The Survivors I: Fresh Beginnings

Different

III - Cole

My team lost the math competition that day. It didn't matter. What was being served for lunch was unexplainable. It didn't matter. My phone was destroyed. It didn't matter. What mattered was that day. I was sitting having my last lunch, and it was terrifying.

Katrina appeared to be the only other alert one. Words do not echo through her lips. Her fingers form a steeple and her eyebrows narrow. Everyone else was fine, just fine.

"Zach, why do you eat that?" Emily asked if him, who brings her own lunch.

"I just do," he replies. "What else would I even eat?"

"He has a point, besides I think it's okay," Denys butted in.

"I still don't understand how anybody can eat that," Emily continued, taking a tenacious sip from her bottle of cherry water.

I gazed to Katrina's worry and I heeded to the table conversation. I wondered what her mind was stirring, but I knew it had to include what was going on. Everybody, unwitting, continued their average conversation, while Katrina and I remained disquieted.

"Is something wrong Cole?" Tanner asked of me.

I jolted out of fixed focus and conjured my answer in seconds.

"No, I'm just tired from waking up early right after the break," I chuckled in a feign manner.

I was assumed to be just a sleepy being, but again, they were unaware of the fact that terror could come. Each was ignorant to the world which they reside.

I gently rubbed my eyes to continue the charade. I then open them to notice the girl next too me performing oddly, Catherine.

Her shoulders, slumped, had goosebumps lining every inch of her arms. Her left hand quivered in place while her right fingers rapidly struck her knee. Her eyes gave the floor a deathly state while she sat unusually farther away from us.

Time flew as if it was a bird. The whole crowd was beginning to exit while I sat and studied Katrina and Catherine. They left as well, but didn't realize anyone but themselves, as did I. I quickly sprung to join them. I followed Catherine, Katrina, and Shelbie, because we all had the same English class next. Once I caught up, we had just reached the room.

"Where's the teacher?" Shelbie questioned.

"Probably taking his old man pills," a student joked.

Laughter arrived, but not from me.

"I bet he'll get here right after the bell rings," he said. "I'll bet three dollars!"

"I'll take you on!" exclaimed his friend.

Sure enough, the bell rang, and the kid was given his three dollars, but Mrs. Moore didn't show herself. Just then, an announcement boomed with static over the intercom.

"School is cancelled, but you parents will have to pick you," the speaker started. "Everyone please report to the cafeteria."

I knew she had to have been a victim.
I was definite.