Tompkin's School (For The Extraordinarily Talented Book 1) (21 page)

“Just try,” he urged.

I was fuming with frustration at this point. Wasn’t he listening? I had no clue what to do! I squinted my eyes and while trying to attempt to push a message to him I froze everyone.

“Iz,” he said, “we don’t have any other choice.”

“Fine,” I sighed.

I took a deep breath and tried to relax. I tried to focus on everything I could feel. I felt goosebumps crawl up my arm as a chill ran up my spine. I felt my chest rise as my lungs filled with air and I tried to focus even further inward to the deepest crevice of my being. I squeezed my eyes shut, pulling my fingers into a fist.

Did anything happen?
I thought.

“Izzy,” Kain’s voice said, “wrong power.”

“Ugh,” I sighed, “you heard that? I was trying to do what I did when I froze everyone!”

“We don’t have time,” Kain said, looking towards the door, “he’s going to be in the cafeteria any second now.”

“No!” I cried, “I have to unfreeze everyone first!”

I kept my eyes closed, returning my focus inward trying to tap into the power I had unleashed earlier.

“Iz, he’s walking up to the door!" He cried.

“Just one more second,” I said, “I know I can do this!”

I heard the door to the cafeteria move and I waived my hand, pulling the door closed.

“Hey, what’s going on?” I heard Chuck exclaim.

“Come on,” Kain said, dragging me back to the table, “this isn’t working.”.

“It has to!” I said in frustration.

“Iz, face it,” he said, “everyone is still frozen. We
need
to get back to that table.”

“But...,” my voice trailed.

Defeat sunk in as we raced back to the table and sat in our appropriate seats and tried to find ways to look natural.

“We have to pretend to be frozen,” he said.

“Oh sure!” I cried, “for how long? The whole school is going to be late for class!”

“I have no idea,” he replied, “for as long as it takes, I guess.”

I looked down at my plate so that if I needed to blink it wouldn’t be too noticeable. As I picked up my fork I waived my hand again and Chuck stormed into the cafeteria.

“What the heck?” Chuck gasped once he had made it through the “stuck” doors.

I heard his footsteps echo throughout the unnaturally still room. Nothing moved, not even the eggs benedict being plopped onto students’ plates, frozen in the air. I couldn’t imagine what was going through his mind, but I hoped he would just think himself crazy and go back to the dorms to get more sleep. If all those who were frozen weren’t able to hear then all that they would know is that time flew by in a blink an eye...literally. So, Chuck would be the only one who would know and without any proof he would be assumed delusional. The sound of his footsteps got increasingly closer to our table and I hoped that he couldn’t hear my elevated breathing. My heart was racing and felt as though it would explode.

He’s right behind you,
Kain’s voice filled my thoughts and I cringed at the thought of Chuck so close to me.

I wanted to leap out of my seat and throw him across the room, making him feel the helplessness that he had made us experience when he kidnapped us. I knew Kain was feeling the same way, but if we did then we would be losing our advantage. At this point no one knew what we could do...well, except for Amadeus which was a whole other problem. I heard him move closer to me and felt his arm brush passed mine and I saw him try to take the fork from Lee’s hand. I heard him gasp when the fork would not budge from Lee’s frozen grasp.

“Whoever is doing this,” he shouted, his voice echoing throughout the entire hall, “you will regret this!”

I heard his phone suddenly ringing. Was he calling someone?

⎼“Hi, this is Chuck,” he said, “I need to speak with my Uncle...no it is important. I don’t care if he’s about to head to a meeting. Just hand the damn phone to my Uncle!”

I heard a muffled response on the other side of the call, but it didn’t take a genius to figure out the secretary was not happy with how they were being spoken to.

⎼“Thanks, I’ll take that into consideration next time,” Chuck replied, sarcastically, “my Uncle
,
now
.”

There was silence for almost a minute and then the Uncle got on the line.

⎼“Yo
u
must
come down to the cafeteria,” he said, “there is definitely a being in this school. The whole area is frozen! Just get down here, you have to see this.”

Oh great
, I thought, hoping Kain could hear me,
the Uncle is going to join and see this, too.

You just have to figure out how to undo all of this
, his voice replied.

I heard Chuck’s footsteps get farther and farther away. Was he leaving? I carefully turned my head ever so slightly so I could see the front door. Sure enough, Chuck had just left the cafeteria. Probably to wait for his Uncle to get here. This was my last chance. There was no use having this ability and using it tonight if I couldn’t control it. I closed my eyes and tried to control my breathing. I tried to forget the situation we were in and just focus on the task at hand.

Breathe
, Kain’s voice said,
we can do this.

Suddenly, I felt a surge of power and when I blinked the room began to buzz with the sounds of students chattering amongst themselves. I opened my eyes and everyone seemed to be acting as if nothing happened. I looked at Kain who looked completely relieved.

Well, that was fun,
I told him, sarcastically.

He just shook his head and began picking up his things for class.

“Hey, you all might want to check the time,” he said.

“Crap!” Leslie exclaimed, “It’s eight o'clock!”

“How?” Lee asked, surprised, “We barely sat down!”

“I have no clue,” Leslie said, “but I’m out. Bye!”

I stood up, following their lead, and as I did so I saw out of the corner of my eye Theodore Tompkin and Chuck entering the cafeteria.

“I’ll see you all later,” I said to everyone.

“I’ll see you tonight,” Lee replied, a dazzling smile spreading across his face that made my heart skip a beat.

“Yeah, I’ll see you then,” I smiled.

I grabbed my bag and headed towards the cafeteria entrance where the President and his nephew, Chuck, were apparently arguing.

“Now,” Theodore’s voice hissed, “if you demonstrate anymore of this foolishness there
will
be repercussions that will be most certainly unpleasant.”

I couldn’t help but glance in their direction and when I did so Chuck and I made eye contact. The look in his eye made me wish I had never looked over. There was nothing but pure hatred in his eye and I knew he would be gunning for us even harder than he had before. This time he wouldn’t be after us for answers, he would be after our lives.

‡‡‡

Classes were finally over and Kia and I decided to go straight back to our dorm room to start preparing for the evening’s festivities. The bathrooms were a crazy nightmare as there were only a few mirrors compared to how many girls were waiting in line to do their makeup so we had to set up our own area with a mirror and a table for our makeup and hair supplies.

“This’ll do,” Kia said, after meticulously laying out every brush and comb.

“Was that worth it?” I laughed.

“Of course!” Kia exclaimed, “If your supplies aren’t aligned in an orderly fashion you might as well not do your makeup or hair at all!”

“Of course,” I said, sarcastically, “you’re so weird.”

“You’ll be thanking me later,” Kia said, confidently, “now, will you
please
let me curl your hair?”

“Good luck,” I laughed.

She just shrugged and began preparing the curling iron and hot curlers.

I glanced over to where my phone was on my desk. I quickly checked to be sure Kia wasn’t looking and then I waived my hand causing my phone to fly into my hand. I smiled proudly to myself, knowing that if we did come into contact with the journal that I’d be able to whisk it away without anyone knowing.

“We really need to start on our makeup,” Kia said, turning around.

I was
so
glad she turned around then and not earlier.

“Sure,” I smiled.

We began getting ready and soon it was time to put on our dresses and head out.

“Wow!” Kia gasped, “that dress is
amazing
!”

I slipped into satin champagne pumps and then glanced at my reflection. I was wearing my new sequined high-low gown that had a satin trail and a heart-shaped neckline. I wore long earrings and paired it all with a matching clutch.

“Thanks!” I replied, “So, do you! That color of purple looks perfect on you.”

“I know,” she laughed, “now, to celebrate.”

Kia went to our mini fridge and pulled out a bottle of champagne.

“Where’d you get that?” I asked.

“I snuck it out of the monitor’s office,” she shrugged, grabbing a couple of plastic cups, “come on! We should end this semester with a little fun.”

She opened the bottle and poured us two glasses.

“Cheers,” I smiled.

“Ching, ching!" She cheered.

We laughed as we “clinked” our very classy plastic cups. This had been a nice distraction from what was about to go down tonight. I had almost completely forgotten about my worries. It probably wasn’t the smartest decision to have a drink before tonight, but hey if Chuck was going to be there I would need something to take the edge off, right? I downed a second glass before we headed down to meet the guys who were waiting on the porch of our dorm. They were allowed to pick us up at the front of our dorms just for this occasion. I wasn’t sure if the dark and dreary weather was a bad omen or what, but whatever happened next Kain and I were as prepared for it as we possibly could. I stepped out onto the porch and was welcomed by Lee’s pleasantly surprised face. He was holding a single read rose for me and as I took it from his hands I kissed him on his cheek.

“Fancy meeting you here,” I teased.

“You look amazing,” he whispered.

“Thank you for my rose,” I said.

“Of course,” he added.

“Are you all ready?” Kain’s voice interrupted our romance, “come on.”

“The path is terribly muddy!” Kia complained, “my heels are going to get ruined. I’ve got to go get my boots.”

“Alright,” Kain said, “we’ll meet you at the caravan, I guess.”

“Are you sure?” Lee asked.

“Yeah, man,” he replied.

“See you there,” I called as we headed out down the treacherous path.

Lee reached for my arm to assist me and I gladly accepted his help.

“Are you sure you don’t need to get a change of shoes?" He asked.

“No,” I smiled, “My heels will be fine.”

I was determined to be on time. We could only afford one of us lagging behind as one of us needed to have eyes and ears on everything going on. Little did Lee know that my other hand was stretched out towards the ground using all the power I could muster to harden the mud so that my heels wouldn’t sink.

Hurry,
my voiced whispered into Kain’s thoughts.

I’ll try,
his voice replied.

I was relieved that he heard my thoughts that time instead of me freezing everything. I needed to save that little power for later. We reached the cars and, like the gentleman he was, Lee opened the door to his giant black truck and helped me in. I had picked the most ideal dress as it was shorter in the front on one side so I was better able to move. I couldn’t imagine running around in the frock Kia was wearing.

“Thanks,” I smiled.

I glanced around at the other students piling into their cars. I spotted Leslie getting into that gross, blackmailing Amadeus’ car. I couldn’t
believe
she was going to the social with him of all people! I scanned the crowd one last time, spotting Kain and Kia making their way to the cars. Then I saw Chuck speeding passed us so fast I didn’t even get a chance to see who was in the seat next to him!

“Hey, did you see that?” I asked.

“Yeah, whoever that was is in quite a hurry,” Lee replied.

We started navigating to the President’s home, all of the cars following the leader. That is, except for Chuck. We arrived at the mansion which was completely lit, the lawn was decorated with little twinkly lights leading up to the front door, and there was even valet! This was definitely quite different from the first time Kain and I had visited this house. Before it was mostly dark and eerily quiet, but now it was ablaze with lights and music.

“Wow,” Lee exclaimed, “the honor society definitely knows how to throw a party.”

Lee handed his key over to one of the valet guys and escorted me up the path to the entrance.