Halloween Part 2

Slight tw: someone gets shot.

Eddie:

A large part of my brain was still struggling to comprehend what had happened. Three loud cracks had sounded through the air, like a broom handle repeatedly snapping in half. We all knew what it was, whether through action movies or crime shows or traumatic events, but no one seemed to be able to admit it. Hushed voices were sounding through the room, people too afraid to talk louder. There had been a good deal of screaming at first before the teachers managed to herd everyone to the walls, cover any windows into the room and kill the lights. No one seemed to know what was happening, but everyone knew one thing, was painfully conscious of it:

Someone had brought a gun to school.

Nina:

There weren't a whole lot of benefits to my early school years, but growing up in America, you know what to do if someone brings a gun onto campus. I'd run down the hall, going from door to door, frantically trying to find one that was unlocked, nearly collapsing from relief when a handle twisted and I practically fell inside the classroom. I shut the door as quietly as I could behind me, trying to make sense of things.

Gunshots.

Someone had brought a gun to school.

I glanced around and realized I was in the science lab. The only classroom in the building that had translucent windows instead of walls. I glanced around. Whoever had pulled the trigger, they were nearby. The gunshots were too loud for them not to be. Could I hide under a desk?

My ears were straining in the silence and I froze as I picked up footsteps. Not the desperate, hurried footsteps of a student running away. The slow, measured footsteps of a person looking for someone they know can't escape. I darted away from the door and my eyes alit on the supply closet. I ran over as quickly as I could, trying to be quiet and hid inside, sliding down to the floor, struggling to breathe as I ran my fingers over my locket. I was going to be fine. I was going to be fine. They probably didn't even know where I was.

I heard a door open and my heart stopped beating. The door closed.

I could definitely hear footsteps now.

I lifted a shaking hand to brush the sweat off my face and realized I was crying.

Joy:

Whispers raced around the crowd, everyone wanting to know the same thing. Who had the gun? Where were they now? Were we all going to die?

I checked my watch for the millionth time and saw it had been barely five minutes since the gun had been fired. It felt like a lifetime. There was the sound of a door opening, and as one our heads snapped to the source. It was Mrs. Dickerson, who taught science to the primary schoolers. One of the doors led straight out onto the grass lot in front of school, and she, Mr. Sweet and Mr. Taylor were ushering students through as quietly as possible.

I glanced around, trying to make sure no one had been shot. Logically, I knew the gun hadn't been fired in the room, the shots weren't nearly loud enough. But I couldn't seem to silence the voice in my mind that insisted one of my friends was dead. I saw Patricia, pale but determined, sitting with Eddie, who looked as though he might throw up, and Fabian, who was clearly terrified. Amber was leaning her head on Alfie's shoulder, tears streaking down her cheeks, marring the beautiful glitter she had so carefully painted on. People started walking towards the doors, and I saw a teary Mara holding tightly onto an expressionless Jerome. I felt a hand grab my shoulder and jerked before realizing it was Patricia, gesturing at me to come outside with the rest of them. Nina had left for the house a few minutes ago, she was probably outside already.

I kept my breathing controlled as best I could, ignoring the tears dripping off my own chin, my hand tightly clenching Patricia's as we made it outside. The second the smell of grass touched my nostrils, I felt like I could breathe again. We were outside, we were out of the school. Everything and everyone was going to be fine.

The students kept trickling out and we began sorting ourselves into houses. We'd never been trained in this sort of thing; school shootings didn't happen in the UK. But we did have fire drills, and everyone seemed to be treating this more or less the same. Once everyone had evacuated, we sorted ourselves into groups with the rest of our housemates and waited for our house masters or house mothers to come. As Anubis headed over to our spot, nervous laughter started filtering through the crowd. Maybe it had been a bad joke? No one seemed to be injured.

The eight of us found each other and congregated into a rough imitation of a circle, Fabian looking everywhere for Nina.

"You know, it's strange, isn't it?" We all turned to a wet-faced Mara.

When she didn't elaborate, Alfie prompted, "What's strange Mara?"

"Well everyone knew about the party tonight. If it were a student or a teacher, why wouldn't they have been in there with us?"

There was a beat of silence. "Well they would've known the bags were being searched," I reminded her.

Mara frowned. "I don't know. It just doesn't make sense."

Our heads whipped back to the air as more gunshots sounded, accompanied by the faint sound of breaking glass.

A high-pitched scream pierced the air, and I didn't have to hear Fabian hoarsely say her name to know who it was.

"Nina."

Nina:

I hadn't meant to scream, I hadn't been able to help it. Glass rained down around me, and it took me a second to realize that whoever it was had simply blown out the window, not shot me.

"Are you going to listen to what I tell you this time?" I didn't answer, I was too busy shaking and trying not to vomit. "Stand up Ms. Martin."

My legs didn't seem to be working properly, but because I wasn't in the mood to die today, I braced my hands against the wall and dragged myself into a standing position, keeping my eyes fixed on the floor. I didn't know where I was supposed to look.

"Look at me Ms. Martin." I almost choked on a laugh. Well that solved that problem. I dragged my eyes up, ignoring how quickly my heart was racing, words drumming through my head with each beat of my pulse. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die.

I meant to bring my eyes up to their face, but my vision got stuck on the gun they were casually holding in front of their chest.

"I said." The gun cocked and I choked on nothing. "Look at me Ms. Martin."

I forced my eyes up, trying to see through the tears, and blinked in confusion. Who wears a ski mask to shoot up a school?

"Now are you going to do what I tell you Ms. Martin?"

They opened the door as I realized their voice sounded strange, like I was hearing it through a really crappy telephone. I couldn't tell if it was male or female, young or old, or anything of importance. What the hell was going on?

My chain of thought was derailed by the gun barrel that was suddenly a foot from my face. I was going to throw up. "Step out of the closet Ms. Martin."

My fingers were going numb, my whole body felt cold all over, but I somehow managed to step out of the closet. They gestured carelessly with the gun. The gun was silver. It seemed too small to be so fatal. "Walk over there."

I followed the gesture, walking on trembling legs over to stand in front of one of the lab tables. My fingers clenched and unclenched, trying to force some circulation to come back.

The shooter walked towards me and those same five words kept repeating through my head, an endless broken record. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I desperately wanted to ask the shooter who they were, but I also wanted to live, and so I said nothing, too scared of saying the wrong thing to say anything at all.

"Did you know you're rather famous in some circles Ms. Martin?" They were maybe two feet away. No possible way to miss from that distance. "The girl who was touched by death." The gun was pointed right at my forehead and my eyes were starting to sting from not blinking. "Care to explain how you did it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about." The words chiseled themselves out of my throat and left my lips in a raspy voice that I hoped they understood.

"No?" The gun vanished for a split second and then pain exploded in the right side of my face, knocking me over. The entire world was spinning, spinning, stars were bursting in front of my eyes and a ringing was filling my ears. The entire right side of my face was on fire, all I could feel was pain as I clapped a hand to my cheek and eye; blood, hot and sticky, trickling over my fingers. Next thing I knew the back of my head was burning and the shooter was tugging me up by my hair, forcing me to lean backwards over the desk, and my entire universe narrowed down to the sudden press of cold metal against my stomach.

My breathing shallowed out, all I could do was try to gasp in oxygen, try to breathe through the pain and the tears, praying each breath wouldn't be my last, as their mouth moved next to my ear and the gun dug itself into my skin.

"You don't know what I'm talking about, Ms. Martin?" A breathy laugh. On the off chance I didn't die today, I'd remember that laugh for the rest of my life. "Well then allow me to remind you."

Amber:

My hand was holding Alfie's so tightly I was surprised he hadn't protested yet as we all stood around the school. All around us were voices, some loud, some quiet, all of them wanting to know what was happening. I saw the younger years crying, clutching each other for protection, and found myself faced with the sudden need to look elsewhere. I focused on Mr. Sweet, talking with the policemen and paramedics who had just arrived. There were three different ambulances, men and women in dark green uniforms climbing out, and at least a half a dozen police cars, all of them deep in discussion with the teachers.

There was movement in the corner of my eye. I turned to see Jerome and Eddie struggling with a distraught Fabian, forcing him to stand still. My ears didn't seem to be working properly, but I could tell that Fabian wanted to go back into the school and Eddie and Jerome weren't letting him. Mara and Patricia and Joy all looked like they were quietly trying to reason with Fabian, but he didn't appear to be listening.

"There's a maniac with a gun on the loose in there and Nina's still inside with him, do you honestly expect me to just sit here?" Fabian demanded.

I tugged Alfie over as Eddie started speaking again. "Fabian, she's fine. Trust me OK? Let the police handle this."

It might have been true when he said it, but the next second, another gunshot sounded.

No one screamed this time.

Nina:

It's a strange thing being shot.

Nothing like in the movies, where they jerk backwards and fall over in fittingly dramatic poses, and then it's over and they're dead.

At first all I felt was an intense burning sensation in my stomach, as if someone was holding a blow torch to my skin. I looked down and saw that the shirt Amber had made for me was becoming stained with scarlet as blood spilled out of me, and my knees buckled as the shooter let go of my hair. I slid down to the ground, clutching a hand over my stomach, trying to hold in the blood. There was so much blood. It started to mix into my vision from the cut in my eye, turning everything red. Why did dying have to take so long? I don't want to die. I had too much to say, too much to do. I couldn't die yet. I had to turn in my English assignment, I had to go to college, I had to help Mara clean the kitchen next week, I had to live long enough to learn who shot me. I had to tell Fabian I loved him.

The pain was starting to spread, and suddenly I was lying sideways on the ground. I was vaguely aware of a door slamming shut. The pain was spreading out everywhere, from my stomach to my head to my legs. Was it possible for fingernails to ache? I wanted to scream, to call someone, but I couldn't do anything except lie there and try to stop myself from bleeding out on the floor.

Patricia:

The eight of us were sitting on the ground in a circle, acutely aware of our missing link. When the gunshot had sounded, Eddie's face had screwed up in pain and he'd collapsed. We'd immediately surrounded him and I'd screamed for the paramedics, but by the time they arrived he was already sitting up, claiming it was only stress. Mr. Sweetie had arrived with a police officer and we'd immediately started yelling at them, demanding to know why they weren't going in, why they were leaving Nina alone with that psychopath. I don't think I'd ever heard Mara swear before, but in those moments, the vocabulary she'd picked up since she and Jerome had started dating became quite clear.

The officer started to say something about procedure when the loud speaker crackled to life and a voice I didn't recognize drifted over the lawn.

"Assuming you want to, it is safe to come in now. Nobody's dead. Yet. Although I'm afraid one of your students has been shot. I believe her name is Nina Martin?" Fabian made a strangled sound and Amber's shoulders shook as her crying renewed. "If you hurry, maybe you can save her. Thank you for your time, good night!"

Nina:

Time was passing.

Strictly speaking, I wasn't really aware of time passing, but somehow, I was still alive. And if I was still alive, I must be continuing to live, so time must've been continuing to pass.

I was aware that I was dying. Men in uniforms danced in front of my vision, but I couldn't hear what they were saying, so I blinked to let them know I was alive. More time passed and people in bright green vests appeared, and my ears started to regain functioning.

"Ma'am? Can you hear me?" Someone was shining a bright light into my eyes. "Hi, hello? Can you tell me your name?"

Name. Say my name. I could do that. "Nina Martin." Did I actually speak or did I just mumble? I wasn't sure. Did it matter?

"Perfect. That's wonderful. Get a backboard and a c-collar. Nina I'm going to need you to stay awake, OK? Can you do that for me?"

"Yes." There was a sudden pressure where I'd been shot and my body jerked with the renewed pain.

"Are you a student here Nina?"

"Yes," I gasped. They were fitting something cushiony around my neck.

"Lovely, where are you from?"

"America."

"On three, one two three!" If I could have, I would've yelled in pain as I was lifted, but suddenly I was set down on something long and sturdy and then I was moving smoothly.

The voices started filtering in and out. "What do – parents think – you – to school here?"

I wasn't entirely sure what the question was but I tried to answer anyway. "My parents are dead."

My lips felt dry and I was suddenly seized with a sadness so intense it ached. Blackness started creeping into the edge of my vision. I don't want to die.

Joy:

I looked over to the school in time to see the paramedics carrying someone out. I recognized the curly hair and a cold sweat overcame my body. No. No way. It couldn't be true, I didn't want it to be true. "Eddie," I whispered, and everyone turned towards me, as though sensing the importance of the next words out of my mouth. "Eddie who's that the doctors are carrying out?" Suddenly the night was filled with desperate screaming.

"Nina!"

"Nina!"

"NINA!"

Patricia, Amber, and Fabian, all screaming out her name over each other. Patricia actually tried to run over to Nina, but an officer held her back. "Miss, you need to let the paramedics do their job."

As Patricia began yelling at the officer I didn't scream, or cry, I simply felt an overwhelming sense of guilt. I was the reason Nina hadn't been at the party. If only I'd remembered to bring the stupid Book, she would've been with the rest of us. She would've gotten out with everyone else. If she died, it would be all my fault.

I realized the others were having an actual conversation and forced myself to listen. "Ms. Williamson, it's school policy. You have to go back to your house, and once we know more about Ms. Martin's condition, you may join her at the hospital."

"Screw school policy," Patricia spit at the headmaster.

"Nina's our friend, we need to be with her." Fabian was beside himself, practically shaking with grief and fury.

Mr. Sweet sighed. "Mr. Rutter, I understand you are worried, but you being at the hospital will do nothing for Ms. Martin." His face brightened momentarily and he waved at someone behind us. "Trudy will follow Ms. Martin to the hospital, she will alert me as soon as we know more about Ms. Martin's situation. In the meantime, I will escort you back to Anubis house."

"Is she going to be OK?"

Eddie was staring intently at his father and Mr. Sweet looked distinctly uncomfortable. "Let's just head back to Anubis house and —"

"Dad. Is Nina going to make it?"

We all seemed to hold our breaths, because if any of us could get an honest answer out of Sweetie right now it was Eddie, and we all knew it. There was a beat of silence and then Sweetie sighed. He polished his glasses, and not meeting our eyes said, "I don't know."

Nina:

Words kept working their way into my head, strange things that didn't make any sense.

"60 and dropping."

"Curb!"

"Stay with us Nina, you're doing great."

"Stats are dropping, 82."

My body felt like someone had doused me in oil and set me on fire, my head felt like someone had stuffed it full of spiky cotton.

"Come on Nina, wake up and breathe."

"She's hyperventilating!"

"Give me the bag."

"We're losing her!"

"Damn it Nina stay with us!"

Patricia:

No one said a word as we pushed open the door and headed to the living room. Mr. Sweet cleared his throat and tried to suggest that we go to bed, but the looks we gave him were so full of venom that he quickly desisted with that particular idea, and went into the kitchen to make tea.

After a few minutes Victor headed down and scowled when he saw us. "What is the meaning of this? All of you, get to bed. Now."

"Piss off," I snapped.

For about two seconds Victor actually looked taken aback, and then he practically swelled with fury. "Ms. Williamson —"

"Victor, if I may have a word?" Mr. Sweet interrupted.

Still glaring at me, Victor grudgingly followed Mr. Sweet out into the hallway. Mr. Sweet came back in when the tea kettle started whistling, and poured us out cups that we eventually started drinking in small sips, mostly just to have something to do with ourselves. Mara was sitting in a chair on Jerome's lap with puffy eyes, resting her head on his shoulder. Alfie and Joy, and me and Eddie had taken over one of the couches, squeezed so close together our shoulders were touching.

Amber and Fabian were together on the other couch, and it suddenly hit me how off that image looked. The best friend and the boyfriend. Two out of three of the original Sibuna trio. There was an almost tangent wrongness to the image, one that made me want to scratch out my eyeballs. I closed my eyes. I didn't want to contemplate the damage that would happen if Nina didn't make it. I cast my thoughts back, trying to remember the last thing I had said to Nina, and found I couldn't do it. Aren't you supposed to remember the last thing you say to a person?

For the next few hours, the only sounds were the occasional clinking of tea cups, people sipping and swallowing, and the sounds of Eddie's watch ticking. At first, we were all so high strung that the idea of sleep seemed unthinkable, but somewhere around midnight Mara's eyes drifted shut, and not long after that, Joy's head drooped onto the shoulder of Alfie, who was already using the armrest as a pillow.

My tea cup was long empty, but I still held it, trying to find some way to warm myself. Eddie's arm was around my shoulders, and now I let myself lean into him, focusing fully on how his collarbone fit beneath mine, trying hard to avoid looking at either of us. The blood from our costumes didn't seem nearly as funny anymore.

It was almost one in the morning when the sound of a telephone ringing split the air and we all jerked awake, Alfie emitting a sleepy yell when he knocked his still filled cup of tea onto his pants.

Mr. Sweet, who had been asleep at the table, nearly fell off his chair before scrambling for his mobile. "Yes? Ah, hello Trudy."

We all watched with laser focus as he communicated with our house mother.

"Really? Are you sure?" I could practically feel my eardrums stretching as I tried to make out what Trudy was saying on the other end of the line.

"Alright. Thank you. Thank you very much."

He hung up and stared at the table for a moment. None of us dared to speak, hell, we hardly dared to breathe as we waited for Sweetie to hand us the verdict.

The headmaster's face suddenly broke into a tired smile and he looked over at us. "Nina's going to be fine."

The effect was instantaneous. Jerome, Alfie, Eddie and I cheered loudly, jumping up and shouting our delight, as Mara and Joy started crying again. Fabian practically collapsed backwards into the cushions and buried his head in his hands, while Amber hugged him so tightly I was worried she would take his head off.

Once the initial euphoria died down we immediately whirled on Mr. Sweet, requests to go and see Nina flying from our lips. He looked at us as though we were insane. "Now really!" he protested. "It's one o'clock in the morning, can't this wait until a more decent hour?"

There was an immediate chorus of unnecessarily aggressive 'no's', and our pleas resumed in earnest until Mr. Sweet acknowledged defeat. "Alright, alright! Enough!" He blew out a breath. "Alright. You wait here, I'm going to go and bring a school van around. I'll be back in about ten minutes, and then we'll go and see Ms. Martin. Satisfied?"

There was more cheering as he left, and a great deal of hugging – and maybe a little kissing – ensued.

"Wait!" Amber suddenly cried. "We can't go to the hospital looking like this. Especially you two." She pointed at me and Eddie and I faked offense.

"Excuse me Princess Amber," I said, "but I look beautiful."

"What about me?" Eddie protested.

I pretended to give him an appraising look before shrugging. "You need to go change."

About fifteen minutes later, and the eight of us plus Sweetie were driving off campus in jeans and sweats. Amber had even brought a backpack with a change of clothes for Nina, ignoring us when we pointed out that Nina probably wouldn't be leaving the hospital for some time.

The drive over we were practically giddy with relief. Jerome and Alfie kept trying to play road trip games, but I kept threatening to strangle them and Mara kept winning, so the idea quickly lost its appeal. When we reached the hospital we immediately piled out of the van and bolted over to the front desk. There was a long line, but thankfully we ran into Trudy who had been waiting for us. She seemed infinitely amused at a still glittering Amber, and directed us towards Nina's room.

Unwilling to wait for the elevator we ran up the stairs, not even noticing the police officer outside the door until he stopped us from entering. "I'm sorry but this room is off limits."

"We're her classmates," I said, and the others nodded in agreement.

The officer's expression remained unsympathetic. "I'm going to need to see some form of identification."

Amber flipped her hair impatiently. "We're all students at Amun Academic Boarding School. I'm Amber Millington, I'm Nina's best friend. That's Fabian Rutter, he's Nina's boyfriend. That's Alfie Lewis, he's my boyfriend. And that's Mara Jaffray, Mara's boyfriend Jerome Clark, Eddie Miller or Eddie Sweet, no one really knows, and Eddie's girlfriend Patricia Williamson. They're all friends of Nina's. And that's Joy Mercer, who's not really Nina's friend because she likes Nina's boyfriend, but Patricia and Mara are friends with her, and anyway she still lives in the same house as the rest of us."

The policeman seemed a little taken aback by the thoroughness of Amber's introduction, but he quickly recollected himself. "That's wonderful. But I'm afraid I still need identification."

Amber looked confused. "OK, but I just gave you our identification, so…?"

"Here." We turned to see a slightly out of breath Mr. Sweet holding out his driver's license. "My name is Eric Sweet, I am Nina Martin's headmaster. These are her housemates."

The officer briefly inspected the license, asked a few questions, and sighed. "Alright. You can go in later, after I question her. I don't think she's even awake yet."

"Bullshit," I snapped. Before anyone could move to stop me, I shoved the officer aside and opened the door, the others piling through behind me.

My eyes found Nina, and the first thing I felt was relief at the realization that she was indeed still alive. The second emotion I felt was horror, as I took in the rest of her appearance. Namely her face. She had some sort of large, white Band-Aid covering the area from her right cheekbone to above her right eyebrow, and one hell of a black eye forming. Her face had stains of blood all over it, including more than a few dark red patches in her hair. A tall, brown-skinned nurse with a pixie cut was adjusting Nina's IV when we entered, and smiled at us. "She should be waking up soon. Are you friends of hers?"

"We all live together at school," said Amber. "I'm Amber Millington, I'm her best friend, and that's Fabian Rutter. He's her boyfriend."

"They are also not allowed to be in here until she has been questioned," the officer said, interrupting Amber before she could perform her full introductory monologue again.

The nurse, whose nametag identified her as Lily, accepted all of this with a nod as she adjusted Nina's blankets. "Well there's a good chance that when she wakes up she'll be confused, so it would probably be best if you just waited outside until she's ready." With groans and half-hearted protests, we reluctantly filed out. Fabian and Amber wanted to stay though, and only left when the police officer threatened them with detainment. "Oh, excuse me sir? Could I speak with you for a moment?" Nurse Lily asked Mr. Sweet as he tried to follow us out.

Sweetie stayed back and we all looked at each other before quickly pressing our ears to the door, ignoring the officer's protests.

"How is she?" Sweetie asked.

"Mr. Sweet, was it? If I'm being completely honest, and I have to be, because liability reasons: this girl is very lucky. They lost her once in the ambulance, and once on the table, but now it looks like she's going to make a full recovery. She should walk out of here in three or four days, and truthfully? I'd say that's a minor miracle."

At this point their voices hushed as they moved away from the door and we stepped back in defeat.

We proceeded to skulk outside her door for a few minutes as Mr. Sweet headed outside to make phone calls and send Trudy back to school. The only excitement was when Jerome and Alfie announced they were going on a cafeteria raid and took a list of orders, and when an old male patient with a walker fell over and cursed out the nurse who tried to help him up. About forty minutes later, Nurse Lily poked her head out of the door as we munched on cookies and chocolate and whatever else Jerome and Alfie had managed to carry back.

"Nina's awake and says she's ready for visitors if you want to talk to her."

"I need to debrief her first," the officer protested as we all surged to our feet and Lily frowned.

"Officer, the gunshot wound is not self-inflicted if that's what you were thinking. Now this girl has been through an extremely traumatic experience, I think she's allowed a couple of minutes with her friends before the interrogation process starts. Don't you?" Without waiting for an answer, she turned to the rest of us. "Nina just woke up a few minutes ago, so I'm going to ask that you be tactful, and try not to overwhelm her with questions. Can you do that?"

We all impatiently assured Nurse Lily that we could, and she stepped aside to let us in.

Nina was lying on the bed with her eyes closed, curly hair splayed out on her pillow, and I looked away from her face as my throat tightened. Fabian sat down in the chair next to her, gently taking her hand in both of his as the police officer went over to the corner, folded his arms and scowled at us. "Nina?" Fabian's voice was gentle and we all leaned in.

Nina slowly pulled her eyelids apart, her eyes first going to Fabian. "Hi," she said weakly, and we all released a collective breath. At this she looked at the rest of us and her eyes widened, a small smile playing across her lips. "Oh, you guys didn't all have to come."

"Of course we came, Nina." Amber sounded insulted.

Nina exhaled a breathy laugh. "Well, now I feel special."

"How are you feeling?" piped up Alfie, and Amber not-so-discreetly elbowed him in the stomach.

Nina raised her eyebrows. "Like I got shot," she deadpanned.

"Well you look like hell," Jerome noted. This time the elbow was Mara's.

"I got shot," Nina repeated, sounding indignant, but there was a small smile on her lips as she said it. We all started laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation, but Nina clapped a hand over her stomach and started coughing harshly. We all looked around frantically before Nurse Lily calmly poured some water and helped Nina drink it.

Nina's head dropped back onto the pillows, eyes closed.

Nurse Lily frowned. "Maybe it'd be better if you came back tomorrow."

"I want them to stay," Nina protested, eyes opening. At this point the police officer cleared his throat pointedly and Nurse Lily gave a sigh of resignation. "Well they have to leave for now, the police have some questions for you."

"Why do they even want to question Nina?" I demanded. My trust in the police ranged somewhere between zero and none.

"Because they need to find out if she knows who attacked her," Nurse Lily said calmly. "If you're determined to stay, then why don't you go to the cafeteria while you wait?"

Grumbling, we started to leave with the exception of Fabian, who stayed determinedly in his chair. The officer asked – well, ordered – him to leave but Nina clenched his hand tightly. "Can't he stay?"

The officer threw up his hands in surrender, but Fabian was allowed to stay as the rest of us filed out.

The questioning took less than an hour, during which time we continued to haunt the hallway outside Nina's room, ignoring all of Mr. Sweet's pointed suggestions that we return to school. The officer seemed unsurprised to see us when we exited, giving us all a healthy amount of glaring before allowing us to go back in.

It turned out Jerome and Alfie had brought an Uno deck, and an extremely competitive tournament started. And if at one point a couple of us threw a match or two so that Nina could win? Well, no one said anything.

At some point the conversation turned to oral surgery. As it turned out, Fabian and I were the only ones to not get all four wisdom teeth removed. Fabian had only had two to start with, while mine had simply never needed removal. We really should have headed back to school, but at this point it was nearly three o'clock in the morning, and nobody thinks clearly at three o'clock in the morning.

"Are you going to have a scar?" mumbled Alfie.

We all sleepily yelled at him, but Nina shrugged, playing with her sheets. "Eventually, yeah. Right now, it's just stitches though. And it'll bruise first."

"That is so badass," said Alfie, sounding appreciative.

A few of us laughed, and the discussion turned to scars. It eventually turned into a contest that Joy won, courtesy of a scar on her left foot from when she was twelve. I remembered the occasion well. Her foot had slipped into an open grate and been sliced open along the top; she'd been on crutches for three weeks, and complained about it for at least twice that.

I'm not sure when we fell asleep, but sometime later that morning Nurse Lily was shaking us awake. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes, attempting to lean away from the wall I'd spent the night propped up against, and groaned out loud as my back cracked in a few dozen places. Eddie laughed until he tried to move from his position next to me, when he groaned even louder than I had.

Mr. Sweet had fallen asleep in the chair in the corner at some point and was now trying to herd us out the door, saying we had to get back to school.

Amber and Fabian and Eddie and I complained, but Mr. Sweet held firm. "You can have Trudy drive you back later today if Ms. Martin wishes, but as of right now, we must return."

"Why?" yawned Jerome.

"Because I have to return, and I cannot leave nearly a dozen students here without supervision, and no means of returning to campus." Mr. Sweet began grabbing elbows, directing bleary-eyed students towards the door but Nina grabbed Fabian's hand as he made to stand.

"Can you stay?" she asked. Her voice was so quiet that I barely caught it, I doubted any of the others had.

Fabian nodded and instantly sank back down into the chair. Sweetie sighed. "Ms. Martin, we must return to school."

"Please can he stay?" Nina's voice was scratchy but determined, and she clutched Fabian's hand so tightly she seemed to be daring Mr. Sweet to try and make her let go.

Sweetie glanced between the two of them and rubbed his eyes, sighing. "Just Mr. Rutter. No one else."

"Wait if Fabian's staying why can't I stay?" protested Amber.

"No." The headmaster's voice was bordering on waspish, and so Amber gently gave Nina a reluctant hug goodbye, leaving the backpack with clothes and promising to come back later with makeup.

I didn't give Nina a hug, but I squeezed the hand not latched onto Fabian before heading outside with the others. The walk out of the hospital and to the car was spent practically attacking Mr. Sweet with questions about when we could return, until he snapped at us that these things would be decided later today, after numerous cups of tea.

The drive to school saw most of us fall back asleep, and I was leaning my head onto Eddie's shoulder, half-conscious when he placed his lips against my ear and whispered, "Don't let it go to your head Yacker. But I'm really glad you didn't get shot."

My lips twitched into a smile as I replied, "Don't let it go to your head weasel. But I'm glad you didn't get shot either."

Nina:

"You can't feel guilty about this."

Fabian, who had been pressing our joined hands to his forehead, looked at me, startled. "What?"

I gave a tired smile. "You're wearing your guilty face. You've found some way to blame yourself for this, and I won't let you do that."

Fabian sighed and pressed my fingers to his lips, causing me stomach to do flip flops. "I shouldn't have let you leave the gym."

I shrugged. "It wasn't really your choice. Besides, Joy forgot the Book, I had to get it —"

I sat bolt upright before falling back down with a cry of pain, my hand going to my stomach.

"Nina, it's safe OK?" Fabian looked terrified, his hands hovering over me, unsure of what to do. "Amber went upstairs and got it when we went back to the house. The Book is fine." He gestured towards the backpack next to his chair. "It's right in here."

Nodding, I tried to get my breath back as I made to blink the sudden colors out of my vision. "Good. Thank her for me, would you?" He nodded, and I smiled, bringing our hands up to my lips. I pressed a quick kiss to his knuckles, looking up at him in time to catch his still guilty expression. "Fabian. I mean it. You can't blame yourself."

"Nina —"

"Fabian, unless you pulled the trigger, there is no way in earth, heaven or hell I am going to allow you to punish yourself for this."

His expression suddenly became one of interest. "Speaking of." He glanced around and I braced for the question I knew was coming. "Nina, you really don't know who did it? Pulled the trigger, I mean."

I shook my head. "No. No, like I told the police they were wearing a mask, and they did something to their voice." Fabian frowned and I internally sighed. "Look I know it doesn't make sense OK? But that's what happened I swear —"

"Nina, you don't have to swear anything. I believe you. It just doesn't make sense is all."

"Well that's more than I can say for the police." I tried to laugh but it was suddenly very hard to breathe. Fabian looked at me, concern shining in those beautiful brown eyes, and reached a hand up to my face to brush away tears. I hadn't even realized I was crying. "I thought I was going to die." Now I really was crying, and I couldn't seem to stop. Great, big, heaving sobs that rattled my chest and tore through my throat, threatening to rip me apart. "I thought I was going to die." I wanted to stop crying, if for no other reason than it hurt the place I'd been shot but I was no longer in complete control of my body.

All I was conscious of right now was Fabian's hand in mine, the lifeline tethering me to earth. If he let me go I didn't know what would happen. There was a dip in the bed and then Fabian's arm was around my shoulders and he was tucking me into him, careful of the tubes sticking out of my body, pressing my face into his chest as I cried and cried and cried. "I thought I was going to die." Fabian didn't say anything, just held me to him as I cried until I had no more tears left in my body, and then he just held me.

"Tell me about something happy."

"Something happy?" I hiccupped.

"Yeah." Fabian seemed insistent. "Tell me about a really good day. One I don't know about."

A good day. I racked my brain, tossing through old memories, trying to find one from before I came to England. There were depressingly few, but eventually I found one.

"One day, my mom was getting back from visiting some friends from college. And my dad and I cleaned the whole house to get ready for her to come back. And, when I say, the whole house? I mean, the whole house. Rug beating, furniture dusting, window cleaning. The whole nine yards. We did the laundry, and we washed all the dishes, and my dad made a game out of it. For every chore I finished before him, I got a piece of chocolate. I really wanted the chocolate, so I tried to finish every chore before him, without realizing he was just making me do all the work." Fabian laughed, and I felt his chest vibrate. "It took us over twelve hours to finish. I'm pretty sure I would've repainted the walls if my dad had let me. And then when my mom got home that night, I was covered in chocolate, but the house was cleaner than it had been since we moved into it. She joked that must have given the cab driver the wrong address."

I smiled at the memory, and at Fabian's fingers in my hair. "How old were you?"

"Ten." My smile stilled. "That was the year they died."

There was a moment of silence and I could tell Fabian was contemplating whether or not to change the subject. "What were their names?"

I drew idle circles over his hipbone with my finger. "My mom's name was Adelaide. My dad always called her Addie. And, my dad's name was Matthew."

"Those are good names."

I started to laugh, but it hurt, so I stopped. "Thanks for the validation." I tilted my head up to look at him, smiling. "They would have loved you."

His fingers stilled. "You think so?"

"I know so. If you believe nothing else I tell you, trust me, when I say my parents would have adored you."

I let my head rest back onto his chest, grabbing his hand again. "I would've liked to meet them."

There was a hot feeling in the back of my eyeballs that I repressed. "I wish you could have."

I'm not entirely sure what we talked about after that. All I was aware of was the boy beside me. As my eyes started to shut again, I embraced a feeling I hadn't felt since before a gun had been fired at the school. I felt safe.

AN: so Nina got shot. I wonder who shot her? There may or may not be a Halloween part 3, but probably not, which means it's back to one POV per chapter now. I hope you've enjoyed this special occasion, I know I have!

Favorite, follow and review please. Let me know whose POVs you'd like to see.