up the extinguisher and strains to hold the monster off all by herself. “Obsidian!” she shouts.

Sid takes over, grabbing the extinguisher and swinging it as hard as he can against any part of the Ghost’s body. Pain explodes in Sid’s arm as he moves, but he holds his scream back with a grimace.

The Ghost looks angrier than before. He bares his teeth that don’t look like human teeth at all. They look larger, and as though they’ve been sharpened. No matter how many times Sid hits him, it seems to only slow him down.

“Ral! Progress!” Sid cries, his voice cracking a bit because of exhaustion.

“Almost done!” She replies.

The Ghost takes hold of the fire extinguisher, pulls it from Sid’s grasp, and throws it aside. Sid gulps. “How long!” he calls.

“Just a few seconds! I promise!” Ral says. That’s enough for Sid.

“Keil, get to Gale and grab on to something stable,” Sid commands without looking at her.

“What?” she reacts.

“Do it. Right now.” Sid has been staring at the Ghost, and to his horror, the Ghost returns the unblinking stare, seemingly locked on to him. Little by little, it crawls onto the seat.

“If I stop, Little Johnny here is sure to get in!” she argues.

“Let him come,” Sid mutters. “Trust me! Go!”

Keil drops the wrench then dives towards the front seats, and the Ghost takes that as a cue to crash through the window. He’s dripping wet as he raises his knife and prepares to pounce on the other four. Sid throws the wrench at the Ghost’s back. “Hey!” he shouts. “You don’t want them!”

Quiet falls. The Ghost turns around. Slowly. The expression on his face hasn’t changed. Sid backs away in little steps, hoping to lure the Ghost to him. He speaks in slow, easy sentences, so as not to agitate the monster. If he brings out words like ‘brobdingnagian’, he’s sure to die.

“You’ve been watching us the whole night,” Sid says, remembering Gale. “But you only attack when we’re alone. I’m alone.”

The Ghost takes the bait and moves towards him in slow, but long strides. Sid stares at the bloodstained knife in the Ghost’s hand, and his left arm starts to hurt once more. Sid’s eye twitches, but otherwise, he ignores it.

“You’re not done with me, are you? This little scratch you gave me?” Sid shows off his left arm which is still oozing slightly. The Ghost seems invigorated at the sight. “It’s not complete. Not yet. You have to finish your masterpiece.”

The back of Sid’s legs bump against the backseats. The Ghost is still walking. Sid keeps eye contact, while his right hand slowly, slowly, unhooks the back window and lifts it up. The Ghost takes notice and starts making that demented gurgling noise.

The bus hums to life, and the Ghost makes a distorted march towards him. Sid sees at the side of his eye that Rob is sitting on the driver’s seat waiting for a signal. He tries to speak, but his voice is gone again. Yes, he’s afraid of the dark, yes, he’s afraid of ghosts, and most of all, yes, he’s afraid of death who is staring him right in the face!

Sid’s arm brushes against the backseat, and pain sears through his arm. In that very moment, Sid finds his voice and remembers what he has to do. “ROB! FLOOR IT!” he bellows, then flattens himself on the ground.

The Ghost pounces, but when the bus shoots forward, he catapults headfirst out the window. Sid stands on a seat and hurries to kick the rest of him out. The Ghost’s legs fall out to be quickly replaced by an arm as he holds on for dear life-- afterlife?

The Ghost’s disfigured hand curls around Sid’s ankle, fixing him with one last glare from a visage of pure hate. Sid brings the window down to slam on the Ghost’s wrist. With an inhuman screech, he lets go, and is carried away by the current.

Sid watches the Ghost, feeling many things at the same time. Fear, rejuvenating relief, bone-rattling panic, success. Sid hits his head on the back window’s glass when Rob rams Gate A off its hinges. They nearly run over the house just across the road.

“You can slow down now,” Sid says, massaging his head. He looks at his friends and lets go a breath he didn’t know he was holding in. They’re all there. Bloody and bruised, but they’re complete, and they’re all in one piece. Or, their respective pieces, rather. For that, Sid is thrilled.

And he swears up and down he’ll never admit it to any of them.

They all make this sort of celebration by stationary whooping and cheering. They’re all too tired for anything any more intense.

“We ghost-busted Little Johnny!” Keil says, overjoyed.

Sid stares pensively at the distant figure of the ‘Ghost’ struggling to swim back to the platform. “It’s not a ghost...” Sid realizes. “It’s a man.”

*

Streetlamps bless their eyes on their way home, and despite the storm and the floods, the height of the bus ensures that they stay safe and dry for about until the water fills up the engine. Sid notices only then that he doesn’t have his flashlight anymore. He must have dropped it by the stairs, when Rob caught him.

Ral bandages his arm, then pushes him to the seat beside Keil.

“Make up,” Ral commands them both.

Sid stares blankly at Keil, who holds his gaze for no more than a few seconds, then rips her eyes away. “I’m sorry,” she tells the ground. “For punching you, shouting at you, and whatever.” She holds out her hand stiffly, but seems to mean it.

Sid stares at the outstretched hand. He doesn’t know what comes over him, but he feels a pang of remorse that helps him breathe easier. He supposes that it had finally occurred to him, probably when he got punched in the face, that they aren’t that different after all.

He takes her hand. “Ghosts are real,” he smiles.

Keil returns a full-on grin that’s infectious. Pretty soon, they’re both laughing and shaking hands vigorously. Ral joins in, ever the ray of sunshine.

Gale stays cognizant for the rest of the trip too. They all apologize for accidentally locking her out of the bathroom. Of course, typical Gale as she is, she forgives them. “I should have shouted instead of just abusing the door,” she says, and, “It does not matter anymore. What is important is that we make it home.”

And that’s the next problem.

“Uh, Sid?” Rob’s voice calls from behind the wheel.

Sid leans on the driver’s seat to stand beside Rob. “That may be the first time you said any part of my name without malice,” Sid snarks.

Sid thinks he sees a smile form on Rob’s face. “Can it, Trinidad,” Rob says, still looking at the street ahead. “I don’t have enough gas to get everyone home. That, and I don’t know if you noticed, but I’m bad at driving.”

“I wasn’t going to mention it,” Sid smirks. He has noticed. They’ve been bumping of streetlamps and crossing over sidewalks for a good amount of time. Sid’s got to hand it to him, though. The bus hasn’t tipped itself over yet.

“It’s not my fault! If this was a car, heck yeah, I’d nail it. Driving a bus is a first for me,” Rob says.

“I wasn’t going to mention it,” Sid repeats, amused. He considers the ‘getting everyone home’ problem. “What street are we on?” he asks, because he can’t recognize anything amidst the flood, the rain, and the darkness.

“Red street,” Rob informs.

Whoever decided to name streets after colors has a lack of imagination, Sid thinks. There’s a billion categories to choose from! Sid shakes his head, reminding himself to stay focused. “Take a left. Right there.”

Rob obeys without any snide remark, probably because driving takes a lot out of him. Sid spouts out a few more directions that Rob obeys with nearly no flaw. Nearly. The streetlamps have taken a beating. The bus drives up a hill, where the flood doesn’t get to reach.

“Park right there. Beside the blue house,” Sid instructs.

“Where is this?” Rob asks suspiciously.

Sid smiles. “It’s my home.”

They disembark through the back window, which is wider and safer than the shattered one. There’s a bit of a fuss upon leaving, (“You parked the car in the middle of the street.” “I know what I’m doing!”) but once Ral picks the lock of the house, they all know the worst is over.

Sid’s exhilarated to know that the electricity still works. He’s been in the dark for far too long, for his liking. As soon as they enter, Gale asks to use the phone to contact her Dad. Sid remembers she mentioned that her Dad was a doctor, and would pick her up late because he took the night shift. That was before the storm caused traffic and casualties. Sid lets them all use the phone while he prepares hot water for everyone to take a bath. Rob hovers to make sure Sid doesn’t faint and hit his head on the stove.

When Sid returns with the water, Keil’s hand is in the refrigerator, Ral’s flipping through channels like she owns the place, and Gale’s asleep on the sofa beside her. Sid doesn’t know what he expected.

“I’m getting everyone dinner!” Keil blurts like a defensive criminal caught in the act. “I’m not sleeping on an empty stomach!”

Sid gives her one long stare. He tilts his head to the right. “There’s Stick-O in the cabinet.”

“Bless the Lord, oh my soul!” Keil exclaims, dashing to the cabinet.

“Get everyone some milk too,” Sid tells her.

“Don’t order me around!” Keil says.

“Do it or I won’t tell you which cabinet.”

“I can find it myself.” There is about twenty cabinets in Sid’s kitchen.

“Fine,” Keil relents upon noticing.

“Thankyou. Milk is in the fridge, cups are in there, and Stick-O’s in there,” Sid points in different directions, causing Keil’s brow to furrow. Sid leaves her to it, being followed out by Rob.

“So you own the huge mansion up the hill,” Ral greets him with, staring at the news. The storm has destroyed a few houses a city away. The images they flash on the screen makes Sid feel lucky.

“It’s not a mansion,” Sid says, though he feels boastful when Ral mistakes it for one. He turns to face Rob. “Here, make yourself useful and pour this over there.” Sid hands Rob the kettle of hot water and points to the bathroom.

“Fine, but if you faint again...” Rob starts, making Sid’s eyes roll. “I won’t!” Sid says, shoving him away.

Sid then turns to Gale. She’s curled up like a cat. Sid’ stomach twists when he sees the stain of her wounds on the bandage. He prods her awake. “Hey...”

Gale opens a bleary eye to peek up at him. “Go wash yourself up in the bathroom,” Sid says. “There’s still clothes in the closet, from the last time you slept over. The first aid kit is behind the mirror.”

Gale nods, and Sid helps her up. She wobbles to the bathroom, where Rob is freaking out. “Dude! Your bathroom is huge! I’m hating you more by the minute-- Oh.” He steps aside for Gale to enter. She’s about to close the door when Sid says “If you need anything, just ring.” She offers a weak smile then locks the door.

“There’s a-” -expletive- ”-telephone in there too?” Rob turns to Sid.

“Yes. There is a telephone. This is a huge house. We use an intercom,” Sid explains.

“Can I go next?”

“No. I’m going next. I got stabbed in the arm.”

“Can I go after?”

“No. Keil’s after. Her knee got sliced.”

“After her?”

“No. Ral comes after.”

“Why?”

“I like her better.”

Rob groans, but quickly smirks again. “I wonder what I can do with this information. I know your address,” he says like a threat.

“You can take that kettle, fill it with water, and heat it by the stove,” Sid says sarcastically.

He expects Rob to stick out his tongue again, but instead, he says, “I don’t know how to use a stove.”

Sid blinks at him. Twice. “Of course you don’t know how to use a stove.”

Once everyone is already bathed and in pajamas, and all their wounds and bruises are properly dressed, instead of using any of Sid’s abundant guest bedrooms, they sprawl around the living room’s sofas and watch TV. Sid’s consciousness is already drifting away, when he hears something from the news that makes his blood run cold.

″The Midnight Murderer has escaped his asylum earlier today. His current whereabouts are unknown...”

*

Written October 31, 2016