Dexter Morgenstern - The Slender Man

On my way I see Shana and decide to go and talk to her. When I approach she looks up at me, but I’m still ten feet away and didn’t want to risk saying anything she wouldn’t hear and trigger an awkward moment. I hold my arms out as I clear the remaining distance and she accepts my hug with no hesitation. She isn’t crying, but I can tell the pain of losing her sister hasn’t dulled any from the day it happened.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” I say for the tenth time. I feel like since I’m her best friend, I should have more things to say than what everyone else has already said.

“Do you want me to stay over for shivah?” I ask. Sitting shivah is another custom I don’t like. It’s when the mourning family stays in their house and well, mourns, devoid of anything that would be considered pleasurable. They don’t use hot water, shave, listen to music, or even leave the house for a whole week! The only interaction they will even get is from visitors like me and my family. It’s another custom I don’t want my family to uphold, because all it will do is hurt them further after my death. Some may not feel that way. Some may use the shivah as it’s intended, to set aside an official period of time suitable for mourning and to let it all out, but not me. It takes a while for her to muster a response, and she starts by shaking her head.

“Yeah, but some of my relatives will still be in town visiting for the first couple days, so not until Thursday. I need you to let the school know I won’t be back for a week,” she explains.

Oh right… school. It’s Tuesday today and we have that essay to write. We haven’t even started it, but I think Ms. Alder will forgive us in light of the circumstances. That is, unless she shares Leanne’s point of view on my brother’s survival.

“Don’t listen to Leanne,” she says, as if hearing my thoughts.

“Huh?” I say.

“I overheard what she said. Don’t listen to it. There’s no reason for her to believe that it’s not fair Adam’s okay,” she says.

“Equal isn’t always fair,” I say in response.

“Alyssa, it’s time for us to get going, we need to give the Hawthorn’s some space with their family,” Dad calls. I turn and nod at him, then turn back to Shana.

“See you Thursday?” I ask. She gives me a forced smile and nods.

“Bring food,” she says. I turn back and head toward my family. As I walk, my mind hops back to Leanne. If that’s the way that she really feels, then what about the others? Will all of them resent me?

I walk through the entrance of my school. The Cherokee County board of education is very creative with its school names. Here we have Murphy Elementary, Murphy Middle, and my school, Murphy High. It’s very shoddy though, and many residents of Murphy try to enroll their children into the high school in Andrews; Andrews High. I remember late last year when I walked through these doors in September. I bought into the myth that everyone would size me up and shun me because of my freshman status and that I’d have twenty pairs of eyes boring into my neck. I soon tossed that aside, but now I am expecting those same burning gazes, not because I’m a freshman walking into the high school building for the first time, but because I’m the “Lucky One.” I am the only one of around fifteen students that didn’t lose a sibling in the crash. There are people in all grades that would happily switch places with me, and like Leanne, they may resent me because that won’t happen.

I head straight into my first class, English. I walk into the doors and I am almost relieved to see that Leanne is absent. That little bit of relief drops when I see that Jason Larch is here, and he’s giving me that hateful glare I’ve been anticipating all morning. What I wouldn’t give to have Shana walking in with me right now. I try not to look at anyone else as I find my way to my desk, but I can sense more than one pair of eyes on me.

It’s five minutes till class starts and it looks like Ms. Alder is in a hurry to prepare something. She looks away from her work just quickly enough to see me about to sit at my desk.

“Welcome back Alyssa,” she says.

“Th-thank you,” I stammer. I’m a little nervous about Ms. Alder, hoping that she won’t bring up the creative history essay that’s overdue. I look around at the other students and see that most of them are looking at the books on their desk or whispering amongst each other like normal. So that helps my mood a bit. I just hope that the gossip of the week isn’t on me.

“Alright class, it seems that many of the students still haven’t returned, but we can’t delay any longer. Please open your books to chapter thirty,” she says. I realize that I don’t know which book she means, but rather than asking on impulse, and drawing attention to myself. I steal a gaze to my right and see that everyone is opening their literature books. It’s a good thing I looked, because if I had to guess I would have opened grammar

Ms. Alder is a stout woman, but not really fat. She looks like a woman that simply doesn’t have the will to exercise but still doesn’t eat too much, and at her age it’s starting to take its toll. She has short sandy brown hair and bangs that cover half of her forehead, which is a little too big. She wears contacts, but with her physique, she’d look better off with actual glasses. She acts as both our history and our English teacher, which is where my whole dual-subject assignment comes from. She leads us through the next chapter, which is on multicultural literature, a topic that generally bores me. Her class isn’t very interactive as she reads from the text verbatim, so my mind wanders. I guess that’s why my grades are falling.

I look around and see Jason Larch just about as entertained as I am. Didn’t he get arrested ? I think. Why did the sheriff let him off so easily? He’s normally not a pushover. I notice that Jason has a little bruise on his nose, but it doesn’t look broken. Something peculiar about that bruise is how visible it is from ten feet away. I realize that his skin has paled a bit, quite like Leanne’s. She had a nosebleed, and so did Lionel, who’s also paled. Is everyone getting sick? I take my attention from him and notice that very few of the other students appear sick. In fact, even Lindsay Willow isn’t sick looking, and she has been around Lionel. Must not be a very contagious thing though, otherwise I’d have it by now, because my immune system is terrible and I get sick at least every quarter.

After Ms. Alder reads the chapter to us, she stands up and offers a fifteen minute break to everyone. Most of the kids jump up as they have a sudden realization that they are about to wet themselves and they’re dying of thirst, and pretty soon, it’s just Ms. Alder and me. I should get up and go too, I think, but as I do she addresses me.

“Hey Alyssa, we missed you this week,” she says.

“Yeah, sorry,” I say, even though we did have permission to skip school due to the accident.

“It’s not too much to hope you’ve finished your essay?” she asks. I cringe, that’s the subject I’ve been dodging.

“No, Shana and I were gonna work on it, and make stories that work together but—”

“Don’t worry, only three students have turned in their essays on time, but I do need yours by the end of the week, and Shana’s too,” she says, and that reminds me.

“Oh, um, Shana won’t be able to,” I say.

“Her family is sitting shivah- in mourning and it’s a custom that they don’t leave the house for a week,” I continue.

“Well if she’s at home she can work on it there, and you can bring it for me?” she suggests.