Wuthering high: a bard academy novel (15 page)

My legitimate — as in consensual — kiss happened three years ago.

I think this could pretty much make me into a kissing virgin again, considering my memory of “the kiss” (with Gregory Mason, my seventh grade “boyfriend” of five weeks) is vague at best. Basically, it happened in my room, after Gregory had come over to do math homework, and Coldplay was blaring. My door was open (per Mom’s rules), but she was too busy talking on the phone to one of her friends about the pros and cons of liposuction to pay much attention to what was happening in my room, and Lindsay (thank God) was at softball practice.

Gregory had put down his pencil and said, “You wanna kiss?” just like he’d asked me if I wanted a piece of gum. I said, “Okay,” and then Gregory had smashed his face into mine at high velocity. Then, for good measure, he’d thrust out his tongue three times, just like a lizard. The first time, he hit my lower lip, the second time my upper teeth, and the third landed a direct blow to my tongue itself with such force it felt like he was trying to wrestle my tongue to the roof of my mouth.

I later heard from other girls that this was Gregory’s patented technique. Three lizard-tongue thrusts. Based on the way these girls (admitted lip hos) laughed at Gregory, I’m guessing his approach wasn’t very good. Of course, I could tell this myself. I’m still wondering how a boy’s tongue could be so pointy.

So I don’t have much experience in the kissing department, and that’s because I’m exceptionally picky about the people I choose to go with. So sue me. I mean, I won’t go with just any boy who asks me. Not that I’ve had a
ton
of boys ask me freshman year, but I did get a few offers, just not of the caliber I would accept.

And now here is Ryan Kent, sitting nearly nose-to-nose with me, his lips slightly parted and no words coming out. I’m leaning in to him, or he’s leaning in to me, I can’t tell which, and it feels like everything in the world has been paused TiVo-style. I want this moment to last absolutely forever.

That’s when I hear it. The soft sound of laughter. Girl-maniacal laughter. I freeze. Does Ryan hear it, too? Or is this just my overactive imagination again?

The girl’s laughter gets louder.

The spell, or whatever it was between us, breaks, as Ryan looks up.

“Do you hear that?” he asks me.

“You hear it, too?” I exclaim, relieved. Maybe I’m not actually going crazy. “I thought I was imagining it.”

“No, I definitely hear it,” Ryan says. “Who do you think it is?”

“I don’t know, but every time I hear it…” Before I can even finish my sentence, the smell of smoke reaches my nose. “I think it’s the Bard arsonist.”

“The kid setting fires?” Ryan asks, starting to look alarmed.

“I think we ought to get out of here, quickly,” I say, pulling Ryan to his feet.

“Hey — is something burning?”

“Yeah, it could be us, if we don’t get out of here.”

Ryan sweeps his iPod into his backpack and crumples up the garbage as he grabs my hand. I’m too busy being happy in the knowledge that I’m once again touching Ryan Kent to be too disturbed by the fact that this whole place may soon go up in flames. I realize this is wrong. But what can I do? I
am
a girl, after all.

The smoke starts to get thicker, and as we make our way down the stairs I hear laughter above us. It sounds closer than it’s ever been. When I look up I see a crazed-looking woman in a white nightgown. Her hair is a mess and she has a wild look in her eye. I’ve never seen her before. She’s peering at us over the railing; when she sees me looking at her, she just starts to laugh.

The
laugh.
It’s the same laugh I’ve heard before every fire. The maniacal, I’m-crazy laugh. That’s it. It’s her. This woman in the nightgown. As I watch, she backs away and runs upward — toward the fire. You know, because people who walk around with crazy hair in white nightgowns are probably — what’s the word I’m looking for —
insane?

Still, I can’t just let her die, even if she is a crazy person.

“Wait,” I cry, tugging on Ryan’s arm. “There’s a woman up there. A woman by the fire.”

Ryan slows. “We were just up there, there wasn’t a woman,” he says.

“I saw a woman.”

“Hello?” Ryan calls upward. No one answers. The smoke is so thick now that I start to cough. “Maybe I should go see.”

Ryan rips off his sweater and puts it across his face as he rushes, without hesitation, straight up the stairs. Of course he would moonlight as a superhero.

“Ryan! Ryan…wait!”

I watch him as he climbs up the stairs. What have I done? If that’s the crazy arsonist, then Ryan is going to be in serious trouble. It’s now so smoky that I can’t see the upper landing, or Ryan, at all.

“Ryan! Are you okay? Ryan!”

I start to move up the stairs when two strong hands grab me from behind. I turn to see Heathcliff there.

Of course he’s here. He’s always around when fires start, a nagging voice in my head tells me.

“Let go of me,” I cry, tugging hard against him, but he’s too strong for me.

“Cathy, we have to go!”

“I’m not
Cathy,
” I cry, fighting him harder.

“I have to get you out of here,
now.
”

“I’m not going without Ryan.”

“Forget him,” Heathcliff says, frowning.

“I’m not leaving without him. Either you help me get him or I’m getting him by myself.”

Heathcliff loosens his grip. “You know that anything you tell me to do, I’ll do.”

“Then help Ryan.”

Heathcliff frowns at me, but then he turns and runs up the stairs, his arm covering his mouth. Is it possible? Does Heathcliff
do my bidding?
No one does my bidding. Not even Lindsay. Or should I say, especially not Lindsay.

I’m starting to get light-headed from the smoke. Seconds later, Heathcliff appears, and he’s got Ryan slung over his shoulder.

“Come on,” he says, grabbing me by the arm and leading me forward.

Outside the chapel, Heathcliff carries Ryan over to a nearby tree and lays him down, scowling as he does so. Even good deeds don’t make Heathcliff happy.

“Miranda? Is that you? God, what happened?” Hana cries, running up to me. Samir isn’t far behind. I guess they were in the library, because that’s the direction from which they’re coming.

“Are you okay? And who’s this?” Samir asks, pointing at Heathcliff.

“I…” I am light-headed, is what I am. The smoke…and everything. My throat closes up and I start to cough, and then I can’t stop. It takes hold of my chest and shakes me so hard that I feel like someone has a vise grip on my bronchial tubes. Heathcliff’s head shoots up and I see him walk over to me, a concerned look on his face.

I double over, I’m coughing so hard, and I wonder when I’ll be able to stop. That’s the last thing I remember thinking before I pass out.

Twenty

I wake up on a
stretcher in the infirmary. It’s a large room with several cots and at least three private exam rooms with doors. It’s the most brightly lit room at Bard, with fluorescent lights above me. It looks like a mini-emergency room. I can’t help but wonder why they have such a big infirmary.

The first thing I hear is Samir’s voice. “I’ve never seen anyone faint before,” he says.

“Ugh?” I grumble, meaning to form words, but my throat feels like someone took my tonsils out without any anesthetic. I guess it was the smoke I inhaled in the chapel.

“You fainted,” Hana says.

“Dropped like a stone,” Samir agrees. “By the way, you are heavier than you look.”

“You caught me?” I croak, sounding like either Patty or Selma from
The Simpsons.

“No, your friend did. He carried you all the way here.” I look over and see that Heathcliff is staring at me, doing his strong-and-silent routine while sitting outside the infirmary on a bench in the hall, as Coach H and Ms. W attempt to interrogate him. He won’t look at them, just at me. Samir continues, “I’m just
guessing
you’re heavier than you look, based on, well, looks.”

“Shut up, Samir,” I say. “You are so like a little brother sometimes.”

“I know. It’s one of my most charming qualities.”

“What are they doing?” I ask Hana, looking over at Heathcliff.

“They’re trying to figure out what happened,” Hana says. “But he’s not being very helpful — big surprise.”

I cough a little, but recover. I feel totally crappy. My throat is burning and my head feels like I’m having the worst caffeine-withdrawal headache ever.

“What about Ryan?”

“He’s fine. He’s over there,” Hana says, pointing to one of the closed-door exam rooms. “He’s resting.”

I sit up, thinking I’ll go over and try to talk to him, but I’m stopped mid sit-up by a sharp, blinding headache.

“Ow,” I cry, holding my head and slowly laying back down on the cot.

“Coach H warned us that might happen,” Samir says. “You shouldn’t move too quickly.”

“Nice of you to tell me now,” I say, “when it does me absolutely no good. And what does he know about it?”

“He doubles as the school nurse,” Samir says, which causes me to laugh. Only the laugh turns into a cough, and then a wheeze.

“Oh, don’t make me laugh, it hurts,” I say, putting a hand to my chest, which feels like it’s on fire.

“I’m serious. He
is
the school nurse. He told us he drove an ambulance in the war.”

“War? What war? The Gulf War?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t ask him,” Samir says.

“Never mind that,” Hana says. “I think you’ll want to know that we found out something else about your friend over there.” She nods her head in Heathcliff’s direction. “He’s not a student here.”

“What do you mean?”

“We overheard his conversation with Coach. Bard has no record of him.”

“Why is he here then?” I ask.

“Nobody knows,” Samir says. “He won’t even give his name, but Hana said you know him.”

“I don’t know him,” I say. “Not really.”

“Who just shows up out of nowhere at Bard?” Hana asks.

“And pretending to be a literary character from the 1800s, don’t forget,” I say.

“I’m missing something,” Samir says.

“I’ll fill you in later,” Hana says.

“In any case, he
seriously
digs you,” Samir adds, in case it wasn’t already obvious.

“What clued you into that?” Hana asks him sarcastically. “Him saving Miranda from a stack of burning backpacks, or just now when he pulled her and her date from the burning chapel?”

“I’m just saying, maybe Miranda didn’t notice. She did pass out. She could have memory loss.”

I noticed. I definitely noticed.

“Do you still think he’s the one setting fires?” Hana asks me.

“He’s what?” Samir exclaims. “Why doesn’t anyone tell me anything?”

“I don’t know. I’m beginning to think that the arsonist is a woman. Before the fire, I saw a crazy woman in a white nightgown. She was laughing. But it’s the same laugh I’ve been hearing near other fires.”

“Sounds like Mrs. Rochester,” Hana says.

“Who?” Samir asks.

“Mrs. Rochester. From
Jane Eyre
?” Hana explains. “It’s my favorite book.”

“Jane Eyre
is your favorite book? You are such a nerd,” Samir says.

“That’s rich coming from you, Mr. I Collect
Lord of the Rings
Toys.”

“Can we get back to this Mrs. Rochester character?” I ask the two of them.

“Jane Eyre is a governess who goes to work in the house of Mr. Rochester,” Hana says. “The two of them fall in love, but what Jane Eyre doesn’t know is that Mr. Rochester has a crazy wife he locked in the attic. She’s insane, and she laughs all the time, and well, she…sets fires.”

“Nice love story,” I say.

“It is a weird coincidence,” Hana says. “Heathcliff trying to be Heathcliff, and then this woman trying to be Mrs. Rochester.”

“What is this? Some new psychological condition?” Samir says. “Like schizophrenia, only with literature — Shakespearenia?”

Suddenly, behind us, the conversation of Heathcliff and Coach H gets louder. It’s an argument.

“Tell us where she is,” Coach says, nearly at a shout. “Where is Emily? Where is she?”

Who’s Emily?

“I’ll not tell you anything, you milk-blooded coward,” Heathcliff says.

That’s when Coach H rears back and strikes Heathcliff. Actually hits him straight across the face. Headmaster B gasps.

I’m stunned, and Samir and Hana are speechless. That has got to violate some cardinal campus rule about teacher-student relations.

Heathcliff, for his part, doesn’t even flinch or even make a sound. He just spits at the feet of Coach H, as if to say, “That’s the best you can do?”

“I’ll tell you nothing,” Heathcliff says in low tones. Then he puts both hands on H’s shoulders and shoves him hard into the Guardians, who are supposed to be keeping watch. As the three stumble and fall, he runs the other way toward the exit. He pauses there before he leaves, looking straight at me. He doesn’t smile, he just meets my eye for a fraction of a second, and then he’s gone.

I definitely don’t want to get on that boy’s bad side, I think. He’s a force to be reckoned with.

“Your boyfriend is some kind of badass,” Samir says.

“He’s not my boyfriend,” I say, but even I’m not exactly sure if that’s true.

Headmaster B and Coach H draw closer together and speak in urgent whispers. They’re joined shortly in the hall by Ms. W, who seems pretty upset by Heathcliff’s disappearance. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but they seem worried. A bit frantic, even. They start to argue. They can’t seem to agree on what to do next. Headmaster B leaves.

“Something is definitely up,” Samir says. “They look worried.”

Coach and Ms. W finally take notice of us, and the fact that I’m sitting up and conscious.

“You,” Coach says, pointing. “You need to tell us everything.”

After I recount my version of the story, Coach says, “I told you it was her,” as if he knew about our Mrs. Rochester lookalike.

“We have a serious problem on our hands,” Ms. W says. “Has someone checked the vault? If any more books are out…” she trails off.