Ella and Lottie

Bertie

Chapter 4
Lottie

My head bent my wrist back as I leaned my cheek on my palm as my form tutor, Miss Mose, took the register in the background. I still had the image of Ella, asleep curled up on my bed, her face just visible in the yellow half-light, her small hands cupped under her cheek like a small child, a few strands of thick black hair dangling in her oval face tinted gold in the lights escaping from the thin curtains, her lips slightly parted, her chest pressed against my rising and falling in time with mine, her heart thudding against mine...

Okay, enough now stop it! I demanded my brain furiously. I impatiently flicked the auburn braid that had fallen in front of me, over my shoulder. I wrenched my locker open with unnecessary force and a cascade of books tumbled out. Ugh, I need to get my head in the game today. The trample of footsteps and the clang of metal meant the rest of my class was racing and jostling each other down the hall to the English room. A hand shot out to help me up. It was Wilma and beside her offering me an armful of dropped books, as Wilma shut my locker with a definite click, Bailey. A prizewinning smile lit up my face. My perfect friends always had my back, especially when I didn't tell them to.

"Oh, what would I do without you two?" I beamed as Wilma marched me down the hall and Bailey swung her small arm around my waist, her new trainers squeaking on the floor.

"Be, even, later for lessons!" Bailey giggled.

"Stop dallying you two," Will slid in between us and grabbed both our hands; mine, big and clumsy with bitten nails and Bailey's small, smooth with lovely rounded-off nails tipped with rose pink.

"Okay coming!" I saw up ahead Miss Lin was ushering my rowdy class through the well-known door. At the same second my bag, which I never properly zipped up, tipped as I hurried and my folder, which was precariously balanced as it was, clattered out. I leant to scoop it up as my friends, never glancing behind them, sauntered into the classroom. With a huff, I strode towards the door muttering about books and how annoying they are to carry.

Out of the blue, an arm shot out of a small storage cupboard and clamped around my waist, another arm almost simultaneously firmly clapping around my mouth before I could manage a single sound. Thrashing, the arms drew me into the blackness of the dusty cupboard. As the door shut me and my attacker in, the pure darkness that felt like a weighted blanket smothering me, quieting my attempts of struggle. Finally, the rough hands let go of me. I inhaled a ragged breath to scream. Before a sound left my lips I felt a breath stirring my hair on my neck and a voice in my ear. A soft low murmur but in the chilly darkness, the hiss was threatening and sent shivers over my entire body.

"I wouldn't do that if I was you," threatened the figure which I could blurrily see the outline of in the weak light seeping under the door. "I know your secret Charlotte." This was accompanied by a low chuckle and the hand which had formerly curled around my waist to draw me into the dark cupboard tugged on a metal chain which trailed up into the darkness of the top of the small space. I gulped, this was so... I felt dizzy. This was unreal, this happens to heroines in stories. Not normal girls walking down school corridors. I took a deep breath and thought like a heroine as only a heroine could handle this.

"Which is... what ?" my brave facade cracked a little before I stared my villain right where the dark shadow of their face was.

Fizzle, crackle, pop. The light bulb spluttered and groaned and finally, swinging, shone a dim orange glow which banished the shadows into the corners of the swashed room. On the other side of the old lamp that reminded me of interrogation rooms from movies, was ...

"Oh, that, it's that you are in love with Ella Weber in year ten, of course." Bertie lowered his face to my level, the curling ends of his shaggy black fringe curtaining the endless tunnels of his dark eyes. Bertie was tall, taller than me which was odd in my year even for a boy, he towered over me and had to hunch his shoulders to get our face's level. My first reaction to seeing the familiar figure of an old crush was embarrassingly enough for my cheeks to flame.