Public schools were dangerous. Well, I amended, any school was, but normal public high schools like this were even worse. Laughter and conversation seemed too loud in the small hallways. The metallic clangs of locker doors swinging around echoed off the painted cinderblocks. Way more people than I was used to flowed in currents that I couldn't keep up with. Students wound this way and that in unintelligible patterns, some of them with their headphone volumes turned up to an uncomfortable level. I gave those kids wide berths.

The cacophony of noise almost beat a kind of rhythm, one that made... him perk up inside my head. I winced and stopped listening. He became silent and didn't fight. It appeared that he knew how tenuous our situation was, too. If anybody found out that he was there, we would be in lots of trouble, not to mention danger. The students here would hate us, the police would show up and probably arrest us... again, if my memories of his night were correct. And that didn't even take into account the trouble we'd be in at school!

I did my best to match the walks of the other kids and pretend that I belonged. Hands in pockets, fiddling with headphones, head down, waving and nodding at the occasional person who made eye contact. Judging by the way I was dressed - glasses, sweater vest, converse - I belonged squarely in the "dork" category, maybe bordering on "hipster". Normally, it didn't really matter, but public schools had this weird thing about clothes and cliques. Nobody would pay attention to me unless I did something to draw it. I pushed my dark bangs down as far as they would go in an attempt to hide the tiny silver ring around my left eyebrow. That did not fit into the dork image.

As I walked, I saw lots of kids passing around a photocopied poster with a black and white picture on it. I peered closer, then jumped back and walked faster. The papers were wanted posters, with his face and his name. I ducked my head even further. I needed to find somewhere to hide until school got out and people wouldn't question a teenager being out on the streets. A janitor's closet, maybe, or an empty classroom. I didn't need even more attention for being out in the halls during classes. I guessed that here, that would mean a trip to the principal's office or detention.

I was sure that everybody here could tell that I wasn't supposed to be here, that I had no idea what I was doing. But I tried anyway. It seemed to be going well, though - nobody looked twice at me. As well it should be, I reminded myself. I attended a public middle school like this for three whole years across the country, and even if I was out of practice, at least part of me belonged here. I ignored him in the back of my mind. I was normal, I was human. Me.

A very loud bell rang right next to me. I jumped, my hands flying to cover my hypersensitive ears, and stumbled right into a broad letterman jacket. The blond brute it belonged to turned around, a scowl on his face that might have been scare if I hadn't seen much more horrifying earnest smiles at my actual school.

"Watch where you're going, twerp," he growled meanly. The hallway emptied out with the bell, a few kids sending me pitying looks as they passed by. One of the blond kid's friends, wearing a matching teal letterman jacket, chuckled quietly as the blond kid grinned.

"Um, s-sorry," I stammered, playing up my natural shyness. I'd gotten over it, mostly, but it wasn't too hard to adopt that veneer again. He winced at the pathetic display, but I just shrugged internally. I needed to act the part, didn't I? It had been a while since I had needed to deal with bullies like these, but I remembered well enough: let them do what they wanted and hope they don't want background music and turn on their phones.

The blond jock grabbed the front of my sweater vest. His dull green eyes roamed my face, and I became hyper-aware of the bangs covering my eyebrow ring. If he saw it, however, he didn't care.

"You look new," the jock said. Dang it. I'd been trying to avoid that. "So I guess I'll have to teach you." He swung me around into the lockers beside us. My back hit the flimsy metal painfully. I felt him wanting to fight back, but he didn't have any control right now. I was sympathetic, since I knew well what that was like, but right now we were in agreement: me was better right now.

"Never." The jock pulled me away from the lockers then pushed me back into them. My hands scrabbled at his, though I didn't try very hard. If I really wanted to, I could push him off of me, but that would bring more trouble than I think I could handle. The jock would let me go soon and think no more about me, if I just let it happen and acted the way he expected me to.

"Touch. My. Jacket." The jock punctuated each word with another bang into the lockers. My glasses fell off somewhere in there, so his fist pulling back was blurry, but I could still see it coming. The jock's ugly, huge friend chuckling grated on my nerves. I shut my eyes, gritted my teeth, and braced myself for the kind of bruise on my face that I hadn't had in an entire two school years. At least my glasses wouldn't get broken.

"Hey, Jake," said a new voice from behind the jock. It was feminine, but lacking any kind of emotion. Impressive. "Didn't Coach say you were on probation for this kind of thing?"

The jock - Jake - forgot about the punch and turned around, revealing the newcomer to me. I almost thought she was a monster, but quickly realized she was just goth. My high school had sure changed me. The girl's black eyeliner covered the space from eyebrow to eye, and I could see it all. She was looking down at her phone, which had a black coffin-shaped case. I almost chuckled. This girl...

While I had been looking at the girl, Jake had been busy thinking. I didn't know how many brain cells he had, but I was willing to bet I could count them on one hand. He jeered at the insult and urged me to say it out loud. I refrained.

Finally, Jake made up his mind. To the protests of his friends, he dropped me, so I let my knees give out and dump me on the scuffed floor. He growled out loud at the girl, until her eyes flicked up and met his. They were light hazel, almost yellow. I smirked, then quickly dropped it and turned my head down before anybody could see.

Jake thrust an angry finger at the girl. "You'll get what's coming to you, freak."

"Oh no, I'm so scared." Her voice was still flat. "Hey, Jerk and company, why are you still here?"

After fuming for a moment, Jake turned around and kicked me in the stomach. When I came back to the world, he and his friend had left. I coughed.

"Clara," said the goth girl. She hadn't left, but was offering her pale hand to me. I looked up at her black-lined smirk, then grabbed her hand.

"Jackson," I replied. Clara's short black hair bobbed around her cheeks as she helped me stand.

As you can tell, this is nowhere near finished. I have 10k words or so planned, 8.5k written, and 3k edited. I'm releasing them about 1k at a time, probably about every week on Thursdays.

This story picks up in the middle of the movie Ghouls Rule, which had a couple cool concepts but ultimately sucked like most "canon" MH. Clara is my version of Claire. Nick is... whatsisname. You'll meet him next chapter. I thought making him a bit alt would be more in line with Clara's character.

So, uh, review please! I eat reviews for breakfast! :)