The layout of the school was still the same way I knew it to be. There were three dorms in total, with a tall church building, a clinic beside it and then the teachers quarters at the back.
What I couldn't remember was the isolation room. It should've been somewhere between the chapel and the clinic, but there was no other building in sight.
There was no one else around to ask for direction, so I considered going back to the teachers quarters to look for Ms. Duval. She was the only person I could trust in this maze of confusion.
Except—I bumped into three students, and from the sneers on their faces, I knew they were trouble.
"Running off again in the middle of the night to meet your secret lover?" the blonde girl asked, twisting her hair.
I could tell she was the leader of the pack, but I had no memory of her in the book.
"Who are you?" I turned to the trio. "I need to find the isolation room, maybe you can help me with that."
They laughed like I'd said something so absurd.
"You must've hit your head really hard when you fell into that ditch," blondie replied. She moved closer to me, poking my chest when she closed the space between us. "I know I told you to go kill yourself, but I didn't think you'd listen like a good girl."
Oh.
"I mean she's a dumb bitch. You should've been more specific," the girl on her right said, and they all giggled together like a bunch of airheads.
"To be fair…this school is better off without people like her." She put her hands on my shoulders.
I didn't realize what she was doing until she pushed me, my butt hitting the hard ground. I almost cried out in pain.
"I'd like to beat you until that smug face of yours becomes unrecognizable." She turned, like she was looking for something. "But, I'd rather not stain my hands. Besides, you'll just run to your prince charming…" she giggled again and her minions followed.
"More like queen charming." They laughed again.
"What kind of lame joke is this? I don't recall writing characters that had nothing going on in their brain." I tried to get up, only to have blondie kick me back to the ground.
"Who said you could stand up? Fucking freak." She gestured to the other girls. "Tie her up. Next time you'll do well not to mess with us."
"Wait…what? I've never even met you before." I started to panic, it was hard to remember the interaction before this scene because I didn't even know the characters. "What did I ever do to you?"
Blondie paused for a second. "Uhm, give me a second. How about when you reported me to the dorm mistress because I'd mistakenly made you slip down the stairs? I mean, I'd never intentionally hurt someone else." She turned to her minions who had the rope ready. "Right?"
They both nodded. "You're too kind to hurt anyone."
Wait…was I getting bullied right now?
"Look, I don't know what happened in the past between us. But I need to be somewhere, so if you can all take a step back and we can all forget this happened. Including the tripping incident of course." I tried to reason with them since I couldn't fight my way through.
"Nice try. Veronica, Samantha. Tie this bitch up, we need to go back to the dorm."
I raised my hands like it would stop them. "Let's talk this out like adults. Okay?" My heart raced when they got closer, maniacl grins on their faces.
They were about to grab my hands when someone yelled, "The headmistress is coming."
Everyone froze, me included.
"Let's get out of here." Blonde retreated, her minions following her.
It wasn't until they entered the dorm that a figure stepped out from the shadows. I groaned, I didn't know this character either, I'd put all my attention on the main leads.
"And who are you?" I asked, taking her hand when she stretched it towards me. "I don't mean that in a rude way, I just can't remember a lot of people."
I winced when I finally stood up with her help and dusted my uniform.
"Charlotte."
I waited for her to elaborate.
"I'm your roommate. I went to the Clinic to look for you, but they said you left with Ms. Duval. I went to Ms. Duval's office and she said you left to the see the headmistress, whose office I'm coming from by the way."
She was shorter than me so she had to raise her head to peer into my face, her lips drawn into a thin line. "And now I find you being bullied by those airheads."
I had a feeling she was really pissed at me. "Uhm…" I scatched the back of my head. "Why were you looking for me?"
Her brows furrowed and she took a step back from me. "You don't remember our argument this afternoon?"
I shook my head. "The last thing I remember is waking up in the ditch. They said I tried to kill myself. Is that true?"
She pushed up the circular glasses on the tip of her nose. "It's possible. We've only known each other for less than a week, but every night you always mention going back home in your sleep. Whenever I ask you about it after you wake up, you claim to not remember anything."
"Going back home?"
She nodded. "Not that I'm entirely surprised. I would want the same if I went to a new school and found out that I had an uncanny resemblance to a student who had passed a week prior. As if it's not creepy enough, you both have the same name."
"Hold up." This was not the plot of my book. "What do you mean? That's not how the story should go."
"What story?" she asked, looking around. "I think we should continue this conversation in the room. We'll be in trouble if any of the sisters find us outside."
"I was asked to go to the isolation room. But I need to know about the girl that looked like me." Maybe it would give me a lead to finding out why I ended up here.
"Isolation room? What did you do?"
"Well…" I sighed. "Everyone seems to think I want to kill myself. I'm supposed to do confession every night until I realize what a sin suicide is. That was what the headmistress said." I groaned. "I don't even remember writing it."
"I'll take you to the isolation room. Do you know how long you'll be there for?"
"She didn't say. Is it scary in there?"
She shrugged and started walking. I followed her.
"I've never been in there, but the other students said they've heard voices of people begging to be set free. It was nicknamed 'room of the damned' for that very reason. It's usually a punishment reserved for the most unrepentant students. I don't know why she sent you there, especially with you still being a new student."
"Feels like she has it out for me."
We stopped in front of a small building, it was only one storey tall. There was a small window on the top floor. And aside the dim light coming from the entrance, there was no other trace of life in it.
"We're here. There's a guard at the foot of the stairs, he'll take you to the room. I have to go back to the dorm now, I hope you come out soon."
"Wait—"
She was already gone, walking into the darkening night with swiftness. I looked at the building again, and imagined it growing a head that loomed over the sky.
It wasn't exactly a monostrous structure, it was the eery isolation it gave that made people lose their minds.
I waited to see if I'd hear the rumoured voices, but there was nothing.
"I can do this. It's just a book I wrote, nothing here is real." I said those words over and over again as I walked inside the building.
There was no furniture or decor in the receiving area. The guard in question was an old man that said nothing as he led me up the stairs.
I felt like a lamb that was about to be slaughtered.
The solitary room only had a small bed with a thin matress on it. There wasn't even a sink, or a bowl that I could use in the case of an emergency. This was worse than a holding cell.
I walked in, wincing when the strong smell of rot hit my nose. Did someone die in here?
"Can I at least get drinking water? I suddenly feel so thirsty," I told the man but he said nothing as he closed the door behind me.
It wasn't until the lock clicked in place that my brain processed the situation. I ran to the door, peering through the opening at the top.
"Wait! Let me out. I don't think I can stay here," I screamed, but there was no response. What the hell was I thinking walking into this place? "Let me out! I don't belong here."
I screamed until my voice cracked. It was already dark outside, no one was coming to save me.
I thought of Ms. Duval. Was she looking for me? After all, she's said something about going to the dorm to give me my meds.
Will Charlotte tell her that I was imprisoned?
I could hear the headmistress at the back of my mind, reminding me that 'this is not prison. It's only for students to realize the need to seek forgiveness after sin'.
A chill crawled down my spin when I heard a bird cry in the distance. The room suddenly grew small and threatened to swallow me.
Something flew past the small window and made me yelp. I could hear the voices now, hoarse and wretched, begging for a way out.
I moved away from the window, walking back until I hit the cold door.
"This is not real. This is not real."
My heart beat loudly in my chest, the atmosphere growing cold. Maybe this was the end for me.
I was already doomed, whether it was in my book or in the real world. I mattered to no one.
The voices grew louder than my thoughts, begging for the same escape I so badly needed.
My eyes were about to close when I felt something crawl across my back.
Then I heard a faint voice beside my ear. "Scream if you dare."