The School for Wayward Final Girls

Prologue

 The sound of sharpened nails drumming along my back, nearly digging in, sent me shooting upright in a pool of sticky sweat. The sherpa blanket sunk to my knees as I scooted away from the sand towards the water that was being leeched of the moonlight towards the rays of the golden shining sun.

Dawn.

Shit.

My mom is going to kill me.

"Peter. Wake up. We fell asleep." I shook him furiously until he stirred in his sleep, wiping the drying drool off of his mouth. "Come on, Peter. If my mom is going to kill me, your dad will send your ass to jail for his inane model citizen teens program."

"Genesis. Just five more minutes." Peter turned onto his side as the San Francisco 49ers blanket wrapped around his naked torso. I forced my eyes to avert from his chest. I blinked to clear my head of all the thoughts that just cascaded to the surface.

With my head fully cleared, I made no further attempt to be nice in my pursuits to wake him up. "Alright, you asked for it." I tucked my unruly brown morning hair behind my ears as I scoured the deserted beach for an abandoned sand pal. Finding a lime green one half buried in the sand and half visible to the naked eye, I hastily snatched the bucket and began filling it to the brim with ice-cold water.

Coming back to where Peter is sleeping, I sloshed the water over his sandy-colored hair with warning. When the splash of water did not wake him up, the rest of the water followed suit until his chest glistened with water.

Nearly drooling myself, I yanked him up by his shoulders as he glared at me with a look of pure annoyance.

"What's the damn hurry, Gen. Either way, we're dead."

"You know the stories. My mom suffered through a lot when she was my age."

"What stories?" Peter stared at me dumbfounded.

"You know, Freddy Krueger. The child murderer from the street she grew up on. It's some type of tree. Oak street. Maple street-"

"Elm Street." Peter supplied.

"Yeah, that's the one. So, you have heard of the stories?"

"Everyone has. But they are just stories, Gen. Nobody dies in their sleep. It's just a story to scare teenagers into always listening to their parents."

"What does dying in your sleep have to do with listening to your parents?"

"Maybe if you break curfew. Freddy will getcha!"

I screamed as Peter teased me and chased me towards his car. The only thing he was missing was Freddy's sharp blades for fingers. My mom didn't prefer going into much detail, but she mentioned the details that counted. The details she made sure not to embellish in her tone. Her story never sounded rehearsed, though; it always sounded full of foreboding to me.

I finally reached Peter's run-down black Chevy when he caught me in his arms. I screamed and playfully pretended to shove his arms away from me as a giggle bubbled within me.

"Gotcha! Freddy Krueger will always get you." It's odd that Peter and I are joking about a difficult conversation my mother had with me before she went to stay at a clinic when I was nine because the nightmares came back of her boyfriend from high school, Glen. She named me after him even if she doesn't like talking about him much these days, I know that they were in love, and whatever monster was really lurking around Elm Street, he took Glen away from my mom, Nancy, and my mom couldn't save him. That guilt has chewed her up since she was my age, and she has never let go of those horrific nightmares of the past.

"Seriously, Peter. You are a major tool sometimes. Can you please just take me home?"

He kissed me on the cheek and wrapped me into his naked chest. "You know I'm just messing with you, right, babe? I would never let any monster hurt you." I knew he meant it, but his unsympathetic side was showing, and I loathed it.