Whispers in the Dark (7 page)

“See, nobody believes me,” Dorian said irritably, looking away. “I was hoping you
would be the one person who would see it my way.”

“Get to class, Dorian, and don't let me hear you saying anything else about them.”

Dorian walked away, clearly upset.

Good job, Adrian, I thought to myself. Good job. You handled that well.

Chapter 5

I
stayed late that day at school to go over my lesson plans. I couldn't help but
think about what Dorian was saying. Denise obviously knew something, too.

Should I ask her about the surveillance cameras? Should I go to Mrs. Ramsey? Should
I question these things, or just focus on the work for the students?

I sat in the empty classroom and just thought to myself. Maybe I should start asking
more questions.

The sound of kids running up and down the hallway, right outside my classroom, interrupted
my thoughts. It sounded like a soccer ball was being kicked, hitting the lockers
and bouncing off the walls. There had to be at least two or three kids playing.

They were so loud! Why hadn't any of the other teachers said anything to them? I
guessed I had to be the bad guy. I got up from my desk.

“Hey, hey, guys,” I said, as I entered the hallway. “You're gonna have to go outside
with—”

To my amazement, there wasn't a single soul in the hallway! How could this be? The
hallway was empty! A soccer ball rolled down the hallway toward me. The sudden silence
caused chills to shoot down my back. I looked up and down the hallway.

I know I'm not hearing things, I thought. Was I? I grabbed the soccer ball. Maybe
I scared them off. But that fast, though?

I'd better get ready to leave. Lea'd texted me earlier, asking how late I
was going
to be today. I gathered my paperwork and put it in my briefcase. I turned off the
lights in my classroom, then headed down the hallway.

As I neared the doors, a student sat on the outside steps. As I got closer, I noticed
that it was Isabelle. She was sniffling, and her eyes were watery.

“Hey, Isabelle,” I said to her. “Is everything okay?”

She frowned as she looked at me and replied, softly, “Yeah.”

“Are you sure?” I asked, concerned. “If there's something bothering you, you can
talk to me.”

“I said I was fine,” she said quickly.

I knew something wasn't right. I could hear the pain in her voice. Isabelle's reaction
was the same way Lea responds when something is wrong with her.

“Your parents late picking you up?” I asked.

“Mr. Ramirez, I really don't feel like talking right now,” she responded, looking
away from me.

“Okay, okay. Well, if you ever want to talk, you know where my desk is,” I told her.

What was going on with her now? Seemed like it was one thing after another at this
school. I wondered if Robin had opened up to Isabelle about what had happened with
Jason and Ashley.

“Hey, Isabelle,” I said, walking back toward her. “One last thing, then I'll leave
you alone.”

“Yes?”

“Does Robin ever talk to you about Jason and Ashley?” I asked.

“Who?”

“Those two students who Dorian and Raven were arguing about today,” I reminded her.

“Oh. Yeah. Them,” she said, shaking her head. “I just know they're no longer here.”

“Well, yeah, I know that,” I told her. “But did Robin come to you and talk about
them? I mean, I don't see her talking to a lot of people, and I see you all together
sometimes. So I was just wondering if she talked to you about their bullying her.”

“Yeah, she said they said some pretty mean things to her,” Isabelle informed me.
“Well, I heard they said mean things about everybody. So the way I see it, they got
what they deserved.”

“They got what they deserved?” I asked, concerned. “What do you mean?”

Isabelle paused, as if she realized what she'd just said. “They're no longer at this
school. They didn't deserve to be here. They made fun of people every day. I only
know what Robin told me, and they were really mean to her. That's all I know.”

Isabelle seemed like she knew more than she was telling me. I could tell she was
getting irritated with all of the questions. I figured I might have better luck if
I backed off for now and just asked a few questions at a time.

“Okay, well, thanks, Isabelle,” I said. “See you tomorrow in class.”

“Okay.”

I decided I'd have a talk with Robin and get to the bottom of this mystery.

I lay in bed reading over
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian
. I figured
if Isabelle was reading it, I could probably work it into the curriculum. This was
a pretty good book.

Lea had sent me a message saying that her sorority had a chapter at the University
of West Georgia, and she was going out with them tonight for dinner. I couldn't help
but feel like she was only going out because of how much I've been hanging out with
Greedy and Justin.

My eyes started to feel heavy as I continued to read, so I figured I'd take a ten-minute
nap. I laid the book down and closed my eyes for a few minutes.

I woke up hearing a sound downstairs. Lea must have gotten home. I sat up in bed,
rubbing my eyes.

“Hey!” I called out to her. No response. “Lea!”

No response. I decided to go downstairs. As I got out of bed, I could hear noises
coming from the kitchen—the floorboards creaked, and there was a muffled sound, a
voice, maybe?

“Hey!” I called again from the top of the steps.

The sounds stopped, but no response from Lea. She would have said something by now.
I knew she heard me. The muffled sounds started again. My nerves started to kick
in, and my heartbeat sped up.

I held onto the banister and slowly walked down the steps. The sounds in the kitchen
grew louder, but I couldn't make out what they were from. Step by step, I felt my
adrenaline rush.

I reached the bottom of the steps and slowly turned toward the kitchen.

Suddenly, someone grabbed the back of my shoulder!

“Adrian!” Lea shook me, waking me up. “Are you okay?”

“What?” I asked, confused.

“I've been calling you from downstairs,” she told me. “Come help me get this stuff
out of my car.”

It was just a dream. Seems like my dreams were getting more and more intense.

The next morning, I thought about what Dorian had said about looking at surveillance
tapes to see what had happened to Jason and Ashley. I decided to talk to Denise about
the tapes and about Robin. Denise was on the phone when I walked into the main office,
so I took a seat in front of her desk. She held up one finger to tell me to wait
just a moment. As I sat there, I got a text from Greedy, asking if I'd had a chance
to speak to someone about a job. I'd reply later.

“Good morning, Mr. Ramirez,” Denise greeted me when she put down the phone.

“Hey, I really need to know something,” I whispered to her. “What's really going
on with Robin? I really want to know.”

Denise looked at me without saying anything. I could tell she was really thinking
about telling me the truth or not. “You're really concerned, aren't you?”

“She's my student, so yes, I am,” I told her. “I'm going to sit down with her to
see how things are going, but I need to know both sides of the story. I know there's
more than what you're telling me, and if I can help Robin, then I want to do whatever
I can.”

Denise took a deep breath and said, “Okay. I can tell that you're really concerned.
So when I tell you this, you have to believe me and not think I'm crazy.”

“Okay.”

She sat silent, then said, “Let me ask you a question. Do you believe in spirits?”

“Spirits?” I asked, making sure I heard right.

“Yes, spirits!”

“Yeah, I guess so,” I answered, a little creeped out as to why she was asking me
this.

“Well, I'm asking you because there are some strange things that have happened at
this school since I started working here,” Denise explained.

“Really?”

“Yes! I remember last year, I would stay after school to get caught up on some paperwork
that Mrs. Ramsey left me,” Denise started. “I'd be the only one in the office, and
out of nowhere, I'd start hearing whispers in the office. It freaked me out because
I knew I was the only one there. I don't stay late anymore. But now, I've noticed
that when it's totally quiet in the office, I can hear someone whispering. I say
a prayer because it freaks me out every time.”

“So, you think it's a spirit?” I asked.

“It has to be,” Denise replied. “I believe that there are some unexplained things
going on at this school.”

“Well, something unexplained happened to me the other day,” I told her. “I was going
over my lesson plan, and I know I heard some kids running up and down the hallway
kicking a soccer ball. I got up from my desk to tell them to go outside, but there
was no one in the hallway. But there was a soccer ball!”

I let that sink in for a minute.

“Oh, wow!” Denise looked surprised by my revelation.

“And it creeped me out because there was no way that those kids could have run that
fast down the hallway without my seeing them,” I told her. “But what do spirits have
to do with Robin?”

In walked Mrs. Ramsey before Denise could answer me. “Good morning, good morning.”

“Good morning,” Denise and I said in unison.

“Denise, I need for you to resend that e-mail from yesterday,” Mrs. Ramsey instructed.

“Okay.”

“I'll come back after school,” I told Denise.

“Okay.”

Once again, chills ran down my back as I thought about spirits in the school. Could
that really be what I'd heard? The spirits of children playing in the hallway? As
I walked down the hallway, I looked up at the camera planted in the corner of the
ceiling.

“Look at the surveillance cameras,” Dorian's words echoed in my head. I still had
to ask Denise about the cameras.

The rest of the school day went on without any issues. Denise's experience of hearing
whispers stayed in the back of my mind. As I walked back to her office later that
day, I had a different outlook on the school now. This place felt a bit creepier
with the students gone for the day. A cool shudder trickled down my back as I walked
the hallway. I glanced nervously into each classroom as I passed by, thinking about
the voices of the kids I had heard. I couldn't help but feel as if someone was following
me.

Get it together, Adrian, I told myself.

Denise sat quietly tapping on her keyboard as I entered the office.

“Hey, you,” she greeted me.

“Hey,” I replied. “I have a question for you.”

“Okay, go ahead. I'm listening,” she said, continuing to type on her computer.

I looked around to make sure no one else was in the office. “I know you said you
believe that strange things are happening at this school. Have you ever thought about
going back and checking out the surveillance footage? I mean, I think it's worth
a look. There might be some answers there as to what's been going on.”

After a few seconds of clacking on her keyboard, Denise responded.
“Okay. We can
do that.” Denise hopped up from her mesh chair, and I followed her as we walked out
of the office. She didn't say anything as we walked to a door at the end of the hallway.
Denise took out some keys from her pocket and opened the door. She flipped on the
light. It was a small security room. A desk at one end held a computer and monitor,
and a rack of six smaller monitors that showed black-and-white live shots of the
hallways, the campus, the main entrance, cafeteria, gym, and the administrative offices.

“Let me show you this,” Denise said, sitting down at the desk. She opened the drawer
of a file cabinet beneath the desk, and pulled out a DVD from an unmarked folder
at the back. The DVD was labeled
Ashley January 20.
“I was thinking the same way
you were thinking when I first got here. So I started looking at some of the surveillance
tapes, since I have access to them. I was checking to see if there was something
that Robin did to Ashley and Jason. I copied and saved this footage on a DVD, hoping
to show somebody one day, and I didn't want it to be deleted.”

Denise inserted the DVD. It held two video files, and she double-clicked the first.
The footage, in grainy black and white, showed students in the hallway. “Look, that's
Ashley right there,” Denise pointed to a tall, slim blonde girl. Ashley was standing
at one side of the hall, talking with two girls who leaned against the wall. “Now,
watch. Robin is going to come from this direction.”

A group of five or six students walked up the hallway toward Ashley, Robin among
them. As Robin passed Ashley, she rubbed her hand across Ashley's back. Ashley jumped
and turned around, but by then, Robin had slipped ahead in the group.

“You saw that, right?” Denise asked me.

“Yeah. She touched her.”

“Right. Now, I'm going to fast-forward to later that afternoon.”

Denise fast-forwarded the video. Ashley was walking up some steps with more students.
She stopped suddenly and looked down the hallway, as if she'd seen something.

Ashley slowly walked away, still looking back. Then she started to run. Suddenly,
Ashley was out of sight on the video.

“Here's what happened from another camera,” Denise said. She opened the other file.

From a different angle, Ashley was running down the hallway, then she tripped and
fell. She looked back. She had a terrified look on her face. The video stopped.